"It was the only way, Dad. You know what she can be like."
I sit back on the hard bus seat, dizzy and slightly nauseated. All Doris ever told me was that we were "discontinuing" the cello lessons because Jake was going through a "troubled" time. "That"s why your mother sent you to the shrink?"
"Uh-huh."
"Was that any good?"
Jake shrugs. "The shrink wanted to know why I set the cello on fire. The simple answer would have been that I didn"t want to set my mother on fire, but of course you can"t say that, so we spent a few hours kicking around teenage angst and raging hormones and c.r.a.p like that."
He ventures a smile at me. "I"m not crazy, you know. The cello was rented, and I knew Mom had taken the insurance policy on the rental, so it didn"t cost you guys anything."
"Yeah? The shrink was a hundred and fifty a pop."
"Well, at least you didn"t have to pay for any more cello lessons, Dad."
"I wish I could have paid for guitar lessons."
Jake shakes his head. "Nah. Wouldn"t have been any point. The day I burned the cello was the day the music died."
My heart sinks. "Don"t say that. It"s not too late. If you want to play the guitar, you can play the guitar."
"Tell you the truth, Dad, I don"t really know what what I want anymore." I want anymore."
"I know how you feel."
This was all my fault. If I"d been around, he never would have had to burn the cello. Together we would have fought the good fight against his mother, and switched him over to the guitar. He might have liked it. He might have joined a band.
He might have been happy.
We"re both jolted by the ringing of Jake"s cell phone. He presses a caller ID b.u.t.ton and his face goes pale. "s.h.i.t. It"s Mom. What should I tell her?"
"Nothing."
"Maybe the school contacted her."
"If they could have contacted her, they"d have done that before they ever called me. Go ahead, answer it. I"m not here, by the way."
He takes a deep breath and answers the phone, sounding remarkably calm. "Hey, Mom. How"s the conference going?"
He"s not a bad actor. Most kids who"ve lived through a divorce can put on a pretty good show when they have to.
He rolls his eyes at me. "I"m on a bus," he tells her. "Just didn"t feel like taking the subway...."
Except for the crosstown bus Jake never rides buses, not counting those few weeks after 9/11 when everybody was convinced the subways were going to be bombed or anthraxed. We all felt safer riding buses, even though they were blowing up every other day in Israel.
"He"s all right," I hear him say, and I realize Doris must have asked him how his father was. "She"s fine," he says, and I realize she must have asked him about Sarah. "Not much," he says, and I know she"s just asked him about his homework load for the weekend. Homework!
He tells her he loves her and clicks the phone shut. "Now we can both breathe a little easier," he says, grinning at me.
"Three lies in one phone call. Not bad."
"Well, the part about loving her is true. That should count for something."
"Do you love her?"
"Of course I do! She can"t help the way she does things. And I"ll tell you, she"s a lot easier to get along with since I torched the cello."
"Jake. She"ll be back tomorrow. We"re going to have to deal with her, one way or another."
"You"re the one who said, "f.u.c.k Monday.""
"Yes, I did. But I never said, "f.u.c.k Sunday." You just went from Ivy League shoo-in to high school dropout so fast, I"m surprised your ears didn"t pop. Your mother doesn"t even know it yet, but her wettest dream just went drier than the Sahara Desert. Please don"t go kidding yourself that this can possibly go smoothly."
He stares at me. "I never kid myself," he says simply. "It doesn"t pay off, does it?"
"No, it doesn"t."
"Mom thought I was going to go the academic route, just like her."
"Don"t knock it. Tenure. Summers off. A million holidays a year. Respect up the kazoo, especially as you get older."
"Thanks anyway. I"d join the army before I"d become a teacher. And believe me, I"m not about to join the army."
"Well, son, as long as we"re talking this way it"s my sad duty to inform you that someday, you will have to do something something for a living. They taught you many wonderful things at that school, I"m sure, but the one lesson n.o.body seems to get around to is the one about the direct relationship between the need for money and the suffering that goes into getting it. Maybe they were saving it for last, but I tell you, it"s a h.e.l.l of a surprise to spring on people. Finding out there"s no Santa Claus is nothing compared to this." for a living. They taught you many wonderful things at that school, I"m sure, but the one lesson n.o.body seems to get around to is the one about the direct relationship between the need for money and the suffering that goes into getting it. Maybe they were saving it for last, but I tell you, it"s a h.e.l.l of a surprise to spring on people. Finding out there"s no Santa Claus is nothing compared to this."
I pat him on the cheek, harder than necessary. He"s a little surprised by the slap, and narrows his eyes at me for just a moment. "There"s no Santa Claus?"
"Nope. Sorry, kid."
"Well, that"s all right. Like I told you, I"ve got a plan. Have a little faith in your offspring, Father."
I get to my feet and push the tape that makes the bell ring. The bus glides to a stop. "We"re here. Let"s go."
There"s nothing like a walk in the old neighborhood to remind you why you left and never came back. On the streets of Flushing we pa.s.s carpet-sized lawns protected by knee-high hedges. Behind them are houses that seemed to have been built by and for midgets, places that make you feel claustrophobic just to look at them. In the backyards they have their aboveground swimming pools, giant blue plastic teacups, and through the summer months they float on their backs on cloudy chlorinated water and wonder out loud how anybody can stand to live in Manhattan.
"First stop is my old school," I announce.
It takes less than five minutes to walk to Holy Cross High School, a big, gloomy place of yellow brick fronted by maple trees that don"t seem to have grown much taller in all those years since I was last here. The patches of lawn are still bordered by short metal poles with chains looped between them. Jake follows me to the main entrance and stops at my side.
"Whoa, Dad. You went to Catholic Catholic school?" school?"
"It was my mother"s idea. Guess she wanted to save my soul. I"m not sure it worked."
There"s a large crucifix hanging directly over the doorway, and the Jesus figure nailed to the cross is bigger than life-sized. It"s made of some kind of weather-resistant metal, pitted and pocked by decades of rain and snow. It"s a muscular Christ with a scowling face, as if He disapproves of every student who ever walked beneath him.
Jake can"t stop staring at it. "Was that thing there when you went here?"
"Oh yeah."
"Pretty gruesome way to start the day, walking under that thing."
"Nothing like a good dose of guilt in the morning to get you going.... Do you know the story of the crucifixion?" Jake laughs. "Dad. Are you joking?" joking?"
"I"m serious! I know I never told you about it, and your mother"s no believer."
"I learned about it in school. World religion cla.s.s, eighth grade. I think I got a B."
"What did they teach you?"
"That Jesus Christ died for mankind"s sins, and He rose from the dead three days later."
I nodded. "That about wraps it up."
"Also that G.o.d is actually three beings-a father, a son, and a holy spirit. I never quite understood that."
"n.o.body does. We all just acted like we did so the nuns wouldn"t hit us with a yardstick."
Jake stares at the crucifix. I can barely stand to look at it, turn my gaze to the sidewalk. "The bravest kids in school used to throw s...o...b..a.l.l.s at it."
"Oh, man," Jake laughs, "that took b.a.l.l.s!"
"It sure did. But that"s nothing, compared to what Paschal Tufano did. He climbed up there and stuck a cigarette in Jesus"s mouth. And he was only a freshman at the time, a cla.s.smate of mine. Talk about b.a.l.l.s."
Jake laughs. "Did he get caught?"
"He got caught, and he got expelled."
"You"re kidding!"
"Swear to G.o.d. Many roads lead to expulsion, my son. You write a smart-a.s.s essay, Paschal Tufano sticks a Marlboro in the mouth of the son of G.o.d. In the end, it"s all the same."
I chuckle, thinking of Paschal, wondering what the h.e.l.l ever became of him. Jake continues staring at the crucifix.
"Did you ever throw a s...o...b..ll at it?"
"Never."
"Why not?"
"Because it would have been a sin, and at the time I was concerned with sins. Even thinking thinking about chucking a s...o...b..ll at the crucifix would have been a sin. That"s what we were taught here. You don"t have to actually do something bad. Even bad thoughts are sins." about chucking a s...o...b..ll at the crucifix would have been a sin. That"s what we were taught here. You don"t have to actually do something bad. Even bad thoughts are sins."
Jake stares at me in wonder. "They taught you that?"
"They certainly did."
"That"s unbelievable!"
"Now do you see why I never took you to church?"
"Did your parents believe in all this stuff?"
"My mother did. My father didn"t."
"When did he die?"
"About five years after my mother, I guess."
"You guess? guess? What did he die of?" What did he die of?"
"He had a heart attack, too, Jake, and he died at home. That That I remember. Okay?" I remember. Okay?"
"Why are you getting nasty?"
"Jake. Please. All these questions...I have to sit for a minute."
"Dad, are you all right?"
I"m far from all right. My shirt is damp with sweat and my head is pounding. I lick my upper lip and taste salt. "Thing is, Jake, I really can"t stand the sight of a crucifix. Never could."
"Why? It"s just a statue on a cross."
"It"s a little more than that to me."
"Why?"
"Maybe I"ll tell you later. Right now I just have to sit a minute, and be quiet."
I"m feeling dizzy, and the strength has left my legs. Taking me by the elbow, Jake helps me to a stoop across the street from the school, where we both sit down. Jake rubs my back in a circular motion.
"I"m sorry, Dad."
"Sorry about what?"
"Sorry that you"re so...alone."
He"s right. He"s absolutely right. That is the perfect word for what I am.
And then, for the first time since the day I packed up and moved out on my wife and son, I begin to cry, and I mean hard. The tears are plopping on the cement between my feet, and I"m sobbing like a child, the child I haven"t been for so very long.
It"s an awful thing to do to Jake, but he"s strong. He just keeps rubbing my back in the same circular motion.
"Hey, Dad. Come on. It"ll be okay."
At last I start to calm down. The time has come to start telling him things, the things I have promised to tell him, things I"ve kept buried for so long that the graves no longer have headstones.