Justin Taylor - Flings - Stories

“Do you think they know about what happened?” Ken asks.

“Jesus Christ,” Angie says. “Why would you even ask that?”

“I’m sure it came up when they were negotiating, if not sooner,” Mike says. He’s about to start ballparking what it probably cost the Rosens, in terms of resale value, when Angie says, “Please, for fuck’s sake, can we just, like, not?”

She slows toward the guard gate, not quite needing to come to a complete stop before the sensor reads the beige plastic card clipped to the sun visor. The gate arm — a white plank of wood striped with orange reflective tape — eases itself skyward and they coast on through. Then it’s a quick right onto the I-95 overpass, then the loop-around on-ramp for the southbound lanes. In the car there’s no noise but the white rush of the air conditioner and the thrum of their wheels on the road.

“Hey, so why don’t we put some tunes on?” Mike says. The sooner this silence is broken, he feels, the better. Ken reaches through the space between the front seats and plugs a thin black cord into a jack on the dashboard. Now he can DJ off his iPhone. Mike pays both kids’ phone bills because it’s a better value, he says, for them to all be on a family plan. Angie used to insist on sending Mike a check every month for her share, but he never cashed them and eventually she stopped.

“Here’s a great version of my song from ’98,” Ken says, stringy hair falling in his face as he stares at the glowing rectangle, scrolling through MP3s with a swerve of his thumb. “They’re gonna play it tonight — second set opener, I can feel it.”

“Nah, they’ll save it for New Year’s Eve,” Angie says.

“Could be both,” Ken says, “but tonight for sure.”

“How can you possibly know that?” Angie’s getting exasperated; when it comes to her brother, it doesn’t take a lot.

“Sister, I can feel it in my bones.”

“What makes it ‘your song,’ Ken?” Mike interjects, hoping to head off this argument before it can get going.

“Not ‘my,’ Dad,” Angie says, replying on her brother’s behalf. “‘Mike’s.’ It’s called ‘Mike’s Song.’ So I guess it’s yours if it’s anybody’s.” She laughs.

“Well, yours and Mike Gordon’s,” Ken adds. Mike knows enough to know that Mike Gordon is the bass player. He could ask for more details but doesn’t want a full-blown history lesson. When Ken gets going about the Phish, forget it.

“I guess we’ll have to share then,” Mike says, forcing a laugh of his own. He hates when he’s wrong about things. Ken hits the play button and music fills the car. Mike recognizes the little signature of notes that kicks the song off — he just never knew its name before and hadn’t thought to ask. It’s six o’clock on a weeknight but all the traffic’s headed in the other direction. Already dark out. They’re making great time.

He takes his own phone out of his pocket and knocks out a quick text to Lori—“Thinking of you, cannot wait until nye, xo”—but then he doesn’t send it, instead goes back and changes “Thinking” to “thinkin”; “cannot” to “cant,” though the autocorrect grants him the apostrophe; “you” to “u”; and finally, in place of the “xo,” an animated smiley face that will wink at her when she opens the message. Ken and Angie are going back on the thirty-first for the New Year’s Eve show; Lori and Mike, who haven’t seen each other much this week, are going to spend the night alone. He’s got a bottle of Rías Baixas that’s going to be perfect with the steak she’s planning to make them. Music on the stereo, the countdown on the living room TV.

“Who you talking to, Dad?” Angie asks.

“Just Barry,” Mike says.

“Oh.”

Barry Stern’s another rainmaker at the firm and at this point Mike’s oldest, closest friend. He’s someone about whom Angie will have no further questions, especially since he’s currently going through a nasty divorce himself, which she will definitely not want to hear about, or else has already heard about from their mother, who would have given Christina’s version, not that Mike’s got anything to say in his friend’s defense. Barry was always a fuck-around, but then he started getting reckless, and since having been kicked out of the house he’s been on an almost nihilistic tear — secretaries, summer associates, maybe one of the interns (Mike isn’t certain and doesn’t want to know); he’s going to get the shit kicked or sued out of him one of these days, maybe both. Not that anyone else would see it this way, but compared to Barry, Mike’s been practically a saint. He rarely stepped out on Miranda, and when he did it was only ever with professionals. You’re in town somewhere a few days on business, let’s say, and you’ve been given a number by someone you trust. You call the number and that’s that. Or you’re sitting at a titty bar and the dancer leans in close and whispers that she’s about to get off her shift. He was safe and discreet about all of it. This thing with Lori was a total surprise.

The kids know Lori exists but they haven’t met her. A picture of her on the fridge has gone thus far unremarked. He thought about inviting her out tonight but wasn’t sure how they would have reacted to the proposal, and his instinct said to let things lie for the time being, besides which Lori didn’t want to see Phish, though that hasn’t stopped her from acting hurt about being, quote, “left out.” “I’m sure we’d have tons in common,” she’d said of his children. “Being the same age and all.” Which isn’t true — Lori’s almost thirty-two — but close enough to make Mike certain that delaying introductions was the right move. One ancillary benefit of this plan is he’ll spare himself seeing whatever shit shape Ken’s bound to be in by the time the New Year’s concert lets out. Another good reason for letting Angie get her driving practice in tonight.

Angie. He looks at his daughter, appraising: she was a blond baby, now a chestnut-haired woman with his chilly eyes — green, like her mother’s, but still, indubitably, his. Sturdy close eyebrows, thin lips, no makeup, a sharpness to her jawline that makes her face seem to taper toward an almost heart-like chin. A beautiful woman in black jeans and a pale-yellow T-shirt, her slender fingers drumming the steering wheel, her face flashing in and out of shadow as they fly through the night.

She was always the precocious one, a pain in the ass sometimes but easy to be proud of. Great grades in school even when she was in her “rebellious” phase, partial scholarship to NYU, internships every summer; always in a rush to get her life started, to be the best. She works for a feminist nonprofit — something like Emily’s List but not Emily’s List — urging rich old Democrat ladies to support city council and statehouse candidates. When Mike and Miranda wanted to see her they’d go to New York, which wasn’t a bad arrangement by any means: breeze in, try out whichever new hotel Mike had been hearing about, museum and a Mets game, Broadway show if there was anything decent playing, hugs and kisses and a town car back to JFK. Which is still pretty much how the visits go, come to think of it, only Angie hasn’t invited him in a while, and the next time he goes it will probably be alone.

Ken’s had a more difficult time than his sister in terms of, let’s say, finding himself, and even that’s a charitable way of putting it — but why shouldn’t Mike show his own kid some charity? He’s rocking out in the backseat, head bopping, eyes closed, hollow-cheeked and vaguely horsey with a weak goatee. Faded red corduroys and a blue T-shirt commemorating some other Phish concert he went to six years ago. A hemp necklace strung with a single ceramic bead the color of river mud. Ken’s a guitar player, and quite gifted, which Mike’s not saying merely as the boy’s father but rather as a man who prides himself on knowing shit from Shinola. When Ken finished high school he stayed right on living at home, enrolled at Miami-Dade Community College, worked part-time at a restaurant in the mall. Turned out he didn’t like restaurant work much, or community college, so the next year he transferred up to FSU, which it turned out he didn’t like either, though he still lives in Tallahassee; when pressed he says he’ll go back to school sooner or later, “when the time’s right.” Meanwhile he seems to be doing okay living off his music (plus a not-inconsiderable monthly supplement from Mike), playing at bars by the college and at house parties, jamming on the side with a couple guys who tour with George Clinton. He’s never met Clinton himself but says there’s been some talk that if a spot ever opens up he’d almost definitely get asked to audition. Anyway, he’s still finding himself.