Knitting Under the Influence

Sari nodded and moved forward, trying to conceal her discomfort. She knew her friends had deliberately left her alone with him, and she could have slit their throats for doing it so obviously.

After a moment, Jason said, “The funny thing is, ‘Fat and wore overalls’ did it for me. I remember her now.”

“She wasn't that fat,” Sari said, a little wearily.

“It was probably just the overalls. She's certainly not fat now. Not an ounce on her.”

“No.”

“Was I really an asshole?” he said. “Is that how people remember me?”

Sari searched for a response. “Do you care?” she finally said.

He gave a short laugh. “That answers that.” She was silent and he said after a moment, “I mean, I know I wasn't a saint, or anything. I probably did some pretty shitty things. But it was high school. Who didn't? We were all just trying to impress each other, right? It was a crazy, awful time for everybody.” Sari stayed silent. This wasn't a conversation she wanted to have with him. So she didn't say anything, just let him stumble along for a few moments and then gradually fade into silence.

The park was mostly empty, except for the autism walkers, who were strung out along the path. Ultimately, they would make a big circle, ending up back at the same wide grassy field where they had cut the ribbon to start the walk-which seemed very appropriate to Sari. Years had gone by and here she was, right back where she had started, hating Jason Smith and being aroused by his very presence.

Her silence went on for too long, and Jason said, “Everything all right?”

“I’m fine,” she said. “I’m glad it didn't rain. We got good weather for the walk.”

“I don't even know who the money's going to,” he said. “And, to be honest, I didn't have time to get any sponsors. It's just… I saw a flyer at the clinic. So I asked Shayda if she knew whether you were going, and she said she thought so. So I came.”

“It's a good excuse to take a walk,” she said.

“It's a good excuse to see you away from the clinic.”

Another silence. Then Sari said, “Zack's been awfully quiet.”

Jason glanced down. “He gets that way in the stroller. Very mellow and relaxed. Sometimes, when the day feels like it's been endless, I just throw him in and we walk for hours.”

She craned her neck to see into the stroller. “I think he might be asleep.”

“I wouldn't be surprised. He was up at four this morning.”

“Oh, man,” she said. “That's too early. Did he go back to sleep?”

“Neither of us did.”

“Does that happen a lot?”

“Constantly.”

“You should have told me he was having sleep issues. We have some strategies for dealing with them.”

“Really? Like what?”

“Like not letting him nap during the day,” she said.

“Now she tells me.” There was a pause. “I wasn't even supposed to have him today. Denise was. But she said she had to work. On a Saturday morning, she has too much work to-” He stopped.

“I’d like to meet Denise,” Sari said. “Show her what we're doing with Zack.”

“I tell her what I can,” he said. “She's not with him enough for it to matter.”

“Why isn't she?” Then: “I’m sorry. If you don't want to talk about it-”

“Are you kidding? I’m desperate to talk about it. I’m just afraid that if I start, I won't be able to stop. You may run away from me screaming.”

“I doubt it.” She instantly regretted saying that because it sounded flirtatious. But she was curious.

“We'll see,” he said. “Anyway, the thing about Denise is… How do I describe her?” He thought for a moment. “Perfect. She's perfect.”

“No one's perfect.”

“Not her, then. Her life. Her life was perfect. Up until this”- he gestured down at the stroller-”everything in her life was perfect. First of all, she's really beautiful. We met in college and she was just the most-” He stopped. “Doesn't matter. She's beautiful, is all. And smart and talented and athletic and funny and basically just good at everything. So she figured she'd be good at the mommy thing, too. Better than anyone else. Meanwhile, I didn't even want a kid. That's the real joke of this whole thing. I didn't think I was ready.” His mouth curled briefly into a humorless grin. “I’m sure you'll be shocked to hear I’m not the most mature guy in the world. Before we had Zack, I was still getting drunk a lot on the weekends and my career wasn't working out, but I kept thinking what the fuck, I was still young, I didn't have to grow up yet. But Denise just kept moving ahead. In every way she could.”

“What does she do?”

“She's a TV executive. She started as someone's assistant right out of college and kept getting promoted like every six months. And now she has her own assistant. And treats him like shit, I might add.” He swatted at a fly near his face. “Anyway, she talked me into having a kid. She said any child of ours would be amazing, and it seemed-well, it's obnoxious to say, but it seemed like a kid of ours probably would be.”

“It's not obnoxious,” Sari said.

“Yeah, it is. At any rate, she talked me into the whole thing. And when she got pregnant, she was totally into it. She did yoga and drank milk and basically just did everything right. And then Zack was born and he was a really cute baby-”

“He's still amazingly cute.”

“Yeah, I know. But pretty soon things started being weird with him.” He glanced at her. “You know how the story goes. And Denise just couldn't deal.” He thought for a moment, the two of them walking in rhythm, his fingers tapping on the stroller handlebar like he was typing. Then he said, “No, that's not fair. She tried to connect to him at first, but he kept getting worse and eventually it was easier for her to just go to work and let me or Maria take care of him. And when he got diagnosed, I think it just-” He shrugged. “You know. She had always been this golden girl and now she was failing at something.”

“It's not a question of failing,” Sari said.

“Strangely enough, I got that,” Jason said. “I didn't feel like I had failed. I just felt like I wanted to make it better. As soon as possible. But she… You know what she said to me before she moved out?”

“What?”

“She said she was too sensitive to stay. That it hurt her too much to look at him and know he'd never be like the other kids and that's why she had to go. Like the only reason I could stay with him was that I didn't care as much as she did.”

“That's kind of bullshit,” Sari said.

“Thank you for saying that. I’ve never- Uh, excuse me?” This last was to a guy who was kneeling on the pathway in front of them, tying his shoe. The guy jumped up.

“Sorry,” the guy said. “Didn't see you. Oh, hey, Sari!”

“Jeff,” she said, her heart sinking at the sight of her ex-boyfriend. “What are you doing here?”

“Same thing as you, I assume. The autism walk, right?” He kissed her on the cheek. “I was hoping I might see you here.” He looked pretty much the same as the last time she'd seen him, his back shaped like the letter C, his hair still badly cut and combed all wrong-there was even a familiar sheen of greasy perspiration on his forehead. Fortunately, he no longer looked like she had just socked him in the stomach the way he had the last time she saw him, when she had broken up with him.

It was hard not to compare him to Jason, who stood a head taller, his shoulders wide under a simple V-neck black sweater, his thick hair tousled and wavy. When his eyes caught the sun, they were this unbelievable shade of blue…

Sari suddenly realized that both men were watching her, waiting for her to say something. “I didn't know you were involved with GRAY,” she said quickly. GRAY stood for Get Rid of Autism Yesterday, the name of the organization sponsoring the event.

“Are you kidding?” Jeff said. “They've funded most of our research. I’m fairly certain I told you that.” He had an aggrieved tone to his voice, like she owed him that at least-to remember things he had told her back when they