The Man I Love (The Fish Tales, #1)(31)

David flicked the lighter, held the flame a moment and then released the tab.

“Exactly,” James said. “And I was f*cked up over it. I came home destroyed. Came home thinking people would be sympathetic about me losing my best friend, my twin. I actually thought grief might make us all closer. Fat chance. My dad never knew what to do with me. It was like I was the price he had to pay for a daughter. Now Penny was gone and she was the only thing standing between me and him. And my brothers. It turned into a free-for-all. Whatever grief they had, they took it out on me. And my mother was checked out. She started drinking her pain away. It was a mess. I needed to get the hell out but I felt New York was too far away. So I came here.”

David looked grim. Erik couldn’t think of anything to say.

“It’s funny. Abandonment takes all forms, doesn’t it?” James said. “David’s father died. Fish, your old man took off. Mine was present, but made a campaign of not being there. Which is worse? Having no male influence in your life, or having the wrong male influence? I mean, who was your father figure, Fish? Your go-to guy?”

Erik ran a hand through his hair. “My uncles, I guess. My mom’s brothers. No, actually, not really. They were there but I can’t say they were my substitute father figures. Maybe my basketball coach? He was definitely an influence but pretty much when I had a problem, I went to my mom.”

“Do you still? Is she still your first phone call?”

Erik smiled. “Daisy’s my first phone call.”

David snorted. “Or you just roll over in bed.”

“Well, who do you call, Dave?” James asked.

“These days?” David scratched the back of his neck. “Leo. Or him.” He pointed at Erik.

“Shut up,” Erik said, laughing.

“Yeah, you laugh,” James said. “But I already know if I need a body buried or a secret kept, I’m calling you, Fish.”

Will arrived home then, his hair damp with sweat and his face red with exercise. “What’s up, *s,” he said. He tossed down his backpack and chugged the last of his pineapple juice. Then gave a hearty belch.

“What’s with you and the pineapple juice?” James said. “You suck that shit down twenty-four-seven.”

“Vitamin C,” Will said, walking into the kitchen. “Keeps you from breaking out.”

Erik chuckled. “Among other things.”

“Don’t give away trade secrets, Fish,” Will called.

“What?” James said, looking from the kitchen to Erik and back again, eyebrows wrinkled.

Secure in the privacy of a private joke, Erik shook his head with a smile and went back to tinkering.





Difficult Time Signatures


Will chose not to dance in the fall concert. Instead he put all his energy into his senior project. Challenged by Kees to step away from classical ballet and create a work for the contemporary dancers, Will was struggling to come up with an idea. All through September he spent long hours listening to a variety of music, either loaded into his Walkman while working out or running, or playing on the stereo at the apartment.

He sat motionless or sprawled on his back in front of the speakers. He sighed and cursed a lot. Occasionally he jotted something in a notebook, only to tear out the page and throw it in a crumpled ball at the wall. Erik sensed the clouds of creative frustration releasing the first drops of creative terror and, he had to admit, he was more than a little fascinated. This was the eternally self-assured Will on the verge of panic. What would he do?

Then one evening James burst into the house on Colby Street, breathless and panting, waving a tape. “I got it,” he said. “Listen.”

He popped the tape into the stereo and tossed the empty case to Will, who looked and passed it to Erik. It was Philip Glass’s soundtrack for the movie Powaqqatsi. Out of the speakers blasted, of all things, a coach’s whistle. And then an explosion of joyful sound made Erik’s eyebrows first fly up, then wrinkle as he took in what sounded like an indigenous drum-and-bugle corps. First a hypnotic, repetitive foundation of acoustic percussion, followed by a cavalry charge of trumpets over fat tuba bass notes. Then a children’s choir layered a simple melody on top of the rhythmic cadence of constantly changing time signatures.

Will unfolded his tall body and stood up.

“How do you count this?” Erik asked, losing the beat and finding it again.

Daisy got up and helped James push the coffee table aside. Will continued to stand still.

“It’s straight eights,” Daisy said.

“No,” James said. “This section is two sets of eight then a set of six. But then it changes.”

“I count ten beats in every phrase,” Erik said.

“You can’t count,” James said, his eyes shining. “You have to sing it.”

“I like this,” Will said, both hands on his head. “Holy shit, I like this a lot.” He looked visionary. His chin nodded in time to the drums. His head tilted, his eyes closed. Fingers dug in his hair as his feet moved in a simple pattern. Three steps forward, one back. Three forward, one back. The back step became a hop. Then a hop with a half-turn to repeat the sequence facing the other way. Eight steps against ten beats in the music.

“It doesn’t match up,” Erik said.