Down in the Zero

'An old girlfriend of mine, she's a doctor. Told me if I was gonna smoke, this is what I needed to do.'

'Be better to quit smoking,' he said, with all the superiority of someone who fucks up his life twelve ways from Sunday but doesn't share your bad habits.

I didn't say anything, just crunched my crackers, popped the pills, chased them down with the water. The kid joined me at the table, started on his meal without much enthusiasm.

'You expect the cops?' I asked him.

'No, they didn't come around before, why should I?'

'I don't know. I don't know how things work around here. It's just that if they do, you may need to explain me…what I'm doing here, see?'

'Sure. I'll say you're the caretaker. It won't be any big deal.'

'It could be if they run my sheet.'

'Huh?'

'I've got a record, kid.'

'Oh. I mean…I kind of figured that.'

'Did you?'

'Well, from what my mother said…'

I looked a question at him, waiting.

'She didn't say you were a criminal or anything. Just that you could…take care of things. I know in her business, she had to deal with some pretty heavy people, so…'

'Her business?'

'When she was young. Before she had me. In England, where she lived.'

'What business was that?'

'You know,' he gave me a quizzical look. 'She was a gem dealer. Traveled all over the world. That's when she met you, right? When you worked as a bodyguard?'

'Right,' I told him.

'Were you…close with my mother?'

'It was a long time ago, kid.'

'I know, but…'

'What? You want to know if we were lovers?' Softening it for him if that's what he needed.

'Lovers? Like romance? No. I want to know did you have sex with her?' he asked, looking at me head–on for the first time that day.

'That's your mother's privacy you're talking about,' I said.

'Privacy? My mother? You have to be kidding. I was just curious, that's all. She never has sex with men.'

'She must have…at least once.'

'Yeah, with a turkey baster,' he laughed, a feathery undercurrent to his voice. 'Artificial insemination. My mother's gay. She told me, a long time ago. She said she wanted a baby, but she didn't want a man. That's why I was wondering…if she ever did.'

'I get it,' I told him, not answering his question. 'Your father, was he…?'

'No. It was an anonymous donor, she told me. She was married once, but it was for money. The guy was gay too— he wanted her for a beard. I guess the joke was on him, huh? I don't know who my father is.

'You mean your biological father?'

'That's what I mean— I don't know whose genes I have in me.'

'Neither do I,' I told him.

'You were adopted?'

'No.'

'Then how …?'

'I was raised by the State. In an institution.'

'Like a foster home?'

'Like a jail.'

'Oh.' He got up, busied himself with loading the dishwasher for a minute. 'You ever wonder about it? Who your father was?' he asked over his shoulder.

'No.'

'I do,' he said, coming back to the table. 'All my mother could tell me was that he had a very high IQ. It was a special sperm bank. Very expensive. She had it done in Switzerland.'

'You already got all you're going to get from him,' I told the kid.