Truth in Advertising

HOW ARE YOU ENJOYING THE PARTY?


There is a plaque above the entrance to our office building, the names Lauderbeck, Kline & Vanderhosen writ large in crisp Futura. There was a time when it thrilled me to see those words, to walk under them and into this place. The year I started, the agency had been voted Agency of the Year by one of the trade publications. Like most institutions when viewed from the outside—other people’s families, other careers—it appeared to be a wonderful place.

Now I am simply part of the crowd that daily streams in through the revolving doors, shows their ID, waits for one of six elevators, quick fake smile, nods, reads the paper, stares at the coffee cup, the feet, sniffles, listens to the iPod, presses the elevator button over and over and over.

The days meld together. Moments of lightness, of meetings, walks down a hallway and nods and smiles to coworkers of five years, eight years. Wasn’t I taking this exact shower at this exact time yesterday morning? Or was it a week ago? What day is it? The subway and the coffee cart and the gym, the copier, the men’s room, the cafeteria, the void of time lost. We settle into a life. Maybe we made this life or maybe it simply happened. People get promoted. They get married. They have children. She’s how old now? Holy cow. Where does the time go? They leave for another company. They come back three years later. They get divorced. They move to a larger home. They take a trip to Africa. They have chemo. They have an affair. They lose a parent. They find their way, are blessed with good fortune, win the club doubles tournament. They travel to Detroit for business. They drive through an intersection, are hit by a drunk driver, live in a nursing home the rest of their days. I don’t know where time goes. This seems like a good tagline for something.

The holiday party starts at 10:00 A.M. and the office is dead, people taking the morning off.

The paper says the war in Iraq is not going well.

The paper says the war in Afghanistan is not going well.

The paper says the man whose ex-wife cut off his penis years ago and threw it out of a car window is in talks with Fox to start his own reality TV show called How Bad Is Your Ex?

I stand and look out the window, watch as two men unload sacks of what looks like flour. Each time one of the bags hits the two-wheeled cart, a puff of white mist comes out of the corner of the bag. The job seems appealing from this distance. They wear work boots and heavy cloth jackets and there is physical labor involved. They’re talking and laughing as they do it. Has one of them told the other a filthy joke, using words like tits or p-ssy? Is that snobbish of me? How the hell do I know who they really are? Maybe both are trying to get their master’s in writing at Columbia. Maybe one just told the other the story of Sisyphus, of rolling the rock up the hill, only to have it fall down and start again, how it’s a metaphor for life, for work. Are they classical scholars, Larry Darrell–like from W. Somerset Maugham’s The Razor’s Edge? Seekers of truth, of God in the everyday, the every detail? A woman in a formfitting skirt walks by and I see one of them mouth something. The woman turns and gives them the finger. The men laugh.

Smash cut to opening credits of Oprah. Camera dollies in over the heads of applauding audience members. Cut to Oprah, clapping (for herself?).

Oprah says, “Finbar Dolan. My last show and there was only one guest I wanted and that was you.”

“Thank you, Oprah.”

Oprah says, “Wouldn’t commercials be funnier if you were allowed to swear?”

“Absolutely.”

“If every spot were like something on HBO.”

“Volvo. Drive f*cking safely.”

The audience laughs.

I say, “And brought to you by McDonald’s. I’m f*cking loving it.”

Oprah laughs. “Hahahahaha!”

I laugh and jump up and down like Tom Cruise. The audience is hysterical, applauding. Oprah’s laughing.

Oprah says, “You’re awesome.”

I say, “No, you’re awesome.”

The audience applauds both of us and our awesomeness.

Oprah says, “Why aren’t you more famous, more successful?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know what others are missing.”

“Your father was a police officer.”

“Yes.”

“He went into harm’s way to protect people. He stood between us and danger.”

“Yes.”

“And yet you . . . you do nothing for others.”

“No.”

“Do you volunteer?”

“No.”

“Do you give money away?”

“Once in a while but not much.”

“Do you give blood?”

“God, no. Can’t stand needles.” I laugh and turn to the audience, but it’s an entirely different audience of somber, disappointed people who loathe me.

Oprah says, “What do you do for others?”

I say, “What do you mean?”

“Your father was a volunteer during World War Two, saw combat, sat in the pitch black for hours with a dead man on him. Yet you can’t even bring yourself to honor a dying man’s request.”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about. He hit my brothers. He left my mother.”

“Your mother had an affair.”

“No.”

“Your mother had sex with someone who wasn’t her husband.”

“Shut your goddamned mouth.”

Oprah says, “It’s your a-ha moment.”

“It’s not true.”

“Why do you lie?”

“Why do you put yourself on the cover of every issue of your magazine?”

“We’re talking about you.”

I say, “I’ve never watched your show.”

“You even lie to yourself. You’re like one of those birds that skim across the water, looking barely below the surface, unable to engage in anything lasting or meaningful.”

I say, “Let’s go to a commercial.”

• • •

Keita is standing at my door.

He says, “Fin. I am so sorry for you.”

It’s begun to rain outside and though it’s still early, dark clouds make it seem like dusk.

“Keita,” I say. “Thank you. And thank you for your very kind message last night.” It’s only then that I notice his expression. “Is something wrong?”

“Fin. Have I offended you?”

“Offended? No. God, no. Why?”

“Did I do something wrong?”

“Absolutely not. Why? What happened?”

“My father’s office call me. I must go back. I am told I am impeding business.”

“What? No. There’s very little business that happens here to begin with.”

“I wanted to see the TV commercial. Go to Hollywood.”

The math comes slowly to me, but when it does, it’s clear. Someone called. Frank, Martin, Dodge. Most likely Frank. He’d push a Girl Scout down to win a race. I would prefer that Keita fly home, truth be told. I’m deeply tired and don’t feel like babysitting. But there’s something about his expression, the wounded, childlike look that says he simply wants to belong, that somehow opens a small empathic window. He’s also wearing suede Converse All Stars with his dark suit, a nod to this morning’s party, perhaps. I say, “Then come to the shoot with me. Please. As my guest. Put me on the phone with your father.”

A wide-eyed grin. “You would do this?”

“Absolutely. We’re buds, right?”

I’ve strayed too far into jargon.

I say, “Buddies. Friends.”

He likes this word. “Buddies. Yes. Buddies. Okay.”

He pulls up a chair next to mine and we sit uncomfortably close as Keita dials his Vertu cell phone (base price, $4,000) and speaks Japanese, his personality changing, his voice rising, his tone more severe. He waits, puts his hand over the phone. “One of his three assistants. She does not like me. Fin. Your father. He is better?”

Maybe all conversations should take place from a few inches away, where you are almost touching the other person, where you are looking each other in the eye. Perhaps there would be less lying.

“No,” I say. “He died.”

Keita puts his hand to his head. It’s the hand that’s holding the phone and his forehead hits the speaker button. I know this because I hear someone speaking in Japanese on the other end of the phone.

Keita ignores it. “Buddy,” Keita says to me, putting his other hand on my shoulder. There is something about his pain, the gesture, that moves me to the point where I find a hitch in my throat. The voice speaking Japanese becomes louder, angrier.

Keita whispers, “My father,” and rolls his eyes.

Keita takes the phone off speaker and talks to his father in Japanese. I hear his father respond, watch Keita’s bad-dog expression. I understand it all too well. Anger sweeps over me, a kind of chemical response that surprises me. Keita hands me the phone and I lie my face off to Keita’s father, telling him that we need Keita for the shoot, that he provided valuable input during the early stages of the creative process and during the internal review and that the client met him and asked for him to be there. And that we know he’s needed in Japan but he’s needed here as well. Keita’s round face smiling the entire time. And who knows. It never hurts to have a billionaire around.

• • •

We’re gathered in a massive room in a hotel in midtown Manhattan with stained carpeting. There are no decorations, nothing to suggest Christmas. The feeling is less festive and more of a mandatory conference on ethics in the workplace. I stand at the back, having arrived late. The anxiety pit in my stomach has returned. I feel as if I’ve not done the homework and am trying not to be called upon. Also, I want a clear line of sight to the men’s room. I’m still having digestive issues.

At present Frank is speaking. He has been speaking for some time. Dodge stands at his side. “When you take away the bricks and mortar, the computers, the copiers, the faxes, and phones, all the paper and the soda and stuff, you, our people, are our most important resource. I love you guys. And no, I don’t mean in that way. Although some of you, I’d be open to it.” He laughs, though no one joins him. People make disgusted faces. Someone says, a little too loud, “A*shole,” and causes a small commotion. Frank seems unfazed.

Later, promotions are announced. New partners, awards. Outstanding Employee. Best Attitude. Person Who Makes the Workplace Better. Outstanding Account Service Person, Outstanding Copywriter, Art Director. The magic of the AV Department flashing a giant photo on the huge screen at the front. To look around in these moments is to see something rich. When a name is announced for a promotion or partnership or an award, I see, in the faces of my coworkers, the happiness they feel for this person, hear the genuine applause as the embarrassed recipient returns to his or her seat, red-faced, swarmed by their seatmates. The older women in accounting—from Brooklyn and Queens and the Bronx—have changed from their work clothes into pretty dresses, nicer shoes. People look around in their chairs, wave to friends, a kind of instant regression to high school. The women giggle. The men push one another on the shoulder. We look for something deeper than merely a paycheck.

After the buffet and polite chat, the mixing and socializing, the music is turned up and the lights are dimmed and the line at the open bars set up around the perimeter of the enormous, hideous, curious-smelling room begins to grow. People react with lunatic delight when a Kool and the Gang song is played. “Cellllllll-e-brate good times, come on . . . da-da-da-dut-dut-dut-da-da . . . waa-who!”

The music gets louder, the dance floor gets more crowded, women remove those pretty party shoes as they pit out with sweat and take large gulps off of their sixteen-ounce plastic cup of Bud Light (regular Bud was the only other choice). Odd pairings, both on the dance floor and in the room itself. People begin to touch one another when explaining a point. Or hug one another for no reason. “You’re the best!” God was bored with the humans, so he invented alcohol.

It is one-thirty in the afternoon.

I see some of the young copywriters and art directors talking with some of the young account and media girls. Will you remember this day, any of you, years from now? I see Ian talking with two older, heavy-set women who work in human resources and for some reason it breaks my heart. He is a person who cares about other people, wants them to feel welcome, as if he, himself, is throwing the party.

“Helen,” he’ll say. “Are you having a good time? You look gorgeous in that dress. Why don’t you wear your hair like that more often?”

I see Phoebe in a cluster of people across the room. She smiles, but something’s different. I’ve made a horrible mistake.

I see Martin talking with Frank and Dodge. He sees me, motions me over.

Frank says, “Fin. You can fix this, right? You can make your mark with this one. Merry Christmas, by the way. Even though it’s January.” It’s something Frank says. Make your mark. Every assignment, every ad, every spot could be the thing that will vault you to . . . what? Fame, I guess. I’m not really sure what he’s talking about.

Before I can respond Dodge puts his arms around me and holds me. “Of course he can fix it. This is the prince of diapers. And what a handsome prince he is. What an opportunity. The Super Bowl. And yes, Merry Christmas in a completely nondenominational way,” he says. “And I can say that because I’m a Dutch Jew, okay?” Forced laugh. The hug goes on several seconds too long. Boozy breath. I’m holding my drink and am not sure what to do with my other hand, so they both hang suspended. This must look strange. He releases me and wipes something off my lapel as he says, “It’s a marvelous party. Promise you’ll save me a dance.”

I say, “I promise.” I turn to Martin. “Fix what?”

Frank says, “How was your evening with Keita? Did he mention me?”

I say, “He did, Frank. He likes you very much. He said his father admires you.”

Frank turns to Dodge. “I told you the old man wasn’t offended by the Lost in Translation joke.”

Martin says, “Excuse us.”

We walk to the bar.

Martin says to the bartender, “Johnnie Walker Blue. Neat. In a glass, not a plastic cup.”

The bartender says, “Bud Light, undrinkable white wine, shitty vodka.”

I say, “Fix what?”

Martin turns to me and says, “The account. Your account. The world’s greatest diaper, my good chap. Not a good meeting yesterday, I’m afraid.” He turns back to the bartender and says, “There is a bag marked MARTIN CARLSON, EXECUTIVE CREATIVE DIRECTOR under the table behind you. Open it.” We watch as the bartender opens the bag and produces a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue.

Martin says to me, “Sent Emma ’round this morning.” To the barman, “Make it two, please.” Martin drops a twenty in the tip cup and we take our drinks, turn and look at the crowd. We see Keita dancing with several women.

“What happened?” I ask.

“They were underwhelmed. My fault. I should have put more resources on it.”

I feel my face flush, an open embarrassment.

He clinks my glass with his. “Cheers.”

We drink. It tastes like ash to me.

“I thought they liked Al Gore. I thought you liked Al Gore.”

“I did. They didn’t.”

I say, “Did they buy anything?”

“1984.”

“You seem disappointed.”

“I am. I think it’s mediocre at best. It’s someone else’s idea. I don’t like doing other people’s ideas. That’s not how I got where I am.” There’s an edge to his voice.

Then he says, “Can you do this? Because if you can’t—and I understand if your head is elsewhere—I need someone else on it.”

He turns and looks at me and I think, I don’t know this guy at all. He’s the kind of person who would fire me now and never think twice about it. In other words, a boss.

I’m tempted to say f*ck you. But I don’t. Would never. I’ll rescript this whole conversation later in my mind and I will sound bold and strong and turn and walk away after a biting, insightful comment. Martin will follow me and say how right I am and how he was testing me and I passed and also here’s a raise and a promotion. But here, now, my current feelings are a jumble of fear, embarrassment, and a pathetic need to please. Also, I need the job.

The DJ plays The Isley Brothers’ “Shout.” “Don’t forget to say yeah yeah yeah yeah . . . say you will . . .”

We watch as Keita lays down on the floor and does the worm, clearly a fan of the movie Animal House. He urges others to join him, though no one does.

Martin says, “How’s your father, by the way?”

There are times in life when you can, if you choose, truly connect with another human being. You simply have to tell the truth.

I say, “He’s doing much better. Thank you.”

• • •

“Is it?” asks one of the young creatives.

“Is it what?” I ask.

The party has broken up and cabloads of people have made their way to a dive bar just north of Houston, which, until we arrived, was nearly empty. The Clash song “Train in Vain” keeps playing on the jukebox. It’s not a large place, and we’ve packed dozens of people in. Much drinking. The windows are fogged up. Someone breaks a glass and screams. Others laugh. The bartender doesn’t react. I saw Ian and Phoebe earlier but lost them in the crowd. I stand against the wall of the bar, drinking a stale draft beer, and watch Mike Carroll talk very closely with Karen Simpson. He touches her arm to make a point. She nods deeply in agreement. In the next moment they are kissing passionately, comically, the kind of kiss where the woman wraps one of her legs around the man’s leg. They are married. But not to each other. No one seems to notice or care. Two young creatives are talking to me but I’m not listening to what they’re saying. They keep buying me beers, saying I’m “awesome” and that it must be “awesome” to go on big shoots and work with A-list directors like Raphael and huge stars like Gwyneth Paltrow. I make out the occasional word in what they’re saying, here and there, like I do if someone’s speaking French to me very, very slowly. I see Phoebe’s profile. She’s talking with two other guys from the creative department. She’s laughing.

“Awesome,” he says, a big innocent smile on his unlined face. “Is it awesome?”

I’ve read that for an average-size adult, cremation takes from two to three hours at a normal operating temperature between 1,500 and 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit. And that afterwards any remaining bone fragments are processed in a machine to a consistent size and placed into an urn selected by the family. Awesome? Depends on the day, the hour, the moment. Yes. No. It depends on what you want from a job. Although international business class on a new British Airways 747 upper deck is pretty great.

I say, “It is awesome. It’s completely awesome.”

They look at each other and high five.

“Awesome,” one of them says.

I shake hands with the two young creatives and make my way to the men’s room, wash my hands, throw cold water on my face. I look tired. I should go home. I should go home and take a hot shower, read a book. I’m breathing heavily. I lean against the dirty basin, look at my face, turn and look at my scar, run my finger over it.

We had a great assignment. A Super Bowl spot. And we blew it.

To the bar, smiling, nodding, pointing. At the bar I order another beer.

“Signore,” I hear next to me.

“Stefano. What’s new?”

“Not bad.”

His English gets confused, especially when he’s been drinking.

Stefano says, “I heard that Tom Pope vomited in public.”

“I heard something about that.”

My beer arrives. His scotch. We clink glasses, sip, look around the room at our life.

“You look tired, Fin.”

“I am tired,” I say.

He smiles. “Do you know what you need?” he asks, the hint of mischief on his face. “You need a woman. Not a girl,” he says, frowning comically, drawing out the word girl as if it were somehow below his European sensibilities.

“These little, these little minxes here, the, the Jennifers and the Kims and the Jills and the Courtneys and the Alexandras. My God. These little Botticellis running around with their lovely round bottoms. But so clueless. Fun, of course. Yes. Why not. But a woman. A good woman. This is a different thing.”

One of the young creatives has his arm around Phoebe’s shoulder. She has on a black cashmere sweater with buttons up the front. A long skirt. Boots. No makeup. Her lips are glossy. She’s talking and her teeth are very white.

“Fin. I would like to say a name to you and ask if you know who it is, please.”

“Okay.”

“Mr. Roger Bannister,” he says, nodding slowly, a slight grin on his stubbled face.

“Roger Bannister,” I say. “Did he break the four-minute mile?”

“That is exactly correct.” He says this with great pride, as if Bannister were his father.

Stefano says, “May I tell you about that day?”

“Please do.”

“It was a windy day in Oxford, Fin. We are talking about May 5, 1954. England. He almost called the attempt off, you see, because of the wind.” Stefano is looking off into the distance, telling the story as if he was there that day, as if he’d reported upon it for the BBC.

“He was a medical doctor, Mr. Roger Bannister was. Imagine that. It is late afternoon, by the way. Five o’clock when this takes place. The wind had died down.”

He turns to look at me now, suddenly. “He almost canceled the attempt, Fin.” A look of dismay on his face.

“Because of the wind,” I say.

“Exactly right. Because of the wind.”

He turns back to the movie that is playing in his mind. He nods slowly.

“But he did not cancel, Fin. No. On this day, he ran. He ran like no man had run before. On this day he became immortal. The first man to run a mile in under four minutes. Three fifty-nine point four. He was twenty-five years old that day. My God, what a thing.”

He sips his drink.

“He would go on, of course, to a very successful career in medicine. Neurology.” He turns to say this last word to me, a secret between men.

“He married, raised a family. Fin, he was knighted by the Queen of England in 1975. This once meant something, to be knighted. Not like now, where they knight the Spice Girls or George Michael.”

He says, “Do you know what Roger Bannister wrote of that day? He said, ‘I felt at that moment that it was my chance to do one thing supremely well.’”

Stefano raises his glass to mine, gently taps it against the lip, the quietest click amid the conversations and music, and takes a slow sip off the old-farm-table-colored scotch.

“Fin, I turn forty soon. This is a milestone. Most surely the end of any hint of youth. This is a sobering thought for a man. One’s erection will never quite be the same. I read this in a magazine. Tragic to me, this is. Of course, as an Italian I am very different.” He winks. “Fin, would it surprise you to learn that I intend to break the four-minute mile on my birthday?”

“It would, yes.”

“Do you think it’s possible? Do you think by sheer force of will a man can transcend his shortcomings and do this great thing?”

Several thoughts go through my head.

Depends upon the man.

Absolutely not.

It would be lovely to think so.

And then I say what he wants to hear. “Definitely.”

• • •

I’m thinking about leaving without saying good-bye to anyone when Phoebe comes up behind me.

“Hi,” she says.

“Hi.”

We both look around.

Phoebe says, “Last night was weird, right?”

“I’m a fan of pretending things never happened.” I’m wincing.

She nods, a fake smile. “I know. I’m not, though.”

The words sting.

I say, “I’m sorry. It was dumb and selfish and . . . I’m sorry.”

“Yeah. You confused me a bit there.”

“I said I was sorry.” A little too much edge.

“Don’t get mad. It’d been a weird day for me. I mean, I know you’d been through a lot in Boston and that’s why I came out to meet you. It’s just that . . . the Frenchman sent me a ticket to Paris. And it was just . . . it was a weird day and it’s not like . . .”

Ian comes over and puts his arm around each of us. He’s had a few drinks.

He says, “My favorites. My Scott and Zelda. My Nick and Nora. My Sacco and Vanzetti. How are we?”

I say, “Good. All good.”

Phoebe says, “Did you hear that Stefano wants to run a mile in four minutes?”

Ian says, “You said ‘run.’ You mean ‘drive,’ right?”

I say to Ian, “Martin said the meeting didn’t go so good.”

Ian says, “Not so much. Who cares. How are you? How was yesterday?”

I say, “Fine. It’s all fine. Did I mention the ashes?”

Ian says, “What ashes?”

“In my father’s will.” To Phoebe: “I didn’t mention this last night.” To both of them: “This lawyer reads a letter. My father wants to be cremated. And he wants his ashes spread out over the Pacific near Pearl Harbor. And he wants one of us to do it.”

I say this to them with an attitude in my voice, a tone that suggests, Can you believe he’s asked for that? I hear my voice. I hear it as if I am someone else listening to me. And I think, That guy’s an a*shole.

Ian says, “So wait. Are you going? I’m confused.”

“No. No.” I want to say more, but that’s all that comes out.

Phoebe says, “So what happens to the ashes?”

I say, “We’re sending them to the VA. They take care of it.”

Ian says nothing but I know his expressions. Phoebe’s, too.

“What?” I ask.

“Nothing,” he says. “It’s sad.”

“What’s so sad about it?”

“It’s just sad.”

I say, “It’s not sad so much as insane.”

Phoebe says, “Why is it insane?”

I say, “Because . . . it’s . . . he was . . .”

The knot in my stomach has grown tighter and there’s something about the condescension in Phoebe’s voice. Or am I putting the condescension there, the way you do with sarcasm in an e-mail that wasn’t meant to be sarcastic? I’m suddenly very tired and drunk. Who the hell is he, after all these years, to tell us we have to do this thing for him? Why the f*ck should any of us bring his ashes to the middle of the goddamned Pacific Ocean?

One of the young creatives comes up to Phoebe. He is younger than I am and probably more talented and certainly better looking and he was making Phoebe laugh earlier.

He says to Ian and me, “What up, dawgs?” Then to her: “A bunch of us are heading over to this place in the East Village. Thought you might want to come along.”

I want to punch his handsome face, his confidence, his straight white teeth. He probably knows karate. Someday, not all that many years away, I will be dead.

Phoebe smiles. “That sounds great.” I hate that she smiles.

He smiles, too. I know what he’s thinking. I know exactly what he is thinking. And I want to punch him again. He turns to leave, flashing a peace sign as he does.

Phoebe says, “So you’re really not going to do it?”

It is almost impossible to explain family behavior to someone outside the family. What seems normal, acceptable, within the circle can seem selfish, foolish, absurd outside of it. The simple truth is that I don’t want to do it. Can’t be bothered. To do it is to deal with it, think about it, face it. Eddie chose anger, Maura chose a bizarrely clean house, Kevin chose leaving. I chose made-up stories about diapers. And yet it is unsettling to have a mirror held up to your selfishness in the cold, ugly light of day. It embarrasses me. It pisses me off.

“No,” I say a little too forcefully. “I’m not. And he didn’t ask just me. He asked all of us.”

“But none of the others are going to do it, you said. They didn’t even come to the hospital.”

It’s as if she’s found the pain point and keeps pressing on it. I realize in a moment how angry I am that Maura and Eddie couldn’t drive the seventy-five miles from Boston to Hyannis to see their dying father, how I agree with Phoebe 100 percent. And in the same moment how Phoebe doesn’t get to criticize my family and how angry she makes me by being right.

“No . . . no.” I can’t seem to get the words out.

She says, “So maybe you should. I think it would be a nice gesture.”

I’m shaking my head back and forth. “No. No, it wouldn’t be a nice gesture. I’m not sure you understand. This person’s a stranger to me.”

Phoebe says, “But it’s not about you.”

It triggers something, some Eddie-like place that I rarely go, a pathetic, dangerous place where you pity yourself, gather up all the hurts, the slights, the disappointments, the anger. I read something once that said the harder you argue a point, the less sure you are of how you feel about it. I want her to take my side, to understand me, validate me. Even though I know I’m wrong.

“What the f*ck does that mean?” I say, too loud, channeling my father.

I feel Ian look at me. “Easy, Fin.”

Phoebe’s face, genuine surprise. “It means forgive him.”

I gulp my beer. The last thing I need. I should order a glass of water.

I say, “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I’ve never spoken to her like that before. I can see the hurt. I need to stop this but can’t. She takes one step too many.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “It just . . . it seems a little sad. It’s a dying man’s wish. I mean, do it for your mother.”

• • •

“You’re not supposed to be home,” she’d said.

“Finny,” she’d said.

“I’ll be back,” she’d said.

I saw it. That’s the part I always leave out in the retelling. Especially to myself. I followed her. On my bike. Did I mention that? I probably should have mentioned that. Back streets. One-ways she couldn’t go down. I’d thought it would be funny. Show up at the store at the same time. Slow motion. The bike and pedaling fast and the breeze. Cloudy sky. Streets I knew so well. The way a boy rides a bicycle, the second nature of it, the assurance and joy. He’s smiling, this boy. Me. I see him as someone else, though, in the memory. It’s a game to him. He’ll catch her. She’ll be surprised and they’ll laugh. Except, she didn’t turn into the store parking lot. He almost shouted. She kept going and didn’t make the bend in the road farther on. Big old trees. The car rockets forward, up over the curb, airborne—he sees it rise up—and hit the tree. A car horn as he careens across the road, still following, forgetting now that he’s on a bicycle, knowing only that he has to get to the car. If he can just get to it everything will be okay. The noise of the car hitting the tree a tremendous thing. But it’s not happening. It can’t be happening. He’s across the road and off his bike before it stops. You can know a thing before it happens. There is, still, deep within us, primal, acute instincts that sense danger. He’d never followed her to the store before on his bike. Why today? You’re not supposed to be home. Why touch his face? We weren’t physical. We didn’t hug. It’s a trick. It’s a joke. It can’t be happening. The hood bent up like a tent and fluid running from the car and steam hissing and the windshield on the driver’s side shattered and her head on the dash at an unnatural angle, black blood—see, it’s fake, blood is usually red—pouring in a thick stream down her forehead, nose, mouth, chin. He tries the door. It’s stuck. He’s a boy, a skinny boy, no strength. The driver’s side window is cracked with a space big enough to push his head in, which is hard because he’s shaking so badly now it’s difficult to move but move he does and puts his head in and the moment before he touches her—no, pushes her, pushes her to see if she is alive, his last hope—he pulls his head out fast and cuts his jaw on the jagged glass. If he doesn’t push her, she can still be alive. Men are running from Petersen’s, from the market. He sees a woman standing by her car with her hands over her mouth and nose, eyes wide. It’s fine, he wants to say. It’s fine. It’s not happening. It didn’t happen. He just needs to get on his bike, get home, beat her home. It’s a game. She’s going to the store for milk. She’s coming home. We needed some things. He got on his bike and pedaled. When he came home Maura stared at him. She was smoking, which she never did in the house. Our mother would kill her. She didn’t seem to notice the blood on his chin, his shirt.

“Finny,” she said. “There was an accident. Mum’s dead.”

She sat down on the kitchen floor. Dropped to the kitchen floor, really. She sobbed and sobbed. He sat down next to her. He didn’t want to get blood on her. He didn’t cry. “Never let Mum see you cry,” Maura had told him.

They took him for stitches that evening when the cut wouldn’t stop bleeding. Four stitches.

The thing is, I never told anyone.

Now, here, in the bar, I feel shaky, light-headed, like my blood sugar is low. Someone is shouting. It’s very loud and I would turn to look but I’m the one shouting.

“You don’t know what the f*ck you’re talking about! That dying man left his family! He left his wife! She committed suicide! Do you know that about the dying man?! Forgiveness!? She drove into a f*cking tree!”

Massive amounts of information in a tiny space of time. Mick Jagger singing. “I can almost hear ya sigh . . .” The Steel Wheels album. Someone—a man’s voice—says under his breath, “What the f*ck, dude?” People murmur. The squeak of the door at the front of the bar. Someone scrapes a barstool back. My ears are hot and my throat hurts. Ian’s strength, taking my hand from Phoebe’s arm. Ian’s voice. “Fin. Calm down.” No, that can’t be. Wait. My hand wasn’t holding her forearm, squeezing too hard. The expression on her face, eyes wide, genuinely scared. Phoebe pushing her tongue up against the back of her top teeth, trying hard not to cry, the tears welling in her eyes, the last image I remember before I grab my jacket and find the door as fast as I can.

• • •

There is a package.

Tom Hanley sent it from Boston with a note. “Your father asked that I give this to you, but not in front of the others.” He also wishes me the very best and that if I’m ever in need of legal services to please consider him.

Consider him? Absolutely. But perhaps you, Tom, could consider the effect of getting a package from your dead father. Consider this, my portly Boston Irishman. You walk in the door of your apartment. It’s late. You’ve had a bit to drink. Perhaps you kick off your shoes. Perhaps in doing so you trip, stub your toe, and say filthy swear words out loud, surprising yourself at the volume of your own voice. Perhaps you take your coat off and drop the mail on the floor as you make your way to the refrigerator, noticing along the way that you can’t seem to catch your breath. This could be in part because you ran from a bar for several blocks before throwing up in a dirty snowbank, a group of passing college kids laughing and calling you a dickhead. You drink deeply from a bottle of club soda, some of it spilling down your shirt front. Small flashbacks, what Ian calls “Oh, shit” movies. You screamed at a friend. No. Not possible. You grabbed her shoulders. You shook her. Again, not possible. You’ve never done anything like that in your life. Before tonight. And she is not any person. She’s your best friend. No. More than that. You reach into the refrigerator and grab leftover vegetable lo mein, wondering whether to use a fork or eat it with your hands when you see her face in your mind, the horrified expression on her face as you shouted at her. You opt for the fork. You sit down on the floor, back against the wall, and look at the mail you’ve dropped, splayed out, and realize that you look like an ad for . . . what? Maybe for a guy who’s an a*shole and is sitting on the floor? No product there. Maybe for “Refreshing Canada Dry Club Soda,” a drink so refreshing that you’re forced to drop your mail and sit down to enjoy it? Very bad. Your cell phone rings and you hope it’s her so you can beg forgiveness but you see it’s Ian and you don’t feel like talking. Maybe for Pine-Sol, floors so clean you actually prefer not to sit on a chair. There’s an American Express bill, a Crate & Barrel catalog, a New Yorker magazine that will join an unread pile of others, a Con Ed bill, and a manila envelope from Sullivan, O’Neil & Levy, Attorneys-at-Law, in Boston. Inside is a separate envelope. I decide that it would be a good idea to floss my teeth.

I stand up, with difficulty, and walk into the bathroom, turn on the hot water, though it will be some time before it arrives, as I’m on the sixth floor of an old building and it takes minutes for the hot water to make its way up. I brush my teeth and then floss, digging into my gums by accident several times, causing my mouth to bleed. I make the mistake of gargling with Listerine and am forced to spit it out immediately, as it stings my now-open gum wounds. I wash my face and the soap gets in my eyes. I look up, lean against the basin, my face inches from the mirror, and stare. I stare at the pores on my nose, the tiny, almost invisible hairs on the ball of my nose, the lines around my eyes when I squint, lines I’ve not really noticed before. Out loud I say, “You are Finbar Dolan.” I say it again, slowly. “You. Are. Fin. Bar. Do. Lan.” I say it again. And again. And again. Slower each time, trying hard to understand what the words mean. But the more I say it, the less it means, the more confused I am as to who the man in the mirror is, as if he’s a total stranger. And not in a Michael Jackson way. In a meaningless way.

It’s a nine-by-twelve manila envelope and it has my name on it, Catholic-school cursive, blue-ink pen. Inside, two sheets on white notebook paper, blue lined, unfolded. Where was he when he wrote it? What time of day? Was he wearing a robe? Did he have a cup of coffee in front of him?

Dear Finbar,

In early 1945 I was on a submarine that did patrols out of Pearl Harbor. We sailed north to the Aleutians, south to Australia. For over a year we never saw combat. In February, we were on our way back from a two-week patrol when we were hit by a Japanese destroyer. There was an explosion. Then another. And another. I was in the tiller room with signalman second-class Ralph Thomsen. We were both thrown. The sub rocked side to side with each new explosion. Ralph screamed. He screamed like I’ve never heard a man scream. The lights had gone out. I made my way to him, felt around, and realized that he’d been caught in the rudder ram and it was crushing his chest. He kept screaming. Please, dear God, help me. Help me. There was nothing I could do. I couldn’t see. I had blood coming from a gash on my forehead. He just kept screaming. The door to the tiller room was jammed. He grabbed my hand and held it. He wouldn’t let go. I don’t know how long we were in there. Several hours. And I’m not sure when he died.

The rest of the war was different for me. I was terrified every day until the war ended. And then one day, on maneuvers an hour away from Pearl Harbor, we surfaced. I was the first man up. Another boat was signaling like crazy: “War is over.” All you think about when you’re in the service is getting out. But then I was out, standing in front of the Fargo Building in Boston, still in uniform, and didn’t know what to do, didn’t know where to go. Some guys, they got out of the service and they felt like they had a new lease on life. I never felt that. I just felt like I didn’t deserve to live. I felt guilt at being alive. Can you understand that?

I am not sure you can point to a single incident in your life and say, “I am the way I am because of this.” I don’t know. Maybe you can. My point is I take full responsibility for who I was. I am not proud of it.

I never blamed your mother for what happened with that man. It was a relief in a way. It’s not that I didn’t love her or you kids. As God is my witness. I was just different, after the war. I was afraid. That’s why I went on the police department. I needed to prove to myself that I wasn’t.

Sometimes, at the scene of an accident, I would watch the people who survived. They would sit with their head in their hands with this look on their face. And the look was always the same. It said, “Just make things go back to how they were before this happened.”

I heard about your mother’s death. I felt responsible. When I came to the wake and saw you kids, I knew it was over. I knew there was nothing I could ever do to make it right. I thought it would be easier for all of you if I stayed away. I was dead to the four of you. I was dead to myself. All I can tell you is that I wish I had it to do over again. I am not proud of the life I have lived.

Why you?

Because Eddie would have thrown the envelope away without opening it. Kevin would have read it and thrown it away. Maura’s more like me than her mother. So it will be you. If anyone does this thing, it will be you.

You owe me nothing. I know that.

I am not looking for forgiveness. I’ve been to confession. All I am saying is that I was changed by the war. I tried. I did try. But I failed. I don’t know what else to say. Except that there is a part of me that wished it was me and not Ralph who died that day.

Your father,

Edward Dolan, Sr.