CHAPTER 1 - THE DAY BEFORE

 

I never thought my destiny would change after a simple evening phone call from the folks.

All your life you hear things like, “If I had just done things a little differently…” Or “If I had been two minutes earlier…or later…” Or “If only my car hadn’t started when it did…”

You hear all sorts of bullshit like that, usually when something unexpected happens, or when things go terribly wrong. Most of it deals with guilt or wish fulfillment. Someone didn’t get his promotion because he pissed off the wrong guy. Or a woman was involved in a traffic accident because she stopped to buy a cruller when she should have been somewhere else. Or the guy who was just one number off with his LOTTO ticket because he cut in line and bought the wrong ticket.

But even so, you don’t take any of it seriously.

At least, you try not to…

You put emphasis into such talk only if something horrible happens to you personally and you want to convince yourself that one simple and innocent factor might have prevented it.

In my own case, the phrase, “If I hadn’t answered the phone,” had been, in my humble opinion, the single factor that changed the entire course of my destiny. To make the situation even worse, the bizarre event took place at the kitchen table of my condo, while I was enjoying a succulent meal of chicken cordon blue and green bean casserole after putting in a hard day at the office.

My phone rang, and my first instinct was to enjoy my meal, then see who it was, and answer it—or not answer it. Half of me wanted to let it ring while the other half—that curious part that almost always get you in trouble—told me it might be important.

I checked the display and decided to answer it. It was from my folks, so I figured it would be all right, since I could engage in our usual small talk while enjoying my meal at the same time.

“I take it you heard about your high school friend dying,” Mom said the moment she heard my voice.

I placed the cell on the table near my left elbow and had a sip of port wine.

“Which one?” I asked. This didn’t by any means suggest that I had so many friends to consider. I had never been an athlete in high school. Consequently, I hadn’t been a member of the “Circle”—that esteemed group of arrogant, narcissistic, self-appointed individuals associated with sports and scholastic achievement—a clique exuding colossal popularity and an almost godlike façade amongst the commoners. To make my social position even worse, I had been a musician, playing trumpet for four years in the high school band.

The topic of this conversation, to me, could not have been more irrelevant. I graduated more than twenty years earlier, fashioned a respectable career in software, and had severed all ties from my high school years. Any friendships I had made during this time had long since died from gross neglect and simple indifference.

In short, my memory needed slightly more coaxing.

“Who are we talking about?” I asked.        

“What was his name, Andrew?” my mom asked. “Caliban? Cavendish?”

I could well imagine my dad’s irritation as he nibbled on whatever they were having for dinner. Knowing them as I did, it was either a medium rare T-bone and baked potato, or a juicy pork chop and seasoned curly fries.

Since they were on speaker, I heard him say “Cavanaugh. Bruce Cavanaugh, I believe.” Then he went silent. I could easily imagine him nibbling on his entrée, then having a slug of Michelob, his favorite beverage. His belch made me smile behind my wine glass.

Bruce Cavanaugh. The name instantly twanged a cloud of unpleasant familiarity. Cavanaugh had always been considered our class zero, the sort of non-entity most people ignore or make fun of. He was the boy everyone snubbed in class and on the street. Always daydreaming and never one to pay attention, he was held back for two years because of poor attendance and abysmal grades. Propped up immeasurably by his prowess on the track, he eventually graduated.

Since he had spent most of his childhood dodging bullies, he developed quick instincts and had regularly done the hundred-yard dash in less than ten seconds. In twelfth grade, Cavanaugh, at twenty, was five-eight, weighed in at around one-twenty, and could outrun anyone. For some strange reason, he singled me out as his best and only friend from the third grade on and stuck to me like Velcro until graduation day, when, thank God, we finally went our separate ways.

“How about that? Cavanaugh’s, well, dead…” It was difficult, keeping the word “finally” out of the sentence. I found it awkward to contain my sense of relief. Although I tried keeping the smile from taking over, my impulsive reaction had won out, clearly revealing my emotions.

My mother said, “You don’t sound very sad, Frank…”

“Yeah.” My father had also picked up on my obvious lack of remorse. “Sounds like ya just won the Lottery.”

I had nothing to say, so I didn’t say anything.

“Wasn‘t he that little jerk,” my father asked a moment later, “used to ride over here on his bike from the other side of town to see ya when you two were in grade school?”

I tried to hold back the groan but was unsuccessful.

“Frank? Your father just asked you a question.”

“That was him, all right.”

“Didn’t ya used to hide in your room when we told ya he was here?”

“Yeah…”

“We always figured you didn’t like him much,” Mom said.

“He seemed weird,” Dad added.

“He was,” I said. “He always got me in trouble.”

“Is he the boy, carved your initials on your third-grade teacher’s desk?” Mom asked. “Then she called and asked one of us to come to the school and have a talk with your principal?”

“That was him.” Even after thirty years, I found myself getting angry all over again.

If only Cavanaugh had left me alone in those days…

If only he’d stopped bugging me…

But he didn’t. He stuck to me like a tick on a dog and, once he’d completed his second run-through of sixth grade and made it to junior high, stayed right there, at my side.

After that, things got worse.

In grade school, bonding is a simple process. The “misery loves company” mentality becomes the norm. A kid needs a feeling of belonging among another kids. It could be as simple as both kids being the same size or having the same hair color. Or even the minor matter of living on the same street. In many cases, two boys becoming prime targets for the playground bully could be all it takes to form a kinship.

In high school, however, the process transforms into something slightly more complicated. There are more kids involved, and their frontal lobes have developed a little in the last year or so. Attitudes are more prevalent. Temperaments have progressed, most of them negatively.

The submissive, in this case, has become much more isolated. His standing and reputation have suffered, and he is forced to struggle to maintain whatever friendship he has managed to develop.  

Cavanaugh focused on keeping me as his only friend from third grade on. He didn’t ease up on me until after graduation, when I went off to college and he found himself in the town jail for drunk and disorderly after several days of drinking gin at the local bar and wrapping his ancient TransAm around a telephone pole on his way home.

“He wanted me to be his friend since the third grade,” I told my parents. “And he never left me alone.”

“He had issues,” my mother said. “You probably were nicer to him than anyone.”

“He was an idiot,” I replied.

“You’re not still down on him, are ya?” Dad asked. “It’s been what? Twenty years?”

“Some things you just don’t forget.”

“The important thing,” my mother said, “is that he’s dead and you’re not, and you still have a productive life ahead of you.”

“How’d he die?”

“Somethin’ about him leavin’ a bar and gettin’ slammed by a pickup truck.” My father cleared his throat.

I wanted to laugh. It seemed fitting, an idiot like Cavanaugh dying after leaving a bar.

“He’s buried out there behind the Presbyterian Church,” Mom said.

“I take it ya won’t be goin’ out there to see the grave,” Dad said.

“You take it right.”

“You sound so bitter,” Mom said.

“Just relieved.”

“You’re forty, dear. That all happened when you were a kid. You’re not a kid no more.”

“I’m thirty-nine, Mom…”

“Thirty-nine. Forty. What’s the difference?”

“One really big, important number.”

“How’s your love life goin’, by the way?” Dad asked.

Dad could be so embarrassing.

“Just fine.”

“Whatever happened to that last one? The babe?”

“Maura?”

“Yup, that was her. Terrific. Sweet. Great legs.”

“Andrew…” Mom did her best but couldn’t do much about Dad once he started up.

Mom groaned. “Act your age, Andrew.”

“Thought I was,” he said.

“You’re acting like…like…a—”

“A guy?”

“Yes. That.”

“You oughta be used to that by now, Glenda. I mean, after forty-two years?”

“You’d think I would’ve had my head examined long before now, wouldn’t ya?” she asked.

“Talk to you guys later.” I picked up my wine glass. And thought about my childhood.

Bruce Cavanaugh was dead. It was amazing how little I cared. It was also amazing that a small part of me felt slighted because even though I had moved on with college and a solid career, I found that I might have considered my life more complete had I looked him up to let him know how well I’d been doing. I know how petty that sounded now, but I just couldn’t help feeling this way.

The thing that should have bothered me but didn’t was that someone I had known in high school was dead and I found that I didn’t care one bit.