Displaced Montrealer

Saturday, April 10, 2010

books, midair

Reading a collection of New Yorker short stories I discovered Frank Conroy. I thought there was something perfect about the following passage describing an interaction between father (Sean) and son (Philip).

"Why were you crying?" Philip asks.
Sean stops at the top of the stairs. His first thought is not how the boy knows but if the knowledge has scared him. He goes into the room, and there is Philip, wide awake, kneeling at the foot of his bed, an expectant look on his face.
"Hi." Sean can see the boy is not alarmed. Curious, focussed, but not scared.
"Why" the boy asks. He is six years old.
"Grownups cry sometimes, you know. It's O.K."
The boy takes it in, still waiting.
"I'm not sure," Sean says. "It's complicated. Probably a lot of things. But it's O.K. I feel better now."
"That's good."
Sean senses the boy's relief. He sits down on the floor. "How did you know I was crying?" He has never felt as close to another human being as he does at this moment. His tone is deliberately casual.
The boy starts to answer, his intelligent face eager, animated. Sean watches the clearly marked stages: First, Philip draws a breath to begin speaking. He is confident. Second, he searches for language to frame what he knows, but, to his puzzlement, it isn't there. Third, he realizes he can't answer the question. He stares into the middle distance for several moments. Sean waits, but he has seen it all in the boys face.
"I don't know," the boy says. I just knew."
"I understand."
After a while the boy gives a sudden large yawn, and gets under the covers. Sean goes downstairs.