“A bunch of little thuds, actually. They time the explosions. The trick is to keep the boat upright as it sinks so it’ll settle straight down onto the ocean floor.”
“Blowing shit up is fun no matter how old you are. It’s a primal instinct. Legalized violence.”
“Sure. Instead we watch hockey or football or boxing and compete in business. We don’t actually take part in the violence ourselves anymore. We’re civilized.”
“Yeah,” Galvin said, but he sounded like his thoughts were somewhere else. “Yeah.”
They both fell silent for a moment, peering at the horizon, the scudding clouds, the seagulls diving and swooping and cawing. “You know,” Galvin said, “sometimes when you’re out on the boat in the middle of the ocean, with nothing around for miles, nothing in sight, nothing but water, you realize how insignificant we are, in the scheme of things. You find yourself thinking, you know-O Lord, be good to me. Your sea is so wide and my boat is so small.”
“Hmph,” Danny said. “Not all that small, actually.”
“Okay, asshole,” Galvin said, feigning annoyance but visibly pleased. “I guess it’s all relative. The big fish doesn’t look so big to the even bigger fish.”
“Guess so.”
“Danny,” Galvin said. “So this thing I wanted to talk to you about?”
“Yeah…?”
“Look, you told Abby she can’t come to our house anymore. I want to know why.”
So that was it. Not what he’d expected at all.
“It’s complicated, Tom.”
“They’ve become close. Best of friends. Does that concern you?”
Was Galvin onto him, somehow? Did he know why Danny wanted to keep Abby away?
“It’s not the closeness that concerns me.” Danny said. “It’s… I want her home more often.”
“That all?”
Danny felt his guts constrict. “That’s all,” he said. “Nothing more than that, really.”
“Be straight up with me. This isn’t about that nose piercing, is it? I mean, yeah, Jenna never should have taken Abby to get her nose pierced. That was wrong. Celina shouldn’t have just assumed that Abby had permission. Just because she said so doesn’t make it true. I know how angry you were about that, and hell, if I didn’t have the two older boys, I’d probably be freaking out, too. But-”
“I-Abby said she had permission?”
“And Celina should have checked with you. I don’t know what else I can say but that she screwed up. She meant well, Celina did, but she screwed up. We screwed up. In loco parentis, all that crap.”
Danny couldn’t help laughing with relief. “I’ve already cooled down. I mean, I was angry last night, but, well, if that’s the extent of her teenage rebellion, I’m lucky. She’s not pregnant, and she doesn’t have a tattoo on her butt or something.”
“As far as you know.”
Danny groaned comically.
“My parents wouldn’t let my sister Linda get her ears pierced until she graduated from high school.”
“I don’t get the whole piercing mania anyway, to be honest.”
“Danny, listen, I’m not one for deep talks, you know? Feelings and all that? Not my department. But you and I both know this isn’t just about the piercing. Right?”
Danny felt trapped. He heaved a sigh of frustration. He couldn’t keep pretending that this was all about a nose piercing, not anymore, not face-to-face with Galvin. He hesitated.
Galvin went on: “It’s about the money, isn’t it?”
No, Danny was about to say, but then he caught himself. “Maybe that’s it.” His iPhone emitted the tritone text alert, but he didn’t dare check it.
“You know, I was afraid this might happen. That’s why I never lend money to friends. I made an exception in your case because I saw how desperate things were for you. But it almost always causes tension in a friendship. I’m a man, you’re a man, I get it. You feel somehow embarrassed that you had to take money from me. Now you feel obligated. There’s just no way around it. Maybe I didn’t handle it the right way. I don’t know.”
“No, Tom,” Danny said. He shook his head, fell silent. Of course he felt awkward about it, who wouldn’t? But if only that were the problem. “It was incredibly generous.”
His iPhone made another text alert sound.
“Danny, you gotta understand something. Abby’s like family. What she’s done for Jenna-I can’t even begin to express my gratitude. Your girl, her heart, her friendship-she’s-” Danny was quite sure that Tom Galvin’s eyes were moist. “I don’t want anything to happen to that bond between the two girls. It’s too important to her. It’s too important to me. So listen. Whatever I’m doing that makes you uncomfortable, we have to sort this out. Okay? Whatever it is.”
“Of course.”
“I have an idea. We’ve got a place in Aspen. How about we all go out there this weekend, just the two families? You guys and us. Bring your girlfriend, too. We’ll take my plane; it’ll be fast and easy and a good time. My two sons both have other plans, so it’ll just be the girls. You and I can hang out, schmooze, talk this thing through. For the sake of our daughters, huh? What do you say?”
36
The little boy was screaming. He was afraid of the big vaccine needle. And the young woman aide clearly didn’t know how to stick the needle in without inflicting pain.
Dr. Mendoza saw this and placed a gentle hand on the nurse’s shoulder. “¿Puedo probar?” he said. May I try? He never liked to make the aides feel inadequate.
“Por supuesto, Doctor,” the young woman said right away, nodding, handing him the hypodermic.
The boy, who looked to be around three, was yowling and bucking in his mother’s strong arms. And who could blame him? To little children, all hypodermic needles looked big and scary. “What is his name?” he asked the mother.
“Santiago,” the mother said. She was missing most of her front teeth.
“Santiago, I’d like you to meet my friend Nicolás.” He pulled from the front pocket of his white coat an orange rubber toy with colored nobs for eyes and ears. “Nicolás is a Martian. He’s very, very scared of needles. Look.”
Santiago stopped struggling for a moment and looked warily at the toy. His cheeks were wet with tears, and a dribble of mucus ran down from one nostril.
Dr. Mendoza moved the hypodermic needle near the toy, touched the needle against the orange rubber skin of the toy’s tummy, then squeezed its belly. Its eyes and ears bugged out in comic fear. Santiago burst out laughing and reached for it, and Dr. Mendoza let the boy have it. He had a dozen more in the back room of the clinic. Every time he visited the United States, he bought them at a toy store in San Diego. The children loved them.
“Can you help Nicolás? He needs his shot to make him all better.”
Santiago was happily squeezing the rubber toy’s belly, making the eyes and ears pop out, and laughing delightedly.
“Now maybe you can show him what a brave boy you are. Can you close your eyes and count to three, very slowly?” asked Dr. Mendoza.
He held the needle just above the boy’s shoulder.
“Uno…”
The needle’s point touched the shoulder.
“Dos…”
Then Dr. Mendoza inserted the needle lightning fast, and it was over.
“Tres,” the boy said, squeezing his eyes tight, bracing for the shot that had already come.
“We’re done!” Dr. Mendoza said. “You did it! You did such an excellent job!”
The boy opened his eyes wide. “Really?”
The clinic was located in the outskirts of Culiacán, the capital of the Sinaloa state in Mexico. The neighborhood was desperately poor, and the people couldn’t afford to see a doctor. So they queued up for hours, sometimes all night, to see a doctor without charge. Some days, there were dozens waiting when he arrived at seven in the morning. Some brought tortillas for their lunch.