Hope and Other Punch Lines(24)

“I’m fine,” Abbi says, shy and friendly at the same time, but I feel her stiffen next to me.

“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wondered about what happened to you,” he says, and it occurs to me that this is far from the first time someone has said this to Abbi. How weird it must be to know strangers have thoughts about you. No one has thoughts about me, not even the other kids at school. The only exceptions: Jack, my mom, and when my mom tells him to, my stepdad.

“That’s really kind,” she says with a rehearsed graciousness.

“It’s not kind, it’s the truth,” Chuck says.

“Nothing happened to me. Not really,” Abbi says. Her voice gets small, and I fight the urge to put my arm around her, to protect her. I know why I’m here, and I’m going to keep doing this until I get my answers. But that doesn’t make the situation comfortable for her. Or make me right.

“You grew up! Just like you were supposed to all along! Life happened to you. They didn’t take everything. Okay,” he says, and claps again. “You kids want a drink? It’s hot out there. I could use a drink.”

Chuck gets up without waiting for our answer, heads to what I presume is the kitchen, and comes back a few minutes later with a bottle of beer and two cans of Coke. He puts the soda in front of us, the beer in front of himself. If I were my stepdad and judgmental, I would note that it’s three-thirty in the afternoon.

“I assume you didn’t stop by to say hello,” he says.

“Thanks for taking the time to meet with us,” I say. “I wanted to ask you a few questions. About that day. We’re tracking down all the people in that photo.” I make a conscious effort to keep my leg from bouncing up and down. I don’t want Chuck or Abbi to know I’m nervous.

“Why?” he asks.

“I think it makes a great piece for our school paper. Finding out what happened to the survivors. Hearing their stories,” I say.

“Stories,” he repeats with the same bite he used on the phone for the word camp. “I hate that. How we aren’t real people to anyone. We are stories.”

He speaks to Abbi. Not to me. I don’t remind him that even he admitted to wondering about what happened to Baby Hope. That the curiosity is universal.

Of course, now would be a good time to play my own 9/11 card. I could explain that I am also in the club, free museum admission and everything. That might buy me some of Chuck’s goodwill, though probably not Abbi’s. I don’t know. For whatever reason, I can’t seem to say it out loud. It feels too much like a lie.

“I didn’t mean to insult you. I’m a journalist, and—”

Chuck laughs right in my face and then covers his mouth like he didn’t really mean it. I think about the picture and how tired I am of no one telling me anything. How tired I am of being fifteen and dismissible. I decide to go with one version of the truth.

“Fine, I’m not a real journalist. You’re totally right. I’m a kid playing dress up, and most of the time I’m a big idiot. But I wasn’t trying to say you’re a story instead of a person. I think our stories are actually what make us people. We each have a history. You know what I mean?” I ask. Of course he doesn’t know what I mean. “Stories are like the…currency of connection. And all your stories woven together might tell some larger story about the history of our country from that moment to now.”

My voice has turned earnest and pleading. Not the tonal shift I was going for. I was hoping I’d sound like a bit of Sorkin dialogue. Fast and sharp and convincing.

“Who is this kid?” Chuck asks Abbi, and then finishes his beer in a single long gulp. “?‘Stories are the currency of connection’? You read that in some book?”

I wonder if Chuck used to have a good sense of humor. If it was grief that turned him mean and replaced the funny parts with derision. Or if, like his being muscular, he was born that way. No trauma required.

“No,” I say. “As nerdy as it sounds, I actually believe it.”

“My story,” Chuck starts, and for the first time since we’ve sat down, he doesn’t look ready to pounce. He looks deflated, like that single beer let all the air out of his body. “My whole story is that I lived. That’s really all there is to say, isn’t there? I made it out to live this life of glory and bliss.”

His lips turn up into a quivering smile. I hate those sorts of setups—when someone tells a joke they don’t want you to laugh at. We wait out an interminable awkward silence. Abbi and I both look at our feet. What can we say to that? Actually, sir, your life looks chock-full of glory and bliss?

“The thing is, I was one person before, another person entirely after. You’re too young to know what that’s like. How one day, one single day, out of the clear blue sky, can change everything. And then the strangest part—and I’m not even kidding—the strangest part is that afterward, I was—that I am supposed to be—grateful,” he says, and unlike with the words camp and story, there is no sarcastic emphasis on the word grateful. Only a disbelieving wonder.

“I still can’t wrap my head around that part. That in the wake of something like that, our expectations get so whittled down. Doesn’t matter that I haven’t slept well in fifteen years. God forbid a car backfires and I take cover like I was in ’Nam or something. Let’s not even get started on my relationship with my wife. Well, ex now. But still, because I wake up each morning again and again, I’m supposed to be grateful?” He turns it into a question, like he really wants to know the answer. Like we are here to solve a mystery for him and not the other way around. “You know what would have been better than surviving nine-eleven? You know what I’d be truly grateful for? If it had never happened at all.”