The Family Fang - Kevin Wilson [128]
“Honey,” Camille said. “That’s not true.”
“Okay, fine,” Caleb said, composing himself. “It means something but it doesn’t mean as much as the art.”
“If we didn’t make a fuss about you disappearing then no one would notice or care that you had disappeared. Without us, what does your dying mean?” Annie said.
“And we do appreciate that. Like we said, we had hoped that the two of you would add something to the piece, though we had not imagined you would actually find us. You did a little too much, in that respect. What would be great is if you went back to your own lives, forgot about this meeting, and continued to look for us. That way, you would be a genuine element of this piece.”
Annie put up her hand and shook her head. “We don’t want any part of this. In fact, we want this to end. We want to fuck this up so badly.”
“But why?” Camille asked. “Why would you do that?”
“Because you hurt us,” Annie said.
“You’d ruin more than ten years of difficult artistic work just because your feelings got hurt?” Caleb asked.
“I don’t understand,” Camille said. “You didn’t want to be with us anymore. You removed yourselves from our lives.”
“We didn’t want to make art anymore,” Buster said. “Not your kind of art. We still wanted to be with you.”
“You can’t separate them,” Caleb replied. “We are the things that we make. You have to accept that.”
“We did,” Annie said. “That’s why we left.”
“Then why did you come back?” Camille asked. She was beginning to lose her composure, tears welling up in the corners of her eyes.
“We needed help,” Buster said.
“And we helped you, goddamn it,” Caleb responded.
“No, you didn’t. You left us,” Annie said.
“Because we had to,” Camille answered.
“This is ridiculous,” Caleb said. “I’m sixty-five years old. This is it. This is the last big thing I’ll ever make. I am begging you not to take that away from me.”
“You’re willing to live like this for six more years, until the state declares you legally dead, just to make an artistic statement?”
“Yes,” Caleb said. Annie looked at her mother, who nodded in agreement.
Annie pushed away from the table, and Buster did the same. They stood over their parents, who waited for an answer.
“We won’t tell,” Annie said.
“Thank you,” Camille said.
“But we don’t ever want to see you again,” Annie replied.
“Okay,” Caleb said. “We understand. We can agree to that.” Camille hesitated for a few seconds but then nodded. “If that’s what it takes,” she said.
“This is the last time we’ll ever see you,” Buster said, emphasizing each word, wondering if his parents understood exactly what this meant. He watched their faces for recognition of the finality of the moment, but there was nothing there but a certainty that they had rescued what was necessary in order to keep living. Buster was about to repeat himself, but he knew that nothing would be changed, and so he simply allowed the moment to pass.
The Fangs looked around the sparsely populated mall.
“All these places are going out of business,” Camille said. “It’s a shame.”
“They were perfect for what we wanted to do,” Caleb said. “It was like these places were built for our particular kind of art.”
“It was so much fun,” Camille continued. “We would walk into some mall, fan out, and no one had any idea what we were going to do. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced. I could see each one of you, Annie and Buster, but it was a game. I couldn’t even acknowledge you, because it would ruin everything. And I just waited for whatever amazing thing to finally happen, all these people walking past us, movement on all sides of us.”
“It was so wonderful,” Caleb agreed.
“And then it happened, whatever we had made. And no matter what it was, I remember how much I loved the aftermath, the confusion on everyone’s faces but ours. We were the only ones in the whole world who knew what was happening. And I couldn’t wait for that moment, when we were all together again, just the four of us, and we could finally allow ourselves the satisfaction of having made something beautiful.”
“It was the most incredible feeling,