The Shrine at Altamira

by John L'Heureux

  John’s face went hard, and he withdrew into himself, but Dr. Clark scooped him up in his arms—to hell with decorum—and said, “You’re a good, good boy. You’re a good boy. You’re a good, good boy.”

  Ana Luisa sat in the waiting room and prayed to the Virgin for guidance. Should she tell Dr. Clark that Russell had been following John? He’d go back to jail for sure. He was in violation of his parole. And he had done this terrible thing. Still, he looked so old and so beaten. She had watched in her rearview mirror as he stood beside the car talking to John, and she could tell he meant no harm. He wanted forgiveness. He wanted to be punished. She understood that. But if he wanted to be punished and he violated his parole, why not send him back to jail? He should be punished. But he had only one eye. And what did you do in an earthquake if you were in jail and had only one eye? “Virgen Santísima” she said softly, “my little darling Virgin, tell me what I should do.”

  At once she knew what to do. If Dr. Clark came out to the waiting room, she would tell him about Russell. Dr. Clark would know what to do. If the nurse was with him, it would be a sign, and she wouldn’t tell him about Russell. She had made up her mind. She stared at the door, expectant.

  On the other side of the door, Dr. Clark was making rapid calculations. If John’s mother was in the waiting room, he’d call her inside and tell her about Russell. If John’s grandmother was there, and she probably was, he would … what would he do? Let the moment decide?

  He opened the door to the waiting room just as the door from the hall opened and two men entered the room, a recovering acid burn and his Healthcare driver. Ana Luisa looked startled. She turned to the newcomers and back to Dr. Clark, and then she smiled at Peggy, who appeared directly behind Dr. Clark. “Doctor,” Peggy said, and at the same moment he was paged on the intercom, and John turned back to shake his hand, and Ana Luisa came forward to say something, and everything stopped.

  Dr. Clark put up his hands, surrendering.

  “Help,” he said.

  Everybody smiled at everybody else.

  The next day Russell followed John, and spoke to him, as they feared and knew he would.

  “I knew you’d be here,” John said.

  Russell sat in the car and said nothing.

  “Gram will be here in a minute, you know. She knows you follow me. I told the doctor. Everybody knows.”

  Russell nodded.

  “How come you do it?” He leaned into the car on the passenger’s side. “Is it because you’re sorry for what you did to me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, why don’t you say it?” He waited. “Why don’t you say ‘I’m sorry’?”

  Russell looked at him for a long time. “I am sorry, John. But that isn’t enough.”

  “Can I get in the car?”

  “Yes.”

  He got in the car but left the door hanging open. He was perched on the seat, half sitting, ready to run. “I’m not afraid of you,” he said.

  “No. I wouldn’t hurt you. Never.”

  “But you did. You tried to burn me to death.”

  Russell nodded.

  John wanted to kill him. He said, “My mother goes out with a man. His name is Arthur. She might marry him, and I hope she does.”

  John said, “They’re in love. She doesn’t love you anymore. She hates you.”

  John said, softer now, “I hate you too. I hate you more than anybody in the world. And you can’t do anything about it.”

  “No,” Russell said.

  John punched him then. In the arm, as hard as he could. And again. And again, with both fists. He knelt on the seat and punched Russell in the chest, the neck, the face. He dented the black eye patch. John punched, and he kept on punching, until Russell’s lip began to bleed and there were tears on his face. In all this time, Russell had not once turned away from the blows, not once lifted his hand to protect himself. John punched until he was too tired to go on.

  He scrambled out of the car then, and slammed the door hard. “Bastard,” he screamed. “Sonofabitch.”

  He was still shaking with uncontrolled anger—one of the crazy fits he sometimes had—when Ana Luisa pulled up in front of the school.

  Ana Luisa told Maria and, despite John’s howls of protest, Maria called the police. It’s about Russell Whitaker, she explained, and in less than a minute they had connected her with Forte, Whitaker’s parole officer. For some reason, Forte seemed angry at her, and he rambled incoherently as if he’d been sleeping or maybe even drunk.

  Nonetheless Russell was arrested that evening at home. He came quietly, without any protest, even when his hands were cuffed behind his back. They led him out, and one cop pushed his head down as the other one helped him into the squad car. Next door, Janelle watched from the front step and her mother watched from inside the screen door. As the car drove off, Janelle turned and shook her head sadly, and her mother shook hers in response. It was too bad.

  At the police station, however, Russell would not deny he’d been following John, but he would not admit it, either. “We have proof,” they said. “Your electronic tag.”

  Russell smiled, because everybody knew those things malfunctioned all the time.

  “Other people have complained,” they said. “Your mother-in-law. This Dr. Clark.”

  “Whatever the boy says,” Russell said.

  “You can kiss your ass goodbye,” they said. “You’re dog meat, One Eye. You’ll never see the outside again.”

  “Whatever the boy says.”

  “He says he hates you. He says he never wants to see you again. Can’t you understand that?”

  “If that’s what he says.”

  “Besides, it’s the condition for your parole. You can’t have contact with any of them. Can’t you get that straight? You’ve had it, pal. You’re done for.”

  In the end, though, they let him go. The boy denied he had ever seen his father. He had made it all up, he said. He’d been lying. No, he’d never seen him. No, he’d never even seen his car. He insisted on it, he swore, he went completely out of control. They didn’t believe him, but they had to pretend to take his word for it, because the mother had no proof, and neither did that Dr. Clark, and the boy’s grandmother said she might have made a mistake after all.

  They told Russell that if they ever got proof he violated his parole … well, he knew what to expect.

  They told Forte that he’d lucked out on this one, but the next one meant his job and his pension and et cetera.

  They told Maria that she’d better keep an eye on that kid. She was playing with fire, they said. Get it? But they were embarrassed for saying that, so they said take care, lots of luck, have a good one.

  During her lunch hour Maria went to mass at Saint Anne’s. She hadn’t been to mass in years, and she was distracted by the informality and the handshaking and all the chatter, but she managed finally to think about what she’d come here to think about. Russell.

  Did she want him punished still more? He had lost an eye, she knew that. But he still had his face, didn’t he? Which was more than her son had. Was it vengeance she wanted? And more and more vengeance, like the Jews and the Arabs? Or was she just trying to protect her son from his sick father?

  The more she thought about it, the more confused she got. She knew why Russell had hurt John. For her. To get at her. To make her love him. And she knew—but how did she know?—that John was safe with him now. Russell would never harm him again. Russell had given her up. He had replaced her with John.

  Her mind wandered. She could see a time when John would be all better, his face normal, and he would decide of his own free will to stay with his father, who would love him and take care of him and everything would be good again. And she would be free.

  The bells rang at the consecration, and she buried her face in her hands. Christ was on the altar now, in the bread and wine. My Jesus, mercy, she said to herself, and almost at once she thought, What nonsense. How could she ever have believed s
uch things? She sat back in the pew and examined her nails. She waited for a bolt of lightning to strike. Go ahead, she thought, strike me with a thunderbolt. Strike me dead. At least then I’ll be free.

  But by the time mass was finished and she left the church, she found herself praying, Just let me love him. Just let me love him enough. She meant John, of course, and so she was surprised to find she was thinking of Russell.

  What she needed was Arthur. What she needed was sex. When she got back to her office, she called Arthur and made a date for right after work. She began to feel better at once.

  Sex would be her salvation in the end.

  “I’m going to Billy’s house,” John said, “so you don’t have to pick me up after school.”

  Billy was a friend, another burn victim, and Maria was relieved that John finally had a friend. He needed friends. She was glad for him. More than a month had passed since the police incident, and there had been no sign of Russell anywhere around the house or the office or the school, but still she didn’t trust him. Or John, either, for that matter. She was suspicious.

  Ana Luisa was more than suspicious. She was convinced that John’s friend was really Russell.

  She parked around the corner, and when school let out, she was surprised and pleased to see John and Billy come down the path and get into a long gray Mercedes. The car drove off, and Ana Luisa returned to her own car, relieved, and a little guilty. Poor John, she thought. Poor Russell.

  An hour later, in west San Jose, John came down the path from Billy’s house and got into his father’s car and they drove off in the direction of the beach. They had two hours together. Father and son.

  It was that easy.

  John was fascinated by Russell’s house, by the fact that Russell had lived there when he was John’s age. Every time he visited, he explored the bedroom, he looked into the bureau—only blankets there—and into the closet, where there was a pair of shoes, some trousers, a few shirts, and a bright blue suit. He lay down on the bed and pretended he was his own father.

  This afternoon they sat in the living room eating pizza and watching TV. There was nothing on except talk show stuff, but John didn’t seem to mind and so Russell didn’t mind either. They were watching Oprah.

  Russell pretended he was not looking at John, but in fact he studied him the whole time. John was small for his age, and he looked frail, but he was strong and wiry, with a good, sturdy body and a wonderful mind. He was quiet, mostly, but when he spoke, he was quick and witty and smart. And he had fierce determination. Russell could see that whatever John decided to do, he would do. Nobody would stop him.

  Everything he saw in John was a discovery, a revelation. The way he walked, the way he listened, the way he held his fork, ate, drank, the way he smiled, the way—like his mother—he leaned forward when he explained something. And he had Maria’s eyes too. Maria’s way of laughing.

  Russell shifted on the couch, as if he were trying to get a better view of the TV.

  He could see only traces of himself in John—the shape of the face, the strong chin. His son.

  He wanted to devour him. He wanted to worship him. He wanted to kiss the child’s feet and beg his forgiveness. But he could never ask that. He would never ask that.

  Suddenly John said, “How come you always stare at me?”

  “Do I?” Russell said. “Do I always stare at you?”

  “All the time,” John said. “How come?”

  “I guess because I’m your father. You’re my son.” With forced casualness, he said, “I love you. So it’s natural for me to stare.”

  “You’re always staring,” John said, frowning, but he sounded pleased.

  Russell thought, This is the happiest moment of my life. These are the happiest days of my life.

  Russell pitched the ball and John hit him grounders. John had a sharp eye and a good batting arm and he connected solidly with the ball.

  It was a Saturday in November.

  They were at the beach.

  Russell was living his whole life over in John, and this time it was a good life.

  They were walking through a field of mustard grass. It was February, but the sun was hot and there was no breeze and the yellow flowers stretched ahead of them for nearly a mile. John paused, and a long black snake slithered past him, and then they went on. John was not afraid of snakes. But Russell’s heart beat faster, faster, and for a long time he said nothing.

  Maria was late and Arthur was getting impatient. And then suddenly she was there, looking out of breath, as if she’d been running, as if she couldn’t wait to see him.

  “Sweetie,” she said, and gave him a big kiss. Not a long one, because they were in the bar of the Get Lucky, but a big one, with lots of love, with abandonment, he figured. He let his hand slip lower on her waist, and he pressed hard. “Arthur,” she said, “I’m sorry. I am sorry, really, but I can’t stay. I’ve got to work late. All right? Okay?”

  “I’ll wait,” Arthur said. “Then we’ll go to my place.”

  “I can’t,” she said. “It’s John. I’ve got to get home for him.”

  Arthur pulled a face.

  “I do,” she said.

  She said, “Try to understand. Okay?”

  She said, tired of being nice, “Forget it, Arthur.”

  Arthur hadn’t had time to adjust to each new mood, and he watched, confused, as she left the bar. He swung around on the stool and, blushing, said to the bartender, “Hit me again.”

  Maria never had time for love these days. Not even for sex. Work came first, she said. And then John. Arthur shrugged. Fuck that. Where was he supposed to fit in? After everybody else?

  It was funny: for a while he’d been afraid of getting too involved because he wasn’t ready for anything heavy yet, and because of the kid and all the bills, and because he liked his independence. And during all that time, she’d been hot for him, she was all over him. Then he went to her house for dinner that time, and met the kid, and found out the bills were taken care of by her health plan and by private donations and by this Dr. Clark, and he thought, Why not get involved? She was beautiful and sexy and, the big thing, she made him feel like he was a tiger in bed. He began to really fall for her. He was in love. And all of a sudden she began to pull back.

  The problem, he realized, was that she didn’t love him the way he loved her. She liked the sex, that’s all. The only person she really loved was that kid of hers. John. A smart little bugger with a face like Halloween. How could she love that kid? How could she look at him?

  “Hit me again,” he said to the bartender.

  Everybody, everybody was all fucked up.

  . . . . .

  Rain had begun to fall, one of those cold February rains that promised to go on forever.

  Maria came in stamping the wet from her shoes. She tossed her umbrella in the sink, let her raincoat fall to the floor, and swept John into her arms, dancing with him across the kitchen floor. He laughed, and she laughed with him, and then she put him down.

  “You’re getting too heavy for this,” she said, squeezing him hard. “My big boy. My wonderful big boy.” She looked at him, and he was laughing and laughing.

  “What?” she said. “What’s so funny?”

  “I’m just happy,” he said, and threw his arms around her.

  “It’s a perfect night for popcorn,” Maria said. “And a movie. And we’ll turn up the heat.”

  But John was not listening to her. He was thinking that this was the first time she had ever looked at him without that pain in her eyes, and he was happy, happier than he had ever been in his whole life.

  Dr. Clark, at his shrink’s insistence, had been taking long walks. Walking was good exercise, and good exercise was good therapy, and blah, blah, blah.

  Today he was doing the three miles around Lake Lagunita, an abandoned reservoir that had been tarted up as a kind of inner-city park. It was a very pleasant place. Mothers with babies gathered there each afternoon, and the j
oggers used the track in early morning and late evening, but at noontime it was a nice private place for a three-mile walk. And it was only a short drive from the Burn Unit.

  Dr. Clark was feeling good today, he had a lot of energy, and to prove to himself that things were looking up, he decided to jog—from here to the live oak on the far side of the lake. Less than a mile. He felt funny jogging in dress shoes, Guccis no less, but the air was clear today and there was a cool breeze and for once he didn’t feel like committing suicide. He was jogging well. His breath was strong and regular, and he fell into an easy stride. He could do a mile. Maybe more than a mile. But by the time he got to the live oak, he was winded and he slowed down to a walk. He stopped and rested, his hands braced against his knees.

  As he stood there, bent over, a little dog appeared from nowhere. It was a beagle, or at least part beagle, and it stood ahead of him on the path, wagging its tail, a tentative look on its face. “Hello, you,” Dr. Clark said. The tail wagged furiously, but the dog stayed where it was. “Come here,” Dr. Clark said, squatting down, “come on.” The dog crept toward him, its head lowered as if it expected to be hit. “Good boy, good fella.” He rubbed the dog’s chest and scratched behind its ears. The dog had no name tag, no collar at all. Dr. Clark stood up, and the dog raised itself on its hind legs, wanting more pats. “Walkies,”. Dr. Clark said, and set off again on the path, the dog by his side.

  It would be nice to have a dog. He could get up early and walk it, and take it out for a run at lunch, and it wouldn’t be much trouble. It would be good company. Also, there were professional dog-walkers—he’d seen them, with five and six dogs at a time—if he had to go away for a conference.

  He looked down at the dog and, as if it knew it was being watched, it looked up and wagged its tail. Dr. Clark laughed out loud.

  I’ve got a dog, a beagle, he imagined saying to the shrink. He could see the shrink’s surprise. And how do you feel about that? the shrink would say. I think it’s good, he’d say; I feel good about it. I’m not afraid that it will die, or run away, or burn. It’s just a dog.