Against his better judgment he bought a ticket. He lost interest within fifteen minutes and dozed. He woke up to the credits and walked across the hall to a different screen and sat down before a story of intrigue whose plot was more sophisticated for his having missed the first half. When that show was over, he exited the building and bought a second ticket. He saw another show and half of a fourth before he was forced out of the warm plush oblivion into a torrid pace more odious for the dumb comfort that had preceded it.
He resolved never to indulge himself again. Then he woke and decamped and felt the blank expression of eternity boring through him again, downtime’s merciless black-hole eyes, and in a small misfortune of time, he drank himself into a state watching a game on a bar TV.
After letting the dead battery languish a long time, he bought more minutes from an authorized retailer located beside a mattress store. He was unable to reach her on her cell so he tried her at the office, and there they informed him that she had left months earlier for another firm.
He dialed the number the old firm gave him and a casual voice answered. He was informed that Jane was on vacation and wouldn’t be returning for another week. Did he care to speak to a different broker?
“How nice,” he said. “Where on vacation?”
“I want to say Paris, but don’t quote me,” said the voice. “The south of France, maybe?”
He stood in the snow-patched prairie with the ice-blue brook running toward the rafting centers and trailer parks, far from the south of France, far from Paris, and a wave of death washed over him. Not biological death, which brought relief, but the death that harrows the living by giving them a glimpse of the life they’ve been denied. Its sorrow was a thousandfold any typical dying.
He pocketed the phone and walked slowly toward the russet uplands rising in the distance. Ravines in the granite of a north-facing slope sprouted green fronds in feathered clusters. He leaned back against the rock face and felt like crying. She was only resuming life. In the many months that passed between phone calls, she had done just as he had told her. He had no one to blame for it but himself.
He walked about the prairie until he got a decent signal. Becka was on a tour bus when his call came in. “Hello?” she said.
“Is your mother on vacation?”
“Dad?”
“Where’s your mom?”
“Where are you?”
“Who cares where I am?”
“I do. Can’t you imagine I might be curious?”
“I’m in a field,” he said. “What more is there to say?”
She was silent. “Mom’s in France.”
“On vacation?”
“Yes.”
“What’s she doing there?”
“She’s on vacation,” she said.
“What’s the name of the hotel she’s staying at?”
She paused again. “Why do you want to know that?”
“I want to call her.”
“What for?”
“Did she go there alone,” he asked, “or with someone?”
Again she paused.
“Becka?”
“With someone,” she said.
He bought a used car from a local dealership wreathed in flag bunting. He was dragged away from his new purchase by a long walk, and afterward looped back without sleeping. His body cried out for rest but he was determined to trump its dumb singular want by keeping constant attention on the pain of the living death he would suffer until he found his way back to her.
But he was too tired to drive straight to New York and did not make it a hundred miles before falling asleep. The road curved around while he kept straight. He went through a wire fence into a field where he struck a cow. The car undercut its hind legs and lifted the animal off the ground. It hit the hood and the windshield shattered into a cobweb. He slammed on the brakes and the beast caromed off. He stepped out, bleeding and dazed, and approached the animal, which lay flat, legs broken, and stared back at him with an unblinking eye that began to drip blood. He bent down and put both hands on it as if trying to keep the life inside, but the movement of its moist nostrils died out, and with it any final hope that he might make it back home.
He grabbed the pack and abandoned the car with the door hanging open as the rest of the scattered herd lowed at him, agitated and alive. He grew smaller in the shimmering distance and soon disappeared around the bend.
She called and called again. He let the phone ring into voice mail. He let the battery die. His right eye closed up from conjunctivitis and the pharmacist recommended that he see an ophthalmologist, but he settled for nonprescription drops that took effect slowly. Passing a downtown bank with an electronic clock, he noticed the date. He counted backward. Sixteen days earlier, it had been his birthday.
He recharged the battery using the men’s-room outlet in a visitor center. He discovered fourteen messages waiting for him. One was from Becka wishing him a happy birthday. The others were from Jane. He had meant to be self-preserving, not cruel, in not calling her back, but he understood now that he could not have it both ways.
Still, he waited. The sun infused the green skin of the tent. He was staring up at it, preparing himself to rise and pack, when the phone rang. He answered in a voice he hadn’t heard in days, maybe weeks. She spoke faster than he was accustomed to.
“Do you think I wanted this to happen? I wanted you. How many times have I called you since I came back from France? Twenty? I’m not trying to be heartless. This thing with Michael, it just happened. These things happen. Do you know how long you’ve been gone? Do you know it gets lonely? It gets so lonely. I didn’t intend this. I kept telling you to come home. You told me to remarry. Go on with your life, you said. Well, that’s what I did, I went on with my life. I went to France with a man I like. Can you blame me for that? You can’t because you told me to. I’m not in the wrong here. All you had to do was come home, Tim. I kept telling you that. Come home. I’m telling you now. None of this matters. France, it doesn’t matter. It was nice being taken care of for a while, that’s all. I would be lying if I said it wasn’t nice. But it’s not what I want. I want you. Say you’ll come home, and I’m yours. I’ll come get you. I’ve always been willing to come get you. Are you there?”
He didn’t reply.
“Say something. You won’t call me back and when you finally pick up the phone you won’t even talk. Say something, please. Say what you’re thinking.”
“I’m happy for you, banana.”
She began to cry into the phone. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”
“I never imagined one of us taking a vacation without the other.”
Her sob came from deep down in her chest. He told her she had nothing to be sorry for. She was exactly right. He had told her to do it.
“Can’t you come home?”
“I can’t.”
“Can’t, or won’t?”
“I honestly can’t,” he said.
The call ended. He had told her to go on with her life only because her love and constancy had been so true for so long, he never dreamed they would actually be taken away.
She called a few months later to see if he would agree to make their separation official. Michael had asked her to marry him.
He was quiet. Finally he said that a few days prior, he had passed a Mail Boxes Etc., where he thought he could open up a mailbox. She could have the paperwork sent there.
“Are you sure you don’t mind?”
“I don’t mind,” he said.
“Maybe the lawyer can just fax it.”
“Either way,” he said.