‘Does he love you?’
‘In his way, yes, I suppose he does.’
Maria looked at Alexandra for a long time without speaking. It was a look similar to the one she’d gotten over the years from various auto mechanics when she’d brought her car in because she’d heard a creak that she was sure was the telltale complaint of a crucial part about to give way. Inevitably, the mechanics never heard the creak, and they sent her on her way with that same patient but mildly scolding look. They had plenty of customers with real problems, cars that wouldn’t run at all.
‘Trouble with Miami,’ Lawton said as he sat down, ‘it’s always summer. I’m sixty-seven years old, and, goddamn it, I’m ready for a real fall. Maybe I’ll try Ohio. I’ve heard that’s nice.’
‘You were raised in Ohio,’ Stan said, eyes on his plate. ‘You old fool.’
‘Stan,’ she said. ‘Cut it out.’
At the sink, Alexandra watched Mrs Langstaff across the street. Big woman heaving herself into her van, then pulling out the drive, off to work at her candle shop. A row of neat lawns over there, prim hedges running along the sidewalks. Dogs asleep on porches. Flowers blooming in window boxes. Alexandra’s daytime world. Miami Nice. Almost as unreal as her nights.
She walked over to the oven, took out her father’s pancakes, carried them to the table, and set them in front of him.
‘You like summer, Dad. Yellowtail fishing, dolphin. You used to love that time of year most of all.’
‘I used to love a lot of things.’
He stared into a slant of sunlight, mouth clamped.
‘Dad?’
He didn’t reply.
‘Don’t disturb him,’ Stan said. ‘He’s counting dust motes, picking his lotto number for the day.’
Stan stood up, brushed the crumbs off his white uniform shirt.
‘You’re not funny, Stan.’
‘Hey, Alex.’ Stan’s blue eyes were hard on hers. ‘It isn’t working. We can’t keep living like this. Guns and shit. The old man’s got to go. You should just start getting used to the idea.’
Alexandra sponged off the counter by the sink, kept her eyes from him.
‘After work, I’m going over to the range,’ Stan said, ‘hit a few buckets of balls.’
‘With Delvin.’
‘That’s right, with Delvin.’
‘The mysterious Delvin.’
‘He’s a guy from work, Alex. He’s not mysterious.’
‘So why have I never met him? Why don’t you ever bring him home?’
Alexandra looked over at Lawton, who was pouring more syrup on his pancakes. There was syrup spilling over the edge of his plate, pooling on the table.
‘Look, I’m not having a goddamn affair. I like to hit golf balls, and I like Delvin. Why is it that all of a sudden I can’t spend a little free time with a buddy?’
She rubbed hard at a crusty spot on the rim of the sink.
‘Just be home before nine, okay? I need to be at work early tonight. There’s stuff piled up from the lab.’
‘The Bloody Rapist strikes again, huh? Guy kills somebody, next day the goddamn overtime starts.’
‘I don’t have a whole lot of choice. It’s my job.’
‘You’ve got choices, Alex. You’re just making the wrong ones.’
She turned to face him. She kept her voice under control.
‘Is that supposed to be some kind of warning?’
‘Take it any way you want. But get one thing straight – I’m not going to keep doing this, baby-sitting your old man. Spending every night listening to his babble. I didn’t sign on for that.’
Measuring her breath, she leaned her hip against the stove.
‘Is that right? And what did you sign on for, Stan? Just the good times?’
Stan wouldn’t hold her gaze. He busied himself with his newspaper.
‘I’ve had enough of this. It isn’t right. Guns and shit. You said it was going to be temporary, him living here. A couple of weeks and you’d find a place for him. That’s what you said, Alex. I remember plain as day. It’s the only reason I agreed in the first place.’
‘Those places are horrible, Stan. I looked at half a dozen and I wouldn’t leave a dog in any of them.’
‘Well, then you’re damn well going to have to keep on looking, Alex. Because this isn’t working out.’
‘I can’t do that to him, Stan. Stick him in one of those sterile, hopeless places. He’s my father.’
‘No, he’s not. Not anymore. He’s some five-year-old kid with slobber on his chin.’
He was about to say something more when Lawton pushed back his chair.
‘Hands in the air, Frank Sinatra. Get ’em up and there won’t be any trouble.’
He had his pistol out again. Rising slowly to his feet, using his left hand to steady his aim.
‘Dad, now stop it. Come on, listen to me.’
‘Up in the air, where I can see them. And you, young lady, over by the fridge. Hands up, as well.’
‘Fuck this,’ Stan said, and started toward the dining room.
‘Freeze, you bastard.’
Stan kept going and Alexandra’s father lifted the pistol and fired a warning shot into the ceiling. A slab of plaster fell to the floor and milky dust clouded the room. He fired again, gouging a hole in the wall above the doorway.
Stan was on his knees in the dining room, hands above his head.
‘Jesus Christ! Alex, goddamn it. Do something.’
‘When I say freeze, I mean freeze, punk.’
Alexandra stepped in front of her father. The pistol pointed at her heart.
She took a breath, edged close to him, tried to intercept his eyes. Very quietly, she hummed the first few notes of the wedding march, hearing the shiver in her voice, but going ahead with it. Eyes on her father’s eyes, watching them slowly unlock, drift away from the felon he saw beyond her shoulder. His mouth opening as Alexandra stepped closer, singing the notes again, a little louder.
The pistol sagged, came slowly down. Her father took a long breath and looked up at the ceiling as if searching for the laughing gull trapped in the big sanctuary. She slipped the pistol out of his hand and hooked her arm through his and propelled him forward toward the dining room.
Stan was on his feet, fists at his side. His mouth was twisted and his face purple. There were muscles quivering in his cheeks, as if he were chewing on roofing nails.
‘Goddamn it, Alex, the bastard could’ve killed me.’
‘You’re okay, Stan. Everything’s fine.’
‘Where’d he get those goddamn bullets?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Jesus H. Christ. One of the neighbors hears gunshots over here, calls the police … I could lose my fucking job.’
‘All right, all right.’
She went back to the wedding march, her arm looped through her father’s, leading him down that long aisle of memory.
‘I