Even such a mild suggestion of fault-finding was noteworthy for Johanna, who having long ago chosen Walden for her children preferred not to question either its principles or its practices.
“Anyway, when I realized I wasn’t going to get there at four, I went to the school office and tried to call the show. I ended up talking to some PR office in Soho before they could get me connected to the Pavilion itself. I’m sorry, Salo.”
“No, don’t worry. I’m sure this isn’t our cup of tea, anyway.”
The “our” was a gift.
“I’ll just take a quick look and come home.” Perhaps, he thought, with his now-liberated hours, after a stop in Red Hook.
“Okay,” he heard her say. “I’m sorry, though. I was looking forward to it. Let me know if you see the one with the cut-out little girls.”
The harried person behind the desk was giving him some very unhappy attention. He was not yet reaching out his hand for the phone, but that had to be imminent.
“See you later.”
He expressed his thanks by purchasing a catalog, which indeed featured a cover photograph of a naked little girl shooting a rifle. Then he turned into the shock of another person, standing utterly still before him. Salo was significantly taller than this person, so he looked down.
“I heard your name called,” she said, the person. She was looking up at him: a woman, short, slight, African American. She wore the contemporary art uniform of black pants and black shirt, and had a video camera slung over one shoulder. Her other hand held a takeout cup of coffee.
“Yes?” said our father, automatically.
“It’s Salo, yes? Oppenheimer?”
“Yes,” said Salo, mystified.
“I don’t think you remember me,” she said.
You don’t think? I remember you? He gaped at her. Then it occurred to him: the wedding in Oak Bluffs. Where he had met Johanna. The bride had so many friends. Surely this was one of them.
“Oh, I do,” our father said, trying to persuade them both. “Martha’s Vineyard, right? The … wedding?” But now he couldn’t remember the name of the groom, his fraternity brother, let alone the bride. He’d lost touch with them both. And besides, after that weekend he was with Johanna, and the world had drawn itself around the two of them.
“Martha’s…？” said the woman. “No, I don’t think so. Not a wedding. I’m Stella. We were … I mean, I was. In the car. With you.”
It took a moment to land, and then another moment to release him, but by then he was lost to so many things: a clear sense of who he was, and where he was, and what he was supposed to be doing in the world. Because he had missed a signpost, a very, very important signpost, perhaps as far back as that long-ago morning, back past the years of tumbling through space while attempting to pass as a husband and father, back even further to that girl he hadn’t looked at, only an extra body in the back seat, only a shadow over his wrist as the Jeep rolled in the air. Here she was, standing in front of him, up to his shoulder, dressed in black and, appallingly, smiling at him. He would never have known her, not on the street or in the lobby of an “Outsider” art fair or anywhere else, but suddenly, now, it all came searing back at him. Her name was Stella.
“Stella,” he said.
An impatient man was actually pushing him aside, to get at the registration table.
“Excuse me,” this person said, gruffly, after the fact.
That smile. It was small, because her mouth was small, and her teeth were perfectly aligned. Too perfectly, he thought with new horror. Had her teeth been smashed? Were these new teeth, false teeth? He struggled to remember in what specific ways he had damaged her: arm, foot, concussion, suture.