by Mary Morris
I try to listen, but I don’t hear a thing.
47
I’M THE CHILD of a deaf man. My father had scarlet fever as a boy and lost most of his hearing. It is difficult talking to him and worse when he talks to us. Actually he never talks. He shouts. He barks. My mother likes to joke that his bark is worse than his bite, but that brought me little consolation. He is an angry man, angry in ways I’ll never understand, but even if he isn’t angry, he sounds that way. Everything in our house is loud. The TV, music, dinner talk. As I grow older, I develop an aversion to noise.
When I’m sixteen, my father has ear surgery. I’m not sure I understand it, but it is discussed in our house for a long time. Would he have it? Wouldn’t he? But he does. Afterward he’s in a lot of pain. And he doesn’t seem to hear any better than he did before. But then one day when I’m at a friend’s, my mother calls. Would you like to talk to your father on the phone? she asks.
I say sure, why not. And then as I hear his voice I realize that I’ve never talked to him on the phone before. He couldn’t really hear. When I get home, they tell me what happened. My mother was walking through the room and suddenly my father jumped, startled. What’s that? He asked her. And my mother stopped walking. What’s what? It was her footsteps. He’d never heard footsteps. At last he can hear them. But the thing I’d hoped the surgery would fix doesn’t work. He never stops shouting.
My father’s temper is a family secret. Later, when I tell people about it, they are stunned. One cousin refuses to believe me. It doesn’t seem possible that the charming man they knew was capable of such rage. But there is a Yiddish phrase for this: “Street angel, house devil.” Once, when he is quite old, my father is driving with my mother, and a friend of theirs is in the car. The woman says something, no one seems to remember what it was, and my father lights into her. He calls her the worst kind of person, a liar, a piece of garbage. I can’t remember it all, but what I remember is my mother’s response. She comes home beside herself, in tears, and tells me how stunned she is. “This never happened before,” she says.
I am dumbstruck by her response. “Yes, it did, Mom. It happened every night.”
“But it never happened with people before,” she replies.
Over the years friends tell me how brave I am. How they admire my courage. I have no idea what they mean. I see nothing courageous in anything I do. I feel safer on a mountain pass, in the snake-infested jungle, or sleeping on a straw mat in some funky border town than I ever did at home.
48
A GROWN TIGER can weigh up to six hundred pounds and, as a species, has been hunting for more than two million years. And it has memory. A tiger remembers slights and grudges. It has its enemies. In John Vaillant’s brilliant nonfiction book, simply called The Tiger, an Amur tiger in northern Siberia stalks and kills a man named Vladimir Markov specifically for the purpose of revenge. This is not a spoiler; the reader learns this on the first page.
Markov knew that he was being stalked and that there was little he could do to stop it. When his remains are found, or what little is left of him, an official involved in the case asked out loud, “Why is the tiger so angry?”
49
Brooklyn, 2008
EVERY MORNING Larry draws my bath. I lie in bed sipping coffee or reading the paper until it is ready. I hop on one leg on the upstairs walker into the bathroom. The room is steamy hot, the mirrors cloud up. Larry tests the temperature with his elbow—the way I did for our daughter when she was small. He places the shampoo, conditioner, soap, and washcloth along the side of the tub. “Okay,” he’ll say. “I think we’re ready.” I make my way to the side of the tub, drop my robe, as Larry pulls out two plastic trash bags and begins the arduous process of wrapping my leg. He ties the bags tightly around my thigh, securing it with duct tape.
He waits as I swivel from the side of the tub onto the white plastic chair that sits inside. I rest my leg on the side of the tub, then ease my way into the water as Larry pulls away the chair. I soak, careful to keep my leg raised. My days used to begin with a walk in the park or a morning swim. I’d write until midafternoon, and then meet a friend for coffee or a drink at a nearby café. On the way home I’d shop for dinner. I’d put on some music as I stood at the counter, chopping vegetables, peeling shrimp. Now this seems far away.
Each day is excruciatingly the same. I wash, then call Larry to help me out of the tub. On the edge I dry myself. While I’m dressing, Larry goes downstairs. He prepares my breakfast and my lunch. Then he rinses the commode we keep by the bed (because I can’t get to the bathroom in the night). It had never occurred to me that this would be part of our marital contract—the sickness-and-health part that we’d agreed to. But he never complains. He never shirks. His last task of the morning is to carry the commode down to the supply closet in my office, where he’s made a space.
There’s a bathroom on the ground level, but the hallway is too narrow. I can’t get my walker through. So I keep the blinds in my office drawn and when I need to, hop over to the commode. At the end of the day he empties it.
* * *
—
The pain surprises me. I didn’t anticipate it. It’s different from any other pain I’ve known. I’ve had nerve pain, I’ve had muscle pain. But this one comes from deep inside my bones. It is especially bad at night for some reason. I take whatever painkillers I am allowed, but it is never enough. Every night I find myself shivering. The only thing I can do is pull the caramel-colored blanket over my head. I disappear under the covers, sometimes for hours at a time. I don’t know why, but this seems to help. Larry, my optimistic husband, says that it must be the pain of the bone healing. Like growing pains. But this feels like the opposite. Every night it feels as if I am shattering all over again.
* * *
—
A week after my accident, Larry returns to work. The flowers stop coming and the visits grow sporadic. The novelty of my broken leg begins to wear off. The days are an endless routine—each beginning and ending in the same way. But that first Sunday is the worst because Larry, a journalist, always works on Sundays. As well as often on holidays such as Thanksgiving or Christmas. I never liked it, but it’s his job. Still he felt badly, leaving me that first Sunday. I could see it in his eyes. That day I never make it down to my office. I just sit on our sofa, watching families heading off to brunch. I cry. I try to hide this from my husband. For most of the day I don’t answer the phone. People think I am resting.
50
ON OCTOBER 3, 2003, at the Mirage in Las Vegas, Chris Lawrence knew something was wrong. He was one of the chief animal handlers for the team of magicians and performers known as Siegfried and Roy, and he worked with Mantecore, the tiger, every day. And Mantecore was not responding to Roy Horn’s commands. Murmurs rose from the crew backstage. The tiger was going rogue, but before they could do anything, the four-hundred-pound beast wrapped his jaws around Roy’s neck and dragged him offstage. At first the audience of fifteen hundred thought this was part of the act. An illusion concocted by the Masters of the Impossible. Slowly they realized it was not.
The official version of the story is that Roy had a stroke onstage and the tiger was trying to protect him, but in fact the opposite is true. Roy’s stroke occurred as a result of the attack. Years later Chris Lawrence broke his silence. He said that for months before the attack Roy had stopped feeding the tigers and stopped whispering to them before their shows. In other words Roy broke the bond and the tiger felt no loyalty to comply. The animal handlers and crew tried to distract Mantecore, but in the end the tiger simply released Roy and walked away.
51
India, 2011
I’M GROWING ACCUSTOMED to the rhythm of our days. The predawn knock on the door. The stinging cold. The tray of tea and biscuits. Our drive to the preserve, where we bribe a guide, and Ajay swings into the jeep. On day three, he removes the scarf for the fir
st time. It is as if he doesn’t mind my seeing him. His hair is slick and wet. Clearly he has showered. I feel as if in some way I am being honored, but I’m too cold and sick to care. I now have two hot-water bottles—one provided by the hotel. One is in my lap and another at my feet. I have blankets over me and I can’t stop coughing. I know that I have a respiratory infection deep in my chest. I’m fairly certain it’s not contagious, but I’m as sick as a dog. I’m just hoping it isn’t pneumonia. I should see a doctor, but that will have to wait. And I have no antibiotics.
Dawn is breaking as we drive into the park. A family of monkeys greets us before they scatter through the trees. I laugh, watching them go. A jackal peers from the side of the road, waiting for us to drive by. We go a bit farther, then stop at a crossroads. Spotted deer graze in the distance, steam rising with their breath. It is here that I miss my daughter, Kate, the most. We have shared our love of animals—the iguanas that lived on the roof of the beach hut we rented in Costa Rica, the sea turtle she swam with in the Caymans, the sea lion that played chicken with her in the Galápagos. She would love this, and I make a vow to bring her here one day. Maybe when she has children of her own.
For now we pause as Ajay does what he does best—listen. His eyes dart through the brush as Sudhir watches him, listening too. After a few moments Ajay points to the right, and we head off. I have no idea what he has heard, but I trust his instincts. I know he is a good man—the same way, perhaps, that Larry knew that Dr. Patel was a good surgeon. You feel something about people at times. And I felt it here. We are driving on a road on the far right side of the reserve. I haven’t been down this road and it is more rutted, and, therefore, less traveled.
In a tree above we see a snake-eating hawk. Sudhir hates snake-eating hawks. But it is beautiful to see that bird above us. Other birds dart by and Ajay can name them all—even if he doesn’t see them. He knows them by their songs and by the flapping of their wings. We stop again and Ajay raises his finger into the air. He reminds me of a friend of mine who, just from a few bars, can name any Duke Ellington song—including when and where it was recorded and even what take.
“Do you hear that?” Sudhir whispers. I shake my head. “Listen,” he says.
I listen and then I do hear something. A very high-pitched squeal. It is barely audible and seems as if it is coming from miles away. “Yes, I do hear that.”
“Barking deer calling spotted deer alarm call.”
Once more we are off at breakneck speed on this deeply pitted road, driving into terrain where no other tourists come. We drive across a narrow riverbed, our wheels underwater. We drive past a ghost tree—its pure white branches reaching overhead. At last we come to a savanna of tall grass, rimmed by the forest. We stop and Ajay stands up. His eyes scan the borders of the savanna. He is looking for a flicker in the grass, a movement that isn’t the wind but a large beast making her way. He reads the forest the way fishermen read the sea. He knows every ripple, what every bent blade of grass might mean. “She’s in there,” he says with confidence. “She’s lying down. She’s out there,” Ajay says. He points to the bushes where in fact I can see the slight rustle in the grass. I ask him how he knows that it’s a “she.”
This is when I learn that all unseen tigers are referred to as she. He doesn’t know why. Perhaps because they are mysterious and unpredictable like hurricanes. This will also be true when I push on to Kahna. Later I will learn that even in the most remote parts of Siberia where the Amur tiger roams, the unseen tiger is “she.” Good trackers can tell from the pugmarks if it is a male or female, but if you have not seen her or her mark, then it is she.
The tiger has been around for more than two million years. Humans have always known the tiger. In Asia there is no place in memory that a tiger does not roam. In the jungles of India or the taiga of Siberia, what lurks out there, what you can hear breathing as if you are the one being hunted, is she.
We are parked at the edge of a river with savanna around us. White-tailed deer, sambar deer, wild boar graze in the open meadows. Aquatic birds wade in the bulrushes. Clearly they do not sense any danger nearby. Ajay’s eyes are on the dry brush at the edge of the savanna. He listens for the cries and watches for any movement in the grass. “She’s in the bush,” he says. “She’s out there.”
52
Brooklyn, 2008
ON THE DAYS when I go to see Dr. Patel, I try to look my best. I wear blue sweaters and earrings to accent my eyes. Lipstick, hair blown dry. The works. A visit to the doctor is a major event in my otherwise uneventful world. It’s as if I’m auditioning for a role. The role of perfect patient. I begin to fantasize about Dr. Patel. Not in an intimate, sexual way. It’s more the way I once fantasized over my seventh-grade teacher. I want to know about him and his life. I try to get information out of him. I understand this is a common occurrence. I had a friend once who, after an accident, had a long affair with her plastic surgeon who was married and many years her senior.
From the moment Dr. Patel walked into my hospital room at four in the morning in his green scrubs, I was drawn to this man. He was going to be my savior. I don’t know if there is the medical equivalent of Stockholm syndrome, but I think I had a case of it. I am the kidnapped, identifying with my captor. I am Patty Hearst to his Symbionese Liberation Army. My foot, my freedom, it is all in his hands. I have to believe that he is the best and I need to believe that I matter to him. Of course there are transient relationships in this world that are intended to be transient. Teacher to student, architect to client, doctor to patient. And yet at the time when we are living within their sphere, they can become the most important person of all.
I befriend his assistant, Naomi. She is young and quite attractive with long, dark hair. I imagine that she and Dr. Patel are a couple. That they have a thing, but it’s an office secret. I envision her lingering after work, waiting for him to take her out for a drink. Do they sit in dark corners of restaurants, eating steak? One day when Naomi is standing in his office, she tells me that she had an ankle injury similar to mine, only from a car wreck. Her ankle is filled with hardware. She’s wearing high heels. Something I can’t imagine ever wearing again. I admire her scar and her shoes.
One afternoon when he is running particularly late, I ask her, “So what’s his story?”
Naomi gives me a sly look. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, you know, is he married or what?”
Naomi confides in me that nobody knows. He is a very private person. This only feeds my fantasies more. I don’t want to sleep with my doctor. But I want him to know me when I’m not laid up. When my life bears a semblance of what it had been before. I imagine inviting him over for dinner. He can bring Naomi. But he comes alone. He brings a good bottle of red wine and gives me a kiss on the cheek. He shakes Larry’s hand and meets Kate. They joke about “her mom,” and he thinks she’s a great girl. He drinks scotch and compliments the food. He becomes my friend.
* * *
—
Except for visits to the doctor and the occasional morning coffee I’m a shut-in. Friends come by. They sit on my sofa, chatting. I’m a captive audience, a priest at the confessional, the therapist they’ve always wanted. Many share the secrets of their lives—things they’ve never told me before. One confides that she’s thinking of ending her marriage. (She does.) Another tells me that she fears her daughter is doing drugs. (She’s not.) Still, this doesn’t stave off my feelings of imprisonment.
I read the opening of Naguib Mahfouz’s novel Palace Walk. A woman, staring down at the street, recalls passing the market below on her way to the house where she was to live after her wedding. That was thirty years ago, and she has not been outside since. How do women all over the world do this? Women in harems, shut-ins who are stuck at home or who, for whatever reason, cannot leave. I put the book down. I can barely breathe.
Depression settles in. I google
dreary stories. Virgin found in trash. Man commits suicide after putting his dog down. When I read about the Puerto Rican grandmother in the Bronx, murdered by a person posing as a wheelchair trainer, I weep.
53
India, 2008
SUDHIR LOVES SNAKES. He loves to capture them and set them free. If they sneak into your house, then, Sudhir tells me, happily, I am your man. Back in his room at the hotel where he stays, he has an eight-foot male python that crawled into the house of one of the villagers, probably because of the cold. “Snakes don’t like the cold.” Sudhir says he’s looking for a female python. He wants them to mate. Then he’ll set them free back into the wild. Sudhir talks a blue streak. Back at the hotel he asks me if I’d like to see his python and I tell him I would, not really sure of what this might entail. In another context this would be a pickup line.
Shortly after lunch Sudhir drags a huge gunnysack onto the lawn and dumps the python in front of me. “That crawled into somebody’s house?” I am in shock.
Sudhir smiles, proud of himself, as he caresses the snake’s head. The snake begins to coil around Sudhir’s arm, working its way toward his neck, until Sudhir decides that this isn’t such a great idea, and for the next fifteen minutes, he struggles to stuff the snake back into the gunnysack. He’ll get a midsection in and the head comes out. Then vice versa. It’s clearly easier to get the snake out of the sack than it is to shove it back.