The Lost Boys Symphony (26 page)

But first, he needed to quiet himself. He focused on individual houses as he walked down Hamilton, tried to erase his recollection of them and instead just
see
them as they really were. The sky was a smoky shade of white but still bright, the clouds kindly diffusing the sunshine instead of blocking it out. It was a beautiful winter day. Lucidity came slowly, but soon Gabe felt almost normal again. He began to rehearse what he would say to Val, and that task took him the rest of the way home.

There was a man on the porch.

Gabe stopped at the bottom of the steps. The man was sleeping in one of the camping chairs, his chin on his chest. Gabe ascended a few steps to get a better look. It was Henry, but he had thick, short hair. It was ruffled and pushed up in a way that was either purposely boyish or completely accidental, and on his face grew the beginnings of a beard. Had he cut his hair to rendezvous with Val? Gabe couldn’t picture this Henry being so vain, but he couldn’t be sure. He knew nothing about the man sleeping on his porch aside from what he
used
to be, and that was almost like knowing nothing at all. Then still, as always, it was possible that this Henry was a figment, an apparition that was now mocking Gabe, mirroring his own cleanly shorn head or simply showing Gabe what he wanted to see.

Gabe charged up the steps and roared. Henry awoke, confused, and Gabe grasped his shirt with both hands, pulled him up out of the chair. Then he hesitated. He had no plan. A few seconds before he could have strategized, thought it through, but his rage hadn’t allowed him to wait. He’d never been in a real fight before, and having just instigated one, his options were limited. Henry began to fight back. Their hands wrestled awkwardly, they shoved each other, Gabe grunted, Henry just kept saying
Gabe! Gabe! Gabe!
over and over again, and when that failed to slow Gabe’s pathetic onslaught, Henry laughed, tore Gabe’s hands from his shirt, and spun him around by his wrists. Gabe struggled, tried to use the heel of his foot to scrape down Henry’s shin, but he couldn’t get any real purchase and ended up just stepping on Henry’s foot.

“Ow.” Henry laughed. “Calm down.”

“You fucked her?”

“I said calm the fuck down!”

“I’ll throw you off this fucking porch.”

It was a mistake to have given Henry the idea. Gabe felt himself rise and kicked his feet in the air, tried to push back against the railing. But Henry quickly swung all of their combined weight forward and let go. Gabe’s foot caught the wrought iron and his body spun as he descended into the low shrubs just in front of the house. He felt the branches poking and scraping, and then he landed on the small patch of grass between the bushes and the sidewalk.

For just a few seconds, everything was blank. Gabe forgot to remember why he’d been fighting, who he was fighting, Val’s pregnancy, everything. There was only the pain in his body. He held his breath.

The quiet of the street seemed to amplify the sound of Henry’s laughter.

“Fuck,” said Gabe. “My fucking leg.” He rubbed his hip and thigh with both hands.

“Calm down now,” said Henry.

Gabe looked up. “Fuck you.”

“Are you okay?”

“Fuck you!” yelled Gabe. He could feel tears gathering in the dark space behind his eyes and nose. He fought them back and hissed through his teeth as he sat up. “Why are you doing this to me? You told me I should be with her, you acted like it’s what you want or like it’s meant to be or something, and I actually believed you. And then you…you
fuck her?
Why? Why would you do that?”

“I could ask the same of—”

“It’s different!” said Gabe. He tore a fistful of grass from the ground and threw it at Henry, but it only made it as far as the bushes. “Don’t even try to compare this to what I did. Because you left. You went fucking crazy and left me here alone and she was the only person in the world that ever gave a shit about me besides you. Of course we started talking, of course we started seeing each other. There was nobody else, all right? Can’t you see that? You’re not like other people. The three of us? We all had something that nobody else could ever understand. Val and I got physical, but it wasn’t because we didn’t care about you. It’s fucking different, all right? But you—you come here and manipulate me, infect me with some sickness that I don’t understand. You act like you know me, like you care what’s best for me and then…I mean, the coffee table—what the fuck? And now
this?
There were so many times when I wished you would come back, but now? Just…” Gabe swallowed, shook his head. “Just leave me the fuck alone.”

Throughout Gabe’s outburst Henry had stared down from the porch, his face steely and impenetrable. Now he sat back down, and Gabe’s view of him was obstructed by the floor of the porch and the bulk of the bushes.

“Nothing?” said Gabe.

“I’m sorry,” said Henry.

“Oh, God,” said Gabe, “you’re sorry. Is it yours?”

“I don’t know,” said Henry. “I’d like to think she’s mine, but I’d also like to think she’s not.”

Gabe lay back on the ground and laughed. “
She?
So she’s going to have it, and it’s a girl, and you don’t know whose it is? I don’t believe you.” He stood up and tested the weight of his body on each leg. He was unharmed. Better than that, actually. He felt clearheaded. Still, not wanting to miss a chance to chastise Henry, he limped dramatically toward the stairs and sat down. “You threw me off the porch,” he said.

“I’ll do it again.”

Gabe couldn’t stop himself from smiling. There was the cleansing effect of the fight and the fall, but it wasn’t just that. He and Henry had fought like brothers their whole lives. It was familiar, comforting even, to hear this man goad him the way he always had.

“Just tell me the truth,” said Gabe.

“I said I don’t know. I remember watching her grow up. There’s a lot of you in her. Not the way she looks, necessarily—she has so much of Val—but the way she
is.
And in the past, the one I remember now, I didn’t know it was even a possibility that you
weren’t
her father until—you know. A few weeks ago. But of course I’ve thought about it. The time line. It’s possible.”

“Just
tell me.
” Gabe had meant to sound stern, but all that came was a desperate mewl. “You know things. You have to know things. Just tell me.”

“I’ll always love Val. Somewhere else…she loved me back for a long time. But she always loved you, too. This is how it’s supposed to end. That’s all that matters.”

“So it doesn’t matter if the baby she’s carrying is mine or yours? You can’t actually believe that.”

“I can. I do.”

Gabe looked at Henry. He was more recognizable without the beard. It was comforting.

Henry looked back and smiled. “You always loved her, Gabe. This is what you wanted, and now you get to have it. You’ll take care of that child because you love Val. It’ll be yours because she loves you back.”

“This is all bullshit,” said Gabe. “We’re just supposed to move on after this? After all this?”

Henry smirked.

“You can’t just come into my life and distort everything.” Gabe shook his head. “You can’t fuck Val and make me crazy and act like you’re being noble about it. It’s not fair.”

“I’m not being noble about anything.”

“I don’t want to hear any more,” said Gabe.

Henry stood up from the low canvas chair and stretched his hands high up into the air. “Then I won’t say another word,” he said. He crossed the porch to the stairs and placed his hand on Gabe’s shoulder as he walked down to the sidewalk, where he turned around.

“Don’t show up here anymore,” said Gabe.

“You won’t be seeing me again. Not like this, anyway.”

 “Good,” he said.

“Her name is Annie,” said Henry, and he turned and walked away.

The music had returned—Gabe didn’t know when. It was such a constant presence that it was hard to keep track of its comings and goings. As he watched Henry saunter down the sidewalk toward the center of town, the song swelled to a plodding requiem. Gabe didn’t try to quiet it. Fighting only made him tired. He lifted himself up, got his keys out of his pocket, and entered the house.

Shoes off by the door. Bathroom. Glass of water. Gabe went through the coming-home routine as though his world were not dissolving around him. As if his girlfriend—was she his girlfriend? would she ever be
his
anything again?—as if Val weren’t pregnant, possibly with the baby of a man from another time. As if he were not having aural hallucinations and Henry weren’t still missing somewhere, his future self haunting a depressed pocket of New Jersey like the Ghost of Homeless Future. The water gurgled through the pipes. The floors creaked. The bathroom mirror reflected Gabe’s image just like always. Finally he was sitting on the couch with one hand curled around the remote and the other gripping his phone.

He would call Val soon, but not before he decided how to tell her everything he meant to say.

Sorry.

I’m an asshole.

Forgive me. I’ll come back.

The man you were with, I think I know him.

Maybe we’re both insane.

And then, unbelievably,
You’re keeping the baby. And her name is Annie.

I’m yours now, and you’re mine.

He slipped his thumb over the well-worn power button on the bulky black TV controller, lifted it to get a line of sight between transmitter and receiver. Just before he was about to turn it on and escape for however long he could, he heard something. A muffled snort or a heavy sigh from his bedroom. He set the remote on the couch cushion and placed his glass of water down among the rest of the filth on the coffee table.

He heard it again, right on the other side of the doors. He stood, slid one side open just enough to poke his head in, expecting to find Cal sleeping in the wrong room at this odd hour for some predictably odd reason.

There was a body in the bed, but it wasn’t Cal. He was turned away, a man, his face close to the wall. Gabe opened the door wider so that he could step inside. The man wore unfamiliar but clean clothing. His beard and hair were uncut, probably since the day he’d left his bedroom at the top of the stairs nearly seven months before. Gabe had no problem recognizing this Henry. He was the real Henry, the one who’d been missing, and now, incredibly, he was found.

Henry snored again and it was all Gabe could hear. The music was gone. The house seemed to shrink around him. It was familiar and safe. He was home. He left the bedroom and slid the door closed behind him. He found his phone and looked for Val’s number in his recent calls.

Then, thinking better of it, he opened his contacts menu, and touched Jan’s name. He would talk to Val later. They had the rest of their lives.

I will not save Vanessa Wingerath for last. Thank you for your grace, intelligence, humor, and positivity. I love you more every day. It’s impossible not to.

This book has had many lives. It took ten years to write, but that should not imply that I wrote it for ten years. Mostly I ignored it for eight years and wrote it for two.

It was only after the first meeting of the Escriben Cartel that I started writing every day, so I mean it when I say that this book would not exist without EC. Special thanks are owed to Zachary Marco for starting the group and for being a particular kind of man. I’m no less grateful to Ryan Dodge, Alex Woodson, Sam Ferguson, and Zachary Scheer. Also, to the Monday-night bartender at Tom & Jerry’s in New York: You are a beautiful freak. You may not care, but you are the enigmatic glue that holds the Escriben Cartel together.

Thanks to my former work-spouse Erica Barmash. Even after our marriage ended, your support was ongoing and instrumental. Special thanks to the staff at the Chipotle on Fiftieth between Park and Madison.

Long before I got serious about finishing
The Lost Boys Symphony,
it was Hanna Karsevar who helped me to find this book’s emotional backbone and gave me the confidence required to keep typing.

It’s my opinion that an exceptional high school English teacher is the absolute best thing that can happen to a teenager. I had two. There will always be a John D’Ambra inside my head challenging me to be succinct. There will always be a Mark Wright in my head reminding me to pursue my interests with as much curiosity, vigor, and joy as possible.

Roald Dahl, Kurt Vonnegut, Philip K. Dick, and Paul Auster taught me that books can make you a better, more interesting person.

Mark Vonnegut’s beautiful writing about his own mental illness was invaluable.

To my HarperCollins family: I became an adult while working at 10 East Fifty-Third, and in that time I learned more about the business of books than it’s advisable for a writer to know. I’m especially grateful for all the love I felt when I decided that it was time to leave.

Jean Naggar, Jennifer Weltz, Alice Tasman, Jessica Regel, and Mollie Glick were my first ever real-life bosses and coworkers, and I couldn’t have hoped for better. Alice in particular has been a warm and savvy ally during this publication process. Thanks also to Tara Hart and Laura Biagi.

Jessica Regel gets a new paragraph because she is now my agent. Jessica, thank you. Thank you so much. Your intelligence, level head, and good taste make you the ideal representative and friend. I hope that your obvious and emphatic belief in me will someday be warranted. Thanks as well to everyone at Foundry.

A note to the reader: Wes Miller at Little, Brown is the reason that you finished reading this novel instead of lighting it on fire. Thank you, Wes, for helping me shape this beast of a convoluted story into something resembling a page-turner. You have a fantastic sense of direction and your instincts have taught me to trust my own. Thank you also for suggesting that I cut down on words like
vomit
and
cum
and
masturbate.

Thanks also to Miriam Parker, Carrie Neill, Peggy Freudenthal, Anthony Goff, Megan Fitzpatrick, Nancy Wiese, Tracy Williams, Kapo Ng, Reagan Arthur, and anyone else at Little, Brown who had a hand in bringing this book to market. Alison Kerr Miller copyedited this book and obliterated
many,
many
repetitions and errors. Before, it was just alright. Now it’s all right, except where I insisted that it shouldn’t be.

Others with whom I discussed this book and whose thoughts and positivity are notable include Dan Forst, the incredibly talented and charismatic Julia Weldon, Andy and Analiese Wilcox Marchesseault, Katie Clarke, Jody Avirgan, Brandon Contarsy, Caitlin Clarke, Amanda and Luke McCormick, Brianne Halverson, Joshua Cristantiello, Olivia Wingerath, Tamini Wingerath, Joe Sackett, Leah Wasielewski, Angie Lee, Kathy Schneider, Jonathan Burnham, Matt Calhoun, Christian Larson, Cyriaque Lamar, Mike Milnes, Andy Weeks, Pete Calautti, Scott Farah, Jamie Peterson, Mackenzie Firer-Sherwood, Victoria Loustalot, Charlotte Ross, and Jonathan Janeway.

This book was written using Scrivener, the only software for writers that makes any kind of sense. It was written while listening to Steve Reich, Max Richter, Miles Davis, Brightblack Morning Light, white noise, and Medeski, Martin, and Wood.

Thank you, Megan Clary.

Deep gratitude and love to the artist, poet, and musician Dan Ovadia.

Finally, thanks to everyone in my Ferguson and Wingerath families for their love, humor, and acceptance.