Rafael Yglesias - Fearless

However, Byron wasn’t hurt. He didn’t back away. He moved closer to Max while he listened to the lecture. His high cheeks seemed to lift his mouth into a grin. His thin eyebrows rose up and merged with the edges of his haircut. When Max finished, Byron nodded to himself as if he had come to a conclusion. “You’re jealous of me,” he said mildly.

“Jealous of you?” Max rocked back on his heels and tilted too far to the right. He put out a hand to steady himself. The pantomime of being off balance was a good reflection of how he felt. Max assumed Byron meant that Max was jealous Byron had a rich father. “Jealous of what?” he asked to be sure.

“That I’m so good at it and I’m just a kid.” Byron gestured to his drawings. One of them had slid too far off the coffee table; it began a slow and noisy descent to the floor. They both watched it drop without making a move.

After the paper had settled, Max said softly and gently: “You’re not good. You’re precocious. Maybe someday you will be good, but right now you’re simply doing something ordinary at an early age.”

“You’re jealous,” Byron nodded his head up and down, grinning. “Yes, you are.”

“Listen to me.” Max took him by his narrow shoulders. The firm grip stilled Byron. His eyes were alarmed; they stared into Max’s, their usual conviction flickering. “You’re very bright and I’m sure you’ll be successful and your father loves you. You don’t have to pretend to be grown-up. You don’t have to do great grown-up things for your father to love you.”

Byron shrugged Max’s hands off. He swaggered away, skidding onto his knees and sliding to the fallen drawings. He picked them up carelessly and shoved them into the portfolio. “My dad,” he said as if it were of no consequence, “is a wimp.”

Max assumed he had misheard. “What did you say?” he asked. He was still on his haunches, an adult cut in half. He stood up; suddenly, he had to be tall.

Byron was done with his sloppy cleaning. He flipped the portfolio together and zipped it up recklessly. The zipper buzzed shut. “He’s a wimp.” Byron faced Max. “He’s even scared of my mom.”

Max slapped the boy. His hand was already back at his side before Max was conscious of the action. He had hit Byron hard. The child’s head remained turned to the side where the blow had pushed it. White ghosts of Max’s fingers still burned on the clean new skin.

“My God,” Max mumbled.

Byron’s face gradually pivoted back toward Max. His eyes were awash with tears and yet they looked fearlessly inward at something ugly. Byron’s mouth trembled but made no sound.

Max shivered. He was cold.

The sun came across his jaw, bobbing through the plane’s windows. He glanced at Jeff and made a decision — I’m going to sit with that abandoned child so he will not die an orphan. Max saw the look on Jeff’s face as he left him. Jeff’s eyes were startled and frightened. He mouthed something at Max, a plea…

Max understood his partner’s last look— Jeff wanted me to stay with him. He needed me .

Byron was gone. He heard wailing.

Debby was shouting: “Max! What’s going on?”

She came out of the bedroom with her hair wet, wearing only a towel. Max shook himself, like a dog drying off, to wake up from the memory.

He had forgotten exactly who he was or where he was or what time in earth’s history he was living in. His first real thought was that he was living on the Upper West Side and that his apartment needed to be painted. Then he noticed Byron by the front door. From the angle he had of the foyer, Max could only see Byron’s legs. He moved until he had a full view. Byron was spread on the floor, leaning his head against the door, clutching his portfolio and sobbing. Debby came beside Max muttering or mumbling something — Max didn’t pay attention. He smelled fragrant shampoo.

Max and Debby approached the weeping child together. She talked while they moved, saying things to both Max and Byron. Her eyes looked scared. Max was curious whether the marks from his slap would still be on Byron’s face.

Byron lifted his head from the door. He looked at Debby. He paused his sobbing and shouted: “I wanna go home!” There were no marks, only tears.

“Okay. Max will take you home,” Debby said soothingly.

“He’s angry,” Byron said and sobbed again.

“You take him home,” Max said to Debby. Even he was shocked and frightened by the cold fury in his voice. “I don’t want to have anything to do with him.”

Carla was downstairs waiting for him the next day. She smiled at the sight of his black Saab, bleached gray in spots by cold and dirt. Her eyes were lively and her hair was organized somehow — although still looking wild, black and lustrous. She likes me, Max thought and felt as proud as a teenage lover.

“So where are we going?” she said, bustling in, her down coat swishing. She pulled the door shut with a bang and grabbed the seat belt, pulling it across her chest in a hurry. Today, all of her movements had energy.

A dark-skinned man came out of her building, walked up to the curb, rested one foot on a fire hydrant and stared at Max. He was short and broad; his hair was a dulled black, straight and slicked back as if it were a skintight cap. He wore a gray uniform with a name sewn in script over his breast pocket. He didn’t have a coat in the freezing air and he didn’t shiver or blanch. He was still and ominous.

“Who’s that?” Max said although he knew.

Carla had to look; she didn’t know he was there. She had been concentrated on fastening the seat belt. She glanced up and frowned a little. She said in a disparaging tone: “That’s Manny.” She finished buckling herself in and said: “So where to?”

Max returned the stare of her sentinel husband. He wondered: Will I have to fight him to get her?

He drove to the Staten Island ferry.

“Is this safe?” she asked with a sly smile as they were being guided in to park their car in the ferry’s wide belly.

“No,” Max said, not smiling. “It’s had accidents. I think there are more boating accidents than with any other kind of vehicle.” He reached the spot where the attendants wanted him to park. He shut off the engine.

“I can’t swim,” Carla said. She wasn’t smiling anymore but she didn’t sound scared.

“I’d like to make this ferry sound especially dangerous, but it isn’t. I wanted to show you the dockyard on Staten Island where old ships are hauled to be scrapped for junk. Besides, we’ll get a good view of the city on the ride.” Max opened his door.

“I know that. My girlfriend lives on Staten Island,” Carla said and for a moment seemed not to be willing to move.

“Do you want to visit her?”

“No,” Carla laughed. She opened her door. “She’d ask me a million questions about you later and that would drive me crazy.”

They got out. The other passengers were heading for the enclosed deck. Max took Carla’s arm — he could feel her fragile elbow inside the down of her coat — to the open area at the back of the parked cars so they could see Manhattan retreat as the ferry moved into open water.

A gust of wind blew across them. His face felt paralyzed by the cold.

“We’re gonna freeze to death,” Carla said but she didn’t make a move to go inside.

Max had spent all night alone in a hotel waiting to be with Carla, expecting that she would make him feel happy. He had spent the night alone in a hotel because when Debby returned from taking Byron home, they had a fight and Max had walked out.

Debby had come in, stood at the closet and told Max right away, “His mother was very angry. I think you’re going to be hearing from them.”