“Cos not.”
Of course not.
Most of the other times Marty spoke he would’ve elaborated in his calm, almost academic manner, at length, and that would’ve been that, but on this occasion…he just didn’t have the patience to get into it. There was just too much, and it wouldn’t have been near as simple as when he’d explained why he no longer shot squirrels (surely his best, simplest story), and…this one was really for him, and that was kind of the point.
He was a widow, now, and these things were important. The years weren’t advancing anymore, they were in retreat. Some things you kept to yourself. When you’re very young, nothing’s yours. Then you get a few years, and you almost live for the idea. Put a decade or two under your belt and most people forget…But you remember, late.
And so he remembered, for himself.
A great many years ago when he’d been one of those kids, when his folks had taken him on a vacation somewhere off the coast, on an island, where a lot of Mainers thought the real life of the state existed, and most vacationers, at that, he’d made a friend.
A somewhat long story short, later he discovered his friend, who had also been on vacation, but from way out in Colorado, had had a son, who was very happy with his life, except his dad had died, a phone call happened, and that’d changed everything.
This man sounded nervous. They didn’t know each other, the man had never heard his dad talking about Marty, had only discovered his existence in an old scrapbook, which featured a picture of the two, Marty’s name, and the name of the island that had improbably introduced them. The man had done some digging, and while Marty himself and few enough of his acquaintances thought of him in relation to a job, that’s how the man found him. And arranged to meet, on that island. Or near-abouts.
He had clearly been nervous. He’d never done anything like this before. He had a wife and a newborn son…But he didn’t talk much about them. He just wanted to reconnect with his dad…or the closest he could. Which would be Marty.
Marty arranged everything. The man showed up hungry, practically twitching. As it happened Marty had a friend who lived on the island, who agreed to let them stay at his home (this was decades before anyone had thought of airbnbs, mind you), and that’s where Marty prepared the steak, but the man, being so nervous, had insisted on eating at a diner, and so the steaks cooled in a refrigerator, and Marty and the man had fish and chips.
The man showed Marty a pack of cigarettes he thought Marty might enjoy, but Marty hadn’t smoked in decades. Played around with one to be polite, set it aside when it only made things more awkward. The man showed Marty a coin that had belonged to his dad, just some silly knickknack…
And it ended badly. They moved things to the house, and the man, late at night, went trudging through its dark interior, and Marty listened as first the fridge door opened and then the front door…
And then later, when he was back home, in that lonely place where his kids were all grown and his wife’s side of the bed was cool…he learned that the man had choked to death.
There are things you can’t explain. Did Marty feel a twinge of guilt, as if he’d abandoned the man during some midlife crisis? Cos he did. But these are the things you keep to yourself.
Cos they are. That’s life.
He wasn’t about to have a whole conversation about any of that. He moved on to some other topic. Most of life was like that. Some things anyone can find out. He gave that man’s wife better peace not explaining any of this. Her and everyone else. A kind of safe haven. Even if the mystery of it seemed otherwise.
