The Axeman's Jazz

face, hard, harder than was reasonable for a woman her size. “Fucker! Dickhead! Fuckface!”
    He was getting creamed. He had his arms up to protect himself, he was trying to grab her flying fists, but she was fast, driven by an unsuspected fury.
    “Missy. My God! What have I done?”
    He thought later that it was the despair in his voice that stopped her. “Missy, I’m so sorry.” He held her by her elbows and watched her face turn from furious to frightened. Terrified. She looked at him as if he were Jack the Ripper and broke away.
    He reached for her, afraid that something in her had snapped, that she’d run to the edge and jump; but instead she climbed through the window that led back inside, clambering clumsily, bruising her bare legs in her panic. His impulse was to try to follow her, to soothe her, talk her down, but he resisted, knowing she was too far gone, that she hated him right now, that she was afraid of him.
    She has good reason.
    Sonny thought that he should be the one to jump off the building, that Missy had trusted him and he had betrayed her.
    Like what happened with Gan-Gan.
    But that wasn’t what happened with Gan-Gan.
    “You know it was, son. You killed your own grandfather.”
    I didn’t mean to!
    “You didn’t mean to upset Missy either. But you turned her from the sweetest girl in the world into a violent, cursing harpy.”
    He hadn’t realized how much his father’s voice echoed in his own brain.
    Later, when the call came, it didn’t seem real, it seemed like some crazy part of his mind that had somehow broken out and spilled over into life. His father had never phoned him at work before.
    “Sonny, you feeling okay? Missy called, said she’s worried about you.”
    “Missy called you?” How dare she! How dare she break the trust between them. They were two against the world, two against a lot of things, firm allies against his father.
    Okay. Okay, so she did it out of revenge. I betrayed her, so now she’d betrayed me. Now we’re even.
    But it didn’t feel even. He felt controlled, Missy’s marionette, Papa’s puppet—pull its strings or push its buttons, no matter, either way it’ll fall apart.
    “She said you seem awful depressed lately. She on the rag or something?”
    “I don’t understand why she called you.” He did, he just wanted to know what story she’d given him.
    “She said you were under terrific pressure from med school, from your rotation—which rotation, son? I don’t even know.”
    “What did she want you to do about it?”
    “I don’t know. She said she just needed to put it out there.”
    “Well, now she has.”
    “I got somethin’ to tell you, boy. Get rid of her.”
    “What?” He had heard it, but he couldn’t comprehend. “Get rid of her? Friday night you had our wedding all planned.”
    “She doesn’t want to marry you. She said that Friday night.”
    “She said what?”
    “You gotta face it, boy. For once in your life you gotta act like a grown-up and look at what’s happenin’ right before your eyes. The girl is not gonna marry you. She’s pretty, don’t get me wrong. Real pretty thing. Sweet thing. But she’s just not wife material. Into that weird religion and all. You’ve gotta forget her, son.”
    Even for his father, this was pretty strong stuff. Sonny said, “Dad, I want to ask you a question. I hope you won’t take it wrong, but this is pretty weird, what you’re saying.”
    “What do you mean, weird? You’re my son, I’m telling you what I know.”
    “Dad, are you drinking too much?” His face went hot the minute the words were out. He’d never spoken to his father that way.
    “What did you say to me?” Furious.
    “Well, Mama said she was in Al-Anon. I was just wondering.”
    “You leave your mother out of this!” He was yelling so loud Sonny had to hold the phone away from his ear.
    Sonny said he’d have to call back, his beeper had just gone off. He was shaking when he hung up; the conversation had upset him more than he realized.
    He had recognized words from his childhood, a phrase he’d heard a lot after he’d mouthed off, “talked back,” his father called it—“What did you say to me?”
    It was always shouted, always with eyes narrowed, face suffused, belt in hand, buckle out “so it’ll really hurt.” It had to be answered. If Sonny didn’t answer, his father would beat him until he said the words again, and then would beat him for saying them. If he did answer, they could