The Detonator Page 3

  How long did the affair last?

  One single solitary night.

  But brevity didn’t prevent my partner’s wife, Patty, from falling in love. Or so she insisted at the time, the dirty-blonde-haired, hazel-eyed woman even going so far as to persistently call me at my home and on my cell, long after I’d made it perfectly clear through my dogged silence that it was over. So to say my mood just went south at the sudden and unexpected presence of Patty and Brian’s daughter on the beach in Cape Cod, of all places, is putting it major league light. I guess, in the end, you can try and escape your past, but no way in hell does it ever escape you.

  I buy us a couple of cold beers at the outdoor bar while Alison grabs us a small table that overlooks the beach, including the backs of both my wife and my son in the near distance while the sound of the waves gently crashing on beach provides a somber soundtrack.

  Sitting myself down, I place Alison’s beer in front of her, and mine in front of me. We both crack the tabs, take respective sips of the ice cold beer.

  “No knock-knock jokes?” I say, the words coming out forced and hoarse, as if they were peeling themselves from the back of my throat.

  “Excellent memory,” she says, staring contemplatively into the opening on the top of the can. “My dad loved those corny jokes.”

  “You still think about him?” I say, picturing the short, stocky, black-haired and thick-mustached Brian.

  “Every day,” she says. “Sometimes more than that.” Then, looking up at me, her face bright and smiley. But somehow not happy. “And what about you, Mr. Singer? Do you remember my dad?”

  My mind fills with images. Brian and I tossing a Frisbee on the big green outside our lower campus dorm at Bates back in the mid-1980s. Brian, wearing a black tuxedo at my wedding, standing beside me as my best man, and me standing at his side, just a few years prior as he wiped moisture from his brow with the back of one hand while checking his pockets with the other for a wedding ring he was sure he’d lost.

  Brian and me signing our first contract for the explosive demolition of an abandoned refrigerated warehouse on Albany’s north end--a job no one would touch because of the possibility of contaminating the area with old and still very toxic Freon. Brian staying up all night to create a detonation sequence that could be construed as a work of pure explosive art. Brian high-fiving me when the building imploded onto its own adjacent parking lot as planned, the press interviewing us for what seemed like hours afterward, and even some of the younger bystanders asking for our autographs. Brian and I sweating out our first big demo jobs in Scotland, West Africa’s Benin, Paris, and New York City, celebrating our first huge bonus at a steak house with our wives dressed in sultry black evening gowns. Brian and I shouting out in joy at the birth of our kids, and watching our plans…our collective hopes and dreams…come to fruition.

  But then I also see the defeated Brian sitting on the concrete floor in the wired-to-blow warehouse in Alphabet City, one hand gripping divorce papers, the other a second electronic control box.

  “I know it was you, pal. I know it was you who bedded down my wife, made her fall in love with you. I…know…it…was…you.”

  Now it’s me staring into my beer can like it’s a crystal ball that can’t see the future, but instead, is doomed to replay the mistakes of the past.

  I attempt to paint a happy smile on my face. “So, Alison, you’re a journalist now?”

  She shakes her head, pulls something out of her bag that looks like a pen, only larger. But when she thumbs a switch on the metal cylindrical device and brings the other end to her mouth, I realize it’s not a pen at all.

  “E-cig,” I say. “That do it for you like real cigarettes?”

  “Nothing replaces the tobacco blast of a real cigarette. But I don’t want cancer.”

  “Better watch yourself. Those things have been known to explode. Could do one hell of a job on your pretty face.”

  Grinning, she says, “I was raised in the explosives business, remember? I’ll be sure to take every precaution possible.”

  “I’m sure you will,” I say. Then, “And what is it you want to know?”

  “I’m researching a story for non-professional reasons,” she says, exhaling a breath of blue steam. “It’s a very personal story involving you, me, my mom, my dad, and the past. But…”

  “But what?”

  She drinks some beer. Not because she’s thirsty, but because what she’s about to tell me is going to hurt. Or so my gut tells me.

  “Well, Mr. Singer—”

  “You’re not a kid anymore, Alison. It’s Ike.”

  “Okay, Ike Singer. There is something you should know, I suppose.”

  I glance out at the beach, spot Ellen seated in her lounge. From all appearances she hasn’t moved an inch since I left her alone with our son, who is currently digging a great big hole in the sand. The old-man-kid enjoying his beachside vacation, like it’s his last. I would gladly die before I ever hurt my wife and son again.

  “It’s about my mother,” she says.

  Just like I saw the many faces of Brian, I now see Patty. Her big eyes, her shoulder-length hair. I feel her touch. Even after all this time.

  “I’m listening.”

  Alison steals another, longer sip of her beer, exhales.

  “She’s dying,” she says.

  I love my wife. Love her more than myself. Need her more than the air I breathe. So why does news of Patty’s mortality feel like a swift kick to the gut?

  Now it’s my turn to drink. I finish the can, get up from my chair, grab us two more, set them down on the table.

  “I haven’t finished my first yet,” Alison comments.

  “Drink up.”

  But she just stares at the condensate running down the sides of the two cans placed in front of her.

  “What’s Patty dying from?” I ask.

  “Cancer. It’s in her liver and her lungs.”

  “Radiation?”

  “She’s finished with it. It helped for a while. Shrunk the tumors. But they came back. Doctors say it will reach her brain before Christmas.”

  I do the math. Five months.

  My mouth is dry, pulse pounding not in my chest but in my temples. Why does Christ give us a life only to snatch it back up before we’re barely halfway through?

  “Is that why you’re here, then? To tell me your mom is dying?”

  She pauses to smoke more of the e-cig, then stares down contemplatively at the two drinks set before her. She pockets the e-cig, raises her hands back up, locks her gaze on mine.

  “I know about you two. About what happened that one night in 1999.”

  Another powerful kick to the stomach, my lungs suddenly emptied of their air.

  She goes on, “I know now why my father died inside that imploded warehouse all those years ago. Why he did it. Why he wanted to take you with him.”

  A third kick.

  Don’t deny it, Singer, I tell myself. That will only make it worse. Best just to hear her out. Best just to accept the fact that you have this coming.

  Cracking the tab on the second beer, I drink half of it down in one gulp. Getting good and soused feels like the perfect medicine right about now. But then, that would be like feeling sorry for myself over something I have no right to feel sorry for myself over.

  “She still loves you, Ike,” she says. “She never stopped. She fell in love with you, but then felt abandoned by you. What hurt her more than anything was your not calling her or returning her calls. Not even once. I thought you might like to know that, now that she’s dying.”

  “I appreciate it,” I say. But it’s a lie and she knows it.

  She steals a glance down at the beach.

  “You know, Ike,” she says. “You and the missus and your boy, you really do make a picture-perfect family. E
ven if he is sick. Really special. Norman Rockwell couldn’t have painted it any better.”

  Exhaling. Feeling sad, agitated, and anxious.

  “Thanks,” I say. “But I have to ask. What’s your point, Alison?”

  “Course, it’s too bad the boy won’t live long,” she says in place of an answer. “You know, way back when, I knew there was something not quite right with him, but I just couldn’t put my finger on it. I thought he looked like a cartoon character or something out of the Muppets. Like Elmo.” She laughs. “But then, I was what, nine years old?”

  “He suffers from Hutchinson–Gilford progeria syndrome, thank you very much. You’re right, he has very little time left and I’d appreciate you not talking about him or referring to him as a Muppet.”

  “We have that in common you and me.”

  The mix of emotions running through my veins now channels into outright anger. Anger at myself for screwing up. Anger at Patty for getting sick. Anger at Alison for showing up suddenly in my life unannounced while I’m on vacation with my son, arguably for the very last time.

  “What do we have in common?” I ask.

  “Loved ones with very little time left.”

  It’s not the words themselves, but the way she says them that forces a steely cold tremor up and down my entire system of nerve bundles. This is not the sweet little kid I once knew. The kid with the bad knock-knock jokes.

  “Anyway,” she goes on. “You are very lucky. If you could have seen what my family life was like after my father died. After my mother lost you. I don’t think a day went by when she didn’t drink herself to sleep.” Shaking her head. “Did you know that for many years, I was moved around from foster home to foster home during those periods when my mother couldn’t take care of me? Do you have any clue how very little the city of Albany cares about its neglected and abused children?”

  Neglected…Abused…

  A slow burn replacing the cold Freon in my veins.

  “No. I wasn’t aware,” I say. “But I’m quite certain you won’t be appearing in any ‘I love Albany’ public relations TV spots anytime soon.”

  “Well, why would you be aware since you broke off all communication with us? After all, my dad tried to kill you. I can’t blame you.” She drinks more beer. “It lasted for a period of maybe five or six years. From time to time my mother would break down and be hospitalized, and from time to time those horrible social services Nazis would send me away, whether I liked it or not. My God, some of those homes were hell on earth. Trust me, Ike, the system is cold, calculated, and corrupt.” Peering into my eyes, smiling once more. Like she’s capable of an instantaneous emotional sea change. “I really like calling you Ike. I…Like…Ike.”

  “That so.”

  “Listen, Ike, you know what it’s like to be forced to walk the woods at night with a crazy foster father? You know what it’s like to feel his naked body pressing down on yours? To feel his hand covering your mouth so his wife can’t hear the screams coming through the trees?” She laughs, drinks, sets the can back down. “I wonder sometimes, Ike…I wonder sometimes if your sweet, precious, gorgeous wife, Ellen, knows the whole truth and nothing but the truth about what happened sixteen years ago. Would it upset her if she knew the truth? If she knew who you really are?”

  “That’s enough,” I say. “What the hell do you want from me?”

  “Hey, everything okay here?” Ellen says.

  I raise my head up quick. My wife is fast approaching along the concrete walkway. After a fleeting moment, she stands before the table, a black cover-all shrouding her torso, leaving just smooth tan legs exposed. The legs of a twenty-five-year-old. Her hair is neatly parted above her left eye, her sunglasses giving her the look and feel of someone famous and glamorous.

  I stand, nearly knock over my can of beer.

  “Sure,” I say, the hoarseness having invaded my throat and voice once again. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  “Maybe Alison is asking some tough questions. Putting you on the spot.”

  I swallow something cold and bitter.

  “I have indeed been hard on Ike,” Alison says, sliding out her chair, standing. “But your husband has responded like a real trouper. Haven’t you, Ike?”

  I nod, the slow burn having completed its mission of filling every vein and capillary in my body.

  “Alison was just leaving.”

  “I was?” She giggles. “Oh yes, I guess I was.” She takes hold of her beer, drinks down the rest, crushes the aluminum can in her hand, just like her father used to do inside our dorm room while we watched episode after episode of old Twilight Zone reruns. “That’s what Ike and my dad would do even to the meanest, oldest, toughest building there was. What did you two call it? A true implosion?”

  “We never actually got to perform a true implosion,” I say, more under my breath than out loud. “Your father—”

  “Yes, we know what happened to my dad.”

  She sets the crushed can on the table, grabs her bag, places the strap over her shoulder.

  “Well,” she says. “I’d better be going.”

  She walks around the table, goes to Ellen. Holding out her arms, she gives my wife a big, tight hug. Caught by surprise, Ellen purses her lips. I know that behind those sunglasses her eyes have gone wide. She makes a half-hearted attempt at hugging back.

  “Nice seeing you again, Alison. Don’t be a stranger.”

  The two separate.

  “Oh, I won’t be,” she says. “I won’t be a stranger at all, believe me.”

  Shooting me a wink of her right eye, she walks past me, her shoulder brushing against mine.

  Ellen comes to me.

  “You okay, Ike?” she says. “You look a little pale.”

  Glancing out toward the beach, I spot Henry standing in the newly excavated hole. It’s deep enough to hide his thin legs almost entirely.

  I say, “I guess remembering the past…remembering what it was like to work day in and day out with explosives and shooting buildings and bridges that could fall on your head if you didn’t do things right…remembering what happened on that final day…took more out of me than I thought.”

  More lies to hide my shame, my guilt, my remorse. So many wrongs don’t stand a chance in hell of making a right out of what happened all those years ago between Patty Darling and me.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t answer any more of her questions.”

  I shake my head. “It’s okay. She’s Brian’s daughter after all.”

  Ellen nods, contemplatively. “Amazing how much she looks like Patty back when we were all in school together. Same eyes and hair.” Then, forcing a smile. “Head back down to the beach? It’s our last day of fun in the sun before reality settles in.”

  “Not yet. I think I’ll have another beer, then meet up with you guys in a few minutes.”

  “Don’t get drunk, Ike Singer,” she says, bringing her hand to my face, gently caressing it. “I was hoping to sneak in a shower break with you later when Henry falls to sleep.”

  In my mind, thoughts of Patty dying. Bad thoughts. Disturbing thoughts.

  “Sounds good,” I say. Under normal circumstances, I would be counting the minutes and seconds until later tonight when I will finally have Ellen all to myself. But now I am frightened over what might become of Alison’s sudden appearance.

  Leaning in, Ellen kisses me on the mouth. Then turning, she heads back toward the short flight of steps that leads down to the beach.

  I go back to the bar, order a third beer. And a whiskey chaser to go with it.

  Chapter 4

  When night falls, we head out for lobster at a restaurant retrofitted from an old three-masted whaling schooner. We’re seated at a booth that’s got its own brass porthole which opens onto a narrow inlet. The briny-smelling breeze blows in through the round hole. We can
hear the seagulls and the occasional hum of an outboard motor while the night fishermen flock to the bay with their spinning rods for sea bass and stripers.

  The lobsters are a bit cold by the time they get to us, the mashed potatoes lumpy, and the salads limp. But Henry just loves this place because it makes him feel like a ship captain. It’s at once heartwarming and heartbreaking to see Henry happy. Sometimes it’s easier when he isn’t feeling good. Or he’s in pain. Because then we have the option of giving him something to make the pain go away. We are in control. We are able to help him. But seeing him happy reminds me…reminds us…that soon the time will come when he won’t be so happy. The happiness is temporary. Staged. Fleeting.

  After dinner, we play miniature golf, eat soft ice cream cones, ride the go-carts. I’m not saying much of anything, not because I’m not enjoying a night accented with a cool breeze that blows off the ocean, but because I can’t get Alison Darling’s face out of my head. Can’t shake the image of her mother from my brain. Patty, lying on her back inside a dark hotel room, only the red and blue light from the neon-lit sign mounted to a metal pole in the parking lot, oozing though the breaks in the curtains, flashing on the popcorn ceiling…

  On several occasions, Ellen asks me if I’m feeling okay. Would I like to go back to the hotel early? Lie down?

  “You have a long drive in the morning,” she reminds me. “Maybe you need to get some rest.”

  But I plant a smile on my face. As genuine a smile I can muster.

  “I’m fine,” I lie. “Just a little too much sun today.”

  My mind is racing with words. Words that suddenly, and very unexpectedly, come at me in the voice of Patty Darling. They invade my brain like a thousand fire ants.