Bridge of Sighs

with. It’s ironic, I suppose, that the other structures up the street are in less danger of collapse, despite the fact that their owners have let them decay, one rotten clapboard at a time, while we’ve spent money. Foolishly, some would say, and it’s true that Berman Court never made much sense as an investment. According to my mother, I’m attempting in vain to “own my life.” Otherwise, why throw good money at Berman Court or, for that matter, the Third Street house I can’t convince her to move back into? The answer she stubbornly refuses to credit is that while the house where Sarah and I now live is in the Borough, I consider myself not only a resident but also a product of the whole town. Why shouldn’t I invest in all three sectors? I have a convenience store in each, why not a house? I’m not trying to own my life, just acknowledge it, as well as the narrative of our family, its small, significant journey. Is this not an American tale? Are we not the most typical of postwar Americans? That’s how my father would see it, so of course it makes sense that my mother would adopt the opposite view.
    At any rate, I’m proud that these Berman Court apartments are in better condition now than when the Marconis and we Lynches lived here so long ago. The rent we charge is modest, not even enough to cover expenses some months, but over time we’ve found good tenants, most of whom are getting on in years and respectful of the premises and each other. Despite the neighborhood, our building always has a waiting list.
    Nobody’s around, so I lumber down the bank to where the footbridge used to be. Since St. Francis closed, there’s been far less pedestrian traffic there, so the bridge was allowed to gradually fall victim to our long, difficult winters. Downstream, the old trestle was condemned and torn down years ago, and the gravel pit into which the braver boys leapt from the trestle’s edge is now infested with weeds. Despite signs posted all over the property, people use it as an unofficial dump, thereby avoiding the fees charged by the county landfill. Given what they represent, there’s no reason I should miss either the footbridge or the trestle, but in truth I do. The loss of a place isn’t really so different from the loss of a person. Both disappear without permission, leaving the self diminished, in need of testimony and evidence.
This happened. I was there. Once upon a time there was a footbridge. My father stood just there.
This story I’ve been composing so faithfully, now I think about it, probably is little more than my poor attempt to restore what was and is no more. Is this why Bobby paints? To leave his paintings as evidence?
    Half an hour later, I’m sitting at a traffic light in wet, squishy shoes, having somehow slipped into the stream. Trying to imagine how I’ll explain this clumsiness to Sarah, I see Brindy and a man I don’t know emerge from a lower Division Street duplex. She’s wearing a jacket, but the man, despite the chill in the air, is in his shirtsleeves, his hair mussed. The nonchalant way he leans in the open doorway reminds me of Uncle Dec, though he’s been dead some years now. Brindy’s a head shorter than whoever this man is, and when she turns back to face him, I almost expect her to rise up on tiptoes to kiss him, but she doesn’t. When the traffic light changes, the car behind me toots and she turns around, her face flush and radiant until she sees me, but her expression changes before I can look away and pretend not to see what I’ve seen.

HOMECOMING
     
    T WO THINGS AMAZED Noonan about his mother’s final flight—that she’d gotten so far as Jacksonville, Florida, and had been gone for so long, almost two months. He hadn’t heard about it until after the fact, when he was downstate, with one more year to go at the academy. If he managed to graduate, which, given the turmoil of his junior year, was by no means a certainty, nothing much awaited him but the draft and, almost certainly, Vietnam. If he got tossed out before graduation, Vietnam that much sooner.
    Of course his mother had been running away since he was a boy, but only later, after he’d returned home, did he understand the sad truth—that she’d finally made the clean getaway she’d been dreaming of for so long. Instead of staying lost, though, as he would’ve advised, she’d called his father from Florida and told him that, yes, she’d consider returning, but only if Noonan