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  Diana still hadn’t called. I thought of calling her. Should I? Maybe she just needed a little encouragement. Maybe she needed to know I was sincere, that I meant it when I said that I wanted to be involved with her and Jack, that I would be consistent in wanting this, that it wasn’t just some kind of a phase.

  I could call her, and we could go to the movies, something easy, something neutral, where we didn’t have to talk too much or deal with each other. Why not? She still liked me; I could tell. She called all those times after we got together, didn’t she? I would just show her that I had always cared about her, that I had been thinking about her all these years. I could make a whole CD with the songs I’d written about her. It would be like Layla.

  Something told me that I shouldn’t call her, so I went to see Ellen.

  “You just have to give her some time to think, Tom,” she said. “You’re sure there was chemistry?”

  “I’m sure there was,” I said. “Pretty sure, I felt it anyway.”

  “It usually goes both ways,” she said, nodding, reassuring me.

  I looked at Ellen, sturdy, emotionally stable Ellen. “Sometimes I am so sick of being myself that I just don’t think I can take another minute,” I said. “Do you know what I mean?”

  She closed her eyes, blew out a stream of air. “Yes. I do, God, yes.”

  Ellen used to be married. I went to the wedding. It was in Pennsylvania, where they were living. The guy worked in her law firm, and they stayed married five years. He left her for someone else in the same firm. Ellen quit the firm and moved back out here. She said she would never get married again. She wanted a kid, though. I think she missed the possibility of a child way more than she missed having the husband. She checked into the various options—domestic adoption, international adoption, in vitro fertilization with donated sperm. None of these things worked out for her, for one reason or another. Eventually, she stopped talking about it. I don’t believe that she stopped wanting a child, but she seemed to have decided that it hurt too much to talk about it.

  “Do you think it’s possible to change things about yourself? I mean, on purpose. Let’s say there was something seriously wrong with your personality. Could you change and be a different way, if you wanted to badly enough?” I asked her.

  “Oh, Tom,” she said. “I really, really would like to believe that.” She sighed this heavy, sad sigh that had years of heartbreak in it.

  I wanted to fix this for her, to repair the things in her life that had disappointed her. A little frantically, I looked around her place. “Ellen?” I said.

  “What?”

  “You know that TV you’ve got in your bedroom?”

  “Yes.”

  “I could put that up on one of those suspended shelves. Then you’d have more floor space and a better view of the TV.”

  She said, “I guess. But you don’t have to.”

  “No problem. I want to. I’ll go to Home Depot tomorrow.”

  nineteen

  The phone was ringing when I got home. I got to it on the fourth ring, just before the answering machine came on.

  “Hi,” she said. “It’s me. Diana.”

  “Hi,” I said. My heart was pounding, partly from the run to catch the phone and partly from the thrill of hearing her voice.

  “I decided you should meet Jack. I talked to him about it.”

  “You did?” I said it too fast. “What did he say?” This was happening way sooner than I expected. I was settled in for a long, long wait.

  “First he said he didn’t want to. Then, about five minutes later, he said he’d think about it. He disappeared into his room for a while, and I didn’t hear anything. But, anyhow, he came back out a while later and said he’d do it.”

  “He’d do it? Does that mean he wants to or just that he’ll go along with it?”

  “I can’t speak for him, but I think what he feels is curious about you, but also a little angry that you haven’t come forward sooner.”

  “Angry?” I said. “Come forward? How could I? I hope you told him that I didn’t know he existed! He’s angry? Already? Before I’ve even met him?”

  “Well, yeah, of course,” she said.

  “Of course? Are you angry?”

  “Well, yeah. You didn’t try to find me. You didn’t try to find out why I left, even. Wouldn’t you be angry?”

  “I thought you left because of the car thing! That’s what you said. And I got a car. You just never gave me a chance to—”

  “You’ve missed his whole life up to now is how it seems to him.”

  “It wasn’t my fault! You did that. Have you mentioned to him that this was all your decision?” My voice sounded harsh. This was not going well.

  She didn’t say anything for a minute. “I mean, look at it from his point of view. You’ve missed a lot: birthdays, Christmases, school projects, sports events—”

  “But you left me!” I said, incredulous. “You moved! You left town! You didn’t contact me! I got in touch with you!”

  “You didn’t want a kid!” If it’s possible to yell in a whisper, this is what she did.

  “You’re right! I didn’t!”

  “If you had known, would you have participated? Would you have stayed with me and been his father?”

  “What? You left! You took off! I didn’t get a chance! You didn’t give me a chance to even consider it!”

  “But would you? You didn’t contact me! You didn’t even try to find out where I was!”

  I didn’t answer right away. “How do you know what I tried to do?”

  “My parents are listed in the phone book. You didn’t call them. In more than ten years, you didn’t call.”

  “OK, OK, fine. You’re right, I didn’t. But now I have. As soon as I found out about the kid, I called you. Now we’re in touch. And I want you to know that I thought about you. I thought about you a lot. You never left my—you never left my heart.”

  She didn’t speak for a few really long, heavy seconds. Then she said, “You know what, Good? That’s a really great line. You might want to write it down so you don’t forget it. You might want to use it again sometime. But you know something? Spoken live over the phone to me just now, it sounded like crap.”

  I didn’t have to write it down, I had already used it in a song, which was about Diana, not that I’d tell her about it now.

  “I’m sorry you feel that way,” I said. “I meant it sincerely.”

  I heard a soft, moist sigh coming through the pause at the other end of the phone. Was she going to cry again? Oh, God.

  “Well,” she said. But she left it there, the word floating in space between us.

  “Well?” I prompted.

  “How do you want to arrange this meeting?”

  “I guess you could come over here,” I said.

  “You don’t sound like you mean that. If you don’t want to do this, we don’t have to, you know. You’re the one who asked for it!”

  “What? I want it. I just invited you over. Come right now, if you want.”

  “We’ll come tomorrow. Afternoon. After school. About four.”

  “Great. Perfect. Can’t wait.”

  “We’ll see you then. Good-bye.”

  She said it in that way that is good-bye but also go to hell. People don’t really say the whole word good-bye unless they mean go to hell. At least that’s been my experience. I’ll change her mind, I was thinking. I’ll make her see how nice I can be, how caring, and how sincere. I’ll practice every day.

  The next day, I got up early and went shopping. I had to make my place look better. Right now it looked like the scene of a crime or something. Or like some weird person with a lot of odd pets might live there. I wanted it to look like a real person lived there. A nice person with real furniture and a real TV and matching towels. I didn’t want to scare the kid with my ugly comforter the very first time he saw me.

  I went to a department store, the kind that sells everything. First I bought towels,
six blue bath towels, matching hand towels and washcloths, a bath mat, and even a matching dispenser for liquid soap. The saleswoman put it all into a giant bag for me. Then I went to the kitchen department and picked out a new kettle for boiling water. It was very shiny and would make all my pots and pans look dingy and banged-up. So I bought a whole new set of those too. I took all this stuff out to the car, and then I came back in for more.

  I picked out a bed, a desk with a bookshelf that matched, an entertainment center, a new kitchen table and chairs, and a lamp with a white shade. I was thinking, This is great. I can just buy the stuff as if I were the kind of person who had nice stuff all the time.

  The salesperson was a young guy named Chris. “Wow,” he said as he typed the order into a computer. “Starting a new life?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Kind of.” He probably thought I was getting divorced or something. “I just needed a change,” I said.

  “Change is good,” he said. “Change is a good thing.”

  “Right,” I agreed.

  “Last name?”

  “Good.,” I said.

  “Oh—like, G-O-O-D?”

  “Exactly.”

  There was more typing involved in the transaction than I had expected. I was eager to get the new stuff home and set it all up. I would have to call the Salvation Army to pick up the old stuff. Temporarily, I could store it in the garage. The sales guy seemed to take a long time. I sat on a couch while I was waiting. If I had any space, I would get one of these too.

  “OK, sir,” said Chris. A printer started grinding out forms. “Your pieces should ship in about four to six weeks.”

  “What?” I said.

  “Yeah, that’s the soonest they can—”

  “But I needed them right away!” I said. “I was hoping for, maybe, later this week?” I didn’t want to say today, which was what I had really been hoping, because he would think I was a complete idiot.

  “Sorry, see, your items are in all these different warehouses in different parts of the country. We don’t actually have any of this stuff here.”

  “You don’t?” Of course they didn’t. What was I thinking?

  “No, but you can track your order with this number here.” He tore a pink form out of the printer and pointed to some numbers on the bottom. “You call this, and punch in this, and they’ll tell you when to expect it. You can call as often as you want for updates.”

  “Oh,” I said. “I see.”

  “So… do you still want to get it?”

  I thought about it. “Yeah,” I said. “I do. Thanks.” I took the pink form, folded it, and put it in the pocket of my T-shirt. It really didn’t seem like much to go home with. But I still had my bathroom and kitchen stuff. At least I could use that right away.

  At home, I hung up the towels in the bathroom and filled the soap dispenser. I piled the old towels into a box. I got my old pots and pans and put them in the box too. I took all this out to the garage.

  Then I went to work on my main living space, I tried to throw stuff away that looked messy or made me seem immature. I had been saving that calendar from a couple of years ago, because it had pictures of famous guitar players. Actually, it was more than a couple of years, it was 1987. Not the decorating theme I was going for at all. I took it off the wall, meaning to get rid of it, but I had grown attached to those guys after all this time. I stuffed it into a drawer, which now didn’t quite close.

  I dusted, arranged, and dumped a bunch of old stuff into a garbage bag. Then I went out back and put the bag in the trash. I wanted to come back to this great surprise, a transformed apartment. No such luck. What I saw was a run-down bunch of old furniture that looked like rejects from the Salvation Army. I needed something to perk the place up. A plant! I thought. A plant will help, something fresh and green and alive!

  I drove down to the grocery store to get one. My neighbor Robin was there. I had forgotten that she worked at the store. If there was one thing I did not enjoy, it was unexpectedly running into people I knew. It happened that Robin was working in Produce today, which was right next to Floral. She was unloading apples from a cardboard box. She looked up. “Hi! Can I help you find anything?” she said, then she saw it was me and got embarrassed. They’re supposed to greet the customers. It’s a rule that the employees have to be friendly.

  “Oh, hi,” I said. “I’m getting a plant.” I bent to stare at a bunch of plants on a stand.

  Robin nodded. “Gift?”

  “No, I just—I thought my place needed one.”

  Robin nodded.

  I looked at all the plants. Which one? They all looked fine together, but separately each one looked kind of pathetic. I straightened up and stepped back. I had no idea which to take. I wiped my hands on my pants, making wet finger tracks along the denim. I was sweaty all of a sudden, just from the strain of trying to choose the right houseplant. Free-floating anxiety, its called. I knew all about it because I’d had it before, and I’d researched it. I had done too much changing for one day. My heart started to pound, and I wanted to walk out of the store and forget about the stupid plant. But Robin was there, and I had already told her I was going to buy one. I just stood there, the plant decision far beyond my capabilities now.

  Then Robin was standing next to me. What was she going to say? What’s the matter with you? Choose one, would you? Just pick one up!

  Robin bent down. “These are nice. If you forget to water them, they don’t die right away. They kind of wait for you to remember them again. You could put it near your kitchen window. They get little purple flowers on them, if you’re really lucky.”

  “Oh,” I said, barely choking the word out of my sticky throat. I took the pot from her. “Yeah. Good idea.” Now start walking, I told myself, before you have to talk again.

  “Good luck with it!” she called after me.

  I didn’t say anything back. It wasn’t absolutely required in this situation, I decided. I tried to convince myself that she had already turned back to the apples—or maybe she was helping another customer—and didn’t notice that I hadn’t answered.

  I took the plant home. It had one of those plastic hooks on it, so you could hang it up. I gently tapped the nail into the plaster above my kitchen window. The nail went in. I hung up the plant. There. Easy. No big deal. Then a whole chunk of plaster fell right off with the nail in it. The plant crashed to the floor, spilling dirt and breaking off two major branches. I swept up the mess and set the plant down on the counter next to the sink. To hell with it.

  twenty

  It was almost four o’clock, and my place looked shabbier than ever. I thought cleaning it up had made it look worse. There were more bare spots from the things I’d removed so the dinginess of the paint and furniture was more evident. I didn’t want to sit down because I didn’t want to move a chair or wrinkle my cheesy bedcover.

  Now they were late. I was starting to get nervous about this when they pulled up at 4:08. Diana parked right out front. She had that purple Beetle. Very clean and new, of course. Perfect.

  When they stepped out, my heart was pounding. I was seeing my son for the first time. He was tall, at least I thought he was tall. Of course, I had no idea what the normal height for his age was. He was slouching. Was he slouching? Did I slouch? Maybe he got that from me. He wasn’t looking at the house. Maybe he was shy. Did he look like me? I couldn’t tell. Diana knew the way, of course, as she had been here before.

  They were getting closer, but still they didn’t look at the house. Diana knocked in a way that was sort of gentle but strong at the same time.

  I opened the door. “Hello,” I said.

  “Hi,” Diana said.

  The boy wasn’t looking at me. Give him time, I was thinking. He’s shy. Nothing wrong with that Perfectly normal I said, “Hi, Jack. It’s nice to meet you. I’m Good. I mean, that’s my name. Last name. And people call me that. I’m your—Well, come in!” My voice made this phlegmy, croaky sound.

  They w
alked in. He had on a big T-shirt that said VOLCOM and a pair of baggy shorts. Sneakers, of course. And he had glasses, very stylish, nice glasses, I was happy to see. They didn’t make him look geeky or anything.

  Jack looked around my place, at the walls, the ceiling, the bed. He peered around the kitchen door.

  “OK.” I clapped my hands together. It was a goofy thing to do. I don’t know what came over me. Anyway, they both jumped at the sudden sound. “Sorry,” I said softly. “Hey, can I get you something to eat?” I took three steps, and I was in the kitchen. “I have Oreos, ice cream, juice, milk, hot chocolate.” I looked at them and waited. I wanted them to come in the kitchen and see that I at least had shiny new pots and pans.

  Silently, they were consulting each other. He raised his eyebrows at her. She pressed her lips together. They were using a language that I didn’t speak. What were they saying?

  “No, thank you,” Diana said. “We’re fine. Jack just had a snack after school.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Right. I see. Of course. So, OK, why don’t you sit down?” I had exactly three chairs. The thing about the chairs was that they didn’t match. I wished for, I longed for those matching chairs I had chosen today. I was tempted to explain that new, better, matching chairs were coming. I wanted them to know that these were not my real chairs.

  We sat down. Diana was next to me.

  “What do you think?” I said, gesturing around the place. I don’t know why I asked them this. I was just setting myself up for criticism.

  Diana said, “It looks exactly the same as I remember it,” An indictment.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Well,”

  Jack was looking at the guitars, which I had carefully lined up along one wall. “Jack,” I said, “do you play an instrument?”

  “No,” he said quietly.

  “Oh. Well, when I was your age, I started playing the guitar. I had lessons,” I waited for a reply. When there wasn’t one, I said, “I loved it! The second I had the thing in my hands, I knew it was for me. The Beatles were a very big deal then. I don’t know if you know about them, but I was a big fan. That’s why I wanted to take guitar lessons. Hey! Maybe you’d like to learn!” I jumped up too fast and bumped into the table. Diana steadied it with her hand. I took an acoustic guitar off its stand and held it out to Jack. “Want to try?”