A Taxonomy of Barnacles, page 19
First, he ruled out the surprise proposal. Surprise was an overrated state of mind that precluded the flow of necessary emotions such as love and lust. A tear-jerking proposal was not his style. Did it not slightly weaken a woman’s credibility to claim it was the happiest day of her life while sobbing into her soup? Next to go were the midday proposals, the ones that shocked with their banality. These proposals, rendered on a walk in the park, or while shopping for groceries, had a certain antiquated charm and offered the added financial benefit of circumventing the high price of glittery nighttime pomp. But these lacked in force what they gained in spontaneity. By default then, Billy moved on to the numerous nocturnal options, but all of these seemed embarrassingly corny and contrived. A ring dangling from a dinner fork would surely fail to impress. Worse yet, the truly breathtaking proposals, those uttered on the ledge of a canyon or on the hundredth floor of a skyscraper, were too melodramatic to be taken seriously and risked unforeseen contingencies. What if your woman turned green with vertigo just as you hit the deck of the Empire State Building? Surely, this would hurt your chances at acceptance.
No, none of these options would do. Bridget would deem them maudlin musings, labored displays of romance. Billy would rather call on a trained chimp and ask him to perform in his place. Perhaps, he should expand his breadth and consider the truly ornate proposals. If money was no object, whimsy and imagination were his limits. He could wait for a perfect summer day, hire a skywriter to write the question in the clouds, then take Bridget on a picnic and, at just the right moment, direct her gaze toward the sky. Or, he could rig up a string of lights, spell out the question on a rooftop, then take Bridget on a helicopter ride and direct her eyes to the ground. He could draw on current technology and send the query via text message. He could encrypt his proposal in an eye chart then submit her to an eye exam. He could wrangle Charles, construct a sign, tie it around the dog’s neck, and then lure the dog into her room by way of dangling meat. He could drop the ring into the batter of a cake, bake and present the cake, then wait for Bridget to choke. He could devise an elaborate treasure hunt culminating at their favorite restaurant, then jump out from beneath a table, toppling drinks, terrifying Bridget, and trying the patience of everyone else.
As a last resort, he could always consider the most taboo of options: the postcoital proposal, otherwise known as “popping the question after sex.” This proposal had earned a bad reputation for good reason, he supposed. It was manipulative, if not downright mean, to exploit such a vulnerable state. But perhaps, Billy considered, this mode of proposal was so déclassé as to be due for a revival, capable of a comeback like bell-bottoms or the micro-miniskirt. Maybe, he could breathe life into this unseemly tradition, turning raunchy into romantic, salacious into spontaneous. Yes, the more he considered this one, the more inspired he felt. A postcoital proposal allowed the happy couple to ride the coattails of euphoria all the way to the harsh light of sunrise, permitting those with cold feet to warm them on another foot. And yet, Billy had no choice but concede this proposal had its drawbacks. Though dramatic, it risked complete alienation and all but ruled out fireside retelling to posterity. And, more to the point, this proposal required succeeding in the one arena in which Billy had continuously failed. In his twenty-odd years of trying to seduce Bridget, he had never managed to get much farther than first base. Therefore, the postcoital proposal must be ruled out as well; Billy had no right to assume he could even get to the coital part.
Besides, Bridget was far too discerning to approve of these proposals. He would fare better offering her a gift certificate and bidding her to buy her own ring. No, none of these proposals would work. Each one fell too neatly into a category. His proposal must defy genres, must transcend the semantics of love and contracts, must not only sweep Bridget off her feet but sweep up all the competition. And, as though it were not enough pressure to face the poet’s empty page, the notorious high standards of his particular princess, and, worse still, the battlefield of those who had tried and failed before him, Billy faced a yet more terrifying challenge: the affection of Bridget herself. For though he suspected that she was warming to him, and there was no denying he had made great strides in the last few days, he still had little reason to believe Bridget loved him back. The task was therefore so monumental and he, so hideously ill-prepared, that he felt he had no choice but call on his brother for help. Feeling particularly disheveled and distraught, Billy arrived at his weekly tennis game with Blaine with the explicit intention of asking his brother for advice.
In tennis, the twins were equally matched, though they both had different strengths. Billy had a superior serve while Blaine had a better net game. Billy’s overhead smash was virtually unreturnable but Blaine had a killer backhand. Despite Blaine’s tendency toward hyperbole, this backhand was an objective fact, surpassing the speed of some airplanes and, on occasion, causing injury to his opponents. Whenever Blaine had the opportunity to implement this shot, the current rally was sure to end. But unlike typical backhands that lurch due to topspin or halt unexpectedly due to slice, Blaine’s coupled delicacy and might, producing on the faces of those at its mercy, a perfect portrait of surprise. Blaine’s opponents often took drastic measures to avoid feeding Blaine this shot, hitting to his forehand as a rule and all but giving up on the point when the ball entered Blaine’s favored zone.
Still despite this obstacle, Billy loved playing tennis with Blaine. His matching constitution made him uniquely equipped. Billy was blessed with the ultimate opposing weapon to Blaine’s backhand; a forehand that possessed, Billy felt, equal and opposite power. Still, according to Blaine, tennis proved their inherent inequity. Their game score, he argued, was indisputable proof of his superiority. He won exactly 51 percent of their matches over the years. When Blaine did win, he usually won by a hair due to a much-debated double-fault or an inaudible bounce on the line. Without fail, on these occasions, Blaine subjected Billy to the most punctilious of victory dances, sending Billy off the court with the heartfelt intention of never playing his brother again. And yet, despite these negatives, the boys still relished their Saturday game and, depending on the score, brunched together afterward. They used their standing date to air out current issues, catch up on pressing gossip, idly bicker, and continue the debate they’d been having since childhood on the subject of the Barnacle girls.
At the moment, Billy and Blaine stood at the net, engaging in their pregame ritual, attempting to intimidate the other with a series of threatening looks. Blaine took the opportunity to remove his sweats, revealing a blinding white tracksuit that made him look debonair in a fastidious sort of way. Billy wore a T-shirt with a rip on the left side of the chest that threatened, with sudden arm extensions, to reveal his left nipple. He wore plaid shorts, hastily grabbed from the top of a soiled laundry piled that, he realized now for the first time, were actually not a pair of shorts but rather a pair of boxers. Tiring of Blaine’s intimidating tactics, Billy walked up to the net and tapped it rhythmically with his racket as though he had every intention of chopping it in half. At Blaine’s pointed glance, Billy ceased tapping and stared across the court defiantly then, gripping the net, took a deep, solemn breath and announced, “I think I’m ready.”
Despite the vagueness of his announcement, Blaine immediately understood Billy’s import. But, rather than respond outright, he opened a new can of balls, miming, in time with their angry pop, the opening of a bottle of champagne. Opposition, Blaine knew, would only strengthen Billy’s resolve. Feigned endorsement was the surest way to change Billy’s mind. “Well, that’s fantastic news,” Blaine said. “How are you going to do it?”
“See that’s the thing,” Billy said. “Bridget and I have that running joke.”
“Ah yes,” Blaine sighed, “I know it well. Alice and I were the butt of it.”
“Blaine, please be serious.”
“I’m aware of your game,” Blaine sniffed.
“Suffice it to say Bridget is an aficionado of the genre. Proposing to her is like serving wine to a world-class sommelier.”
Blaine pursed his lips as though the word itself had conjured up a particularly weak vintage. “An aficionado?” he asked.
“A goddamned connoisseur. So my task is doubly difficult. If I propose … when I propose, it needs to be perfect and surprising and romantic, but not pretentious, never pretentious, and above all original.”
“That does sound challenging,” said Blaine. He paused for a moment as though to give the subject a moment of serious thought. Then, offering his brother an encouraging smile, he said, “Maybe you should ask Trot’s advice. He’s liable to have some tips.”
Billy regarded his brother with overt annoyance.
Blaine rolled a ball to his foot with his racket, and scooped it into his hand. Once he’d palmed it, he began bouncing it intensely as though to replicate for Billy the urgent passing of time. Still bouncing, Blaine turned from Billy and sauntered to the baseline. When he arrived, he looked up to find Billy’s back turned, but disregarded this as an inconvenience and hit the ball across the court.
Billy, despite his distracted state, heard and heeded the ball’s approach and managed to return with a respectable backhand lob.
It’s so like Billy, Blaine decided, to return the ball by accident. Since Billy was a little boy, he’d fallen into his good luck.
Billy relaxed his stance while Blaine set up to return his shot. “Maybe I’ll do it on the bus when she’s least expecting it.”
Shielding his eyes from the sun with his left hand, Blaine prepared to return. He backpedaled to set up for Billy’s lob, smacking it back before the bounce with an overhead volley. The force and direction of his shot, Blaine predicted, would preclude Billy’s return. But again, though seemingly oblivious to the ball, Billy meandered across the court and managed somehow to return Blaine’s volley with a crisp down-the-line forehand.
“No. I suppose I should try for romance,” Billy continued. “Central Park at twilight at the Boat Pond … or maybe the Museum of Natural History under that great big whale.”
Blaine released his mounting annoyance on the tennis ball, returning now with a crosscourt backhand that promised to elude his brother. But again, without the slightest indication of travail, Billy glided across the court and managed, in spite of most laws of physics, to nick the ball back across the court with a deft backhand slice.
Billy hustled to the net to set up for a volley. “To kneel or not to kneel?” he said. “Outdoors or indoors? Do you think Mom will give me Grandmother’s ring, or would Bridget prefer something new? Ugh,” he moaned. “There are too many choices. It’s a wonder people ever get engaged.”
Forcing a smile, Blaine took a swing and prepared to throttle the ball, hitting what would have been, under normal circumstances, a picture-perfect passing shot had Billy not managed, at the last second, to jab it back over the net.
“Maybe more pomp and circumstance. Something incorporating fireworks,” Billy said.
“Maybe you should wait for Haley’s comet,” Blaine sneered. He raced to the ball with noticeable effort before dinking it back with a lob.
Billy allowed the ball to bounce while he considered Blaine’s last suggestion. He had all but forfeited the point but he changed his mind at the last possible second and funneled his frustration into an overhead smash whose force and power finally ended the rally and officially pissed Blaine off.
Billy bowed his head with excessive largesse as Blaine approached the net.
“Do you want my honest opinion?” Blaine asked.
Billy nodded eagerly.
“All of this crap is beneath you,” he said. “Fireworks and roses can’t win a girl’s heart. Your time and money are better spent. This kind of courtship is out of date. For all intents and purposes, romance is dead.”
Billy stared at Blaine indignantly. “I respectfully disagree.”
“If I were you, I would wait,” said Blaine. “This is not something to rush.”
“On the contrary,” Billy said. “There’s no time to waste. Trot could propose any minute.”
Blaine stared blankly at his brother, noting, in spite of himself, the decline in his brother’s looks. He tried to appear appropriately concerned while he racked his brain for a credible delay. “Why don’t you do it next year at Passover? Or at a baseball game.”
“Bridget would hate that,” Billy scoffed. “Sporting events are cliché.”
Blaine regarded his brother with new irritation. Billy’s absurdly furrowed eyebrows, his look of utter helplessness, his melodramatic view of life; he was practically a woman. There was nothing he could say, Blaine now realized, to cure Billy of his ailment. Giving up on sarcasm for the moment, Blaine resorted to a new device and attempted to speak to Billy in his own language. “Remember the ’ninety-two play-offs?” Blaine asked.
“It’s time to move on,” Billy said. “I know you’ve tried to block it out, but my team won last year.”
“You’re absolutely right,” Blaine conceded, smiling magnanimously. “You should enjoy that victory. It’ll never happen again.”
“It must be sad for you,” mused Billy. “The end of an era…”
“An era,” Blaine barked. “How long is that? Oh, I know. Eighty-six years.”
Baseball was, to be sure, a particularly hot topic between the twins. Billy had lost many bets on behalf of the Sox, betting on his team for thirty of their eighty-six cursed years. And Blaine had recently suffered the humiliation of watching that very curse broken on his team’s home turf. Throughout, Blaine had tortured Billy with incantations of Red Sox defeats, reminding him of their bitter disappointments and near misses in scrupulous detail. Billy took comfort in championing the underdog and, when they finally won the series, relished their reversal of fortune with decidedly unsportsmanlike glee. Of course, baseball was only the subtext of the twins’ rivalry. The real issue at stake was which of the two twins, born four minutes apart, was the better man?
“All right, all right,” Blaine conceded. “Let’s put this aside for a moment.”
Billy folded his arms over his chest, attempting to change the subject.
Blaine offered Billy a saccharine smile then, without further fanfare, launched into his favorite speech. “Let’s, for a minute, remember Tug Johnson’s history-making at bat. The Yanks are down three runs in the bottom of the ninth. The bases are loaded, they’ve got two outs, and Tug is at the plate. The Red Socks bring in Cox to close and the stadium goes wild. Cox takes his time at the mound, really stares Johnson down.”
Despite Blaine’s attempt at a dramatic reenactment, Billy was already bored. He uncrossed his arms then replaced them on his hips at a defiant angle.
“Cox knows what everyone knows about Johnson: this batter will not be rushed. He never swings at the first pitch. He gets a look at the pitcher’s stuff, learns all his secrets. So, there we are in the bottom of the ninth, with everything on the line, and what does Johnson do with his first ball? He takes a goddamned strike. Next, he dodges Cox’s slider. Now, we’ve got ball one. Cox throws a splitter. Tug taps it back. Strike two. The crowd explodes. A curveball followed by a slider. There’s ball two and three. Now Tug’s working a full count. Of course, you know the rule…”
Fuming, Billy mustered a nod. Of course, he knew the rule: A Major League batter cannot foul out. In order to get his third strike, he must hit the ball into the field.
“Everyone thinks it’s over for the Yanks, but Johnson keeps his cool. He swings and hits eight, nine, ten balls, every one of them a foul. Now Cox is pulling out all the stops: his slider, his knuckleball, his curve. Johnson and Cox are a pair of cowboys and this is their sunset duel. Finally, Cox lets a weak one fly and Tug seizes his chance. He swings and cracks it over the fence, sending players home from every base, winning the game and the play-offs for the best team in the world!”
“So,” said Billy. “That was dumb luck. A once-in-a-lifetime event.”
“Oh, I beg to differ,” said Blaine. “Why do you think he’s called Two-Strike Tug?”
“If you need to live in the past,” Billy quipped.
“I wouldn’t get cocky just yet.”
“Your point?” Billy interrupted.
“My point.” Blaine exhaled. “My point is even the best players need to use their head. What was Tug doing at the plate?”
“Praying to God,” Billy quipped.
“Wrong,” said Blaine. He paused dramatically. “He was waiting for the perfect pitch.”
Billy stood for a moment, considering Blaine’s thesis. He shifted from one foot to the other, then shook his head again. “But I love Bridget,” he declared. “We’re not playing against each other.”
“Until the day we die,” said Blaine, “men and women are on opposing teams.”
“It’s just that kind of thinking that caused your marriage to end in divorce.”
“At least I got married,” said Blaine. “You may never get to the altar.” With this, he turned and marched to the baseline, kicking up a haze of green dust. “Look, I don’t care what you do,” he yelled. “Just don’t take it out on me if you end up striking out.”
Billy gazed across the net with new desperation. Without fail, talking to Blaine always made him feel worse. “Fine, then what’s your advice?”
Before responding, Blaine tossed and served down the centerline. “Don’t be so predictable. Make her work for it.”
Billy made a half-hearted attempt to return the serve. He frowned as the ball hit the back fence. “Your love life is a mess,” he said. “Why should I trust you?”
“Because somewhere, deep down, you suspect I’m right. And right now, you’re batting zero.”
