"I'm not always that way."
"I'm the only one who ever comes in here."
"Am I always that way?"
"Everybody else is afraid to."
"Except the maid," I say, trying a mild joke.
"I'm not counting her."
"I do come in here to work, or to get away from all of you for a little while and relax. I don't know why everyone around here is so afraid of me when I never do anything to anybody or even threaten to. Just because I like to be alone every now and then. I know I certainly don't get the impression that people around here are afraid to come in here and interrupt me when they want to, or do or say anything else to me, for that matter. Everybody always is."
"You spend nearly all your time at home in here. We have to come in here when we want to talk to you."
"I have a lot of work to do. I make a lot of money. Even though it may not seem like much to you. My work is hard."
"You keep saying it's easy."
"Sometimes it's hard. You know I do a lot of work in here. Sometimes when I just seem to be scribbling things on a pad or reading I'm actually thinking or doing work that I'll need in the morning the next day. It isn't always easy to do it at the office."
"If you ever do say you want to speak to me, it's only to criticize me or warn me or yell at me for something you think I did."
"That's not true."
"It is."
"Is it?"
"You never come into my room."
"Is that true?"
"When do you?"
"You told us not to come in. You don't want me to. You keep the door closed all the time and you ask me to please get out if I do knock and come in."
"That's because you never come in."
"That doesn't make sense, does it?"
"Yes, it does. Mommy would know what I mean. You never want to come in."
"I thought you didn't like Mommy."
"Sometimes I do. She knows what I mean. All you ever do when you come into my room is tell me to open a window and pick my clothes up off the floor."
"Somebody has to."
"Mommy does."
"But they're still always on the floor."
"Sooner or later they get picked up. Don't they? I don't think that's so important. I don't think that's the most important thing you have to talk to me about. Is it?"
"I'll try never to say that to you again. What is important?"
"I've got posters on my wall and some funny lampshades that I painted myself and some funny collages that I made out of magazine advertisements. And I'm reading a book by D. H. Lawrence that I'm really enjoying very much. I think it's the best book I ever read."
"I'm interested in all that," I tell her. "I'd like to see your posters and your funny lampshades and collages. What's the book by D. H. Lawrence?"
"You don't like D. H. Lawrence."
"My own taste isn't too good. I'd like to see what you've done with your room."
"Now?"
"If you'd let me."
She shakes her head. "You don't want to. You'd only pretend to look around for a second and then tell me to pick my clothes up off the floor."
"Are they on the floor?"
"You see? You're only interested in joking. You're not really interested in anything I do. You're only interested in yourself. You're not interested in me."
"You're not interested in me," I retaliate gently. "When I do start to ask you questions about yourself, you think I'm snooping into your affairs or trying to trap you in a lie or something."
"You usually are."
"Not always. You do tell lies. You do have things you try to hide."
"You won't let me hide them. You want to know everything. Mommy too."
"Sometimes they're things we should know."
"Sometimes they've got nothing to do with you."
"How can I tell until I find out what they are?"
"You could take my word."
"I can't. You know that."
"That's very flattering."
"You do lie a lot."
"You don't enjoy talking with me. You never want to discuss things with me or tell me anything. Unless it's to make me do my homework. Mommy spends more time talking to me than you do."
"Then why don't you like her more?"
"I don't like what she says."
"You aren't being fair. If I do try to tell you something about the company or my work, you usually sneer and make snotty wisecracks. You don't think the work I do is important."
"You don't think it's important, either. You just do it to make money."
"I think making money for you and the rest of the family is important. And doing my work well enough to maintain my self-respect is important, even though the work itself isn't. You know, it's not always so pleasant for me to have the work I do at the company ridiculed by you and your brother. Even though you're joking, and I'm not always sure you are. I spend so much of my life at it."
(Why must I win this argument? And why must I use this whining plea for pity to do it? Why must I show off for her and myself and exult in my fine logic and more expert command of language and details in a battle of wits with a fifteen-year-old child, my own? I could just as easily say, "You're right. I'm sorry. Please forgive me." Even though I'm right and not really sorry. I could say so anyway. But I can't. And I am winning, for her look of resolution is failing, her hesitations are growing, and now it is her gaze that is shiftily avoiding mine. I relax complacently, with a momentary tingle of scorn for my inferior adversary, my teen-age daughter. I am a shit. But at least I am a successful one.)
My daughter replies apologetically. "I'm interested in your work," she tries to defend herself. "Sometimes I ask you questions."
"I always answer them."
"With a wisecrack."
"I know you're going to sneer."
"If you didn't wisecrack, maybe I wouldn't sneer."
"I promise never to wisecrack again," I wisecrack.
"That's a wisecrack," she says. (She is bright, and I am pleased with her alertness.)
"So is that," I retort (before I can restrain myself, for I suppose I have to show her that I am at least as good).
My daughter doesn't return my smile. "See? You're grinning already," she charges in a low, accusing tone. "You're turning it into a joke. Even now, when we're supposed to be serious."
I turn my eyes from her face and look past her shoulder uneasily at the bookcase on the wall. "I'm sorry. I was only trying to make you feel better. I was trying to make you laugh."
"I don't think there's anything funny."
"No, I'm not. I'm sorry if you thought so."
"You like to turn everything into a joke."
"I don't. Now don't get rude. Or I'll have to."
"You start making fun of me. You never want to talk seriously to any of us."
"That isn't true. That's the third time you've made me deny it."
"You always try to laugh and joke your way out whenever something serious comes up."
"That's the fourth."
"Or you get angry and bossy and begin yelling, like you're starting to do now."
"I'm sorry," I say, and pause to lower my voice. "It's my personality, I guess. And my nerves. I'm not really proud of it. What you have to try to remember, honey, and nobody seems to, is that I've got feelings too, that I get headaches, that I can't always control my own moods even though I seem to be the one in charge. I'm not always happy either. Please go on talking to me."
"Why should I?"
"Don't you want to?"
"You don't enjoy talking to me."
"Yes, I do."
"Now?"
"Yes. Tell me what you want to. That's how I'll know. Please. Otherwise I always have to guess."
"Was Derek born the way he is?"
"Yes. Of course. We think so."
"Or was it caused by something one of us did?"
"He was born that way."
"Why?"
"Nobody knows. We all think he was. That's part of the problem. Nobody knows what happened to him."
"Maybe that's what I'll be when I go to college. An anthropologist."
"Geneticist."
"Did you have to say that now?"
"You want to learn, don't you?"
"Not always."
"I thought you'd like to know the difference when you make a mistake."
"Not now. You knew what I meant. You didn't have to stop me just to show you're smarter. Did you?"
"You're very smart. You're very bright and very clever. Maybe you should be a lawyer. That's a compliment. I don't pay you compliments often."