Melt (6 page)

      “Oh,” he said. There was a pause as he tried to think of what to say next. Inebriation runs contrary to intelligent conversation.

      I leaned back against the railing, sighed. Brian found something to say, but I wasn't listening. I stared at the moon in the distance above him, round and shimmering, beaming lines of light into the tide. Looking to the side of Brian, who slurred on, I watched a lone duck float through a moonbeam.

      “What the hell you doin', man?” Joey's angry voice yanked me back to the bridge. Joey was leaning into Brian, poking his finger into his chest.

      “Nothing,” Brian said, moving backward. Joey moved with him, practically on him. “I wasn't doin' nothing, I swear.”

      “I seen you over here, talking to Doll.” Joey's voice was even more sloshed than Brian's, and he reeked of that horrendous Bacardi 151.

      “Who's Doll?” Brian asked.

      “Don't act like you don't know who I mean.” Joey gave Brian a shove. “Dorothy. She's with
me
.”

      “Joey, stop,” I said. I couldn't fathom these caveman antics. “He was
talking
to me. So what?” I grabbed at his arm. He shrugged me off, bunched up the front of Brian's shirt into his fists. Brian had backed up as far as he could. The steel railing pressed into his lower back from behind, while from the front Joey pressed his weight into him.

      “Shit, man,” Brian sputtered. “I'm sorry, all right?”

      “No, it ain't all right,” Joey barked at him. “It sure as shit ain't all right.” Despite those angry words, he let go of Brian's shirt. I thought he was done, that he'd come to his senses. Instead, he clasped into Brian's neck, hanging Brian halfway over the railing and throttling him.

      “Oh my god! Stop, Joey,” I screamed. “You're killing him!” Brian was bright red, gurgling and convulsing. The whole crowd semi-circled around us, watching, but no one did anything to help. “Joey, look at me. I'm begging you ….” He ignored me, continued to choke Brian, who flailed helplessly. “
Joey, look at me
.”

      He did it then.

      He let his fingers slip looser, turned my way. His eyes were glossy, wild with rage. I didn't know this Joey.

      “Let go of him,” I said quietly. “Please.”

      He looked back at Brian then, with surprise, like he didn't know how he'd gotten there, on top of this guy he was strangling.

      He let go.

      He moved off of Brian, who sank coughing to the walkway. The crowd moved in then, surrounding Brian, offering him drinks and assistance. Now, they cared.

      He came over to me, tried to touch me. I moved away. “Don't,” I said.

      He looked at me again, then, his eyes still glossy but now tame—remorseful. “Doll … I'm sorry. I don't know why ….”

      “Joey, you almost killed him.”

      “No … yeah, I know. I don't know what happened to me ….”

      “Gee, maybe that rum you were guzzling happened to you.” I started walking. I should've done it earlier.

      God.

      Someone had almost died.

      Because of me.

      He followed me through the streets, all the way home. “Doll, Doll, come back. I'm sorry,” he kept repeating. His voice tapered, getting lower and lower until it dropped off completely, leaving him silent behind me except for the sound of his scuffling sneakers and his labored breathing.

      At least he kept his distance.

      At least he didn't try to touch me again.

      Halfway down my driveway I turned and saw him there. Illuminated in streetlight, peering through my gate, hands gripping the bars. Lost. Forsaken. I almost gave in, went back to him. But then I thought of those hands clenching Brian's neck. I thought of Brian's veins bulging between those fingers, trying to flow.

      I shivered, went inside.

      For a week he called my cell phone over and over, leaving apologetic, pleading messages.

      I finally picked up. I'm not sure why. Maybe those things they say about time are true. Or maybe I just missed him more than I hated what he'd done.

      He'd never do that again, he swore. He'd stop drinking the rum. I was right, it was the rum for sure, he agreed. He said for now on, he'd only drink beer.

      For him, that was something.

      I forgave him.

      That night, right before I went to sleep, I opened up my hope chest, slipped in a paper. It read, “I wish Joey would stop drinking.”

      But even as I closed my trunk, I knew he wouldn't. I knew he wouldn't because of what he'd said, about the drinking and smoking weed getting him through. I knew there was something eating away at him, gnawing bit by bit at his soul.

      I just didn't know what it was.

      The smell of pancakes wafts through our kitchen as Mom stacks them up. Dad blink, blinks at me. I stare away, at an orange teapot, complete with little pockmarks all over it, just like a real orange. Whoever made it must've pecked away at the orange with a mini-spear or something.

      You have to give those teapot sculptors credit.

      They're good.

      I drift back to a third memory. Last Saturday, two weeks after the incident on the bridge. Joey and I had seen each other every day since I'd forgiven him, but it had taken me a while to feel comfortable letting him touch me. He respected me, he tried nothing. He was just happy to be with me. Finally, on Thursday I let him hold my hand again. I slipped it to him while we were walking back to my house, and it was there again—that magic. It was like nothing had happened, nothing had changed between us. That made me relax completely, and I asked if he'd like to take the train into Manhattan on Saturday. He said sure, although his enthusiasm dampened when I suggested we go to the Met—the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I explained to him. Apparently he was not a huge art connoisseur. Still, we went.

      It turned out that Joey had never been to a museum, except in the first grade, when he went on a class trip to the dinosaur rooms at the Museum of Natural History. That blew my mind. I'd lived most of my life just a few blocks from the Met, and had gone there almost weekly. So I took him around, showed him the Egyptian exhibit and tomb, and the medieval section with all the thick suits of armor. He was amazed; he hadn't even known these things existed anywhere, least of all thirty miles from home.

      Then I took him upstairs, to the paintings.

      To my favorite place in the museum, and possibly in the world.

      To the Monet room, a place where you could actually be among some of the finest works of Claude Monet, who was in my opinion the greatest of the Impressionist painters. Monet was infatuated with gardens and water and often depicted both. He created stunning pastel-colored, dream-like portraits of nature.

      This room is my sanctuary.

      We circled the room slowly, weaving through people, taking everything in.

      The last painting was my favorite. Bursts of lavender water lilies floating on an ethereal pond. I turned to tell Joey how much I loved it, but stopped when I saw his face. I didn't have to tell him—he felt the same way. He was mesmerized, steeped in thought. It was as though he was trying to figure out how to enter the painting. Or maybe, somehow, he had.

      After a while he turned to me, smiled that little smile.

      “Thanks,” he said.

      I took his hand, led him to the bench in the center of the room. Surrounded by beauty, we sat.

      We sat crooked, his denim-covered knees touching mine in grey tights. I felt this tingling through my legs and I inched closer into him, into his arms.

      God, I felt so safe in those arms.

      So, so safe.

      Then he kissed me.

      There were all these people milling around the exhibit and then just like that there weren't. They evaporated, they melted into the air. It was just us, then. Just us left, and the water.

      Us in the water, kissing softly.

      He held me tight, like he was my vessel guiding me across.

      I melted then, too, but not all of me. Just the hardness, the coating over my everyday life. I didn't need its security, because I had Joey. It vaporized—poof!—and I was free to be me.

      I realized then, as I reveled in my freedom, that the covering I'd been sheathed in hadn't been shelter, not anymore. It had started that way, but it became a pall, obscuring me. A facade—a camouflage of who I was supposed to be, but wasn't. It was the personification of everyone's expectations.

      Everyone except Joey. He's the only one who didn't expect, or assume. He gave me room to breathe.

      My shell had gone from protection to prison, and I hadn't even noticed. I'd been locked inside—safe, but alone. I'd spent so much time being who Mom and Dad wanted me to be that I'd never gotten to explore who I truly was. I just didn't know it until now.

      In my sanctuary, kissing Joey, I knew it was safe.

      Finally, it was safe to be me.

      Mom's finished cooking and we're all at the table. She and Dad both blink at me now, waiting patiently like good little therapists for my answer to the question she asked ages ago, and which she's just repeated: How's everything going with Joey?

      Isn't my session over yet?

      This is what it's like now, at my house. This is what it's come to. Meet the shrinks. If they'd just be my parents again, I'd spill it all out.

      I'd ask for help in reconciling the two Joeys. The one that's headed for prison, or worse—and the other, who set me free.

      “Fine,” I say. Our pancakes are in plates in front of us, losing steam. “Everything's going great. Pass the syrup, please.”

Joey

      Snap.

Crackle.

Pop.

      Me, Jimmy and Warren

crunch

cereal. We're playing

the

game

looking at the

sunny yellow wallpaper

looking at the white light on the

ceiling looking at the bananas and the

oranges and the red and green

apples in the bowl in the middle

of the table looking

everywhere

except

at them.

      Pop's jabbing his finger at Mom,

he pokes

into her arm,

he yells she's a worthless

bitch.

My

head

feels like it's gonna

pop

right off my neck, it's gonna

burst

wide open

like a sledgehammered

watermelon—

shimmering crimson

gunk splattered

over green linoleum and

bright

sun.

      Jimmy crunches away he chews on he doesn't give a

shit let ‘em kill each other that's what he thinks.

I think that's a good excuse not to help her but

what's

mine?

      But it's not my

job

to save my

mom

is it?

Aren't I the

kid?

Is it my

fault

she chooses to stay with

this

prick

she married?

Once

I asked her if she

knew

before.

I asked her if she knew what he

was

when they were

dating.

She said she didn't. She said he was just

old

school

Irish

Catholic.

She said he wanted a housewife to

cook and

clean

and she didn't wanna work anyway she wanted someone

solid

to support

her.

Yeah, he was solid alright he packs a nice

solid

punch

don't he?

I asked her why she

stays.

She said she stays for us for

me

and Jimmy and

Warren.

And for a while after that

conversation

she was my

hero

she was my

home

warrior

keeping the family

whole.

But then it came to me what a load of

shit

that was. She don't stay for

me

and my

brothers she stays for

her.

She stays ‘cause it's easier than

going

than taking care of

herself and not knowing what's out there in the

cold

dark

world.

She's got no one else to count on that's for

sure.

Back when

Pop

started being

Pop

she went to her mother and tried

telling her it wasn't

working

out.

My grandmother she's not the

sympathetic

type.

She told my mom: You made your own bed,

enough

said.

      Grandma stopped visiting when I was

little after

Pop

told her to eff off one time.

But I think she was glad to be done with

us

anyway to leave us with the

mess

Mom

chose.

Grandma wasn't exactly overflowing with

warmth.

Touching her was like getting a

brain

freeze in your

body.

The really funny thing is that out of them three