Grand & Humble (8 page)

“I said I’ll go to the damn Eye Ball!” This time, even Ludmilla had to have heard him—which is what his mother had probably wanted, anyway. No better way to keep the maid in line than to prove you had your teenage son in line too.

Harlan turned to go. He’d just come from the pool, but he’d only just started on his workout, and anyway, he desperately needed to connect with the water again. He couldn’t go back to the high school, not yet, not before his mom called the principal, who would, in turn, contact his coach. No, for today, he’d have to go to the pool at the community center.

Behind him he could feel his mom’s eyes on him again, watching his every defeated step. But he wasn’t about to look back at her.

Another plate crashed on the floor behind him.

And Harlan jumped again in surprise, exactly like his mother knew he would.

Manny couldn’t do it; it was impossible. He’d made it all the way to the bottom level of the Chasms of Chaos, and he’d assembled all the pieces of the Key of Life. But he couldn’t find Dragonio’s Gate anywhere. There was clearly something he was missing, another piece of the puzzle. Was there another, hidden level to the dungeon? A missing piece of key? That was the one thing Manny hated about computer games. For all their talk about “choices” and “interactivity,” there was really only one “right” way to win the game. You might have a little latitude about how you got there, but the final outcome was always the same.

Playing this game is stupid, Manny thought. He knew he should be asking his dad about his being adopted. He’d tried to bring it up a couple of times now. But he’d never been able to get the words out.
He wasn’t sure why. What was the worst thing that could happen? That he’d learn he was wrong and his dad would be offended by the question?

No. The worst thing that could happen was something he couldn’t anticipate, something completely unexpected. If he was right about being adopted, there had to be a reason why his dad had kept the information from him all these years. His subconscious mind seemed to know the reason—and if his nightmares were any indication, it was something serious and scary. So what was the goddamn hurry? Why not wait until the time was exactly right?

Manny saved his game and pushed away from the computer. Everything was all mixed up. He needed to get away, clear his mind, maybe even get some exercise.

He turned to his dresser. The bottom drawer was open, and he spotted a pair of nylon running shorts lying right on top.

“Where are you going?” his dad asked as Manny walked by the kitchen, backpack in tow. The third Tuesday of the month was the night of the partners’ dinner down at the law firm, so his dad always got home early. Now he was chopping vegetables on a plastic chopping block.

“Huh?” Manny said. “Oh, the community center. I thought I’d go for a swim.”

“What?” his dad asked.

“A swim. Aren’t you always saying I need more exercise?”

“But you don’t know how to swim.”

“I do so know how to swim!” Manny said, offended somehow. “We had to take a week of swimming in P.E.”

“You did?”

Manny nodded. “And for the record, I was the only kid in my whole class who had never taken lessons.”

“Manny, we couldn’t afford it.”

“Uh-huh. Funny how we always had money for organic vegetables.”

“No,” his dad said.

“Huh?”

“You can’t go swimming.”

“It’s okay. I can fake it okay.”

“I mean it,” his dad said. “You really can’t go.”

For a second, Manny thought his dad was joking. Then he saw the look on his dad’s face. It wasn’t disapproval or annoyance. No, there was no expression at all—just as in that earlier dream of Manny’s.

What was going on? Did it have something to do with the incident with the jack-in-the-box? But that
had been over a week ago, and there hadn’t been any weirdness in the air since then.

“Are you serious?” Manny asked.

“There’s something I need you to do for me,” his dad said.

“Right now?”

“Right now.”

“Well, what
is
it?” Manny didn’t try to hide his annoyance.

His dad didn’t answer, just started hacking at a head of broccoli. Did he have a chore for Manny or not? It almost seemed like he was stalling for time. Finally, his dad glanced out the window, and Manny swore he saw relief flash across his face.

“We have a clog in one of our gutters,” his dad said. “It’s not draining right. You need to clear it.”

“Right this very minute?”

“Manny, do you know how much damage a clogged gutter can do?”

“But—”

“Manny, please. Just do this for me, okay?”

Manny got the ladder from the garage and climbed up to the offending gutter. It was cold outside, but not freezing. Even so, he could see his breath in the wet winter air.

There was water standing in the gutter itself. It hadn’t rained in a couple of days, so his dad hadn’t been blowing smoke when he’d said the gutter was clogged. The water was brown and stagnant, full of dead leaves that had probably been festering there since fall. Manny hadn’t remembered to wear rubber gloves, but he didn’t want to climb all the way back down now, so he reached inside and just started rooting about in the mess. It was cold—even colder than he’d expected—and the icy chill actually stung his hand. Stirring up the water released a foul smell. Short of scooping dog poop off the lawn, this was about as unpleasant as yard work got.

Why was Manny doing this? Yeah, sure, because his dad had asked him to. But that wasn’t the real reason. The real reason he was on the roof was the same reason he’d been playing that computer game and then heading for the swimming pool. It was all a question of avoidance. And what was Manny avoiding? Saying out loud the words, “Dad, am I adopted?”

Manny had pulled five or six handfuls of rotting leaves from the gutter, but it still wasn’t draining. Whatever was clogging it was wedged deep in the downspout itself. He would have to reach down and see what he could find. With a sigh, he pushed up his sleeve and stuck his arm inside. But the added
volume caused the water in the gutter to overflow; it spilled onto him, soaking the front of his sweatshirt.

“Goddamn it!”
Manny said, and the words echoed off the neighbors’ garage. He had exclaimed partly in frustration about the cold water and the fact that he’d been wearing a clean sweatshirt. But it was mostly frustration with himself, the way he was being so cowardly with his dad. Did that make Manny a coward? It was true that he’d also never been able to stand up to the jocks at school, but that was more a question of self-preservation.

Manny’s fingers brushed something deep inside the downspout. By now he’d lost almost all the feeling in his hand, so it wasn’t clear what he was touching. Whatever it was, it had to be what was blocking the flow of water. But for the moment, it was just out of his reach.

He leaned in closer, careful not to lose his balance on the ladder. He only needed another inch or two. Cold water soaked up to the shoulder of his sweatshirt, but he was already so wet that it didn’t matter.

Finally he had it. His fingers closed around something pliable, but with a brittle, spiky exterior. A pinecone? He pulled on it, but it was wedged in there pretty tightly.

I’ll do it, Manny thought to himself. He’d finish
with the downspout, and then he’d confront his dad. Because no matter what his dad told him, it had to be better than not knowing.

Manny gave the clog a hard jerk, and finally it gave way. He lifted it up through the muck. Still more water splashed out of the gutter, but at least he’d gotten the obstruction. He lifted it up so he could see what it was.

A dead pigeon. It had to have been in there for weeks, and it was partly decomposed. The eye sockets were empty, and the body was soft and bloated. It was the broken feathers and curled claws that had felt prickly in his hand.

“Eewww!” Manny said, flinging the bird away, almost losing his balance.

He started down. First, he was going to go inside and scrub his hand with soap. Then, a promise to himself was a promise. He was going to have it out with his dad.

“Dad?” Manny said back in the kitchen. His father started in surprise. He’d been slicing a cube of tofu. Meanwhile, Manny hadn’t even bothered to change out of his wet clothes.

“Manny,” his dad said. “What is it? Did you clear the gutter?”

“It’s taken care of. But now I want to ask you something.”

“Did you check the others? Because they might have clogs too.”

“Am I adopted?”

On the stove, onions sizzled in a frying pan.

“What?” his dad said.

Manny repeated the question, even though he knew his dad had heard him perfectly.

There was another hesitation. Then his father laughed. “What makes you think that?”

But his dad’s hesitation had already answered Manny’s question.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me?” Manny asked.

His dad stood by the stove a very long time, until the onions started to smoke. Then he turned off the burner and walked to the kitchen table and sat down.

“How did you know?” his dad said.

Manny took the seat across from him. “I’m not sure exactly. It was just a feeling. That something wasn’t right.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being adopted.”

“I don’t mean with that. I mean with us.”

His dad nodded once.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Manny asked. “If you
don’t think there’s anything wrong with being adopted, why did you keep it a secret?”

His dad searched the Formica tabletop, as if for an answer. “I don’t know,” he said at last. “You were just such a sensitive baby.”

“So?”

“So there’s a stigma.”

“Not anymore.”

“You don’t understand,” his dad said. “I was a single father.”

“What do you mean?” Manny said. “What about Mom?”

His dad thought for a second. “I didn’t adopt you until after she died. I guess it was my way of moving on.”

Manny thought about all this new information. The man and woman he’d thought were his parents weren’t his parents at all—and the woman he’d thought was his mother wasn’t even his
adoptive
mother.

“Anyway,” his dad went on, “people judge you when you’re a single man who adopts. People think you’re depriving the child of a mother.”

Manny didn’t say anything. He couldn’t deny what his dad was saying.

“So we moved,” his dad said. “We left town, came
to the city. We left everything and everyone behind. Then people wouldn’t know I adopted you.”

Manny nodded. That explained why they didn’t have any old friends, or old basement junk either.

“What do you know about my—” Manny almost said “parents,” but he stopped himself in time. His dad
was
his parent. His being adopted didn’t change that. “My birth parents?” Manny finished.

“Not much,” his dad said. “They were killed in a car accident. You were home with a baby-sitter.”

A car accident, Manny thought.

“How old was I?” he asked.

“Almost three. That’s what I always wanted to explain to people. Adoptive parents want babies. They’d rather have a baby of a different race or the wrong sex than a toddler of the same race. They want to make their mark. Or maybe they’re just afraid that the birth parents have already messed the kid up and it’s too late to change him back. Anyway, at three years old, you would’ve been hard to place, even though you were white. I was doing a good thing!”

“Dad! Of course you were!”

He sighed. “I’m sorry, Manny. I’m sorry I lied to you.” Manny was all set to say that he understood, that his dad didn’t have anything to be sorry for. But before he had a chance to speak, his dad said,
“But now I’ve got to get back to my stir-fry. Let’s talk about this later, okay? Why don’t you go check the rest of those gutters before it gets dark?”

That was it? He was dismissed? Manny wanted to say more, to have his dad say more to him too. He would’ve thought his dad would have
wanted
to say more; that was the way he usually worked. But apparently there was nothing more
to
say, at least not now. They’d talk about this again later, his dad had said. But would they? It had sounded kind of final to Manny. And now he was just supposed to go outside and check on the gutters?

Manny didn’t go back outside. He went up to his room to undress for a shower. As he did, he looked out the window. He could see the gutter from there, the one he thought he’d cleared when he removed the dead bird. It hadn’t drained. The gutter was clogged by something deeper still.

Harlan felt like every eye in the room was on him—which was saying something, since it was the night of the annual Eye Ball and the whole room was decorated with eyeballs of every sort. There were thousands of eyes in all: eyeball balloons, plastic anatomic eye models for the table centerpieces, even eyeball ice cubes in the punch.

Of course, the two eyes that mattered most were his mother’s. He could sense them trained on him like the scope of an assassin. But Harlan wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction of looking back at her, of acknowledging her existence. He also wasn’t going to talk to anyone. Nope, he was just going to stand there by the wall, Pepsi in hand, staring listlessly out at the dance floor. His mom had forced him to come to this thing, but she couldn’t make him mingle—
“shake out some votes,” as the Senator liked to say.

His mom wasn’t even supposed to be here. This was supposed to be a solo Harlan gig. But she’d made it a point to come tonight because she’d sensed dissension in the ranks. She’d blackmailed him into going and now she
had
to come, to make sure he did what he’d said he would do. But even she couldn’t make him do any more than fulfill the letter of the law.

“Harlan!” said a familiar voice. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

It was Beth Farrell, the novelist he’d met at the Bittle Society dinner. With all the charity and fundraising events Harlan had attended, he’d never seen her before that dinner; now he’d run into her twice in a matter of weeks. What were the odds?

“Ms. Farrell,” he said, nodding politely.

“Beth!” she chastised him.

“Right. Beth. You were looking for me?”

“I was.” Suddenly she was digging into her handbag, which was far too large to be in any way fashionable. “I wanted to give you…” She kept rummaging until she finally found what she wanted. “This!” And with that, she produced a book. The title was
The Moment of Truth
, and the cover was a picture of a man looking into a mirror, while the face in the mirror was looking away.

Harlan read the name of the author. “It’s yours,” he said.

“I seem to recall your saying you’d never read me. Here’s your chance. Signed by the author and everything.”

Harlan smiled. “How’d you know I’d be here tonight?”

“Oh, I read something somewhere about your being a ‘Cornea Crony.’”

“‘Corporal’!”

“Right!” Beth smirked. “Anyway, I figured anyone who had to put up with an embarrassing name like that deserved at least one freebie.”

“Well, thank you,” he said, reaching for the book.

She pulled it back from his hand. “But I’m only giving it to you on one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“If you don’t like it, you have to lie and tell me you do.”

“You don’t have to worry. I’m sure I’ll love it.”

“Now what did I just say?” Beth said. “You have to lie
convincingly
. There’s no way you can know you’ll like my book until after you’ve read it!”

“But I’m not lying. I know I
will
like your book.”

She looked at him wryly. “How in the world can you possibly know that?”

He grinned. “Because I know I like you.”

She blushed—the desired response. “Why, Harlan. You little flirt.”

“I try.” Harlan
was
flirting—with a thirty-five-year-old woman, no less. It felt good to feel like his old self again.

He looked over at his mom, on the other side of the dance floor. She was pretending to talk to the wife of the city manager, but she was really watching Harlan. He knew exactly what she thought about his talking to Beth Farrell again. It made him happy to know that he was driving his mom crazy.

Harlan turned back to Beth Farrell. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Anything. I’m an open—well, you know.”

“Is it weird to have fans? People who feel like they know you because of your books?”

“Oh, you have
no
idea,” Beth said. “It’s very flattering, of course. But mostly, I just keep wondering when they’re all going to realize what a fraud I am.” She grimaced. “I guess you could say I’m not very comfortable being in the spotlight.”

Harlan nodded. “Uh-huh.”

“Oh, please!” Beth said. “Don’t pretend you can relate, because I know you can’t. You were born to be the center of attention.”

“Well, I guess I am kind of a people person,” Harlan admitted.

Beth laughed. “I’ll say you are.” She thought for a second, then said, “I once read this great definition of the difference between an introvert and an extrovert. An introvert is someone who gets energy from being alone, and who is drained of energy by being around other people. An extrovert is the exact opposite—someone who gets energy from other people, and who is drained by being alone.”

Harlan nodded. “Everything being equal, I guess I’d rather be around people.”
Certain
people, anyway, he thought.

“Ever do any acting?” Beth said. “Spending time in an actual spotlight?”

“Harlan,” said the voice of Harlan’s mom. “I need to speak to you a moment.”

His mom? Where had she come from? He’d been so busy talking to Beth that he’d lost sight of her.

“Excuse us, won’t you?” his mom said to Beth, in a voice so innocent that it made Harlan want to strangle her. He felt like he should say something—object to his mom’s interruption of their conversation. So why didn’t he?

Beth gave his mom a look that was equal parts amusement and disgust. Then she turned to Harlan.
“Be sure and tell me what you think of my book,” she said. “But remember: I want praise, not the truth.”

And then she was gone, and Harlan was alone with his mom. He was furious with her, but didn’t know where to begin. But before he
could
begin, she grabbed Beth’s book from his hand. “I’ll take that,” she said.

Harlan found his voice at last. “Mom! You can’t just interrupt me like that! And that’s
my
book!” Could she
be
more of a bitch?

“I was just going to hold it for you,” she said, even more innocently than before, in a tone so convincing that it almost had Harlan fooled.

“Hold it? Why?”

“Because you’re on. You’ve got to go up now and pick the winning raffle numbers.”

Harlan stood behind the stage—really just a raised wooden platform underneath hanging lights. He was waiting for Dr. James Berman, the evening’s “‘Macula’ of Ceremonies,” to finish describing all the prizes in the Retina Raffle. In just a moment, he’d introduce Harlan so he could go up onto the stage to pick the winning numbers.

But that was one stage Harlan didn’t want to be on. It wasn’t that he was afraid of the spotlight or the
crowd—he’d told Beth the truth when he’d said he was comfortable being in front of people. What he didn’t like was being there on orders from his mom. But he
did
have to go up onto that stage; he didn’t have a choice, not if he wanted to keep swimming.

“Third prize is for all you husbands whose wives say you never do anything romantic,” Dr. Berman was saying into the microphone. “It’s the perfect night on the town, starting with dinner for two at the Rose and Lobster!”

Out on the dance floor and at the surrounding tables, people applauded. Dr. Berman went on explaining the details of the prize. But Harlan shivered. The hall wasn’t cold—on the contrary, people had been dancing, and the air was stuffy. But he felt a strange chill.

“Our second prize will be a real treat for the shopaholics in our audience,” Dr. Berman was saying. “The merchants at North Park Mall have all gotten together to donate a five-hundred-dollar gift certificate!”

An image flickered in Harlan’s mind—but it was vague, too dark to make out. Was he having one of his premonitions? Here? Now? In front of all these people?

No, he thought. He had to fight it—to use that
anti-premonition technique he’d used before. He deliberately slowed his breathing and imagined himself on life support, trying to make the filling and emptying of his lungs as even as possible. Then he forced himself to concentrate on the here and now, to be aware of every little thing going on around him.

“And for the grand prize in the Retina Raffle,” Dr. Berman was saying, “a week-long trip for two to Hawaii!”

Harlan’s technique wasn’t working; no matter how hard he tried, he didn’t seem to be able to stop this premonition from coming. But this one was different from all the others. The feeling of dread was getting stronger and stronger and the image in his mind was somehow growing bigger, but it still wasn’t any clearer; it was just a haze, completely indistinct. And yet the uncertainty of this vision, its elusiveness, actually made it even more unsettling than any of his other premonitions.

“Harlan?” whispered a voice. “That’s your cue.”

Harlan turned. Sharon Blakely, the special events coordinator, was standing beside him. She was staring out at the stage, toward Dr. Berman and the audience beyond.

“Huh?” Harlan said.

She smiled at him reassuringly. “You’re on.” Sure
enough, Harlan heard applause coming from the hall. But Harlan didn’t—couldn’t!—move. Sweat dripped from his scalp. It felt like he was breathing through a pillow.

“Harlan?” Sharon said. “Are you okay?”

He wasn’t okay. By now, the vision had expanded to fill his brain, but it still wasn’t focused. It was infuriating, like the blind spot in the corner of your eye that, when you look right at it, isn’t there anymore.

Out in the audience, the applause faded away—abruptly, impatiently, almost like someone had pulled a plug.

“Harlan?” Dr. Berman said, up onstage, in a mock sing-song voice. “We’re waiting!”

“Harlan!” said Sharon, beside him, more emphatically.

But suddenly he felt a new presence near him behind that stage.

“Harlan?” his mom said. “What are you doing? Why aren’t you going on?”

He looked at her, but he couldn’t get enough of a breath to speak. It was like she was one of those vacuum pumps that are used to preserve food and she had sucked what was left of his air right out him.

He shook his head no.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “I don’t know
what you’re trying to pull here, but it’s not going to work. Now get up there.”

She pushed him up the small set of steps.

Harlan stood at the top of those stairs, in the shadows at the back of the platform, out of the range of the hanging stage lights overhead. He felt like a quadriplegic—someone with no control over his arms or legs. But quadriplegics could at least blink; Harlan couldn’t even do that. It was all he could do to keep from collapsing into a puddle of saline solution.

His mom had followed him up the steps. She pushed him again, and momentum alone sent him stumbling forward, through a curtain of light and into the glow of the brightly lit stage.

“Ah!” Dr. Berman said to Harlan. “I see you decided to join us at last.”

But it was at that exact moment that the premonition crystallized in his mind. It was an image of…

Nothing. Harlan had never seen, or even imagined, anything like it. It wasn’t darkness or gloom or haze or shadows or fog. It was
nothing
. A void, a vacuum—the absence of matter, of light, of
anything!

As if Harlan himself did not exist.

It was true that all of Harlan’s premonitions so far
had involved the prospect of his own death. But this one went even further,
beyond
death, to the nonexistence—the terrible nothingness—that came after. Or was this just a glimpse of what it meant to have no self?

The “image” tore through his brain like a chain saw. He did not
exist
! Suddenly, the mind’s eye was a hollow socket and his soul was a bottomless pit.

Harlan was overwhelmed by what he saw—or, rather, the infinite emptiness that he felt.

Dr. Berman saw the panic on Harlan’s face. “All right, then,” he said, taken aback. “Let’s just get to it, shall we?” And then he turned to the bin with all the numbered Ping-Pong balls.

Harlan swayed awkwardly. Sirens rang in his head; every mitochondrion in every cell of his body called out in alarm. He glanced back behind the stage and saw his mother gesticulating at him like an outraged mime.

“Harlan?” Dr. Berman said, looking around for the cute boy in the tux. Finally he found him, still at the back of the stage. “Oh. There you still are.” He made an exaggerated motion with his arm. “Well, get out here! Trying to generate a little suspense, eh?”

Out in the audience, people chuckled. They knew the senator’s son, and they knew how out of charac
ter this was. So they assumed this had to be some kind of gag—a skit of some sort.

“Look,” Dr. Berman said, “I can’t move this bin. You have to come to me.”

The audience roared.

Harlan stumbled a little, but caught himself and somehow kept himself standing upright. The audience mistook his motion for a step and applauded encouragingly.

“That’s it!” Dr. Berman said. “There we go.”

“Go!”
his mom whispered.

And then the void in Harlan’s mind began to suck him in. It was slow at first, just a gentle tug on the edges of his being. But it was already picking up pressure, like the intake of a jet engine as it revved up for takeoff.

Harlan could not stay. If he didn’t leave that stage then and there, he knew he would simply cease to exist. His soul would be sucked away like so much loose lint.

He turned to go. It was the easiest, most satisfying step of his entire life. He felt like Johnny Appleseed taking his first step on the American frontier, or Niels Bohr walking into his first physics lab. Harlan was
born
to walk off that stage.

Better still, the horrible nothing in his mind was instantly gone.

He thudded down the stairs, past his mother.

“Harlan!”
she said. “What are you
doing?
”

It didn’t matter. She could put shackles on his legs to keep him from swimming, or banish him to some forsaken dungeon. He wasn’t going back onto that stage.

“Harlan!” she hissed. “Don’t you do this! Don’t you
dare
—”