The Shoe on the Roof Read online

  Down here. That was the neighbourhood’s unofficial name. Rents were cheaper down here, hence the proliferation of dollar stores, payday loans, pawnshops, and—equally insolvent—artist’s studios. But a larger gentrification process had already begun, and the gallery Amy worked at was just edgy enough to be hip, and just hip enough to be expensive.

  She was holding up a Cubist painting by a Cuban artist (“Cubanist,” as it was known) for a local dowager to consider—“This would go well in any room, really”—when she saw Thomas coming directly at her, like an arrow.

  Poor Thomas. In the instant their eyes met, his determination collapsed. Instead of striding forth with a confident air, he rushed headlong into it, spilling out his words unchecked.

  “I texted,” he said, voice unnaturally high. “I called and I called and I texted, and I waited outside your building and you never answered. We need to talk.”

  “No,” she said. “We don’t.”

  She turned to leave but Thomas blocked her way. The customer, caught in the crossfire, slipped aside with an embarrassed look. “I’ll, ah, come back later . . .” she said.

  Amy tried again to slip free, Thomas again stopped her. He could see the doors closing, one by one, in her eyes, behind her gaze. “Please,” he said. “Not like this.” He tried to explain (to her, to the others, to himself most of all) that what had happened was only a misstep, a hiccup, not fatal. “There’s nothing between us that can’t be fixed.”

  He was remarkably handsome, the man who stepped between them. Streamlined facial features, artfully tousled hair. A fucking turtleneck, no less. Who the fuck wears a fucking turtleneck? He worked at the gallery with Amy. What was his name? Larry? Lewis? Something forgettable, anyway.

  The man put his fingers, lightly, against Thomas’s chest. “Easy now . . .”

  Thomas caught the trace of an accent. German? Dutch? Something insufferable. Even his haircut had an accent.

  Thomas talked past him. “Amy, we need to work this out.”

  “No,” she said. “We don’t. We really don’t.”

  Thomas tried to get closer, but the handsome man blocked his way. “Relax, okay?”

  “You relax.” Not the best retort, admittedly. What Thomas might have said, should have said, was Hey, dickwad, why don’t you transfer your sexual inadequacies onto someone else? She doesn’t need rescuing. But instead he pushed on, pleading his case—badly. “Amy, we need to talk about the baby.”

  At this, the other man’s arm dropped away. Even he was taken aback by this.

  Amy stepped in, face distraught. “There was no baby. Don’t you see? I drew it, with a pen. The blue line on the— I had to know. And now I do.”

  Thomas felt his knees give out. She kept talking but he couldn’t hear. It was the ocean in a conch shell, the static between stations. He turned away, drunkenly, left the way he’d come. If a plane crashes on the border, where do you bury the survivors?

  CHAPTER SIX

  YOU DON’T BURY SURVIVORS.

  It was a riddle from Thomas’s youth, one asked of him by men with clipboards who nodded approvingly at his answer.

  But that was a long, long time ago. Today, a cartoon sun in sunglasses was giving viewers a cheery thumbs-up. “Good morning, Boston! Your local forecast is next. Warm fall weather is on its way!”

  Thomas always wondered why cartoon suns wore sunglasses. It made no sense. The winter forecasts featured a snowman with a scarf. Rain was a duck with an umbrella. Snowmen might get cold, and ducks might get wet. But a sun radiates light. Why would it need sunglasses? He never could figure that out.

  Thomas was waiting in the muffled silence of City TV’s morning show. It had been years since Thomas had been inside a television studio, but it was still a familiar world. He was always struck by the empty intimacy of such places, cavernous and crowded at the same time. Thomas hung back, beside a wall of television monitors. Various feeds showed interchangeable reporters standing by. No sound. He looked for a volume control, but found none. Illuminated in the liquid glow of television screens, he watched as the monitors rolled over, one by one, onto a single image: a well-dressed gentleman with stone-cut features, heavy brow and greying hair, a lapel mic, pinned appropriately. Here was a man awaiting his moment. Here was a man sitting imperiously, posture perfect, back straight, without a flicker of doubt or a fidget of worry. A title appeared on the screen: DR. ROSANOFF, author of “The Good Son.”

  A predictably perky blonde with bulletproof hair was reading an intro off the teleprompter. She turned to Dr. Rosanoff with a practiced smile and Dr. Rosanoff began to speak. Thomas turned his attention away from the monitors to the studio itself, but he still couldn’t hear what was being said. The host and her guest sat ringed by a circle of light, and Thomas could catch only the occasional interjection from the host, delivered with more punch than necessary. “Really?” “Wow!”

  The floor manager walked past, a balding man with headphones; every floor manager that ever lived. When he spotted Thomas, he hurried over.

  “What are you doing here? We’re live. The greenroom’s that way. We’ll call you when it’s time.”

  “I’m not a guest.” Then, referring to the monitors: “How do I get sound?”

  “What? No, no, no, out you go. I don’t know how you managed to get in, but—” He was interrupted by the voice of Dr. Rosanoff echoing behind them.

  “Tommy? Is that you?”

  On set, they’d gone to commercial and Dr. Rosanoff was peering through the darkness, shielding his eyes with his book. “It is!”

  Thomas stepped into a pool of light, lifted his hand in greeting. “Hey, Dad.”

  And that was when the floor manager realized who he’d been hectoring. “Oh my God. If you’re his son, then you must be the . . .”

  Dr. Rosanoff was calling to Thomas, eyes still shielded. “We’ve got one more segment. It won’t take long. It’s good to see you.”

  They began the countdown out of commercial. “Five . . . four . . .” and then, silently, on fingers, three . . . two . . . one.

  “And we’re back!”

  The floor manager sidled closer to Thomas, whispered breathlessly, “So you must be . . . You’re the . . .”

  “You can say it.”

  “The Boy in the Box. My God, I feel like I know you. Don’t go anywhere. I have a copy of the book, it’s right here. One of our giveaways.” He fumbled with the same heavy book that Thomas’s father had been holding up: The Good Son, by Dr. Thomas Rosanoff, PhD. His father’s face filled the entire front cover. The floor manager clicked his pen at Thomas, smiled awkwardly. “Would you mind? Murray. That’s my name. My wife and I, when we had the twins, this was like our Bible. Would you write something?”

  Thomas signed the book while barely looking. Later, when Murray checked what had been written, he would find the following message: “Dear Murray, Fuck off. Best wishes, Thomas.”

  Sound was leaking out of one of the monitors, faint but audible, and Thomas leaned in to listen, so closely that the image on the screen became pixelated and began to break up.

  The host with the helmet of hair was asking, “It’s been twenty years since the first edition. Ten years since the second. Does it feel that long? Or do you figure, ‘What the heck, I’m not going to worry about—’ ”

  “And still in print,” Dr. Rosanoff noted. “Twenty years and still in print.” He smiled, teeth brilliantly white in the studio light. Nice teeth. Expensive teeth. “It’s been revised several times, of course, but overall, the crux of the matter, the approach to early childhood development and socialization, that hasn’t changed. This new edition includes all the latest developments in the fields of nutrition, neurobiology, juvenile medication, and so forth. I’m quite pleased with how it holds up.”

  “That’s the real test, isn’t it? The test of time. How does that make you feel? To know that you’ve written—well, a classic, really. And Tommy. How does he feel? It’s his childhood on display, af
ter all.”

  Dr. Rosanoff looked off-camera, to where he imagined Thomas might be standing, lost in the glare, and he smiled with fatherly—and academic—pride. “The success of young Tommy speaks for itself. I truly have raised ‘the good son.’ ”

  The host turned back to the camera. “We’ve been speaking with renowned psychiatrist and author Dr. Thomas Rosanoff”—then, as a laughing aside thrown his way—“and I like how you worked the title in right at the end.” She smiled again at the camera. “We have two copies to give away. No? Only the one? Okay, we have one copy of The Good Son to give away, so don’t go anywhere! We’ll be right back after traffic and weather.”

  The interview ended with Dr. Rosanoff caught in a close-up, still looking offscreen, still pixelated.

  Later on, in the dressing room, Dr. Rosanoff would sit like an Easter Island rendering, head surrounded by a voluminous drape of cloth while the hair-and-make-up artist, spray-bottles slung about her waist, circled around him, wiping off his TV tan with soothing creams and hand towels. The mirror that he was enthroned before was outlined in prima donna lights. With Thomas standing behind the chair, they spoke to each other via the mirror.

  “What brings you to this side of the river, Tommy? Studies going well, I trust? You look tired.”

  “Well,” Thomas admitted. “That’s sort of why I’m here.” I can’t sleep, and when I do, I can’t dream. I can’t concentrate in class and I feel like I’m going to cry and I’m worried that if I do, I won’t be able to stop. It feels like there’s nothing inside me, not even emptiness. It feels like I’m on the other side of a wall, shouting to be heard. Like a dancer at odds with the dance. “It’s my thesis. I’m supposed to see Professor Cerletti this afternoon and, to be honest, I’m not ready.”

  Dr. Rosanoff nodded. “Bio-psych is a tough field, Tommy. I pioneered it. I should know.”

  “See, that’s the thing. I’m not in bio-psych anymore. I switched to experimental neurology. Lab work, mainly, but still—still med school. Unfortunately, it’s not going well, either.”

  “Neurology? When did this happen?”

  “A few months ago. Well, last year, actually. I meant to tell you.”

  “You let me worry about Anton. That man owes me more than he can ever repay. It’s hard enough for you as it is, living under my shadow. The expectations, the weight of your name.” The make-up woman was now methodically wiping Dr. Rosanoff’s neckline. “I should never have done that to you, Tommy. I should never have saddled you with ‘Junior.’ I’m a tough act to follow, I know that. I’ll talk to Anton, sort it out. A new submission date?”

  “A do-over. My research has stalled. I need to start again. A fresh thesis. Another year, at least.”

  “I’ll take care of it. You concentrate on developing something good, something big. Something that will make a real name for yourself.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “Everyone’s watching you, Tommy.”

  “I know.”

  “Hoping you’ll fail.”

  “I know.”

  “Prove them wrong.”

  “I will.”

  The make-up lady removed the cloth around Dr. Rosanoff’s shoulders with a magician’s flourish and he rose, body emerging from Easter Island, a towering figure in every sense.

  “Other than that, life is good?”

  No. “Yup.”

  “And how is she? The new one. Emily.”

  “Amy. We aren’t together anymore.”

  Dr. Rosanoff held his arms outward while the woman brushed his sleeves, whisking him clean. “That’s a shame. I liked her. Reminded me of your mother. Your mother had a spiritual side as well. I find it . . .” he searched for the right word, “. . . endearing.” He said, “Walk with me,” and Thomas did. Down endless hallways, past cramped recording studios and editing suites. “I remember Emily—”

  “Amy.”

  “Amy. Saying grace, going on and on and on—at Red Lobster, no less. Do you remember how hard it was for us to keep a straight face? I liked her. It’s a shame it didn’t work out.” He stopped at the receptionist’s desk. “Tommy, I still have some things to wrap up here at the station. A panel discussion. Satellite relay, national. So, I’ll have to say goodbye to you here. The Prius is running well?”

  “It is.”

  He nodded. “Good. Let me worry about Cerletti. You concentrate on your research.”

  “Thanks.” Thomas turned to go, then stopped. “Hey, Dad. You know how we were laughing? At Amy, when her eyes were closed?”

  “She didn’t hear anything, Tommy. She never noticed.”

  “I know. But we shouldn’t have done that. It wasn’t kind. We shouldn’t have done that.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  FOR ALL ITS APPARENT variations, there are only two types of fame: the type that can get you laid, and the other kind. If you fell down a well as a child, that would be an example of the latter. Appearing on a second-rate reality cooking show—Season Two, the one with the mussels!—that would be an example of the former. Thomas’s fame, paltry as it was, was of the fallen-down-a-well category. It was the “former-child-actor-arrested-in-a-liquor-store-holdup” variety of fame. The “one-hit-wonder-where-are-they-now?” or “baby on the Gerber bottle” style of celebrity. Perhaps because of this, Thomas had always held an affinity for those relics of past lives, the former child stars staring out at the world through their mug-shot freeze frames. You could see the bewilderment in their eyes. Thomas would study them whenever they appeared, in a magazine or on a screen, would search for signs of hope, of youth, buried somewhere in their gaze, but he never found it. Only that same stunned bewilderment you see with people who find themselves on the receiving end of an elaborate and unusually cruel practical joke.

  In his second year of med school, Thomas had altered his identity, dropping his father’s surname, adopting his mother’s instead. Thomas Alexander: two first names, yet somehow less than the sum of their parts. He’d started in experimental psychiatry and then switched to bio-psych, then to neuroscience and neurology, tunneling his way ever deeper into the human mind. How far can you walk into a forest? Another riddle from his youth. Halfway. After that, you’re walking out of the forest. How far would Thomas have to tunnel before he came out the other side?

  For such a complex knot of wiring, the brain itself is surprisingly easy to fool. Inept therapists have no problem planting false memories, optical illusions can trick the brain’s visual perceptions with a breezy nonchalance, a brick to the noggin can scramble the circuitry and a tumour in the frontal lobe can turn a God-fearing parson into a sensual libertine. Thomas found this fascinating. He wanted to use his knowledge of the brain for the betterment of mankind, and he wanted to do it one person at a time. Starting with himself.

  He first had an inkling that he could use his knowledge of the brain to get women to sleep with him when he was sitting through a particularly dull lecture. It was an idle thought, something to muse about while Professor Cerletti droned on and on about less and less interesting things. The lecture was on “mirror neurons.” These lie at the heart of human empathy. That was the theory, anyway. Mirror neurons fire in reaction to other people’s situations. Watch a game of basketball on TV and your own leg will twitch. Hear someone weep and your own eyes will well up. Witness a daredevil leap off a cliff in Acapulco and your own chest will tighten, your breath will catch in your throat, as though you yourself were about to take the plunge. True, mirror neurons are not consciously controlled, but . . . what if? What if you faked it? What if you consciously mimicked the facial expressions of someone else, their speech patterns, their turns of phrase? Wouldn’t that trigger their own mirror neurons, make them feel closer to you, lower their defences?

  Thomas doodled a note to himself about this; he would later learn that police interrogators and used-car salesmen employ the same technique, imitating the body language of suspects and potential customers, smiling when they smile, frowning when
they frown, crossing their arms when they cross theirs, leaning forward, sitting up, looking down. A subconscious game of Simon Says, not unlike the Catholic masses he would later attend. If you could use mirror neurons to nab a murder suspect or net a sale, why not use this technique for more, shall we say, pleasurable goals? This was before he met Amy.

  The way to a woman’s heart, he realized, was through her brain.

  At which moment, Thomas’s phone vibrated. Bernie had sent him a text, even though he was sitting right next to him. It read: “Booorrring.”

  Professor Cerletti had brought up an overhead image of the limbic system, that interconnected series of organs that fits snugly into the brain’s inner reaches like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. “The hypothalamus, located here in midbrain, is the primary pleasure centre.”

  Bernie sent another text. “Not the clitoris?”

  Thomas: “Apparently not.”

  Bernie: “Dammit. Now they tell me. Here I’ve been searching all this time for nothing.”

  Thomas: “The hypothalamus is probably easier to find.”

  Bernie laughed. They hadn’t noticed that Professor Cerletti was no longer talking, had in fact turned his baleful gaze upon them, nor that the lecture hall was now deathly quiet.

  “Something amusing happening in the back?” Cerletti asked, locking his eyes onto Thomas with an undisguised animus.

  “No, sir.” Nothing amusing at all.

  Thomas’s first successful neurological seduction occurred soon after, almost by accident. He was living in a dormitory at the time and had, against his better judgment, attended a Friday-night party in the Common Room. This is what normal students do. They hang out in the Common Room I am a normal student; therefore, I will hang out in the Common Room. A fairly straightforward syllogism, but one built on a false premise. Thomas would never be a “normal student.”

  He regretted coming as soon as he entered. The room was fogged with the skunkweed aroma of cannabis, was crowded and noisy with regrettable indie music bleating from someone’s speakers. Bodies squeezed past, hands clutching bottles of cider and beer like security blankets. Navigating the room was like trying to wade through a swamp. Everyone was shouting to be heard. It was the rhetoric of dorm rooms, wherein the passion of one’s opinions and the logic with which they were presented were inversely proportional. Here was the baffled rage of strident young men and women confounded by the fact that injustices were allowed to exist in this world. (They were not yet old enough to realize that injustice, like longing, gravity, taxes, or air, will always be a part of our world, not an anomaly. Not a tumourous outgrowth to be excised, but an inevitability.)