This Is Where I Leave You

since then. I have a feeling her next voice mail will break new ground.

    Thursday

Chapter 10
    I have a recurring dream in which I’m walking down the street, all footloose and fancy-free, when I look down and realize that beneath my pants, one of my legs is actually a prosthesis, molded plastic and rubber with a steel core. And then I remember, with a sinking feeling, that my leg had been amputated from the knee down a few years back. I had simply forgotten. The way you can forget in dreams. The way you wish you could forget in real life but, of course, can’t. In real life, you don’t get to choose what you forget. So I’m walking, usually out on Route 120 in Elmsbrook, past the crappy strip malls, the mini golf, the discount chains, and the themed restaurants, when I suddenly remember that I lost my leg a few years ago, maybe cancer, maybe a car accident, whatever. The point is, I have this fake leg clamped to my thigh, chafing at my knee where my calf used to descend. And when I remember that I’m an amputee, I experience this moment of abject horror when I realize that when I get home I will have to take off the leg to go to sleep and I can’t remember ever having done that before, but I must do it every night, and how do I pee, and who will ever want to have sex with me, and how the hell did this even happen anyway? And that’s when I will myself awake, and I lie there in bed, sweaty and trembling, running my hands up and down both legs, just making sure. Then I get up to go to the bathroom, even if I don’t have to, and the cold bathroom tiles against my heels are like finding fifty bucks in a jacket pocket from last fall. 84These are the rare moments when it actually still feels good to be me. And sometimes during my waking hours I think, wouldn’t it be something if this life was just a dream too? And somewhere there’s a more complete and happy and slimmer version of me sleeping in his bed, next to a wife who still loves him, the linens twisted up around their feet from their recent lovemaking, the sounds of their children’s light snoring filling the dimly lit hallway. And that me, the one dreaming of this version, is about to shake himself awake from the nightmare of my life. I can feel his relief like it’s my own. 7:43 a.m.
    There is nothing more pathetically optimistic than the morning erection. I am depressed, unemployed, unloved, basement-dwelling, and bereaved, but there it is, every morning like clockwork, rising up to greet the day, poking out of my fly cocksure and conspicuously useless. And every morning, I face the same choice: masturbate or urinate. It’s the one time of the day where I feel like I have options. But this morning I can hear the low groan of the floorboards above me, the rhythmic creak of the sofa bed in the den - Phillip and Tracy enjoying some early morning, pre-shiva coitus - and my options are whittled down to none. I can hear Tracy’s muffled voice groaning something over and over again as they gather momentum. The first song that comes to mind is “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and I hum it loudly to drown out the muffled cries and grunts seeping through the ceiling as I flee to the linoleum safety of the closet-sized bathroom. I’m still pissing when I reach the home of the brave, so I loudly hum the theme to Star Trek in a continuous loop until I’ve washed my hands and brushed my teeth. When I emerge, the noise has subsided and my mother is sitting on the edge of my bed in the kind of short, satin bathrobe you’d want to see on your twenty-three-year-old girlfriend.
    “Sleep well?” she says.
    “Not really.”
    Upstairs the creaking begins again. Mom looks up at the ceiling and smiles at me. “That boy,” she says, shaking her head fondly. “Tracy must be forty-five if she’s a day. Obviously, he’s working through some mother issues.” She leans forward, and the satin lapels of her robe spread, revealing the large D cups she had installed about fifteen years ago. She’d discovered a lump that turned out to be benign and somehow converted the experience into an excuse to upgrade her breasts. She hasn’t worn a bra since.
    “Mom!” I say, looking away. “Cover up, will you?”
    She looks down, lovingly surveying the promontories of her age inappropriate breasts like she would an infant grandchild, before unhurriedly refastening her robe. “You were always something of a prude,”
    she says.
    “It’s a mystery to me why anyone in this