The Perfect Son (27 page)

THIRTY-ONE

Felix used to brag to Saint John that spring in North Carolina began on February 1. Not this year. February 8, and record lows had kept the furnace rattling all night. The weather was moving backward into the grip of full-blown winter. The house was definitely not constructed for such temperatures. Since the panic attack, Ella had complained endlessly of being cold, and Felix had bought several space heaters. The master bedroom was now stuffier than a National Health Service waiting room in a heat wave, and still, she couldn’t get warm.

The humidifier made some strange gurgling noise and struggled to disperse moisture into the brittle atmosphere of the house. Felix snapped the new elastic band around his wrist and returned to his Dear Robert letter.

A week had passed since the Life Plan deal had gone through. It was time to step down from the partnership and offer to train Curt, and Felix wanted everything in writing. After ten years of partnership, he didn’t trust his soon-to-be-ex partner. Nor did he trust Curt. Quitting in the summer was still plan A, part B, but that was a secret shared only with Katherine.

Ella coughed and appeared in the hall wearing her fuzzy gray slippers, yoga pants, and a ratty old cardigan he didn’t recognize. She tucked the cardigan under one arm, then the other; it resembled a huge chest bandage.

“What are you doing out of bed?” Felix closed his laptop and jumped down from the kitchen stool. The wood floor was cold under his bare feet.

Ella smiled. Her face was gray; the roots of her hair were gray; she matched the gray Saturday morning sky beyond the sliding doors. “I thought I’d try moving around.” She caught her breath. “Prove to Harry I’m not a sloth.” She reached for the doorjamb.

“Ella, please, you’re doing too much.” Taking her elbow, he guided her back to bed. “Did you use the sleeping pill last night?”

“Yes, Papa Bear.” She paused, her breathing still whistling as if she had asthma. “I am now the good patient who takes every pill known to womankind.”

Felix was firmly of the belief that sleep deprivation had been a contributing factor in the panic attack. After she came home the first time, Ella had catnapped during the day and slept poorly at night. Dr. Beaubridge had prescribed sleeping pills, which she’d refused to take: “Because I wake up with my heart pounding, Felix. I wake up terrified and have to relive it all.”

But sleep deprivation could be dealt with, could be fixed. Could be cured. This was a positive step involving forward motion. And now they were tackling the depression. It was early days for the antidepressant, and yet Ella seemed less adrift.

“Morning, Mom! Morning, Dad!” Harry skidded into their bedroom doorway. “Shall I make everyone french toast?”

“Lovely. Thank you.” Ella’s smile wavered.

“Dad?” Harry looked hopeful.

“Yes. Thank you.”

Felix had eaten breakfast—brain food to help compose the letter—but Harry needed to feel useful. Felix had discovered this about his son. Besides, he could always skip lunch and squeeze in twenty minutes on the treadmill.

“I’ll bring you a tray, Mom!”

“How about I do that, Harry?” Felix said as he watched Harry trip over nothing.

Two hours later, Felix was scrubbing the griddle that Harry had supposedly cleaned. Why, oh why, had he let Harry cook? Simple. Concern for his son’s emotional well-being. He’d squeezed in an emergency appointment for Harry with the child psychologist after the panic attack, and everything had seemed fine. But you never knew. The young brain had a way of assuming guilt.

It was hard to say which came first—the doorbell or the sound of the front door opening. His house was no longer his castle.

“Yoo-hoo. Anybody home?” Eudora entered, followed by Katherine, who was carrying a huge Moses basket.

“Good morning, ladies.” He wiped his forehead with his arm, brushing back his hair. Ella had told him she liked it longer, that it made him look younger, sexier. He wasn’t convinced it was anything but untamed and irritating. “Did I miss something?”

“You and Harry are having the college talk today, right?” Katherine said.

His phone, buried in his jeans pocket, buzzed with a reminder.

“It appears so,” Felix said. How had he forgotten?

“Well, hon, since Harry believes talking about college caused the panic attack, we thought we’d keep Ella occupied with a girls’ day. English and southern style!”

Katherine dove into her huge wicker basket and held up two DVDs. “
Love Actually
and
Notting Hill
,” she said.

Eudora rootled around in the basket, too. “Plus
Fried Green Tomatoes
and
Steel Magnolias
.”

“Also, popcorn,” Katherine said.

“Two bags, since I can’t bear anyone picking at my popcorn. And this.” Eudora pulled out a bottle of champagne.

“What’s that for?” Felix said.

“The best reason of all, son. To celebrate life.”

Harry came rushing in. “Hi, Katherine! Hi, Eudora! Dad, when we’re finished with the college powwow, can Sammie come over?”

Felix glanced up at the ceiling. His quiet, secluded hiding place was suddenly bursting with women and busier than Clapham Junction.

“Why not?” he said, too exhausted for argument.

Harry rocketed off toward his bedroom, and after five minutes, rocketed back. They settled at the dining room table—Harry with a glass of milk and a six-pack of Krispy Kreme Original Glazed Doughnuts and Felix with a mug of black Earl Grey. Harry twitched through a concerto of tics, then devoured a doughnut. Felix lined up his legal pad and two pens—one black, one red.

“We’ll start with a list of your top ten choices and go from there.”

Harry turned beetroot.

“What?”

“I’d like to discuss an idea. I mean, a proposal. About college visits.” Harry reached for another doughnut but pulled back.

Felix crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m all ears.”

“Max and I have been doing some research,” Harry said. “Brandeis—you know Brandeis, up near Boston?”

Felix nodded.

“Brandeis has an open house in two weeks, and we’d like to go. By ourselves.”

Felix bolted upright into a coughing fit. “The two of you want to fly to Boston? A-
lone
?”

“Yup.” Harry clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

“You can’t possibly expect me to agree.”

“Why not?”

“A thousand answers, most of which hinge on two facts: you’re phobic about flying, and you’ve never flown without your mother. What happens if you freak out and some airline employee assumes you’re a terrorist?”

“Look at me, Dad.” Harry’s fingers strummed the air. “I’m a blond American teenager. No one could mistake me for a suicide bomber.”

“Need I remind you about that appalling airline woman who wanted to call security because you were ticcing? What if something happens that’s out of your control? Suppose the flight gets delayed or diverted?”

“Then I’d have to deal with it.” Harry rocked back and forth in his chair. Felix put out a hand to stop him before he snapped the chair legs in half.

“You guys want me to be more independent, tackle my future, right? Then you have to give me the space to try.” Harry fired a manic smile. “And let’s face it, at some point I have to take my show on the road. If it makes you feel better, I’ll type up little cards I can hand out to people on the plane that say, ‘No, I’m not an escaped lunatic, I have Tourette syndrome.’”

“Let me get this right. You want to go on your first college visit alone. Even though you have no clue what to ask or what to look for?”

“How hard can it be, Dad? I listen, I ask questions. I like a place, I don’t. After talking with Sammie, I’ve decided to investigate small liberal arts colleges. She’s the one who suggested Brandeis.”

“I will not fund any college decision based on where your girlfriend is going.” Felix began tugging pills off his black cashmere sweater.

Harry clicked his tongue again. “I’m not asking you to. She wants to go to NC State, but she suggested I look at small liberal arts colleges. I think she’s right.”

Felix’s lower leg swung back and forth, back and forth. He stopped when he accidentally kicked the table. “And what about Ivy Leagues?”

A part of him doubted he should even push for Ivy Leagues anymore. Could Harry cope with the pressure? Could Ella? But if you didn’t aim for the top, didn’t push yourself to be the best, what did you have except unfulfilled potential? And what kind of a father didn’t want the best for his son?

“The way I see it”—Harry snarfed down another doughnut and continued to multitask through chewing and talking in a most unpleasant manner—“if I can’t get on a plane without Mom, then considering
any
out-of-state college is pointless. And I’m not talking Russia. Boston’s a plane ride away, and there are direct flights. I checked. And doesn’t Mom’s old roommate live in Boston? We could stay with her.”

“I see you’ve done your research.”

“If I can do this one college visit with Max, an easy trip with a direct flight, it could give me the confidence to think bigger.” Harry’s voice was high and slightly squeaky, a sign he was overstimulated. “Harvard bigger.”

Felix paused before answering. “Do you honestly think you can do this, Harry?”

“Do
you
think I can do this?” Harry stared at Felix, his chest heaving and his eyelids blinking in rapid fire.

“Yes. I think you can. But here’s the deal—if you take the trip with Max, you agree to a weeklong college tour with me over spring break. It’s going to be in the Northeast, and it’s going to include Harvard.”

“Really?” Harry beamed as if he were standing on a winner’s podium with a gold medal. “Rad! Thanks, Dad, thanks.” Harry shot up and spun in different directions. “I’ve got to go call Max, I’ve got to—”

“Harry, please sit down so we can finish this conversation.”

“Yeah, sorry, Dad. I’m just, you know.” Harry grimaced and blinked, grimaced and blinked. “Excited.”

Not a sentiment Felix shared. This was going to be expensive and probably a complete waste of time. On the other hand, Harry had used convincing logic. He did need to learn independence. Also, this would be a good test, a dry run before the real college tour over spring break. Although he had yet to raise the issue of a week’s absence with Robert. Would it be easier or harder to negotiate vacation time as a worker bee, not a partner?

“Sit down and help me create a budget and a to-do list.”

Harry squirmed and cracked his knuckles. Felix and Ella never discussed money in front of Harry, but he needed to man up and learn how to budget. The thought left Felix nauseated.

“Let’s start with Max’s home phone number so I can coordinate booking flights with his parents.”

Harry gulped loudly. “Couldn’t you just book the tickets and ask them to reimburse you?”

“No. I prefer to keep the finances separate.”

Harry gnawed on his thumb.

“I promise to be on my best upper-class Brit behavior,” Felix said. “How’s that?”

“’Kay.”

“Let’s assume the two of you can stay with your mother’s old roommate. That will help keep the cost down.”

Harry nodded.

“Do you know how to draw up a budget?”

Harry shook his head.

“It’s a simple math problem that involves listing income and expenses, and then balancing the two. Since income is irrelevant here, we’ll list your expenses, and it will be up to you to stay on target.” Felix smoothed down the first page on his pad and wrote
Harry’s trip
. “What’s the date of the open house?”

“February twenty-seventh.”

“I’ll call the admissions office and sign both of you up for the tour.”

“Great. That’s great, Dad. Will you be okay—I mean, you and Mom, here by yourselves? If something should happen—”

“Nothing’s going to happen.”

The concern was surprising and sweet. But sweet could only carry you so far. Sweet also meant others could take advantage of you. Was sending Harry out into the world by sanctioning this trip a horrible mistake?

“Dad, there’s a problem.”

“Only one?”

“How are we going to tell Mom? I mean, I’m sort of terrified to tell her anything that isn’t ‘I’m fine, school is fine, Sammie’s fine.’ Will she freak out—about me going on a plane by myself, although I won’t be by myself because I’ll have Max and she knows I’m not nearly as anxious if Max is with me?”

“I have no idea, Harry. I’m making everything up as I go along.”

“Does she know about you stepping down from the partnership?”

“No.” Felix wasn’t entirely sure why he’d told Harry about this when Ella was back in hospital, but after the panic attack he’d been more worried about Harry than Ella. Felix had wanted—needed—Harry to know that their lives would not spin out of control, that Felix wouldn’t let things get worse.

Someone turned up the volume on the movie in the bedroom. Music played and Eudora giggled. Katherine joined in. Felix didn’t hear Ella laugh.

“Why are we keeping stuff from her, Dad?”

Felix slumped back in his chair. “Because we’re trying to protect her?”

“Like she always protected us,” Harry said quietly.