Scott Spencer - A Ship Made of Paper

There at the table next to Daniel’s sits Clive Mason, whose wife is dying of breast cancer, with his arm around Mary Gallagher, whose husband is a state patrolman serving three years in prison for grand larceny.And now they are joined by Ethan Cohen, who owns a women’s clothing shop next to the GeorgeWashington Inn, and Shane Chilowitcz, who teaches per-formance art over at the college, where he lives with his Polish wife, who is at home minding their six children.

Got no one to turn to Tired of being alone Feel like breaking up Somebody’s home.

Ah, truer words were never sung, Daniel thinks.He looks up from his book, habitually scanning the place for Iris.Though in the week he has been coming here every night, he has yet to see her, he continually expects her to walk in at any moment.It’s maddening to be constantly on the look-out for her, but it gives him a gambler’s fervid hope that something trans-forming is just about to happen.

The singer sways behind his keyboard, surrounded by customers, who are also swaying to the music—a few are singing along.It has be-come even more crowded around the bar.There are people standing three deep, talking, laughing with piercing animation, signaling the newly hired bartender for drinks.

Standing near the bar is Mercy, Ruby’s baby-sitter.She is dressed to look older than her age—plenty ofmakeup, a tailored brown jacket over a black scoop-necked blouse, ironed jeans, heels.She looks like one of the young women at the bank—sobriety and trustworthiness mixed with a kind ofsingles-bar brassiness.She has been trying to get Daniel’s attention, and now that he has finally seen her she smiles and walks over to his table.

“Hello, Mr.Emerson,”she says.She has put so much color on her lashes it seems a struggle to keep her eyes open.She holds a glass ofbeer with a thin slice oflime floating in its amber.

“Hello, Mercy,”he says.He almost asks, What are you doing here? But, the custom ofthe Bistro prevents such snoopiness.

She takes his smile as an invitation to sit.She arranges herselfcarefully in the bentwood chair, as ifshe were taking her place on a jury.The rim ofher glass is faintly red from her lipstick.“I’ve been thinking about that stuffyou told me,”she says.Her voice drops to a whisper.“About becoming an emancipated minor?”

“It’s a big step, Mercy.It’s basically a desperation move.”

“I really have to get out ofthere,”she replies, and as she says it the man with whom she arrived at the Bistro strides from the bar to Daniel’s table.He is more than twice her age.His name is Sam Holland, he is one ofthe area’s writers, not the most celebrated but possibly the richest, and he is someone Daniel knows.A couple ofyears ago, just when Daniel, Kate, and Ruby were moving back to Leyden, Holland’s teenage son had gotten himself into a lot oftrouble, and Sam had talked to Daniel about handling the kid’s defense.

Whatever chagrin Sam might feel about being away from his wife, or from being seen with a girl two years younger than his son, is nowhere in evidence as he thrusts his hand out and grasps Daniel with a manly grip.

“Hello, Danny,”Sam says.He is wearing a blazer, a white shirt, and blue jeans;his thick, suddenly pewter hair is swept straight back.“How’d your house make it through the storm?”

Daniel thinks about this for a moment.“We took a couple ofhits,”

hesays.

“We were decimated,”Sam says, with a wide, radiant smile.He has dragged a chair over and sits close to Mercy.Daniel imagines their knees are touching.“Were you home for it?”Sam asks.

“Not in the beginning.”

“At least I was home,”Sam says.“That made it semimanageable.

Where were you?”he asks Mercy.

“At my girlfriend’s.They let us out ofschool early and like ten ofus walked over to her house.”

“Party time,”says Sam.

”Kind of, ifyou call not being able to watchTV or wash your hands a party.”

“That’s exactly what I call a party,”he says.“That’s the trouble with your generation, you don’t know a goddamned party when you see one.”

He turns back toward Daniel.“So where were you when the storm hit?”

“I was at HamptonWelles and Iris Davenport’s house,”Daniel says.

”My girlfriend baby-sits their kid,”Mercy says.“He hit her on the head with like a toy truck.She had to get twenty stitches on her scalp, but you can’t see them because the hair’s grown back.”

“That’s a lot to endure for three-fifty an hour,”Sam says.

”Try eight,”Mercy says.

”Well, for eight dollars an hour I might take getting hit by a truck—

you did say it was a toy truck, didn’t you?”He looks at Daniel, as ifhe, at least, would understand the joke:the ways we disfigure ourselves in or-der to put bread on the table.

“No one wants to baby-sit that kid,”Mercy says.“He’s like really really mean.”

“He’s not even five years old,”Daniel says.“Maybe your friends are reacting to something else.”

Mercy, having no wish to antagonize Daniel, and, in fact, wanting only to keep him on her side, lowers her eyes.

“I have to go to the ladies’room,”she says.

As soon as she is safely away, Sam leans closer to Daniel.

”I’m helping her with her homework,”he says, deadpan.

”Take her home, Sam,”Daniel says.“You really have to stop seeing her.Her father’s crazy and a cop, it’s going to end very badly.”

“I know,”Sam says.

“Don’t you worry about her, Sam? Do you know what happens to those girls?They end up dancing in a cage with spangles on their nipples.

You know what I mean?”

“Look, it’s not that simple.I could end up dancing in a cage somewhere, too.”

“You could end up in jail, is where you could end up.She’s a kid.”

“I love her.I’m drawn to her, and I don’t have a list ofreasons why.

It just happened.You think I wanted this? My whole life is in the process ofgoing down the drain.”

“Then do something about it.”

“I tried.Do you have any idea how foolish I feel, being here with…

with someone so inappropriate,”he says.“But the thing is, I can’t help it, I literally cannot help it.Everyone thinks being with a young girl is like finding the fountain ofyouth.The truth is, it’s just the opposite.First of all, I can barely concentrate on sex because I’m so busy sucking in my stomach.And then, when I get out ofbed and I make these little groans, you know, the way a man does, the knee hurts, the back, a little sore shoulder, whatever.You groan, after forty-five you get out ofbed and you make a little noise, I don’t care ifyou’re Peter Pan.So I get up, straighten myselfout, and Mercy’s all breathless, panicked.‘What’s wrong, what’s wrong?’she’s asking.‘Nothing,’I tell her,‘absolutely nothing.’And she says,‘But you were making these noises.’And I have to tell her,‘Honey, that’s what you do when you wake up in the morning.You groan.’And she nods, trying to be a good sport about it, but I swear to God, Daniel, I have never felt so fucking old in my entire life.These guys who think they’re going to get a second at bat in the youth league by hanging out with some young girl, they’ve got it exactly wrong.You want to feel young, find yourselfsome old broad and run circles around her.”

Tonight’s singer is finishing up;the applause sounds like rain on a tin roof.Daniel’s eyes habitually scan the room;he cannot let go ofthe dream ofIris suddenly appearing.He imagines her sashaying through this convivial throng, her sitting next to him, a tilted, slightly apprehensive look ofarrival and surrender on her face, her bony knee knocking against him, her night voice an octave lower, cracked with fatigue, the whites ofher eyes creamy, like French vanilla.