David Gates - Preston Falls

And again the kids surprise her. Roger comes downstairs the first time she calls him; Mel says the sauteed vegetables are yummy — they're not, so she must be trying to make up for sulking — and eats the couscous without remark. And thanks Jean for making dinner. Roger says, "Yeah, thanks. Mom," and pretends to vomit. These are good kids. You just have to know how to read Roger.

She feels like leaving the dishes for Willis — he'll get back here sooner or later — but she doesn't want to see herself as being that small a person. Though she does decide to let them dry by themselves in the dish drainer, just so he'll see them and know she washed up. She takes Philip Reed's card, on which she's jotted the fax number, and goes up to

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Willis's study, which used to be the walk-in hall closet. She sits at his computer (Roger neglected to turn it off), clicks out of Mortal Kombat and into Word:

WilUs,

Your friend's lawyer says he will be there on Tuesday morning to handle things. (He says he's faxing you, so maybe you've already heard from him. Anyway his name is Philip Reed.) Apparently nothing can be done until Tuesday (bail, etc.) because of the holiday. The children and I, and the dog, are driving back to Chesterton tonight (Sunday). I really don't know what to say, except that I would have never imagined you allowing a thing like this to happen. Whenever this is over, I would appreciate you not suddenly showing up in Chesterton, if that was your plan. As of now I really don't want any communication with you, though we will have to talk.

Jean

She prints the thing and feeds the printout into his fax machine. It's already creeping through when she realizes this last part is a fairly personal thing to be sending for everybody at the jail to read. But guess what: too bad. Now he can be humiliated, though it's not her actual intention.

At least when Carol gets here Jean won't have to try to hold all this together by herself. Not that she couldn't. Not that she doesn't. Let's see: it's Sunday. Carol was planning to arrive Tuesday, so she must be somewhere in the Midwest. Iowa, maybe. Nebraska. Jean pictures her coming to the rescue in her sporty little red truck, shooting along down a two-lane blacktop alley between green rows of tall corn. Though around Preston Falls the corn's already being harvested. And put away in silos. With tractors. Jean is so sick of country this and country that.

When she comes downstairs, Rathbone's lying on the couch in the hall. Mel's sitting, full lotus, in the middle of the empty living room. Roger's at the kitchen table, looking at the old Weekly World News Willis thought was so hilarious, with this badly faked picture of Hitler with lots of wrinkles; at age one hundred and something, he'd come out

of hiding in Argentina to help Saddam Hussein. Willis's riff about this is that it's great because the story's written absolutely straightforwardly, like a piece in the Times. God, a respite from Willis's riffs about things: there's that to be thankful for. Up and at 'em, she tells the kids, then whistles for Rathbone and puts his leash on him. She turns off the lights, clicks the lock on the kitchen door and closes it behind them.

As they go jouncing down Ragged Hill Road, she thinks, What if this is the last time? Which it could very possibly be, considering. Okay, well, what if. Before she even gets to the stop sign, she's gone through the whole thing: the divorce; the settlement leaving her the kids and the house in Chesterton and him the place in Preston Falls; Willis quitting work and moving up here and falling apart like his father and not being able to make his support payments; her and the kids ending up in an apartment, though maybe still in Chesterton so at least they won't have to change schools. Above one of the vacant stores on Main Street, maybe. Would that be depressing enough?

TWO

In his dream, they've widened the Tappan Zee — a dozen westbound lanes — but Willis still can't move for all the traffic. Then he finds a special exit ramp no one else seems to know about, and he's suddenly on a dirt road, passing weathered gray farmhouses with dingy white chickens pecking in the dooryards. This place, he understands, is Rockland. But now he's clipping by so fast he doesn't dare look away from the road, which begins climbing steeply uphill; off in the distance he sees higher hills and a gaudy blue-gold-orangey Maxfield Parrish sky As the truck melts away beneath him he shouts, "Oh yes, God!" and tries to soar, but it must be too soon and he wakes up.

He's in jail. Lying on a bench welded together out of steel laths, bolted to a cinderblock wall. His feet are cold because he's taken off his boots to use as a pillow. At the rear of the cell, a seatless toilet bowl and a sink, with a piece of polished metal screwed into the wall for a mirror; the front of the cell is bars. He looks up at the caged lightbulb they never turn off; it could be any time, any day. He closes his eyes and regards a throbbing black spot burned into the general redness. But let's not go back to sleep again. He's been here overnight and then all of Monday He knows this because he's had three meals: an Egg McMuffin and coffee (breakfast), a McDonald's hamburger, small fries and coffee (lunch), and a drumstick, mashed potatoes and coffee from Kentucky Fried (dinner). So it must be either Monday night or early Tuesday morning. He's been handed two faxes: one from a lawyer, saying he'd be here Tuesday morning, the other from Jean, telling him the lawyer would be in touch. And not to come to Chesterton. Weird that a prisoner could receive a fax. And a cop came in with the news that a gun had been found in his truck and a weapons charge would be filed. Is it actually against the law to have a gun in your truck? Shit, you always see these people with gun

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racks. Maybe it's against the law only if you're not really that kind of person.

So far he's done a good job of keeping himself together. He's tried remembering famous poems: "Stopping by Woods" was too easy and "Prufrock" too hard; he couldn't get past the patient etherized upon the table. The half-something retreats of oyster shells. He's figured out the changes to "Gee, Baby, Ain't I Good to You" if you're in G, though he can't be dead certain until he gets an actual guitar in his hands. He's named all forty-eight real states, picturing a map in his head and counting on his fingers. He got down and did push-ups. Three, actually, which left him sweating and gasping, his chest pounding. Still, this could be a beginning.

Movies have turned out to be the best thing. Better than books, he's ashamed to say; Dombey, at least, should be fresh, but he can't remember the sequence after the mother dies and they get the wet nurse — ^which is what, the first chapter? He's able to keep The Godfather going for a good long time. First the guy saying "I believe in America" and you find out he wants these guys murdered that raped his daughter and Brando does that thing where he brushes up at his jawline with the backs of his fingers and says, "That I cannot do." He's also holding a cat. Then something like "But let's be frank. You never wanted my friendship. And you were afraid to be in my debt."

He tries The Wizard ofOz, but it gets vague in the middle. The Man Who Came to Dinner, same problem. Ten minutes, Mr. Whiteside!

But good old North by Northwest: he can keep that one together, sort of. Someplace around where Gary Grant rear-ends the car and the cop car rear-ends Gary Grant's car or however it goes and the black Gadillac with the bad guys makes a U-turn and vanishes, he falls asleep again.

Somebody says "Hey" and he wakes up. Another of these cops or guards or sheriffs. "Your lawyer's here."

Willis gets his feet onto the floor and sits up, his forearms on his thighs. His head hurts and wants to loll.