HOME IS ANYWHERE YOU HANG YOUR HEAD Saturday, May 9, 1992 (Henry is 28)

HOME IS ANYWHERE YOU HANG YOUR HEAD


Saturday, May 9, 1992 (Henry is 28)

HENRY: I’ve decided that the best strategy is to just ask straight out; either he says yes
or no. I take the Ravenswood El to Dad’s apartment, the home of my youth. I haven’t
been here much lately; Dad seldom invites me over and I’m not given to showing up
unannounced, the way I’m about to do. But if he won’t answer his phone, what does
he expect? I get off at Western and walk west on Lawrence. The two-flat is on
Virginia; the back porch looks over the Chicago River. As I stand in the foyer
fumbling for my key Mrs. Kim peeps out of her door and furtively gestures for me to
step in. I am alarmed; Kimy is usually very hearty and loud and affectionate, and
although she knows everything there is to know about us she never interferes. Well,


almost never. Actually, she gets pretty involved in our lives, but we like it. I sense
that she is really upset.

“You like a Coke?” She’s already marching toward her kitchen.

“Sure.” I set my backpack by the front door and follow her. In the kitchen she
cracks the metal lever of an old-fashioned ice cube tray. I always marvel at Kimy’s
strength. She must be seventy and to me she seems exactly the same as when I was
little. I spent a lot of time down here, helping her make dinner for Mr. Kim (who died
five years ago), reading, doing homework, and watching TV. I sit at the kitchen table
and she sets a glass of Coke brimming with ice before me. She has a half-consumed
cup of instant coffee in one of the bone china cups with hummingbirds painted
around the rim. I remember the first time she allowed me to drink coffee out of one of
those cups; I was thirteen. I felt like a grown-up.

“Long time no see, buddy.”

Ouch. “I know. I’m sorry.. .time has been moving kind of fast, lately.”

She appraises me. Kimy has piercing black eyes, which seem to see the very back
of my brain. Her flat Korean face conceals all emotion unless she wants you to see it.
She is a fantastic bridge player.

“You been time traveling?”

“No. In fact, I haven’t been anywhere for months. It’s been great.”

“You got a girlfriend?”

I grin.

“Ho ho. Okay, I know all about it. What’s her name? How come you don’t bring
her around?”

“Her name is Clare. I have offered to bring her around several times and he always
turns me down.”

“You don’t offer to me. You come here, Richard will come, too. We’ll have duck
almondine.”

As usual I am impressed with my own obtusity. Mrs. Kim knows the perfect way
to dissolve all social difficulties. My dad feels no compunction about being a jerk to
me, but he will always make an effort for Mrs. Kim, as well he should, since she
pretty much raised his child and probably isn’t charging him market rent.

“You’re a genius.”

“Yes, I am. How come I don’t get a MacArthur grant? I ask you?”

“Dunno. Maybe you’re not getting out of the house enough. I don’t think the
MacArthur people are hanging out at Bingo World.”

“No, they already got enough money. So when you getting married?”


Coke comes up my nose, I’m laughing so hard. Kimy lurches up and starts
thumping me on the back. I subside, and she sits back down, grumpily. “What’s so
funny? I’m just asking. I get to ask, huh?”

“No, that’s not it—I mean, I’m not laughing because it’s ludicrous, I’m laughing
because you are reading my mind. I came over to ask Dad to let me have Mom’s
rings.”

“Ohhhhh. Boy, I don’t know. Wow, you’re getting married. Hey! That’s great!
She gonna say yes?”

“I think so. I’m ninety-nine percent sure.”

“Well, that’s pretty good, I don’t know about your mom’s rings, though. See, what
I want to tell you—” her eyes glance at the ceiling “your dad, he’s not doing too good.
He’s yelling a lot, and throwing stuff, and he’s not practicing.”

“Oh. Well, that’s not totally surprising. But it’s not good. You been up there,
lately?” Kimy is ordinarily in Dad’s apartment a lot. I think she surreptitiously cleans
it. I’ve seen her defiantly ironing Dad’s tux shirts, daring me to comment.

“He won’t let me in!” She’s on the verge of tears. This is very bad. My dad
certainly has his problems, but it is monstrous of him to let them affect Kimy.

“But when he’s not there?” Usually I pretend not to know that Kimy is in and out
of Dad’s apartment without his knowledge; she pretends that she would never do
such a thing. But actually I’m appreciative, now that I no longer live here. Someone
has to keep an eye on him.

She looks guilty, and crafty, and slightly alarmed that I am mentioning this. “Okay.
Yeah, I go in once, ‘cause I worry about him. He’s got trash everywhere; we’re gonna
get bugs if he keep this up. He’s got nothing in that fridge but beer and lemons. He’s
got so much clothes on the bed I don’t think he sleeps in it. I don’t know what he’s
doing. I never seen him this bad since when your mom died.”

“Oh boy. What do you think?” There’s a big crash above our heads, which means
Dad has dropped something on the kitchen floor. He’s probably just getting up. “I
guess I’d better go up there ”

“Yeah.” Kimy is wistful. “He’s such a nice guy, your dad; I don’t know why he
lets it get like this.”

“He’s an alcoholic. That’s what alcoholics do. It’s in their job description: Fall
apart, and then keep falling apart.”

She levels her devastating gaze at me. “Speaking of jobs...”

“Yes?” Oh shit.

“I don’t think he’s been working.”

“Well, it’s the off-season. He doesn’t work in May.”

“They are touring Europe and he’s here. Also, he don’t pay rent last two months.”


Damn damn damn. “Kimy, why didn’t you call me? That’s awful. Geez.” I am on
my feet and down the hall; I grab my backpack and return to the kitchen. I delve
around in it and find my checkbook. “How much does he owe you?”

Mrs. Kim is deeply embarrassed. “No, Henry, don’t—he’ll pay it.”

“He can pay me back. C’mon, buddy, it’s okay. Cough it out, now, how much?”

She’s not looking at me. “$1,200.00,” she says in a small voice.

“That’s all? What are you doing, buddy, running the Philanthropic Society for the
Support of Wayward DeTambles?” I write the check and stick it under her saucer.
“You better cash that or I’ll come looking for you.”

“Well, then I won’t cash it and you will have to visit me.”

“I’ll visit you anyway.” I am utterly guilt stricken. “I will bring Clare.”

Kimy beams at me. “I hope so. I’m gonna be your maid of honor, right?”

“If Dad doesn’t shape up you can give me away. Actually, that’s a great idea: you
can walk me down the aisle, and Clare will be waiting in her tux, and the organist will
be playing Lohengrin....”

“I better buy a dress.”

“Yow. Don’t buy any dresses until I tell you it’s a done deal.” I sigh. “I guess I
better go up there and talk to him.” I stand up. In Mrs. Kim’s kitchen I feel enormous,
suddenly, as though I’m visiting my old grammar school and marveling over the size
of the desks. She stands slowly and follows me to the front door. I hug her. For a
moment she seems fragile and lost, and I wonder about her life, the telescoping days
of cleaning and gardening and bridge playing, but then my own concerns crash back
in again. I will come back soon; I can’t spend my entire life hiding in bed with Clare.

Kimy watches as I open Dad’s door.

“Hey, Dad? You home?”

There’s a pause, and then, “GO AWAY.”

I walk up the stairs and Mrs. Kim shuts her door.

The first thing that hits me is the smell: something is rotting in here. The living
room is devastated. Where are all the books? My parents had tons of books, on music,
on history, novels, in French, in German, in Italian: where are they? Even the record
and CD collection seems smaller. There are papers all over, junk mail, newspapers,
scores, covering the floor. My mother’s piano is coated with dust and there is a vase
of long-dead gladiolas mummifying on the windowsill. I walk down the hall,
glancing in the bedrooms. Utter chaos; clothes, garbage, more newspapers. In the
bathroom a bottle of Michelob lies under the sink and a glossy dry layer of beer
varnishes the tile.


In the kitchen my father sits at the table with his back to me, looking out the
window at the river. He doesn’t turn around as I enter. He doesn’t look at me when I
sit down. But he doesn’t get up and leave, either, so I take it as a sign that
conversation may proceed.

“Hi, Dad.”

Silence.

“I saw Mrs. Kim, just now. She says you’re not doing too good.”

Silence.

“I hear you’re not working.”

“It’s May.”

“How come you’re not on tour?”

He finally looks at me. Under the stubbornness there is fright. “I’m on sick leave.”

“Since when?”

“March.”

“Paid sick leave?”

Silence.

“Are you sick? What’s wrong?”

I think he’s going to ignore me, but then he answers by holding out his hands.
They are shaking as though they are in their own tiny earthquake. He’s done it, finally.
Twenty-three years of determined drinking and he’s destroyed his ability to play the
violin.

“Oh, Dad. Oh, God. What does Stan say?”

“He says that’s it. The nerves are shot, and they aren’t coming back.”

“Jesus.” We look at each other for an unendurable minute. His face is anguished,
and I’m beginning to understand: he has nothing. There is nothing left to hold him, to
keep him, to be his life. First Mom, then his music, gone, gone. I never mattered
much to begin with, so my belated efforts will be inconsequential. “What happens
now?”

Silence. Nothing happens now.

“You can’t just stay up here and drink for the next twenty years.”

He looks at the table.

“What about your pension? Workers’ comp? Medicare? AA?”

He’s done nothing, let everything slide. Where have I been?

“I paid your rent.”

“Oh.” He’s confused. “Didn’t I pay it?”


“No. You owed for two months. Mrs. Kim was very embarrassed. She didn’t want
to tell me, and she didn’t want me giving her money, but there’s no sense making
your problems her problems.”

“Poor Mrs. Kim.” Tears are coursing down my father’s cheeks. He is old. There’s
no other word for it. He’s fifty-seven, and he’s an old man. I am not angry, now. I’m
sorry, and frightened for him.

“Dad.” He is looking at me again. “Look. You have to let me do some things for
you, okay?” He looks away, out the window again at the infinitely more interesting
trees on the other side of the water. “You need to let me see your pension documents
and bank statements and all that. You need to let Mrs. Kim and me clean this place.
And you need to stop drinking.”

“No.”

“No, what? Everything or just some of it?”

Silence. I’m starting to lose my patience, so I decide to change the subject. “Dad.

I’m going to get married.”

Now I have his attention.

“To who? Who would marry you?” He says this, I think, without malice. He’s
genuinely curious. I take out my wallet and remove a picture of Clare from its plastic
pocket. In the picture Clare is looking out serenely over Lighthouse Beach. Her hair
floats like a banner in the breeze and in the early morning light she seems to glow
against a background of dark trees. Dad takes the picture and studies it carefully.

“Her name is Clare Abshire. She’s an artist”

“Well. She’s pretty,” he says grudgingly. This is as close as I’m going to get to a
paternal blessing.

“I would like...1 would really like to give her Mom’s wedding and engagement

rings. I think Mom would have liked that.”

“How would you know? You probably hardly remember her.”

I don’t want to discuss it, but I feel suddenly determined to have my way. “I see
her on a regular basis. I’ve seen her hundreds of times since she died. I see her
walking around the neighborhood, with you, with me. She goes to the park and learns
scores, she shops, she has coffee with Mara at Tia’s. I see her with Uncle Ish. I see
her at Juilliard. I hear her sing!” Dad is gaping at me. I’m destroying him, but I can’t
seem to stop. “I have spoken to her. Once I stood next to her on a crowded train,
touching her.” Dad is crying. “It’s not always a curse, okay? Sometimes time travel is
a great thing. I needed to see her, and sometimes I get to see her. She would have
loved Clare, she would have wanted me to be happy, and she would deplore the way
you’ve fucked everything up just because she died.”

He sits at the kitchen table and weeps. He cries, not covering his face, but simply
lowering his head and letting the tears stream from him. I watch him for a while, the


price of losing my temper. Then I go to the bathroom and return with the roll of toilet
paper. He takes some, blindly, and blows his nose. Then we sit there for a few
minutes.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why didn’t you tell me you could see her? I would’ve liked.. .to know that.”

Why didn’t I tell him? Because any normal father would have figured out by now
that the stranger haunting their early married life was really his abnormal, time-
traveling son. Because I was scared to: because he hated me for surviving. Because I
could secretly feel superior to him for something he saw as a defect. Ugly reasons
like that.

“Because I thought it would hurt you.”

“Oh. No. It doesn’t... hurt me; I...it’s good to know she’s there, somewhere. I
mean...the worst thing is that she’s gone. So it’s good that she’s out there. Even if I

can’t see her.”

“She seems happy, usually.”

“Yes, she was very happy.. .we were happy.”

“Yeah. You were like a different person. I always wondered what it would have
been like to grow up with you the way you were, then.”

He stands up, slowly. I remain seated, and he walks unsteadily down the hall and
into his bedroom. I hear him rummaging around, and then he comes slowly back with
a small satin pouch. He reaches into it, and withdraws a dark blue jeweler’s box. He
opens it, and takes out the two delicate rings. They rest like seeds in his long, shaking
hand. Dad puts his left hand over the right hand that holds the rings, and sits like that
for a bit, as though the rings are lightning bugs trapped in his two hands. His eyes are
closed. Then he opens his eyes, and reaches out his right hand: I cup my hands
together, and he turns the rings onto my waiting palms.

The engagement ring is an emerald, and the dim light from the window is
refracted green and white in it. The rings are silver, and they need cleaning. They
need wearing, and I know just the girl to wear them.