Nobody's Fool

heavy coats and gloves. “I’m used to it,” he said, his voice prudently low. Actually, it was more than prudence that caused Ralph not to say it too loudly. There was also guilt. Saying “I’m used to it” felt like an admission, as if to suggest that they both saw Vera in the same unflattering light, which wasn’t true. Ralph wouldn’t have gone so far as to say that his wife was wrong to be upset. He’d have been upset himself if it had been any of his business, which it wasn’t, none of it. People
would
get themselves into fixes, was the way Ralph looked at it. Peter had gotten himself into one, and that was all there was to it. And since it was the kind of fix Ralph had no real experience with, he considered it morally imperativenot to suggest a resolution. Probably he’d suggest exactly the wrong thing. Vera, on the other hand, seemed to know what Peter should do, which was typical. His wife’s strong suit was providing other people a sense of direction, and this was what Ralph was really acknowledging when he said he was used to it. What he was used to was his wife knowing what to do next and making sure it got done.
    â€œYour mother just wants what’s best for you, is all,” he said.
    â€œI know,” Peter said, zipping Will’s jacket. The little boy, who had apparently had his throat zipped into his zipper at some point, always put his mittened hand beneath his chin to prevent it from happening again. Sully was right, of course, Peter reflected, the boy was scared of just about everything. “And that would be fine if she didn’t always assume she
knew
what was best for me. Me and everybody else,” he added, to indicate he understood that Ralph too suffered her certainty.
    â€œHeck,” Ralph shrugged. “It’s only love, is all it is.”
    Peter shook his head. “No, Pop, you’re wrong. It’s love, all right, but it’s not
only
love.”
    Ralph wasn’t sure he followed Peter’s distinction, but never mind. “Anyhow,” he said. “Don’t pay no attention to what she said. You know you’re welcome to stay here as long as you need to. This house is part mine too, and as long as it is, you and yours …”
    Ralph discovered he was unable to continue, his voice having suddenly constricted with complex and powerful affection for all concerned. Constricted with love. With only love.
    Peter studied his stepfather. “How do you do it, Pop?” he wondered. “How do you put up with it?”
    Ralph was grateful for the appreciation but had no idea how to respond to Peter’s question without seeming to grant another admission. “I’ll handle things here,” he said. “She never stays like this long. By tonight …” He let the statement trail off when he remembered who he was talking to. He might have been able to convince a stranger that things would be better by evening. But Peter knew his mother, and therefore he knew better. In truth, Ralph himself had never seen Vera more down than she was now. “I just hope we don’t get no more phone calls.”
    Peter looked down at the garage floor. “I have no idea how she got the number.” Actually, this was not true. It had occurred to him late last night that he’d called Deirdre collect over Thanksgiving. The number had probably appeared on her phone bill. Concerned as he was by the phone calls, they weren’t his worst fear, which was that Didi herself might show up, which she had in fact threatened to do.
    â€œHow’d you ever go and meet somebody like her?” Ralph asked. This was the question that had been puzzling him since the previous afternoon when he had taken the last of the calls and wished he hadn’t. Ralph had no firsthand experience with academic people, but he imagined them to be like the people he saw on the Albany educational channel on the cable. Vera liked watching that channel and was always contemptuous of Ralph when he had to confess after watching one of those drama shows for a full hour that he wasn’t too sure he understood what was going on. The way he figured it, everybody at Peter’s university probably talked the way they did on educational TV, and so he was not prepared when the young woman on the telephone who kept calling and demanding to talk to Peter and who apparently refused to believe that he wasn’t there