City of the Dead (Alex Delaware, #37)(76)

“Okay, cards on the table. I looked you up and found out you’re a prof at the med school crosstown. Your being an academic gave me momentary relief. Then it gave me pause.”

“How so?”

“The relief came from hoping you’d understand the whole academic thing. Then I wondered if you’d bend over backward not to account for it.”

“Why would I need to understand the whole academic thing?”

“Because Toni’s going to try to use it against me.”

“She feels being an academic will work against you in this situation?”

He scooted forward, returning to the edge of the sofa. “As a matter of fact, that’s exactly what she feels. You know how it is with divorces—I mean, obviously you do. Toni and I started off great. Part of what she liked about me was what I did. I met her at Indiana U. She was a grad student. Not in my department, in nutrition, but then she gave up because her dad’s wealthy and she didn’t need to work.”

That hadn’t answered the question. I said nothing.

Con Deeb said, “Sorry. I really am prattling. This is doubly hard for me because frankly, I’m feeling like a failure. This isn’t my first divorce. Fortunately, there were no kids produced from my first marriage but still, you view it as a failure. It is a failure. I never thought I’d be in this position.”

Long, slow head shake. He played with the soul patch.

I said, “I’m still wondering how Ms. McManus hopes to use your profession against you.”

“Oh. Sorry. I’m all over the place…well, first of all there’s the financial end. She’s probably going to make a case for being in a far better position to have primary custody over Philomena because her allowance from her dad is many multiples of what I can ever hope to earn. Then there’s the issue of the transitory nature of my employment. If you’ve done any sort of background, you’ve learned that I haven’t stuck around anywhere for a while. But it’s not due to transgression, Professor Delaware. That I can assure you and I have no problem with you contacting any of my previous employers and asking them. I’ll sign consent forms, whatever it takes.”

“Appreciate it,” I said. “So what led to your moving around?”

“Toni will try to blame me—I’m flighty, I don’t buckle down. The truth is, the job situation for anyone teaching semiotics isn’t exactly booming. Do you know what that is?”

“The study of symbolism?”

“Among other things,” he said. “It’s the study of what we call semiosis. Processes involving the establishment of signs. Yes, symbolism is part of it, but so are metaphor, allegory, indication, and designation. It’s all about the ways we communicate and sometimes they’re not obvious.”

Talking about something he felt comfortable with had relaxed him. But he tightened up almost immediately.

“That must sound like utter bullshit to you.”

“Not at all,” I said.

“It really is interesting. Has implications all over the experiential map. Anthropologically, sociologically, economically, and yes, psychologically. Even the bio sciences. Semioticians try to discover what leads the world to communicate the way it does. We sometimes get tagged as new-age flakes, which is patently unfair. Plato and Aristotle wrestled with signs. So did every philosopher of note. We look at the interplay between the inner and the outer worlds—”

He stopped abruptly.

“Whoa, Con, put the brakes on, this is not what he wants to hear.”

I said, “No need to censor yourself and for the record I’ve never found choice of occupation to be relevant to child custody. Unless the job’s immoral or illegal.”

“Well, I’m not a jewel thief,” he said. “I may be esoteric but I sure don’t act out.” Uneasy smile.

“Tell me about your child-rearing style.”

“My style…never really considered it in that sense. I suppose I’d be characterized as a lax dad. I don’t believe in punishment and I feel kids have an inherent wisdom that needs to be respected. If we don’t mess them up, they’ll do fine in the long run. Which isn’t to say I don’t hold Philomena’s hand when we cross the street. Or I let her eat unrestricted amounts of junk or…you get the point. I’m just not much of an arbitrary disciplinarian.”

“Is Toni?”

He thought. “I want to be fair. No, not really. She’s stricter than me, but that’s a low bar. I suspect she’s going to tell you she’s the primary parent and the adult in the house. That she spends a lot more time with our daughter than I do. That I can’t argue with. I’m away from the house teaching and when I’m home I’m grading papers or writing them. So yes, in a technical sense, Toni spends more time with Philomena but I don’t see that as justification for her taking Philomena away from me.”

“She told you she intends to do that?”

“Not in so many words,” said Con Deeb. “But when she gets pissed at me, she threatens. ‘I’m not the one who needs to live in L.A.’ ‘I’m not the one bound by wherever your little precious world takes you.’ She’s from Louisville and wants to go back there. Her parents own a huge horse farm and a bourbon distillery and all sorts of commercial property—the main source of their dough is a slew of rental properties. I have no doubt she’s going to try to move back there and if I protest—when I protest, because I surely will—she’ll say just find yourself a job in Kentucky, you’ve always moved around. When she gets on that tack, I tell her college teaching jobs aren’t exactly in massive profusion and she has three stock answers. A. Switch professions, B. Teach high school or elementary school, or C. Work at Walmart.”