The GPS proclaims the news from the dashboard: 2694 La Grange, you have reached your destination. Easing the Lincoln down the red dirt road past a dry creek bed, I cut the engine next to the massive framework of a home nestled in the edge of a bluff populated with towering white oaks and longleaf pine.
Joe appears from around the rear corner of the house with an armful of yellow lumber.
“Siri gives shitty directions,” I say, stopping to keep from running head-on into him.
Stunned, Joe stares me down without expression. “Yes, she does.”
Feeling as though I should, in some ridiculous way, offer to help with the lumber, I opt instead to simply nod, fruitlessly attempting a smile. “How’s it going?”
Joe turns, continuing past me around the corner of the house. “It’s okay.”
“Listen,” I say, following. “Wait up.”
Joe calls over his shoulder, catching me glancing up at one of the construction workers hammering on the roof directly above us. “Don’t worry,” Joe says, “Javier doesn’t speak any English.”
Javier’s English-speaking smile doesn’t go unnoticed. “Maybe there’s a place we could talk.”
“Sure, Phillip,” Joe says, throwing down the lumber and taking several long strides away from the house. “How far away would you like to get? Huh?” Joe turns and walks even farther away from the site, stopping next to a box of roofing shingles. “How’s this?” He takes a few steps more. “How do you feel about Memphis? Is that far enough?”
Hearing him call me by my given name for the first time, I am even more mortified and self-conscious. Moved by the degree to which he clearly cares, I’m acutely aware of my lack of ability to repair the situation. After kicking the dirt beneath my feet for a moment, I step over the scattered two-by-fours to get closer.
“What happened to you?” Joe says. “After that day on the pier, I never heard from you again.”
“I’m sorry,” I say, thinking I could have found a more original response.
“Sorry and what?” Joe says.
“Tina’s not well,” I hear myself say for the first time to anyone.
Joe takes the news in for a second. “I’m sorry to hear that,” he says, and I can tell he truly is.
Doing anything possible to break his pitying gaze, I take a seat on a nearby sawhorse. “And I don’t need you to do anything or say anything. I just needed to tell you.”
The silence from behind me is deafening. But I asked for it. I pat the empty place next to me on the horse. “Take a load off, would you?” I say quietly.
Another moment of stillness before he comes around and sits. His hair, now shoulder length, makes him look less like an aging basketball star and more like a college student playing the lead in a freshman production of Godspell.
“You know,” I say, “Mama Louella used to tell us if we had too much on us, we’d get a pass on anything. You could pretty much commit hari kari but if you said, ‘You know, Mama Louella, I’ve had a lot on me lately,’ she’d say, ‘Whoa, sugar, that’s all right,’ and all would be forgiven.”
“You can’t turn people and situations on and off like that, Bo Skeet. You understand that, don’t you?”
For a moment I feel as if a piece of my gut has been removed with a dull blade. “I do now.”
Hoping it’s not enough to scare him off, I carefully reach up to finger the curly locks hiding half his face. “I like this hair.”
“I just forgot about it, I guess.”
“It looks like you did,” I say, pulling my hand away before he asks me to. “Listen. It stunned me when you said you might come to California. And when I say stunned, I mean I was awestricken. The thought that you would even consider that made me happier than I’ve been in years. You always see in movies where people will go, ‘I can’t see you anymore. I’m scared.’ And I always called bullshit on that. I mean, what the fuck? Someone loves you, someone really terrific, and you leave ’em because you’re scared? But I get it now. I get it because I want it so badly. And all that’s going on with Tina? It was just too much.” Feeling as if I may cry, I dig my thumbnail into the palm of my hand, hoping to relocate the emotion to a more neutral place. “I thought maybe you’d go to Jessup and forget about me.”
Joe shifts his feet, and I can tell our precious time is almost up. “Well,” he says without looking at me, “that’s a lot of information you’ve just given me. Thank you for being honest. You know, Phillip, honesty is a good trait in people. Without it, others can never feel they can trust you.”
“I know that,” I say, willing to do almost anything to prolong our time together.
“I’ve got to get back to work,” Joe says. “And you need to go get back to Clarke County and forget about me.”
Scooching over to hook my arm in his, I lean in to press my face against his shoulder. It smells like turpentine and sawdust.
“What are you doing?” He says it with an air of annoyance because he’s supposed to, not because he’s annoyed.
“Just sniffin’,” I say, pulling him close.
Joe pats my hand, jumps off the horse, and begins gathering the scattered pieces of lumber.
“You know,” I say, standing, “you’re the first person outside my family to call me Bo Skeet—I mean, since I was a kid.” He glances at me out of the corner of his eye. “The first time you said it on the porch that day? Boy, the show was over for me.”
Figuring I’m roughly six seconds into overstaying my welcome, I do everything in my power to push down the importunate Please tell me not to go tell me to sniff all I want kiss the back of my neck like you do when I’m asleep, but I know it’s coming out for sure if I stay, so I head back up the red dirt road. When I turn around to look one more time, I catch him looking back, too.
When I get back to the Lincoln, I find myself thinking of a movie I saw when I was a kid. It was called Let’s Scare Jessica to Death, and at the ticket office Mrs. Bailey, the manager of the theatre, gave out cards with an inkblot of Jessica’s face on the front. The gimmick was if you stared at the image long enough, you could then close your eyes and the tormented heroine would appear on the inside of your eyelids until you opened them again.
Before I start the engine, I shut my eyes tight to see if I can still see Joe Tischman’s big soulful eyes looking back at me, but I can’t.