Envious Moon(40)

Dr. Mitchell has taken a keen interest in my writing. He always asks me what I am working on, as if there is any question. He wants me to share it with him but I put him off, telling him I’m not ready.

“Your only allegiance is to the truth, Anthony,” he says.

I feel like saying, tell me something I don’t know. But I don’t. What would be the point? We’ve had these arguments before, arguments about truth. Dr. Mitchell thinks that all truth is absolute, that something is either true or it isn’t. I tell him that it would be nice if the world were that easy, but I know that it isn’t. Truth is often a matter of perspective. I may see things differently from where I stand, than he does from where he stands. It doesn’t make my views and understanding of things any less valid. It just makes them different.

Berta came to visit with news of Victor. Victor has not been to see me since I first came here, and I don’t blame him. He has a hard time with it and has chosen to stay away. Victor has done well for himself. He married Maria, sweet-eyed Maria, who worked as a maid in that Cross Island mansion. When I first heard that, I thought it was really funny. Ironic even. It was almost as if we all had to pass through that house, like some kind of sacrament, before we could get on with the rest of our lives. The two of them have three children, Berta tells me, two girls and a boy. Victor has his own business doing plumbing and it keeps growing. There are these black box trucks all over town that say PEREZ PLUMBING AND HEATING on the side. He has something like ten people who work for him.

Berta says he and Maria bought a ranch house on the water on Great Island. From his windows he can see the Galilee harbor and the boats going in and out. He has a big grassy lawn that on nice days the kids run around on. There’s a swing set. He has a spare tire around the middle and still has that mustache that he likes to comb. If I were there, I’d give him shit about it, you can bet on that. But I’ll also admit that when Berta tells me all this, it makes me wistful. I mean that sometimes I still imagine that kind of life. A pretty wife and well-behaved kids and a nice house. Ball games on the weekend, backyard cookouts. Church on Sundays. Putting up a Christmas tree.

But I also know it’s hard to have that life and also have the truth. There’s a kind of willful ignorance that goes with living that way. You have to turn your back on the things that really drive you. The passion. And the desire. That electric feeling you get from going after what you really want. You have to live a lie. No one would admit that. Not even Victor. But I bet sometimes he feels it. Maybe when his whole house is sleeping, his wife and kids, and the neighborhood is quiet. Maybe he sits in a lawn chair in the garage with the door up and sneaks the cigarette he’s no longer allowed to have. He looks out across the water to the lights of the boats leaving the harbor. And he taps that part of himself that is still alive, somewhere deep within, and he wonders what could have been.





In the dark I knocked on the door to Terrence’s trailer. There were no lights on but his truck was parked near the trees. I heard him in there, knocking around and then the door opened and he stood in front of me wearing only his boxer shorts. He was lit from behind and I saw his massive stomach, his chest covered with gray hairs, and a scar that ran down his side like a seam. He peered behind me.

“Is that her?” he said.

“Yes,” I said.

He stepped away from the trailer. “Let me get a better look at her,” he said.

“Don’t bother,” I said but Hannah stepped forward until she was only five feet behind me. Terrence whistled through his front teeth.

“Damn,” he said.

“Leave it alone,” I said but he was looking over my head at her.

“Why else you get me at this time?” Terrence asked.

“I need your truck.”

He laughed. “What do you mean, my truck?”

We both looked over at it. An old Ford, once red, now more rusty than anything. “They know the car.”

“So? That’s not my problem. I need my truck. How you think I haul this thing around?” He reached behind him to tap on the metal of the trailer.

“I’m taking the truck,” I said.

“I tell you what,” said Terrence. “Maybe you give me a piece…” He nodded to Hannah. “And we can talk about it, okay?”

I pushed him so hard and so fast he had no time to react. It took him right off his feet and he fell backward and smacked his head against the side of the trailer. “Aw, f*ck,” he said, “my head.”

I hated to do it but I had no choice. I rushed past him and into the trailer and there was only the one light but I scanned all the surfaces and there, on the small stove, I saw the keys. I went to them and I grabbed them and when I turned around, Terrence was blocking my way. His hair was all wild around his neck. He said, “You little shit.”

His pudgy hands reached for me but I dodged them and then ran right into him. When we collided, I swung wildly at his face. My fist hit bone and I felt his hand crashing into the back of my head. I kept punching at him, as hard as I could. I had my eyes closed so the only way I knew I had hit him was the pain in my hand. I must have hit him ten times. He slumped to the floor. I heard him breathing heavy but he did not say anything. I didn’t look down at him. I wanted no part of his face. I climbed over him and out into the campsite.