Quicksilver(19)

I said, “To know your mother’s name, to have seen her face even if just in photographs—that makes it a lot worse than if she’d been unknown, a total mystery. I’m sorry, Bridget. That’s a terrible burden to bear.”

She shrugged. “Well, it’s not like I loved her and lost her. I never knew her.”

I had often used a similar line. It was a defense against the resurrection of sharp emotions.

Unfolding her napkin and smoothing it on her lap, Bridget said, “But I think Grandpa was torn up by it. In spite of all the trouble Corrine had been, he loved her. And he’d lost Jeanette to cancer not long before all this.”

“He was so lucky to have you,” I said. “Having you would have made all the difference, such a blessing.” I heard myself again and said, “I mean, a widower with a thankless daughter—he needed someone to give him a sense of purpose.”

At that point, Sparky returned from the men’s room, and the waitress, Darlene, brought our drinks. She was a zaftig, fortyish brunette with maybe three pounds of hair swirled up in a fabulous creation and pinned atop her head. Darlene had the silken, smoky voice of a chanteuse, the physical presence of an opera diva, and the confidence of a matador. She called Sparky “Mr. Man,” called me “Choirboy”—I don’t know why—and renamed Bridget “Angel,” which I entirely understood. Darlene warned us away from the chicken soup. She recommended the pulled-pork sliders with coleslaw and fried onions, which came with French fries, and she took our orders.

After Darlene departed with the promise to be back in ten, Sparky said, “So have you kids been hitting it off?”

I said, “I’m sorry about Jeanette and Corrine.”

“Well,” he said, “you can either do the wrong thing and let a loss like that destroy you, or you can do the right thing and be properly grateful for all that came before the loss. Grief should drive you to your knees, but if you stay there forever, you’re saying you know better than God how the world should work. And you don’t.” He looked at Bridget. “So he’s five feet eleven. Is that okay with you?”

She put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed affectionately. “He’s just right, Grandpa. Actually, I worried that he might be as tall as a basketball star, and people would stare at us everywhere we went.” She smiled at me. “I take it that Grandpa told you I’ve been expecting you for two years.”

Her eyes were the warm green of Caribbean waters, and I felt myself floating away on her gaze. “Uh, so then, you know, um, what if the guy in this vision of yours, what if he wasn’t me?”

“It wasn’t a vision. A presentiment. And he’s you. I’m sure. How could he not be you, considering how we met and what we are?”

“But we don’t know what we are.”

“Precisely.” She frowned. “I’m certain you’re him and this is meant to be, but maybe you’re not sure.”

Sparky didn’t give me a chance to fumble the moment. “Quinn is sure. It’s just that he hasn’t had much luck with girls, so he lacks confidence when it comes to romance. Daphne Larkrise knows his type. He’s rather like Kenny Talbot in Love Insurance.”

“I adored that character,” Bridget said.

“He’s shy like Kenny,” Sparky said, “unsure of himself, perhaps too humble for his own good, but he’s got great potential.”

I said, “You know, I’m right here.”

“Oh, yes, absolutely,” Bridget said. “That’s what I like so much about you. You’re always right here, in the moment, never lost in yourself and off somewhere. That’s a rare quality these days. We just met this morning, but I feel like I met you two years ago.”

Sparky recognized the moment when I began to adapt to the high weirdness of our situation, when my perplexity began to mellow into a kind of delightful amazement. He shifted from being a cheerleader for romance to being a substitute father with the usual concerns. His brow corrugated. His gray gaze grew flinty. “You realize, Quinn, that there can be no marriage until we understand this wild river we’re in, run whatever rapids must be run, and reach calm water.”

I shaped my face into that of a responsible suitor with only chivalrous intentions, which in fact was the truth. “Of course.”

“And until there is a wedding, there will be no hanky-panky.”

Bridget appeared to be amused. But she also sounded as sincere as a stick in the eye when she said, “None. As Daphne Larkrise has written, ‘Delayed gratification leads to greater satisfaction.’”

“Quinn?” Sparky said.

“Yeah. Yes. I feel the same.” When he continued to skewer me with his stare, I said, “Remember, I was raised by nuns.”

“Oh, I remember. Just so you don’t forget.”

I said, “It’s not a thing you forget if you don’t want to spend a week peeling potatoes.”

That was when the monsters arrived.





|?9?|

I didn’t immediately realize they were monsters. They appeared to be about twenty years old, clean-cut Ivy League college boys, the kind who had gone to the best private schools since they were two and learned to read by paging through GQ magazine. The blond wore Converse sneakers, black jeans, a black polo shirt, and a pale-gray summer-weight knee-length topcoat. His companion wore bright-yellow sneakers, a gray suit, a white-and-yellow T-shirt; he carried a red-and-black-checkered tote bag.