"Yes, Cadmus let it drop one day. What's that got to do with anything?"
"Last Sunday I got a call from Loretta. She wanted me to come over to the house. Urgently. She'd just been to see this astrologer, and he was full of bad news."
"About what, for God's sake?"
"About us. The family."
"What did he say?"
"That our lives were going to change, and we weren't going to like it very much." Garrison was cradling his wine glass in his hands, staring out past his brother with middle distance. "In fact, we're not going to like it at all."
Mitchell rolled his eyes. "Why the hell does Loretta waste money on this bullshit-"
"Wait. There's more. The first sign of this…" Garrison paused, searching for the word "… big change, is that one of us is going to lose our wife." His gaze finally came back to Mitchell. "Which you have."
"She'll be back."
"So you keep insisting. But whether she comes back or she doesn't, the point is she left."
"Are you telling me you believe what this guy was saying?"
"I haven't finished. He said the other sign was going to have something to do with a man from the sea."
Mitchell sighed: "That's so lame," he said. "She probably told him something about the situation… and he just fed it back to her."
"Maybe," Garrison said.
"Well what's the alternative?" Mitchell said, a little irritably, "That this dickhead's right, and we're all heading for disaster?"
"Yeah," Garrison said. "That's the alternative."
"I prefer my version."
Garrison sipped his wine. "Like I said…" he murmured, "you've always had a weak stomach."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Garrison gave a rare smile. "That you don't want to even contemplate the possibility that there's something going on here we should be taking seriously. That maybe things are falling apart?"
Mitchell threw up his hands. "I can't believe I'm having this conversation," he said. "With you, of all people. You're supposed to be the rational one in the family."
"And look where it got me," Garrison growled.
"You look just fine to me."
"Jesus." Garrison shook his head. "That goes to show how much we understand one another, doesn't it? I'm chewing antidepressams like fucking candies, Mitch. I go to analysis four times a week. The sight of my wife naked makes me want to puke. Does that help paint the picture for you?" He eyed his wine. "I shouldn't really be drinking alcohol. Not with antidepressants. But right now I don't give a fuck." He paused, then said, "You want something more to eat?"
"No thanks."
"You've got room for ice cream. Allow yourself some childish pleasures once in a while. They're very therapeutic."
"I'm putting on love handles."
"No woman on the fucking planet's going to throw you out of bed because you've got a fat ass. Eat some ice cream."
"Don't change the subject. We were talking about you mixing drink and pills."
"No we weren't. We were talking about me getting a little crazy, because it's done me no fucking good staying sane."
"So get crazy," Mitchell said. "I don't give a shit. Take the next board meeting naked. Fire everyone. Hire deaf-mutes. Do whatever the fuck you want, but don't start listening to some crap from a fucking astrologer."
"He was talking about Galilee, Mitch."
"A man from the seal? That could be anybody."
"But it wasn't anybody. It was him. It was Galilee."
"You know what," Mitchell said, raising his hands, "Let's.stop talking about this."
"Why?"
"Because the conversation's going round in circles. And I'm bored."
Garrison stared at him, then expelled a long, strangely contented breath. "So what are you doing with the rest of the night?" he said.
Mitch glanced at his watch. "Going home to bed."
"Alone?"
"Yes. Alone."
"No sex. No ice cream. You're going to die a miserable man, you know that? I could arrange some company for you if you like."
"No thanks."
"Are you sure?"
Mitchell laughed. "I'm sure."
"What's so funny?"
"You. Trying to get me laid, like I was still seventeen. Remember that whore you brought back to the house for me?"
"Juanita."
"Juanita! Right. Jesus, what a memory!" .
"All she wanted to do-"
"Don't remind me-"
"-was sit on your face! You should have married her," Garrison said, pushing his chair back and getting up. "You'd have twenty kids by now." Mitchell looked sour. "Don't get mad. Ypu know it's true. We both fucked up. We should have married dumb bitches with childbearing hips. But no. I choose a drunk and you choose a shopgirl." He picked up his glass and drained the last of his wine. "Well… have a nice night."
"Where are you off to?"
"I've got an assignation."
"Anyone I know?"
"I don't even know her," Garrison said as he headed away from the table. "You'll see. It's much easier that way."
There was a time in my life-many, many years ago; more years than I care to count-when nothing gave me more pleasure than to listen to songs of love. I could even sing a few, if I was drunk enough. On occasion, before I lost the use of my legs, we'd venture out together, my wife Chiyojo, Marietta and myself, to see traveling players in Raleigh, and there'd always been a spot or two in the show when the mood would become sweetly melancholy, and a crooner, or a quartet of crooners, or the leading lady with a handkerchief clutched to her bosom, would offer up something to tug at our hearts. "I'll Remember You, Love, In My Prayers," or "White Wings"; the more grotesquely sentimental the better as far as I was concerned. But I lost my appetite for such entertainments when Chiyojo died. A plaintive ballad about love irrevocably lost was a fine thing to indulge in when the idol of your affections was sitting beside you, her hand clutching yours. But when she was taken from me--under circumstances so tragic they beggared anything a songwriter might dream up-I would start to weep as soon as a minor chord was played.
And yet, in spite of my resistance to the subject, it creeps closer to these pages with every passing moment. Sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, this account draws nearer and nearer to a time when love must appear, transforming the lives of the characters I've set before you. Few will be untouched by its consequences, however immune they may believe themselves.
And that, of course, includes myself. I've wondered more than once if fear of my own vulnerability was not the reason I didn't attempt to put pen to paper earlier. The passion for words was always in me, from my mother, and I've certainly had plenty of spare time in the last century or so. But I could never do it. I was afraid-I am still afraid-that once I begin to write about love I will find myself consumed by the very fire I am building to burn other hearts.
Of course in the end I have no choice. The romance approaches, as inevitable as the apocalypse Garrison was telling his brother about in the restaurant: because, of course, they are one and the same.
Garrison parted from Mitchell outside the restaurant, dismissed his driver and went uptown to an apartment which he had purchased, unknown to anyone else in the family, for exactly the purpose he intended to use it tonight. He let himself in, pleased to find that the temperature of the place was far lower than would usually be thought to be comfortable, which fact meant the erotic rituals of the evening had already begun. He didn't go directly to the bedroom, though he was now in a state of excitement. In the living room he poured himself a drink, and stood by the window to sip it and savor the moments of anticipation. Oh, if only all life were as rich and real to him as these moments; as charged with meaning and emotion. Tomorrow, of course, he would despise himself a little, and behave like a perfect sonof abitch to any and all who crossed his path. But tonight? Tonight, marinating in the knowledge of what lay before him, he was as dose as he knew how to being a happy man. At last he set down the glass, without really drinking much at all, and loosening his tie wandered through to the elegantly appointed bedroom. The door was ajar. There was a light burning inside. He entered.