The Coffee Cantata

Yet when Ben Asher died, for instance, their's was a common grief, and they came together not as friends-in-need but as brother and sister, and their grief was real, overwhelming -- and all too real. And when her mother held onto them both at the service, with a fierce possessiveness that surprised many of those gathered, John's mother Becky seemed the least surprised.

And yet this bench, this bench of all the places in the world, had become their touchstone, the one place that the universe allowed them to be what they truly wanted to be. Intimate, in a place beyond brother and sister. They talked about life and their world, dashed hopes and broken dreams, and their darkest fears -- still waiting in the shadows.

A month before graduation from high school John announced he was taking Lindsey to their senior prom, and when parents squirmed under the weight of so much confusion he asked his father to come with him, for a drive.

And John drove that evening, a subtle change of orientation, perhaps. Drove his father down to Venice Beach, and they walked out to the promenade, the sidewalk along the beach. Sophie and Lindsey were there, waiting for them on the bench, and for the only time in their lives all four acknowledged the truth. In fact, they reveled in their truth of their existence. They talked for hours, they got up and walked along in the evening as a family, as, perhaps, the family they should have been.

"I remember the night," John said a few minutes into this passing sigh, "when we walked here. How they held onto each other. How the truth of the universe came to them in those few hours."

"That was the only time I ever saw them together -- when my mother wasn't terrified, and lonely."

"I never liked Prentice," John said. "There was something..."

"Dishonest, John, is the word. He was a pretender, a chameleon. I never knew where I stood with him..."

"No one did. Do you miss him?"

"Not really. I miss watching our parents right here, together. He never fit into that world."

Asher nodded. "I miss you. I miss us."

"I know."

"We could live nearby, at least. See each more more often."

"No, we couldn't. That's the truth, John, and you know it."

"It's not a physical thing, you know. I just feel like half my soul has been cut away..."

"It was, John. That's always been our truth."

"Is that why you left, the reason why you went on that little walk?"

"Part of it, yes. But I don't understand the world we live in, this life -- not like I think I should, anyway."

"And you're still searching, aren't you?"

She nodded her head. "Yes."

"I'm sorry," he whispered. "For saying those things..."

And she took his hand, kissed his fingers then looked into his eyes with a ferocity that shook him to his core: "John, you never need to apologize to me for a thing -- not now, not ever."

"Life is a cruel joke, isn't it?" he said.

"No, it's not. It's anything but. It's a gift, John. The most precious gift in the universe."

He nodded his head slowly. "Can you tell me about him?"

"Who?"

"The doc. Peterson? Has anything happened yet?"

"No."

"Do you think it will?"

"Yes. Someday." She laughed a little, then looked away. "Not yet, though."

"Do you love him?"

She nodded her head, "Maybe." But she squeezed his hand and he smiled.

"I thought so. What are you going to do now?"

"I'm not sure."

"Bhutan?" he said, his voice lost among his fears. "You're going back, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Soon?"

"I don't know. There are a few things I need to finish here, but yes, soon enough."

"Will you ever come back?"

"No."

A tremble passed between them, a shaking in the universe, and he squeezed her hand. "I'm not sure I can deal with that."

"I know I can't, but that's..."

"Why you have to go."

"Yes."

They walked back to the Rover a few minutes later, and as they approached the old beast he stopped and looked at the truck's weathered lines. He drifted back to that day, in those days after he was let go from the Times. He was almost broke, needed a car, and she'd picked him up and driven him around, looking at cars. Then she saw this one and smiled. "It suits you," she said, then she bought it for him.

'That day, this car, sums up our life, doesn't it,' he thought. 'And it always will.'

He drove her up to Westwood, the little Rover an echo all the way, and when he stopped in front of her apartment on Gayley he looked up at the smoggy dome of the night and shook his head.

"Will you at least call me? Before you leave?"

"I can't do that to you."

"Why do I think this is our goodbye?"

"I don't know."

"Is it?"

She shrugged. "Who knows what's waiting out there? Behind all the shadows?"

He turned cold, his voice full of menace. "It doesn't matter. I'm going to tear it all down, start all over again."

She saw him walking down Rexford after school, kicking at swirling piles of leaves -- lost in time -- and she smiled, tried not to laugh at the little boy by her side in the dark.

+++++

She tried not to smile when, in the usual professorial rush early the next morning, she saw the boy with the rucksack come in and sit by the window again. He pulled out her book and put it on the table, then came up and ordered coffee from her, then he went back to his table and sat. Then he picked up the book, looked at the back cover -- then at her. He shook his head, but when she called his name and he came up to get his coffee, he looked at her again, slowly this time, carefully now.

"Excuse me," he said -- holding the book up, "but is this you?"

She nodded. "I'm sorry, but yes, it is."

"Holy crap," he muttered under his breath.

She sputtered through a happy laugh. "Wow," she said, shaking with repressed laughter, "I've never had such a glowing review."

"This is one of our textbooks," he said, "but it's much more than that."

"Oh, what's it like...to you?"

"It's been, I don't know, more like a call to arms."

"Ah."

"Is that you meant it to be? A manifesto?"

"No," she sighed, still smiling. "Just a little slice of truth, a voice in the wilderness, perhaps."

"We have to write a research paper...and I was just wondering, could I interview you?"

"Me? Good heavens...why?"

"Why? Are you kidding? You're called like, I don't know, the conscience of a generation..."

"Really?" she said, suddenly feeling like she was back in high school -- and the principal had caught her reading Lolita behind the gymnasium. "Good God, that's silly."

"So? Could I?"

She shrugged. "Well, I get off at one. Could you come by then?"

"Yes, Ma'am, I sure can."

"Okay. Now go drink your coffee, before it gets cold."

Sara had ignored her all morning but she came up now. "Seems a little young for you," she said. "Maybe you should throw this one back."

"Yeah. Maybe."

"So how'd last night go?"

"Gently, quietly into that good night, my dear Sara."

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You know, I never understood you. Not back in high school, and certainly not now."

"Really? You didn't?"

"You two were so close, then -- poof -- nothing. Then you show up at the prom together, now he's in the White House, he's mister know it all, then he shows up here all goo-goo eyes -- and anyone can tell he's..."

"No, he's not, Sara."

"Yeah, sure -- whatever you say. So what happened?"

"We said goodbye."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Oh. Well, I guess I'm sorry then."

+++++

He was waiting outside when she got off at one, and he walked beside up the hill to her apartment, but she walked over to the swimming pool and sat.

"You live here?" he asked nervously.

"Yup."

"Oh."

"I'm going to go get some lemonade. Want one?"

"Sure."

She went inside, changed out of her work clothes and poured two glasses, then went back to the pool. "Here you go," she said as she put his drink down, then she sat in the shade of a dusty umbrella. "So, fire away?"

"You know, I just want to know about you right now. Where you're from, that kind of thing?"

"Me? I grew up a few miles from here, went to school and worked here."

"Were your parents poor?"

"No. Not at all."

"Isn't that an inherent contradiction?"

"Why would it be?"

"You were writing about poverty, about inequality. But aren't those foreign to your upbringing?"

"So? I'm a reporter. A researcher. I look for facts to reveal an as yet undefined truth, not the other way around."

"How so?"

"I wasn't looking to write something to help define a pre-existing agenda. I was hoping to find a few undiscovered truths out there, maybe employ them to help make sense of what I found. By the way, what's your name?"

"Pete, but my dad calls me Bud. Could you, too?"

"Call you Bud? Sure."

"Oh, God. Here he comes."

"Who? Your father?"

She turned, saw Doug coming through the gate, and she watched him coming up the stairs, then saw recognition in his eyes -- when he saw her, and his son.

"Bud? What are you doing here?"

"Hey, Dad. Working on a research paper, I guess. Do you know..."

"Yes, I'm her physician. How are you doing today, Lindsey?"

"Not bad,"she said, trying not to smile at his obvious discomfort. "And you?"

"Mom called. Wants me to look-in on Dad, and I was running up now. You going to be long?" he said to his son.

"I don't know? Maybe."

"Well, I'll be down in a minute. Why don't we go out to dinner. The three of us."

Bud looked after his father when he walked away. "Am I missing something?" he said to her.

"Such as?"

"I don't know. I felt some kind of weird energy between you two."

"Really? Well, he saved my life. We've talked a few times."

"Has he told you about my mother?"

"Very little. Why?"

"I don't know. It just seems like our lives have been defined by the wars between them?"

"Wars?"

"Yeah. It's like she decided, somewhere back in time, that the purpose of her existence was to tear him down. I don't know why he stuck it out with her."

"Perhaps love had something to do with it?"

"You know, I kinda doubt it."

"Maybe he needed someone to tear him down."

"What? Why? Why would you say that?"

"Maybe she kept him focused on what was most important to him. Medicine. Healing."

Bud seemed to have trouble absorbing that; he sat back and looked up into the sky, shook his head. "You, like, see into people, don't you? Like empathy, only deeper."

"Do I?"

"It comes through in here," he said, holding up her book, "like in every page."

"Maybe you're confusing empathy with insight."

"No, I don't think so. Do you like my dad. I mean, like him -- that way?"

"I think I could."

"I see. Are you working on a book now? I mean, working at that coffee shop can't be your idea of..."

"Fun? Work isn't about fun, Bud. It's about self-respect."

"So, it's not, like, research?"

She shook her head. "Groceries and rent come to mind as good reasons to work."

He chuckled. "Yeah. Guess so."

"You'll know so, soon enough."

"But, are you working on a book right now?"

She sighed, looked at her hands sitting on her lap, then into his eyes. "I'm not sure yet. Maybe."

"I kind of hope you do."

"Interesting times, aren't they? Why don't you work on a book?"

"Me?"

"Why not?"

"Because I don't know squat. I haven't had any experiences of my own yet."

"Ah. Well, maybe that ought to be your first priority right about now."

"It doesn't feel like the right time..."

"It never feels like the right time."

"Oh."

"Yes. I see, said the blind man."

He nodded, then pinched his brow. "How'd you get sick?"

"I went on a walk."

"A walk? Where?"

"Started in Shanghai, walked north, to Tibet, then south, to the Himalaya, and I crossed into Bhutan last summer."

His eyes went round as saucers. "You did? Why?"

"Oh, in a way I was following in my father's footsteps. I was trying to escape."

"Escape? From what?"

"Inevitability."

"I don't understand."

"Neither do I. Not yet, anyway."

"So. You're going back out there? To keep walking?"

"I don't know. Maybe -- someday."

They turned and looked at Doug when he came out of the main building, and they both watched his eyes as he sat down in the sun.

"I think Mother needed a little pat on the shoulder," he said. "How are things going here?"

"Good," his son said.

"You reading that for Portman's class?" Doug said, pointing at her book.

"Yes, that's right."

"What did you think of it?"

"It's an anthem generator, a call to arms," the boy said, looking into his father's eyes.

"And?"

"And, it's an eye-opener, but confusing, Dad. It's the why of things I don't understand yet."

"Oh? Are we still talking about the book?"

"Maybe, but sometimes there's no clarity -- until you see things with your own eyes."

"And what do you see, Bud."

"You two are in love."

Lindsey put her lemonade on the table -- fearing she she might cough it out. "Jumping to conclusions, Bud?"

"I don't think so. Not from where I'm sitting, anyway."

"Bud, that's not appropriate. We haven't even..."

"Dad, you know, I don't want to hear it. Because, well, if you haven't, well then, shame on you. You've denied love all your life, and now, here it is, right in front of you, waiting. And still you're waiting? For what, I wonder? Maybe so mother can come and tear her apart, right in front of your eyes?"

Father looked at son, friend looked at them both, each lost in the moment.

"So, just when did you get so smart?" Doug asked quietly, looking down at his hands.

"I don't know, Dad. Maybe you just thought we're blind, but you know something? We're not."

"Doug?" Lindsey said, blissfully ironic now. "Need something to drink? Lemonade perhaps. A little hemlock on the side?"

And the three of them just looked at one another, then laughed.

+++++

She fell into their new routine.

She worked in the morning, then Doug came by in the middle of the afternoon and they talked for a while, before he went up to check on his father, and then, with her little red journals open on the desk she would fire up the Mac and start writing. She wrote about herdsmen and farmers, monks and monasteries, and when she wrote about her father's desperate journey from North Vietnam to Bhutan she tried to remember his words, his recollections -- his feelings -- and she felt them come to her again as eternal echoes.

But it all came down to mountains and valleys, the sun rising -- and setting. Running from your fellow man, then falling into the arms of good people who were willing to help. Highs and lows, good and evil. She had focused on inequality in her first book, and while she didn't want to revisit those themes in her writing, she found it an inescapable burden to not do so. To turn away now would, she knew, be her greatest defeat.

Some days Bud knocked on the door, wanted to talk -- about this or that -- his research paper one day, what she found so mesmerizing about Bhutan the next.

"Mesmerizing?" she said when he asked her that. "Do I appear hypnotized?"

"Sometimes," he said -- almost evasively. "You never appear anxious, but when you talk about that monastery it's like someone has opened the floodgates, and you're dancing with Prince Valium."

"Holy cow...Prince Valium?"

"Oh, sorry. That's my mom's weapon of choice."

"Weapon?"

"How she beats back the world."

"Ah."

"I'm curious, how do you beat back the world?"

She looked at him, curious now, about what he was trying to get at. "I'm not sure you can. Why?"

"Can you stop with the Zen riddles for a moment?"

Riddles, she thought. Am I a riddle? "I can try," she replied. He always seemed despondent one moment, curious the next, but she thought something was different today, some little spark was in his eyes that hadn't been there the last time she saw him. "What is it you want to say?"

He looked away, lost in his thoughts. "You know, you're like a statue, maybe a lonely goddess in a cool garden, chiseled of pure white marble. You're this gorgeous thing, like God started in on you and decided to make you his idea of perfection. When I talk to you I feel myself falling in love with you, and I can't help it," he said, his lips trembling. "I can't help looking at you and feeling the way I do."

"Then why are you hiding?"

"Hiding?"

"Yes. Your feelings."

"Because I think it's wrong."

"To love someone?"

"Yes."

"Oh," she said, "are you're confusing love with sex?"

"I -- what?"

"You feel love, but you feel in conflict with the idea, but is that because the idea of sex is bound to your idea of love?"

"No, I don't think so. I mean, I see you as one set of things -- a writer, say, but I look at you and I pretty much want to crawl in the sack and get it on with you, too."

"Really? Well, good luck with that."

"I know, but that's not what I'm trying to get at, so don't worry."

"What are you trying to get at, Bud?" She watched his fingers now, fidgeting a little, his eyes not making contact.

"I'm afraid. Afraid of Bhutan. Afraid you're going to leave one day, and Dad will go with you."

"That's an awful lot of fear, don't you think?"

"No, it's not hardly enough. My mother's sicker than hell, and I wonder what will happen to us -- if Dad leaves after she dies."

"I don't know, but what makes you think he'd leave? For that matter, why do you think I'm leaving?"

"You've as much as told me that before, Lindsey. And Dad sure thinks you are."

"Really? How strange. I'm not sure what I'm having for dinner, let alone if I'm moving half way around the world. But it's curious."

"Curious?"

"Yes. So much fear over something that isn't? But, it's more than just odd, to me, anyway. Like it's kind of odd that you'd tell me you'd like to take me to bed. Kind of like there are no boundaries any more. Know what I mean?"

"Yeah. I know I shouldn't have said that..."

"But you did. Why, I wonder?"

"Sometimes I think there just isn't time for all that anymore."

"All that? What do you mean?"

"Civility, maybe, the remnants of decaying social conventions."

She looked away from his words, yet she had to consider a potential truth in his idea -- consider them a partial truth, anyway, perhaps a universal truth, waiting to be explored. And, she thought, maybe, just maybe, such collapses in norms had precipitated the flight of the desert fathers, perhaps been a force that informed that earlier monastic impulse, and she wanted to turn and write -- and then it hit her.

Writing wasn't the same thing as living, just as living in fear isn't the same thing as being afraid. One is contemplation, the other -- experience -- so why was he afraid of something so nebulous? Or was he, really?

"I wonder, Bud, has time become so precious? Civility exists to smooth out the rough edges, to help create a little harmony. Is that such a bad thing? Or have we come to that point again?"

"Again?"

"Oh, nothing. Just a thought."

"Do you know how beautiful you are? I mean, do you ever think about it?"

"What?"

"I'm sorry, but it's a simple question? Do you?"

"I'm not sure I can answer that, Bud. Physical beauty is not something I've ever given a great deal of thought to, in anyone, and especially not when it concerns me."

"I think that's what I'm trying to get at, in a round about way. Yet you seem to write about ugliness all the time. Not physical ugliness, but, well, maybe moral ugliness. Do you ever wonder what the results would be if people were bombarded with tales of ugliness day-in and day-out, so much so that they forgot what beauty was? Real beauty, I mean?"

"That's a good question, Bud. But what is real beauty?"

"I'm not sure I know. I know it's not necessarily manufactured beauty, the Hollywood formula of beauty, anyway. That kind of beauty is packaged and sold, but then again, maybe the most beautiful sunset in the world isn't really beautiful after all. It's here one minute, gone the next."