As we parked and walked to the food court, Curtis said, “I’ve been thinning hemlocks all day, and I’m starved. I think I’ll get myself a twelve-inch hero sandwich. How about you, Antonio? You feel like a hero?”
“Not really,” Antonio mumbled.
Irritation flashed in Curtis’s eyes.
“I’ll get a hero,” I said.
Ignoring me, Curtis opened his wallet, took out two ten-dollar bills, and held them out to Antonio. “Get whatever you’d like.”
Antonio stared at the bills. “I won’t need that much.”
“Then bring me back the change.”
Mom was full of cheer while we ate, going on about how good her fish and chips were. Once everyone had finished, Curtis looked to Mom. She nodded, and then Curtis stood. “I’m going to take a walk,” he said. “Down to the end of the mall and back. Heroes need to keep moving.”
Fifteen
“So how does your father seem to you?” Mom asked Antonio.
“He’s okay,” Antonio answered, picking at his fingernails.
“Just okay?”
Antonio kept picking at his nails.
“Antonio?”
Antonio frowned. “I don’t know him. I can’t say anything about a guy I don’t know.”
“How about you, Laz? What do you think of Curtis?”
I looked at the table. “I d-don’t know him either.”
She folded her hands together as if she were praying and looked from Antonio to me. “Well, I hope that eventually he is more than okay for you boys, because Curtis and I have decided that we’re going to reconnect.”
Silence.
“What’s that m-mean?” I finally asked.
“Duh,” Antonio mocked.
“Antonio,” Mom snapped. She turned to me. “It means he’s going to move in, Laz.”
Antonio dropped his head. Five seconds went by. Ten. Fifteen. “Does he expect me to call him Dad?” Antonio said, breaking the silence.
“Do you want to?”
The answer was immediate. “No.”
“Then call him Curtis. Laz, you can call him that, too.”
I nodded.
“And you’ll be respectful. Both of you.”
I nodded.
“Antonio?”
“Whatever you say.”
“But where will he sleep?” I asked.
As soon as the words were out, I felt like a fool. Antonio laid his forehead on the table. Mom paused, and then answered. “He’s going to sleep with me, like a grown man does with a grown woman.”
I looked toward the mall and saw Curtis approaching. When he reached our table, he opened the bag he was holding. “I got us pretzels.”
“Thanks,” I said, taking one.
Mom also took one, but Antonio shook his head. “Not hungry.”
Curtis drove the Corolla back to Jet City, got into his pickup, and returned to his own place, wherever that was.
Back inside the trailer, I lay on my bed, listening to my mom through the wall, moving around. Soon Curtis Driver would be in her room, in her bed. They’d have sex sometimes, and I’d hear them. Just thinking about that made my whole body ache.
Sixteen
Two days later he moved in. I was coming home from the driving range when I saw him unload a box from the back of his pickup and carry it up the three stairs that led to the trailer.
When he stepped back out, our eyes met. “Let’s talk,” he said.
He went to his truck and leaned against it. I stood in the roadway and waited. Nothing. Finally he scrunched up his face and spoke. “I know you don’t want me moving in, Laz. And I get it.”
I shook my head. “I n-n-never—”
“Just listen,” he said, stopping me.
I nodded.
“You’re going to be a senior. Once you graduate, you’ll be wanting to move out, right? That’s just natural. Start your own life and all that. So how long is that? Nine? Ten months? That’s all we’re talking about. We can make this work that long, right?”
I swallowed. “Y-Yeah.”
Curtis stuck out his fist and we bumped knuckles. Then he nodded toward his truck. “How about giving me a hand with my stuff?”
Nothing was heavy, not even his big-screen TV, but my legs were wobbly, as if I’d been hit by a sucker punch. Sure I was planning on moving out of the trailer someday, but I always figured that I’d decide when I was ready. Now Curtis Driver was calling the shots. Ten months, and then he wanted me gone. I could feel time rushing at me like a train.
That night, Mom ordered Domino’s for Antonio and me, and then she and Curtis drove off somewhere. When the pizza came, we ate in the front room, the Mariners game on the TV.
“What do you think?” Antonio asked, his head down.
“About what?”
“Come on, Laz.”
I thought about Curtis shoving me out the door in ten months, but that’s not what I said. “It’s okay.”
He snorted. “It sucks.”
I shrugged. “He’s your f-father. You should g-give him a ch-chance.”
Antonio’s eyes narrowed. “I’m dead to him for twelve years and I’m supposed to act like it’s Christmas because he’s back for a couple of weeks?”
“Maybe he’ll st-stick around this t-time.”
Antonio stared at me for a moment. Then he pushed his chair back and headed for the front door.
“You g-going out?”
“Yeah.”
“You want some c-company?”
“I’m good,” he said, and the door closed behind him.
I finished the pizza and dumped the box in the trash. Curtis’s TV was ten times nicer than Mom’s, but instead of following the game, I kept picturing those TV shows where families reunite after years apart. Everybody hugs and cries and they’re all happy.
That wasn’t going to happen with Antonio and Curtis.
Around eleven I went to bed. I couldn’t sleep, so I channel-surfed FM stations until I found a murder mystery full of creaking doors and howling winds. It was fake-y, but it was okay.
Around eleven thirty, Mom and Curtis returned. I could hear them moving in Mom’s bedroom, and I panicked. Then an idea came to me. I rooted around in a drawer until I found my earbuds. I plugged them into my radio and turned up the volume. I followed the story for a while, but then I must have fallen asleep, because I don’t remember the ending. The next morning, jazz was playing when I awoke.
A wave of relief broke over me. All I had to do was sleep with the radio on and the earbuds in, and I’d never hear anything from my mom’s bedroom.
When I came out that morning, Antonio had already left for his job at Home Depot. Mom was in the kitchen drinking coffee, and I could hear Curtis walking in her bedroom. He was a big man, way over two hundred pounds, and with every step the floorboards groaned.
“You want scrambled eggs?” Mom asked.
I heard the shower go on; Curtis would be a while. I could eat and get out without seeing him.
“Okay,” I said.
As Mom scrambled the eggs I put two slices of bread into the toaster.
“This can work,” she said when she put a plate in front of me a few minutes later, “if we all make an effort.”