New York Echoes by Warren Adler Read Free Book Online Page A

weekends. Sometimes, she greeted him without the mask, but the
smell of lilacs had seeped into the atmosphere of the house. He could barely
wait out the weekend.
    â€œI can still smell it,” she would tell
him when the mask was off and the lilac scent did not help.
    Finally he could stand it no longer.
    â€œWe’re both casualties of 9/11, Rachel.”
    She agreed and they got a friendly
divorce. It took him months to get rid of the smell of lilacs. He called her on
the fifth anniversary of 9/11.
    â€œI can still smell it,” she told him.

A
Dad Forever
by Warren Adler
    Jack Spencer observed
his fifty-year-old son across the table at Michael’s, a celebrity haunt in Manhattan where Henry was a regular. Noting that his son’s eyes swept the room with
eagle-eyed intensity, nodding here and there to others in the crowded dining
room, Spencer said, “You seem to know lots of people, Hank,” with a touch of
pride. Henry was the creative director of an important advertising agency.
    â€œI guess,” Henry shrugged, offering his
father a shining, bright smile, certainly a cosmetic spruce-up. He was
handsome, with big brown eyes behind high cheekbones like his late mother’s. In
fact, he looked so much like Dorothy that Spencer felt a pang of deep sentiment
and had to squelch a sob, disguising it with a cough.
    Henry had certainly enhanced his
appearance since Spencer had last seen him two years ago. Apparently there had
been an eye job, which eliminated the bags that were a family affliction on
Spencer’s side of the family tree. Spencer had never corrected the bags under
his eyes. And there was the touch-up of Henry’s sideburns, once graying.
    They did speak
periodically on the phone. Their conversations had become, over the years, more
like short news bulletins from New York than real dialogue. Spencer defined it
as perfunctory, obligatory, and dutiful, but feared to protest its lack of real
intimacy. He was well aware that his expectations exceeded the reality. But at
seventy-five, he supposed, he was more tolerant of disappointment and more
willing to accept small victories. Even lip service had its attractions.
    The fact was that
hearing his son’s voice was comforting, validating the existence of genetic
tissue between father and son. Lately they had communicated more by e-mail,
enhancing the news bulletin definition. Like any report from a faraway place,
all it lacked was a dateline and audio input.        
    â€œYou look great, Hank,” Spencer said
with sincere admiration. His son’s success was a source of pride, and he
acknowledged it frequently in their telephone conversations and e-mails.
    He had long ago made
peace with the knowledge that his son was gay. There was, of course, only one
answer to that dilemma, and he and Dorothy had confronted it when it became
apparent, then finally admitted. Parental aspirations had little to do with
reality. When one truly loved one’s children, the only option was acceptance.
    Henry’s sister, Carol, had provided them
with two grandchildren, which filled that void. Not that he and Dorothy had
been professional grandparents. Carol lived with her husband and the kids in Los Angeles and Spencer got to see them twice a year. Thankfully, he had had his busy
practice as an internist in Chicago to keep him occupied and able to cope with
the physical loss of his wife, three years ago.
    He was semi-retired
now, which enabled him to, as he put it, smell the roses, which was more of an
excuse than a necessity. Tomorrow he would board the gargantuan Queen Mary for a
trip across the pond with a group of Chicagoans to visit the literary sights of
the United Kingdom. English literature had always been his hobby and private
joy, especially the Victorians, and he had had a lifelong passion for
Shakespeare.
    â€œIt should be fun,
Dad,” Henry said as they dipped into their Cobb salads. “I’m