Finding Mr. Brightside (3 page)

“Thirsty,” she says.

“Want one? I should’ve offered.”

Juliette shakes her head, brings the can to her lips, and takes a sip that my grandma, she of the sugar-sensitive canker sores, would be proud of. As she slides the can back over my way, the note Mom left on the counter catches her eye. She starts reading it out loud.

Off to the casino with Aunt Jane, sweetie!
Make sure to let the dog out. Love you!!
Wish me luck! 777, Mom!

“Mom overdoes it on the exclamation points when she’s excited about playing the slots,” I explain.

Juliette’s pupils contract into blank periods. The life comes back when she sees my golden retriever padding slowly into the kitchen with her eyes all squinty as if to say
You teenagers woke me up … and I’m glad you did. Come pet me!

I appreciate Juliette leaning down and introducing herself to my dog at eye level, shaking her extended paw—good dog manners are important to me. The dog and I have been through some shitty times together.

“She likes you,” I note.

Juliette looks up at me. “Doesn’t she like everyone?”

“Not quite. She’s been avoiding the neighbor’s Labradoodle.”

“Understandable,” Juliette says to the dog, scratching her ears. “What’s her name?”

“‘The dog.’”

I tell Juliette about how we tried several different tennis-related names—including Volley, Lettie, and Billie Jean King—but none of them stuck. I’ll be the first to admit: boring story. But Juliette thinks it’s a good example of how “naming anything is impossible,” so maybe not.

“Want to sit down or something?” I ask.

She nods. We head toward the living room, sitting on opposite ends of the leather sectional.

“Do you still play tennis a lot?” she asks.

“Quit,” I say, sprawling out across the cushions, my preferred state of being these days.

“Why?”

I’m honest with her about my lack of motivation, explaining that my dad had enough ambition for the both of us. After he was gone, I didn’t have anyone to remind me there was a hungry group of runners-up just around the corner, waiting to steal our trophies, so we better get up a little earlier for practice tomorrow.

“Sounds like you made the right choice,” Juliette says softly.

“Really?”

“No idea,” she says. “I was trying to be supportive…?”

We share a laugh—she gives me most of it, holding herself back. Why is she here, again? And why does she smell so good, even from over here, like … fancy laundry detergent and green tea extract? Meanwhile, the dog rolls over and allows Juliette access to her furry underbelly.

“You two really do seem like old friends,” I say, failing to stifle my yawn.

“Maybe we met in a past life.”

The idea of reincarnation sounds peculiar coming from her—she doesn’t seem like the “back in the day, when I was a butterfly” type.

“Maybe you and I crossed paths in one of those lives, too,” I propose, as casually as possible.

Juliette purses her lips like a girl who’s been making this expression for centuries, thinks about it for a second, then surprises me by saying, albeit reluctantly, “Sure. But I think I might’ve been a whale.”

“You’ll never believe this, but me, too.”

She’s almost smiling as she rolls her eyes.

“Do you think we could’ve been friends?” I ask.

“Friend
ly
, yes,” she allows. “Assuming our whale parents weren’t associated back then.”

I hold up my hand. “I’m almost positive they swam in separate pods.”

She looks at me curiously, for a split second, before breaking eye contact.

We chat for a while longer until a warm blanket of mononucleosis falls across my body … disregard, it’s an actual blanket, Juliette has brought over my mom’s favorite throw and is covering me up. Damn you, Paxil.

“You don’t have to go.”

She starts to say something, stops.

“Were you this good-looking of a whale in our other life?” I ask her, one eye half open. I wouldn’t bet money that I’m speaking English anymore. “What I mean is, would you have dated an ordinary whale like this?”

She sits down on the floor beside me, rests her head on the edge of the cushion. She looks like she’s been fighting sleep for a while. I want to tell her to let it win, but turning it into an official competition probably wouldn’t help.

“I’m guessing I was an emotionally unavailable whale back then, too,” she says. “But I would’ve considered going on some kind of date with you, yes. Someplace where the water is warm.”

“Now you’re talking.”

Content, I make my best approximation of a joyful whale noise. I may be beached right now, but I’m excited about my life for the first time in a long time. Even if it’s a past life, in whale form.

Juliette says something else that I really want to process, but I’m drifting away, having some sort of hallucination now, seeing my dad in his casket—his cheekbones, broken in the accident, reconstructed with some sort of goopy mortician’s wax. Mom’s panicking. She can’t remember checking a box saying
YES
to an open casket; thinks maybe she delegated the decision to someone else. I tell her I would’ve done the same thing. “People are probably thinking I’m a bad wife for letting him be seen like this,” she whispers from our spot at the end of the mourning line. Those people aren’t worth our time, but on this day, when Mom is being forced to pretend like everyone doesn’t know about Dad and Sharon Flynn, the thought of their judgment is un-fucking-acceptable to me.

I walk over to the casket and politely ask a few respects-payers to stand back. Then I start trying to close the casket. I hear the various gasps and utters of “Oh my God,” but I don’t care; I’m problem-solving, protecting my mom. My dad, too, in a way. And yet the casket isn’t really cooperating. I grab a different handle and pull down harder. The stupid … padded … lid … won’t budge. No one looks interested in helping me out; most have backed away. The struggle continues until the funeral director shows up and Mom leads me away to regroup. She’s not mad at me, very rarely is. We find a room to hide in and proceed to let it all hang out. We cry about Dad’s face and how we’ll never see the real him again. We get angry about his betrayal. We wish he would’ve been less one-thing-to-the-next, more open to enjoying himself with us, not just others outside our family. Then we start laughing at how the funeral director looked like he wanted to arrest me. Then we go back to crying because here we are, laughing at my dad’s funeral, what’s wrong with us? Mom says we’re reminding her of “that one
Mary Tyler Moore
episode with the clown funeral” and I go “Oh, yeaaah” even though I have no idea what she’s talking about. “If I tell you something about your dad, Abe … will you promise not to think any less of me?” I promise, and she whispers, “Sometimes I wonder if I ever really knew him.” I tell her that makes complete sense to me, he was a hard guy to read. Then my mom’s sister Jane barges in with a bottle of vodka and dares us to have an extra-stiff drink with her, which we do.

When I wake up, Juliette is gone. But it feels like she’s here. There’s also a chance I’m still sleeping.

5

Juliette

W
HY AM
I
STILL HERE
?

My throwing a blanket over Abram’s admittedly decent body was the type of random act of kindness I’ll look back on someday, a tear in my eye, and think,
Remember that one time I cared?
From the hallway, I watch as Abram flips around on his side so he’s facing the back of the couch, blanket not quite covering him, his sweatpants drooping even further and revealing more than just a hint of butt-naked butt. It looks pretty much like what one would expect, if one were inclined to have such expectations: white, two cheeks, firm. And what about that bizarrely pleasant scent—a mix of shampoo, salt, and this morning’s cologne—I picked up while sitting underneath him on a big pile of unswept dog hair? What about how I wouldn’t mind smelling an encore?

I walk forward toward Abram, allowing myself one more close-up of his cute face. It really does look like a younger version of his father’s, and yet I’m still not hating his guts. What would it be like to lean down and press my lips against his? I bet it’s warm there, near his breath. Might be nice not to be freezing for once in my life. Maybe kissing Abram would turn out to be the best thing I ever forced myself to do for no apparent reason.

Something’s wrong with me.

I decide to give myself the grand tour of his house and reflect later, eventually ending up in the master bedroom. There’s an iPad on the dresser; I touch the Home button and a paused game of Candy Crush appears. The bed Abram’s father should’ve had enough self-control to sleep in more often is empty and unmade. Suzy Morgan has allowed a photo of their wedding day to remain on a stand beside the TV—bad choice. On the other side, a Zumba Blu-ray box sits unopened atop a good two years’ worth of mint-condition
Women’s Health
magazines. I’m not sure who’s doing a less adequate job of taking care of themselves, this family or mine. Too close to call.

I wonder if Suzy read any of her husband’s texting exchanges with my mom. That’s exactly what I did while waiting around the hospital, went through my mother’s personal things, starting with her cell phone. Wish I’d stopped reading after the first sext.

I force my eyes to swallow the hot tears welling up inside them—they don’t taste nearly as good cold—and struggle with the urge to throw something at myself. That Yankee Candle on the nightstand, perhaps. I step into the walk-in closet before temptation strikes me down.

The hanging space and cubbyholes have been unevenly divided between husband and wife, Ian’s tailored suits and shiny wing tips taking up the majority, too many of Suzy’s garments getting the second-class Tupperware bin treatment. A year after her husband’s death, Suzy’s still afraid to claim what’s rightfully hers.
Not acceptable.
I start removing blazer after blazer from the hanging rod and flinging them to the floor. Do the same with the wing tips. Then a bunch of shiny leather belts that look identical. I can smell Ian Morgan’s woodsy cologne wafting up from the growing pile. If I were a garbage bag, where would I be?

Abram’s still fast asleep in the living room when I grab a box of Heftys from underneath the kitchen sink. I go back to finish the job I probably shouldn’t have started in the first place, before his mom gets home.

*   *   *

An hour later, I’m turning the key in my front door. I didn’t come away from Abram’s house empty-handed; took a roll of garbage bags (we’re out) and my Doritos Locos Supreme, which I took a few bites of on the way home, but I’ll deny that to the grave. I find my father passed out on the couch in his office. What is with everybody falling asleep today? I place a blanket over him, too, careful not to wake him.

I take my garbage bags to his bedroom, the place in the house he most avoids. I will myself into my parents’ walk-in closet, which hasn’t been touched since that night. I think about asking my father if it’s okay that I do this, but I know his answer will be hidden underneath a mask that makes it impossible to tell if he really does care. I know that mask well, wear it every day, so I must be equally annoying to deal with.

My mother might have been selfish with her time, but she was very generous with her things. Shoes, lipsticks, perfumes—if it wasn’t already on her person, I had carte blanche.
Oh, that smells so good on you, Juliette. Don’t be a stinge—spray a little more. And definitely wear my Gucci belt with those jeans, yes?
My mother climbed the corporate ladder, made her own money, so there was really nothing wrong with her always having more of everything … except that everything was never enough.

Sharon Flynn lived in a world of scarcity, probably because her parents themselves died before she graduated high school; in response, she accumulated things, promotions, lovers. And who better to keep around as a backup than a man like my father with a large trust fund and zero desire to spend it? In other news, I need to quit googling “grief coping mechanisms.”

I pick up a slinky black dress. The Chanel label I was once so enamored of seems so silly and pointless now. Just a word on a thing. Why are we keeping this? In case she needs a sexy cocktail frock in the afterlife? For me? I can’t even bring myself to wear my favorite pair of her least-overpriced jeans. My dad certainly isn’t going to jump up from the couch, grab an empty box and start organizing away, so I’m the default family member who has to place each item, once so essential to my mom’s persona, into a stolen garbage bag. And rather than completely lose my mind to the sadness of what I’m doing, it’s much easier to blame her for putting me in this position.

6

ABRAM

J
UST HEARD MY MOM SCREAMING
“Oh my God!” from another room. I throw off a blanket I can’t accurately remember putting over myself and run to her bedroom. She’s inside the closet, surrounded by a gang of stuffed garbage bags.

“Mom? You okay?”

She doesn’t seem to be in any pain, although she’s wearing a tight red mummy dress that looks like a challenge to move around in. Dad always liked her in red.

Mom turns to me, confusion in her eyes. “Did you do this, Abram?”

I look down again at the bags, then up at the empty hangers that once held my father’s clothes. “Maybe?”

“Maybe, what?”

“Tonight’s been kind of a blur.”

“Have you been drinking?”

“Strictly Sunkist.”

My mind flashes back to Juliette. Here. In my house. Sipping from my can of soda. Staying awake through my boring stories. Watching me succumb to sleep. Bagging up my father’s old clothes?

“Well, you’ve been meaning to go through this stuff anyway,” I say.

Mom usually appreciates when I look on the bright side for her, but she’s determined to crack the Case of the Walk-In Closet Organizer first.

“You didn’t invite anyone over tonight, Abram?”

I hate lying to my mom, especially after what she experienced with Dad. Still, I’m not quite ready to tell the truth about this one.