A. Homes - This Book Will Save Your Life

"Is this all right?" he asks.

"It's perfect," she says.

The absence of the breast, the unevenness of her, at first makes it difficult; it is a less-than-perfect fit. First he is on top of her, unbalanced, and then she is on top of him, self-conscious, the single breast hanging like an empty udder. The scar is a single long dark line.

They find a good position, spooning; he is behind her. "It must have been awful," he says.

"I felt it," she says. "At first I thought it was nothing. I waited, and then it was something. I could have had reconstruction at the time, but I wasn't ready. I remember thinking, Why not just put something else there — a hat rack, or a plant stand — why not just hang geraniums off my chest wall? I told them I'd think about it, and then I just couldn't think about it again."

He holds the one breast in his hand like a piece of fruit.

Later, they stand next to each other at the bathroom mirror.

"You look good," he says. "You're incredibly shapely."

"Thanks, so do you," she says. "You're very fit."

They stand side by side, looking.

"You're very brave," he says.

They make love again.

He touches her scar with his tongue. She shudders. "Does it hurt?" he asks.

"No," she says.

He makes love to every part of her, the breast and the absent breast, the positive and the negative space. It is slow and profound, and when he comes the release is deep, astounding, like something outside of reality, something unnamable, of the gods. He embarrassingly exclaims, "Oh yeah," before he can stop himself.

And when they are done, they are not sure if they are married, are bound at the soul, or will never see each other again. They have given each other a great gift. Emptied and refilled.

He rolls over. "Are you Jewish?" he asks her.

"Half," she says.

HE GOES HOME. It is late. The house is dark. He walks in, sees dinner on the table — untouched. There are candles burned all the way down, flickering in pools of wax. The house smells like vomit. Ben is perched on the kitchen counter, livid — drunk.

"Welcome to the party, shithead. I tried to call you and got no answer, and then I had a drink. I waited, I tried again, I kept trying to call you, and I kept drinking. I finished a bottle of wine."

"My phone must have been in my pants."

"That's more than I want to know."

"Did something happen? Where's Barth? I thought you guys were going to the movies."

"Anhil took him to a donut show or something. I thought something happened to you — maybe you wrecked the car, had a heart attack, or you just left. I made you dinner. I fucking walked down to the grocery store, bought stuff, and cooked, and you didn't come home. You didn't come home and you didn't even have the fucking courtesy to call."

"I'm sorry," Richard says.

There is silence.

"I drank the wine and then I drank all your scotch. I don't know why, but I drank your scotch. What is scotch anyway, and why do people have it in the house? It tastes like shit. I drank it, every last drop, and I don't feel very well. I'm not a big drinker, that was never one of my problems. I threw up in your bathroom; it made quite the splash." He laughs. "I didn't clean it up yet; I'm not done. I finished the scotch, but, you know, I could go another round. I was thinking I'd dip into the Mr. Clean any minute now. You fucking suck." He slides off the counter and crumbles onto the floor as though the counter is higher than he anticipated. "You don't care about anything other than yourself — everything is about you. It's your fault I'm gay, that I go around trying to get men to pay attention to me, to fuck me." He is waving the empty bottle for emphasis. "Oh, and another thing, I love you. I love you so fucking much. If anything ever happened to you, I'd go crazy. I'm already half crazy, and I hate you for it. I never really had a father; I lived my whole life with some enormous fucking hole. Oh, and speaking of which, I'd like to fuck you. I mean why not? What better way of getting to know you?" Ben pulls up to Richard, humping him like a dog.

Richard pushes him away. Malibu barks. "You're not too big for me to hit," Richard says.

"That's great. You want to fight? What do you want, to spank me, tie me up, and maybe whack me with your belt? Do you mind if I jerk off while you do it? Maybe that's what we should do; maybe, as a rite of passage, you should just fuck the hell out of me." He pulls his pants down and bends over, flashing his ass at Richard. "Or maybe I should fuck you — maybe that would be a way to rid myself of this wretched feeling. If I raped you, would I feel better? That would be a hell of a thing for a son to do to his father. Do you think that's in any of the books? Would you press charges?"

"Pull up your pants."

"I never told anyone, but whenever I was mad at you I would go out and give an old guy a blow job; that was my way of getting back. Sometimes I did it to people you and Mom knew — it was like double word score, extra points," Ben says. "My whole life, I kept thinking you'd know I was miserable, you'd know I needed you, and you'd come and get me — you'd rescue me. And you didn't even fucking call."

"The time difference," Richard says. "I thought you were sleeping."

"People call home from fucking spaceships; there is no excuse."

"You're right," Richard says. "It's OK to be angry."

"It's not, it's not OK. It's not OK for you to just say 'I'm sorry,' like that means something. I'm fucking sick with rage — that's why I ended up in rehab. I was getting stoned to make it go away, to stop being so scared. Don't you understand — you hurt me? You're still hurting me. You call to tell me you went to the hospital with chest pain; I have fucking chest pain every day, my goddamned bone marrow hurts. There is so much I don't even know how to say to you, I could fucking kill you," he blurts in rubbery, drunken anger, charging towards Richard, and then he pulls back and is quiet. "Want to see what it's like not knowing if someone's ever coming back?" Ben takes off down the back steps, into the night.

Richard goes after him. At the bottom of the steps, he listens for a clue, a direction, a sound in the distance. He doesn't hear anything except the waves lapping at the shore. Did Ben go into the water? Did he go up towards the road?

"Ben? Ben, are you out here? Can you hear me? Don't do this. Ben! Come back, let's talk. I'm sorry. I'm really fucking sorry, I can't apologize enough." He runs down the beach, towards Santa Monica, his flat fucking feet pushing off the soft sand; he is not a good runner, but he keeps going.

"Ben? Ben, please."

Looking up at the highway, at the movement of the cars around the curve, he wonders — would Ben have run up to the road? Would he have put a thumb up to hitchhike? This is how bad things happen, this is how they become irrevocable, this is how you can lose someone forever.

"Ben," he bellows.

The night is moist, the air hanging, dense fog. He looks again towards the road and towards the water. The amusement park is in the distance, the Ferris wheel spinning, colors pulsing as if offering happiness for half-price, barkers willing to make a deal, four darts for three dollars, another dart another dollar. This cannot be happening. He thinks of the saber-tooth. What if the saber-tooth is real, what if he is out there somewhere waiting? He's probably hungry — he hasn't eaten any people yet, because there are no people on the streets, everyone is always in a car. Does he eat cars? Richard pictures punctured tires, tooth marks. He runs farther down the beach.

"Ben! Ben, where are you? I'm sorry, Ben, sorry for everything. Ben, can you hear me? Just say you can hear me. Ben!"

He trips over something — a thick, heavy thud. He falls hard onto — what? — an animal? He pats the animal's flesh — rough, dense, leathery. The animal shifts, groans. A pack of sea lions? The sea lions are resting, lined up next to each other, on top of each other. He hurries to get up, worried they will think he's an intruder and attack. He pushes off the lion, back onto the sand.