I had just circled an ad for an \u201centry-level communications specialist,\u201d whatever that was, when I heard a pair of flip-flops earning their name up the drive.\u00a0 The wearer of the flip-flops stopped about ten feet in front of me. \u201cYou job hunting?\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a girl, seventeenish, wearing a pair of mirrored aviators, her copious black hair tucked into a cheap looking baseball cap with the word HOSS across the front of it.\u00a0 She wore cut-off denim shorts and a tight black pocket-tee.\u00a0 Her smooth-looking skin was tanned to a perfect cocoa color.\u00a0 Her body was lean and athletic. I did not respond.<\/p>\n
She sighed.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m looking, too, but I haven\u2019t had much luck.\u00a0 You had any luck yet?\u201d\u00a0 She shifted the weight of her upper body from her left leg to her right and put her hand on her hip.\u00a0 One of her flip-flops issued a strained squeal.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d I finally said, \u201cHaven\u2019t had much luck yet.\u201d\u00a0 \u2026Or ever, I thought. I figured since I\u2019d been busted red-handed, I\u2019d fess up.\u00a0 I put the newspaper and pen down on the ground and picked up the can of beer that had been languishing next to my chair and took a sip of its lukewarm contents.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d like to be a lifeguard,\u201d she said. \u201cAt a pool.\u00a0 It\u2019s like my dream job. It\u2019s a noble thing to be, too\u2014like a firefighter, or a doctor\u2026or an\u00a0 EMT.\u201d\u00a0 She stopped talking and glanced to her left, down the street.\u00a0 \u201cMy name\u2019s Cherri, by the way.\u00a0 It\u2019s not a name I\u2019d have picked myself, but it\u2019s memorable, I guess.\u00a0 I feel more like a Samantha, or a Harriet.\u00a0 I\u2019ve always liked the name Harriet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m Bruce,\u201d I said.\u00a0 \u201cBut I\u2019ve always liked the name Jack.\u201d\u00a0 I hinged out of my chair and stretched.\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cYou live around here?\u201d\u00a0 I was curious because in my five years at Joe River Plantation, I\u2019d never seen her\u2014or anyone like here\u2014before. The Plantation, as most called it, was like one of those creepy horror-movie communities that the viewer eventually realizes is devoid of young people.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just moved in three houses down on the right.\u00a0 Seth\u2019s a chemist at Hybrilabs.\u00a0 My mother\u2019s dead.\u00a0 Are you drunk?\u201d\u00a0 She took off her sunglasses, stuck them in her shirt collar, and moved closer to me, looking at my eyes.\u00a0 Her irises were dark brown, so dark that it almost looked like she had no irises, just really large pupils.\u00a0 I stepped back.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo I look drunk?\u201d\u00a0 I stepped around her so that I was outside the garage.\u00a0 She walked around me, into the garage.<\/p>\n
\u201cAwful lot of bottles and cans in your recycling bins.\u201d\u00a0 She picked up a can.\u00a0 \u201cThis one still feels kind of cool.\u201d\u00a0 She dropped it back into the bin.\u00a0 \u201cDo you have a pool?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNope.\u00a0 No pool.\u00a0 I don\u2019t remember seeing anyone moving in down there.\u201d\u00a0 I walked to the end of the driveway and, sure enough, a beat up grey Volvo lounged in the drive of the house she\u2019d said they moved into.\u00a0 I\u2019d always wanted a Volvo, but Lucille had hated them.\u00a0 While we were married we bought a new Mustang every two years.\u00a0 Now, post-divorce, I can barely afford the upkeep on the ten-year-old Civic that sits in my driveway.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe moved in at night\u2014last <\/em>night, actually,\u201d she said, still standing in my garage.<\/p>\n \u201cYour dad a spy or something?\u201d I made the assumption that \u201cSeth\u201d was her dad. I walked over to the refrigerator and pulled a fresh beer.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ve never heard of people moving into a place at night.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo, I just told you\u2014he\u2019s a chemist, at Hybrilabs.\u00a0 You are<\/em> drunk, Jack.\u00a0 I think I\u2019ll call you Jack from now on, okay?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSure, Harriet,\u201d I said.\u00a0 \u201cAnd I\u2019m not drunk. Not yet.\u201d\u00a0 I took a sip.\u00a0 \u201cHybri<\/em>labs.\u00a0 Where\u2019s that?\u201d<\/p>\n She walked over to the fridge, opened it. \u201cIt\u2019s over off of Marion Street, on Francis Avenue.\u201d\u00a0 She pulled a beer.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s a lab where they make cosmetics and stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo why did you move in on a Saturday night, if your dad\u2019s not a spy?\u00a0 Help yourself, by the way.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s an experiment\u2014and thank you, Jack, I will.\u201d\u00a0 She sat down in my chair, took an adult sip of the beer.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d\u00a0 I finished my beer.<\/p>\n \u201cSeth is conducting an experiment that disallows him from going outside during the day.\u201d\u00a0 She burped loudly.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m confused, Harriet. Disallows<\/em>?\u201d\u00a0 I grabbed a folding lawn chair, unfolded it, put it next to her chair and sat down in it.\u00a0 \u201cDo they do tests on monkeys and rats and bunny rabbits where your dad works?\u00a0 At Hybrilabs? Is it like The Secret of NIMH<\/em>?\u201d\u00a0 I burped, but not as loudly as she had. I almost said, \u201cAnd why do you keep calling your dad by his first name?\u201d but decided I liked her and didn\u2019t want to scare her off.<\/p>\n \u201cLook, it\u2019s complicated, and you wouldn\u2019t understand.\u00a0 Don\u2019t ruin our fledgling friendship with too many questions, Jack.\u00a0 It\u2019s all so tedious.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n It turned out that Cherri\u2019s dad, Dr. Seth Newsome, was in fact a chemist at Hybrilabs\u2014not a spy at all\u2014and was indeed conducting an experiment that \u201cdisallowed\u201d him from being outside during the day.\u00a0 He was developing a special \u201csunless tanning lotion,\u201d something you could apply to your skin that would give you a natural looking tan without your having to lie out in the sun for hours. In part, the experiment is why they moved to Florida from Upstate New York, where they had been living in a small town called Waterford. Waterford, and its six-months of overcast drear had given him the idea to develop the cream, but Florida, he\u2019d decided, would be the ultimate testing ground.<\/p>\n \u201cAll the lotions and creams on the market now are a joke.\u00a0 They turn your skin various shades of orange.\u00a0 They don\u2019t give your skin an authentically tan<\/em> look.\u00a0 What I\u2019m working on will.\u00a0 But a key factor will be how it interacts with natural sunlight\u2014lots of it.\u201d<\/p>\n The trick to the whole thing, though, was that the experiment, in the first part of the testing phase, called for no direct sunlight, which would prove that the results of his tanning lotion were 100 percent legitimate. \u201cIf I go outside during the day at any point during the testing period it will ruin the whole thing.\u00a0 It\u2019ll throw off the whole experiment.\u201d\u00a0 He slept during the day and stayed up all night.\u00a0 He got up at sunset and rubbed the stuff on his body and went to work at Hybrilabs and he made sure he was home before dawn.<\/p>\n I had learned all this and scant other details about the father and daughter when they had me over for dinner one night not long after they\u2019d moved in.<\/p>\n Cherri looked curiously motherly as she made us baked Cornish game hens, homemade organic mashed potatoes and fresh green beans\u2014and she knew what she was doing. The game hens were moist and had a wonderful rosemary-garlic flavor.\u00a0 When I asked her how she\u2019d seasoned the potatoes, which had some kind of remarkable garlic-lemon thing happening, she refused to tell me.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s a secret,\u201d was all she said.<\/p>\n We had a very dry white wine after dinner and sat around in their living room and talked.\u00a0 There were still unpacked boxes here and there, all over their house, and no TV to be found anywhere.\u00a0 I figured they didn\u2019t have one at all.\u00a0 Anyway, I couldn\u2019t judge them too harshly because I had next to nothing in my own house.\u00a0 Lucille had taken just about everything in the divorce, which was fine with me.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t want any of it.\u00a0 The more she took the better\u2014less to remind me of her, of us.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause of the work I\u2019m doing,\u201d said Seth, \u201cevenings are my and Cherri\u2019s only real quality time together.\u201d\u00a0 Seth had on a faded red t-shirt with small holes in it here and there, cut off shorts and leather sandals, and he did, I had to admit, have a remarkably real-looking tan. \u00a0To me, he didn\u2019t look like a chemist.\u00a0 He looked more like a writer, someone who worked form home, someone who probably didn\u2019t stick to schedules too well, someone who was always late for appointments.\u00a0 In a word, he looked irresponsible.<\/p>\n \u201cSeth, I\u2019ve got to admit,\u201d I told him. \u201cYou have a great tan.\u00a0 That stuff really works.\u00a0 It looks real\u2014like a real tan.\u201d<\/p>\n Seth looked over at his daughter with raised eyebrows.<\/p>\n \u201cOh God,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t encourage him.\u00a0 Trust me, he doesn\u2019t need any of that.\u201d After a tense pause, she added, \u201cWe don\u2019t even know if it\u2019s safe.\u201d<\/p>\n They acted more like a married couple then they did father and daughter.\u00a0 I wanted to know how the mom \/ wife had died, but was afraid to ask, figured it was a secret, like the recipe for the mashed potatoes.\u00a0 If I waited, eventually, I\u2019d find out.\u00a0 Information like that usually surfaced after you\u2019d known someone for a while.<\/p>\n He sat back down.\u00a0 He moved his hands over his arms and then his chin and neck.\u00a0 \u201cI believe it\u2019s safe.\u00a0 I feel good, and everything seems fine, and none of the\u2026ingredients by themselves are harmful to any of the body\u2019s systems. Anyway, we\u2019ll soon know the answer to that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPlease, Jack,\u201d Cherri interrupted. \u201cTell Seth the prospective names are no good.\u201d\u00a0 She put her head in her hand.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat are the names?\u201d<\/p>\n She stood up and made a frame with her hands, and announced, \u201cTan in a Can! … or \u2026Tan-Can!\u201d She dropped her hands to her sides.\u00a0 \u201cThere are others, too, but they\u2019re all essentially variations on the theme of a tan<\/em> coming from a can<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWell\u2026\u201d\u00a0 I pushed my wine glass around on the table.<\/p>\n \u201cCome on! They\u2019re terrible, and you know it.\u00a0 Sounds like Fix a Flat, or Can of Worms\u2026.What kind of woman would ever buy something called Tan in a Can? Wait. I know. I think I see her now.\u201d She squinted, as if an image were coming into focus. \u201cYes, there, do you see her? She used to be lovely. Now, she\u2019s just tired, functionally alcoholic and desperate for attention. Poor old girl\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cClever,\u201d said Seth. \u201cBut don\u2019t you like that they rhyme?\u201d he said with an incredulous look on his face. \u201cAnd, besides\u2014I don\u2019t really give a damn who buys it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt doesn\u2019t need to rhyme.\u00a0 What does rhyming have to do with any<\/em>thing?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s right, Seth,\u201d I said.\u00a0 \u201cThey\u2019re not very\u2026 alluring sounding.\u00a0 Could be more, I don\u2019t know, feminine.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSee?\u201d\u00a0 We all sat quietly for a moment.<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe something like Essence del Sol?\u201d I said.<\/p>\n \u201cWell,\u201d said Cherri, \u201cthat\u2019s better<\/em>.\u00a0 You\u2019re on the right track, at least.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Meeting Seth and Cherri turned out to be a good thing for me on the job-hunting front. One Friday afternoon, in August, just after school had started back up again, I was out mowing the lawn and Cherri got off the school bus, and came walking up the sidewalk toward my house.\u00a0 When I saw her standing at the edge of my yard, I stopped the mower and walked over to her.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s up?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s too hot to be mowing right now, Jack.\u00a0 You should wait until about an hour and a half before dusk to mow, either that or early morning.\u00a0 This is the hottest part of the day. You\u2019re gonna burn up and overheat yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n When you\u2019re unemployed, I thought, you have all this time, and not enough stuff to fill it with.\u00a0 My yard hasn\u2019t looked this good in years.<\/p>\n \u201cAnyway, Seth wants to see you around sundown.\u00a0 Just come over at eight.\u00a0 We\u2019re having pizza delivered.\u201d\u00a0 She didn\u2019t wait for a response.\u00a0 She turned and walked back up the sidewalk to her house.\u00a0 I watched her the whole way.\u00a0 As she turned onto her driveway, she looked back at me, caught me staring.\u00a0 \u201cAren\u2019t you gonna finish mowing?\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n There were some job openings at Hybrilabs.\u00a0 Most of them weren\u2019t anything someone with an MA in English could do, but there was one.\u00a0 They needed a new proposal editor, someone who could take the jargon-laden prose that the chemists came up with to submit for corporate approval and turn it into something a layman could understand.\u00a0 \u201cI could do that, I think,\u201d I told Seth.\u00a0 \u201cGood,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cGo online and apply and submit your resume or CV, or whatever, and I\u2019ll push it through. I\u2019ll get you an interview.\u00a0 But from there it\u2019s up to you.\u00a0 I\u2019ll put in a good word, but you\u2019ll have to sell yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n I must have done something right, because they called me three days after I interviewed and made me an offer of $65, 000 per annum, which was more money than I\u2019d ever made in any of my previous jobs teaching, adjuncting, or freelancing. I\u2019d never got a job so quickly and painlessly in my entire life. Somehow is seemed wrong, too much for too little. Nothing in my life thus far had been this easy.\u00a0 I\u2019d had to fight, tooth and nail, for everything, so I\u2019d learned to be suspicious of things like this; things that seemed like an unaccounted for gift. But this time, I decided, I\u2019d take it, and I\u2019d let myself believe I deserved it.\u00a0 Something good had happened and I was going to enjoy it.<\/p>\n This time I had them<\/em> over for dinner.\u00a0 I cooked the only thing I could do well, the only thing I could pull off on my divorced-guy budget, spaghetti with meat sauce and a nice side salad with garlic bread.\u00a0 Seth announced over our dinner that night that he was almost ready to become diurnal again. His plan was to take pictures of himself before going outside during the day for the first time.\u00a0 Once he\u2019d done that he could test the product in the sun.\u00a0 He would spend the first week going outside during the day, carefully noting any irregularities and spending nearly the entirety of each day outside.\u00a0 After that week, if all was well and good, if the product was safe and the results lasting, he would publish his findings and, according to him, the \u201coffers would begin to roll in.\u201d\u00a0 To me, Seth seemed overly optimistic, and his plan seemed too simplistic, but if he was happy and excited, I was happy for him.\u00a0 Plus, what did I know?\u00a0 He was the scientist.\u00a0 He knew what he was doing.<\/p>\n Seth decided that his first day out would be spent at the beach.\u00a0 That was where he wanted to spend his first day out-of-doors, sunning and bathing and walking up and down the beach.\u00a0 Cherri was going to go with him and they invited me along too.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n It was hot and humid, normal conditions for a late-August Florida day, and stepping on the white beach sand with bare feet was like walking on the hot points of thousands of sewing needles.\u00a0 We found a spot just ahead of the stretching tide and sat up our chairs and large beach umbrella.\u00a0 We had a cooler with beer and snacks in it.\u00a0 Cherri poured two beers into red plastic glasses and handed me one.\u00a0 Seth announced that he was going to go for a walk.\u00a0 He took off his shirt and took a deep breath.\u00a0 \u201cThis is fantastic!\u00a0 I\u2019ve been dreaming about this for months.\u201d\u00a0 He scratched at his right shoulder and then turned and began walking south down the beach.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m going to walk to the pier and back!\u201d he shouted and pointed at the long, spindly spine of the pier, stretching out to sea.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s so hot,\u201d said Cherri. She took a large drink of beer.<\/p>\n \u201cTake it easy on the beer. Seth said you can only have a couple.\u201d\u00a0 I dug my toes into the sand.\u00a0 Beneath the top three or four inches, the sand was cool and damp.\u00a0 It felt good on my heat-exhausted toes.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll drink as many as I want, Jackie-boy.\u201d\u00a0 She took another sip.<\/p>\n \u201cI think I\u2019ll take a walk myself in a little while.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll go with you, if you want.\u00a0 We can finish these beers and then pour two more and take them with us.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat sounds good.\u201d<\/p>\n We sat there for a while enjoying the relaxed quiet of the beach.\u00a0 I closed my eyes and listened to the waves breaking\u2014rhythmic, calming, meditative\u2014and the occasional caw of the seagulls as they floated and careened in the wind, and then some completely unpleasant third sound broke in.<\/p>\n \u201cLet\u2019s go! Pack up! Let\u2019s go!\u201d\u00a0 Seth was running toward us, still quite far away, and I squinted to see what was wrong.\u00a0 I could see that he was sort of patting wildly at his torso. He looked like a man on fire, but without the flames.<\/p>\n \u201cGet it all up!\u00a0 Come on!\u201d He fell as he got about twenty yards from us and he rolled around in the sand.\u00a0 He moaned and got back up.\u00a0 \u201cFuck!\u00a0 Let\u2019s go!\u201d\u00a0 Finally Cherri and I got up and started getting everything together.<\/p>\n Seth\u2019s skin was very red, and it was burned through in a few places.\u00a0 The burned-through spots, like cauterized holes in his flesh, were not bleeding.\u00a0 He ran up, snatched a towel and wrapped it around himself, and kept running.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I drove and Cherri sat up front with me.\u00a0 Seth lay spread out in the back seat, hissing and moaning.\u00a0 Every few seconds he arched his back and screamed in extreme pain.<\/p>\n \u201cWhere are we going?\u201d\u00a0 I pulled out of the parking lot and drove out into the street.\u00a0 To my left, a car screeched to a stop.<\/p>\n \u201cShit, Bruce!\u201d said Cherri.<\/p>\n \u201cDumbass!\u201d yelled the driver.<\/p>\n I waved, looked both ways, and then accelerated.<\/p>\n \u201cWhere the fuck are we going?!\u00a0 The emergency room?\u201d\u00a0 I was shaking.<\/p>\n \u201cYes!\u201d said Cherri.\u00a0 She reached over and touched her dad\u2019s arm gently.<\/p>\n \u201cNo!\u201d screamed Seth.\u00a0 Then he hissed, again. \u201cShit!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re nuts!\u201d yelled Cherri.\u00a0 She looked at me and then back at her dad writhing in the back seat.<\/p>\n \u201cSeth, she\u2019s right.\u201d I said, calmly as possible.\u00a0 \u201cI think we should drive to the emergency room.\u00a0 It\u2019s only about 2 minutes from here.\u201d\u00a0 I swerved to the left to avoid hitting a small girl on a pink bicycle with training wheels.\u00a0 She\u2019d appeared from nowhere.<\/p>\n \u201cJust drive me home,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cI know what to do for this.\u00a0 They won\u2019t know.\u201d<\/p>\n I looked at Cherri.\u00a0 She was scared.\u00a0 She nodded.<\/p>\n \u201cAll right,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n We pulled into the driveway. Seth was shivering now.\u00a0 His skin was red and there were large lesions all over him.\u00a0 Where there weren\u2019t lesions he was beginning to blister.\u00a0 He looked like he\u2019d been close to a large explosion.\u00a0 Except for the shivering, he wasn\u2019t moving.\u00a0 Cherri got out of the car and opened the door to the back seat.\u00a0 \u201cCome on, Dad.\u00a0 You can do it\u2014just make it into the house.\u201d\u00a0 Seth was wheezing now.\u00a0 He slowly got out of the seat.\u00a0 Cherri closed the door and guided her dad, Shrouded in brightly colored beach towels, towards the front door of their house.\u00a0 As he walked, hunched over, he moaned. I couldn\u2019t help fixating on the fact that she\u2019d called Seth \u201cdad.\u201d It was the first time I\u2019d head her do that.<\/p>\n Cherri sat Seth down on the reclining chair in the living room.\u00a0 He sighed and slowly curled up, pulling his legs up onto the chair.\u00a0 He looked terrible.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t want to say it, but he looked like he might not make it.\u00a0 I\u2019d never seen someone so damaged before.\u00a0 I\u2019d never seen a body so hurt.<\/p>\n \u201cGo to my office,\u201d he whispered, \u201cand look for a white five-gallon bucket with ICE written on the cap.\u201d\u00a0 Cherri got up and did as he said and came out of his office with the container.\u00a0 Cherri strained as she waddled the bucket over to the chair her dad was sitting in. \u201cOpen it and start spreading the cream over my skin.\u00a0 Do it liberally. There\u2019s plenty.\u00a0 Just rub it in.\u00a0 Quickly.\u201d Cherri looked up at me. I was standing next to her.\u00a0 She was gauging my reaction\u2014seeing if I was up to the task. I nodded, knelt down next to her and gently took the towel off of her dad. \u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s okay,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cThis is going to help.\u201d\u00a0 She lifted off the lid of the bucket.<\/p>\n \u201cPlease,\u201d said Seth.<\/p>\n \u201cYou fucker!\u201d she said, and her voice cracked.\u00a0 \u201cI told you this was not safe. I told you\u2014I always tell you and you never listen.\u201d\u00a0 She collapsed to the floor and hit the carpet a few times with her fist, and then she started pulling at the fibers as if she were pulling at someone\u2019s hair.\u00a0 \u201cI wish mom were here!\u201d she said loudly.\u00a0 It was the only time, except for that first day, that she\u2019d ever mentioned her mother around me.<\/p>\n I helped her back up onto her knees and took her hand and put it in the clear cream and then put her hand on her father\u2019s leg.\u00a0 \u201cCome on.\u00a0 You can do it.\u00a0 This is serious,\u201d I said.\u00a0 She straightened up and looked intently at her dad.<\/p>\n \u201cOkay, okay,\u201d she said in a whisper.<\/p>\n \u201cHurry,\u201d said Seth.<\/p>\n I dipped my hand in too and started on his other leg.<\/p>\n After a few minutes, Seth had calmed; his entire body, layered in the clear cream, relaxed and he eventually fell asleep.\u00a0 After washing our hands and making sure Seth was as comfortable as possible, Cherri got us beers out of the cooler that we\u2019d left in the car and we sat at their dining room table and drank.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat am I going to do, Bruce?\u201d\u00a0 She looked over at her dad.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, let\u2019s just wait for him to wake up and discuss it with him.\u00a0 I don\u2019t see getting around a trip to the hospital, though.\u00a0 He\u2019s in bad shape.\u201d<\/p>\n She said nothing.<\/p>\n \u201cCherri, he\u2019s really hurt.\u00a0 I think we\u2019ll have to take him to the hospital.\u00a0 We probably should have from the beginning.\u201d<\/p>\n Cherri said nothing.\u00a0 She sat there resting her forehead in the palm of her hand.\u00a0 She was crying quietly.\u00a0 Her shoulders twitched.\u00a0 She put her arm down on the table and put her head behind it.\u00a0 I wanted to do something.<\/p>\n \u201cCherri, he\u2019ll be all right.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t mean to upset you.\u00a0 It\u2019s not good, but he\u2019ll get better.\u00a0 It\u2019s just a matter of getting him better as quickly as possible.\u201d\u00a0 I drank the rest of my beer, and then sat there nervously for a few minutes, wondering what to do.\u00a0 I got up and walked over to where Seth was.<\/p>\n He was curled up in the chair with a blanket over his body.\u00a0 Sores were on both his cheeks, and one was right in the middle of his forehead.\u00a0 The top few layers of skin on his face were beginning to separate from the rest.\u00a0 I knew that in a day or two he\u2019d be one big blister.\u00a0 It was going to be a long, painful recovery.\u00a0 For some reason, I started thinking of names:\u00a0 Sunburn-in-a-Can<\/em>, Third-Degree-Burn-in-a-Can<\/em>, Near-Death-Experience-in-a-Can<\/em>, Canned Coma<\/em>, The<\/em> Napalm Treatment, Poor-Useless-Bastard-on-a-Couch-in-a-Can<\/em>.\u00a0 Seth moaned.\u00a0 I turned back to where Cherri had been sitting, but she was gone.<\/p>\n I got up to leave and, on my way out, I found Cherri back with Seth. She sat next to him, on a stool, smoothing his hair back and singing. I couldn\u2019t quite make out the song, but it called to mind \u201cYou are My Sunshine.\u201d I paused, told them I\u2019d check on them later. Neither responded, and I left.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Seth recovered without any official medical treatment.\u00a0 He\u2019d refused to go to any doctor. According to Seth, going to the doctor or to the hospital was completely beside the point.\u00a0 He kept rubbing the mysterious cream on his skin and after about three weeks he was in pretty good shape\u2014not completely better, but no longer red\u2014and his sores were healed enough for him to return to work.<\/p>\n All in all, he seemed pretty unfazed by the whole ordeal; he didn\u2019t seem to care that his initial product had failed miserably, and that he\u2019d nearly killed himself.\u00a0 In fact, his resolve seemed stronger than ever.\u00a0 He redoubled his efforts.\u00a0 He was back to the task of creating a tanning lotion that gave your skin a real-looking tan with a vengeance.\u00a0 This time, though, he\u2019d decided not to submit himself to a nocturnal lifestyle.\u00a0 He\u2019d created a new product and used it just as someone would who\u2019d bought it off the shelf.\u00a0 \u201cThat was a huge mistake,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cThis way, I can monitor the effects of direct sunlight on an ongoing basis.\u00a0 This way is safer.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be able to make adjustments as I go.\u00a0 By the end, it\u2019ll be a perfect product.\u00a0 This is\u2026ideal.\u00a0 This is the way to do it.\u201d\u00a0 He didn\u2019t talk to me about it much.\u00a0 He, I\u2019m sure, could sense that I wasn\u2019t as enthusiastic about his scientific endeavors as he was, and didn\u2019t bother me too much with details.<\/p>\n Anyway, I wasn\u2019t worried about Seth anymore.\u00a0 I was worried about Cherri.\u00a0 She\u2019d quit coming over and sitting with me in my garage, clandestinely drinking beers. Eventually, I never saw her at all.<\/p>\n One night I went over to their house to check up on them.<\/p>\n It was now mid-December, and their house, inside and out, was still just as devoid of adornment as always.\u00a0 Outside, no Christmas decorations.\u00a0 Inside, still boxes here and there. Still no TV.\u00a0 Still nothing on the walls\u2014not a painting or a photo, or anything.<\/p>\n Seth let me in.\u00a0 He was wearing his uniform of denim shorts and a ratty t-shirt, and acting strange, jumpy, which didn\u2019t really worry me because he\u2019d always been that way.\u00a0 Matronly Cherri, quietly washed dishes in the kitchen. Seth was now standing in the living room, polishing something small and round with a white rag.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s up, Brucie?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cNothing.\u00a0 Just thought I\u2019d come check on you guys.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh,\u201d said Seth, \u201cthat\u2019s nice of you.\u00a0 Cherri, honey!\u201d he yelled.\u00a0 \u201cBruce is here.\u201d\u00a0 He walked down the hall, towards his office.<\/p>\n Cherri walked out of the kitchen.\u00a0 She was wearing an apron and was holding a hand towel with a picture of a rooster on it.\u00a0 \u201cHey, Jack.\u201d\u00a0 She dried her hands with the towel and folded it in half long ways and stuck the end of it in her apron.\u00a0 \u201cHow have you been?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFine.\u00a0 How about you?\u00a0 How\u2019s school?\u00a0 How\u2019s swimming?\u00a0 You guys make it to nationals?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not in school anymore, Jack.\u00a0 Seth and I have decided that that\u2019s best. I\u2019m homeschooled now.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat?\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 You enjoyed going to school.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe.\u201d\u00a0 She crossed her arms and then uncrossed them and snatched the hand towel out of her apron.\u00a0 \u201cI was way ahead of all the other kids\u2014academically.\u00a0 Plus, Seth needs me here.\u00a0 He\u2019s on the verge of completing this thing and he needs my help.\u00a0 I need to be here.\u00a0 I need to make sure this thing gets done,\u201d and then she added in a whisper, \u201csafely,\u201d and widened her eyes at me.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, maybe you\u2019re right\u2014about being ahead in school.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure you\u2019re right.\u00a0 But, it\u2019s not really your responsibility to cater to your father while he carries out his crazy experiments, is it?\u201d<\/p>\n She threw down the towel and walked closer to me.\u00a0 Her eyes were wide and serious looking.\u00a0 She whispered intensely.\u00a0 \u201cJack, you don\u2019t understand.\u201d\u00a0 She looked down the hall, and grabbed my arm and guided me into the dining room, where the towel was on the floor, next to the dining room table.\u00a0 The towel had fallen so that you could see the rooster\u2019s head but not the body.\u00a0 \u201cI can\u2019t lose my dad.\u00a0 I almost lost him that day at the beach.\u00a0 If I were to lose him, I would have no one.\u00a0 No mom.\u00a0 No dad.\u201d<\/p>\n Seth walked into the dining room. \u201cWhat are you two talking about so emphatically<\/em>?\u201d<\/p>\n Cherri looked at me.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m just a little bothered that Cherri isn\u2019t in school anymore, Seth.\u00a0 I know she\u2019s smarter than all the other kids, but what about the swim team?\u00a0 What about just being a normal<\/em> kid?\u201d<\/p>\n Seth forced out an uncomfortable chuckle. \u201cWell, Bruce, that\u2019s just it.\u00a0 Cherri isn\u2019t a normal kid.\u00a0 She is much too mature for all that.\u201d\u00a0 He put both of his arms to his side, and then awkwardly put his hands on his hips.<\/p>\n I walked closer to him.\u00a0 His skin was still somewhat pink and shiny.\u00a0 There were still whitish scabs where there had been sores and peeling skin where there had been blisters.<\/p>\n \u201cI agree,\u201d I said.\u00a0 \u201cBut I think you might be denying your daughter some pretty basic experiences.\u00a0 Namely, just being a teenager, who goes to school, and makes friends, and goes to the Nationals with her swim team\u2026. You\u2019re letting your bizarre life overshadow and distort hers, my friend.\u00a0 Let your daughter have a life.\u00a0 Let her be a kid, instead of trying to make her replace your wife.\u201d<\/p>\n The moment I uttered the word \u201cwife,\u201d he put a pretty impressive haymaker across my jaw and left cheek.\u00a0 He\u2019d seen it coming, had anticipated it, the dreaded word. I fell sideways to the floor.\u00a0 Cherri ran over to me and helped me up.<\/p>\n Seth stood there, wide-eyed, shaking his hand and hissing in pain.<\/p>\n I stood there for a moment, stunned. Cherri\u2019s hand was on my back.<\/p>\n Seth was breathing hard now and looking wildly from me to Cherri.<\/p>\n I touched my jaw.\u00a0 It hurt, but it would be fine.<\/p>\n \u201cYou know what?\u201d I said. \u201cI just thought of something.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat?\u201d said Seth.\u00a0 \u201cYou just thought of what<\/em>?\u00a0 What the fuck did you just think of?\u201d He took a couple steps closer to me and looked like he was ready to hit me again.<\/p>\n \u201cCherri\u2019s Secret Recipe<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 I made a frame with my hands, the way Cherri had that first night we all had dinner together. \u201cHow about it? Seems just about perfect, doesn\u2019t it? Appropriate, I mean.\u201d<\/p>\n Seth looked at me funny, and then crossed his arms.\u00a0 I picked up the towel with the picture of a rooster on it and threw it at Seth.\u00a0 He caught the towel and started twisting it.<\/p>\n He moved closer and got in my face.\u00a0 He glanced at Cherri who was still standing next to me.\u00a0 \u201cIt sounds like a fucking condiment,\u201d he said.\u00a0 He flung the towel onto his shoulder and walked away.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s fine,\u201d said Cherri. She walked over to me and put a hand on my shoulder. \u201cIt\u2019s fine,\u201d she repeated, this time she closed her eyes and smiled.<\/p>\n I left their house that night, after saying goodbye to Cherri, giving her a hug, and wishing her well, and went straight home and sat in my driveway and drank a beer.\u00a0 It was a quiet, cool night, and I was alone again.\u00a0 I wished Cherri was with me.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n They moved a year later. Cherri had been accepted at a very good private university in Southern California.\u00a0 She\u2019d told me about it one day a month before they moved, when I\u2019d seen her at the Come \u2018N\u2019 Get It, the grocery store close to our Neighborhood.<\/p>\n \u201cThey have a really good swim team,\u201d she said.\u00a0 I told her I was happy for her.\u00a0 She smiled and thanked me in her too-mature-for-her-age way. I wanted her to be excited, but I couldn\u2019t help asking about Seth.<\/p>\n \u201cHow\u2019s Seth? How does he fit into all this? Is he going to move with you to California?\u201d<\/p>\n She straightened up a bit and took a deep breath. I shouldn\u2019t have asked, I thought. I was being nosey. It was none of my business, really.<\/p>\n \u201cHe wants to,\u201d she said. She absentmindedly handled a box of macaroni and cheese in her cart. \u201cBut I don\u2019t think I want him to.\u201d She looked up and she seemed to be fishing for advice.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you don\u2019t want him to go\u2014tell him that.\u201d<\/p>\n She smiled a little, let go of the box of macaroni and cheese.<\/p>\n \u201cI will,\u201d she said, almost whispering.<\/p>\n I didn\u2019t believe her, But I let it go. I told her that I missed hanging out with her in the garage, drinking beer.\u00a0 She told me that she missed it too.\u00a0 We hugged each other and smiled and went our separate ways and I never saw her again. I walked down the aisle where the sun blocks and tanning lotions were. They all had pretty forgettable names.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cLook, it\u2019s complicated, and you wouldn\u2019t understand.\u00a0 Don\u2019t ruin our fledgling friendship with too many questions, Jack.\u00a0 It\u2019s all so tedious.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":15986,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2074,2283,2284],"class_list":["post-15952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fiction","tag-fathers-and-daughters","tag-sunscreen","tag-the-girl-next-door","writer-steve-lambert"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15952"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15952\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15995,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15952\/revisions\/15995"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}