A Fool's Errand - Part 2

Jimmy would be staying with his stepdaughter and her new husband for the duration of his visit, which had its good points, but also presented a few challenges. The house he and his family had abandoned was within walking distance; this was one of the good points, considering he had been denied the use of Angelique's car. Years of experience had taught her the dangers of lending vehicles to Jimmy; he was one of those people who somehow damage everything they touch. It wasn't purposeful so much as the predictable result of carelessness, and he was clumsy besides. Jimmy had never been able to admit these traits to himself, and so would become hostile at the insinuation. This by itself resulted in tension, but when all the other factors were thrown into the mix—wounds dating back to his stepdaughter's early childhood in some cases—the result was an oppressive atmosphere of unresolved conflict, pain, and alienation.

As you might expect, communication was nonexistent, at least in any meaningful sense. Words were exchanged, but they were only symbolic approximations; they weren't intended to impart knowledge, or even information. In fact, Jimmy's words—when he spoke at all—were more likely to obscure facts and circumstances than illuminate them. Over the years, he had learned to disavow any knowledge of anything, because doing otherwise almost always resulted in full-out warfare with his wife, and he was never the winner in that war. In a moment of drunken indiscretion, he had once referred to Katrina as "a jackbooted thug," but he had been alone in the bathroom at the time, and so had not been held accountable for the treacherous blasphemy. Still, the idea that she might somehow discover the treason, even after so many years, held Jimmy in a paralyzing grip. The only way he could escape the terrible possibility was to pick up the remote and drop into the rabbit hole of cable TV.

It was for all these reasons that Jimmy spent the entire time at his stepdaughter's house gazing at the television, his face frozen in a mask of childlike awe and wonder. Unwilling—and probably unable—to communicate on any meaningful level, his response to virtually any question was generally limited to the same three words, uttered during brief pauses in the television characters' scripts.

Angelique: "So, how long are you going to be in town?"

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "Are you going to work on the house? Fix the windows?"

Jimmy: "What?"

Angelique: "Mom said you were here to work on the house so it could be sold."

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "She said you're paying $1,800 a month for rent. You must need the money."

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "And a houseful of new furniture?"

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "Whatever. You're planning to see your new granddaughter, right?"

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "Heard any news about your brother? Is he still a crack whore?"

Jimmy: "Pray hard."

Angelique: "What?"

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "How's the new dog? Getting big?"

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "Is that pilot still living with you guys? She has a kid, right?"

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "Mom said you lost your job. What happened?"

Jimmy: "I don't know."

Angelique: "Oh for . . . what does that mean?"

Jimmy: "What?"

Angelique: "I give up."

Jimmy: "What?"

Every so often, Jimmy managed to tear himself away from the TV just long enough to go over to the old house and think about what needed to be done in order to sell it. Unfortunately, thinking was as far as he ever got with the job, and an hour or two of that was more than enough to drive him out again. Then it was back to his stepdaughter's place, back to the chair in front of the TV, and back to the altered state of consciousness that had become, for him, everyday reality.