Chapter Ten

Matty & Claire & Terry & Matt

The night Terry ran off and they salvaged her from the park christened Fitzgerald Green was ten days before the diocesan gala where all the problems were destined to happen before, during, and after. Matty hadn’t yet informed Claire about the protest he was planning to be part of. He didn’t know if she would try to talk him out of it or not, but he wasn’t convinced it was advisable to tell her, either. True, the two of them had been discussing his grim, nonexistent future job prospects and Claire was dutifully, loyally livid on the subject of the high-handed bishop. “That old boozehound,” she’d go. “Somebody ought to get to him, force him to see the light. Your brother and your dad—they both have serious juice with the diocese. Why can’t they set him straight?” Her husband appreciated that she had his back, so why was he skeptical of her intentions? As for his family, he realized that his father was in elaborate business negotiations with Mackey and that Philip had his own challenges living within the bounds of the Catholic hierarchy, so a part of him issued them both a pass, almost respecting that their hands were tied even if they wanted to help, not that they’d revealed evidence of an inclination to do so. “If I got him to myself, one on one,” Claire said, and not for the first time, “I would work my special charms, persuade him to change his tune. Give me five minutes alone, he’ll be painting houses next day.” She was continually upset about what the diocese was doing to Matty, and she also remained furious about how they had treated Hector, sweet, dedicated, principled, charming Dr. Alessandro. The two had formed a kind of friendship and she still called Hector Doctor, she didn’t care what bureaucrats thought and transcripts showed. “I can visualize you and your voodoo at work now,” said Matty. “You wagging your finger in the bishop’s face, poking him in the chest, now that is some kind of image.” He laughed. She herself was deadly serious. “I am not a finger-wagger.” “You kinda are, dear, but in your own fetching way.” And you know, Matty thought, improbable as a face-off between the two of them was, there was a slim chance she could hypothetically influence the bishop, but she would certainly irritate the hell out of the man, as she would any man, if she were given occasion and opportunity. Nonetheless, he doubted any plan of hers or anybody else’s to move the man’s mind or heart would do the trick. No, the bishop was a stubborn, arrogant man, and it would take an exercise of power, pure power to get under his skin, which is exactly what he and his team were drumming up. It was at this stage of his ruminations that his wife stunned him. “The big diocese gala’s coming up. You guys should do that demonstration, shock the do-gooder Catholic world.” “What did you say?” “Time for public protest…” “How do you know about that?” “I can read your mind.” “No, how’d you find out?” “I’m your wife.” “Try again.” “I don’t know, I guess I read the emails.” “On my computer you read my emails?” “They were right there, if you don’t want me to read them, you should have said so.” “You went on my computer?” “Important point is, you’re doing the right thing, I’m proud of you.” “So you went on my computer.” “All right, if you insist, yes, I did. I’m trying to be a good wife.” Matty felt hopeless all over again, but he was resigned. Maybe this was what a good wife would do. Then again, there was no question that trouble had been brewing in paradise for a while at home. Since before the beginning of time, since Adam and Eve, paradise has been the default locale for brewing up trouble. A while ago, this husband and wife had drifted into separate sleeping arrangements, almost before they were both conscious of establishing new limits. His imminent joblessness didn’t augur well for domestic bliss, that was for sure. “We’re going to have to talk about what you did, but not tonight, it’s too depressing.” “Whatever, Matty. I’m on your side, you know, especially when you do something stupid, like tonight with that student of yours—” “Terry.” “Yes, Terry.” Because that was indeed the night Terry was consigned to the cramped spare bedroom that had been doubling as Matty’s sanctuary, that is, his office. Peace at any price, he rationalized, buying time. Insofar as the girl, his student, had colonized his space, he was relegated to the only other available resting place for the night, the beleaguered couch in the living room, the dejected piece of furniture they had been debating shoving out on the curb along with a FREE sign. Not that he was counting on getting much shut-eye under the lumpy couch-cushioned circumstances that applied to a Dead Husband Walking like himself. Claire supervised accommodations for their guest—not the right term as far as she was concerned, more like headache, more like interloper. Tonight would take place under her watchful, suspicious, ever-vigilant purview. That was her plan. Somebody around here needed such a thing as a viable plan. One night, and one night only, Claire could stomach this insanity, and tomorrow the vixen could haunt somebody else’s domicile. “There’s the bathroom, you can brush your teeth, left a spare new brush on the sink, so go clean up now,” she adamantly instructed Terry, pointing the way down the hall as if the girl should now proceed to walk the plank. And while she was out of sight, Claire arranged the sheets, the towels, and her own rampant misgivings. She engaged in reconnaissance maneuvers, too, digging into the girl’s possessions. What’s with all these damn condoms, and what were her designs relative to their use, and her fucking bra, which a proper girl should have been wearing? So all that spoke volumes as to what Terry was about. But then the bombshell. She was startled when she came upon her incredible discovery: “What the hell?” She feared the girl was dangerous, only now she would not be dangerous anymore, Claire would see to that. Matty heard his wife talking to herself as he was slipping on his oversize sleep shirt, and barefoot he hustled back to her across the hardwood floor. He asked what was the matter. “Never you mind, not to worry.” “You’re not leaving her a towel?” “I will come back with a mint to put on her pillow.” Claire repaired to her own bedroom with a towel strangely, awkwardly cradled in both arms, because, as he did not yet realize, she was stealing away with her concealed discovery. Lights systematically were switched off throughout the apartment and Terry came back from the bathroom in the dark and closed the bedroom door behind her without saying a word. To her it felt like it had been forever since she took off from her house, because she should have done this forever ago, though it was only a matter of hours. Sometime in the middle of the night—Matty might have dropped to sleep—he was astounded to find he had a visitant—this was not a dream—who was staring down at him uncomfortably lying there. Terry knew enough to whisper, although Claire seemed to be safely far off in a distant room. “Couldn’t sleep,” she said. “You?” He struggled to gain his bearings. “You realize…” she began to say. “What?” he said, fearing his bearings weren’t to be activated. “You realize,” she said again, “I’m not going to school tomorrow, right?” “Oh, yeah, right, I wasn’t banking on your doing your normal cameo in class.” “If I go to school, my mom might come looking for me with her creepy dildo of a boyfriend,” she said, which would have counted as a far-fetched possibility bordering on the miraculous, she supposed, considering her mother wouldn’t register for a few blotted-out days that her daughter was missing, unless the slithery, scaly boyfriend clued her in. “So can I stay here, Matt?” It was late and Matty was miserable and he was having difficulty deciphering her intent: she was staying here, in his apartment, so what was the question? This was the sort of conversation he had never expected to share with a student—then again, there never had been a complicated student quite like her. “It’s the middle of the night.” “But we are both awake. So can I?” “What are you talking about?” “Can I stay here for a while, few days, weeks?” That struck Matty as being a formidably terrible idea, even factoring in that Terry showed herself to be in command of a high percentage of appalling ideas. But he should talk. Look at what he did tonight, letting this girl into their apartment in the first place. That move alone earned him an Idiot Medal. “Do you understand what you’re asking?” “Sure, I’ll read your books, cool library you got, like, homeschool myself, watch TV, wait till you come home from work, I’ll cook dinner. I make a wicked…” “Come on, Terry, that’s not going to work—for Claire, that’s for sure.” “Why do you suppose she hates me?” “She doesn’t hate you, she doesn’t know you.” “She hates me, I can scope out when somebody hates me, which I’m used to after living with Dash, my mom’s squeeze, and she doesn’t understand me like you, Matt, you understand me, which’s why you invited me over.” That didn’t seem to describe the current situation in any accurate respect, but what was to be gained by correcting her? “I appreciate you letting me bed down here. I do feel guilty putting you out like this, wish I had someplace else to go. I’ll head back to the park, if you want. Just say so.” “We can come up with a plan in the morning, remember that teen shelter I was telling you about?” She was sitting on the coffee table within reach of the couch, and this was the first moment he realized the girl was now leaning over in his direction, wearing a white, clingy tank top, extra-large T-shirt, the hem of which she pulled down around her knees, and evidently nothing else. And she confirmed for herself that he took notice. “Forgot to bring my astronaut PJs,” she made a face to communicate: dumb joke. “I was kinda in a rush, getting chased down the street and all, you know, girl-in-distress type shit.” He looked away toward the kitchen, which seemed like a safer place upon which to rivet his uneasy attention and to expunge the astronaut image. To be clear, it never crossed her mind to tell him her eyes were up here—he wasn’t that type of guy, not at all. Saying as much to Matt would have been hostile. And yet, he was thinking, if Claire walked out of her bedroom to get a drink of water or go to the bathroom, this scene was going to initiate World War C. Terry was either impervious to peril or in love with it, he could not tell. He resolved to get rid of this girl before something crazier happened. “You should go back to bed, we’ll talk in the morning.” “It’s already morning.” “Terry, let’s get clear. I’m your teacher, I’m looking out for you—tonight,” he stressed. About which commitment he was beginning to regret more and more. “You’re more like my friend.” To him, she was a kid, just a kid, a troubled kid, with some crazy shit coming down in her life, and nothing untoward was going to happen between them. Wait, there was no between them, nothing, whatever she was thinking or doing sitting on the coffee table undressed like that. “I’m a married man, my wife’s right here.” Okay, that was a leap, and not a logical one, and under these circumstances possibly a simplification if not a distortion. “You don’t need to remind me, Claire put that news bulletin up in neon. But you’re not sleeping in the same bed with your wife, I see.” “I think we should change the subject.” “Envious or jealous?” “What the hell?” “Never clear on the diff between the two.” “What are you doing?” “I’m asking you to explain the difference. Because you’re my teacher, which is what you keep telling me you are, like I got Alzheimer’s and can’t remember.” In the process, she had cast him under her spell, and he realized he was disoriented. Guys, get down to it, they’re all the same, she thought. She was a teenager, he thought, and he knew the limits of their relationship, which was one of those things they didn’t have, a relationship. An unscrupulous man might take advantage, he would have to acknowledge, and he didn’t meet the criteria, now, did he? Did he? No, he did not. He played it out, almost calmly. Envy, he tried to explicate to her in an even tone, envy at its most elementary referred to the soul-crushing desire you have for something of value somebody else possessed, whereas jealousy was the sickening fear, the whiplashing disgust, the drunk-like loathing of being displaced. “So, like, really no difference?” “Big difference, night and day.” “Take Claire, she envious or jealous of me?” “Neither.” Such an adolescent, such a narcissist, what was Matty thinking bringing her home? “Let me help you out, Matt. She’s one or the other, envious or jealous, but she may actually be both.” So much for the appeal of pedagogy, and another almost similar-sounding, etymologically related term for a crime the Catholic Church was dealing with on a thousand fronts. At the same time, Terry knew what Joneen might do about now. At least she knew what Joneen, her former friend and perennial pseudo-slut chesty with words, would say she would do. Just reach for it, let the guy know you’re willing to make him feel good, which is what guys are all about, they’re very simple, guys, no matter how old, all they got is an on/off switch, so grab that switch, it’s no big deal, it’s easy, simple, and two minutes later they’re doing whatever you want them to do for you. Gospel According to Joneen. No skin off your nose, it’s nothing. But Terry wasn’t so sure. She did need Matt’s help, and she was desperate, so it was worth a try. “Good night, Terry.” “I’m not sleepy, you’re not sleepy. Tell you what, had an idea.” She was going to go for it, it would be easy, over in a couple of minutes with him in that old man farmer’s stupid plaid nightshirt. Why the garment made her summon up “farmer” she could not say, insofar as she had no knowledge firsthand (all right, funny association, that) of agriculture or what farmers wore to bed. But while her brain blitzed, she went in another direction. “What’s it like, being rich?” “How would I know? I’m not rich, I’m a high school teacher.” “Your dad is rich, which means you are rich.” “You don’t know what you’re talking about, it’s more involved than that. I work for a living, take nothing from my old man.” “But he would help you, say you needed money, say you got in trouble.” “That’s something we’ll never find out, because I’m not asking.” “My dad, he stopped paying child support, God knows when, and he and my moms, oil and water, he used to say.” Matty felt a reflexive surge of sympathy, which could not be captured in spoken language, and when he sighed she saw his chest rise and fall, which excited her. “Must be cool having all that money,” she said. She was on a riotous jag, no braking for her. “I know,” she continued, “what I’d do with a lot of money.” “Yeah?” “Okay, I don’t know what I’d do, maybe give it away, give good teachers like you a raise. Or buy a car, new clothes, get a breast reduction, which Joneen says I should.” He wasn’t going anywhere near that last subject or Joneen, the troublemaker. “Let’s stay on the high road.” “What does that mean, high road?” “That’s the right question, isn’t it? I guess I have no idea anymore.” “You know, Matt, you oughta be more careful.” He supposed that was certainly true, but he waited for her to be specific, and hoped she would pass on the opportunity. “You didn’t turn off your computer.” Oh, that again? Wait. “You went on my computer, too?” First Claire, now Terry? What was going on? Matty was incompetent technologically, and he had no driving interest in educating himself, it was all a waste of time to him, software, hardware, antisocial media. Owning a cell phone was the extent of his radical and chancy leanings. He was out of step with his own generation in so many respects, and technology was hardly the most glaring example. “And you should clean out your browsing history unless you want somebody finding something you might not like the wrong person finding out, the things they could do to you if they wanted.” “You searched my computer, Terry?” He did know about the search history feature. “Don’t worry, your secrets are safe with me, and also those emails to the other teachers about the protest you got planned, trust me, I got your back, that bishop’s a total dick, obviously.” Another thing his wife and his student had in common. “Don’t ever do that again.” “Anyway, you should be password-protected, nobody ever told you that? Not that I’m judging, a man is like that, I know, no harm no foul. But the things people could see, say she wanted.” Matty chose not to illuminate her on the subject of his wife’s computer intrusion. “And say if somebody didn’t like you, man, they could download pictures and video and shit, or look up X-rated sites, that would get an adult in trouble, put them in lockup, if people had a mind to, like Call Me Tammy taught us, sex ed, is all I’m saying.” Terry and Claire—his computer. Test results were now posted on the imaginary comprehensive bulletin board of his mortal existence: Matty Fitzgerald had officially lost control of his life. Lost control of his job, his family, his wife, and his marriage. Not to mention his goddamn fucking computer. How did I get here, on a bed that is not a bed but a miserable excuse for a couch? Miserable excuse: which was appropriate everywhere tonight. “Terry, listen closely to me. I want you to stay off my computer. We clear about that?” “Pretty touchy, Matt.” That’s the moment—of course it would be dramatically inevitable—when Claire’s bedroom door flew open and she sprinted like an unleashed demon down the hall. “What are you two doing, this hour of night, and you, you minx, wearing practically nothing?” “Talking,” said Matty. Was that the right term? He doubted it. Claire was this side of hyperventilating, and she addressed him as if she had rehearsed her remarks: “You’re like the human sacrifice and they’re beating their drums and they’re going to dropkick him into the volcano, the guy who’s thinking No way they do this to me, because listen, Matty, in this jungle tribe your number’s up next and this girl’s a volcano.” He laughed over the outrageous and, when you got down to it, illogical image, which was typical of her when she went off the rails. “You’ve totally lost me, Claire.” “Maybe that’s so, but don’t you realize what this girl wants? She wants you, she’ll do anything she wants with you and to you. She’s a little bit desperate, you see that, Matty, say you see that.” There she went again, reading minds. “Come on, she’s a high school kid.” Claire was continually amazed at how naïve her husband was—or if he was simple-minded, or a fabulous liar. “You have no idea how dangerous she is, but I have proof.” She glared at Terry. “Physical proof. And she knows I do.” “Yeah, right,” said Terry, “you off your meds?” Terry was discomfited to take notice that the wife was wearing a farmer nightshirt to match her beleaguered husband’s. “Because that’s batshit crazy,” said Terry. True, she did want to borrow the woman’s so-called husband for a minute, to get the help she required. The whole night having blown up, Terry padded back to the room, shut the door. She listened to Claire talking at Matt for a few minutes till the house fell with a thud spooky quiet, and she figured that she kidnapped him back into her bedroom, restaking her claim, poor sad-looking nightshirted thing that she was—they both were. Terry would never wear a nightshirt, long as she lived. She had tuned out the predictable substance of the wifey rant; she’d long ago mastered her survivor’s deliberate deafness at home. She determined she would take off first thing in the morning, so she willed herself to stay awake and get an early start. Restless, she repacked her bag, and when she did, she looked and looked for that gun. She wanted to hold it, feel the heft of it, and avoid the trigger, and she would say to herself, You will come in handy someday. She had made sure to go back into the park and relocate it before they drove off, but here was the bad news: no gun in her bag. Fuck. Superfuck. Now what? She opened the bag of Doritos and binged on the chips, two, three at a time, and when she finished she smacked her fingers free of the orange dust. Claire stole the fucking thing from her bag, or Matt did, sneaky. Now she needed insurance, something to fall back on if necessary, say they were calling the cops right now or in the morning, say they tried to convince somebody the girl had harming herself in mind or somebody else for that matter, and then what would they do to her? Send her back home to the Dash Monster? So she returned to Matt’s computer and got to work, entering key words to search, keeping herself busy till the cops barged in or the sun came up, whichever occurred first. Hunting around on the internet on this mission was like rubbing grains of sand in her eyes. The sick fucks you could find online if you waded into the right cyberporn swamps. Sick beasts lurking everywhere for her, and for him. Look at that. And that. And God, that. No, thanks. Who are these people? They are not human beings. Man, this is some twisted shit, things people do to each other, to animals, to little kids, what kind of person would do that, what kind of deviant would download the shit and slime and scum and jizz and pus she herself was downloading on his computer, she had no idea. When she couldn’t stomach another link, analyze another Petri dish of derangement, she was blasted by the thunderbolt of a new idea. She located Joneen’s nude selfie on her phone, which she was glad wasn’t deleted, and forwarded it in an email to Matt. People his age use email. There, that was a nice play on her part, just to mess with him, and Happy Trails, Mr. Stay on the High Road. But then another sudden, bright inspiration: she took off her tank top. She leaned into the camera and opened wide her mouth like she saw on those sick sites and snapped a pic. But no, because when she looked she was reminded of some big-mouth bass and then, even more, that hysterical painting of the screamer on the bridge she was shown in Western Syphilis Class (Joneen renamed everything), only not so green and without clothes, so she deleted it. Took another: chin down, head tilted, smiling wryly, eyebrow arched, fakely inviting. This one was definitely better: cheesy and sexy, which is what she was going for. She texted it to Joneen, feeling proud of herself and counting on impressing if not electroshocking the girl. Almost immediately, Joneen wrote back, and what was she doing answering texts at this hour? “hmm yowza maybe hold off surgery them’s R pretty girls.” Then Terry had another idea, why not, she was on a roll. She texted her pic to Matt. If it wasn’t so serious, this would be hilarious, wouldn’t it? And if they threatened her, she would have ammo to fire back—but fuck, that gun, why’d they have to take it? Or simpler: she’d tell the school, get him fired, which he was already prepared for anyway, seemed like, so she rationalized she might be helping him out by speeding up the whole shitstorm thing. She also should include the pic in an email, too, so that’s what she did. She’d call the cops herself; he couldn’t lose that image on the school server if he tried. Then and only then she began to worry she’d gone overboard, because she would then be on the school server for Tammy the Immaculate, if she ever got her job back, and everybody else potentially to gawk at. She shouldn’t have done that to Matt. She imagined that the two of them, Matt and wife, were talking it all out in the bedroom, having makeup sex, a projected image that grossed her out, the two of them in nightshirts pathetically hooking up and united by a common enemy: herself. Same time, he meant well by her, her teacher, she knew that. But should it all unravel for him, she knew he enjoyed the advantages of one enormous get outta jail: his old man would come to the rescue, not sure how, because rich people black ops were beyond her. But she’d finally done everything she could to protect herself. So she pulled out a blank sheet of paper from his desk drawer and composed her note, which she would slip under their bedroom door. But no, she decided to place it on the couch where she last saw him in his pathetic nightshirt and where it couldn’t be missed by light of day: “Mister Fitzgerald youre a very bad boy. I dont feel safe in your house anymore. I trusted you. Clair go see for yourself what your husband my teacher is up to on his computer,” intentionally screwing up the spelling and punctuation to amuse herself and exploit their stupid pity for who they thought was a stupid girl like her and then she signed it shouting A DISSAPOINTD FORMER STUDENT FORCED ACCOUNT OF YOU AND YOUR WIFE TO LIVE HOMELESS ON THE ST. But then she hesitated, and reconsidered. She crunched up the paper and stowed it away in her bag, the bag with the bra, the bag without the gun. She’d done enough damage for one teenage girl during a single twenty-four-hour period. See, Matt? she was saying to herself as she softly closed the front door behind her to leave. Told you. No diff whatso, envy jealous same same. It was six o’clock in the morning, and she was never so wide awake as she was now.