Chapter One #2
The morning after Niko’s earache, he was back to his rambunctious self and Maisie wasn’t sick yet.
I let Emily know I wasn’t over it yet, communicating in single syllables.
Emily took the kids to lunch and then over to the playscape in the park while I watched basketball.
March Madness. Gonzaga versus Xavier, Oregon versus Kansas—but I didn’t have skin in either of those games.
Back when I worked at Creative Strategies, Declan from Accounting was always in charge of the brackets pool and he or Charlie, one of the salesmen, would have the rest of us over to watch the games.
I haven’t been gone that long, but neither had bothered to see whether I still wanted in. Out of sight, out of mind, I guess.
I stretched out on the couch with my six-pack of Sam Adams on the floor for company.
What was that TV show where you could “phone a friend” for help?
Who would I have called? My friendships at Creative hadn’t lasted past my being employed there.
My high school and college buddies and I hadn’t stayed in touch.
I had never been that close with the guys on my softball team.
Try maintaining your male friendships when you’ve got two-year-old twins and have lost your job.
While every other dude is out in the world, working during the week and hanging with his bros on the weekends, I’m Mr. Mom twenty-four seven for a couple of toddlers.
By midafternoon, I was half in the bag. Emily and the twins were still out—probably over at her mother’s.
When I got up to take a piss, I swayed a little on my way to the bathroom.
Mid-pee, I saw the envelope she’d left, propped against that stupid doll with the crocheted skirt that covered the toilet paper roll.
We’d both laughed at it after Emily’s great-aunt Charlotte gave it to her one Christmas, but for some reason it’s survived several purges of domestic detritus.
Inside the envelope was a letter on lined paper.
Hey Babe. I’m sorry about yesterday. You were right.
I should have asked you if you minded my going out after work instead of telling you I was going.
I hope you realize how much I appreciate your caring for the twins while you look for another job.
I know it’s hard. And I know you’re going to find another position soon, Corby.
I hope you realize what a talented artist you are and a great dad, too.
Let’s do pizza tonight. Hope we can have some close time after the kids are asleep. XOXO, me.
I appreciated what she’d written, particularly her offer of “close time”—code for makeup sex.
And sure enough, we had it that night, but it was a bust. As usual, we did her first, but she was taking so long that I gave up, got on top, and plugged in.
Went from zero to sixty and was pounding away when she grabbed my wrist and whispered, “Hey, take it easy.” I stopped cold, began losing my hard-on, and pulled out.
Threw on my robe and headed out the door, thinking, shit, man, I can’t do anything right.
Can’t find work, can’t get through the day without drinking and drugging, and now I can’t even satisfy my wife.
“Where are you going?” she said. “Come on. Let’s wait a few minutes and try again. ”
I appreciated the offer. I still love her.
Still want her. A dozen years and two kids after that summer we met, I still can’t believe she said yes when I asked her out that first time.
Or that she committed to me when I drove cross-country to California and showed up out of the blue at her college apartment.
And that she’s stayed committed. Of the two of us, I definitely got the better deal.
And here she was in our bed, offering me kindness and understanding.
So of course I sabotage myself. “Not feeling it,” I told her. “I’ll take a rain check.”
I went downstairs. Walked around in the kitchen, opened the fridge.
I microwaved those enchiladas she had gotten me but kept them in so long, they were dry and tough.
After a few bites, I scraped the rest into the garbage.
Reached up for the lobster pot and made myself a stiff drink instead.
By the time I got back to bed, Emily was asleep.
In all the years we’d been together, I don’t think we’d ever been this much out of sync.
But the next day, things got better. We sat on the floor and played with the kids.
Danced with them to that silly “Baby Shark” song.
When they went down for their afternoon naps, we went back to bed and tried again—successfully, this time, for both of us.
We cooked supper together, the twins watching us as they wandered around underfoot.
Things have been better since then. The usual minor ups and downs but nothing more.
Marriage is all about that seesaw ride, isn’t it? We’re okay.
Now Emily cuts two slices of French toast into bite-sized squares, dotting each piece with syrup.
“Yum, yum, yum,” she says, divvying up the finger food between the kids.
I love watching her with them, more so when I’m feeling relaxed like this.
Maisie resembles her mother: dark hair, dark eyes, Em’s dad’s Mediterranean complexion.
At her twenty-four-month checkup, she was in the thirtieth percentile for both height and weight, so she’s probably going to be petite like Emily.
Niko’s got my reddish hair and lighter skin tone; his height and weight are a little higher than average, the pediatrician said, but compared to his sister, he looks like a bruiser.
Turning to me, Emily asks why the smoke alarm went off.
I hold up the two burnt pieces I threw on the counter, dangling them like puppets.
“Here you go,” I say, sliding the new stuff from the pan onto a plate.
“Be right back.” I head to the bathroom and brush my teeth so she doesn’t smell my breath.
I wait half a minute or so, then flush and walk back into the kitchen. She asks me what I’m smiling about.
“What?”
“You’re smiling. What are you thinking about?”
“What am I thinking about? I don’t know. Nothing much.” I’m smiling because, thanks to the rum and Ativan, I’m pleasantly buzzed.
Maisie, the more fastidious eater, finishes without making a mess, but her brother’s bib is saturated with milk and he has somehow managed to get syrup in his left eyebrow.
Half of his breakfast is on the floor. Emily looks at the clock, then starts cleaning up the mess.
“You know something, kiddo?” she asks Niko.
“I think Mommy and Daddy should get one of those Roomba things and program it to follow you around all day. Would you like that?” Without having any idea what she’s talking about, he nods enthusiastically.
I tell Emily to leave it, that I’ll clean up.
“That would be great,” she says. “I’m running a little late.
” She heads back to the bathroom to brush her teeth and blow-dry her hair.
Just before she leaves for work, Emily addresses the twins. “Be good kiddos for Daddy and Grammy today. No naughty stuff, okay?” She models the correct response, a head nod, which they both mirror back to her.
“Too bad we can’t get that in writing,” I quip. The day before, Niko led his sister in a game of crayon-scribbling on the kitchen linoleum and it was a bitch to scour off those marks without scratching the surface, which I did anyway.
“Okay, I’m off,” she says. “Wish I could stay home with you guys. Love you.”
“Love you, too.” I made sure to start the breakfast dishes when I saw she was about to leave.
Better a sudsy-handed wave goodbye than a boozy kiss.
“Have fun on your field trip.” She’s just finished a dinosaur unit with her third graders and is taking them to the Peabody Museum to see prehistoric bones and footprints.
“Good luck with those leads, babe,” she says. “Maybe today’s the day, huh?”
I shrug. “Maybe.”
Theoretically, I’ll be job hunting today, although, truth be told, I’ve pretty much surrendered to the status quo.
When I hear Emily’s car back down the driveway, then accelerate, I say, aloud to no one in particular, “There goes the family breadwinner.” Then I reach up for the lobster pot, take it down, and refresh my coffee-and-Captain cocktail.
Get the twins dressed and pack the diaper bag.
“Guess what?” I tell them. “Today is a Grandma day.” Maisie claps her hands, but Niko shakes his head and says, “No Gamma! No Gamma!”
“Dude, I feel your pain,” I tell him, chuckling. Emily’s father once referred to his ex-wife as “the iron butterfly.”
I lied to Betsy, telling her I’d drop them off somewhere around eight thirty so I can chase down a couple of imaginary leads, one of them in Massachusetts, north of Boston.
Traffic permitting, I said, I’ll pick them up sometime between three and four.
I added the “traffic permitting” caveat as a cushion in case I need an extra hour to sober up.
I’ve lied to Emily, too—told her that after I drop the kids off at her mom’s, I’ll send out another round of résumés, make some follow-up calls, and then drive over to Manchester because Hobby Lobby has advertised an opening in their framing department.
In truth, having been defeated by several months’ worth of humiliation in my search for employment, and now dreading the possibility of actually getting the Hobby Lobby job and having to mat and frame people’s shitty, mass-produced poster art at a big-box store, I will not be driving to Manchester or doing anything else on my make-believe agenda.