Sarah Court by Craig Davidson Page B

drunken loft above his
head, urged Nicholas to jump and touch it.
    “Hold straight, Frank. It’s hanging all crookedass.”
    Saberhagen set his Flatliner down and used both
hands. Nick came up short.
    “Abby’s turn.”
    “You get two tries,” he said. “No-no, wait—three.”
    “Making up the rules as we go, Quincy?”
    “Three tries, Fletch. Olympic rules.”
    On the second attempt Saberhagen bent his
knees so Nick could touch.
    “Foul! Running rigged contests here at casa de
Saberhagen?”
    “If I bent my knees,” he filibustered, “I’m not
saying I did, but if —we can all agree to it being an
honest error. I’ve got fluid buildup on my left knee.”
    Nick made a fair touch. I reached for the
Measuring Stick. Saberhagen balked.
    “I’ll hold for Abby, why not?”
    “She’s my daughter. Fathers hold for their kid.”
    You’d
have
thought
my
request
was
in
contravention of the nonexistent rulebook.
    “Look, Fletch, now seriously: I’m two inches
taller.”
    “Your elbows were all crooked-ass.”
    “ Like hell they were crooked-ass.”
    Eventually he gave over the stick. Abigail missed
her first attempt.
    “Put your legs into it, Abby.” Another miss. “For
heaven’s sake. Jell-O in those legs? Tuck your shirt
in”—the bastard was right: she did have a little
pudding belly—“ and touch . . . the . . . stick .”
    A third miss. Quincy whooped it up. I wanted to
twist his head off like a bottlecap.
    “That’s what I’m talking about,” he told his son.
“Old-fashioned balls.”
    “Butter churns,” I seethed, “and horehound
candies are old-fashioned. Am I to take it that, what,
your son’s got a pair of steam-driven testicles?”
    A belly laugh from Saberhagen. Too late I realized
he’d accomplished his main, if not sole, ambition of
that afternoon: pissing me off.
    “Next,” he said, “feats of strength.”
    In a corner of the garage was a stack of paint cans
labelled Bongo Jazz . The hue of afflicted organ meat.
To be inside Saberhagen’s house was to inhabit a
diseased pancreas. We settled on paint can hammer
curls. Nick staked himself to an early lead.
    “Twenty-three,
twenty-four,”
counted
Saberhagen.
“Look at Hercules go!”
    Abby’s biceps muscle was a hard lump under her
sleeve. “How long do I have to go, Dad?”
    “Longer than him.”
    “Daddy,” Nick said, “my arm’s hurting.”
    “Don’t call me Daddy, please.”
    Abby’s fingers whitened round the paint can
wire. Only her circulation temporarily cut off. Nick
dropped his can. Twisty veins radiated from his
elbow joint. Abby showed no signs of flagging. Arms
raised, I jogged a victory lap of the garage.
    “Quit carrying on like she’s Sybil Danning,” said
Frank.
    Best part of waking up in a strange bed is how you
lay emptied of personal history. Literally forget who
you are. Then, spiderlike, your brain gathers every
trapping of your miserable history and entombs it in
your skull. You’re you again.
    James slept in the bunk below mine curled up
like a potato bug. I’m unsure why I’ve invited him
aboard, other than my inability to face the coming
days alone. He shares DNA strands in keeping with
Saberhagen and myself. At a certain age a man
welcomes into his life those who are dimmer or more
intense reflections of his self. That way, the views he
holds are seldom challenged.
    We spend the day on the Trent-Severn Waterway.
I cut the motor with the sun at its peak. Cones of
midges coil off the water. James strips and dives
in. Matilda follows. They come onboard covered in
snotlike algae. It dries to a green transparency they
variously lick or peel off.
    Of all my features, my eyes are nicest. They
can be transplanted, which I wasn’t aware of until
recently. Keratoplasty, it’s called. Only the corneas.
Topmost layer peeled off like skin off a grape, scar
tissue and ocular bloodclots removed, donor cornea
stitched to the recipient’s