Slide - Kyle Beachy [68]
Good old Dad.
The argument, once they got around to it, was a quiet affair, endearing almost, not unlike two new lovers’ first experiments with contact. It was Sunday afternoon and they seemed unsure exactly what behavior they were allowed to exhibit in front of me. They stood in the kitchen while I sat on the couch. The sentences I caught were fragmentary and full of gaps.
“I have to wonder when we became too good for tap water.”
“Tastes better, for one. And safer, Richard. All the impurities.”
From the couch it was difficult to know how much of their fight was taking place at the subsonic level. What body language and nuance of posture? She would busy herself with drying a dish or wiping the counter. He would stand still and maneuver his hands through the air over the island.
“Impurities, chemicals, things I don't want in my body. This is my body. My only.”
“Simply no reason. It's unfounded, Carla, based on fear alone.”
“Then don't use it, Richard. It will be mine.”
“These are good, hardworking people, Carla. The record is there. I can show you the numbers.”
They went on like this, an argument that couldn't possibly matter as much as it did. It was like a contest to see who could say the other's name more. Such emphasis on those syllables. Richard. Perhaps this was the point of bringing the pitcher home: stage a fight for the boy, illustrate the rift. Car-la.
They stopped talking when I stood from the couch. My mother moved to the sink and my father opened the refrigerator. I sat at the counter.
“Let's try to all three of us say the word divorce at the same time. See if anything happens.”
My mother looked through the window above the sink into the backyard. She waved her hand in front of her face as if at a fly. My father began to make himself a sandwich on the island, folding slices of meat onto bread. Without once looking at him, my mother opened a cabinet and handed my father a plate. Damn impressive, that, and it seemed to me that this would be their greatest loss of all, the routine comfort of spousal awareness. To know a person so deeply so long, but to what end? Once that person was gone away to someplace else?
“We're giving ourselves some time to think. This is hard for all three of us. Neither your father nor I has said anything about divorce. Have we, Richard.”
“There's someone at the front door,” he said.
A few seconds later the doorbell rang. Stuart, with Marianne at his side. She raised a hand in a short little wave.
“Where have you been?” Stuart asked.
“Me?” I said, letting them inside. “Where have I been?”
Their arrival immediately transformed the scene into one of reunion and introduction. It was difficult to gather five people into a kitchen without feeling some kind of joy. My parents were happy to see my old friend after all these months, happy to meet his girlfriend, who was happy back, nodding hello with her hands pouched into overalls. Stuart explained they'd come on their way to the riverfront for the final day of Fair St. Louis, the annual riverside whoop-de-do of independence. Tonight there would be fireworks launched from barges on the river, screaming skyward and booming, colorful bursts glittering against pitch black, silver light reflected off the Arch. Originally a Fourth of July event, the fair had fallen later and later each year as city organizers and SLH! compiled resident/consumer research.
“You should come, Potsky Obviously.”
“Have you all gone down yet?” Marianne asked my mother.
“Not this year. No.”
Stuart