“Dear, could you take a look at this?”

John continued reading the boxscore and sipping his coffee. Just settled into his Saturday morning leisure karma, he chanced ignoring her voice coming up from the basement office.

“John?”

She was in front of him.

“Sorry?”

“You should see this.”

He sighed and put the paper down. He followed her to the office. Alice pointed at the computer screen. She folded her arms as he examined the information.

Billy’s numbers were way down. No surprise there. His new sales and referrals had never been as strong as his sister’s; and over the summer they had trended downward. They had attributed that to summer lethargy and the lack of the ready market that school provided. Of course, this had not been a problem for Joanie, whose numbers went up in the summer. But then, it really wasn’t fair to compare them, they told themselves, though their glowing pride in the continuous uptrending of her valuation revealed their true feelings.

Alice had chosen her role.

“You’ll have to talk to him.”

John was irritated. This had not been on his psychic calendar for the day. Saturday was for reading the paper, drinking scads of coffee, doing a bit of garden work, playing golf, beers on the terrace afterward, shower, then maybe out to dinner. He looked at Alice and saw the romantic end of his day’s fantasy drain away.

He nodded. “After breakfast.”

“You can start with getting his sorry ass out of bed.”

He pushed open the door to Billy’s room and stepped across to the bed, trying not to trod on the comic books strewn all over the floor. Billy’s pale face was pressed against his pillow, his mouth open.

“Billy.”

The boy did not move. John pushed his shoulder with a finger until the boy rolled over and blinked.

“Can I take your breakfast order?”

He worked him out of bed and down to the kitchen. Alice appeared.

“Is he ready to talk?”

They all marched down to the basement office. Alice sat behind the desk; John shut the door and sat with Billy in front of the desk. Billy was still in his pajamas with the airplanes on them.

“Summer’s almost over, Billy.” Alice pulled a sheet from the printer. She looked at it with a frown. “It’s time we had a chat.”

Billy sat with his hands folded in his lap. He nodded.

Alice leaned forward, resting her chin on the trestle of her interlaced fingers. “How do you think it’s going?”

Billy shrugged and wiped a sleepy bug from his eye, staring at it on his finger, then flicking it away. Alice gave John an impatient look. John turned to Billy.

“Son? Your mother asked you a question.”

Billy sat up straight. “Not so well, Dad.”

“Not so well?” His mother’s tone was mocking. “Not so well?” She picked up the paper and held it out. It had a chart with four bars on it, a declining trend. “It’s a disaster. That tells me there is no effort. None whatsoever.”

Billy’s face was stone-like. Alice looked at John again. He shifted in his chair.

“Billy, we need to talk.”

Alice stood. “Talk? You two can talk. I’ve had it. I’m busting my ass every day out there trying to move this family parcel forward, and this sorry piece of –”

The door opened. “Mom?” Joanie’s head popped through.

Alice’s tone changed instantaneously. “Sweetie, we’re busy now.”

“It’s just that jersey order . . .”

“I’ll do that tomorrow, dear, with the others.”

“No, it’s just that I think I may get another bunch today – Missy’s having a pool party and there’s a whole group of girls from her cousin’s school that . . .”

Alice smiled warmly. “Just leave the paperwork on the kitchen table before you leave for science camp.”

Joanie waved. “Bye.”

The door shut and Alice’s smile disappeared. She set her briefcase on the desk and shoved a file into it. “I’m done. I have work to do.” She zipped up the briefcase and walked to the door. “I’ve got an open house until four. Maybe you two can work out a plan.”

The two of them sat in silence for a few moments staring at their hands. John stood and paced back and forth, hands clasped behind his back.

“Billy, I want to work with you. But I need your cooperation.” He paused and looked at his son, who had pulled the elastic waistband of his pajama bottoms out and was gazing curiously down at their contents. “Billy?”

The boy released his hold and the pants snapped back with a smack. John resumed his pacing.

“We have to get your volume up or we’ll be forced to take steps – you understand – this isn’t what we want – but there really won’t be any alternative.”

Billy rubbed his nose with his palm.

“After all, we all work to keep the family cause going. It’s expected that you do your part. But really . . .”, he picked up the graph sheet as he passed the desk. “This really isn’t good enough. It shows no effort.” He winced inwardly as he caught himself parroting Alice’s words.

 

*                  *                  *                  *

 

Where had it gone wrong? Achievement seemed such a normal path, everything always going up. When they married there were no worries, just the anticipation, the acceptance that it would take time, but not too much after all, it was like a diversified portfolio, they joked, their friends laughed, the well-coifed set that converged on one planned event after another, the law and real estate, always need at least one, of course they would never work together, though god what a combination.

What was he going to do with the boy? They talked; it seemed an imitation of talk, as neither had any appetite for the discussion. It was a sad fact, but a fact nonetheless, that it just was not working out. It was nobody’s fault but it had to be dealt with.

Billy was still in the bathroom. He had sent him there when the tears began, for god’s sake, preparing a face for Alice, she would see right through that, but perhaps pretend enough to settle down and get through the evening.

The water was running, splashing . . . he stretched out across the bed, propping his head against the wall, looking out the window. Not unlike the view from his bedroom as a child, leafy oaks, he remembered, through a tangle of fir trees up close to the house. The room was quiet, as quiet as on those mornings in summer . . . the other children off, day camp, swimming lessons . . .

The water shut off. He could hear the boy humming, the rattling of the loose towel rack, he should put a screw in that.

What was their plan her plan, the charts going up up, to where? He shifted on the bed, his head on the pillow careful to keep his shoes off the bedspread. The boy . . . he needed to get dressed where were the shoes, one in the closet, could not find the other, under the bed, not there.

In the closet, hiding behind the rack of hanging clothes, a little foot stool in the back, even with the light on, they maybe wouldn’t see you, their eyes were up there, their legs were down here, he could see the legs but not the faces, so they couldn’t see his, tucking his feet and bare knees in, out of the line of their eyes, the clothes would hide him.

After they went away, then he would come out, put on the shoes, then he could go, out the door, while they were in the kitchen, he could hear them from here, he could check at the top of the stairs and then he would be out. He wouldn’t have to go then, he didn’t want to . . .

 

*                  *                  *                  *

 

He had dozed off, lying on the bed. The room felt dark, but as he awakened he saw the sun streaming through the windows. The room filled with cream-colored light. One of the top drawers of Billy’s dresser was half-open, a sock dangling out.

He heard the stretching spring of the front screen door. He jumped from the bed, still groggy. The screen banged shut. He clopped clumsily down the stairs and pushed the door open.

“Billy!”

The boy turned around in the middle of the front walk. He was wearing his army shirt with the patches of stripes on the shoulders, shorts, brown socks almost to his knees, scuffed brown oxfords. Over his shoulder was an antique golf club with a yellow wooden shaft, a blue patterned handkerchief knotted into a bundle hanging from the hosel.

John looked at him thinking he had never seen the shoes before, though they were oddly familiar. He joked, the words coming out with a feeble sorrowfulness.

“Where’d you get the Buster Browns?”

Billy’s mouth opened, cavernous and glittering, wet and red. He looked toward the driveway, then back, his face relaxing. He swept his free arm before him, extending it out toward the street, as if on a stage, an interlude of contemplation, reflecting on the set around him.

“What things can this empty theater of worldlings bring forth, what pieces have been split that can not be retrieved, the riven rock, the broken stick, they all breach an opening . . . the jam cannot be unspread, the pebbles in the stream, ripples ringing out, what can be opened, never closed, never closed . . . my desire has become nothing. The planting of the seed, the seed has proven barren, here go I.”

The boy set the butt of the club on the ground like a shepherd’s staff, bent over and picked at a scab on his knee.

“Jimmy was coming over, I don’t want to play with him, he threw sand in my eyes, I ripped my pants, they were brand new, my knee was chunky.”

He looked up, tears dripping from his cheeks, then gone, the club back on his shoulder. He straightened, chin up as if on parade, a calm smile.

“Them was the days, wasn’t they old fellow? We rode the wheelbarrow down the hill into the village, you and me, that was us, da, that was us. Then we put the apples in, it was back up the hill, more than we can remember.”

John heard a noise, a rumbling like a car with no muffler. He looked toward the street – he could not quite focus, his eyes seemed to be turning up. He forced them open, looking at the street, the road, packed dirt, not asphalt, he wanted to walk on it, but he could not force his legs to move, they were tired, immobile, knees bending down, he couldn’t keep moving.

“The time has come, the merchants are all gathering, I must off for my fortune, father, it is the end. No longer can I enjoy the balm of the family bosom, its serene, soothing enfoldment.” Billy began to walk away, toward the steps leading to the street. “My fortune awaits, it is not without regret that I leave you here, this day, this eternal moment of parting.”

John had dislodged himself and was moving down the walk. The boy receded from him without walking, words flowing out, a jet of invective, spouting from the riven rock.

“What have you to say to me now? It is beyond that. Prepare, prepare. What you have not given, it can not be retained. It is an inversion, your inversion. You must keep it.”

John was sitting on the steps. The boy was ambling down the street, kicking a rock as he went. He rolled from side to side of the street, the bundle bobbing behind him, dangling from the stick.

A car came rifling down the street. John stood, watching it pass. He turned back to the house.

 

*                  *                  *                  *

 

From the prospectus for Parcel 22901-A:

“. . . parcel value reflects anticipated future income stream incorporating all publicly available information on income-producing potential of underlying assets, including familial structurings and multi-level initiatives as integrated into such structurings . . . predictive assumptions are based on standard biopsychosocioeconomic metrics using confidence intervals as defined in securitization wrapper. Any repackaging of obligations into subsequent securities does not alter the terms of the initial agreement.

“Default events related to any particle of the parcel will be recorded at earliest possible time and will follow statutory conventions of itemization and estimation of recovery.

“Excision of components, whether on a particle or entirety basis, is permitted at the discretion of the majority parcel owners.”

First published in The Medulla Review, Volume 3, Issue #1