Something Is Out There (18 page)

“Walker—really.”

“Tell me,” he says. “Come on.” It’s as though there’s no one else in the world, as though they have no history, no established pattern of speech and gestures between them. He puts his arms around her and hears himself say her name. “Jenny.”

She pulls away. “Don’t.”

“I’m sorry.”

She lets her head rest on the seat back and regards him. Then she touches his chest. “I’m such an idiot,” she says. “Don’t apologize.”

He can’t speak.

“It’ll be all right. I’m tired of the work on the boat. I never see him.”

“But you love him.” The words sound ridiculous. He feels like a kid. He wants her to say she doesn’t love him anymore;
he wants her to say it’s not Max now, but Walker. He listens to her voice in his imagination say
You. You
.

But she sighs and seems to laugh a little. “I don’t know anything anymore,” she says. “Can we just not talk about it now? Trust me, everything’s the same.”

He looks out at the facade of the store, and sees Sean coming back with his hot dogs and the drinks.

“I think I’d like something to drink,” Jenny says.

“You can have my water,” says Walker. He feels the words as meaning that she can have anything she wants that he can humanly give her, no matter what anyone—brothers, mothers, family, friends, and strangers—has to say about it.

“I wasn’t talking about water,” she says, and gives forth a little laugh.

“Will you take my water?” He feels the oddness of wanting the situation to go on, her tears, her trouble, this instance. He doesn’t want to let go of it.

“Water’s all we can get for now, right?”

“I could go in and get some beer,” he says.

“You’re sweet. There’s plenty at the house if I want it.”

“You can have my water.” He gets out of the truck and heads across the lot to meet Sean, who is about to drop the bottle of mineral water. Walker takes it, and then stands blocking the boy’s way to the truck. “Cut the smart remarks, okay?” He can’t keep the shaking out of his voice.

“I’m just kidding her.”

“Well, it’s not funny—so quit it.”

The ride to the house is quiet. Sean sulks in the back. Jenny looks out the passenger window, and then tries the radio for a while. Nothing of interest is on. She turns it off. Walker grips the wheel. When they pull up in front of the house, he gets out and moves to help her down from the truck, but she has
already made the step down and is holding the seat back for Sean, who gets into the front. She closes the door on him.

“See you both later.”

“We’ll be through in an hour,” Walker tells her. She has already started for the house, and she simply moves one hand away from her side, waving slightly without looking back.

He and Sean go to Pumphries, a recreation center near St. Catherine’s Catholic Church. The court is in the shade of tall oaks and sycamores, and the baskets have chain nets that clang when the ball hits the rim. Walker can’t concentrate. Few of his shots go in, and the shooting around becomes a series of misses and chasing the ball. Sean is irritable and sullen, and they do not speak much. Walker loses two games of Horse and another of 21 to the boy. There’s a puddle of stagnant water at one end of the court and with one of his misses the ball rolls there and splashes in. The stink of it is on his hands when he drops Sean at the river house and heads to Highpoint Terrace to pick up Jenny and take her back to the car dealership. She’s been waiting for him. She walks out to the truck as he pulls up. “Go ahead and get in,” he tells her. “I’ve gotta wash my hands.” In the kitchen, alone, he looks through the window over the sink, hearing the power saw: Max cutting another rib for the hull. Max is out there in the noise with the shade and the sunlight falling through the leaves. The wood chips fly, white in the brightness. Walker discovers himself feeling sorry for him, as if he has betrayed him.

In the truck, Jenny sits with her hands folded in her lap. Walker gets in and looks over at her. “Why don’t you tell him how you feel?”

She seems annoyed at the question. “I don’t want to talk about it. Please?”

He backs out, one arm on the back of the seat, near her shoulder. When he shifts gears and heads out of the neighborhood, she sniffles.

“You okay?” he says.

“Fine.”

She says nothing else. Just sits looking out at the passing houses and streets. It’s as if, with time to plan her response, she has gained a kind of cold equilibrium. When they get to the dealership, she thanks him, opening the door.

“He and I have to see some people about a bid,” he says. “Kitchen cabinets.”

She looks back at him. “Great.”

“If you want to talk,” he manages to say.

She reaches over and touches his arm. “Thank you.”

He nods, and watches her go into the dealership. She doesn’t look back.

At the Highpoint house, Max is still working. Walker honks the horn and waits. There’s the sound of the power sander. He leans on the horn, holds it down. Then listens. The power sander is off. But then the saw starts up. He gets out of the truck, fuming, and stands half into it, still leaning on the horn. When he stops now, there’s silence, and he leans on it again. Max comes from the house, putting on a clean shirt, his body gleaming with sweat. Walker lets the horn go and climbs in again. “You stink. Great. We’ll get this bid all right.”

Max gets in on the passenger side, buttoning the shirt. “Just drive. Christ. You couldn’t come around back and get me? What is it—forty feet?”

“You should’ve been waiting for me. Showered and ready, goddamn it.”

“What the hell’s the matter with you?” Max says. “Jesus.”

The house they are going to is in Harbor Town, past the turnoff to their mother’s river house, and on, to Mud Island. They cross the bridge with the enormous, silver-looking pyramid on the left, reflecting the sun and too bright to look at directly. The road winds to the right and along the river. They turn into Harbor Town, and go over the first little bridge there. The buildings here are very close together, with very little lawn space, and shade trees line the road. The house they are going to is a tall, narrow place with two verandas, one above the other, and a lot of windows. Walker parks the truck and gets out, and Max reaches into the glove box to get the clipboard and pencil. His blue shirt hangs on him, with dark splotches.

“You look like you just got out of a pond,” Walker tells him.

“It’s a hot day. Shut up.”

“You ought to pay more attention to things.”

“What?” Max stops and looks at him.

“You heard me.”

“Hey, just keep your end up, you know?”

Walker starts to move off. “I’m not just talking about the goddamn business.”

“Okay.” His brother takes his arm at the elbow. “Then what? Tell me what’s on your mind.”

Walker pulls his arm away and goes on.

“What the hell’re you talking about? What’s got into you? You’ve been moping around for weeks. Everybody’s noticed it.”

“Jenny,” Walker says. “Has Jenny noticed it?”

“What
about
Jenny, cowboy?”

“Why ‘cowboy’?”

“Do you want to tell me what the fuck you’re talking about?”

He doesn’t answer. They go along the walk, which leads
through a row of forsythia bushes to an atriumlike structure, at one end of which, perhaps twenty yards away, is a wrought-iron door. A tall skinny man with big round green eyes stands there waiting, holding the door open. There’s something about his face. “Hot enough for you?” he says. Walker realizes that he’s wearing makeup; it’s adhering to his hairline, a bad job of it, as if it were slapped on by somebody not interested in getting it right.

“Plenty hot,” says Max, who, if he has noticed, is keeping it to himself.

“Name’s Ron Podrup,” the man says.

Max and Walker introduce themselves. They step past him, into the cool shade of the front room, which is refrigerator cold. A woman sits there, at the edge of the couch, hands folded over her knees. Walker bows slightly, seeing her, and then he sees that she’s been crying. She stands, and looks him up and down. She has a thin, lined face with deep-socketed eyes, and a down-turning mouth. Her hair is parted in the middle of the top of her head and combed straight down either side, and her ears stick out of it—they give her whole countenance a vaguely goofy look. “You’re the workmen?” she says.

“Yes, ma’am,” Max says, coming up beside Walker.

“May Podrup.” She offers her hand, and they shake, and then her tall husband leads them to the kitchen. “We’re actors,” he says. “Community theater. Dress rehearsal.”

“Excuse me?” Max says.

“The makeup.” The man indicates his long face. “She wasn’t really crying.”

“I’m sorry?” Max says.

“They’re actors,” Walker tells him, with barely suppressed anger. It seems to him that building the boat has robbed his brother of the ability to see anything else at all.

Podrup straightens, clears his throat. “Well, anyway. Here’s what we’d like done.”

“Should I go get the calculator, dearest?” she says.

He turns to look at her. “Why, no.”

“Do you need me here, then, dearest?”

There’s an edge to her voice. It’s as if she’s having fun with it, standing there with a faint smile playing at the corners of the bitter-looking mouth. It’s a smile. Her very white teeth show. It changes her entire appearance; she’s actually quite pretty. Walker has a moment of wishing he could feel anything for anyone other than what he does feel, and for whom. It slices through him like a blade. She goes on: “Or will you go it alone on this one?”

“I’ll brave it,” he says. “Why don’t you wait in the living room and we can finish for today in a minute.”

She says, “All right, dearest.” Then she nods at the brothers and leaves the room. He gives them a look, as if seeking some sort of lighthearted commiseration from them. Walker has the sensation of not knowing what to do with his face. He tries a little smile and a nod, but then Mr. Podrup’s made-up face returns to its blank seriousness. He begins describing the remodeling he’s planned—one side of the kitchen to be expanded by knocking down a dividing wall, cabinets to be put all along that side, an opening in the far wall, looking out to the den.

Mrs. Podrup is moving around in the other room. Walker glances back at the entrance there, and sees her cross the frame. She’s carrying a small table. Beyond her is a shelf full of books.

“Can I take some measurements?” Max says. “Walker?”

They work together determining the length and height of the wall. They have always worked together well. The man goes back into the other room with the woman and they’re talking
low. They’re practicing, rehearsing. The woman clearly wants not to do this now, but the man insists. She calls him David, but that’s the name of the character he plays. It’s a drama about a man and a woman on a bus, lovers on a journey somewhere. They are both married to other people. The word
trap
keeps getting repeated. Max scratches a little schematic drawing onto the pad, to show it to them. And he winks at Walker, who thinks about these people pretending so badly for the benefit of the visiting contractors.

Then he thinks of Jenny, and her friend from the computer store.

As they walk back out to the truck, Max says, “Was that weird or was that
weird?”
“It was weird.”

“I don’t think I want to do the work for them.”

“You wouldn’t be the one doing it.”

They get in, and Walker turns the ignition. His brother sits staring at him. “You’ve got something on your chest, and I sure wish you’d let me in on it.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I wish everybody’d let me alone a little, Jesus.”

A little later, Max says, “You really want to be there doing work with those two in the house?”

“They were rehearsing. What’s so weird about that?”

“With us
there?
I think they just wanted an audience. I bet we never hear from them again.”

“Let’s just make the bid and see what happens.”

“A couple of screwballs.”

“Really?” Walker says. “No kidding. How screwball is it to be building a fucking cabin cruiser in your backyard?”

“Hey, is
that
what’s the matter with you?”

“Nothing’s the matter with me. Just forget it.”

“No come on—let me have it. Everybody else seems to want to take a turn. Here’s your chance.”

“You’re talking about Jenny.”

Max says nothing, and they ride on for a few moments in silence.

“Are you talking about Jenny?”

“Just drive, okay? I don’t feel like fighting with you, too.”

“You’re gonna lose her, Max.”

“Really. Who to—you?”

Walker doesn’t respond to this. They arrive back at the Highpoint house. Walker pulls into the shade of the big willow in front. He leaves the motor running. He feels his own heart stamping in his chest. Max gets out and slams the door. Their car with its new fuel pump is in the driveway, so Jenny’s home.

“I’ll call you with the amount when I’ve figured it, and you can call them,” he says, without looking back.

Walker drives away, fast.

That night, he has a dream: he’s in the truck and she and the cowboy are in the back, doing it. The cowboy is ranged behind her and her belly is big, and she looks at Walker and smirks and says his name. He wakes with a start, breathless and for a moment unable to shake the sense of it, the ill-seeming air of it, turning in the bed, the image still too clear, shortening his breath. He rises and walks into the kitchen to pour himself some milk, and there he finds Sean, sitting at the table with a glass of orange juice and the last piece of the cake Minnie baked yesterday afternoon.

“You were moaning in your sleep,” Sean says.

“Let me have some of that.”

“What’s the deal with everybody lately?”

“Nothing.”

“Something’s screwy.”

“Nothing’s going on that I know of.”

“You’re so not a good liar.”

“Hey, why don’t you just mind your own business.”

“That thing with Disco Bill this morning. That was funny.”

“You don’t know shit about anything, so shut up.”