May We Be Forgiven

computer—you know, going online, visiting various sites. I’ve been making lots of lunch dates with women—mostly we don’t have lunch, it’s just sex. A lot of sex.”
    “Were you drunk?” someone asks.
    “No,” I say. “Not a bit.”
    “Do you have a drinking problem?”
    “I hardly drink. I guess I could drink more. I’ve been watching you all from outside. You looked warm and friendly and welcoming.”
    “Sorry, Nit,” the group says in unison.
    “You have to go,” the leader adds, and I feel like I’ve been kicked off the island. I get up from my folding chair and exit, passing the old aluminum coffeepot with its ready light, the quart of whole milk, the sugar, the doughnuts, all the things I was looking forward to. I am tempted to take myself to a bar to become an alcoholic overnight so I can go back.
    “There are other places, for people like you,” one of the men says.
    “There’s a place for everyone,” one woman calls after me.
    I sit in the parking lot, imagining the meeting going on without me, all of them talking about me behind me back—or do they simply carry on?

    A s I’m pulling out of the lot, Claire calls on my cell phone. “We should sell the parking space,” she says.
    “Sure,” I say. “We can if you want. Are you sure you don’t want it?”
    “I don’t drive, remember? I’m selling the parking space to the people upstairs.”
    “The ones with the screaming kids who run up and down on our heads all day and all night.”
    “Yes,” she says. “They have a minivan, and they offered twenty-six thousand dollars.”
    “Twenty-six thousand?”
    “It went into a bidding war, since there are so few spots.”
    “Wow.”
    “They’re paying in cash.”
    “Great, so we’ll split it fifty-fifty.”
    “Actually, I’m the one who paid for the parking place,” she reminds me.
    “Then why are you telling me?”
    “Just wanted you to know,” she says, and then is gone.

    I dream of Nixon. Nixon, the Night Stories. The idea being that he had a confidant; that every night, when Nixon couldn’t sleep, he’d call this friend and they’d talk and sometimes the friend would read to him from books like Moby-Dick and Notes from the Underground and Paul Johnson’s Journey into Chaos or Enemies of Society, and sometimes they would watch television together. Nixon liked the idea that his confidant was up when he was and that he was never really alone. Being alone frightened him.

    F riday evening, as she’s finishing up, having put the mop and bucket away and gone into the powder room to change back into her street clothes, Maria the cleaning lady says, “Mister, I can no work here no more. I miss Mrs. Jane too much. It makes me unhappy to come here. I am here working and you are sitting here all day. I don’t know you. I know your brother killed Mrs. Jane. And what about those beautiful children, who no more have a mother? Please you tell them Maria said hello to them, but to you I say goodbye.”
    I reach for my wallet. I give her five hundred bucks. She takes three and gives me back two. “I have no debt,” she says. And I don’t know what she means.
    “I’ll tell the children,” I say.
    “Good,” she says. “Also, you need Mr. Clean and Windex.”
    “Thank you, Maria.”

    M onday morning, a truck pulls up outside the house, a white truck with a giant insect mounted on the roof. Two guys in white suits get out, unload large stainless-steel spray canisters, put masks over their nose and mouth, and walk towards the front door. Before they come to the door, one breaks right, the other breaks left, and they circle the house, spraying. Tessie’s bark and the sickening scent both prompt me to open the front door and call, “Can I help you?”
    With the first breath I draw, I feel my lungs shrink back; my eyes start to burn. The guys pull their masks off.
    “It smells horrible,” I say.
    “Who are you?” the second guy asks.
    “I was about to ask you the same thing.”
    “We’re under contract. Twice a year we come; the date was set months ago.”
    “Things have changed,” I say.
    “Too late now, we already started. Not the kind of thing you want to stop once you start. Breeds resistant bugs, bigger bugs—very bad things can happen.” Tessie barks.
    “Jesus, is the dog home too? Where’s the lady of the house? She always got the dog and the cat packed in the car. They take off for the day. This stuff is noxious; it’ll kill you if you sit in