The Summer We Fell Apart Read online

  Finn tightened the scarf around his neck and hunkered down inside his father’s leather jacket. He slurped his noodles slowly. So slowly that the girls who had been checking him out ate lunch, had dessert, stalled around, and then paid for their check with one long backward glance at him before they left. He nursed the pot of tea, got up, and pissed, grateful that his stomach was staying steady, and then when he got back to the table he signaled for the check.

  The tiny dark-haired waiter rushed toward him, his face all wrinkled like a dried apple. He talked fast in broken English, said Finn was all paid up, and handed him a fortune cookie with a slip of paper. On the paper was a telephone number and below that were scrawled the names Holly and Rose. Fucking-A. The girls had bought him lunch.

  He broke the fortune cookie into little pieces, tossed the fortune away without reading it, and crunched on the cookie while he shoved the paper with their number into his pocket and ambled out of the restaurant into the narrow street. With no destination in mind, he allowed the chaos and crowds of Chinatown to carry him uptown toward SoHo. It was colder than he remembered it being when he’d left his mother’s apartment. The sky was damp, heavy, and gray. He had no idea what time it was—late afternoon for sure. Just off Broadway, he ducked into a coffee shop near the corner of Thompson and Bleecker Streets. He took a stool at the counter and ordered a coffee. One sip and his bowels let loose, and he tripped getting off the stool in his rush to go to the bathroom. All the sustenance he had gained was lost in the stall as he writhed in pain on the filthy toilet.

  When he got back to his coffee, it was cold. He threw a buck on the counter and hobbled out into the street. On his way up Thompson toward Washington Square Park, he passed a pay phone. His fingertips were numb as he fumbled with the slip of paper. The phone rang five times and he was about to hang up when one of the girls answered. Her voice was high, young. He closed his eyes and rested his head against the metal of the phone stand and tried to remember if either of them looked to be over eighteen.

  She giggled when he said who he was and thanked her for his lunch. She told him they were shopping a few blocks from where he was right this minute. They arranged to meet in the park, so Finn took his time and walked slowly—although he really had no choice because the stint in the coffee shop bathroom had left him wasted and his legs felt like rubber.

  When he finally got to a bench to the right of the arch, he collapsed onto it and stared at the Christmas tree erected below. There were several people taking photographs and a guy with a shopping cart and a boom box blasting what sounded like Latin Christmas carols. Finn closed his eyes for a second but didn’t allow himself to go away. When he opened them again, he saw the girls rushing across the square on impossibly high-heeled boots. They each held several shiny shopping bags in their hands, which they swung back and forth as they stood before him.

  Finn realized that his position on the bench—legs and arms spread open wide—could be seen as some sort of come-on, but he did nothing to adjust his limbs. Why play games? He knew what they wanted but now just the thought of it made him tired. He was beginning to regret his phone call until one of them—he didn’t know who was who—suggested they go for a drink. Exactly what his body needed.

  Too many drinks later to count—drinks that were blessedly paid for with a gold credit card (courtesy of Holly’s father, who, according to his daughter, owned the good parts of Michigan up into Canada, whatever that meant), they took a cab to the W Hotel in Union Square, where the girls were staying.

  Once in their suite, the girls opened the pharmacy. They chattered on about a private club on Gansevoort Street the concierge had told them about and that they’d gone to the night before only to find the boys had been more interested in each other than Holly and Rose. Holly gave a mock pout and said she thought they were going to have to go home without having any real fun. Then Rose climbed onto Finn’s lap and bounced up and down until she was satisfied by Finn’s anatomical response, obviously proving he was heterosexual. In anticipation, Holly and Rose each took a hit of Ecstasy and then told Finn he could have whatever he wanted from the mini bar while they disappeared into what Finn assumed was the bedroom.

  Finn shrugged to himself. So what if he was their second choice for a night of fun. He was a savior, their savior. And the savior shall be duly rewarded. He took every tiny liquor bottle out of the fridge and lined them up on the coffee table in front of him. “Hello, Jack,” he said as he twisted the cap and shot the amber liquid into the back of his throat and then tossed the bottle aside and reached for another. “Hello, Grey Goose,” he whispered as Rose appeared back in the room wearing only a wife-beater and a thong. He could see her heavy nipples clearly through the fabric and it did absolutely nothing for him. His dick, however, had a mind of its own. Or maybe it was just the Ecstasy.

  Holly came up behind Rose and slid her hands under Rose’s shirt. Her fingers stroked Rose’s nipples, pulled them out until they were long and hard and Rose was writhing and moaning. It reminded Finn of the trip to Amsterdam with his father that summer his life changed. His father insisted he and Finn visit the brothels. Sex had been everywhere—nothing was beyond his reach if he had so desired. His father paid for a room where they stood behind the glass and watched two tired-looking women go down on each other. He remembered looking quickly at his father to see his reaction. He had hoped his dad would laugh and say, “Let’s get out of here.” Instead, his eyes were glassy and his breath had been coming in short, shallow puffs between his lips. Finn had wanted to run out of there but he didn’t want to deal with his father calling him a pussy, so he stayed through to the horrible, staged orgasmic ending. If he could have seen into the future, to what would be happening between them in Italy just a week later, he would never have stayed. But he was the son who never challenged his father—he was a coward. He knew what his siblings thought of him going on that trip with their father. Accepting his bribe. Finn was the weak one.

  Finn knew that most likely the porn-star moans coming from the mouths of Rose and Holly were for his benefit. While the show continued, he opened each bottle before him and drank while Holly pulled down Rose’s panties. When it was his turn to join in, he allowed himself to be led off the couch and into the bedroom.

  He didn’t really have to participate, which was just as well. As Holly ground away on top of him and Rose was doing something to his balls, he occasionally reached up to finger a nipple and give a little performance moan of his own, but other than that he drifted.

  It had been different with Miriam. Finn had waited. He wanted it to be right. He wanted it to be out of his house and away from the craziness of his family. He had gotten it together for a while then, had a good job out on the Cape working construction, and he had sent Miriam the money for a ticket to join him. It was Columbus Day weekend of her first year of college and Finn was able to get them a room at a hotel on the beach, run by the family of one of his buddies, an end-of-the-season special that he normally would never have been able to afford. The room had a big bed with a bay window overlooking the ocean and a tiny deck. They had curled up on the one lounge chair beneath a blanket and kissed for what seemed like days. He could still remember how his breath caught in his throat when he saw her naked. He had wanted to cry—had, in fact. They both had.

  Finn had cried because she was so beautiful and because he knew that no matter how much they loved each other, he would screw it up. He was just beginning his slide but even he knew then he’d be incapable of reversing—even for Miriam.

  What should have ended after that weekend went on for years, too many years, too many times that Finn had nearly killed himself or someone else because he couldn’t stay sober. And Miriam. She had loved him through everything—was convinced, in fact, that her love was enough to save him. Until one day she just stopped. He had poisoned everyone around him and miraculously he was still alive. Even his bastard of a father managed to get a brain tumor and piss off. Why the fuck was Finn still ali
ve? So that he would know that Miriam had finally left him behind to marry a doctor and move to Virginia? Was that why?

  Holly collapsed on top of him with a moan. Obviously, she was done. When she rolled off him, Finn was surprised that he was still hard. Rose seemed to take this as some sort of sign that he wanted her and began to crawl on top of him, but mostly he just wanted this to be over. He rolled her over onto her stomach and took her ass cheeks in his hands and slid himself inside. Each thrust caused him such pain he thought he was going to pass out. When she finally cried out, Finn withdrew and crawled off the bed and into the bathroom. He got to the toilet just as the liquid shot out of his ass again.

  When he was done, when there was absolutely nothing left inside him, he slid onto the marble floor and curled up into a fetal position. Shivering, he reached up and yanked a towel down off the bar and covered himself. After a few minutes like that, he must have passed out because when he woke up, there was vomit on the floor all around his face and in his hair and he couldn’t remember puking. He cleaned himself up as much as he could, avoiding the mirror, and slowly opened the bathroom door. Holly and Rose were asleep in the middle of the big bed, curled around each other.

  He picked up his pants and shirt and his father’s leather jacket from the floor in the bedroom. In the living room, he found his shoes and scarf and Holly’s purse—the contents upended across the floor when she had been looking for the drugs. There was a wallet stuffed so tight with cash that it wouldn’t close. When he investigated, he saw that they were all hundreds. He helped himself to three bills and then, before he dropped it back onto the floor, he looked at her ID. She had a driver’s license that said she was Holly Bliss from Gross Pointe, Michigan. She was twenty-two. He took another hundred and a pack of cigs sitting by his big toe. He and his dick were worth four C notes at least—well, his dick was anyway.

  It was snowing when he got outside. Big, wet, juicy flakes that saturated his hair as he started to walk north. He walked up just past West 23rd Street before he hailed a cab. Why not? He gave the hundreds in his wallet a proprietary pat; he was flush.

  He was still wasted when he got to his mother’s building. The doorman had to run across the lobby to catch Finn by the shoulder as he slipped on the wet marble floor by the elevator.

  “Better watch that,” Finn slurred and tried to point in the direction of the melted snow. “The old people will break their fucking hips.”

  The doorman grinned at him, as if he was an old drinking buddy. “I’d say you have more to worry about than they do.”

  “Nah, not getting old.”

  The elevator bell rang, signaling that it had arrived on the floor. “Sure you are, bud, we all are.”

  “Nah,” Finn said again as he stepped into the elevator, “not me.”

  The doorman leaned in and pressed the button for the ninth floor. He held the elevator open a second with his body as he regarded Finn slumped against the back wall. “You okay getting into your place? You want some help?”

  Finn waved him off. The doorman nodded, stepped back, and just as the doors slid shut, Finn yelled, “Wait.”

  The doors slid back open. “What?”

  “Was that your kid the other day? With the umbrella?”

  The doorman smiled proudly, showing all of his teeth and nodded. “That’s my boy, Jonah. He’s five.”

  Finn nodded and closed his eyes. He smelled bile. “That kid saved my life.”

  “What?”

  “Your kid, his red umbrella, saved my life that day.”

  The doorman shook his head; obviously he thought Finn had gone over the edge and didn’t know what he was talking about. “Go sleep it off, buddy.”

  Finn saluted as the doors shut again. He couldn’t find the words to tell him that he had almost stepped off the curb in front of a taxi, and then the red umbrella coming toward him caught his eye and he stopped because he didn’t know it was attached to a person—he thought it was floating in the air and he hadn’t a clue as to how or even why. When it turned out to be the doorman and his son, all he could do was wave and say hello and then feel an inescapable sadness that the taxi hadn’t done its job and smashed his skull to smithereens right there on Second Avenue.

  He let himself into the apartment and grabbed the bottle of vodka from the freezer. From the kitchen drawer, he took a book of matches and headed to the bed. Propped up against the head-board, he lit one of Holly’s cigarettes and took a deep drag. With the other hand, he twisted the cap off the vodka. The first sip gave him a brain freeze. He took another long, hard swallow and closed his eyes and waited for his liquid salvation.

  The morning after the first time he and Miriam had made love, they walked down the beach to watch an old hotel getting demolished. The bulldozer made several passes, ripping off brittle wooden porches until there was a large, gaping hole on the side that faced the beach. Amazingly, there were still beds and chairs and tables in the rooms—they hadn’t been cleared out. When he looked at Miriam, there were tears running down her cheeks. When he asked her why she’d been crying, she said she never wanted the memory of their weekend here to be erased just like that. Even though Finn knew he was lying, he took her in his arms and told her that would never happen. Now, the way Finn saw it, Miriam had married the doctor so she could permanently erase all her memories of him. What she had now was a fresh new memory-making start in Virginia. He took another slow drag off the cigarette before he brought the vodka to his lips again. When he closed his eyes, he saw Miriam as she was that day long ago. Her face was so trusting as she opened herself to him beneath their tent of sheets and blankets.

  Before Finn even opened his eyes, he could hear his mother and George arguing. When he was finally able to force his crusty lids apart, he looked to his left. His sister Amy was twisted into a hard plastic chair below a window, chewing at the cuticle on her thumb. He noticed her hair was still blond and short like it had been a year ago at their father’s funeral. When she saw that he was awake, her eyes widened but she didn’t call attention to him. Instead, she slipped quietly off the chair and bent over next to his bed. She put her head down low near his ear and whispered, “Oh Finny, you’ve come back to us.”

  He couldn’t lift his arm to touch her even though he wanted to. His hands were tied at the wrists to the sides of the bed. He had no fucking idea where he was or why his mother would not shut the fuck up. The more awake he became, the louder their voices were and the more pain his body was in. Fucking liquid fire shot through his limbs and he had no choice but to moan out loud.

  At the sound that came out of his mouth, everything in the room stopped. His mother was at his right side, fussing with the ties around his wrist, and George was at the foot of the bed, frowning. Amy was still hunkered down close to his ear. “Don’t say anything,” she advised him.

  His mother, when she was done fiddling with the ties, reached up and smoothed the hair off his forehead. At the feel of her palm on his skin, Finn cried out again. He had to be on fire and they just didn’t realize it. Why the hell didn’t they help him? He turned a panicked eye on Amy. She shook her head slightly and made small shushing sounds to indicate that he should relax. When the nurse came in, she shot something into the line that was attached to a bag hanging above his head. He closed his eyes and moments later he started to fly.

  He had no idea how long he had been flying in his dreams, but when he woke, he was tired as if he’d been aloft for days with no rest. He wanted to close his eyes again, but a nurse entered the room just then and noticed he was awake. She said, “I’ll go get your brother,” and left before Finn had a chance to stop her.

  When George came in, Finn tried to smile, but something didn’t feel right. His wrists were still tied, so he couldn’t touch his face to see what was missing. Something had to be missing. He had absolutely no idea of time, or memory of where exactly he was, so when George moved closer, Finn opened his mouth to ask him, but it was so dry his tongue got stuck behind his t
eeth. He was desperate for some saliva. Some ice. Something.

  George pulled a chair up to the side of the bed. He shrugged out of his coat and sat down. There were smudges of blue beneath his eyes, and the corners of his mouth were turned down; he looked as tired as Finn felt. He must be dressed for work, because around his neck he wore a tie, although the knot was loose. Maybe it was after work.

  George leaned forward on the bars and said, “I don’t know where to start, Finny. You’re alive…” He shrugged; his mouth was twisted into a sad smile. “If the doorman hadn’t checked up on you, you would have burned the whole building down.”

  Finn closed his eyes. He didn’t want to look at George anymore. He wanted George to go away so he could fly again. He wanted the nurse to come back in and put the juice in the bag that made him fly up, up and away.

  But George wasn’t going to shut up. He was going on about Finn passing out with a lit cigarette. The fire destroyed most of the wall behind the bed and into the closet, but it hadn’t reached the common walls, so no one else was hurt. Apparently, the doorman was worried that he had let Finn go up alone. He knew Finn was too wasted to walk and he wanted to make sure that he had gotten into the apartment safely. When he got there, the bed and the wall were already in flames—the fire had spread quickly because of the 180-proof vodka that was spilled all over Finn’s clothes and the sheets. They think the thick leather jacket Finn had been wearing had actually protected his chest from really severe burns but the heat had seared the jacket to his chest.

  If Finn could have laughed out loud, he would have. His father’s leather jacket saved him? Now that was truly a fucking laugh riot. The last words his father had ever spoken to him were in Italy the summer he and Finn went backpacking. How many years ago was that? Ten? Finn had knocked him to the ground and his father retaliated with the only weapon he had. He had told Finn he wished he’d never been born. He was the mistake that had never panned out. He would always be his father’s greatest disappointment.