“Really?”
“Oh did he ever.”
Wade studied the man closely. He did look a little like Joe, only older.
“Are you Joe’s brother?”
“No, cousin. I’ve never met him, but I was hoping to do that here.”
“You want to wait? You can if you want. I have some ice cream cake you could eat.”
The man looked at his big wrist watch. “You think maybe first thing tomorrow morning he’ll be here?”
“I think so.”
“It’s very important. Can you help make sure?”
“Sure. I’ll try.”
“You can tell him Evan Gallantine wants to see him. He’ll know of me, but just in case, make sure he gets this.” He pulled an envelope from his jacket. “Tell him if he wants any of the ranch money, he has to meet me here tomorrow morning.”
“What ranch money?”
“It was nice meeting you, Wade.”
They shook hands again. Wade felt the man’s gray blue eyes on him.
“What?” Wade said.
“Hard to believe Joe’s not your father. You look a lot like a Meeks to me.”
Evan smiled coolly and left. Wade sat down, smiling coolly himself. He ate some more cake. He remembered as a boy thinking twelve was so old, he would never make it. Now he’d made it. This birthday was getting better and better.
THOUGH IT WAS nearly dark, and Joe had still not returned, Wade was so excited he couldn’t sit still, and went off walking. The air was thick and humid. A jelly of blue glowed around large security lights. Where the sun had just set the sky was purple; everywhere else it was oily black. The city glimmered with squares of office light, illuminating the clouds covering the highest skyscrapers, while the nearby tower construction bubbled with work lights. Wade counted; they put up another floor today. So many stories had been erected just in the weeks since he had come. How fast everything was going when day by day it all went so slow. It seemed so long ago, the days in the hospital when his mom said everything was all right. When it wasn’t. He knew now she didn’t tell him things, at least not everything. It was weird. Joe said don’t think about it. That’s how you get used to it.
On a quiet street, he passed an expensive looking restaurant and saw his dim reflection in the wide paneless windows rising from his feet to high over his head. Stopping, he looked at himself and at the man and woman inside, holding hands, talking, a white rose on the table. They smiled at him until their waitress, looking up, came to wave Wade away.
He walked back to the river and stood there, listening to the water lap against the landfill breakers. The Hudson was wide and black and flat. Wade wondered what happened when you died. Would it be like being deep under water at night? Would you go somewhere else? But if you were living somewhere else, how could it be dying? Dying probably meant it gets all black and that’s it. Now that he’d made twelve, would he make twenty-one? He’d prefer to. He’d prefer to make it even longer.
A chilly gust whipped through his new basketball jersey. He dug into his pockets, hoping somehow his key would be there, but instead found something soft. The envelope. It had been in Evan Gallantine’s pocket so long it was frayed, the flap almost open. By smoothing it out, it had loosened all the way. That made it okay to take out and read:
Leonard Meeks, lifelong Meagher area resident, died this past week of driving off the bridge on his place and drowning in the Hellwater. He was near 60. County Sheriff McComb investigated and called the death accidental as there was not too much alcohol involved. Leonard was born here in Meagher and raised on a ranch south of town, up the Hellwater Valley, owned by the three Meeks sisters and has lived there ever since, until now. His passing leaves his mother, Frances Meeks, and a sister Emma alone on the place, and the other aunt, Lillian, now named Lillian Gallantine, living in out somewheres in California. A brother Harlo survives him, if you call serving time in Deer Lodge surviving, and also a son, supposedly, named Joe Meeks, who is now thought to be somewheres back east. Leonard’s wife died of heart failure years ago and his second son, Scotty, died at age 12, in the big earthquake of ‘59. Father Sterling, the new clergyman in town, offered to hold a service for the newly deceased Leonard, but says there is nothing to report on that this week as Frances Meeks still just isn’t interested.
Wade read it several times, imagining this place called Meagher, imagined the Hellwater, a trough of fire rampaging down a narrow valley, imagined Joe’s father, black hair and white face, in a coffin with gold handles like Wade’s mother’s, and the three old sisters, all in white, reaching up for heaven, and the boy Wade’s age, Scotty, wide open eyes, and faceless. Wade couldn’t imagine more of him than that.
A loud horn drowned out his thoughts. A ferry far out in the bay furrowed past the Statue of Liberty. God, he had never seen her so brilliant, the towering copper-green woman throwing her brightly lit reflection across the black water, and suddenly Wade felt light-headed and raw and happy. He inhaled deeply. Another flurry of wind billowed up inside his new jersey, flapping it like it was breaking into pieces.
He turned and raced back to the trailer, thrilled when he saw the padlock hanging loose. He grabbed his cake and ran inside.
It was dark, the only light leaking from under the door to Joe’s room, which was shut. He tapped on it lightly. Nothing. He started to turn the knob. . .
“Hey there!”
. . .and quickly it let go.
“It’s only me, Joe,” he said, facing the closed door. “I have to give you something.”
“Not now, Wade. I’m trying to concentrate.”
Wade put the envelope back in his pocket. He kept his ear pressed to the door, listening to Joe read through his old books and write in the ragged notebook he carried everywhere.
“Joe?”
“I thought you were going outside, Wade.”
“I did already.”
“Okay, that’s fine with me. See you later.”
Wade sighed and pulled the string to the ceiling bulb; a long tailed rodent swarmed down behind the job box. He went to the front door and examined his reflection in the window. He seemed faceless, not looking as much like Joe as he’d hoped. If only there were some photographs of Joe as a boy. There were some similarities, thin white eyebrows, narrow cheeks. He pulled his wavy hair out of his face, and on impulse, got the tin snips from the job box and raised them to his hair. It took only a few minutes, and now, with a crew cut the same as Joe, there was a lot more resemblance.
He sat out on the steps, letting the breeze bristle his new hairless head, and after a suitable wait, he swung the heavy door behind him so it slammed. Went to the sink, turned it up full, let it run. Went to the toilet, dropped the seat, flushed it loudly. He went to Joe’s door and pressed. It was shut tight.
“Joe, you want to do something for dinner?”
“Dinner? Like what?”
“Eat, maybe?”
“Sure, Wade; go ahead. I’ll get somethin later.”
Wade sat on his bed, two blankets and a piece of foam on top of the job box. He actually was hungry, and wanted Joe to be hungry too. He knelt down to the half-size fridge. Inside, there was only the boiled meat, exactly what was there before, and his cake. Wade sat on the cement-stained stepladder which was their chair, counting drips in the wash basin. He wished Joe Meeks would eat more.
Suddenly, he jumped up and grabbed his cake box. He dragged the stepladder noisily to Joe’s door, sat, and dug his fingers into the thick runny ice cream cake. He smacked his lips loudly.
“Wade?”
The louder he ate, the better it tasted.
“Wade, what’re you doing out there?”
“Eating my cake. Want some?”
“What cake?”
“My birthday cake.”
Wade stuffed a big chewy piece into his cheeks.
“Birthday cake?”
“Yeah,” Wade said. “There’s a little left if you hurry.”
Wade lick
ed the candles, the frosting sweet, the ice cream rich and cold. He had never had cake so good. He could eat this kind forever, he was thinking, when the door handle turned.
THE WAITRESS SPREADING their tablecloth was the same waitress that had waved him away earlier that evening when he passed the windowy restaurant and stopped to look inside.
“It’s my birthday,” Wade informed her.
“I see.” She was friendlier now that he was a real customer. “May Day is a nice day for a birthday. How old are you?”
Wade told her. “I didn’t think I’d ever make it,” he added.
She smiled politely, setting two forks on his left; she was near enough to smell her skin and her bunned hair as she set tulip glasses on the table, lit the candle, adjusted the white rose. She had fingernails like pearls. She began folding two cloth napkins into birds, noticing him staring at her.
“How nice of your father, bringing you here for your birthday.”
“I know, even though, I mean, he’s not really. . .never mind.”
Across the restaurant he saw Joe’s sandy crew-cut ballooning above the sea of tablecloths and flowers, returning from the men’s room wearing the black clip-on tie and black jacket the waitress had so thoughtfully offered them both. Though Joe’s jacket was as small on him as Wade’s was big, Wade was proud to see how handsome he looked as he passed through the sea of dark suits and gowns, nearly slipping on the white tile floor.
Joe ducked quickly into the seat opposite Wade, rattling the fancy glasses. Wade was impressed. Joe’s hands were still wet from washing; Wade had never seen them so clean. And his eyelids, lavender, Wade had never seen that before either, or how they sloped across his eyes toward his cheekbones.
“May I get you a drink, sir; wine, a cocktail?” the waitress chimed.
Joe looked at his wrist as if there were a watch on it.
“No. I don’t drink when I have work later.”
She poured their water and left, her dark slacks rippling against her legs.
“She’s pretty,” Wade said.
Joe fidgeted with the top button on his tight collar. “You couldn’t pick someplace a little fancier, I guess?”
Wade leaned nearer.
“You like her?”
He downed his water in one swallow. “Who?”
“The waitress.”
“Nothing the matter with her, I guess.”
“What do you like best?”
“I don’t know. I don’t like anything better than anything else.”
“Know what I think you like most about her?”
“What?”
Joe stopped fussing with his collar and sucked on his ice, interested. Wade looked from him to her as the waitress returned.
“Her tits.”
Joe’s eyebrows flung up his forehead and the ice stuck in his throat.
“Here we are, gentlemen,” the waitress said, arriving with menus as large as posters. “May I tell you about our specials?”
“No. . .um, thanks anyway,” Joe said, clearing his voice.
“What specials?” Wade said.
“Well,” she began, and as she recited, Wade studied her carefully.
“I think she likes you,” he said after she left
“It’s her job, Wade.” Joe tugged his jacket around his shoulder. “What are you going to get to eat?”
“What are you?”
“You go ahead. You’re the birthday boy.”
“Anything?”
“Yeah, I guess. Get whatever you want.”
“Thanks, Joe,” Wade said, beaming, deciding this was his best birthday ever. Once he finally got Joe out of his room, Joe had asked what he could do for Wade’s birthday, and Wade knew exactly what: To eat at the windowy restaurant, the two of them, and when Joe said okay, he felt so happy, he couldn’t stop smiling. Joe standing shirtless at the wash basin cleaning up, he had looked so strong, Wade thought, running his eyes down Joe’s knobby long back, swirls of hair on his arms, his neck, his knuckles, the bristle of his crew cut. Wade hoped to look like that one day. Maybe when he was twenty one.
Wade closed his menu. “I want that special honey duck thing.”
As much as Wade savored the sweet-sounding dish for himself, he wanted it even more for Joe Meeks, eager for him to eat something besides boiled meat for once.
“That only comes for two, Wade; don’t you listen?”
“I know, but if we both. . .”
“We aren’t that hungry.”
“But it has honey, Joe. It’s good for you.”
The waitress returned again, this time with a basket covered with a dark green napkin. Wade opened it; steam from warm bread rose out, and suddenly it felt days since he’d eaten, weeks, months, years. He felt hunger inside in a way he never felt before. He seized two rolls and pressed them into his mouth.
“Are we ready to order?” she asked.
She held her pen on her pad, polite, waiting. Neither answered.
“Would you like some more time?”
Wade shrugged, mouth full of moist bread, and looked at Joe.
“Well, just that duck then, that’s all,” Joe said.
The waitress snapped her pad shut and collected the menus. “Very nice choice, sir; I personally think it’s our best entree.”
This made Joe Meeks relax a little, and she leaned over to whisper something Wade couldn’t hear. She leaned back and Joe nodded.
“What are you guys talking about,” Wade said. “Making sex?”
Joe’s face purpled; the bristle of his hair rose.
“Well, no,” the waitress said, glancing at Joe, “no, it was just something about dessert.”
“Oh.” Wade slumped back in his seat.
“Are you sure you couldn’t use a drink?” she said to Joe. “I might know just the thing.”
He rubbed the bridge of his nose, nodded, and she quickly left.
Joe’s eyes lifted. “What’d you do to your hair, anyway?”
“You like it?”
“It’s a little funny looking, isn’t it?”
“I thought it looked like yours.”
Joe felt his head. “Yeah, maybe so.”
Wade fingered Evan Gallantine’s envelope in his back pocket.
“Joe, do you think you could tell me some things?”
“What things?”
“You know, sex things.”
Joe leaned quickly forward. “No, for crying out loud.”
“Why not?”
“Well, because it’s not up to me, that’s why.”
“Well who is it up to then?”
“Your mom,” he said, then winced. “I mean. . .she went over it already, didn’t she?”
“Not everything.”
“Not everything?”
The waitress appeared with a frosted glass full of mint-colored drink. Joe sat back and pulled his hands into his lap.
“Yeah, like how come when you get a hard-on. . .”
“Thanks!” Joe exclaimed, knocking his knife into his lap and knee-jerking the table. “Thanks again; that’ll be fine.”
She looked at Wade, nodded graciously, and quickly left. Joe took a long drink. He took another.
“Well?” Wade said.
“Well what?”
“You know, about sex.”
Joe fingered the condensation on his glass. He drank again.
“What’s got into you tonight, Wade? You weren’t this feisty before.”
“I wasn’t this old before. I need to know some things.”
“Well I’m sure no kind of expert.”
“Well, you are compared to me.”
Joe mulled that over, feeling the drink spread inside him.
“What’s there to know? It just happens, that’s all. . .it’s just that. . .see, the man has the, well, his seed, and he. . .”
“Seed?”
“Seed. You deaf? Seed, like, well, like anything.”
“Like a plant?”
“Like
that. That’s all there is to it.”
He lifted his glass to find it already empty. He picked up a piece of bread and mopped up the dregs.
“Then what’s the seed do?”
Joe sucked the drink out of the doughy bread.
“Every man is given, well, a staff, so he can sow his seed. In the womb.”
Womb. The word tumbled in Wade’s mind, somber, dark.
The waitress, in passing, noticed Joe’s empty glass. “I was right about that drink, wasn’t I? May I bring you another?”
“You mean like a vagina, Joe?”
“Please,” Joe said quickly, “one more, thanks.”
Joe waited for the waitress to leave, then finally unbuttoned the collar button that was choking him. He cooled his forehead with his water glass.
“Joe, what’s a womb exactly?”
“It’s like. . .you know, a soft place in a woman’s belly, where if the man sows the seed there, it grows up, um, into a. . .”
“Baby?”
“There you go. That’s all there is to it. It’s no big deal.”
He found he had two pieces of bread, one in each hand. The waitress returned with his drink and two salads.
Wade mulled over his new data quietly for a while, eating his salad, then looked up.
“A man has to sow the seed in the woman, right? That’s the only way to make a baby?”
“Right. Now can we just drop. . .”
“So I really did have a dad, didn’t I?”
Joe began picking at his salad, avoiding Wade’s broad smile.
THE FIRST PLATES of food began to come, sidetracking Wade’s inquisition as he devoured them ravenously, while Joe watched at first, then picked at a piece of crisp skin, then knifed at a piece of leg, and eventually was forking duck as fast as Wade, smothering it with the sweet, lathery sauce.
“You sent mom money, right, Joe? Those envelopes?”
“I helped out now and then. I never need much.”
“Were you boyfriends with her or like that?”
“Let’s just eat up and show a little more respect here.”
“But didn’t you guys ever, you know, make sex or anything?”
“Wade, you don’t ask things like that about your own mother.”
“‘Cause why?”
“‘Cause you don’t. Just try and not worry anymore about her.”
“But I’m not. I’m worrying about you now.”
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