Paradime (7 page)

I don’t know.

But if so, it’s pathetic.

I look at my finger. At least that’s something I’ll be able to talk to Kate about. Maybe I could even get some sympathy. Though without going into the reason for it, of course. That I got distracted looking at this beautiful woman and then so caught up in a fantasy about having dinner with her that I slashed my fucking finger.

She’d love that.

But I needn’t have worried. When I get in, Kate is already in bed, asleep, or pretending to be.

The next morning, the Band-Aid on my finger is just that, a Band-Aid on my finger, not enough to stimulate an actual conversation. So in frustration – because I don’t know what Kate is thinking – I do something pretty awful. I scroll through her browsing history while she’s in the bathroom. Does it help? I don’t know. In amongst all the course pages, I find multiple searches for Gideon Logistics, for whistle-blower cases, and for Afghanistan. There are also a few for PTSD.

Is that, after all, what she thinks
I
have?

It might explain why she’s been putting up with my various dysfunctions – emotional, social, erectile. But then again it might not. So I also listen in on phone conversations she’s having. I allow myself to overhear them from the next room. It’s a small apartment, and she can’t imagine there’s any real privacy when she’s on the phone, so on those occasions when she brings her voice down a notch or two, almost to a whisper sometimes, I have to wonder what she thinks she’s doing, if not inviting me to listen even harder. In which case, what am I supposed to think when I hear this? ‘. . . oh, I don’t know, Sal, he’s trying . . .’ Or this? ‘. . . they’re
so
manipulative, and they have very deep pockets . . .’

But who? Who has deep pockets? And in what way, I’d like to know, does she think I’m
trying
?

On my next day off, I take things a step further. Kate says she’s going out to meet a friend for coffee and I decide to follow her. I give her the impression that I’ll be hanging out in the apartment all morning, but the second she’s out the door I get dressed and skip down to the street. I know which direction she’s probably headed in, so it doesn’t take me more than thirty seconds to catch up and fall in behind her. We move in unison down First Avenue, half a block apart.

What am I doing, though? What is it that I expect to find? Evidence of something? Of
what
? I already have ample evidence that Kate is big-hearted and kind and extremely patient. So what am I looking for now, evidence that she’s conspiring against me somehow? Am I out of my fucking mind?

At 4th Street she turns right. I continue behind her, but slow down and let her pull ahead. I think I know where she’s going anyway, a place she likes on Great Jones. By the time I get onto Second Avenue and look left, I catch a glimpse of her on the southwest corner disappearing right onto 3rd. By this stage, I’ve had enough and stay where I am. I stand there for a few moments, a little tripped out, looking at people, traffic, yellow cabs – one of which, slowing down now for a light, comes to a halt directly in front of where I’m standing. It’s only there for maybe five seconds, and all I see is a profile . . . but fuck me if that isn’t . . . Harold Brunker, the guy on the YouTube clip, the law professor. It’s the beard, something about the – or am I mistaken?

When the light changes, and the cab takes off, I watch as it zigzags across the avenue, deftly manoeuvring itself for a right turn onto 3rd Street.

Fuck
.

She’s meeting
him
?

I could go down there and . . . what? Storm into a crowded coffee shop? Start shouting? Make a scene?

But what if it’s not him?

Of course it’s fucking him.

I glance around, irritated now. For some reason, I’ve never liked this stretch of Second Avenue. It’s dark and airless.

I turn and make my way quickly back over to First.

Kate shows up at the apartment again around midday, by which point my irritation has mutated into acute sexual jealousy. Why was she meeting Harold Brunker? To reminisce about Occupy Wall Street? To discuss whistle-blower legislation? Over coffee? And that’s it?

Please.

Although the practical details of whatever else might be going on – the where, the
how
– resist coherent formation in my mind, I resolve to confront Kate about it the moment she gets in. But when the door opens, I see an equally determined resolve on
her
face.

‘Danny,’ she says, putting her bag down, ‘you remember that thing I showed you a while ago, the YouTube clip? The one you were so dismissive of?’

I remain silent and try to look puzzled.

‘Come on, you remember. The one of that guy, the law professor? Harold Brunker?’

I nod.

‘Well, I actually met with him this morning.’

Yeah? Really? This is where I might grab a kitchen knife, swipe the air with it and level insane accusations at her – instead of what I do, which is just offer a blank, ‘Oh?’

‘Yeah, my friend Sally’s at NYU, she asked around, and it turns out he’s pretty approachable.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah, he’s active in the whole protest scene and takes a special interest in, you know, the privatisation of the military, all the fallout from that, the human cost. He says it’s a form of moral Botox. He says—’

‘Jesus, Kate, he
says
. You didn’t talk about me, did you? You didn’t tell him about Afghanistan, about Sharista?’

‘No.
No
. I wouldn’t do that. Not without asking you first. I was going to maybe build up to it.’

‘Build up to it? What does that mean? What
did
you talk about?’

‘Oh baby,’ she says, visibly deflating, ‘I just . . . I wanted to talk to someone.’ She hesitates, a pleading look in her eyes. ‘I mean . . .
you
won’t talk to me. And I really want to help, I really want to try and understand all of this.’

I swallow, afraid to speak now. Stupid as it was, the jealousy is no longer there, but something else has set in, and I can’t quite place it.

‘And look,’ she goes on, ‘it’s okay that you don’t want to talk.’

From this, it’s clear that she has a worked-out and most likely Google-generated theory about why I don’t want to talk. It’s because I’m hurting, I’m traumatised, and the process of resolving that stuff takes time, it takes effort and commitment.

Nothing to do with how if I
do
talk, I’ll have to keep on lying to her.

‘Moral Botox?’ I say eventually. ‘Cute. Did he make that up all by himself?’

She stares at me, her big heart obviously weary now, her kindness and patience fraying. ‘I don’t know, Danny. Maybe he did. Maybe he didn’t. Maybe he heard it somewhere. Does it matter?’

That night, I dream about Iraq. It’s a rush of impressions, the heat and rumble and smell of a Humvee’s interior, the stark sound of an ammo feed-tray being slammed shut, the plume of smoke that rises from a distant bend in the road. On approach, this becomes a crash site, where an AH-64 Apache helicopter has just been downed. Strewn everywhere are battered sections of fuselage, and the person they’re pulling from the wreckage, it turns out – though I think we’re already somewhere else – is my father . . .

That
wakes me up.

For a while, I just lie there, in shock, staring up at the ceiling. He was a drunk, my old man, bitter and shouty, and he died of lung cancer, too many Marlboro reds. It was actually my mother who got pulled from a wreck, but that was years earlier, after a car accident – a collision with an oncoming truck, apparently. Beside her was my half-brother, Tom . . . who I can’t remember any more, can’t even see in my mind’s eye . . .

I look at Kate, asleep next to me in the bed. I listen to her as she breathes, and I wonder how long it will be before I can’t remember
her
. In a way, it’s happening already, and she’s receding. Though maybe it’s me who’s receding. Or retreating, or . . . succumbing . . .

Eventually, I drift back to sleep, a dreamless one, and when I open my eyes again a few hours later, it’s time to get up and go to work.

It’s a long day at Barcadero, and a stressful one, but towards the end of my shift, it happens again.

This time the woman isn’t there – which punches a hole in my earlier theory.
He’s
there, though, with two older guys. I didn’t see them being seated, because I was in the walk-in at the time, but they’re definitely there now, and having an animated conversation. My guy is sitting in the middle, turning one way, then the other, like a talk-show host.

I go on working, glancing up every few seconds, but, unlike the last time, there’s no panic or sense of urgency – I’m not self-conscious or worried about who can or can’t see him. I just stare at this man who bears an uncanny resemblance to me – or, as he might see it,
I
bear an uncanny resemblance to. And who knows, maybe up close we’re different, maybe there are discernible variations in the size and spacing of our features, in our bone structure, in our complexion. But so what. For the moment, I’m happy to go along with whatever this is, to treat it as some weird . . .
thing
.

After work, though, the weirdness lingers, like a mood I can’t seem to shake, and maybe one I don’t even want to shake, because it has a dreamy, vaguely narcotic quality to it, an intensity that carries me along – through the streets and the subway tunnels, into my building and up the stairs, into the apartment, and all with only the slightest, gentlest ripple of anxiety.

Unsurprisingly, by the following day, the feeling has dissipated somewhat. I can’t quite summon it, but I know it’s there, in the background, submerged.

I wonder if it’ll ever resurface.

It takes three days. I’m coming back inside after a break, walking along the narrow hallway towards the kitchen. A bit further on is where the restrooms are situated. As I’m turning towards the kitchen, one of the dishwasher guys is on his way out, lugging a heavy black sack, and I stand aside to let him pass. Just then the door to the ladies’ opens and someone comes out.

It’s the woman from that first night.

She’s tall, with dark hair in a pageboy cut, and red lipstick. She’s in a short, chequered dress. It’s hard not to stare at her legs, and I do stare at them, but when I stop and look up, I see that she’s staring intently at
me
. She seems mesmerised for a few seconds – but then figures it out I guess, realises why she’s staring at me.

I break away first. I head into the kitchen and make straight for my work station. It’s a while before I dare to, but I eventually look out, and there they are, huddled at the table together, talking and laughing. Dinner is mustard-glazed hamachi, fattoush, branzino, blood sausage, cider mousse, verbena ganache, and I wonder if at any point during it she tells him. ‘The strangest thing, sweetheart: on the way back from the bathroom, I saw this
guy
. . .’

As they’re getting up to leave, I contrive a reason to slip out of the kitchen. I rush along the hallway, yanking off my white jacket as I go. I make my way out to the street by a side exit, move a couple of doors down from the restaurant, and stop as though something in a window display has caught my attention. I glance to my right. This part of the street is quiet. A few people pass, walking slowly in either direction. Over by the kerb, there’s a young guy, no more than a kid, leaning against a parked low-slung sports car. He’s busy with his phone.

I look back at the entrance to Barcadero, and after a moment they emerge, gliding onto the sidewalk. The sports car, of course – I should have guessed – is theirs, or
his
. The kid looks up as they approach and quickly pockets his phone. There is an exchange of keys and what I assume is a fat tip.

The man holds open the passenger door of the car to let the woman get in. As he walks around to the driver’s side, I’m struck by how similar in height and build we are.

A moment later, the car hums to life. It’s sleek and curvy, shiny, a sort of ultramarine blue. As it pulls away, the woman turns her head slightly in my direction, and for the second time this evening, even if only for the briefest moment, our eyes meet.

I live off this for the next few days, the whole thing – her,
him
, the likeness, the otherness of it, the feeling it gives me. It’s not rational, and, if I were to talk about it, or look it up, I know things would go from mysterious to banal in seconds flat.

Hey, I have a cousin looks just like that Seth Rogen.

‘BuzzFeed’s 21 People Who Met Themselves.’

So I keep quiet about it. I certainly don’t mention it to Kate. What I do, in fact, is just wait for it to happen again. I even work on my day off in case I miss an opportunity to see them. Or to see
him
, really. She’s something else, no question about that, with the legs and the lipstick and all, but what am I, fourteen? No, he’s the source of interest here – whoever
he
actually is. And I try to find out. I make overtures to Stanley about maybe gaining access to bookings info, but he looks at me like I’m an axe murderer. I even try to chat up one of the girls who sometimes works front of the house, but that doesn’t go too well either.

After another few days, I begin to lose heart. Because something occurs to me. What if he’s been in the restaurant every single night for dinner
but sitting at a different table
? I’ve just been assuming that he always sits at the corner table, that it maybe has some significance for him. But what if I’m wrong?

A few more days pass, I keep a careful eye out, and he still doesn’t show. Then one morning I’m heading into work on the subway. Sitting directly opposite me is a large man in a crumpled suit who has a briefcase lodged tightly between his knees. He’s flicking through a copy of
Business Week
and chewing gum. I figure he’s a rep of some kind, or maybe an ad exec on the prowl for new accounts. Whatever. After a moment though, I glance down at the cover of the magazine. The layout is a grid of nine photos, each one a headshot, each one a face. I squint for a second, trying to bring the whole thing into focus. And then my heart stops.