Commonwealth

The narrative shifts almost fifty years into the future, and Franny is now middle-aged, while Fix is in his eighties. Fix has cancer, and Franny has come to California to help him during his chemotherapy treatments. As they sit together, Fix recalls the past, telling Franny about her christening party, and she is surprised to learn that her father knew Bert before her mother did. He also remembers a time when Beverly, who ended up divorcing Fix and marrying Bert, had called Fix from Virginia asking for help with 14-year-old Albie, who had set a fire in his school. Fix now asks Franny how Albie and Bert are doing now. He seems to enjoy hearing that Bert has been divorced three times and is now single.

He then recalls his old partner Lomer, who was also a close friend. He had actually “[…] looked forward to sitting in some piece-of-crap car until four o’clock in the morning in South Central because Lomer was there telling jokes” (46). He recalls the night that Lomer was shot at a service station after Fix and Lomer had arrested a man for beating up another man: “His name was Mercado. We found that out later. He had a regular job beating Mexicans who’d borrowed money to be smuggled into the country and hadn’t made enough yet to pay off the debt” (55).

Fix thinks he saw Mercado shoot Lomer. Fix had been sitting in the car writing in the police log while Lomer had gone inside for coffee, and when Fix looked up, Lomer was already dead. Fix thought Mercado was responsible, but Mercado was still in jail during the time of the shooting. Fix had testified at the time that “[they] found someone who’d seen a car driving crazy near the gas station. They made it a point to find the driver and then they made it a point to find the gun he’d thrown out the window of the car” (59). Fix knows the driver was the killer even though he tells Franny, almost fifty years later, that through “a quirk of the brain” he could see Mercado holding the gun (58).

Eventually, Fix was able to get Lomer out of his thoughts, but now, at the end of his life, he finds himself remembering Lomer again, thinking that by dying young Lomer was spared the agonies of old age.

The story shifts back in time again to the breakup of Bert and Teresa’s marriage. At that time, Bert and Beverly move to Virginia. Teresa is suddenly a single mother with four children and must get a job, eventually finding work as a secretary at the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office. She also goes to night school to become a paralegal. Bert pays “modest” alimony, and he also wins the right to have custody of his children every summer. Teresa is upset but also sees the value in having her summers free from her four children: “The thought of a Saturday morning without Albie jumping over her in bed, back and forth and back and forth like he was skiing some slalom course, was not unappealing” (64). She enjoys the idea of Bert’s new wife having to suddenly deal with the daily burdens of four young children for an entire summer.

By 1971, the parents decide that the children—Cal (12), Holly (10), Jeanette (8), and Albie (6)—no longer need a chaperone and are old enough to travel on a plane by themselves. Teresa sends them to Bert in Virginia without any luggage. Her motives are not to punish the kids, but rather to “[let] Bert hit the ground running, she thought. They needed everything: he could start with toothbrushes and pajamas and work his way up” (65). The children hate California and are happy to head to Virginia. Although they miss their mother, they are happy to have a break from their school routines and responsibilities.

While the Cousins children travel to Virginia for the summer, the Keating girls travel to visit Fix in California for a week. When their week is over, they return to spend the rest of the summer with the Cousins children. The girls return upset because they miss their father, but the Keating and Cousins children do not dislike each other. In fact, they are united: “The six children held in common one overarching principle that cast their potential dislike for one another down to the bottom of the minor leagues: they disliked the parents. They hated them” (76).

Bert manages to stay away from the house, claiming to be very busy at work. Beverly is left in charge of all six young children. She seeks a quiet place to retreat to since it seems as if the children occupy every corner of the house: “There was no place to go, no place to get away from them, not even the linen closet because Jeanette hadn’t come out of the linen closet since surrendering the cat” (75). She ends up sitting alone in the stifling heat of her car.

One day, Bert announces they are going to drive to Lake Anna for vacation. There is always tension about who will be stuck sitting next to Albie, the youngest, and to his siblings and step-siblings, the most annoying, with his loud renditions of “Ninety-nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall.” Bert hits Cal when Cal suggests that Beverly ride next to Albie. They check into a motel, and the next morning, Bert and Beverly leave a note, telling the children to get breakfast. The children decide that they are not going to wait for their parents; they walk the two miles to the lake on their own.

Before leaving, eldest Keating daughter Caroline breaks into their car using a technique she learned from her father, and Cal grabs Bert’s gun and liquor. The walk to the lake is hot, and they take a break to drink their cokes. Cal gives Albie candy “Tic Tacs,” which are really Benadryl pills that he carries for his allergies. The Benadryl, in addition to the alcohol that the children pass around, makes Albie fall asleep, and the children continue to the lake where they swim and play. When they return, they find Albie. He is “[…] awake but he was just sitting there in the field, quiet and confused amid the Coke cans, trying hard not to cry. He didn’t ask them where they had been or where he was, he just got up and followed in the line behind them as they passed” (91). When Bert and Beverly wake up, they are apologetic for sleeping so late and treat the kids to pizza and movies. They have no idea how the children spent their afternoon.