Your wife starts up the hill in despair, then gives up and sits in the snow.
Your daughter smiles sadly and offers her wrist.
Over she goes. She weighs very little. Your darling.
“He’s telling the truth,” she yells from the other side. “The bone’s sticking out.”
You must be a man of great courage to then turn and sprint down the hill weeping to rejoin your wife. You must be a man with great courage and a broken heart. Because until that day my father had never done a thing to hurt us. To hurt Connie or me. He loved us. On that we’ve always agreed. He threw us over to save us from death. He believed in people. He believed in the people on the other side of the wall.
We often wonder if he and Mom made it, and if so where they live.
We pull all the next day through a region of discolored reeds. At dinnertime we decide to eat ashore. You can get lard cubes or bundles of spiced grass at Canalside stands. At a family operation near Lock 32 they serve raccoon on a stick, with a lemon slice. Where they get lemons in this day and age I have no idea. Lowlifes are lined up behind the stand, hoping to suck a discarded rind. Raccoon bits are laid out on a card table. The vendor guarantees low heavy-metal content in the flesh. I ask how he can be so sure and he says he used to be a toxicologist. His wife confirms this and goes on and on about the number of skylights they used to have in their den. He produces a fading photo of himself holding a cage of lab rats. Meanwhile their daughter’s giving me crazy eyes while skinning raccoons. The toxicologist sees me looking. He says a beautiful woman is a joy forever. He says a dad can’t be too choosy these days. Anybody Normal who’ll treat a woman reasonably well is a catch. He says it’s amazing how quickly moral standards eroded once the culture collapsed. He says: Look at your marriage rate. He says: A young fellow these days doesn’t think family, he thinks pokey-pokey continually.
When he says “pokey-pokey,” his daughter crinkles up her eyes at me.
“Best raccoon in New York State,” the mother says. The daughter nods and takes off her filthy jacket and reclines and stretches in a provocative way, managing to continue skinning raccoons. The paws go in a cardboard box. Likewise the heads. The pelts are piled neatly on the towpath for later sale to furriers.
“So,” the mother says. “That’s a nice shirt you have on.”
“You’re traveling as part of your job?” the father says hopefully.
“Not exactly,” I say. “I’m going to visit my sister.”
“He’s going home,” the mother says. “Isn’t that nice? A family boy. A family boy returning home after some kind of success. You have nice clothes. Your mother will be pleased.”
“A young man out in the world, making the grade,” the father says. “Such a young man was I, back in the toxicology days.”
“Where will you stay tonight?” the mother says. “Probably a hotel. A very nice one?”
“They stay on their boat, dodo,” the father says.
“This may sound nervy ” the mother says, “but we would be pleased to have you stay with us. Why not sleep on dry land?”
“Don’t push him,” the father says. “Let him decide.”
“I’m not pushing,” the mother says. “I’m inviting.”
“He’s not interested,” the father says. “Can you blame him? We’ve failed to provide her with decent clothes. What man would want her?”
“She’s desirable,” the mother says. “But you’re right. It’s all a matter of presentation. Do you see the form on him? Nice clothing does that. Highlights those good strong muscles. A healthy kid.”
“Yum,” the daughter says.
“Appearing wanton won’t help,” the mother says.
“It might,” the father says.
“You’ll stay?” the mother says. “One night? Please? Who wants to sleep on a smelly old boat when he can have some good home cooking and play some cards?”
“Why insult him by calling his boat smelly?” the father says.
“Oh God,” the mother says. “Did I ever not mean that.”
“Spend some time!” the father says. “Why rush across the country without absorbing the local flavor? Nellie will take you to see the Boyhood Home of Frank Shenarkis.”
“Boy will I,” Nellie says, and licks her lips. Dad nudges Mom in the ribs.
“Just so a man cares for her and respects her in the proper fashion,” he says. “That’s all I want for my little sweetie pie.”
“Take a walk, you two,” the mother says. “Why the heck not? Get better acquainted. Make hay while the sun’s still shining and all.”
So we go for a walk.
The Boyhood Home is a pastel ranch on a street of pastel ranches. It’s hard to believe America’s Last Star was raised here. Just after the collapse of the national infrastructure, Shenarkis, an overweight Normal, reigned supreme on prime time with his depiction of Snappo the comical Flawed. Three times a week the entire nation tuned in. Snappo’s Flaw was that he had a Siamese twin named Tubby growing out of his waist. Shenarkis, a master ventriloquist, handcrafted Tubby from polyurethane and then made a fortune kowtowing to the least common denominator. Every week Snappo and Tubby vied in vain for the love of Carmen Entwhistle, the Normal knockout who employed them to maintain her grounds. Snappo was always either getting tangled up in her vines or knocking something irreplaceable into the pool. He was a fool who knew it. He was gentle and acquiescent and mispronounced many words. All intelligent Flaweds hated him for selling us so short. Carmen came to like him for his simplicity. At the end of each episode they hugged. Whenever they hugged, Tubby would roll his eyes suggestively at Snappo. Sometimes the hugging went on and on. Finally around the time of the Detroit purges the feds yanked the show off the air because of the Flawed/Normal sexual overtones.
We walk through the Home hand in hand. We see the actual Tubby in a display case in the master bedroom, as well as the complicated harness system used to conjoin Tubby to Snappo. We hear a tape of Shenarkis doing Tubby’s voice. It’s an extremely frank Boyhood Home, in that they’ve documented Shenarkis’s addiction-related demise and suicide. In his sister’s room they’ve got the actual suit he was wearing when he wrapped his mouth around an exhaust pipe in despair over his cancellation. Nellie trembles at the photographs of his bloated corpse at Boca Raton. I pull her close. Over the PA comes Frank’s familiar voice singing his theme, “Two Heads and Hearts Falling for You, Dear.” I can’t concentrate. She smells too good. Her lower back is too rock-hard.
Finally they shut down the Home for the night.
“I never liked his dumb show,” Nellie says as we leave. “Dad said he got what he deserved for making Flaweds look halfway intelligent. But I did like the one where he thought the trombone was a scientific instrument. That one I liked because he was such a butthole.”
“I know what you mean,” I say.
At this point I’d say anything. Her brown arms are hot. Our palms have a little river between them. She keeps veering into me with her muscular hip.
“Through the woods?” she says.
“Is it a shortcut?” I say.
“Nope,” she says.
Ten steps in she pulls her blouse over her head. Her chest is sun-dappled and her pit hair is blond. It all happens too fast to follow. Her breath thunders in my ear. She mounts me and screams with her mouth on mine. I feel a pebble being driven into my rear but I don’t care.
Afterwards she immediately says I’m the best she’s ever had. She says our kids will be darling. She says she wants me again, only naked. She pulls off my shirt. I basically lie there like a flounder on a shore. So far letting her do what she wants has been rewarding. My shoes come off. Then my socks.
She stands up naked and starts wailing at the sight of my claws.