A card sticking from the bouquet read:
Christine,
Dating you the first time was unforgettable.
Let’s make this second go-round the same.
Milo was locking the door, his back to the driveway, when he heard a car pull in behind him. His heart sank. The surprise that he planned for his wife would be muted at best if she found him skulking away. He turned, expecting to see Christine’s blue Jetta, but instead saw a black Jeep Wrangler coming to a halt. The top was down and Christine was sitting in the passenger seat beside a man Milo didn’t recognize. Tall, with dark hair and a goatee, and wearing mirrored sunglasses, he was the kind of guy who outweighed Milo by fifty pounds but was still in better shape than he was. He was thick in the neck, the arms, and the chest, with an indeterminable tattoo emerging from underneath the collar of his polo shirt, his face remained expressionless as he engaged the emergency brake and turned the vehicle off.
Milo didn’t like the look of him one bit.
A baby was sleeping in a car seat behind the man, dressed in a pink and white jumper.
chapter 14
“You fucking son of a bitch! How dare you accuse me of cheating!” Christine was shouting into the phone so loudly that her voice was distorted, forcing Milo to position the receiver a good six inches from his ear.
“Well, what am I supposed to think? You pull into the driveway in another guy’s car, and I saw the playpen in the bedroom. What did you expect?”
“How about a little trust, Milo? How about a little faith in your own wife?”
Admittedly, Milo wasn’t pleased with his response after seeing Christine pull into the driveway with the stranger, but he also felt that the deck had been stacked against him from the start. All the details in the scene had pointed to something shady and illicit, as if the universe had been plotting his overreaction.
The good-looking guy with the goatee and the tattoo.
The mirrored sunglasses.
The standard transmission.
Christine’s windblown hair.
The playpen in the bedroom.
Even the Jeep made things appear less than innocent. Had the guy been driving a Honda Accord or even a Subaru Forrester, Milo might not have jumped to the same conclusions and lost his temper. But there was something about a Jeep, jet black, top down, mud on the tires, padded roll bars, Nirvana on the radio. It all screamed, Sex! Sex! Sex!
And there had been the sudden burst of jealousy that had caught him off guard as well. Though Christine had her fair share of male friends from the office, many of them high-powered attorneys with luxury automobiles and personal trainers, Milo had never felt a hint of jealousy about his wife’s relationship with these men.
But this time, standing on his front stoop, staring down on this scene, things were different.
Already his face was flushing, his hands balling into fists, his mind instantly running through possible scenarios that would place Christine and this man in these circumstances.
None of them proved to be very innocent.
Without a moment of thought or reflection, Milo had turned back into the kitchen, snatched the roses from the table, and exited the house, doing his best to ignore his wife and her companion even though he had to walk directly in front of the Jeep and along the passenger side in order to reach his car on the other side of the driveway.
“Milo? What the hell are you doing?” Christine asked, still seated and buckled in the Jeep. The two vehicles were parked side by side, the driver’s side door of Milo’s car and the passenger side door of the Jeep almost perfectly aligned, making it impossible to avoid his wife.
“What do you mean?” Milo asked, trying to avoid eye contact while reaching for the door to his car. He just wanted to get in his car and leave as quickly as possible.
“What do I mean? How about starting with what you were doing in the house? And what’s with the flowers? Could you look at me, for Christ’s sake?”
Milo turned and faced his wife, stealing a glance past her to the man sitting in the driver’s seat. Despite the awkwardness of the situation, he appeared completely at ease, impossibly relaxed, as if this type of situation happened every day in his life.
“Can we just talk about this later?” Milo asked, wishing now that he had left the flowers on the kitchen table and exited the house with a smile and a lie. Not only did he feel awkward, but in the presence of this stranger, he felt cowardly and petty too.
“Can’t you just tell me what the hell is going on? What were you doing in the house?”
“It’s still my house,” Milo countered, feeling jealousy mix with anger. “I’m still paying half the mortgage. Remember?”
“That doesn’t mean you can just barge in whenever you want.”
“Why? Are you afraid that I might interrupt something?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You know what the fuck I’m talking about!” Milo shouted, motioning to her male companion.
Swearing wasn’t a normal part of Milo’s repertoire. In fact, his infrequent use of obscenity rivaled that of Edith Marchand, so he had regretted his choice of language, particularly in light of the sleeping child strapped into the backseat and the sideways glance of the man behind the wheel from beneath his sunglasses. He seemed to be growing larger and handsomer with each passing minute.
“What’s your problem, Milo?” Christine countered with controlled rage. “This is Phil from work. You met him last year at the picnic. This is Ashley. His daughter. Remember?”
He did remember. Phil was one of the new attorneys who had been hired the previous spring. Christine had been on the hiring committee, and he remembered that she had liked the guy a lot. He had interviewed well. Made everyone laugh at the right moments, if Milo was recalling the right guy. And though he didn’t specifically remember meeting Phil at the picnic, Milo had met a number of new faces that day and could’ve easily forgotten the introduction.
But still, why was Phil driving around on a Sunday with his wife, and why was his daughter’s playpen set up in his bedroom? “I don’t care where I met him,” Milo shot back, using these unanswered questions to gather steam. “Why the hell are you driving around with him, and where the fuck is his wife?”
Rather than responding in anger, which is what Milo had expected, Christine stole a nervous glance over to Phil and then leaned in. “Milo, go home. Now. I’ll call you in an hour.”
Milo knew at that moment, with absolute and undeniable certainty, that the correct decision would have been to follow his wife’s advice and get into his car. It’s what he had wanted to do all along. Something was wrong here. He was missing something. Milo sensed that a large piece of the puzzle was absent from the picture. An important piece. The sudden change in Christine’s voice and the evaporation of anger from her eyes had convinced Milo that he should go back to the apartment and wait for the call. But to turn tail and run in front of this man, this thick-necked, tattooed usurper who refused to speak, did not fit the script that Milo was following. It simply would not do. For once in his life, Milo was facing confrontation head-on, unafraid and undeterred.
“Please,” Christine repeated. “Just go home. I’ll call you soon.”
“I am home, goddamn it! This is my house. And I have a right to know what he’s doing here and why his daughter’s playpen is sitting in my bedroom.”
At this, Phil finally spoke, barely turning his head to do so. “Chrissy, maybe I should just leave and let the two of you sort this out.” His voice was ridiculously calm, increasing Milo’s rage. And he had called her Chrissy, a nickname that even Milo didn’t use.
“Yeah, maybe you should leave, Phil,” Milo said.
“Milo, please go home,” Christine insisted, reaching out and squeezing his forearm. Again, he sensed that missing puzzle piece looming over them, waiting to fall into place like a hand grenade, but still he pressed on.
“I am home. Why don’t you tell Phil to go home to his wife.?
??
“Milo, you asshole. Phil’s wife died last year in a car accident. Don’t you fucking remember?”
He remembered. It had been just after Christmas. Phil (he had been Philip back then), his wife (Mary Liz or Mary Claire or Mary something-or-other), and their daughter had been on their way to Vermont when a truck jumped the median and side-swiped their car. Milo had forgotten the names of the people involved, at least until now, but he remembered the accident, the phone call in the middle of the night, and the argument that had ensued when Milo refused to cancel a trip with Arthur Friedman to a diabetes specialist in Albany in order to attend the funeral.
“Oh … Jesus,” he stuttered. For the first time since he had approached the Jeep, Milo realized how crazy he sounded. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s all right,” Phil said, turning to check on his daughter, who was still sound asleep.
“I saw the two of you together and the playpen in the bedroom and … I don’t know. I just sort of went a little crazy. God, I’m sorry, man.”
Phil nodded behind his mirrored glasses and said nothing more.
“Go home, Milo,” Christine said, finally releasing his arm. “I’ll call you later.”
He did.
Two hours later, Christine called as promised, not wasting a second before screaming obscenities.
“Look, I’m sorry, Christine. You’re right. I should’ve trusted you. But I didn’t know what to think. I’m sorry, okay?”
“No, it’s not okay. It was embarrassing and ridiculous, Milo. I work with Phil every day. How the hell am I going to show my face in the conference room tomorrow? Jesus, Milo. You acted like a lunatic.”
“I know, but I’m sure he understands, Christine. We’re not the first people to have trouble with their marriage. Do you want me to talk to him? To apologize again? I will if that’s what you want.”
“Forget it. There’s nothing that you can do. I’ll clean up this mess myself.”
Then she hung up.
Despite his desire to continue the conversation with Christine, to avoid another three days of awkward silence, wondering when and if he should call, he was relieved when she hung up the phone.
He had been waiting at home for more than two hours, the pressure of “99 Luftballons” building with each passing minute. He had attempted to release some of it by opening a jar of jelly and popping some ice cubes, but as expected, this had failed to achieve any noticeable results. At times, there were things that Milo could do to alleviate the pressure of a demand when satisfaction was impossible, but these strategies did not always work. Milo suspected that the anticipation of Christine’s call only compounded the mounting pressure, making any temporary relief impossible.
Eventually he had removed the Highlights poem from his pocket and had begun reciting it again and again, unsure of why this might help but doing so nonetheless. It just felt right.
But Nurse Mancuso found the cure.
She told me not to scratch.
And it worked.
It didn’t hurt anymore.
Though he hadn’t understood his initial fascination with the poem, the repeated recitation, more than a hundred times in total, had caused Milo to develop a newfound admiration for the author. If only he had the same self-restraint as the boy who was able to resist scratching his rash. Milo thought that the demands of the jelly jars, the ice cube trays, and the incessant pounding of “99 Luftballons” in his head were similar to the author’s rash. They also required scratching, but unlike the author, Milo couldn’t ignore his demands. Doing so would only increase their intensity to the point of debilitation.
Yet he recited the poem anyway, hoping to somehow discover the child author’s inner strength. With nothing left in his bag of tricks, it was all that he could do.
Like the Borg, Milo thought, resistance is futile.
This was why Milo was secretly pleased when Christine hung up on him. The pressure of the demand had increased to a boiling point. The Point of No Return was fast approaching. In short order, Milo’s ability to focus would be compromised by blinding pain in the center of his head, a blurring of his vision, and a simple yet inexplicable inability to think.
It was time to go to Jenny’s.
On his drive up the Berlin Turnpike, into the south end of Hartford, thoughts about his driveway encounter with Christine continued to filter through his mind.
Yes, he had made a mistake in accusing Christine of infidelity.
Yes, he had told a widower to go home to his dead wife.
Yes, he had jumped to conclusions and lost his temper like never before, and in front of a stranger and his infant daughter, no less.
Yes, he had cursed like a sailor for all the neighbors to hear. But questions still remained. Why was Christine driving around with Thick-Neck Phil in the first place? Why was the kid’s playpen set up in their bedroom? How did Philip become Phil and Christine become Chrissy? Though he had admittedly made a spectacle of himself, Christine had never really answered any of his questions.
Most pressing, was Thick-Neck Phil still in the company of Christine? Was he inside their house? If so, what were they doing right now?
Milo brought his car to a halt outside of Jenny’s and spent several minutes behind the wheel, trying to clear his mind of these thoughts and compose himself. He took several deep breaths and tried to relax his hands and face. He closed his eyes and turned his neck and head in circles, working out the kinks. When he felt his nerves were as calm as they could be considering the circumstances, he went inside. As many times as he had done this before, and the number was probably in the hundreds, he was still a little nervous every time he took the stage.
Jenny’s was a bar on Brainard Road in Hartford. Small, dim, and adjacent to a movie theater, the bar was a bit of a dive that catered to pilots and mechanics who used the small airport at the end of the road, as well as the after-movie crowd. The food was good, the restrooms clean, and the atmosphere friendly. The bar also had its share of regulars, though Milo did not include himself in this group.
He had chosen the bar for two reasons. First, the owner, Jenny Glover, a busty blond pushing forty but trying desperately to cling to her twenties, was almost always working, and she liked Milo. She probably found him to be a little odd, but he was always polite and made a point of buying a beer before a performance and chasing it with a couple of Cokes afterward. The regulars liked Milo as well. Probably found him equally strange, but men and women who spent enough time in a bar to assume ownership of a stool were likely to be less than normal as well.
More important, the bar was also equipped for karaoke, and though Thursdays and Fridays were Jenny’s advertised karaoke nights, she left the system set up throughout the week and allowed customers to use it from time to time if the desire to sing grabbed hold of someone.
“How’s it cooking, Milo?” a large man with an Italian accent shouted as Milo passed through the doors and made his way inside. Several leather-backed stools surrounded a horseshoe-shaped bar, which was attached to a fairly large, rectangular stage on the open end.
“Just fine, Carmine,” Milo said, commandeering a stool close to the stage. “How about you?”
“My foot’s still giving me hell, but as long as I sit here and drink, it keeps its damn mouth shut. Know what I mean?”
“Yeah, I know. But you really should see a doctor.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. You sound like my wife. I already got one of those and don’t need another, thank you very much. Unless you’re offering, Jenny?”
“Forget it, old man,” the blond behind the bar said, tossing a towel in his direction. She was dressed in a yellow tank top and jean shorts, and she had several tattoos covering her shoulders and back, including a large one across the back of her neck—Fred written in red ink. Milo had yet to find the courage to ask her about that one.
“You gonna belt out a good one, Milo?” asked a pear-shaped man, catching Milo’s eye from across the bar. From the neck u
p, the man, an airplane mechanic and a Jenny’s regular, looked as if he might be in decent shape, with a thin face and a strong jaw. But below the neck, an almost impossible quantity of fat and cellulose had collected between the man’s chest and thighs, making the man look like one of the Weebles that Milo occasionally crushed in a doorjamb.
“Don’t I always, Pete?”
“You must certainly do, Milo. Ain’t that the truth.”
A second later, Jenny slid a beer in front of Milo. “How you doing?” she asked, taking a moment to look him in the eye. Though Milo had never discussed the trouble in his marriage with anyone in the bar, it seemed as if Jenny knew something was wrong.
“I’m good. Thanks. In a rush tonight, though. Got to get home soon.”
“Whenever you’re ready, then.”
Milo’s need to sing karaoke had actually begun in a bowling alley several years ago. Having stopped in on a Saturday night to fulfill the pressing need to bowl a strike, Milo had noticed that a DJ had set up a karaoke machine in the alley’s adjacent bar and was inviting patrons to perform on the small dance floor. Through the glass door that theoretically separated the bowlers from the drunks, Milo could see and hear a threesome, a guy and two girls, all young and drunk, singing “Love Shack” to a small and inattentive audience of drinkers at the bar.
Milo had managed to bowl his strike in the first frame and was finishing his game when the thought of singing first entered his mind. Though he had never sung karaoke before and had never felt the desire to do so, the idea quickly lodged itself in his mind, where it began to take hold. The thought grew into a possibility, and the possibility blossomed into a genuine demand. By the time he had returned his rental shoes and collected his deposit, the need to sing had consumed him, a flashing, incessant beacon that droned out all other thought. It wasn’t a genuine desire to perform or the sudden need for applause. Rather, it was a demanding insistence, an assertion of unknown origin, the building of pressure not unlike the strain exerted on him by his other demands. Based on experience, Milo knew that he could leave the bowling alley and head home without singing, but that the pressure would not alleviate, and would assuredly increase, until he had sung.