Sleeping With Ghosts. Lynne Pemberton
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into the driving seat. He turned on the ignition staring straight ahead. Calvin recognized that distant look and knew better than to pry. His mother had warned him that his father had a dark side that he revealed to no one. Calvin suspected that this had been part of the problem in their marriage. He had broached the subject with his mother once, but Jennifer had been subtly evasive.
‘Anyway, tell me about you, Calvin. How’s school? Your mother tells me you got great grades. She also told me you want to leave.’
From the corner of his eye, Calvin studied his father’s reaction as he repeated what he had been practising for days. ‘Highclare has been great for me; I’ve enjoyed it, well most of it. After you guys split, I felt a bit lost, and being away at school with lots of others in a similar position helped a lot.’ He was staring into the middle distance. ‘It was pretty hard at first, Dad, I just wanted it to be, well, how it was before; you know, happy families, and all that stuff.’ There was no bitterness in his voice, just regret.
Adam gave his son a long glance. Calvin’s angular jaw jutted forward in what Adam knew was a defiant gesture, his mouth was taut. But a few seconds later, his bottom lip had begun to quiver ever so slightly and he squinted as sunlight suddenly flooded his eyes. He shut them, but not before Adam had seen the thin film of unshed tears.
Adam felt the boy’s pain like never before, realizing for the first time that he’d been so selfishly obsessed with his own hurt, he’d failed to recognize his son’s. Reproaching himself, he was filled with a deep remorse, and the compulsion to make amends.
‘Believe me, Calvin, when I say that I know how hard it must have been for you; all kids want their parents to be together, whatever the cost. They don’t understand that it’s not always possible. I don’t need to tell you that your mother is a strong-willed lady, and once she gets her mind set on something there’s no turning her.’
‘Would you have her back now, Dad?’
The unexpected question caught Adam off guard. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘Just something she said last time I was home.’
‘Yeah, go on.’ Adam was curious.
‘A song came on the radio and she got a kind of funny look on her face, you know, wistful, and her voice sounded different, kinda foggy. She said, “This was the first song I ever danced to, with your father.” When the record ended, she turned to face me. Her eyes were full of tears, and I thought she was going to cry. Then she said, “I loved him very much.”’
Adam knew the song. ‘“I’m not in Love” by 10CC?’
Calvin nodded, ‘That’s the one.’
‘Next time you see your mother, ask her what song reminds her of Jordan Tanner.’ Adam’s anger altered his handsome face and his son was sorry he had brought the subject up. They travelled in stony silence for the next few minutes, until Calvin broke it.
‘I think you should know that I don’t want to go to Harvard next year, Dad. I don’t want to be a smart-ass lawyer. I want to go to Art College.’
This revelation did not surprise Adam who asked, ‘Is your mother aware of this?’
‘Yep, but you know her as well as I do, she’s a snob and all she cares about is what her fancy friends think. Harvard Law School is the ultimate as far as she’s concerned. She has this vision of art students with long hair, hanging out and doing drugs. Not the clean-cut Wasp image she has in mind for me! But I don’t want to do that preppy scene, and I hate the thought of being part of a hot-shot law firm. Most of the lawyers I’ve met at Grandma’s are creeps.’ Calvin spoke with the angry conviction of a headstrong sixteen-year-old determined to have his own way.
Adam agreed wholeheartedly. ‘You’re right about lawyers; most of ’em are assholes, give or take a couple, one of whom is my best friend. I never thought for one second Law School was right for you, Cal. You’ve got talent, real talent, and I would love you to be an artist. My greatest regret in life is that I can’t paint. That’s why I hang out in an art gallery for a living, you know, getting it all secondhand.’ Adam slid his hand across the car seat, covering Calvin’s, he squeezed gently. ‘You’ve got my support, son. If Art College is what you really want, and it makes you happy, fine by me. Your Grandfather Krantz would have been proud, he would have encouraged you every inch of the way.’
Calvin breathed a huge sigh of relief. ‘You’ll back me then, Dad, when it comes to the showdown?’
An image of Jennifer’s enraged face drifted before Adam’s eyes. He blinked to clear it from his vision and said in a voice he hoped sounded reassuring and positive, ‘I’m absolutely certain that between us we can make your mother see sense.’ He increased the pressure on his son’s hand.
‘Gee thanks, Dad! I knew I could rely on you.’
That night Adam went with Calvin to Lusardi’s, an Italian restaurant he’d been taking him to since he was old enough to walk. Over linguine pesto they reminisced about Calvin’s thirteenth birthday party, spent in the same restaurant. The teenager had got very drunk on Chianti, it was a memorable first.
Afterwards, back at Adam’s apartment on Central Park West, on Calvin’s insistence they played a selection of his all-time favourite blues artists. The boy whistled and snapped his fingers in tune with the music, commenting that he been the only kid in the neighbourhood to be lulled to sleep by John Lee Hooker, Robert Cray and Wolf Man Jack, instead of the usual nursery rhymes. Adam chuckled to himself thinking how much he loved being like this, just the two of them together. Later they shared a couple of beers, whilst watching a late-night TV movie in the small den that had once been Calvin’s playroom.
Halfway through the movie Calvin fell asleep. Careful not to wake him Adam switched off the television, then bending down he extracted the half-empty beer can from his son’s grip. Straightening up, he stood very still for a long time, gazing with admiration at his son’s body sprawled across the sofa. Calvin was lean and tanned, and toned from hours on the playing field. And Adam was suddenly filled with an indescribable rush of pride and wonder at the fact that he had somehow created this undeniably handsome young man. All the hackneyed parent-and-child clichés sprang to mind. Adam plumped for ‘the best investment I’ve ever made’.
Briskly he walked down the hall, past the kitchen into the living room. It was a vast space with large floor-to-ceiling windows filling one wall, whilst pictures filled every other available square inch – including the bathrooms and the back of the kitchen door. Adam had never particularly liked the apartment, but now as he looked around he realized he hated it. It was more like a gallery than a home.
‘It’s got no soul,’ he muttered, pouring Scotch into a tumbler and lighting a Marlboro Red, thinking of the months Jennifer had spent decorating the interior with her camp interior designer friend, ‘Jovi’ or ‘Javi’, some stupid name he couldn’t remember. Rolling the whisky around the glass, he listened to the ice clinking while finally deciding that the apartment was a monument to his wife: monochromatic, ultra chic and seriously expensive.
Crossing the room he stood next to the window. It was an exceptionally clear night. The dark sky high above Central Park was wild with stars, gold and white lights twinkling like scattered jewels above and below his eyrie on the twenty-second floor. It reminded him of another night five years ago when he and Jennifer had moved in. Memories of the hours of frenzied unpacking flooded back; hanging pictures in great excitement, and eating Chinese take-aways sitting on packing boxes, drinking Cristal champagne out of hastily washed mugs. Yes, it had been a night similar to this one and they had made love on the floor in exactly the same spot where he now stood. Afterwards, he recalled his bare soles had pressed against the side of a suitcase as he had lain, still deeply embedded in her softness. Adam had been awed by the look of radiance on Jennifer’s face: the serene afterglow when desire has recently departed and love remains.
Turning abruptly away from the window, and the memory, Adam finished his drink, then poured himself another before leaving the room. Padding quietly down the hallway, he passed his favourite