An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England_ A Novel - Brock Clarke [104]
"For three years?"
"Yes," he said. "Where did you think I went?"
Instead of answering him, I handed him the postcards. What a relief it was to do that: what a pleasure it is to use someone else's solid, reliable written words instead of your own less-than-reliable ones.
"I didn't write these," he said when he was through looking at the postcards. He put them back in the manila envelope and slid them halfway across the table, so that they rested between him and me like a fence between neighbors. My father still wore the mask of nonchalance, but now I thought I could see its little seams and stitches and all the things that were supposed to hold it together.
"No kidding," I told him.
"That's your mother's handwriting," he said.
"No kidding."
"Why did she do that?" he asked, presumably rhetorically, except then he looked at me for the answer, which unfortunately I was able to give him.
"Because she didn't want me to hate you," I said. "Because she wanted me to think you were out finding yourself instead of living in Northampton with Deirdre."
"She's a good woman," my father said.
"I know she is."
"How do you know that?" my father asked.
"Because she's my mother," I told him, knowing now that the "good woman" to whom he was referring was Deirdre and not my mother at all. I took a long slug of my beer, then took a silent inventory of all the things I wanted to say.
"Oh," my father said, and then the nonchalance cracked and fell off completely, and shame and regret took its place. His head dipped and seemed to be pulled toward the table, as if the table were one of the poles and my father's head something newly magnetized. "Your mother is a good woman, too," he said.
"You know" ― my teeth were gritted, but the words made their way through and around them anyway, as the words you shouldn't say always do ― "it worked for a long, long time."
"What worked?"
"Mom sent me the postcards because she didn't want me to hate you. And it worked: I didn't hate you. I never hated you until right now."
My words had their intended effect: my father's eyes got watery and then the rest of him seemed to get watery, too, his whole body sagging and turning to liquid except for his right hand, which kept its firm hold on the beer can. Then there was me, his son, across the table from him: the minute I said this mean, hateful thing, I, too, turned to liquid except for my right hand, with its firm hold on the beer can. Imagine if my mother had walked into the house right then and seen her two Pulsifer men, only thirty years separating their mirror images. Imagine what she would have thought if she'd seen us right then, just as the night before she'd seen me dancing with and kissing and groping the woman who was not my wife, and suddenly I understood exactly why my mother had thought she'd known me ― I'd cheated on my wife just as my father had cheated on his ― and I also understood that we hate our fathers only as practice for hating ourselves. If my mother had been there in the kitchen, I would have apologized to her, and then I might have apologized to my father, too, for being like him.
"Dad," I said, "did you tell Mom I was going to New Hampshire?"
"I did," he said. He was looking down at the table, refusing to meet my eyes. His voice was like a child's, watery and high. "I told her yesterday morning when she came by the house. She asked where you were and I told her. And then she went after you."
"Why?"
"Because she was worried about you. Because she didn't want you to do anything stupid."
"Too late," I said.
"It usually is," my father admitted.
"Did you tell anyone else?" I asked.
"I did," he said. He raised his head slowly, looking stricken but also hopeful, as though by giving me one thing I wanted, he might be able to give me more than just that.
"Let me guess," I said. "He was tall,