it. She'd wait until they were alone. Steven didn't know yet what he would tell her.
He had seen Jack.
He'd gone to see his new place, way out in Brooklyn, on a dingy street beyond Williamsburg. It was a crummy neighborhood, with trash littering the gutter. The tiny stretch of lawn was tired and beaten down. Jack's building was brick, low and blocky, newish, but already seedy and dilapidated. Its small windows were high and meanly spaced.
In the foyer was a row of buzzers. The slot for 3C held a torn-off strip of paper hand-lettered ANdorN. Steven pushed the button and was buzzed into a low-ceilinged hall. There was no elevator, and Steven climbed the uncarpeted stairs. Upstairs, the hall was narrow, the walls scuffed. There was a bad smell.
Steven rang at Jack's door and waited, trying not to breathe the smell. Inside the apartment there was no sound, though Jack had just buzzed him in, downstairs. After a while Steven pressed the button again, harder. Still silence. He waited again, then pressed the bell a third time. At once, as though he had released a spring, the door opened on his brother.
“Hey,” Steven said.
“Stevo,” Jack said, nodding. He looked terrible; pale, very thin. Dark stubble stood out against his white cheeks. He wore jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, the grimy cuffs unbuttoned and flapping. His feet were bare and dirty. “Good to see you. Come on in.” He ran his hand self-consciously over his head. Steven had the feeling that Jack had just done something quick and furtive before coming to the door.
Steven followed him inside. A huge TV with a tangle of cords was on the floor. In front of it was a plaid sofa, its stained cushions flattened and sagging. There was nothing else, and the bare floor was scattered with CDs, empty cans, food wrappers. Jack stopped and stood awkwardly, with his hands in his back pockets.
“So, great,” Jack said. He nodded and smiled again. “What's up? How long you here for?” His eyelids were heavy, and there was something wrong with his smile.
“Just the night.” Steven looked around. The smell from the hall was in here, too. “Nice place.”
Jack laughed. “Yeah. A palace.” His eyes seemed unfocused. “It's not mine, it's a friend's. I'm just staying here while he's in LA. So. Want some coffee? Want to go out?”
“Sure,” Steven said. “Let's go out.” He understood that Jack didn't want him here in the apartment.
“Shoes,” Jack said, and left the room. Steven followed him.
In the bedroom the shade was pulled down, and the window shut. The air was unpleasantly dense. The closet door was open, clothes heaped on its floor. A bureau stood beside the closet, one of its drawers pulled out. On a wooden chair lay an electric bass, its bright reflective surfaces gleaming dimly. The room felt claustrophobic, as though it were its own whole country, with its own secret laws, its own sinister climate. Entering it felt dangerous.
The bed had no headboard and stood slightly away from the wall. Jack sat down on the tangled sheets and scuffed his bare feet into shoes. His movements seemed labored. He stood up again and gave Steven the bad smile.
“Let's go,” he said.
As they reached the sidewalk in front of Jack's building, a huge black man approached them. He was gray-haired and wore a knitted cap and a red hooded sweatshirt that said HOUSTON COUGARS. His enormous stomach strained against the shirt. He was talking loudly and making large swinging gestures with his fists. As they approached, he looked at Steven and said angrily, “Not once. Not once! Motherfuckers!” The brothers parted, passing on either side of him.
When they rejoined, Steven said, “Jesus. I thought he was going to take a swing at us.”
“Nah, he's harmless,” Jack said without interest. “I see him a lot. Turn here.”
The next block was lined with dingy brownstones. This is Jack's neighborhood, thought Steven, these littered streets, run-down houses, weirdos swinging their fists. It was a shock, realizing how separate their lives now were.
Growing up, they'd shared everything. They'd gone to the same schools, known each other's friends, breathed each other's air. But now Steven saw how little he knew of his brother's life, how opaque it was to him. This was partly age, of course; Jack was still locked into that stupid college routine, all pot and no plans. Jack had always had dumb pot-soaked ideas, rock bands and big schemes, nothing that would ever work. But he'd been funny before, hilarious; he'd had a manic, luminous glow.
Now, in this seedy depressive neighborhood, in the sickening smell and strange silence of the apartment, things were no longer funny. Jack's presence seemed dead, flattened. No light came from him, the air around him was inert.
At the coffee shop they sat in the back. The waiters took orders in a normal voice, in accented English, then turned and shouted in Spanish at the top of their lungs. The other language flowed around them, soft and rapid. At the next table two girls were talking at top speed, like dueling machine guns.
The waiter came, and Steven ordered coffee and a bagel. The waiter looked at Jack.
“Coffee,” Jack said.
“Nothing to eat?” Steven asked.
“Are you Mom?”
Steven shrugged. “I thought you'd want some breakfast.”
Jack shook his head. He seemed not to be blinking.
The waiter filled their thick ceramic mugs and Steven took a sip. The coffee was thin and bitter.
“So,” he said. “What's going on?”
“Nothing much,” Jack said. He shrugged, frowning.
“You working, or what?” asked Steven.
“Is this an interview? Who sent you?”
“Come on,” said Steven. “What's the deal?”
He was irritated by his brother's rudeness, his assumption of Steven's disloyalty, especially since it was justified. Jack always made him choose sides.
Jack shrugged. “I don't want breakfast, that's the deal.” He sipped his coffee listlessly. “So, what's up with you?”
“I'm leaving Seattle. Left it,” Steven said.
“Yeah? How come?”
Steven shook his head. “It's just finished,” he said, “what I wanted to do there.”
“D'jou save the trees?” Jack's tone was nearly mocking.
Steven shook his head again. “No,” he said. “The trees came down.” He looked at his brother, waiting for sarcasm.
“Too bad.” Jack's eyes were opaque.
“So I'm coming back East. I'm thinking of law school.”
“Law school,” Jack said.
“Yeah,” Steven said. “I don't know if they'll buy it.” “What if they don't?”
“I'll do it anyway,
