Joe Baumann
Matthew Smythe cannot get his father out of the house. Whenever he carts in potential buyers, his father rattles the pots and pans, bangs cabinets, creaks up and down the stairs, leaves hot breath on the master bath’s mirror. He even makes the bedrooms smell like cat pee, despite the fact that he never let Matthew have a pet. His father once dragged all the freshly-laundered sheets from the beds in a fury of linens and tossed them down the stairs. On another occasion, he managed to turn on all the faucets and stopper all the sinks while Matthew was away for a long weekend, flooding the basement, ruining the kitchen floor, and rotting the baseboards. The contractor gave Matthew several raised eyebrows as he walked through the house surveying the damage.
Matthew loves the house. Whenever he walks in, it is filled with old smells, sights, and sounds—his father’s turntable playing Tom Jones or the dial radio blaring swing while he baked cherry pies. But it has become a burden, the heating and cooling pricy because of the original—albeit gorgeous—windows and the fickle Missouri weather. Matthew has to pay a lawn service to cut the grass and shear back the Boston ivy and Virginia creeper every two weeks, and a month ago a raccoon died in the attic. Real estate has been all ragweed and scutch ever since the economic downturn, and Matthew’s not raking in from commissions. His book royalties have also dried up; the tightness in his purse strings is starting to feel like a noose. Ergo: he’s selling the house himself. No point in tossing the commission share off to someone else. And with his father causing trouble, he can’t bring himself to leave the keys behind in a lockbox so an unsuspecting realtor walks into a ghastly deathtrap.
Matthew tries to explain himself to his father, constructing arguments at the open throat of the linen closet or standing before the half-bath, pouring out his financial woes. He crosses his fingers that his father will chill out long enough for Matthew to show off the house to young married couples looking for a quaint suburban two-story, even though he knows these pairs piss off his dad the most—the husband some kind of investment banker or accounts manager in mid-thigh khaki shorts, the wife a fitness instructor or graphic designer, and the pair somehow affording a mortgage beyond their means. The last time Matthew showed the house to such a couple, half a dozen cans of green beans and corn came flying out through the kitchen pantry’s door like grenades, leaving the husband with a black eye. Matthew has since emptied the cupboards of all their foodstuffs and glass and china, aside from the wet bar, which looks more impressive lined with wineglasses and bottles of Lagavulin and Grey Goose.
Matthew hears the noise of car doors thumping shut outside. He watches the Bennetts—tan, lithe, movie-star looks—walk up the concrete steps cut into the front yard. He takes in the way they saunter, her right hand cupped in his left, and watches as they pause, looking at something on the gabled roof. Mrs. Bennett, whose first name is Charlotte or Cheryl or something like that, laughs and leans into her husband. All good signs, Matthew tells himself. Their agent is sick with a stomach bug, but they want to see the house anyway. Another good sign.
He lets them come all the way to the threshold, Mr. Bennett’s arm reaching out to press the bell. Matthew screams one final silent prayer that his father won’t upend a bookcase or turn on the living room TV halfway through the showing before he yanks open the door. Matthew flashes a gregarious smile and takes in the Bennetts up close. She has the smoothest glowing skin he has ever seen; if she’s wearing makeup, she’s achieved that like-I’m-not-wearing-any-at-all look. He has gone sterling silver at the temples even though he can’t be more than 30, but the lightning strikes wisping through his hair somehow make him even more youthful. The only thing that will keep him from getting carded for booze well into his 40s is the breadth of his shoulders. He must, Matthew thinks, wake up at five in the morning to sweat through CrossFit workouts.
Matthew is reminded of Leonard, the college swimmer he had an affair with during his short tenure teaching at a marginal liberal arts college in the Midwest. Leonard was a jock, but he bubbled with kindness and an intelligent vulnerability. The stories he wrote in Matthew’s class were sparse in language but rich in subtext, their underbellies wide as caverns. Matthew thinks of him sometimes, jolted awake in the middle of the night by a lucid dream of their sex, the way Leonard’s body seemed to consume his when they lay panting and gyrating. He’s tried googling Leonard’s name now and then, but the results have been inconclusive at best.
“Hi,” Matthew says, extending a hand toward Mrs. Bennett first. “Good to see you.” He knows that it’s really the wives you have to impress, whether or not they’re the breadwinners. Their desire for breakfast nooks and updated bathrooms always trumps the need for a man cave, a finished basement, or a humongous garage that could double as a refugee camp.
The tour starts strong. They love the home office, located just off the entryway through a pair of French doors. Mr. oohs over the built-in mahogany, and Mrs. is keen on the deep green paint. They wonder aloud about the possibility of buying the desk—gigantic, its shine matching the shelves—and Matthew is relieved that his father doesn’t rattle any windowpanes or send a Stephen Ambrose volume flying across the room. Matthew waltzes them through the formal dining room with its crown molding and into the open kitchen-living room combo, and he’s pretty sure he hears Mrs. gasp at the size of the granite-topped island with its massive stainless-steel sink. He feels a swell of pride every time the Bennetts gleefully point out another of the house’s features—the bay window overlooking the manicured yard, the brick fireplace, the composite back deck—and Callie Bennett tugs on her husband’s arm (finally, her name revealed when Bradley muses on how much counter space there is for her to bake cookies during the holidays). Throughout, Matthew is clenched just so, wondering if—when—his father will make his presence known.
Everything is fine until they reach the master bedroom, their last stop on the second floor. Matthew has carefully arranged a vase of calla lilies on the bureau next to his father’s old Timex. Little touches of life help clients imagine themselves living in these intimate spaces. He can see Bradley picturing himself reading the paper on Sunday mornings while sun blots through the generous window, cinching his ties in double Windsors in front of the long vanity mirror in the en suite bathroom, curling up to make love to his wife on Friday nights. Callie stands by the window overlooking the cul-de-sac. Matthew can read her mind; she’s seeing her future children on bikes, wobbling on their first rides without training wheels as they scoop around the circle.
Then the door to the walk-in closet yawns open.
Matthew lets out a dry, mirthless chuckle and walks to the door, prepared to at least shut it and draw their attention back to the jacuzzi jets in the bathtub. But then come the shoes.
He made the mistake of leaving all of his father’s things. Matthew had nowhere else to keep them—his apartment was too small, and he couldn’t afford a storage facility, and those corrugated steel rooms felt so funereal to him anyway, black holes of lost, forgotten, hated things—so he left almost everything as it had been when his father died. Until now, the idea of selling or donating them has felt too painful, the roots of dread and grief too tender for yanking. But now shoes are flying out at him, a cavalcade of Oxfords, brogues, chukka boots, and white nubucks. They clip him in the ribs, smack his shinbones, dash him at the temples. Several tumble into the bedroom.
Matthew turns to the Bennetts. He slams the closet door and then gathers up the shoes, cradling them like a litter of pups. The Bennetts stare at him, mouths open in dark, wet caves. He has spewed out excuses for his father’s misbehaving during previous showings: poorly hung shelving in the pantry, groaning pipes that need to be refitted in the walls, floorboards creaky with age. He can maybe excuse the closet door with some notion that the room is slightly slanted, or maybe that the door is a tad too small for its frame.
Matthew’s eyes hurt. His arms feel heavy, as though the shoes are made of lead.
He drops them and sighs. “It’s my father. He doesn’t want to leave.”
The Bennetts both raise their eyebrows, as if they’ve synchronized this move through practice.
“He’s haunting the place.” Matthew bends over and takes up one of the shoes, a simple loafer. He remembers these shoes. He bought them for his father as a Christmas present many years ago. They were a half-size too small, but his father wore them anyway, probably ignoring a crunchy pinch in his toes. He kept them at the front of his shoe rack. Now they have become a projectile weapon.
A look passes between the Bennetts. Callie approaches him, avoiding the remaining shoes like they’re land mines, and, to Matthew’s surprise, gathers him in a hug. The toe of his father’s shoe jabs at the space between her breasts.
“You poor man,” she says. “We have the same problem with my mother-in-law.”
“You what?”
She sets him free. “That’s why we’re looking for a new place. She’s destroying ours.”
“She sprays me with the sink hose just about every day,” Bradley says. “Usually while I’m drinking coffee in the morning. My own mother.”
“And don’t get me started on what she’s been doing to my dresses.” Callie gives herself the once-over, flattening the material along her sides. “This is about the only one that isn’t in tatters.”
Matthew stares at them. Callie bends down and takes up the other shoes.
“Let’s put these away and see if we can’t talk some sense into him.” She pries the loafer from Matthew’s hands and nudges him to move out of the way. Balancing the shoes in one crooked elbow, she pulls open the closet door and peers inside. Matthew expects his father’s Geoffrey Beane ties to slither out and choke her, but nothing happens.
“There a light in here?” she asks.
“Oh, yes. Of course.” He reaches in and flicks the switch.
“This is really spacious.” She turns back toward them. “Bradley, we could probably actually fit all of our clothes in here.”
“I keep my suits in our hall closet at the moment,” Bradley explains.
“It does have good storage room,” Matthew says.
“Okay,” Callie says, dropping the shoes on the closet floor. “What’s your dad’s name?”
“Jonathan.”
“Jonathan, look. I know you love this house. But homes are just spaces we occupy for a short time. They’re meant to be let go of, eventually, no matter how much we care about them.”
Matthew turns to Bradley, an eyebrow raised.
“She’s good at this kind of thing. She works with abused dogs. Similar skill set.”
Callie pushes her way into the closet, her shoulder brushing against his father’s plaids and Oxfords, his moleskin trousers and twill pants. Matthew catches his breath, praying his father doesn’t deluge her with his panama hats or belt buckles.
“Jonathan,” she says, voice muffled by stacked sweaters. “You love your son. And I know you love your home. But haven’t you seen what you’re doing to him?”
She looks back at Matthew, who smiles sheepishly.
“He needs to move on, too. The dead are meant to help us do that, not stop us.”
Matthew’s father, if he’s listening, makes no response. The walls do not rattle. The sinks in the bathroom don’t splash on. The sports jackets are silent. Matthew thinks of the day he told his father that yes, he liked dating women, but men too. His father had stared at him with a puzzled look on his face until something behind his eyes clicked into understanding. They stared at one another, wordless. Eventually, his father nodded dumbly. They’d never spoken about it again.
Callie looks at Matthew. “Is the silence agreement or a tantrum?”
“I have no idea.”
Taking the lead, she hauls them down into the kitchen and flings open the pantry.
“I love how spacious this is. Do you hear me, Jonathan? I love your house.”
Matthew glances at Bradley, who shrugs, his muscular shoulders slightly stooped.
“So,” Callie continues, “if I’m going to buy it, I need to know that you’re not going to fast-pitch cans of peaches at me. Because—and you can ask my husband for confirmation—I love my canned peaches.”
“She does. Even though the syrup is bad for you.”
“That’s what wind sprints are for.” She smiles at her husband, a mooning, smack-dab-in-the-midst-of-love grin. Matthew wonders how long they’ve been married. She turns back to him. “I want it.”
“You want it?”
“The house. Yes.”
“We wanted something move-in ready,” Bradley says.
“Oh, we can move in.”
Matthew feels a raw tingle on the back of his neck and wonders if it’s his phantasmal father stroking his hair, or maybe preparing to garrote him with his ghostly fingers. But the tingle passes, settling as a dazzling excitement in his lower gut. He nods at Callie and Bradley. She winks at her husband, who looks like he needs to pass a kidney stone.
“I guess the location is great,” Bradley concedes. “Features are what we’re after. Minus the complimentary angry spirit. Which we already have now.”
“Not like this,” Callie says. “This is fixable.” She reaches out and snatches Matthew’s hand. “Write up the paperwork. Call our agent. We’re ready to make a deal.”
When they’re gone, arrangements for faxing of documents sorted out, Matthew slumps down on a barstool, elbows propped on the kitchen island. He lets out a deep, sour breath.
He’s about to pour himself a drink from one of his father’s luminescent amber bottles of liquor when the shaking starts. The drinking glasses cry from their shelf; he hears wine bottles bumping on the wet bar. For a moment he’s frozen, unsure of what to do as the linoleum rumbles under his feet. He’s not even sure if he should stay inside or run out into the yard. He could be hit by a falling support beam if he stays put, but a fissure could open up and swallow him if he dashes outside.
Matthew looks out the kitchen window and is puzzled. The trees are calm and unmoving. The old swing set still tucked into the grass isn’t wobbling.
““Really, Dad?” he yells, hands gripping the kitchen island.
The shaking intensifies. Thick wood moans. A wrenching noise. At first Matthew can’t place it, until he realizes it’s the groaning pain of the house’s foundation.
“Come on,” he says. He starts for the front door, but the rumbling has gotten so bad he nearly falls, ping-ponging back and forth against the walls like he’s blotto off his ass. He hears the first window—those gorgeous, original windows—shatter somewhere upstairs. The French doors leading into the office blast out shards of glass like they’re spitting at him. Matthew covers his face with his arms and dashes, crunching noises beneath his feet.
“Okay, Dad,” Matthew says, placing his hand on the front doorknob. “Dad.” He starts yelling, voice growing throaty and harsh as he tries to out-volume the sounds of the house falling apart: bone china chittering to pieces in the dining room, the chandelier swooping down in a bursting arc, drywall whining and cracking.
“It’s over,” he says.
He tugs on the front doorknob and is hardly surprised when it refuses to open.
“Is this how it’s going to be, Dad? You’re going to knock the house down and bury me with it?”
Matthew releases the knob and leans against the door. He rubs his eyeballs at the inner corners, trails his fingers down his nose and wipes his philtrum; there’s nothing there but an ant-crawl itchy feeling. The house rumbles, a series of tiny shockwaves that burst through his bones. Matthew can almost feel his father’s hands beating through the I-beams and joists and then into the plank of the door, ramming across his back and shoulder blades. When he would get sick as a child, his dad would lie him on the couch and tap on his tiny boy muscles with the fatty sides of his hands. Matthew would let out a tiny hiss of noise, a miniature whine that warbled up and down in pitch as his father moved his hands like he was pounding weirdly on a piano. This would always jostle something in Matthew, and he would feel better, if even for just a few hours, before snot or nausea or stuffy sinuses came rolling back in.
This feels different. But he shuts his eyes and tries to imagine that all his father wants is for things to be better.
Not that Matthew knows what that means. Two years ago, he left his teaching job, denied tenure thanks to his lack of publishing—despite the fact that he came into the position with a well-regarded book—and the rumbled (true) rumors that he’d been romantically involved with a student. He never found out how word of his affair with Leonard spread; they’d both been careful during, but when it ended, they didn’t speak again. Leonard’s name never appeared on the department honor rolls, nor did he show up at any of the pre-graduation parties the department hosted for those completing their degrees. Maybe Leonard changed his major to business or sports management. Matthew took his lumps when he was gently nudged by his department chair to try something else with his life. He packed up his tiny office, which reeked of old incense thanks to the philosophy professor next door, and, in lieu of anything else on the horizon, studied for and passed the realtors’ exam. He loved houses but couldn’t imagine studying architecture, so why not invade people’s spaces to see what they held, show them off, and make money doing it? And maybe, he’d thought, he’d come up with stories to tell, something he hadn’t managed in ages.
But less than a year into Matthew’s new salesman life, his father’s lungs shriveled, filled with grape-sized beads. He was gone in months.
But not quite gone.
Aside from the slosh and gurgle of water somewhere in its bowels, the house has gone silent. The floors are covered in glass. When he stands up straight, Matthew feels his pulse all over.
“Now what, Dad?” he asks, voice rattling up the stairs.
He doesn’t expect an answer, and he doesn’t get one. His father has dialed things back to zero. The air ticks like a car engine popping after a drive. Matthew wanders the house, imagining what he would say to a prospective buyer looking at it now. See how spacious the dining room is without that ugly chandelier? The kitchen, with its broken sink and off-kilter oven attachments, is in perfect condition for a gut job. That large crack in the living room wall? Just knock the whole thing down and gobble up the study for more living space. The flooded basement? What flooded basement? I see an in-home swimming pool!
By the time he’s reached the master bedroom, he’s laughing at the absurdity of it all. Family photos have fallen in the hallway, many of their frames shattered. He plants a hand on each blank space as he passes.
The bedroom is largely untouched. His father’s watch and loose change are still tossed on the top of his bureau in the same reckless pattern. In the bathroom, the tub has not dislodged itself from the wall. The tiled floor is dry.
He lies down on his father’s side of the bed, where he used to curl as a child after waking from nightmares and finding the night too terrifying for solo sleep. His dad would wrap a bare arm around him, and Matthew would drip to sleep washed in the sweet-sour aroma drifting from his father’s armpits. When he was 17 and left home alone for a weekend, Matthew snuck a girl into the house, and they had sex here. His first time, clumsy and brief and full of awkward laughter and a trio of poorly-used condoms that filled the room with a sterile, institutional odor. He washed the sheets the next day, convinced his father would still be able to smell out what his son had done. But not a word was ever said.
Matthew stares at the ceiling, where a long crack has cut from one corner to the other. He shuts his eyes and takes in deep breaths. In the blackness he can feel his father squirming around every inch of the house, like a battalion of noiseless mice. Matthew sits up, opens his eyes.
Standing before him at the foot of the bed is a child, or something shaped like one, made of plaster and water, crown molding and light fixtures. It doesn’t have eyes, but it does have little hollows where eyes should be, thumb-sized depressions pushed into its lopsided head in a familiar shape.
“Dad.”
The child raises a hand, wiggles fingers made out of fused-together nails and screws. Matthew wonders which wall will crumble first without them.
“You’re not going to leave, are you?”
The child shakes its head, drywall flaking off.
“Alright. I get it. Or, well, I don’t. But it doesn’t matter.”
The non-eyes squeeze closed and then widen again.
“What can I do for you?” Matthew asks. When the child doesn’t answer, he adds, “Tell you a story?”
The child nods.
“Okay,” Matthew says. “Come here.”
As the child bounds toward the bed, smelling like a stuffy attic, Matthew shuffles to create a pocket where it can nestle. He’s not sure what kind of story to tell. Maybe one from his book, which his father never, to Matthew’s knowledge, read. Or he could tell him about Leonard. Or about Eddie, a new part in Matthew’s busted life, who is still out there somewhere, waiting for him to show up for dinner. A date Matthew knows he will miss. Because, in just a second, he’ll scoop up this father-child, hold his crumbling body in his arms, and find himself coated and caught, pulled into the busted walls and uneven floor, enmeshed in his childhood home for the rest of his adult life.
