“Why didn’t you tell me you knew?”
“Lily, if you were in my position, what would you have done?”
“Run away long ago. But that’s because I’ve been running for ten years. The slightest blip on the screen and I’m outta there.” Naked, she sat in the lotus position facing me. “Have you told anyone?”
“No one. Look at me! Believe that: I’ve told no one.”
“All right. What can I say, I have to believe it. What are you going to do, Max? I cannot believe this; you know. You know about it. What are you going to do?”
I put a hand on her throat and gently pushed her back down. Lifting myself, I climbed on top and, spreading her legs with a knee, slipped very carefully inside her vagina. Her eyes widened but she didn’t speak. I pushed until I was as deep as I could go, then moved her arms over her head and covered them with my own. Silently, we lay like that for some time. The moment and the knowledge between us transcended sex, yet I was very hard. Her mouth was to my ear when she spoke barely above a whisper.
“I love you. No matter what you do to us, or me, know I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone.”
“I do know that.”
“It’s so tragic. This is all I ever wanted from life: you here, Lincoln sleeping in his room. I was just praying, but stopped because I didn’t know what for. Praying you won’t tell, praying you’ll never stop loving me. It’s all mixed up. And who am I to pray? What God do I go to for help? People say they want justice, but that’s not true. We only want things to work for us and no one else. Even now, a big part of me keeps saying I don’t deserve this ‘cause I’m a nice person. I do good things for others. Isn’t that crazy? Isn’t that sick? Oh, Max, what are you going to do? Do you know?”
“Yes. I’m going to marry you and try to be a good father to Lincoln.”
“Oh God. Oh God.” She began breathing oddly, as if she were panting. Our faces were inches away and we stared into each other’s eyes. Neither of us smiled, there was no joy in or near us. No matter how much she hoped for it, I don’t think she was prepared for what I had said. Keeping her unforgivable secret meant giving up most of what I believed.
“You would do that? You’d do that for me?”
“Yes, Lily. It wasn’t a hard decision to make.”
She wrapped me in her arms and, rocking us from side to side, started saying, “Oh God. Oh God,” again.
PART THREE. BEE HEES FOREVER
“Let us cover, O Silent One, with a sheet of fine linen, the stiff, dead profile of our imperfection.”
Mary and I watched the three of them cross the front lawn and walk toward the house.
“How old is Lincoln now?”
“He’ll be seventeen in a few weeks.”
“Good Lord, that’s all? He looks a hundred.”
“I know.”
“Good, clean living will do it every time, huh, Max?”
If it had been anyone else, I would have snapped back something mean, but Mary did not need more meanness. Her husband had died two months before and, tough as she appeared, her core was melting down toward pure hopelessness.
“What does his T-shirt say? Am I reading what I think I’m reading?”
“ ‘Fuck Dancing—Let’s Fuck.’ It’s one of his favorites.”
“Oh, Max, you let him walk out of the house in that?”
“No. He walked out of the house wearing something different this morning. Probably had the shirt in his bag and changed at school. We used to fight about these things, but he wised up and does it all different now. Diversionary tactics; the art of the end run. Never, ever argue, but if you don’t like what’s said, figure out a detour around that lets you do exactly what you want. Our son is an expert sneak.”
“And the leather jacket is Elvis Packard?”
“Right. The girl is Little White.”
“Why does that name sound so sinister? She looks like a woodpecker. What does her shirt say?”
“ ‘Nine Inch Nails.’ That’s a rock group, in case you don’t have their album.”
“I thought it was a manicurist.”
The door opened and the three clomped in. They all wore oversized black combat boots that laced halfway up their shins. The rest of the uniform consisted of tattered jeans and T-shirts. Although it was cold outside, Elvis was the only one wearing a jacket. It was covered with oversized safety pins, chains, and buttons that said things like “You Disgust Me.”
They shadowed through the room, making no eye contact, and would have passed without a word if I hadn’t spoken. “Lincoln! Mary’s here. Can’t you even say hello?”
“Hello, Mary,” he said in a monotone, then made an exaggerated face at me as if to say, “Okay, are you satisfied?” As one, the gang smirked and kept going. A few moments later a door slammed at the back of the house.
“What a bunch of criminals! How do you live with it? Are they here every day?”
“Just about. They skulk into his room, lock the door, and turn on Carcass. Have you ever heard of Carcass?”
“I take it that’s a rock group too?”
“Yes. Want to hear some of their song titles?” I reached for my wallet and pulled out the small pad I carry to write notes on possible ideas for “Paper Clip.” “Here it is. ‘Crepitating Bowel Erosion.’ ‘Reek of Putrefaction’—”
“Delicious. Hey, they’re not ‘Wake Up, Little Susie,’ but don’t kids always have their own music? We did. What one generation adores, the next thinks is stupid.”
“Mary, for Christ’s sake, ‘Crepitating Bowel Erosion’ ?”
“You got a point. What else do you think they do in there? Whose girlfriend is she?”
“Lincoln told me both of them do her, but ‘none of us are really into fucking, ya know? So it’s just a kinda thing we do in between things, ya know?’”
“Wow, he said that? Times have changed, huh, Max? We spent half our lives thinking about sex. You think that’s true, or was he only trying to impress you?”
“He doesn’t want to impress me. Or anyone. He wants to lie on his bed and listen to Carcass.”
“And do drugs.”
We looked at each other. I chewed the insides of my cheeks. “What did you find, Mary?”
“Names and places. I found what you expected.”
“And?”
“And he does lots of drugs. The girl usually buys them because she’s friendly with a guy in an East L.A. gang who deals. By the way, her human being name is Ruth Burdette. She got it because she was the girlfriend of a guy in a gang called the Little Fish. When you’ve screwed a Fish, you get to be called a Little.”
The fact Little White had a real name and history surprised me almost more than the fact my son took drugs.
“As soon as Lily and I got married, we started talking to Lincoln about drugs. He was always so afraid of them. A couple of times I remember he actually had nightmares where bad guys were chasing him around with giant hypodermic needles. What kind of stuff is he doing?”
“Cocaine when they have money, crack when they don’t.”
“Lily will go mad. She refuses to accept this. She only thinks he’s going through his rebellious period.”
“You’ve got to change that. Get her to accept it and work on the problem with you. Otherwise the kid will die. Simple as that. Get some counseling, maybe check him into a drug program—”
“You sound like a public health pamphlet. Believe me, it’s not so easy. He hates us, Mary. You don’t understand. Anything we do, say, or think, he gets a look on his face of pure revulsion. We’re the enemy. Us with our clean sheets, paid bills, cable TV… We can do nothing right in his eyes. Whatever we give him he assumes is rightfully his, but whatever we tell him he disregards.”
“So he’s an ungrateful little shit. He’s still under age. Stick his ass in a rehab center and too bad if he doesn’t like it.” She lit a cigarette and flicked the match into the fireplace. “What the hell happened to that boy? He was the most wonderful child. Funny, charming… Remember how Frank loved him? You guys did everything right. He was loved, you gave him the right amount of discipline. Read to him, took him places… What happened?”