Liam had said. He was tired. He wanted to take a shower and wash the bullseye off his chest and see if Shy was done babysitting so he could tell her what happened.
“Your mother is still out,” his dad had said, removing his headphones. He looked pretty worn out too, like he’d been walking for miles in his Birkenstocks.
“Where is she again?” Liam’s mom never did much of anything besides put Band-Aids on little kids and walk their old dog and go grocery shopping and make dinner and drink wine and ask him how school was and get mad at him about burning the schoolyard or leaving his shoes directly in the way of the front door or not hearing what she said because he had earbuds in or getting water all over the bathroom floor when he took a shower. Oh, and hoard jam jars full of weed.
“I’m not sure. There was a party at a bar. She seemed to know everyone there. I went in and then I left because there was karaoke.”
“Seriously? That’s so lame.”
“Seriously. It was like a karaoke nightmare, and with my tinnitus, I had to escape.”
Greg had developed tinnitus playing the piccolo in his New Jersey high school marching band. It worsened at Oberlin, where he’d fronted two experimental rock bands, a Dixieland jazz ensemble, and a Philip Glass synth symphony. Ever since, he’d had to wear noise-canceling headphones when out and about. Teaching music to small children who sang in breathy voices and barely made a sound when they blew into their recorders didn’t bother it much, but he couldn’t go to a live concert or anyplace where the music was loud without tremendous suffering.
“Your mom was singing and dancing and having a wonderful time. She didn’t even notice me. I left without speaking to her, but then I went back because I was hoping to talk to Stuart Little from the Blind Mice. He wasn’t there. Neither was she. They… they’d already left.”
There was a sadness in his voice that Liam hadn’t heard before. His parents were nerdy and annoying, but they were usually nice to each other. They held hands at the movies and got each other weird gifts at thrift stores.
“Were you wearing that?” Liam gestured at his dad’s rolled-up Dickies overalls, black Doc Martens, and khaki fishing hat. His dad had explained to him that his style of dress was a tribute to some early-eighties band called Dexys Midnight Runners, but it didn’t really work for him. “No wonder she didn’t want to talk to you.” He was trying to lighten the mood. His dad didn’t respond.
“Want me to call her?” Liam offered. He pulled out his phone. The battery was almost dead. “Let me go inside and plug it in.”
“No, don’t,” his dad said.
“You sure?”
His dad nodded, staring dejectedly at the dog. He looked up at Liam again. “Would you be at all interested in transferring to a public school?”
Liam frowned. It wasn’t like his parents had to pay any tuition. “Not really. I mean, I’m a junior. It’s probably not easy to change schools this far into high school. Why?”
His dad shook his head. “No real reason. I was just thinking that maybe if I got a better-paying job your mom wouldn’t have to work so much and we could do more things together as a family. But if I change jobs you can’t go to private school anymore. Which could be a good thing. It might be good for you to go to a school with more economic diversity.”
“Yeah.” Liam shrugged his shoulders. “I mean, I like my school. And it’s a pretty good deal we have. Plus, I’ll be leaving for college after next year.”
His dad nodded. He looked like he was going to cry. “Wow. That’s soon.”
“Uh-huh,” Liam said.
His dad leaned down to scratch the dog between the shoulder blades. “Never mind. It’s not important.” The dog didn’t move.
Liam went inside to take a shower. His dad stayed outside. After his shower he’d texted Shy, but she couldn’t talk because she could hear the parents of the kid she was babysitting coming home. Liam passed out pretty soon after that.
Now his parents were avoiding each other without admitting they were avoiding each other. It was like sharing an apartment with roommates who never spoke.
His dad was a morning person. He usually woke up first and put on music and fixed breakfast and danced around nerdily while Liam’s mom stared at him and drank her