You let yourself into your place. You go straight to the bathroom. Piss like mad. Splash water across your face. Soap your hands into a frenzied lather.
You expect Stacy to be cross with you but she is uncharacteristically unballbusting.
“Boy, some ten minutes . . .”
“I’m going to take a shower.”
“Zachary’s reading. Go give him a kiss.”
“After my shower.”
“Just go see him fast.”
“I really have to shower.”
You enter the bathroom, close the door behind you. Drop your T-shirt to the ground, peel off your pants. Turn on the water.
“Thank you for the money,” she calls through the door.
“You don’t have to pay me back,” you say. “But I will.”
“Look, just keep it.”
After you towel off and get dressed, you hang out playing cars on the floor with The Boy. Then you order pizza while she fries up tofu for him. Later you give him his bath while she cleans up. She says it’ll be good practice, you’ll be watching him more from now on. You let it pass. It’s not the night to argue. You’re going to stick with the good vibes tonight.
Stacy keeps a pair of pyjamas in her magic bag. You put them on him. Is there anything cuter than a boy in pyjamas just a little too small for him? You tackle each other onto your bed. He pins you, he’s always pinning you. He’s undefeated. You snuggle up to him as you read in bed. A wonderful thing. A great book. In the history of all mankind, there has only been one Dr. Seuss. Still, you do that thing where you try to skip a few pages in the story. Some of those books are pretty fucking long. You’re getting drowsy again. So when you get to how Thing One and Thing Two are in the house freaking out the kids, you subtly fold several pages into the next flip and then suddenly The Cat is already cleaning everything up with his gizmo. A deft move. Neatly done. He catches you anyway. He always catches you. You go back and read the parts you tried to skip. He is delighted.
The Boy is beautiful. The Boy is sweet and innocent. The Boy spreads joy wherever he goes. The Boy For President.
Stacy’s mother is supposed to pick them up. Of course she’s late. Now Stacy’s phone rings and she listens as her mother explains that she’s going to be even a teeny bit later. Stacy clicks her phone closed and gives you a look and then you all read more and talk more and play more until eventually he starts getting wobbly and Stacy turns down the lights and you carry Ack! over to your bed. You lay him down, give him nuzzles, return together to the living room. Turn the TV down lower there too. Sit silently, watching the show. Occasionally you turn to Stacy, give her a good long look. Take her in. Occasionally she turns towards you, does the same.
Thoughts flutter in and out of focus. Many of them revolve around how you wish you could get high. Or rather you can get high, but what if you do? Will she freak? She gets squirrelly about it sometimes when The Boy is nearby. You think also how cool it is that Honey is your girl now. Your girlfriend. Have things changed for you or what? Too bad you can’t bring it up with Stacy, talk about how cool it is this happened. You used to be able to talk to Stacy about anything. But you can’t talk to anybody about this. It’s just that kind of subject. No one’s giving you grief but no one wants to hear you babble on about it either.
You think of Stacy too. How great she is. What a tough gig the single-parent thing is, and how good at it she’s turned out to be. How it’s ironic you’re sitting beside each other right now, looking probably just like a married couple. How you liked her instantly, Stacy, the very first day you met her. All that honesty and vulnerability on display for anyone to see. She was moving into a new apartment, a recent friend of Maureen’s, that was the connection. And she needed help. You, Aaron, Aaron’s brother, Johnny, Henry, and Cuz. Recruited on a day’s notice. Her place was an absolute mess, nothing properly packed, not even enough boxes to go around. She was so nervous. Yet happy you’d all come. Incredulous almost. Watching the bunch of you, complete strangers, killing yourselves moving all her shit up and down the stairs. Just because Maureen and Aaron had asked you to do it. It was a weird day. Hot and stressful but packed with energy and humour. Stacy seemed to be either laughing or crying all afternoon long. All the boys flirted with her, just because she was new. Just to see how she’d react. And in fact it was you she preened back at hardest, wasn’t it? Yes, it was. Not Johnny. You. This was a few years ago, of course. Before she was a mom. Back when she first came to the neighbourhood. Back when Johnny and Honey were solid, the king and queen of Sherbrooke Street West.
You reach over now, put your hand on hers. Stroke it fondly. Think how you’re never as nice to her now as you were back then. That’s the truth. Think how pretty she is, actually. That wide face, wide smile. Big frame, strong frame. Tall, like you. A well-muscled girl. Athletic. In a good way. You like her. She’s a genuinely good person.
She turns in your direction now. Presses her palm against yours. Wraps her fingers around yours.
Her eyes flutter subtly. A soft smile appears.
Uh-oh.
That’s not what you meant. You meant . . . something different. You were expressing your . . . friendship. Your fondness. For her. Was that not clear? Perhaps not. Yet what about Honey? She knows about Honey. How could she not think about Honey? You and Honey just started. Can she really think you’d be thinking about cheating on Honey?
What are you, a big slut?
Gently, you try to extricate your fingers. Loosen your hand.
At first she misunderstands. Tightens her hold on you, thinks you’re playing. Then gets it. Allows you to draw your arm back, her eyes clouding in embarrassment, colour inking into her cheeks.
You try to make it seem casual. You try to make it mean nothing. It doesn’t matter. It’s too late. You feel her stiffening. Feel the couch growing cold.
She stands up, flustered. With no clear destination.
Goes to check on The Boy.
You watch her. Pad down the hall, duck into the room.
When she returns she is collected. She is calm, resigned. Accepting of what has just transpired. A familiar expression for you, this suffering angel.
She sits down in the armchair. Sighs. “Just let me know if you can help out, okay? A couple of days a week?”
Instead of your sense of charity being stirred, instead of kindness being elicited, resentment surges forth in its place. That she forgives you so quickly makes you angry. Why is that?
You say to her, “Well, for how long?”
“Well, for now. I don’t know for how long.”
“How can I say then?”
“You can say okay for now.”
“But how long is now?”
She rubs her eyes, tired as only a mother can be tired. “Are you doing this on purpose?”
You say, “You know, don’t you think Graham should pitch in with this whole thing too? I mean, he’s got responsibilities as well.”
“Lee, I told you. I’m breaking up with him.” She smiles sweetly. “Still.”
“Still what?”
“Well, I might not always be available, you know.”
“Lee, Graham works. Anyway. He can’t just leave his job.”
“He’s always working.”
“Well, he has to. He’s building his business.”
“Right. Like a big sellout. Like a big suck. He sure traded in his jeans and long hair in a hurry.”
“Oh, so what? What’s so great about long hair and jeans?”
“They’re great. Don’t worry.”
“To you.”
“Yeah, to me.”
“And Graham’s doing what he thinks is right.”
“Boy, you sure don’t sound like someone planning to break up.” Why you’re goading her, why you’re picking this fight, you’re not sure. You’re not even sure why you’re ragging on Graham. He’s not such a bad guy. “Admit it. He just gave up.”
“Gave up?”
“Yeah. I just think Graham gave up too easily. It’s like, shrug, shrug, the whole world’s about money, I guess I have no choice but to become a big fink and suck cock like everybody else.”
“Oh, right. You’re the good one to be talking about who gives up easily.”
“I’m not sure in what way you mean that exactly,” you say, give her a sly smile. “Or maybe I am. Is Graham what I’m not?”
“Graham’s trying, I think.”
“As a financial planner? What is that? It sounds like so much bullshit. Investment counselling. Fund management. Mister Two Percent. You know, there was a time when you didn’t suffer financial planners so gladly either.”
“Geez, really? Would that have been, uh, before I had a baby? By any chance?”
“You know, you always bring it back to that.”
“Because it has to come back to that. Moron. Stop pretending you’re so clued out.”
“I’m not saying let The Boy starve. I know you have to eat. Just that you don’t have to suddenly just sell out and go right over to the other side. You can see first if there’s other ways of working things out.”
“What other side? Are you living in a movie? There’s no time to see if things work out, Lee. If this is what it costs to have you watch Zachary a couple of days a week, forget it then.”
Which of course is what you want her to say. But you don’t leap on it just yet. You let it slide. As her phone vibrates to let her know that her mom is downstairs.
She packs up her bags and heads over to your bed to get her son.
You trail after her. “How come Graham never watches Ack!? It just seems funny that you do it and I do it and your mother does it but he never seems to do it.”
“I do it. And my mother does it. You do it occasionally.” But again she averts her eyes from yours. “Anyways, he does it. When I have to go out for a bit. If I ask him. And how do you know when he watches Zack? And how much do you think you actually watch him? Please. I don’t think you have a good grasp on how much time is involved raising a child.”
She’s wrong. You do. That’s the problem.
You say instead, “Is that what it was? Time? You had a baby, so there was no time to waste, better hurry up and grab yourself a financial planner with bad skin and thin wrists who can’t even buy a suit that fits him right?”
“Oh, really. Look who’s talking again. Graham’s wrists are too skinny for you? I’ll have to tell him you said so.”
“Tell him I said they’re faggy skinny, like he couldn’t throw a ball across this room. Or make a real fist.”
She scoops up Ack! He hardly stirs. You take a last long look. So beautiful.
You follow her back out. For the record, you have a pretty accurate idea of how stupid you’re sounding right about now. Very. You’re always ragging on Graham behind his back yet never say anything to his face.
“A financial planner,” Stacy hisses at you, “just helps people save the money they’ve earned. It’s not a dirty thing. It’s his job.”
“Yeah, well,” you whisper back, “why doesn’t he just go earn his own money?”
“Like you, you mean?”
“No —”
“Sell hash, you mean?”
“No.”
“Maybe that’s what he should do. Sell dope. I’ll tell him that. I’ll tell him that’s what you think he should do.”
“Don’t bother. He’d never be any good at it.”
“You don’t think so?”
“Oh, I know so.”
“He’ll be so disappointed.”
“And he wouldn’t get to wear those smashing suits anymore.”
She gives you a sharp kick in the shin. Makes you step backwards, lean up against your front door.
“When are you going to do a little earning and saving? Huh, Lee? A little financial planning. When are you going to get a job? How long has it been?”
“Ah, I don’t think so.”
“You’re too special, I guess.”
You move to one side. Away from the door, and her feet.
“I’m no mutual fund peddler, Stace.”
She gives you a hard look. Can’t sustain it. It fades slowly, in the end just a sad gaze. “No, I guess not,” she says.
“Everyone knows that.”
She sighs. “That’s true.”
“It’s how it is.”
“Yeah, I guess. Except.”
“Except? Except what?”
“You know. Except.”
You sigh. “Except . . . Ack!?”
“Call him Zachary, please, when you’re talking with me.”
“It always comes back to this,” you say. “To what?”
“To this.”
“Say it. What?”
“To Zachary,” you say.
“To Zachary Who?”
You give her a look now. “Haven’t we been through this so many times? What else can I say? Is there something new you expect to hear?”
“No, of course not. Except that it works out just perfectly for you, doesn’t it? How do you feel after you’ve babysat for an afternoon? Like you’ve done something special? Do you feel grand? Is it a grand feeling?”
She’s got The Boy in one arm, with her purse, her baby bag, and the folded-up stroller in the other. You carry nothing, of course. She’s waiting for you to open the door but you have no immediate plans to do so.
“It just feels like I’ve helped out a bit. A little bit, that’s all.”
“Liar!”
“It does.”
“I don’t believe you. You feel all good about yourself.”
“I don’t . . .”
“And then off you go. Over to someone’s house. Over to see Honey.” She spits this out.
You say nothing.
“You have no idea how hard it is,” she says.
“But you wanted a baby.”
“It’s not a question of that!” she hisses.
Abruptly she shifts her cargo down to the floor while still holding Ack! almost perfectly aloft, twists the door handle open herself, and reclaims her load in one fell swoop.
She says, “Can you imagine how much I worry? Yes, it’s about time. And not just about now. It’s about how things will be later. And you have the nerve to stand in front of me and tell me how you can’t go out and work like everybody else? Because it’s just not for you? I’m no planner, Stace. Everyone knows that, Stace. Like that changes a single goddamned thing or makes it one bit easier? What if I didn’t have my mother? Have you ever thought of that? Then what? All you have is time, Lee. Why shouldn’t you at least share some of it? And I’ll tell you something else. If anything ever happens to my mother, it’s your scrawny neck. Understand?”
You lift a hand, dab one side of your head. Then the other. “Sorry,” you say. “I’m just cleaning the blood trickling from my ears.”
“Answer my question.”
“I don’t know what your question is,” you growl at her. “Please don’t be an ass.”
“What do you want to know?”
And you can tell by the way she doesn’t rattle something right back at you, how she pauses and lets her eyes wander for an instant, that she isn’t entirely clear about what it is either. And then in a quieter, smaller voice she says, “Don’t you think you could change?”
It’s a peace offering. An overture. A last-minute chance for you to make nice.
Instead you say, “Geez, I don’t know, Stace. Could I? I guess there was a time maybe when I could have. I mean, there was a time I remember, right around the same time I slept with you one single solitary night for reasons I don’t altogether remember anymore, when you said you were on the pill and I didn’t have a condom but you said you were on the pill and how the hell we could be so unlucky I don’t know but you turned up pregnant and then you had Ack! and the very first thing you let me know was that he was yours and by that you meant not mine and that I should shove off while you gave him the right home and no druggie was going to be a part of that, and so I did shove off just like you wanted, and I guess that was around the time I might’ve changed. . .”
And it is a speech, granted. More or less the one you give to her in your head every few weeks or so. Designed to get Stacy to back off and to let you off the hook. Truth be told.
But she says, “You know, that you actually remember it that way makes me feel better that you’re not around, you know that? Because then Zachary is actually safe from a certifiably insane person, even if it is his father, and it actually makes me sure I made the right decision, and it wasn’t that way at all, you liar. Like you were — what? — going to stop getting high all the time? Stop going out? What I remember is that for like maybe a week, maybe a week, you hung around and pitched in and mostly slept, actually, and after that you and Johnny and Aaron and Henry and everyone else went out more than ever, and there were times when you pounded your fists on my door at five o’clock in the morning —”
“No, there were times you wouldn’t let me in at five o’clock in the morning, and that’s why I had to pound my fists —”
“— because you are —”
“— because if you had just opened the door —”
“— so utterly —”
“— it wouldn’t have been such a big deal —”
“— childish —”
“— and we could’ve all gotten some sleep —”
“— and self-centred —”
“— instead of Zachary crying all fucking morning.”
“— that I’m ashamed I know you sometimes, Lee Goodstone.”
And on this shitty note, she goes.