Why weren't you in bed? I asked. I asked.

I was thirsty. It was yucky.

He made an appalled face.

I kiss you, don't I? I said. I said.

That's not the same!

So you don't mind....

You can kiss him if you want to.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

He dug around distractedly in his bag.

Can you mail a letter for me? he asked. he asked. K. helped me write it. K. helped me write it.

The letter he handed me was carefully folded. A smiley face had been drawn on the flap. Beneath it were the words: I love you! I love you!

I opened it: Dear Iron Man, I realy like your movie. You funny. You look like my dad but my dad hair realy long. I realy like be your friend. Please write me back because I love you. I deaf but I read sub t.i.tle. I want you help mom. I don't know where live she. I want you find her. Your friend, Noah Cantrell. PS-I live Tupelo, which is close Memphis. It's where Elvis can be born. I show his statyou in park to you.

I glanced at him and offered a frown.

Your spelling is awful, I said, ignoring all the other thoughts that went through my mind I said, ignoring all the other thoughts that went through my mind.

Do you think he'll be my friend?

Of course.

Where does he live?

Hollywood, probably.

Do you think he can find Mom?

I don't know.

I hope so.

So do I.

He returned to his breakfast, satisfied that his mission had been accomplished.

18) At the library

I WENT WENT to the Tupelo Public Library after work and picked up a sign-on card from the services desk and sat down at one of their Internet-ready terminals to check my e-mail. The card gave me an hour of Internet and computer usage. to the Tupelo Public Library after work and picked up a sign-on card from the services desk and sat down at one of their Internet-ready terminals to check my e-mail. The card gave me an hour of Internet and computer usage.

Like most people, my e-mail messages were a collection of junk. No message from my agent, impatient for my vampire-house-eats-unsuspecting-family story. No royalty reports or e-mails about checks in the mail. No publishers inquiring about foreign rights. No big shot Hollywood producers wanting to turn Dead Man's Lake Dead Man's Lake into a movie. Just endless messages about enlarging my p.e.n.i.s and helping some poor Nigerian b.a.s.t.a.r.d transfer a billion dollars out of his country. into a movie. Just endless messages about enlarging my p.e.n.i.s and helping some poor Nigerian b.a.s.t.a.r.d transfer a billion dollars out of his country.

I signed into Facebook and found a friend request from Jackson Ledbetter, which I happily approved. I spent most of my remaining time stalking his profile, looking at his pictures, inspecting his friends list, looking at which pages he liked, reading all his status updates going back to the beginning of the year as you do when you're crazy about someone and you want to know all you can.

Before I ran out of time, I searched on Google for Robert "Iron Man" Downey Jr.'s mailing address so that I could put Noah's letter in the mail. The best I could manage was an address for Paramount Studios.

Back home, I nervously picked up the phone and called Jackson Ledbetter. I was rewarded with his voice mail.

I'm ditzy about phones. They make me nervous, and always have.

"Hi. I wanted to invite you on a date. If you're not working Sat.u.r.day, let's do the Furniture Market. Noah said he saw us kissing. Call me. Bye. Oh, by the way, this is Wiley. So. Bye."

Pathetic, I thought, hanging up the phone and putting it down on the kitchen table. Could I be more pathetic, as Chandler from Friends Friends might ask. might ask.

I put rinsed-off baby carrots in a bowl and gave them to Noah as I settled down on the floor with a pillow and World War Z World War Z. I lay parallel to the television and it wasn't long before Noah lay down as well, propping his head on my leg, munching carrots and watching Robert Downey Jr. get the bad guys as I read about the history of the Zombie wars, thinking to myself that this was a real horror novel.

When would I ever have such a good idea to work with?

But your best idea is currently using your leg for a pillow, isn't it?

I glanced down at Noah.

Would writing about him be such a crime?

I thought of a million and one things I could say straight off the top of my head with utterly no prompting and no editorial sweat. I'd have an eight-hundred-page novel in no time. I'd call it something mysterious like What the Deaf Boy Heard. What the Deaf Boy Heard. I'd talk about the travails of a gay man raising a deaf meth baby in the South. I'd talk about the travails of a gay man raising a deaf meth baby in the South.

Only one small problem. To tell his story properly, I would have to confess to what I did. The stupidity of a gay man letting himself be talked into thinking he needed to have a girlfriend, and needed to have s.e.x with her to prove he was a man. The stupidity of crystal meth. Getting a girl pregnant with a child that would have birth defects because the two of you were pa.s.sing a crack pipe back and forth while "finding" yourselves.

There was no way I'd come across pretty in such a tale. I could easily imagine my mom reading this book and being furious with me for shaming the whole family, washing our dirty laundry in public like redneck trailer trash on the Jerry Springer Show.

And what if Noah could read well enough one day to read with his own eyes what his father did, what his mother did? How would it make him feel, to know that he might have been a normal boy, part of the "normal" world of the hearing, but for the fact that his parents had smoked crystal meth?

I glanced down at him, at the tumble of blond hair falling on my leg, at the way he stared so intently at the television screen as if afraid to miss a single moment.

Would he still love me if he knew the truth?

How much longer could I hide it from him?

19) Dead to me now

THE NEXT NEXT day, after work, I drove to New Albany. Not to see my mom but to see two people who might have been my mother-in-law and father-in-law in another life, Mr. and Mrs. Warren. They lived downtown in a solid brick house with fancy columns holding up the front porch. Carefully tended flowerbeds were sprinkled abundantly with color. A small army of rhododendron plants graced the front porch, hanging at evenly s.p.a.ced intervals. The smell of crepe jasmine drifted on the air. day, after work, I drove to New Albany. Not to see my mom but to see two people who might have been my mother-in-law and father-in-law in another life, Mr. and Mrs. Warren. They lived downtown in a solid brick house with fancy columns holding up the front porch. Carefully tended flowerbeds were sprinkled abundantly with color. A small army of rhododendron plants graced the front porch, hanging at evenly s.p.a.ced intervals. The smell of crepe jasmine drifted on the air.

I knocked hesitantly on the door.

Mr. Warren answered, and he seemed neither surprised nor happy to see me.

With his clipped fingernails and hint of cologne, it's safe to say that Mr. Warren was not the sort of man you'd b.u.mp into at Walmart, but I could easily picture him sitting in front of his ma.s.sive flat-screen television watching p.o.r.n with a shot gla.s.s full of Jim Beam in one hand and a great big hunk of Velveeta cheese in the other, or doing whatever else it was these big time small-town sharks did when they weren't s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g people out of their life's savings or shooting the s.h.i.t at the country club and whining about the G.o.dd.a.m.n Christless communist-loving federal guvmint and patting themselves on the back on how well the darkies were doing in the post-Jim Crow era as they worked at McDonald's for frikkin' minimum wage. But we couldn't all have enough money to burn wet mules, now, could we, and ain't that just the plain gosh darn truth?

"How are you, sir?" I asked politely.

"I'm about as fine as a frog hair split four ways," he replied.

"Frogs don't have hair," I pointed out.

"Exactly," he said.

I walked smack into that one.

"May I come in?" I asked.

"What do you want, Wiley?"

"Just to talk," I said.

He considered this in silence, not moving his solid bulk out of the way.

"Reckon there ain't much we have to talk about," he said at last.

"I'm trying to find out where Kayla is," I admitted. "Her son would like to see her, spend some time with her."

"You done come to the wrong house, son."

"Do you know where she is?"

"No," he said. "And frankly, I don't care to know. That girl is dead to me now."

"You must have a lot of kids if you can afford to give up on them so easily," I offered.

"She's my only child," he said in a hard voice. "Of course, you know that. I blame you for getting her involved in drugs."

"I think it was the other way around."

"You were both doing it," he said.

"I tried it four or five times," I said, feeling like Adam blaming Eve. "I was hardly an addict. I tried extremely hard to get Kayla to stop when we found out she was pregnant."

"That's what you say."

"I didn't come here to argue with you about the past. Noah loves his mother. Don't ask me why, but he does, and he wants to see her. We're not asking for child support or weekend visits or anything else. And we're certainly not asking or expecting anything from you. If she would just give him the time of day once in a while, get her head out of her a.s.s, spend a little time with him...."

"Good luck with that," he said. "You'd have an easier time getting an audience with the G.o.dd.a.m.n queen of England."

"Do you know where she is?"

"I done told you, boy, I have no idea. Wherever she is, she can just stay there. She done embarra.s.sed this family to death. Good-bye and good riddance to bad rubbish."

"Do you have to be such a p.r.i.c.k?" I inquired.

His eyes narrowed.

"I would invite you in," he said, "but I don't want your kind in my house. The Bible makes it pretty clear what G.o.d thinks about people like you, Wiley. I need not remind you of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah for their unnatural crimes. I blame you for Kayla, for that boy-that pitiful, deaf boy, and everything he's suffered because of you. That's your doing. That's G.o.d's answer to you you, Wiley Cantrell, for embracing unnatural sin and turning your back on Him. I will not invite the wrath of G.o.d upon this house by having any doings with you you. Kayla has paid a heavy price because of you, just as your boy is now doing, and will continue to do. My wife and I want no part of it."

He delivered this huffy speech, then pressed his lips together as if determined to say no more.

"The only problem with that," I pointed out, "is that Kayla was addicted to meth before I got involved with her that summer. But don't let the facts get in the way of a good story, Mr. Warren."

"I would ask you not to come here again. You are certainly not welcome."

"I hate to be the one to break it to you but shooting the breeze with someone who looks like he's eaten one case of Twinkies too many is hardly my idea of a good time."

"You always did have a mouth on you," he snarled.

"And I know how to use it, too. Unfortunately for me, I have a son who happens to be your grandson, a boy who would like to see his mother. If she comes around, perhaps you could tell her to call me or something."

"If she comes around, Wiley, the last thing I'd do is tell her to call you. I think she's had quite enough of you. I think we've all had quite enough of you."

He closed the door and I heard a click as he slid the lock shut.

It's all good, as we say.

I offered the door my middle finger-a completely pointless gesture, but it felt good-and left.

20) The mysterious life of kudzu

I DROVE DROVE in the direction of Mama's house, not knowing whether I would stop to see her or not. in the direction of Mama's house, not knowing whether I would stop to see her or not.

Truth was, I just wanted to be alone for a while, without Noah hanging on my t.i.ts, alone, by myself, with my own thoughts, able to hear myself think for a change, some quality me-time.

Before Noah was born, I had read all kinds of books on what it would be like to be a parent, but nothing could have prepared me for the truth. I would love to say it was beautiful and inspiring and life changing and awesome, and it was some of those things, of course, but mostly it was utter h.e.l.l. Utter, complete, unremitting, agonizing h.e.l.l. Nothing could have prepared me for the way my life was engulfed by the needs of this new being, this screaming little meth baby who needed constant attention. Day and night, night and day, the crying, the whining, coping with the throes of addiction, the diapers, the p.i.s.sing, the s.h.i.tting, the feedings, the vomit, the health concerns, doctor visits, the worrying and fretting, the shots, the teething, the babysitting, up all hours of the night-I don't know how I survived. I kept thinking it would get better, but it didn't. It got more complicated, more involved. When he was about two, I began to realize he couldn't hear a d.a.m.n thing. I had suspected it for a long time, but there were no tests back then that could be conducted, no way for the doctor to check. But by the time he was two, I knew he was deaf.