CHAPTER XII. THE TRAP

Your hero takes a shot.

Just the facts ma’am? Well, I do not preach, as you know. However, I should not shy from protest, when the people need a word.

A magazine has a winning cover. The handsome tennis champion flashes a boyish grin and lofts the gleaming trophy, champagne wetting the broad chest of his sponsor’s T-shirt. The newsstand features the iconic photo, to the swoon of female fans. And what does the picture say? He is the Man! Spare a thought then for his opponent, alone in an anonymous hotel room. The ball took an unfavorable bounce, he was battling the flu, he tripped at match point. The misfortune warrants no mocking nickname. The label is unworthy, the sentiment unjust. Prize tulips bloom late; hasty judgment speaks ill only of the judge. Let us stop the nonsense.

No man is a loser!

“Quality residence, bub.” We were inspecting the damp rooms and discolored walls of the suite on the third floor of the Dolorosa Apartments. “As soon as I work my magic.” The forensic team was now drawing up the report, over a wobbly kitchen table. The supposed contractor had been scribbling a series of vital repairs on a legal pad that I had just purchased at the corner store. A fresh coat of paint and working sockets were all I wanted, but my grill lacked the chops.

“Pass me a brew.” The poet laid the pen on the parquet, his well of invention dry. King Edward was enthroned at a banquet table, ceremoniously popped a Bud Lite. “Home Desperation, I’m there, first thing tomorrow. Give ya a special deal. We go back.”

“The last time you gave me a deal, I ended up in court.”

“There was excrementing circumstances, bub.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. In any case, I’m not bankrolling any more drug abuse.”

“Gotta eat.”

“Even if I were completely soft in the head, I can think of far more deserving recipients of my charity.”

“Cold!”

“Freezing, in here. So you won’t need a fridge. We’ll take a trip to the corner market. But forget about booze.”

“A professional never parties on the job.”

“I ain’t no millionaire’s son.” The acceptance letter from Harvard Law, opened in a suburban kitchen, occasioned both joy and calculation. The parents could help, but Uncle Sam must also lend a hand. Pursuing the career of preparation, the law school graduate returned to his summer internment camp. Fanshawe, Fanshawe, Elliot, and Cooper occupied the top three floors of a high-rise overlooking Boston Harbor, though my modest office was untroubled by the light of day. But a regular disturbance made up for lack of visual stimulation. A law firm cannot discriminate, and so the whole floor heard Fosburgh berating secretaries, paralegals, clerks, and junior associates alike. One of the oldest firms in the country, the institution is prestigious, the work of handsome pay, and minimal fulfillment. I had breezed through the previous summer on their books, but was now staring at life as a corporate lawyer. Fanshawe was representing an international pharmaceutical company, their malaria pill implicated in third world birth defects, whereupon my inflexible sister launched a blistering attack on my very being. The case dragged on, met with complication, and a favorable outcome would establish my reputation. Despite my recency of recruitment, I had full rein, and a recurring migraine. Gordon had been my doctor since law school. He played guitar; our bands had regularly shared a bill. I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in. Confound the condition! We talked music; the rotund reveler knew my combo rocked the harder. At least he should have.

 I never call in sick. I allude to a doctor only to forestall sorry speculation. The maligned cannot control all rumor, but can return a low volley with a shot of honest accounting. Gordon wrote his note. However, the case was coming to a close, the firm could ill afford delay, and the music club debacle still festered. Plane Crash—a local rag sparking the wildfire—I would add no further fuel. I could pay off my loans in less than two years and dragged my reservations back to work. So there!

Wanton tongues will wag. Bill never lets me forget, my sister has little more sympathy, my wife got wind. The world insists on Annie, but call me what they will, Merrywood faces adversity like a man. The very name of calm and courage? Well, I might be disturbed by a certain soda, but the distress has a good explanation, trust me.

The fall proves no exception. I was under inhuman strain. Whatever the idle gossip, I had no nervous breakdown. Absurd! The custodian did find me on the floor, but the part timer just panicked. I was drained, not overwhelmed. All right, I was hardly able to move, temporarily, but had gone months with little sleep and no proper nourishment. I did briefly collapse, in a manner of speaking, but would have recovered just fine. I didn’t need the ambulance. A chance mishap fells the sturdiest of men. And it never happened again, I can assure you.

Let’s put things in perspective. I spent just two nights in the hospital. Will a mason not disappear from sight to work steadily on the foundations? And after a week at home, I had completely recovered. The firm found me other work, to which I was able to give my full attention. Only Fosburgh cast aspersions. Working all night was not enough, my briefs were subjected to minute and terrifying scrutiny, but the despot rages over a split infinitive, to properly assign the blame.

The decision was all mine, trust me. Most partners were understanding, sorry to see me go. One of them offered to use his connections, put in a good word. What more proof do you want? Corporate law is a trap. But a wily fox sees the glint. And he found employment on more forgiving slopes of the income-distribution curve.

“When ya movin, bub?” One eye pursued the interrogation. The other wandered off on a mission of its own.

“I’m at your mercy, unfortunately. How long will your exquisite craftsmanship take?”

“Honestly? Won’t tell ya no lie, shitload of work here. I’m a professional, gonna bust my balls. Have the place ready in a week. Gua.ran.tee.”

You see the problem. Fluffing the figure by a factor of fifty would likely still lowball the longevity of distress. I had to be out of the house by the end of the month. The budding tenant would be bunking in a building site.

The great outdoors! I joined the National Park Service. My migraines disappeared, along with the smoking habit. I even moderated my alcohol consumption, though soon came back to my senses. Family and friends discovered that the proud holder of a U.S. passport had willingly traded the tailored suits of a promising legal career for park-ranger green. They saluted my spirit, envied my freedom, respected my integrity. At least they should have. At the beginning of the adventure, I phoned home regularly, telling the mother how the magnificent scenery and wide-open spaces had expanded my own horizons. She kept coming back to Disneyland. I opened the address book, mailed postcards of invitation from Joshua Tree, Yellowstone, Mt. Rainier. I received no reply. Annie had taken a back road to nowhere. The hippie would come to his senses, the insurrection run its course.

 “Let’s wrap it up. I’m tired of this dump already.” A bulb hung from the ceiling, and its harsh light made the cramped kitchen even less welcoming. I was squatting on the worn linoleum, my back to the yellowing varnish of an ill-fitting cabinet door. We had finished off another six-pack.

“Okay to drive, bub?” The derelict has some presence. I occupy a pedestal, testament to the world of legitimate income.

“I’ll get a cab. Need a ride?”

“I like to walk. Good for the ole bean.” Squirt jealously guards the location of his living quarters. The lodger pays no rent, mining an inexhaustible resource, the forgiveness of a woman. I’m the gangster of love. Oh please, they only see you as the tapeworm!

“I’ll need a key, bub.” Our roost had been interrupted only by trips to the market for chips and alcoholic refreshment. A churlish Mr. Choi dragged his eyes from a tiny television to view us with suspicion, likely attributing the repeated visits to preparation for a heist. Squirt updated me on his conquests and elaborated, as usual, on his exploits with the Provisional IRA. And, as usual, the shoe and sock were shed to showcase the missing toes. His yarns wander haphazardly and contradict each other to the extent that I have long ceased to believe in any vicinity to a peat bog, let alone a paramilitary brigade. Ireland, the home of blarney.

And does the toeless wonder toot! The boasts would make Casanova blush, put the sheikh to shame. I’m not remotely jealous, needless to say. Like the concoctions of a certain literary character—and I think you know who I mean—why suppose his reports have the remotest resemblance to reality? I have my own success with women, trust me. In any case, who is better off, really? Look at the state of the man!

The pot was a-boil. The stew was rank. I suffered in silence, a stir only releasing further effluvium. But we had indulged, and liquor loosens more than the tongue.

“Tearin up, bub?” Alas, he does not rest content with autobiography.

“A man can’t wipe his eyes, without spurious accusation?”

“Still keepin the flame!” As usual, his barge has lost its moorings. The bookseller might be burdened with some feelings, but boys don’t cry. Please!

“I’m just fine. Although your nonsense would make a stone statue weep.”

“I met yer wife once. Ya done well.”

“She has some good qualities, so I’m told. Although that’s neither here nor there.”

“Cutie pie. I’d give her one.”

He wants to be a paperback writer? Since you ask, I wanted gold records on the wall, more than anything else. But a published novel would spell redemption. The park ranger looked beyond the boundary. A wagon train was crossing the high desert, carrying a rough load, painted in bright colors, as you have come to expect. The adventure would resonate with telling detail, the womenfolk valiantly attempting to keep up appearances in dust and drought, their men hunting for food in the dry scrub, but returning empty-handed after draining a whisky bottle. The pioneers schooled their children, prayed to their God, and worried over debt. The reader would be privy to jealousy and petty squabble, an intimate domestic round set off against a bleak landscape. Youngsters would grow up fast, fall in love, snatch any moment of privacy that the wagons permitted. High drama would punctuate days of boredom, a son’s challenge to his father’s leadership, resolved in the elder’s favor by a brutal fistfight. Facing daily adversity, we would salute their survival, indulge their weakness, ache for their loss. I would wait until the very last page to drop the bomb, stranding the party I had brought to life in a blizzard on Donner Pass.

A telling story demands authentic set. The family station wagon once plied the entire Eastern Seaboard on vacation, but my worldly knowledge never made it through the Cumberland Gap. I now pored over a National Park map and bought a one-way bus ticket to Zion Canyon. The uproot spent his first week working a concession stand, my only memory an awkward encounter with a law school classmate who felt morally diminished in my presence. I acquired a ranger’s hat, rose before dawn for the folding table that did duty as a writer’s desk. The endeavor proceeded apace, slowed down, and gave out altogether. I had no trouble painting a landscape, conveying a sense of place. But my rugged individuals were sketched with a generic pencil; the wagon train connected formulaic dots. I lugged a suitcase and guitar to the Greyhound station in St. George. The pattern repeated itself in Death Valley and the Grand Canyon. I migrated from Utah to California, Arizona high desert to Wyoming geyser, running into the same youthful German tourists and RV-driving retirees. The intended quarry remained elusive. My suitcase held one change of clothing, a few toiletries, packages of writing paper, and a portable typewriter over which I spent my free time, holed up in the spartan accommodation of the seasonal employee. The sheaves I carried over state lines recrossed largely untouched.

The ranger was a quick study. My visitor center lectures were attentively received, the same audience taking up their seat day after day, little motivated to abandon the cool theater for scorching heat outside. I led nature walks and entertained campers around the fire circle, my rendition of park fable accompanied by the crackling of burning logs and nocturnal forest music, the smell of lighter fluid wafting through the campground over pine needles and lichen-covered rock.

“Give ya a buzz mañana!” Weeks would pass before he made any attempt to reestablish contact. We were parting company on the corner outside the apartment building. The degenerate would win no Boy Scout badge, but can hold his liquor. A more upright citizen was steadying himself against a telephone pole.

“Well, look who’s here. Good evening, Anselm. How lovely to see you.” The woman was approaching on the sidewalk. A silver swirl framed her features, a couple of handsome boxers followed on a leash, a long skirt and sensible shoes furthering the distinction.

I have already prepared you. The person never made the party, and my previous memorandum left out a statistic of vital impression, the information having little bearing at the time. And in truth, I am poorly fitted for assessment. Have you remarked the conundrum? You notice a thing at some remove from normal expectation. Should you care? Maybe you are bothered by the mother berating her child on the sidewalk, the couple smooching at a fine-dining table, the teenagers gossiping in a quiet library room, though the public makes no protest. Are you making a big deal out of nothing? Like the opinion that others hold of you, you can never know. Grace is the person, of most appropriate appellation. Although she does walk the earth on legs of mismatched length, with no enhancement of heel. I have an admiration for the stance, the indifference to cosmetic expectation, but no idea how to hold the handicap. I share the observation in the interests of full disclosure. No one else makes remark. Is it just me?

“Hello Grace, nice to see you too.” Suffering my own impediment, I enunciated with care.

“Sorry I missed you at the party. Gloria told me about your move.”

“Indeed, I now rent an apartment. She had to quarantine me.”

“I’m actually quite envious. Owning a house is a burden when you’re out of town. Tanzania is a little far away, haha. I’m working on a story, African women running their own business.”

“Not easy for them, I’m thinking? I hope we’re giving good support.”

“We would best get out the way—I’m walking a fine line. The New York Times seems interested, cross fingers. I hope you like the neighborhood. We should have coffee sometime.”

“Um, this is Edward. He was just leaving. Eddie’s a contractor, going to do some work for me. The apartment could use a little touch-up.”

“Delighted to meet you, Eddie. I’m Grace.” She risked a hand.

“Dapper dogs, milady. Ye keep a right good eye on them, I can see that.”

“I’d like to take the credit, Eddie. They’re not mine. I belong to the local Presbyterian Church.”

“I hear grand things, milady.”

“I’d love to see you sometime. For the service, of course. The minister is at a retreat, and I volunteered to walk the boys.”

“Ah, I used t’ have boxers meself.”

Claptrap! The sole animal he ever owned was a pit bull that had to be put down after relieving a concubine’s corgi of an ear. I only heard the story after he begged me to cover a five-hundred-dollar fine. Gullible Grace beamed at the bricolage. Merrywood has his morals and the righteous will take umbrage, trumpet truth to lie. But the bottle betrays the bugle boy. Her fuss had always prompted flight. I now had to share the attention, and she represented all that was good in the world.

“I enjoy a good walk, now that I’m on my own. Dogs are such good company, don’t you think, Anselm?” My imbalance needed the lamppost, but she had no idea. The animals sat patiently, fixing me with an alert stare. Why can’t Rudyard do me proud? “Well, gentlemen, I’d love to chat, but I’ve got work to do. Here’s my card, Anselm.” She reached into a canvas shoulder bag. “Do give me a call.” The churchgoer smiled warmly and allowed the young men to lead her away. I waited for Squirt’s heartless joke as we followed her limp of departure.

“Classy broad. And she likes you, bub.”

“That comes as a surprise?”

“Nice looking, too.” He would follow with some vile suggestion. “Don’t let this one git away. Lady save yer sorry ass from yer books. Ain’t natural, bub.”

“I take that as a compliment.”

“Outta here.” He saluted. The derelict took one direction, Grace the other, while I shivered in place. Underdressed, overwrought, decision-impaired, I was cemented to the sidewalk, following a gradual reduction the length of Dolorosa. A new bow pulled my strings as the dusk disclosed the undulation. She must live in that direction. The card remained in my clasp as the form dissolved from view.