I started taking quite a few days off, actually. Being a privatecontractor allowed me some freedom, but really it was just about being withDenny. You know, being a good dad.
This is the part of the story where I suppose it won’t surpriseyou to learn that my dad was a violent shit? Nah, I’m messing with you. He wasfine, no daddy issues for me. Steady job at a bank, always taking me for icecream and baseball games. Good advice. The works.
He always did want to be a granddad, though, shame he didn’t livelong enough.
Anyway, before you think I’m some sort of weirdo, I did do someindependent research on the row house and on Denny. And speaking of daddyissues, it only took me about twenty minutes on Google to figure out that Dennywas murdered by his dad, a carpenter named Benjamin. It was a big thing inManchester back at the turn of the last century, the library had a whole folderon it. Thing is, nobody knows why. Seemed like a perfectly normal guy, workedon some of the original mills. Church guy. Denny was an only child and his momhad died of consumption or one of those horrible things we don’t have any more.
Then one day, the kid just shows up dead on the front porch, headall bashed up. They trace the weapon back to one of the dad’s carpentryhammers. Denny’s father killed himself before he could be hanged.
Want to hear about another weird part of the story? Nobody knewDenny even existed before he turned up dead. I mean, obviously he existed butas near as I could tell from the newspaper articles, nobody knew the coupleeven had a child. Easier to hide back then I suppose, but still, poor kid,right? Basically, Denny lived his whole life inside his house, my house, hiddenfrom the outside world.
Well, I determined to not let that happen.
* * *
First, I had to do something about that head wound. You see, Dennywas real, by which I mean when he was present, you could touch him, put yourarm around him. He wasn’t pale or ghostly, his lips weren’t blue, he didn’twalk through walls or float. He didn’t eat but that didn’t matter much.
So, one evening, this must have been maybe three months ago, Dennyand I were hanging out in the living room playing cards, when I decided tobring up the subject again.
“Denny, I want to talk to you about something, but I need you topromise to stay with me,” I said. “It won’t be scary. Can you do that?”
“I think so, Sam,” he said. I noticed that he slid a bit closer tome. The kid scared easy and didn’t like talking about how he died. But that’sparenthood, right? Sometimes you have to have the tough conversations.
“I was thinking maybe we get you some new clothes for you,something you’d like.” I paused and held my breath waiting for him to pop away.“And a hat.”
“You mean to cover my brain up, Sam?”
“Well look, Denny, people wouldn’t understand a little boy likeyou just playing outside or whatever with a, if you are, you know….”
“Dead.” The word dropped out of his mouth like a dead weight. “ButI’m just me, Sam.”
He started to cry, so I just pulled him to me and let him have agood wail on my shoulder. I was careful to not touch the back of his head. Asmuch as I loved the kid, I got queasy by looking at that thing. But I’ll tellyou, the fact that we were talking about it and he didn’t just disappear rightthen and there gave me some hope.
“It’s OK, Denny, I won’t let anythinghappen to you. I love you, kid.”
That was the first time I said those words, I surprised even myself.But I really did love him. He really was my son.
“You do?”
I nodded.
“I love you too, Sam,” he said between sniffles. “OK, we can get new clothes.”
I was elated! I spent an afternoon at the mall picking up somejeans and T-shirts, cool stuff that a littlemodern boy might like. I was so excited I even just blurted out to the cashierat Sears that I was picking up some clothes for my son.
“That’s nice!” she said.
It felt good to say that word. Son.
I admit that by this time I wasn’t really working at all. I hadsome money saved up from past jobs and was putting a lot on my only creditcard, but I wasn’t worried. Work would still be out there later, after Dennyand I really had the time to get to know each other.
Back at the house, Denny was there, just inside the door, waitingfor me. I unpacked all the bags and laid out the clothes for him. He selected aregular pair of jeans, Lee because that’s what I wear, and a Spiderman T-shirt. For a hundred-plus-year-old kid, he was pretty well-versed in all the latestsuperheroes and fads. I bought him three different hats: a wool knit pull down with a Boston Bruins logo on it, a wide sunhat that had one of those flaps that hung down to his neck, and a baseball hatwith a closed snap in the back. He picked the baseball hat.
“Don’t worry,” he said, seeing the look on my face, “I’ll wear thesweatshirt with the hood over it!”
So that’s what he did. There was a long floor mirror in the fronthall and after he had dressed we posed in front of it for a picture. That’s thepicture I showed you, the one with my arm around him. I’ve looked at thatpicture often since that day. Turns out
