Jealousy

I’m hovering around a conversation that’s complimenting the size and beauty of this pecan tree, when someone else says, no, it’s an ash. I’m so bored. It’s possible I could identify an oak, but couldn’t care less. There is, however, this music in my ear, not in my head. I hear it. No one is playing the radio—it’s a party.

Generally, other people’s kids don’t interest me, but sometimes they get involved in interesting things! Take this drunk thirteen year old. I don’t care how he got that way, but his attempts at deception are entertaining. He exhibits the tell-tale signs and smells. Now he’s hugging the host, his mom’s friend. He’s slumped on the couch with his mouth open. He’s tiptoeing back to the cooler and only I see him. I don’t see myself in this little bastard though.

This could take a turn none of us will like, but we’re not there yet. I refuse to act because I hate accepting additional responsibilities.

However, I see the kid’s point—there’s a dullness about these festivities. Maybe it is the heat. What is the occasion?

Finally, here comes Grace, not in a little black dress, but a black dress nonetheless. She’s also wearing a baseball cap to change it up. She’s—legally—drinking a dragon fruit sangria and grimacing after each sip. Someone at the party is rich or at least fancy and brought it to share. Grace is not the type to pour it out.

“Do you hear that music?” I say. “Are you having fun?”

“I don’t, but I am,” she says. “Also, did you see that Clyde is hammered?”

That was the kid’s name, and now it all made sense. Years before, I had been his youth soccer coach because all the other dads wanted to coach football. Clyde rejected the rule about not using your hands, which made him terrible at the game. Also, after all these years, the thought of what’s under her black dress still excites. I’m anxious for that fragile moment when all the guests make a decision and a party is suddenly over. I’m waiting to attempt to unlock Grace’s hips.

But young Clyde is a rule breaker, a stance I’ve lost sympathy for.

Then, the rain starts, and strangely, instead of walking to our cars, we file into the kitchen, doubling down on this party.  Be careful—I’m losing interest. Of course, Clyde will be sick, wreck havoc, destroy personal property. But this music. It’s like the way a dog must hear with no understanding. I can not place the tune.

A year later, the same holiday, we are not invited to a party. Maybe there’s no party at all. We’re watching tv in bed by eight pm, and I ask Grace if she remembers the complete chaos caused by Clyde

“Who?” she says. “I remember Kyle.”

I don’t love this answer—I remember Kyle too. He had informed the party that he suffered from “climate grief,” and touched Grace’s hair in a corner of the kitchen. Had his fingers touched her neck as well? I saw what I saw.

What I know, what quite possibly I was the first to discover, was that Grace has a spot between her throat and her ear that really sparks her interest. I had chalked their encounter up to clumsy flirting, a small dig at me, the effects of that dragon fruit sangria. I had been dragging young Clyde out of the house into the rain.

As for the music, it persists, louder. It’s gotten so loud that I’ve seen an ear, nose and throat specialist. He gave me some drops and a cynical outlook.