The Heat

When my team lost I left the arena and drove to the beach. It wasn’t really a beach that I drove to. It was a street that died by the bay beneath mangroves. Kids went to get high, throw shit in the water. I wanted to throw something but all I had was a sandwich I planned to eat. There wasn’t much point in throwing a rock you found. Returning something that came from the water already. You want to make a change.

The sandwich was warm from the car and sopped with mayonnaise. I ate enough then threw the remainder to where it sank in the bay. I am watching my weight. A crew of kids came, and I said Hi, and I said, You got any weed? They did and weren’t happy to share but let me take a hit that did nothing and I said See ya though I knew I never would. Driving off I thought how a shark would eat my sandwich, or a bird, a cormorant maybe, its glossy neck bloating as the sandwich made its way down.

I got to my dad’s big house, empty since he died. The furniture had been sold and donated and the special pieces trucked off out of state to where my brother lived at a mock farm with two kids and a wife who, I’m not kidding, came onto me one night while my brother was sleeping and we were watching CSI: Miami in the Entertainment Barn. I said, Think of that. Miami. But we’re watching it here in Connecticut. She said, ha ha, then fell against me like a cat and like a cat crawled her body along mine to plant a kiss on my neck, grabbed at my leg beneath the flannel blanket. Grabbed at my dick beneath my J. Crew boxers with little bandanaed dogs on them beneath the flannel blanket, and she said, like in a movie, It’s you I’ve always wanted.

But the job thing, I said. You mean, she asked, that you don’t have one? Yeah, I said. But I should’ve said something else. Here’s the thing, I should’ve said, I’ve inherited half a house in Coral Gables and a decent chunk of money and yeah it’s not like I’m Managing Director and Head of Asian Markets but so what. That’s what I wish I said. But my dad hadn’t died yet.

The next day I left and when I did I came here to this house I hadn’t yet inherited. I told my dad, I want to learn the business. I learned some portion of it then got bored. I stopped learning it and got a job at a bike shop, lost that job, and moved into the back cottage of a white-wood metal-roofed mansion. Some folks I knew lived there and liked to have a person watching over it while they were in Aspen. Most of the time they were in Aspen. Then my dad died, and I moved back into his house. Like, I got this one over on him.

I grabbed a beer and sat myself on the little stone step leading down into the living room. I turned on the TV with my phone. Tight suits on men who’d played for years and still made a living from the game. They analyzed, and I checked the messages on my phone. From my brother: Showing Tomorrow 11AM. Please be up and out for it. And clean up your shit!!! Like three exclamation points were needed. You got it, brother, I said. Kill him with kindness. Let him feel in charge. Brother made it less personal somehow. A little mean, that was the trick.

The next morning I climbed an oak in the front yard and hid myself behind a curtain of Spanish moss. The realtor pulled up and out she hopped with her gleaming hair and then a couple, a man and woman, each in shorts and the sort of linen shirt you’d wear on a yacht in Italy in a photoshoot.

Then they looked right at the tree. The guy said, Believe it or not, I used to climb that tree as a kid. Really? The realtor asked, her voice high and held-at-gun-point happy. Yeah, the guy said, my friend lived here.

Me. I’m the friend, and this guy was my friend, Rufus. Roofie, I called him, though not anymore, because I hadn’t talked to him since high school.

Below me, they walked carefully around the yard. The realtor’s heels pitched into the damp earth.

Esoteric fucking guy, he told his wife, pinching the small of her back, getting just a finger of skin, like she was stitched tight.

What goes around comes around, said the realtor.

Yeah, the wife said, like karma.

Karma, Rufus said. I like that. Nice bromeliad, he said, peeling off a pink sliver of frond and rolling it in his hand.

Then they went inside.

I loosened up a little. Lay myself back on the branch, and I thought about where I’d go once the house sold. Costa Rica, maybe, to look for jaguars. Then I thought about what I’d do for the next week, while the team was on the road.

Nothing, was what I thought.

I want to get laid, was what I thought. So that night I called Rufus. Long time no speak, I said. Like a ghost, he said. I take it you heard I toured your old house? It’s still my house, I said.

I let the quiet linger for a while, but he didn’t speak.

Just wanted to tell you that I’m back in town, I said.

Didn’t know you left, he said.

Oh, I said, I left. You bet I left. I’ve been everywhere.

Nice, he said.

I was thinking we could get a drink or something, I said.

Well, he said.

Well what.

Nothing. So we made the plan for a place with walls of shining chrome and tufted banquettes and gem-toned velvet and orchids hung in faux-reed baskets from twenty-foot ceilings.

So, he said. You like this place?

I hadn’t had a sip of my yuzutini. I like the chicas, I said. That’s for sure. A big laugh, a little snort. I’m married, he said. You heard that?

My brother’s married too, I said.

A lot of people are, he said. He shifted his ass on the seat. Most, probably, by now.

Well, I said. I’m not.

A girl with short dark spiked hair scampered across the floor. She moved like she was dancing already.

Give me a sec, I said to Rufus.

I tried to walk quickly while looking slow. Roaming, too cool. I got to her at the bar. Offered to buy her a drink. Said, Say, do you like the Heat?

I’m just waiting for my boyfriend, she said.

I know that one, I said.

What one?

That one.

You know my boyfriend?

I don’t think so, I said. But I could. I know a lot of people.

Well, she said. Here he is.

I caught my face for a second in the mirror behind the bar. I looked stern and a little aloof and held that in a nice way, then I turned around. There in a cream-colored leisure suit was the tanned frame of my brother. Black hair in tight curls, Star of David finding light in his chest hair.

What the hell are you doing here? he said.

What the hell are you doing here? I said.

Uh, he said. I’m in Miami on business.

What’s going on? the girl said.

This is my brother, he said.

I’m his brother, I explained. Then touched her shoulder, for emphasis. Kismet! screamed the girl.

I always thought if I had a boat I’d name it Kismet, my brother said. That’s how I know you’re the one, the girl said.

Give us a sec, said my brother. Go powder your nose, whatever.

Off she walked, in that same swinging way, and disappeared behind a pyramid of tequila bottles backlit and glowing. Like a hive. Liquid swirled inside. Maybe after the house sells I’ll keep bees.

She’s pretty, I said. Is she even our age?

Our age? he said. We’re different ages.

It’s just, I said. You know what I mean.

He took a sip of my yuzutini. Then he looked at me. He caught my eyes and reeled them up to his.

You can’t tell my wife, he said.

How can you live with yourself? I asked.

Listen, he said. I’m not like this. It’s only that I know she was cheating on me. She confessed to a friend. I read her texts.

Damn, I said. You really read her texts?

Don’t ask me who with, he said. I don’t know and I don’t want to.

Not even a little? I asked.

So I returned to Rufus. We got a few more drinks. He got loose and wanted to find someplace else to go and so I said, Remember that place we’d go in high school? We went lots of places in high school, Rufus said.

By the water. The dead-end street. What was it we called that spot? Ha, Rufus laughed. The Tropics.

To the Tropics! I said.

Drunk in Rufus’ convertible, I closed my eyes. I was eighteen, and my brother was sixteen. Seniors could leave at lunch, and sometimes we’d go to The Tropics to smoke. My brother was too young to leave but he would hide in the trunk. Kids told of times that the guard checked trunks but nobody’d actually had it happen. So there we go with my brother in the trunk drained from debate nationals and running on three hours sleep three days straight, back at school now, mister professional. We’re grabbing tacos and we’re smoking in the car. It’s me and Rufus and a couple others, who cares. We get to The Tropics. Cute girl named Manuela who now goes by M hops out first and drops shorts then shirt and says, Don’t make it so obvious, and slips into the water. We look away for a sec then right back over. So we’re watching. We’re smoking. We’re making it not so obvious. We track her body as it cuts through the black water. Strong strokes, but she’d quit the swim team already. With distance and motion you can lose the white of her underwear. She gets out far and drops down and emerges again, shoots up from the water, her hair plastered tight to her head. Then she swims back. Lies herself on the hot pavement, and from the pavement says, Where’s your brother? We open the trunk. He’s asleep there, or he’s dead. I shake him awake. Hot skin, sweat-slickened. Gasping.

I was telling Rufus this. He was listening intently. I remember that day, he said. That’s when I fell in love with her…

With who?

Manuela. He laughed.

M, I think she preferred M.

That was just a high school thing.

How can you be so sure? I asked.

We’re married, he said.

Probably I said something. Congratulations. Good on you. Wow! What life brings you! But what I remember is getting out of the car. Then I was shin-deep in the muck, high-stepping it through the mangroves, gathering propagules in my hand, like this was some sort of environmental service project. The water got deeper and I reached the last of the mangroves. I looked out across the shaking bay. The lights of the arena shined to the sky, twirled, then roved the black of the water beneath. Slim wind brought the murmur of a crowd, but that could’ve been in my head. Then there was some movement on the white of the arena walls. A jumbotron came alive. From miles away, little figures in red and black dribbled and leaped and shot. I squinted my eyes to see. And I knew I had gotten it wrong. Tonight was a home game, and I had missed it. I began to cry crystal tears, balanced there on the curved woody roots of a mangrove, one arm clutching the trunk. I stood there like an explorer. One by one I tossed propagules into the water. Go forth, I said, be free, but I knew they would root wherever they hit ground.