Jasper smiled again, and Rob melted a little more. Here was a young man whose smile certainly fit the old cliché about lighting up a room. And what was better was that he had no idea how beautiful he was. Men were always more attractive, Rob thought, when they were unaware of the spell they cast.
Jasper put a hand on his arm. He looked contrite. “Listen, we’re both worn out. I’m gonna go home and take advantage of the one thing that’s truly, truly magical about the old rundown apartment I live in—its original claw-foot tub—and take a long bath. And don’t tease me about being girly—I will use bubble bath and lots of candles. I will play some Adele through my Bluetooth speaker. And then I’m going to crawl into bed, not with you, but with Stephen King, and try to read for maybe five minutes before I drop off and sleep for hours and hours.
“And then, when morning comes and I’ve had my coffee, I will call you. We will make plans to do some sightseeing, but most of all, to talk. I need to hear how the real Michael Blake tells a story—especially a true one with a main character I loved a lot.
“Does that sound okay?”
Actually, it did sound okay. Better than. Rob was worn thin too. His eyes burned. His limbs felt weighed down, as though gravity pulled harder now that they were on the ground again. He knew who the “main character” Jasper loved a lot was. Rob stared at Jasper for a moment with a lump in his throat, tears welling up in his eyes, but he held back.
His own daughter, Heather, had been cast in that role thirty some years ago, when Rob was still trying to figure out who—and what—he was. Rob didn’t understand why, but he would let Jasper know everything about their relationship, their wonderful closeness, the cocoon they’d built around themselves, the way their minds melded, the way they could make each other laugh, the tight, loving bond unlike any other…
Until it had all been destroyed. And Rob knew that was his fault. And yet, he felt compelled to lay it all before this young man. His greatest shame. His heartbreak.
And he prayed that, if Jasper could not forgive him, he could at least understand.
Jasper snapped him out of his reverie, which had morphed into an image of Heather, beautiful brunette Heather, laughing at something Rob said as they sat together in his hot tub one winter night underneath a blanket of desert stars.
“Dude. I’m beat. I gotta go. Did you hear me?”
Rob smiled sadly and nodded. “You’ll call me in the morning.”
Jasper gave him a quick nod. “I need to go.”
“Youwillcall?”
“Don’t underestimate yourself. I got your number.”
And with those words, Jasper vanished into the crush of hurrying travelers.
Rob watched him until he disappeared. It took everything he had not to run after him. But he reminded himself ofDeath in Venice.Have some dignity, man, for God’s sake, have a little dignity.
As he waited for a break in the crowd, he remembered a line fromDeath in Venice: “Like any lover, he desired to please; suffered agonies at the thought of failure.” He moved toward the Ground Transportation sign, thinking the quote was apt.
Chapter 11
JASPER SLEPTdeeply. He’d awakened around 4:00 a.m. to an L train making sparks and cackling as it rushed by his window, impatient to make its standing date at the end of the red line, Howard Street. He’d gotten up then to pee and returned to bed to fall back into the kind of sleep that’s so deep, it’s a near coma, experienced only in the very early morning.
And he dreamed.
He held his mother’s hand, and as he did so, he peered up at her—her honey-colored hair, cut in a bob that ended at her shoulders, her wide hazel eyes glancing down at him with love. Her scoop-necked turquoise sundress was pushed out by her bulging belly. A charm bracelet rattled on her tan wrist.
Ahead of them, a stroller containing his baby sister rolled through a crowded and dirty used-furniture store. His baby sister cooed, clutching a red-and-blue rattle in her pudgy fist.
The concrete floor beneath their feet was gritty, worn, cracked.
And then the realization came, even in the dream, where they were. With that knowledge, everything changed. The sun outside, so bright just a second ago, the very essence of summer, vanished behind a cloud. The store went eerily silent as the fluorescent lighting flickered and then darkened, its buzz coming to an abrupt halt.
With the store plunged into darkness, the only light source was the muted sun outside. It was the calm before a very bad storm.
Jasper clung tighter to his mother’s hand. “Mama, what’s happening?”
“Shhh. Don’t worry.” She stopped pushing the stroller long enough to kneel down beside him. She touched his cheek and said in a very soft voice, “It will happen so fast, we won’t feel a thing. No pain. Just a moment of surprise and then it’ll be over, no worse than getting a shot.” She handed him a Tootsie Roll, folding his fingers around the candy. “You weren’t even here.”
She let go of his hand and stood. He wanted to run after her, but she moved forward into the shadows. He stood rooted to the spot, frozen by terror and expectation.
Two figures, black, crafted from shadows, separated themselves from the darkness and moved toward his mother, impossibly quick. A pair of upholstery shears glinted in the gloom, contrary to reality.
A sharp intake of breath, just before a scream.
