Wife 22 (29 page)

He hasn’t called me Mama in at least a year, maybe two.

“You went swimming,” said William, noting my wet hair. “In your shorts?”

“Without me?” says Zoe.

“I didn’t think you’d want to go. You spent half an hour blow-drying your hair this morning.”

“If you had asked I would have gone,” Zoe sniffs.

“We can swim again after dinner. It will still be light.”

“Let’s go for a hike,” says Peter.

“Now?” I say. “I was thinking I’d take a little nap.”

“We’ve been waiting for you,” says William.

“You have?”

The three of them exchange looks.

“Fine. Great. Let me change and we’ll go.”

“We’re not making enough noise,” says Zoe. “Bears only attack when they’re surprised. Or smell you.
Woo-hoo. Woo-hoo, bear!
”

We’ve been hiking for over forty-five minutes. Forty-five mosquito-slapping, horse-fly-buzzing, children-whining, no-breeze-to-be-found-anywhere minutes.

“I thought this was a loop. Shouldn’t we be back already?” says Peter. “And why didn’t anybody bring a water bottle? Who goes hiking without a water bottle?”

“Run up the trail, Pedro,” I say. “Scout ahead. This is all looking very familiar to me. I’m sure we’re almost at the end. In fact, I think I hear the river.”

This is a lie. I don’t hear anything but droning insects.

Peter takes off and William yells after him, “Not too far ahead! I want you to stay in singing range. That’s the rule.”

“I beg you. Please don’t do this to me,” says Zoe.

“
Right, right, turn off the lights, we’re gonna lose our minds tonight
,” we hear Peter crooning.

Zoe rolls her eyes.

“It’s better than
woo-hoo, bear
,” I tell her.

“Do you really think we’re almost there?” asks William.

“
Party crasher, penny snatcher
.”

“Oh, my God. Is penny snatcher a
you-know-what
?” I ask.

“What?” says William.

“You know. Something you put pennies in? A bank. A slot. A euphemism for—”

He looks at me perplexed.

“A purse?” I whisper.

“Oh my God, mother, a
vagina
, just say it,” says Zoe. “And it’s
panty
snatcher, not penny snatcher.”

“
Call me up if you a gangsta
—” Peter’s voice suddenly breaks off.

We walk for another couple of minutes.

“Is there anything more ridiculous than a twelve-year-old white boy using the word ‘gangsta’?” asks Zoe.

“Zoe, shush!”

“What?”

We all stop and listen.

“I don’t hear anything,” says Zoe.

“Exactly,” I say.

William cups his hands to his mouth and yells, “We asked you to sing!”

Silence.

“Peter!”

Nothing.

William tears down the path, Zoe and me on his heels. We round the corner and find Peter frozen in place, standing not more than five feet away from a mule deer. Now, this is not a run-of-the-mill mule deer. It’s an enormous trophy buck, well over two hundred pounds, antlers as long as baguettes, and he and Peter seem to be engaged in some sort of staring contest.

“Back away slowly,” whispers William to Peter.

“Do mule deer charge?” I whisper to William.

“Slowly,” repeats William.

The buck snorts and takes a few steps toward Peter and I let out a little gasp. Peter looks like he’s under a spell: he has a half-smile on his face. Suddenly I understand what I’m witnessing. It’s a rite of passage. The kind Peter’s gone through hundreds of times in his video games, battling otherworldly creature of all sorts, ogres and sorcerers and woolly mammoths, but rarely does a twenty-first-century boy have such an opportunity in real life—to have actual physical contact with the wild thing; to lock eyes with it. Peter extends his hand as if to touch the buck’s antlers, and his sudden movement seems to wake the buck up and it darts away into the brush.

“That was unbelievable,” says Peter, turning to us, his eyes gleaming. “Did you see him looking at me?”

“You weren’t scared?” breathes Zoe.

“He smelled like grass,” Peter says. “Like rocks.”

William looks at me and shakes his head in wonder.

On the way back, we hike through the woods single-file. Peter leads the way, then Zoe, then me, then William bringing up the rear. Occasionally the setting sun pierces through the trees—magenta, then bright orange. I tip my face up to receive the warmth. The light feels like a benediction.

William reaches for my hand.

I
wake in the middle of the night to the sound of Zoe screaming. William and I bolt up and look at each other.

“It
is
an old wives’ tale,” he says, “isn’t it?”

In the few seconds it takes to untangle ourselves from our sleeping bags and unzip the tent, we hear three more very disconcerting sounds: Peter roaring, the sound of feet pounding across the dirt, and then Peter screaming, too.

“Oh God, oh God, oh God,” I cry. “Hurry up, get out!”

“Give me that flashlight!” yells William.

“What are you going to do with it?”

“I’m going to brain the bear with it, what do you think I’m going to do with it?”

“Make lots of noise. Scream. Wave your arms about,” I say, but William is gone.

I take a few deep breaths, then crawl out after him, and here’s what I see: Zoe in her nightgown and bare feet, brandishing a guitar like a bat. Jude kneeling, his head bowed, as if he’s on the chopping block. Peter sprawled on the ground, and William beside him.

“He’s okay,” William yells to me.

A few people from neighboring campsites have run over and stand on the perimeter of our campsite. All of them are wearing headlamps. They look like miners, except for their pajamas.

“Everything’s okay,” William tells them. “Go back to your tents. We’ve got it under control.”

“What happened!” I shout.

“I’m so sorry, Alice,” says Jude.

“Are you crying, Jude?” asks Zoe, lowering the guitar, her face softening.

“Where’s the bear?” I shout. “Did it run off?”

“No bear,” moans Peter.

“It was Jude,” says Zoe.

“Jude attacked Peter?”

“I just wanted to surprise Zoe,” says Jude. “I wrote her a song.”

I run to Peter’s side. His shirt is rolled up and I see a gash in his stomach. I cover my mouth with my hand.

“Pedro heard me scream and was trying to save me,” says Zoe. “With his marshmallow roasting stick.”

“He was running with it,” says Jude. “It got stuck in the ground.”

“Then he impaled himself,” says Zoe.

“Screw you,” groans Peter. “I fell on my sword for you.”

“There’s hardly any blood. That’s not good,” says William, shining the flashlight on the wound.

“What’s that yellow stuff that’s curling out?” I ask. “Pus?”

“I think it’s fat,” says William.

Peter squeals.

“That’s okay, that’s fine, nothing to worry about,” I say, trying to sound like fat poking out of a wound is an ordinary thing. “Everybody has fat.”

“It means it’s pretty deep, Alice,” whispers William. “He’s going to need stitches. We need to bring him to the ER.”

“I just saw that movie
Say Anything
with John Cusack and I got inspired,” explains Jude.

“ ‘In Your Eyes
.
’ I love Peter Gabriel,” grunts Peter. “Your song better be worth it.”

“You wrote me a song?” asks Zoe.

“Is that your car, Jude?” asks William, referring to the Toyota parked in front of our campsite.

Jude nods.

William helps Peter to his feet. “Let’s go, you’re driving. Peter can stretch out in the backseat. Alice, you and Zoe follow in our car.”

“You’re driving like a crazy person. You don’t have to tailgate them,” snaps Zoe.

“Did you know Jude was coming?”

“No! Of course not.”

“Who were you texting on the way down here?”

Zoe crosses her arms and looks out the window.

“What’s going on between the two of you?”

“Nothing.”

“And ‘nothing’ is why he drove four hundred miles in the middle of the night to serenade you?”

Even though I’m furious at Jude—why couldn’t he have made his surprise appearance in daylight?—I think what he did was incredibly romantic. I loved
Say Anything.
Especially the iconic scene where John Cusack is standing on his car holding up his boom box in that trench coat with the huge shoulder pads—
I see the doorway to a thousand churches in your eyes
. Eleven words that pretty much sum up what it was like to be a teenager in the 1980s.

“It’s not my fault he keeps stalking me.”

“He wrote you a song, Zoe.”

“Not my fault either.”

“I saw the way you were looking at him. Obviously you still have feelings for him. Finally!” I say as we drive off the dirt onto a paved road and Jude picks up speed.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” says Zoe, covering her face with her arm.

We drive down an empty road, past meadows and fields. The moon looks like it’s sitting on a fence post.

“Where the hell is the hospital!” I cry after ten minutes. Finally on my right I see a set of buildings, ablaze in lights.

The parking lot is practically deserted. I say a silent prayer of thanks that we’re in the middle of nowhere. If this were Children’s Hospital in Oakland, we’d be waiting five hours to be seen.

I forgot about stitches. Actually, I forgot about the lidocaine shots that come before the actual stitches.

“You may want to look the other way,” suggests the ER doc, the needle in his hand.

Whenever we watch movies or TV that has any bit of sex in it, Peter asks me, “Should I look away?” Depending on the content, if it’s just rolling
around on the bed fully clothed or kissing or a little bit of dry humping, I tell him no. If there’s any sign body parts might be making an appearance, I tell him yes. I know he’s seen breasts on the Internet, but he hasn’t seen them with his mother sitting beside him on the couch. I don’t know who would be more uncomfortable in that situation—him or me. He’s not ready. He’s not ready to see himself get injected with lidocaine, either.

“Look away,” I say to Peter.

“I was talking to you, actually,” says the doctor.

“I don’t have a problem with needles,” I say.

Peter has a death grip on my hand. “I’m going to distract myself now. By having a meaningless conversation with you.”

His eyes stare intently into mine, but my eyes skitter involuntarily toward the needle.

“Mom, I have something to tell you and it may come as a surprise.”

“Uh-huh,” I say, watching the doctor begin to make injections all around the wound.

“I’m straight.”

“That’s good, honey,” I say, as the doctor now begins to inject the lidocaine
inside
the wound.

“You’re doing great, Peter,” says the doctor. “Almost done.”

“Mrs. Buckle,” says the doctor. “Are you okay?”

I feel dizzy. I grab onto the side of the bed.

“This always happens,” says the doctor to William. “We tell the parents not to look but they can’t help it—they look. I had a father in here the other day who suddenly collapsed when I was stitching up his daughter’s lip. Pitched right over. Big guy. Two hundred pounds. Chipped three teeth.”

“Let’s go, Alice,” says William, taking my elbow.

“Mom, did you hear me?”

“Yes, sweetheart, you’re straight.”

William forces me to my feet.

“Your son is straight. And would you please stop shaking?” I say to William. “It’s making me nauseous.”

“I’m not shaking,” says William, holding me up. “You are.”

“There’s a gurney out in the hallway,” says the doctor.

Those are the last words I hear before I faint.

T
he next day, after a six-hour drive home (two of those hours being stuck in stop-and-go traffic), I go straight upstairs to bed. I’m exhausted.

Zoe and Peter follow me into my room. Peter hurls himself onto the bed next to me, fluffs a pillow, and grabs the remote. “Netflix?” he says.

Zoe looks at me with concern.

“What’s wrong?” I ask. I can’t remember the last time she looked at me kindly.

“Maybe you fainted because you were getting sick,” she says.

“That’s very generous of you, but I fainted because I watched the doctor stick a needle into an open wound in Pedro’s belly.”

“Six stitches,” Peter says proudly, pulling up his shirt to expose the bandage.

“Aren’t you overdoing it a little? The doctor said you’d be fine by today,” says Zoe.

“Six stitches,” Peter repeats.

“I know, Pedro, you were very brave.”

“So are we watching
When Barry Met Wally
or what?” asks Peter.

After Peter admitted to me he had no desire to see
The Omen
, I put an end to the mother-son creepy thrillers club. Peter and I are now the sole members of the mother-son romantic comedy club, and I promised when we got home that we’d begin the Nora Ephron series. First we’ll watch the classic
When Harry Met Sally,
then
Sleepless in Seattle
, and finally,
You’ve Got Mail
. I do not expect these movies to result in any nightmares
for Peter, other than the horror of realizing how often and comprehensively men and women misunderstand one another.

“I hate romantic comedies,” Zoe says. “They’re so predictable.”

“Is that your way of saying you want to join the club?” asks Peter.

“Dream on, gangsta,” she says, leaving the room.

“Should I look away?” Peter asks one minute into the movie, when Billy Crystal is kissing his girlfriend outside Meg Ryan’s car.

“Should I look away?” he asks again during the famous fake orgasm scene in Katz’s deli. “Or maybe just plug my ears?”

“Should I look away?” he asks when—

“Oh, for God’s sake, Pedro. People have sex, okay. People love sex. People talk about sex. People simulate sex. Women have vaginas. Men have penises.” I wave my hand. “Blah, blah, blah.”

“I’ve decided I don’t want to be Pedro anymore,” he says.

I mute the movie. “Really? Everyone’s gotten the hang of it.”