Ghost Lights by Lydia Millet Page A

discussion of positions . . . he shrank back past the doorjamb. He could not show Susan he did not wish to sit beside her. On the other hand, he did not wish to sit beside her. It was too soon and too public. He would hang back until others seemed to make the choice for him.
    Casey was still in the kitchen; he could help her bring the food in. A pretext. But he would keep hidden till the last moment, even from her, in case the whole crowd had not taken their seats yet.
    Lingering in the hallway next to the kitchen, he heard Casey talking to someone and hung back again: the food was not ready. There would be nothing to occupy him. He did not want to hover awkwardly; he would hide here, safely unseen.
    He glanced down and picked a framed photograph from a bookshelf, to be doing something in case someone saw him. It was Casey with Stern’s dog, when the dog still had four legs. Must have been taken by Stern, thought Hal, when the two of them were spending time . . . Casey was sitting on the beach in her chair, smiling, and the dog was standing up, her front paws on Casey’s knees. Mostly the dog was featured: you could barely make the person out behind her. Casey did not like pictures of herself.
    Nancy was in the kitchen with his daughter. From his hidden position against the wall he could see one of Nancy’s bony shoulders and part of the back of her chair; its netting contained knitting needles and several large, bright skeins of yarn—red, orange, yellow, pink and purple.
    A garment fashioned of those colors could only be an abomination.
    “You told them tele marketing ?” asked Nancy in a stage whisper, and then chortled.
    “What else? They know it’s a phone job.”
    “But I mean what if they ask you about it? The timeshare thing?”
    “I have a spiel. I once actually did try selling timeshares, for like three days. It was hell on earth, I’m not even kidding.”
    “And this isn’t?”
    “You know what? I kind of like it. I do. Maybe it’s still the novelty, but I like it, Nance. That’s my dirty secret.”
    “You slut ! ”
    “I’m a ho. Hand me the oven mitt, would you?”
    “I’ll take the rice. I can get it.”
    “You sure it’s not too heavy?”
    He could not enter the kitchen at all now. He could not present himself. He was falling apart. He crept back to the bathroom. Familiar refuge.
    Did she mean what he thought? He tried to recall what she had said on the telephone yesterday, not knowing he was there: “What can I do for you,” or words to that effect. But the tone had been sultry. He shivered.
    1-900. Phone sex.
    This was his family. Susan on the carpet. Casey in the chair. Doing that.
    He breathed deeply in and out for a minute, bent over the sink and splashed cold water on his face. When he straightened he reached for a washcloth and then stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. He had once possessed a certain angular handsomeness, or at least he had been told this once or twice—a lean, affable appeal. Then again, most people received compliments on their appearances now and then, even those most egregiously victimized by genetics. It was standard. If he allowed for the margin of error created by social niceties, he would have to guess he was average-looking.
    His eyes were blue but it seemed to him now they had faded, were more and more watery. He half-expected himself to start crying just looking into them—he was on the brink of tears already. Did he look like this all the time? He saw the parallel horizontal lines on his forehead, deeply etched, and thought the eyes disappeared beneath them. He had a full head of hair, small mercies. But he looked unremarkable.
    He disappeared, he thought, against any background; he blended, he faded in.
    How she and Susan must see him: an old man. But he was not old. He was only fifty.
    “Daddy? Are you OK in there?”
    “Yeah. Headache is all. Be out in a minute.”
    “There’s ibuprofen in the first cabinet. Also acetaminophen