The Interloper (20 page)

Every day I went to the Mailboxes Store and checked the box. I knew it was unlikely Raven would have received my letter, read it, and replied in such short order, but in situations like this, one hopes against hope. I did not want to miss his letter on the off chance things unfolded more rapidly than usual. More than once, I arrived before the postal service had delivered the mail, and so I found myself hanging around the Mailboxes Store, sometimes by myself, sometimes with other eager would-be recipients of mail.

On the seventh or eighth day after I posted the letter to Raven, it was just me and the man who ran the Mailboxes Store. His wife/sister was nowhere in evidence. (I wanted to ask him how his wife was, but I knew he would respond that she was his sister; if I asked him instead how his sister was, he would have told me she was his wife.)

My mailbox was empty. “Mail come yet?” I asked.

“Shouldn’t be too long.”

We stood around in silence for a while. I browsed the padded envelopes.

“Growing a beard, huh?” he asked.

“Why not?”

“Expecting anything good?”

“The usual.”

He nodded.

A few minutes later, the mail truck arrived. A young female mailperson placed the mail in the PO boxes. Nothing. Another day of nothing. The man behind the counter saw me close the box without retrieving anything.

“Excuse me,” he said, motioning me toward the counter.

I walked up. He frowned like he was going to say something unpleasant.

“I’m sorry to bother you, but …” He looked me squarely in the eye. “Is there someone I can call for you?”

“What are you talking about?”

“We’re all okay and everything?”

“Are you asking me if I’m okay?”

He stepped back from the counter. “Forget it. It’s none of my business.”

“I guess not.”

He laughed uncomfortably.

I went over this conversation in my head on the way home. I wasn’t quite sure what had happened. He had tried to reach out to me. That much I could tell. But I wasn’t quite sure what he wanted. Was it about his sister/wife? I wondered for a moment if I was dreaming. How could I know for sure that I was not dreaming?

In those cases when I have had a dream-within-a-dream-within-another-dream (the nightmare of facing mirrors and shifting time all rolled into one), I have always known I was truly awake when the resolution of detail suddenly increased. This is difficult to explain. Put simply, dreams seem real while you’re in them, sure, but life feels, smells, looks, sounds, and tastes real.
When we’re dreaming, all the stimuli are patched in directly. When we’re awake, we have to filter out all kinds of insignificant stimuli in order to assemble a picture of reality. You can feel the filtering going on. My old test used to be: Can I taste the spit in my own mouth? If I could, it meant I was awake for sure. But the dream-mind caught up with this scheme. Weeks after I had devised the test, I had a dream in which I could taste the spit in my own mouth, but also in which I had sprouted wings and my penis hung to the floor, and I awoke from it in a state of great confusion.

I pulled the car to the curb. I reached into the glove compartment and retrieved the owner’s manual. I found the index and looked for the fuses section. I scanned the fuse chart to make sure everything looked correct. Now I knew I was not dreaming. The fuse chart was there, and it presented itself to me in such exquisite detail, I could only have been awake.

I stopped at the coffee shop down the street before heading home. I needed a picker-upper. Everything seemed cloaked in gauze. So much of my sleep-deprived mind was focused on getting Raven’s response, on waiting for the response, that whatever parts of it were not spinning in circles of worry were overtaxed, barely able to respond to people around me.

I hit a pole while pulling into the parking lot, putting a small but deep scrape in the front quarter panel of my car. I ordered a large black coffee to go and when I stepped up to the condiment bar to pour some milk in it, I noticed the Cartoon GI sitting at the adjacent table, with his four-color click pen, drawing
conspiracy charts to post around the neighborhood. Cartoon GI grunted as he drew, spoke under his breath. I could only pick out one word of ten. “Fucking … multinational … torture chambers …” I took a peek at his drawings.
NATO ← U.K
. +
SOUTH AFRICA → U.N
. (
ONE WORLD
) and so on, with flag drawings in all four corners.

He looked up at me from under his helmet, then looked away quickly, focusing on the paper in front of him. I walked toward the back door. Buried in the series of grunts, I thought I heard him say “Purple purple panties.”

Everything that went through the Cartoon GI’s head came out of his mouth. His floodgates were always open, and a steady stream flowed out into the world. He held nothing back because he could hold nothing back. Everything came out, all the time. Talking about it is healthy. But nothing changes. We just keep on talking, talking, talking, until the end.

I had nothing to do for the next twenty-three hours, until the next mail drop. I went into the living room to pick up the mess I’d made of food wrappers and still-sticky plates and bowls. But I didn’t pick anything up. Instead, I sat on the couch where Patty had sat before leaving me. I fell asleep and had a series of dreams in which the Cartoon GI was coming to get me.

When I awoke it was dark and someone was pounding on the door. At first I was convinced that it was the Cartoon GI, but as I reentered the world of the waking, I realized how unlikely that was. I looked through the peephole. Standing under the porch light was Calvin Stocking Senior, in his suit and tie, neck fat bulging over his collar, holding what appeared to be a pizza box and a six-pack of beer. I switched on the living room light and opened the door.

“Hey—holy smokes, Owen. You look like shit.” Calvin Senior walked into the living room. “Your place looks like shit,
too. I brought some pizza and beer. Thought we might talk. Unless now is not a good time?”

“It’s fine. It’s a fine time. Sorry about the mess.” I bussed some dishes from the coffee table to make room for the pizza and beer. “I was taking a nap but I’m up now. Your timing’s pretty good, actually, vis-à-vis my nap. Excuse me for a sec?”

“Sure,” he said.

“Just going to put this stuff in the sink.”

“No problem.”

I dumped the dishes in the kitchen sink, ran some water over them. While the water was still running, I grabbed one of Patty’s cookbooks off the shelf and scanned the index for something I didn’t know how to make. Chicken Fricassee. I read the entire recipe to make sure I was indeed awake.… rosemary … ¼ teaspoon pepper … 3 tablespoons … add chicken parts … shake until well coated … combine remaining flour mixture … 30 to 35 minutes … 4 servings.…

“No need for that,” Calvin Senior said. “I brought pizza.” He had walked into the kitchen while I was reading the recipe.

“Sorry. I was checking something.”

The sink had stopped up and was about to overflow. I shut off the water. A fly buzzed into the windowpane, looking for an exit.

“Let’s go back out there,” I said.

Calvin Senior grabbed a roll of paper towels and we returned to the living room. We cracked open two beers and started in on the pizza. I hadn’t had hot food in days; the pizza was delicious. And the beer reminded me of our baseball outing.

“The reason I came, Owen, is that, well, you probably know Patty’s been staying at our place this week.” I nodded. “Now it’s none of my business what’s going on between you two—and I should mention that Patty doesn’t know I’m here—but I wanted to see what I could do toward ameliorating your difficulties.”

“I appreciate it.”

“You understand that Patty is the most precious thing in the world to me.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And if you do anything to hurt her—I mean anything—I will have your balls in a sling so quick you won’t know which way is up.” He took a bite of his pizza and spoke with his mouth full. “But you’re not that kind of guy, are you Owen?”

“No. I’m not. We had a misunderstanding. It’s complicated.”

“I don’t want to hear details.”

“It will resolve itself soon.”

“No details.”

“Okay.”

“You see, I’m in a bit of a bind, here. I like you. But you’ve upset my daughter somehow. Emotionally I mean. So I wasn’t sure if I should come here tonight. Then I thought, whatever it is it can’t be worse than the shit I’ve pulled over the years. The kid needs some talking-to. Again, Patty doesn’t know I’m here. And if push comes to shove, I’m on her team all the way. But assuming this is a regular episode of regular marital bullshit, I thought I’d hop the fence, so to speak, and see how you’re doing.”

“Thank you, Mr. Stocking.”

“You’re welcome. But frankly, you don’t look good.”

I wasn’t sure what to say. “It’s been a rough week. When Patty left, I sort of fell into a hole. Been trying to scratch my way out since. I don’t know what to do with myself.”

He looked pleased to hear me say this. “I’ve been there.” He looked at my beer bottle, which was empty now, and finished his quickly. “Another?” We opened two more beers. We raised them and clinked bottles. “As I was saying, Owen, I’ve been there.” He relished the opportunity to impart his wisdom. “It wasn’t always sunshine and roses with Minnie and me. We had our ins and outs, too. She packed up and left on more than one night when we were first together. It’s part of getting used to each other. Unless you’ve really fucked up.”

“I don’t know.”

“Only time will tell.”

“As long as she’s patient enough—”

He shook his head. “Again, I don’t want to hear it. If I hear it, I take sides, and I don’t want to take sides right now. Things will work out or they won’t. There’s nothing I can do to help you on that front. But you’ve got to pull your shit together in the meanwhile. Be a man! If she decided to come back tonight, she would take one look at this living room and question her decision all over again. One look at you, even. Have another slice.”

“I’m full, thanks.”

“Then it’s time for you to take a shower and shave. I’ll clean up out here.”

“You want me to shower and shave right now?”

“Damn straight.”

“But I’m not going—I mean, I don’t think things are going to sort themselves out tonight, between Patty and me.”

“Of course not. These things take time. But in the meanwhile, kid, you’ve got to learn to take care of yourself, hold your chin up. I know. I’ve been where you are. Misunderstandings, whatever. I let myself go to shit. But I picked myself up off the floor before Minerva came back to me. You’ve got to have dignity. You’ve got to learn the habit of dignity. You walk around with your shirt untucked all the time. You’re on the edge already. So when she takes off for her parents’ house, you fall apart. No one ever taught you to be a man. Get in the shower and shave.”

“Seriously?”

“I’ll clean up out here.”

I went into the bathroom and trimmed my beard with some clippers. I hadn’t showered in days. I’d forgotten how good the hot water felt. I shaved with a blade in the shower. My skin felt slick and refreshed. Maybe Calvin Senior was right—maybe all I needed was to create my own sense of dignity. A shower and a shave seemed like a big step forward. I couldn’t believe I’d let myself go like that. My father-in-law had always intimidated me, as the man who belongs to clubs, who knows sports, as Patty’s protector. I don’t know when his capacity for protection spilled over to include me, but I had never seen the scope of his emotional generosity before, and it amazed me. I grabbed a robe from the hook behind the door and went out into the living room. He had cleaned up all the trash and put away everything but the remaining beers. He was nowhere to be seen.

“Mr. Stocking?”

“In the bedroom.” His voice came from the back of the house.

He had laid out my suit on the bed.

“When was the last time you wore that?”

“I don’t know. I think we went to a wedding …”

“Put it on, you’ll feel better.” I put on the suit, including socks and dress shoes. Calvin Senior helped me tie a full Windsor. “There. You look sharp. Take a look at yourself.”

I looked at myself in the mirror behind the bedroom door. I did look sharp. Much better than I had looked in the morning. And I felt better. I felt like accomplishing something. I could feel a distinct change in my attitude: rather than worrying Raven’s letter would never come, I looked forward to its arrival.

We walked into the living room.

“Have a seat,” he said. I did. He remained standing. “It’s like wrestling an alligator, Owen. You’re on top or you’re on bottom. No in-between. Use everything you’ve got. I hope this thing between you and Patty blows over. And I hope you haven’t done anything really stupid, because if you have, our next meeting won’t be as kind.” He shook my hand. “I have to go home to my family now. You should polish off those beers.” He walked to the front door. “I was never here, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Hope it works out,” he said.

“Me too.” He was out the door. Did I feel better, with my new dignity? Drinking beers in a suit? I don’t know. When I’d finished the last two beers, I fell asleep on the couch.

I awoke late the next morning still in my suit. It was rumpled but better than what I had been wearing for the past few days. I went out and got myself breakfast at a local greasy spoon. People smiled at me as if I was going off to work, as if I was part of the team again. I ate my eggs with gusto and left a big tip. It felt good.

At the Mailboxes Store, the man behind the counter was relieved to see me “all cleaned up,” as he put it. And I was relieved to find in my PO box, despite my getting there earlier than usual, an envelope from Henry Joseph Raven.