drinking or not. You keep it.” She raised her glass to start a toast. “Good times around the corner,” she said.
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s a long corner, Gladys. How about ‘Confusion to the Gentiles’? That was the toast we learned in sixth grade.”
“Allison was a gloomy Gus then,” Lila said. “She would wander the halls like a ghost. She had a theory that she should be wearing men’s neckties, but it wasn’t going over well at Gene Ahern Preparatory School. People would laugh at her and she would cry at them back. She was a sore thumb.”
“And what changed the tide?” Gladys asked.
I looked at Lila and saw her mother’s chin, the crease of her mother’s brow when we stayed out past curfew and snuck in the back. It was all that was left of her. For a while in college I was an experimental filmmaker, if that’s the word for it. We’d get drunk and rip up pages in the Norton Anthology of Poetry and read them into her dad’s video camera in funny voices. There was no point to it, but we loved those movies to tears. They were for a select audience, but then again we were the Chosen People. What would happen to us? What would happen? “It was when I met you,” I said to her. “It all changed then.”
“Birds of a feather,” Lila said, and took my hand.
Gladys sipped her drink. “And what happened to your boy who wanted money?” she asked me. “Did he change you, too?”
“He was a mistake,” Lila said quickly.
“He was,” I said, but this didn’t help, or the drink I finished. It’s one thing to forgive yourself a mistake. But if you knew it was a mistake at the time, how do you forgive yourself then? That boy Adam had left a spiral scar as he tripped through my life, but you’d expect a clumsy passage from someone who showed up carrying his shoes. I looked at Lila, who couldn’t drink what was in front of her. I thought we wouldn’t have times like this, me drunk and her sober, until she was pregnant and a boy was gone from my life. But instead she was sick and he was gone from my life. “He’s dead,” I said.
“He’s nothing,” Lila corrected me. “He’s less than nothing.”
“You can’t be less than nothing,” I said. “Thank God. He killed himself without caring about me. He shed me like skin.” I heard the talk. You can be talking, just talk, and you wish you were conveying something at the same time, but you’re not. How could you be? “He said he felt happy whenever he looked into my eyes,” I said, “but he scarcely ever did. I said I’d hold him all night and make sure nothing happened to him, and sure enough nothing did. I thought I’d keep him because everybody should have a true love you can’t be with, but he lay in the bathtub and got gone, all guilty over something I didn’t even know about. Six years. I thought I’d be doing this with Lila when she was pregnant, not sick. Point No Point, we always said. Point No Point or bust someday.” I stood up and rested my hand on the wrecked TV just for peace and quiet. The ceilings were mirrored, with cameras behind them probably to keep all the money safe, and still I didn’t have any. “How dare he admit there’s no point?” I said, and sat down again to drink Lila’s Old Pal. “There’s no point to drinking, either, but look—I’m doing it.”
Gladys didn’t look surprised. She finished her drink too, and gave me an otherworldly sigh. “And you’ll die too?” she said to Lila. “When is that, dear?”
Lila gave her the smile again, the gorgeous one. “You’re not supposed to ask me that,” she said. “A month maybe, unless this beeper goes off, and then there’ll be another operation and one more month. And then Allison will go to grad school without me and study poetry. She has her loans, she’s all set to go, we just have to wait me out.”
“Poetry?” Gladys said. “You’re wasting money quicker than blackjack.”
“In high school it was Wallace Stevens
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s a long corner, Gladys. How about ‘Confusion to the Gentiles’? That was the toast we learned in sixth grade.”
“Allison was a gloomy Gus then,” Lila said. “She would wander the halls like a ghost. She had a theory that she should be wearing men’s neckties, but it wasn’t going over well at Gene Ahern Preparatory School. People would laugh at her and she would cry at them back. She was a sore thumb.”
“And what changed the tide?” Gladys asked.
I looked at Lila and saw her mother’s chin, the crease of her mother’s brow when we stayed out past curfew and snuck in the back. It was all that was left of her. For a while in college I was an experimental filmmaker, if that’s the word for it. We’d get drunk and rip up pages in the Norton Anthology of Poetry and read them into her dad’s video camera in funny voices. There was no point to it, but we loved those movies to tears. They were for a select audience, but then again we were the Chosen People. What would happen to us? What would happen? “It was when I met you,” I said to her. “It all changed then.”
“Birds of a feather,” Lila said, and took my hand.
Gladys sipped her drink. “And what happened to your boy who wanted money?” she asked me. “Did he change you, too?”
“He was a mistake,” Lila said quickly.
“He was,” I said, but this didn’t help, or the drink I finished. It’s one thing to forgive yourself a mistake. But if you knew it was a mistake at the time, how do you forgive yourself then? That boy Adam had left a spiral scar as he tripped through my life, but you’d expect a clumsy passage from someone who showed up carrying his shoes. I looked at Lila, who couldn’t drink what was in front of her. I thought we wouldn’t have times like this, me drunk and her sober, until she was pregnant and a boy was gone from my life. But instead she was sick and he was gone from my life. “He’s dead,” I said.
“He’s nothing,” Lila corrected me. “He’s less than nothing.”
“You can’t be less than nothing,” I said. “Thank God. He killed himself without caring about me. He shed me like skin.” I heard the talk. You can be talking, just talk, and you wish you were conveying something at the same time, but you’re not. How could you be? “He said he felt happy whenever he looked into my eyes,” I said, “but he scarcely ever did. I said I’d hold him all night and make sure nothing happened to him, and sure enough nothing did. I thought I’d keep him because everybody should have a true love you can’t be with, but he lay in the bathtub and got gone, all guilty over something I didn’t even know about. Six years. I thought I’d be doing this with Lila when she was pregnant, not sick. Point No Point, we always said. Point No Point or bust someday.” I stood up and rested my hand on the wrecked TV just for peace and quiet. The ceilings were mirrored, with cameras behind them probably to keep all the money safe, and still I didn’t have any. “How dare he admit there’s no point?” I said, and sat down again to drink Lila’s Old Pal. “There’s no point to drinking, either, but look—I’m doing it.”
Gladys didn’t look surprised. She finished her drink too, and gave me an otherworldly sigh. “And you’ll die too?” she said to Lila. “When is that, dear?”
Lila gave her the smile again, the gorgeous one. “You’re not supposed to ask me that,” she said. “A month maybe, unless this beeper goes off, and then there’ll be another operation and one more month. And then Allison will go to grad school without me and study poetry. She has her loans, she’s all set to go, we just have to wait me out.”
“Poetry?” Gladys said. “You’re wasting money quicker than blackjack.”
“In high school it was Wallace Stevens
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