So Long, Chester Wheeler(3)

He had the world’s least believable comb-over, and a red, jowly face. He wasn’t ancient. Maybe seventy. But his health was clearly on the rocks. I didn’t know the details, or want to know. Or care.

“You’re a hateful old man, Chester,” I said. “No wonder nobody can stand you. No wonder you can’t keep a health-care worker. No wonder your kids never come to visit. You’re insufferable.”

I must’ve struck a nerve, because on that note he painstakingly turned his chair around and wheeled back into the house. Agostina had to jump out of his way.

She stood on the porch for another moment, grinding out the cigarette on the sole of her hot-pink athletic shoe. She was a woman in her forties with her long hair piled up on her head in intricate designs.

“How can you stand him?” I asked her from my front porch.

“I can’t,” she called back.

“But you still take care of him.”

“Not after seven o’clock tonight I don’t. I’m quitting. This is my last day.”

“Does he know yet?”

“Not yet. Unless his ears are better than I thought and he heard me just now. It’s going to come as bad news to him, because the agency has no one left to send. He drove every last one of us away. I was the only holdout because I needed the money. But it’s not worth it, Lewis. They can’t pay me enough to make it worth it. I’d rather starve.”

“When do you tell him the bad news?” I asked, fairly squirming in my delicious schadenfreude bath.

“Maybe never,” she said. “I might just . . . not tell him at all. I don’t want to hear what happens when he stops holding back for fear of losing me. I think I’ll just go. When I never show up again, I expect he’ll figure it out.”

“Good,” I said. “He deserves all of it and worse.”

She tucked the half-smoked cigarette back into the pack and narrowed her eyes at me.

“Where’d Tim go?”

“California.”

“Without you?”

“Right.”

“You didn’t let on.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Oh. Sorry. You gonna be okay?”

“I don’t think I am, no. But with any luck I’ll turn out to be wrong. I’ve been wrong before.”

“Be well, Lewis,” she said.

“You too, Agostina.”

It felt like a genuine connection, made just at the moment I knew we would never see each other again.

True to her word, and my assessment, I never saw her after that.



“The drinks are on me,” Anna said.

And I said, “They’d pretty much have to be.”

It was the following evening, and we were in a bar downtown. It was a gay bar. I hadn’t selected it. Anna had selected it. I’m pretty sure I mentioned that Anna is not gay. I wanted to ask about her choice of places, but there were so many other questions slamming around in my head.

We were standing at the bar, waiting to get the bartender’s attention.

“You did get a paycheck,” she said. “Right? Tell me you got a paycheck.”

“Yeah, of course I did. I got my final paycheck. The problem is . . . it’s my final paycheck.”

“Right,” she said. “I get that. But you have that savings.”

“I don’t have any savings.”

“You had all that money. That you and Tim were saving for California.”

“Yeah. Well. It’s somewhat fulfilling its destiny. It’s on its way to California. With Tim.”

“He took it all?”

“Every last penny.”

Since calling the bank, I had been angry about this, and I mean a full-on hamster wheel of anxiety and resentment. I expected more of the same as I opened my mouth to answer her questions. To my surprise, I had slipped past it and into depression. Who knew?

“Can he do that?”

“He already did, so I’m going with yes.”

“But, I mean . . . legally. Can he do that?”

“It was a joint account. It was in both of our names.”

The bartender finally fit us into his busy schedule. Anna ordered us a pitcher of beer and then we sat down in a booth to wait. It wasn’t hard to find a booth. It was only 6:30 in the evening.

Her hair was long and straight, a sort of amber color, and I honestly think she’d forgotten to comb it before leaving the house to meet me. She might have been napping when I called.

“So,” I said, preparing to wade deeply into enemy territory, “you never told me your thoughts on Tim’s parting words.”

“The part about how he was sure you’d know why?”

“That’s the part in question, yeah. Does that make sense to you?”

“Yes and no,” she said.

The pitcher arrived, and she poured for me first. She was that kind of friend.

“So you knew he was unhappy?” I asked when the waiter guy left.

“Yes and no,” she said again.

“What does that mean?” I asked, trying to hide my irritation. Probably failing.

“Isn’t it self-explanatory? It’s a yes. Followed by a no.”

“Let me rephrase. Can you please elaborate on the ‘yes’ part?”