Brick Three
“Jane?” he called.
When she didn’t answer, he went out to the hall and peered through the window next to the front door. Jane was walking toward town. Probably meeting a friend. He hoped she’d have a good time—he hoped they all had a good time. He’d have a good time by himself. With the football game.
But the Chiefs were so far ahead of the Bills it wasn’t ever going to be exciting.
He reached for his phone and chose the easiest game he’d downloaded, a kind of numbers shuffle that required his fast, shallow attention but at the same time allowed the deeper, more important problems to be rolled around in the spin dryer at the back of his brain.
As his fingers flew over the small screen, his deeper mind thought: Good God, what a day!
And, Now what am I going to do?
He was a good father and a good son. He knew that.
Or he did until today. The happiest he’d been in his life had been all the years when the children were young and he was the hero of the family.
He’d proudly walked around town with a new baby asleep in the soft fabric front carrier on his chest. There he’d been, bonding with his child and giving his wife a little time to herself.
He’d taken his children to the Great Wolf Lodge so they could swim in their choice of pools and scream as they slid down the giant plastic tube that dumped them into the water.
He’d taken them to Six Flags amusement park and held Florie’s hand as he sat next to her in the roller coaster that made all the kids scream and almost made him barf.
He’d taken them camping in Maine and to a Broadway show in New York City and to the aquarium in Boston and to the Mystic Seaport Museum.
He’d attended endless concerts, recitals, church services, ball games.
Not a movie starring dinosaurs, robots, or flying human beings who were part bat, cat, spider, or panther had exploded onto the screen without Brick Three and his three kids in the audience.
He’d helped with their homework. He’d told them bedtime stories and tucked them into bed.
Over the years, he’d carried in what would amount to tons of food, and he’d carried tons of household trash to the town dump, although that had been kind of fun because half the residents of Nantucket were at the dump on Saturday morning and he could catch up on town news.
He’d paid for a never-ending amount of shoes, coats, T-shirts, jeans, bathing suits, dresses, and team uniforms, and what the hell, why did no one take a moment to thank him because he raised them in a home of their own, and a nice home, one he was proud of, and they always had heat and electricity and food, and they were safe.
He’d paid for three college tuitions. Three sets of expensive textbooks.
Three sets of boat tickets, bus tickets, car rentals, car insurance, and for that matter, bikes.
And surfboards. And electric scooters. Also, drones.
Had they ever thanked him? Of course they had, when they got presents or a special trip, but it never had occurred to them to thank him for all he did on any normal day.
Now they were all going away. Away from him and Jane, away from this house, away from this goddamned exquisitely beautiful island.
Just then a thought hit him on his head so hard it was as if someone had thrown a brick at him.
Had he ever thanked, really thanked, his father?
Brick Three shut off the television and tapped a number on his phone.