He had been in our house multiple times over the years, but I had never stepped inside his home. Now I stood on the edge of a silk rug in front of his fireplace, uncertain what to say.
“Sit,” he said. As I did, he whistled loudly, and bounding into the room came Tosh. “I know who you really came to see,” he said, and smiled.
Tosh slowed to an obedient halt in front of Mr. Forrest and sat down on the floor beside him, facing me.
“I owe you a deep apology,” Mr. Forrest said. “I shouldn’t have run away. I’ve never felt exactly comfortable here. In that, I’m not unlike your mother.”
I spied an oval tray near the mantel. It sat on a spindly cherry-wood table, and arrayed upon it were crystal bottles that refracted light. Mr. Forrest followed my eyes.
“Yes, you deserve a drink,” he said nervously. “I know I’d like one. Come, Tosh.” He led Tosh over to the white-slipcovered couch where I was sitting and patted the space beside me. Tosh jumped up and immediately leaned into my side. “That’s a good boy,” Mr. Forrest said.
While Mr. Forrest’s back was to me, I hugged Tosh and held him to me, petting his floppy ears.
“Port is my choice for you,” he said. “We can sip it and talk about disgusting people before putting them aside.”
He handed me the bloodred liquid and went to sit opposite me on a gold velvet chair that made his knees jut up into the air in front of him.
He laughed at himself. “I never sit in this chair,” he said. “It’s called a slipper chair, and ladies used to have them in their boudoirs. It belonged to my great-grandmother.”
“I see you through the window sometimes,” I said.
“A dull thing to look at,” he said.
I had my arm around Tosh and was scratching the space beneath his right ear. His mouth hung open in a panting smile, and occasionally he would tip his head back and look at me. I took a mouthful of the port and immediately wanted to spit it out.
“Sip,” he said, seeing my face. “I did say that, didn’t I?”
What felt like the longest minute in the world passed as I tousled Tosh’s fur and swerved my head around the room.
“Helen, what happened after I left?”
“Forget it,” I said, suddenly not wanting to talk about it, wishing instead that I could be alone with Tosh.
“I’m sorry, Helen,” he said. “In general I leave the neighbors alone, and if I don’t go flouncing over to their houses, they let me be.”
“His friend hit me,” I said.
Mr. Forrest put down his glass on the marble-topped table beside him. He looked as if he too had been hit. He inhaled.
“Helen, I’m going to teach you two very important words. Ready?”
“Yes,” I said.
“And then I’m going to get you something else to drink because you obviously detest that.”
I had held the port in my hand but could not bear even to pretend to sip.
“Here they are: ‘fucking bastard.’ ”
“Fucking bastard,” I repeated.
“Again.”
“Fucking bastard,” I said, more surely.
“With verve!”
“Fucking bastard!” I said, almost yelling.
I sat back into the couch, on the verge of laughing.
“There are millions of them. You can’t beat them, believe me. You can only hope to find a way to live quietly among them. Sitting and reading in this window, with all my antiques and books… You wouldn’t know it by looking at me, but I’m a revolutionary.”
I wanted to ask him if he had a boyfriend, but my mother had scolded me never to pry.
“You know I’m a book collector,” Mr. Forrest said. “Would you like to see some of my newest acquisitions?”
“What about my mother?” I asked. I pictured her curled around her transistor radio like a conical seashell.
“Her?” he said, and stood with his glass. “We both know she’s not going anywhere.”
He came over to retrieve my undrunk port. Tosh’s tail beat against the back of the couch as he drew near.
“I hate her,” I said.
“Do you really, Helen?” He held both our glasses and looked down at me.
“No.”
“You will always be stronger than she is,” he said. “You don’t know that yet, but it’s true.”
“She let Billy Murdoch die,” I said.
“That was her illness, Helen, not her.”
I stared up at him, not wanting him to stop.
“It must be obvious to you that your mother is mentally ill,” he said. He placed the glasses on the silver tray and turned back to me. “What does your father say about it?”
“Mentally ill.” It was as if someone had just very gently placed a bomb in my lap. I didn’t know how to dismantle it, but I knew no matter how scary it might be, there was a key inside it-a key to all the hard days and locked doors and crying jags.
“Haven’t you ever heard those words?”
“Yes,” I said meekly.
“Haven’t you ever connected them with your mother?”
I had used the word “crazy” but never “mentally ill.” “Crazy” didn’t seem so bad. “Crazy” was a simple word like “shy” or “tired” or “sad.”
Tosh jumped off the couch, sensing Mr. Forrest’s desire to move. I stood.
“We’ll look at books and make you a G &T,” he said. “You don’t owe your life to your mother, you know. Nor does your father, for that matter.”
“You just said she was mentally ill.”
“Your mother is a survivor. I’ll no doubt send you home with a book or two that she wouldn’t know about otherwise, and you’ll return the photograph as a favor to me.”
Tosh, Mr. Forrest, and I all went through the dining room and into the kitchen. After the two other rooms, the kitchen was a shock. It was all white and incredibly utilitarian. Nothing was out on the counters that would suggest he’d eaten or prepared anything to eat in months.
He opened his fridge while I leaned against the sink.
“You can give Tosh a treat,” he said with his back to me. He found the bottles he wanted and opened the freezer. “They are in that white porcelain bunny jar by the sink.”
While I fed an ecstatic Tosh treats that looked like miniature bunnies, Mr. Forrest made me a drink.
“Why are you friends with her?” I asked.
“Your mother is fascinating. She’s incredibly witty and beautiful.”