524
PARTISAN REVIEW
his hundreds of outer space toys: robots, plastic spaceships, polyethy–
lene monsters. Benny is a well-behaved boy, a little shy, reticent but
attentive around strangers. He gets straight As in school, loves history
and social studies.
In
a serious moment I can picture him in khaki
pants, a button-down shirt, long dark hair, books under his arm, walk–
ing along some Ivy League campus with a girl friend who admires his
sensitivity. Is this what Ross looked like some twenty years ago?
When we walk from his room into the hallway, we catch a glimpse
of Ross and Evelyn in the living room, holding hands on the couch.
When Ross leans over
to
kiss Evelyn on the neck, Benny and I both
cringe a little: I can feel our bodies freeze simultaneously. We look at
each other, break into nervous laughter, then cup our hands over our
mouths and retreat to his room. "Do they do this often?" I ask him.
He thinks for a moment, then says, "All the time. Didn't you and
Evelyn?"
"In the beginning, yes. And your mother?"
Benny does not answer. He leans back on the bed, hands folded
behind his head, lost in thought. I think I can detect the discomforting
sting of memory in his distracted expression: the effects of family
conflicts, the way I might have felt after arguments with Evelyn , or
after witnessing my own parents' arguments. I want to reach out to
him, but fear I've already gone too far. "Do you want to talk?" I ask
him.
"About what? " he says, turning on his portable television. It's
time for "Space 1999," one of his favorite shows, so I lean back on his
bed with him and watch it.
I take Benny to the Park,
to
the Cloisters, to the movies to see
Star
Wars
(his seventh time, my first). At first Evelyn seems pleased by the
attention I give Benny, but on the night of the TV volume discussion,
when I suggest taking Benny to a Mets game, she eyes me suspiciously
and asks, "Why are you taking Benny so many places, Michael? I
thought grown-ups and children had nothing in common."
"No fair," I say. "That was a long time ago ."
"And why, of all things, a baseball game? "
"You know how much I like baseball. "
"No I didn't," she says, but as we're edging toward the door she
shrugs her shoulders and lets us go.
Actually I haven't been to a ballgame since I was thirteen, a time
when I ate, slept, and breathed baseball.
It
was the only game my father
ever took me
to,
the Giants' last at the Polo Grounds. "This is not just
