Chapter 10
Q: What did the third wise man say in the infomercial?
A: But wait! There’s myrrh!
Danny and Eve brush their teeth side by side in the bathroom where Danny once killed a thousand ants.
“Er dad oozes ug a ot,” Eve says.
“What?”
Eve spits in the sink. “Your dad uses Bug a lot.”
“Yeah?”
“When you were lighting the fire, he was writing something. I wasn’t trying to look.”
“Does it seem weird that he’s using Bug so much but doesn’t appear to be texting or calling this woman very often?”
It occurs to Danny fleetingly that he could find his father’s Pattern account in about four seconds. And then he could look at Beatrice’s account to see how much time she spends on the app in comparison.
“Maybe she’s just busy with her family,” Eve says.
“Yeah,” Danny says. “Maybe. Or maybe he’s being obsessive and anxious.”
“Mmm. Poor guy.”
“I mean. He could choose to be less anxious.”
“Could he.”
“Yes,” Danny says. “I do hear myself.” He puts his arm around Eve and pulls her to his chest. In the mirror, the mirror of bugs, he looks at himself and wonders what comfort it would have brought him at age twelve to see himself now: without the braces, with the good haircut, with Eve.
“I get mad at him for the things I see in myself.”
“I get that. I get mad at my mom for being complacent because I’m worried I’m complacent. And I get mad at my dad for being mean because I’m worried I’m mean.”
“You’re neither of those things.”
“Yes, but. That’s how families work, right?”
“I just hope that my dad doesn’t end up hurt,” Danny says. “I don’t know how he’d handle it. When my mom left, he was . . . bad.”
“Bad how? You don’t really talk about it.”
Danny squints. “I guess I don’t remember it that clearly. It feels blurry.”
“When did things go back to normal?”
“I don’t know that they ever did. Or maybe he’s the same person as always, but I just became aware of who he was after my mom left.”
“Loss of innocence,” Eve says. “Your moment to exit Eden.”
“I am once again sorry for not having read Paradise Lost.” Danny pauses. “I didn’t want to become aware of who he was. Aware that he wasn’t—like, this perfect person.”
“But isn’t that even better?” Eve says. “You can see his flaws, and you still think he’s amazing. That’s when we really love someone, right? When we see them, flaws and all.”
“Do any of us really think our parents are amazing?” Danny says.
“Shannon does. Don’t you? I always thought you did.”
Danny rolls his hand across an uneasy knot in his neck. “He’s just hard to feel close to. I don’t mean to complain.”
Eve is looking at the sink. “You’re not complaining. You’re allowed to feel that.”
“Eve,” Danny says quietly.
She leans against him but keeps her gaze fixed down, at the tile and their sprawl of toiletries.
“Six months,” she says. “My parents haven’t spoken to me in six months.”
“You could try, though.”
“Right,” she says. “Right. I could try. That’s a really good idea.”
“I just wonder if they’re sitting around thinking the same thing. That you haven’t spoken to them in six months.”
Eve lays her toothbrush on the edge of the sink. Danny watches her hesitate, and then, ultimately, decide she is not able to say it; or he is not able to hear it. Which is maybe all the explanation he needs.
“Sorry,” she says.
“Don’t be sorry.”
She pads softly outside and shuts the door, leaving him in the small and bugless bathroom alone. He did not realize he didn’t have his phone until this moment, when he reaches for it to tell him what he is feeling and finds that it is not there.