The Heaven of Animals: Stories (6 page)

“What I mean is, I know all about people feeling sorry. I know how it feels, and it sucks. I try not to feel sorry for anyone, and I
definitely
don’t feel sorry for you. Even if you’re old.”

“Thanks.”

“And can’t swim.”

Brig laughed. “You’re a trip, you know that?”

It was what his dad would have said. When Brig, as a child, did something goofy or precocious or unexpectedly kind, his father would run a hand over his hair—not ruffling it, just a stroke, crown to eyebrows, like petting a dog. “You’re a trip,” he’d say.

The last time he’d seen his father, the man had come to watch him pack.

“I won’t help,” he said.

“I’m not asking you to,” Brig said.

“You’re making a mistake,” he said, and, when Kate walked into the room, he added, “both of you. You’re both making a big, giant mistake.”

But Brig had heard that before. Leaving the church had been a
big, giant mistake,
along with marrying Kate, a Methodist. Not having kids right away had been a big, giant mistake, then not having kids at all. His father hadn’t been quick to pronounce Brig’s whole life a big, giant mistake, but maybe, if he did, he’d be right. Thirty years down, who knew how many to go, and still Brig had no partner, no profession, no place to call home.

Fuck, but he had to quit this line of thinking. The only thing worse than having someone feel sorry for you was feeling sorry for yourself—not exactly a profound sentiment, but sometimes the truth wasn’t.

Brig’s toes scraped the bottom, and then he was standing. He let go and waded to where Lily sat on the wall. He didn’t want to try lifting himself out, flopping like a doomed fish in front of her, so he used the stairs. He joined her on deck, feet in the water. He ignored the wet press of his khakis, boxers blue beneath. He gave Lily space, a few arm lengths between them.

Lily was watching the water. “Tell me something else that’s true,” she said.

“I’m divorced,” he said. It shot out, a spring-loaded snake from one of those trick cans labeled
NUTS
.

“How long?”

“Years.”

“What happened?”

“I forgot how to be happy,” he said. But that wasn’t quite it. With Kate, he’d only forgotten how to fake it.

As for happiness, true happiness,
unadulterated
happiness—he tried thinking back to when he’d last been happy, but all he came up with was his father’s hand on his head. The world had been so orderly then. Heaven and hell and a surefire way to trade one for the other. He’d had all the answers, the keys to kingdom—kingdoms, three of them. Outer Darkness yawned at his heels, but he’d never tip back, not unless he rejected what he knew. And then he rejected what he knew. Better never to have known than to know and let go—that was unpardonable. That was the unforgivable sin.

He’d tried to find his way back, but if belief is an uphill battle, believing again is a war, musket fire and bayonets grooved for blood.

What did Brig believe now, poolside in wet pants on a night with no moon? He believed whatever he felt. Moment to moment, he was sure he could walk this girl to his room just as he was sure that he couldn’t. Was sure he would find the runaway cat, and sure the cat was dead already. Sure that, one day, phone in his fist, Kate’s voice would bloom, a rhododendron in his ear, and sure, so sure, that she was gone for good.

“You still love her?”

Brig breathed in, breathed out. “I think answering that question would require another joint.”

Lily laughed.

“Your turn,” he said.

“You want me to say what you’ve already guessed?”

“No date?”

“No date.”

“Sucks,” he said.

“Yup,” she said.

They were quiet awhile. A light came on in one window then went out again.

“Tell me something else,” he said.

She kicked her feet underwater, and the surface mushroomed in little burbs.

“One time,” she said, “changing classes, it unsnapped, just . . . fell off. Swim team’s one thing, but
school
? It was like I’d rolled a grenade down the hall. One girl screamed so loud, I swear the lockers shook. Everyone got out of the way. Then everyone tried not to look, they just . . . walked around it, like one of those yellow signs custodians put up when the floors are wet.”

“That’s terrible,” he said.

When she met his eyes, her look was suspicious, unbelieving.

“And I’m sure you would have picked it up.”

“I caught it, didn’t I? I didn’t drop it.”

“That’s true,” she said.

Her feet left the water and her knees met her chin.

“We’re bringing each other down,” she said.

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. Let’s just bring each other up.”

She stood. Inside of a minute, she’d refastened her arm and pulled on her clothes. She wrung water from his shirt and held it out.

She said, “Are you going to show me your place, or what?”

.   .   .

The apartment was small, four hundred square feet, give or take, outfitted with the essentials and little else. The main room was a coffee table, a couch, and a plastic crate overturned with a TV on top. The carpet was worn without being stained. The only thing segregating this room from the next was the kitchen’s linoleum and the narrow, transitional strip of aluminum tacked between. If Lily expected a bachelor pad, posters on the wall and nudie mags in a stack, she’d be disappointed. His was a den of divorce. Half the time on the road, he didn’t require much, and, perpetually broke, he couldn’t have stocked up on much if he did.

“Cozy,” Lily said. Then: “It’s nice.” She ran her hand down one bare wall, beige. All of the walls were that innocuous shade of Band-Aid that put Brig in mind of hospitals or synagogues.

“Can I get you anything to drink?” he said.

“Let’s do shots,” she said.

Air blew cold through the ceiling vents, and Brig moved to his room. He changed into dry clothes, then reappeared with shorts and a shirt for her.

“You’ve done shots before?” he asked.

Lily rolled her eyes and took the clothes from his hands.

When she emerged from the bathroom, her hair was combed. It hung, a wet veil, like black drapes around her face. He’d picked his smallest shirt, an old
X-Men
tee from high school that he’d never summoned the heart to throw out. It was a medium, and still it hung nearly to her knees, sleeves at her elbows. Wolverine leapt from the center, claws out. The fake arm gleamed, a tan, creamy plastic in the lamplight. Behind Lily, through the open door, a bra and panties hung from the shower rod, shorts and sweatshirt balled on the floor.

He thought to retrieve his own clothes, tossed, water soaking into his bedroom carpet, but there was some momentum to be accounted for, and he didn’t want to lose it.

“Tequila okay?”

“Great,” she said, which was good. It was all he had, tequila and PBRs, a case in the fridge and two more in the closet.

He searched the cabinets for a shot glass. He thought he’d had one once, but there was no telling. Finally, he pulled down a pair of mugs. One was yellow, a smiley face on its side. The other, white with brown stenciling along the lip, was an old Waffle House coffee cup, something a friend had stolen for him as a joke. Somewhere was the complete place setting: dish, cup, and saucer, fork and knife. He filled the mugs a quarter full with tequila and walked them along with a saltshaker to the coffee table. He returned to the kitchen and opened the fridge. On a shelf between an expired half gallon of skim and something in Tupperware leaned a lime of questionable integrity, rind chalky and soft. He cut it up anyway, then carried a pair of wedges to the couch.

Lily was seated, and he sat beside her.
Pharmaceutical Representative,
the industry’s trade journal, lay in her lap, pages open to a Samsonite ad.

“Which one do you have?” she asked.

“Those are three-hundred-dollar bags,” he said. “Mine’s over there.”

In the corner stood his suitcase, black and tan, his only piece from a matching set. The suitcase had a retractable handle and two wheels but lacked the lightweight frame people had these days, the four wheels that swiveled and turned on a dime. The set had been a present from Kate’s parents, a wedding gift as practical as they were. They’d tried saving the marriage, her parents, offering to pay for fertility treatments or pay off debts, anything they thought might be wrong. When the dilemma proved ineffable, they offered money for a marriage counselor. But Kate’s mind was made up. Brig wondered whether her parents knew the way it had gone down, or whether they blamed him, whether they assumed he’d left their little girl. He wanted them to have the whole story. He didn’t know why, but he wanted that.

Lily tossed
Pharm Rep
onto the coffee table and held out her hand. He tapped salt onto her skin, then tapped some onto his own.

“You first,” she said, which should have been his first clue. He licked the salt, took the shot, bit the lime. The liquor was cheap. It scalded his throat going down, then churned, syrupy and lava-hot, in his gut. He handed Lily the smiley face mug.

“Count me down?” she said, and Brig did.

On three, Lily licked her hand and downed the tequila, but she didn’t make it to the lime. She was coughing too hard, flapping her hand in front of her face, eyes watering.

“Oh my God,” she said. “Oh my God.”

“The lime gets the taste out of your mouth,” he said, but she waved him off.

“I thought it would taste like a margarita.”

She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. She rubbed her shoulder. He wondered whether the arm ever itched or burned. One late-night documentary had taught him about amputees and the phantom limb pains they sometimes got.

“You know how I promised to tell you if you were staring?” Lily said.

He nodded.

“You’re staring.”

He apologized. He took the mug from her hand and finished the shot. More throat scouring, more burn.

Lily said nothing. Her unused lime segment sat on the table, and she touched it with one finger. It rocked back and forth, a little green boat.

“What are we doing here?” he said.

“How do you mean?” She scooted closer so that their legs touched, and Brig stood.

“Enough,” he said. “This is getting weird. Can I just come right out and say that this is getting weird?”

“This got weird an hour ago,” she said.

“And whose fault is that? Who took off her clothes? Who got me high?”

Lily laughed. She stood and Wolverine stood with her.

“I’m five foot four with one arm. You really think I could get you to do anything you didn’t want to?”

She moved to him, pressed the full length of herself against him, hard, and put her lips to his neck. She didn’t kiss him, just let her lips lie there, soft, warm worms on his skin. Then she pulled away and pulled his hand with her to the bedroom.

.   .   .

A year, he’d waited for Kate’s call.

“Call me when you get there,” she’d said. “Just so I know you’re safe.”

He’d waited a month, then called. He got the machine with his voice still on it, and he left a message. Maybe he’d waited too long. Maybe, waiting, he’d hurt her feelings. But he’d been afraid to call without good news. Because, if he called with good news—proof he could get a job, hold it down, contribute to society and all that—maybe he could make her see he’d change, that, short of being the kind of happy she wanted him to be, he could at least be useful.

He left her his new number and the address to his apartment. He told her what he’d been up to, told her work was good—a lie—and the city was safe—another lie. He told her how, just that morning, a quail had crossed the parking lot, identical brood trailing her like the miniature middles of a Russian nesting doll. Kate loved nesting dolls, had kept a dozen on the mantel in their home. He talked until he heard a beep, then called back and picked up where he’d left off. He told her everything he could think to say except that he missed her, which he did, terribly.

“Call me,” he said at the end.

He waited another month, then, worried she’d missed the first messages, called again. This time, the voice on the machine was hers. She was going by her maiden name, and the new outgoing message was no-nonsense.
Leave your name and number, and I’ll call you back,
it said like a reprimand.

He gave her his information again, then he gave her more news. He’d gotten a raise, he said—big lie. There was a chance he might be transferred to Atlanta—big, giant lie. He said he missed her, that he should have told her that the last time he called. Anyway, he wanted her to know just how much he missed her, how he didn’t care for this arrangement, how, before a year was up and the divorce became final, they might consider other options available to them. Could she call him? Please? And soon?

A year went by.

He called, left his message at the beep. If he could just have a minute of her time. All he really wanted was to say that he was sorry. He was so sorry, and, even if what they’d shared wasn’t happiness, exactly, then at least it was something familiar and good, certainly better than what he had now, which was nothing. Maybe, if it wasn’t too much to ask, maybe she would take him back and everything could return to the way it had been.
Better
than the way it had been. He would try harder, no matter what trying harder meant. He would work. He would take her places. He would listen when she talked. He really would try this time, if only she’d give him the chance. If it wasn’t too much to ask.

The next week, the papers arrived.

He didn’t sign them. By now, he knew enough to know it was over. He only wanted to talk to her. He thought, if he held back on the signing, she’d be forced to call, but the only calls that came were from her lawyer, then his.

He signed.

“Now leave her alone,” his lawyer said. “Don’t call. Don’t write. Don’t give her reason to request a restraining order.”

This seemed, to Brig, excessive. Had he missed something? Was this necessary? Restraint? Restraint from what? Brig had never raised a hand to her. He’d never raised his
voice
. He’d seldom raised his ass from the couch, and
that
had been the problem. But he’d outgrown that. A year in the desert, and he was a new man. He hoped he was.