Ethan Canin - A Doubter's Almanac

“Nobody expects you to.”

“I’m done helping.”

“I know, Mom.”

We were silent. Presently, she said, “It’s serious, though, this time, isn’t it?”

“I’m afraid it is, Mom.”

“Shoot.”

“But he’s strong, you know. He’s very strong. You know that, don’t you?”

“Well, no. He’s not.”

Then, as though to change the subject, she leaned over the railing. At the corner, a tow truck had pulled to the curb, and the driver was positioning clamps around the wheels of a car. He climbed back into the cab, and the car began rocking. Then suddenly it levitated, swinging in its noose. “They don’t give you much of a chance around here, do they?” Mom said.

I nodded. I suspected she was remembering her old life in Tapington; I myself was remembering my own. In the truck’s revolving strobe, the spreading ginkgo at the corner looked a little bit like our old mulberry.

She said, “I just can’t care anymore.”

“I know you can’t.”

“He had his chance. He had lots of them.” She looked away. “Okay, honey. I’ve said it now.”

From up the avenue then, the sound of a street sweeper arrived. Mom’s glass began rattling; soon the whole table was shaking. A moment later, the vehicle appeared: a hunched, roaring beetle, nosing up a pair of brightly shining eyes from the alley.

“ You go help him,” she said.

“I will. I’m going back out there. For as long as he needs.”

She looked out at the street again. “And what about your job?”

“And what about it?”

She took my hand. “Oh, God, Hans. I truly am sorry. I’ll help you . I’ll help Audra. I’ll do everything for Niels and Emmy. But—”

“I’ll take care of him, Mom. Don’t worry.”

She squeezed my hand. “This is just the way things have to go,” she said. “Your father simply can’t take anything more from me.”

BY THE TIME I left for Michigan again, later in the month, it already felt like summer in New York. At LaGuardia, the limos were dripping puddles onto the concrete. Ninety minutes later, when the door opened in Grand Rapids, a maritime chill came hurtling through the cabin like water through a breached hull.

In another rented Audi I took the shoreline route. South of Holland, I pulled over onto the shoulder of the Blue Star Highway and watched the lake piling in behind the dunes. Here, winter was still in the air. The huge swells were slashed with white, and above the bluffs, the hawks were stopped dead in the air. I got back into the car. When the road bent east again, the shadows of the clouds darkened the countryside like another set of lakes, this one moving inland with me through the fields. Midstate, spring arrived. I opened the windows and breathed the familiar air.

At the cabin, Dad was in the garden.

Covered in sweat. Digging steadily. Planting something: more bulbs. A heap of them thrown down beside the tomato plants. Leaning forward from a rusted gardener’s chair, the radio blaring a piano sonata into the woods. What I saw immediately was that he looked healthy. From the rear — except for the crazy white hair that hung past his shoulders — he looked no different from the man I used to know.

“Ouch!” he barked, when I tapped him on the shoulder.

“Did that hurt?”

“No, but you scared the Jesus out of me.”

He kicked away the bucket at his feet and stood, sweat dripping from his chin. His shirt was soaked. His face was streaked with earth and his pants clung to his thighs. “Dad,” I said, “you don’t even look sick anymore. You’re out here working yourself into a lather.”

“That’s because I’m not sick. Doctors are full of it.” He raised and lowered the trowel in his hand like a dumbbell. “I’m on the upslope. Diet and exercise. Study and moderation.”

He was still thin. When he spoke, the tendons moved in his neck.

—

“THIS IS BECAUSE I drained him again,” said Dr. Gandapur. He’d joined us for dinner, then stepped out onto the deck with me after the meal. Earlier in the evening, Dad had grilled steaks on the patio, then retreated to the couch. Now he was asleep on it.

“He is slim and determined,” said the doctor, “so no doubt he will look healthy to you. However, I will tell you”—he opened his fingers—“that he will fool us both. I took off four liters of fluid, you know, which is rather a lot. But it will return, Hans. This is something we will not be able to solve in the long run.”

“I see.”

“But yes,” he said, patting me on the shoulder. “You are absolutely right. He looks remarkably healthy, does he not? He has been doing exceptionally well. This is what we should be grateful for.”

—

“DON’T WORRY,” DAD said, pushing away his plate. “I’ll pay.”

I’d taken him for lunch in Felt City, but the toothpicks were still in his sandwich. The diner was in the back corner of the general store, and as I ate I watched him eye a couple of customers who were shopping for hardware. Suddenly he said, “When you were a young man, you were using that drug.”

“I’m clean now.”

“Well, good.” He nodded. “That’s good.”

“I don’t think I’ve told you yet, but I was in treatment recently.”

He looked at me. “Don’t tell me you actually believe in that stuff.”

“It’s possible that I do.”

“It’s possible ?” He raised an eyebrow. “Well, at least the doubt will serve you.”

The waitress moved past our table then, and he pointed to his coffee. “I could use a refill about now.”

She swept on without answering.

He called after her, “Just dip me one out of the lake.”

He peeled back the tops on a handful of creamers and emptied them into his cup. When she passed again, he raised his finger, but she walked right by.

He leaned toward me. “Rolled in the hay with her once. Now she likes to make me wait.”

“I don’t think I want to know.”

“Of course you don’t. But it wasn’t bad.” He poured another creamer. “At this point, I thought you might be interested in the truth.”

“Well, in this case, I’m not.”

It occurred to me that the illness might be doing something to his brain.

“I was still with your mother.”

“I said I don’t want to know.”

He smiled. “Look at her, will you? I love the small-time ones.”

“Dad, really. I’ll leave.”

When she bent over the pie cooler now, he turned all the way around. But then he turned back and mumbled, “All right, you win.” He rubbed his arm, stretching. “You know,” he said. “I never cared about money.”

“I don’t care much about it, either.”

At that one, he slapped the table.

“By the time I was your age,” he said, “I already had you and your sister. That’s the only reason I thought about earning a living at all. But you know, the money didn’t mean a thing to me.” He sipped his coffee, making a sour face. “For that matter, I wouldn’t have said that you kids were a big part of my life, either.”

“I’m aware of that. We both are.”

“That’s just how it was in those days. I was working. That’s what we did.” With a pinkie, he traced the pattern in the table. “I did my good work early,” he said.

I finished my sandwich and sat back in the booth. The truth was, when he was my age, he hadn’t even met my mother yet.

The waitress was laying out her dinner settings now, moving through the rows of tables. Dad was smiling at her, but she still wouldn’t look at him. He snapped his fingers, but she didn’t even turn.

“She’d had a bit to drink,” he said.