“Kevin what?”
“Kevin Mackerel.”
“Mackerel? Like the fish?”
“I don’t know. I think so.”
“Oh, Kevin Mackerel,” he begins to sing. “Is he a fish or a man? I can’t tell and nobody can!”
My mother comes in then, all fired up with new reasons why Garvey has to stay in college and how she will talk to Al about how to proceed, and I never get to tell my story about how Kevin Mackerel got suspended for farting so much.
No way, my brother would have said.
Yes, way, I would have said, he did so. He just kept doing it really loudly and really stinkily and wouldn’t stop. He got warnings, demerits, a note home but nothing stopped him. So now he’s out of school until December first.
No way! I can hear him, his hands pulling at his hair, his face full of real laughter.
The next morning we get ready to go up to Dad and Catherine’s. We’ll have lunch there and dinner with Mom. I wear a black velvet dress. It has white lace cuffs and a white lace collar.
“Oh look, it’s the first pilgrim!” Garvey says.
He’s wearing the same jeans and a faded flannel shirt with a ripped pocket that flaps around. His hair is matted in the back. Because we’re going to see Dad, I notice these things. So does my mother. “The shower’s free,” she says.
“Oh goodie,” he says, and lights another cigarette.
We drive up in Mom’s car. I know this is a mistake. We should have left earlier and walked.
My father comes out on the back porch. He’s laughing and shaking his head.
“I thought,” he begins, fake chuckling, waiting to make sure we’re in earshot, “I thought your mother had decided to come for Thanksgiving dinner!”
They shake hands. I haven’t seen them together since the beginning of last summer. I’ve never noticed their similarity before, the sloping backs, the narrow eyes.
“When d’you get here?”
“Me and a buddy drove up last night.”
“Oh yeah?”
“You’re looking good, Dad.”
“Can’t complain too much. Things good?”
“Yeah, things are good.”
“Good.”
I can’t bear the fakeness and flee to find Patrick.
Frank is in the kitchen, fishing through a drawer in the kitchen.
“Hey,” I say.
He grunts back, then, realizing my usefulness, calls out, “Where do you guys keep the tape around here?”
“I dunno.” I keep moving. “Where do you keep it?”
Patrick and Elyse are watching the parade on TV from the recliners. Patrick moves over for me. His thumb is red and shiny with little indentations under the knuckle from his teeth. He’s been sucking it, which he does when he watches TV and forgets people can see him.
A ten-story Snoopy floats down a crowded street.
I hate that parade, and get up.
I hear the screen door slam.
From the French windows in the living room, I see Garvey walking onto the tennis court. It’s the first time he’s seen it, seen the garden gone. I can’t remember if I told him about it. The court’s surface is unblemished, a deep dark green with bright white lines. He stands at the far service line facing me but he can’t see me. He looks small. As I pass the stairs, I can hear Dad in the upstairs hallway, whispering loudly.
“It’s a disgrace. Honestly. He’s got on a filthy pair of jeans and an old shirt that smells like cat piss. And his hair.” I know my father is waving his hands around his head. “It’s a goddamn hornet’s nest. You couldn’t take him anywhere. ‘Me and my buddy drove up last night.’ Goes to Harvard and he can’t even speak English. You couldn’t take him to the club anymore. You couldn’t. And she doesn’t care. She let him leave the house like that. And then she lets him drive up here in the car I bought her! He has the nerve to bring that up here to my house!”
And then he’s downstairs, at the bar, rattling in the ice bucket, cracking the paper on a new bottle of vodka. I go and stand beside him, watching him carry out the motions. On top of the vodka he pours a few drops of vermouth. He puts the tops back on the vodka and vermouth and then, with a small spoon, slides out four tiny onions. I put out my hand and he drops one into it. He puts the rest in his drink, which he stirs with a finger. He straightens the line of bottles, the line of glasses, wipes off the spoon and the counter with a paper towel. Only when he is sitting in his chair does he close his eyes and take his first sip. The clock above him says 11:35. The turkey is on the stove, pale and pimply. Catherine hasn’t put it in the oven yet.
I sit beside him on the floor. At some point during the day, I have to tell my father that I’m going back to my mother’s until Saturday morning, until Garvey leaves. “You have a good week at school?”
“Yeah,” I say, stunned by the question, wishing I prepared for it. Then I realize I can tell my Kevin Mackerel story. This time I won’t use his distracting name; I’ll get right to the point. “A kid in my class got suspended for farting.”
He’s bent over his drink. He drinks and shakes his head. It seems like he hasn’t really heard. On another day he might jerk up, eyes big and delighted, and say, “You’ve gotta be kidding me.” Then I remember Patrick will have already told him.
“So who’s coming for lunch?” I say.
“No one, thank God.”
All my life we’ve had old Mrs. Waverly who had her voice box removed and buzzes out her words with the help of a little silver gadget that looks like an electric razor that she presses to her throat, Mr. Harris who owns the garden shop, and Cousin Morgan, Grindy’s cousin who lost a leg and most of an arm in a war. They are all Mom’s people and they’ll never come to this house again.
My father lifts his lighter to his neck and speaks in Mrs. Waverly’s robotic rhythm. “Hel/lo/Da/ley. Are/you/en/joy/ing/school/this/year?” My mother never found his imitations funny, even when he pretended to be Cousin Morgan insisting on passing the heavy gravy boat with his one hand and spilling it in my lap, which did happen one year. My mother’s disapproval always made it hard not to laugh, but without it, it isn’t as funny. Even my father isn’t enjoying it. He starts to pull his arm out of his sleeve to do the gravy routine and then stops and looks at me like he’s wondering where he is. Then he smiles and shakes his head. “Jesus Christ. Good riddance to all of them.”
He goes back to the bar and I go into the dining room. It’s set with Catherine’s china, green and brown. I go to the sideboard my mother didn’t take and open the top drawer. There they are, the place cards with the painted wooden fruit glued onto a corner and all the names in my mother’s big handwriting: Olivia (Mrs. Waverly), Donald (Mr. Harris), Cousin Morgan. There is also Gardiner, Meredith, Garvey, and Daley. And way in the back are Dad (Grindy), Mom (Nonnie), Judy (my mother’s sister), and Ashley, Hannah, and Lindsey (Judy’s daughters). I scoop up every place card and stuff them in my pockets. Then I go out to find Garvey.
He’s still on the tennis court, with Frank. They’re playing in bare feet. I’m not sure if Garvey has met Frank before. They aren’t playing by the regular rules. The alleys are in and you get two extra points if you hit the other person with the ball. Four extra if you ace your serve. And you can serve from anywhere on the court, even right at the net, which Garvey is doing when I come down the old rose garden steps and stand at the green netting that goes around the whole thing. He whales on the ball and it nicks Frank in the shin before skidding off.