The Desperates

by Greg Kearney

  JOEL DINGS HIS grandmother’s doorbell for a good five minutes before her beady eyes appear in the window. Hazel Hannigan is eighty-two and, apart from the burgundy rinse in her sparse hair, looks every minute of it.

  “Who is it? I’ve got a goddamn rifle!”

  “Hi, Granny. Sorry, it’s Joel.”

  “The hell it is. He’s in Toronto, I know that for a fact. Who is this?”

  “Gran, it really is Joel. Joel, who was too effeminate to eat Christmas dinner with you two years ago. Remember when you said that?”

  “Joel? What the hell do you want? Where did you come from?”

  “I’ve been in town for a while. For Mom. But she made me leave the house. Can I maybe come in?”

  “Oh, for Jesus Christ,” she hisses, fiddling with multiple locks.

  Joel hugs his grandmother, who does not hug back. Hazel is infamous for her bile and total lack of tact. Most people hate her, including her children. But Joel has this dim recollection of once, as a child, making Hazel laugh, in spite of herself, laugh into her shoulder furtively, so nobody could see her experience happiness. So Joel retains a fondness for this hateful woman.

  “I’d fallen into a nice sleep for the first time in years and you come and startle me. So is she — gone?”

  Joel, jostled from the night’s events, doesn’t understand the question. And then he does.

  “No, she’s still alive. Sort of. How did you know she’s sick? Mom said you guys haven’t spoken for months.”

  Hazel sits, lights up a Black Cat, sucks it with her anus of a mouth.

  “I’m still her mother. A mother knows when her thing — her child — is in pain. And the girl who comes in to do my hair seen her downtown and said she looks like hell.”

  “You really should go and see her. It won’t be fun, by any means. But you’ll really regret it if you don’t.”

  Hazel laughs, a clammy bramble of a laugh, which dissolves into coughs. “Don’t talk to me about regret, mouthy. I was married for forty-four years to an animal. He broke every bone in my body, he threw me through a window, he threw me off a Ferris wheel, he pushed me down the escalator at Polo Park Mall, and I am to this day convinced that he rigged the bathtub somehow in an attempt to boil me. But I stayed, for the benefit of my children. Then my daughter tells me she’d rather I aborted her than raised her. How do you like that? My whole goddamn life has been one big regret. And now I’ve got my gayandlesbian grandkid scratching at the door like a raccoon. Christ, I’m the one that should’ve been aborted.”

  Hazel cackles. Joel looks at the limp plastic Christmas wreath on the wall above the toaster oven. That wreath has been there always.

  “So is it okay if I just, like, sleep on your chesterfield tonight?”

  “No, it is not okay if you sleep on my chesterfield. What if someone looked in and seen ya? They’ll think I’m running a flophouse. No, you can sleep on the floor in the basement. Well, there’s a loveseat down there, you can lay on that. For tonight. Then I want you out of my hair.”

  Joel descends to find that Hazel’s basement is actually quite homey: chintz curtains on the windows that look out onto black brick, a well-kept navy area rug, a glass-and-brass display cabinet in the corner, filled with ballerina dolls of all sizes. He hasn’t seen the doll collection before. Ballerina dolls, mid-dance, swirled in white and yellow and even black tulle, with real hair pulled into tight buns.

  He snoops around his grandmother’s basement, on this bleak, absurd night. On top of the television is a VHS tape: Estrella Plant’s Ballet and Jazz Dance for Seniors, it says on the box, which also features Estrella Plant smiling strenuously while doing the splits. On the floor by the loveseat is a book: Never Too Late: Inspired Life Change at Any Age. He flips through it; it’s a workbook, with blurbs by old people who have hurled their craggy bodies out of airplanes or reached their very first orgasm, with a much younger partner. There are exercises and questionnaires. Hazel has filled out only one.

  Q: Describe the forces in your life that may have discouraged you from pursuing a goal, and possible ways of addressing those negative forces so that they no longer hamper you.

  A: I always wanted to be a ballerina, but when I told Daddy that I wanted to be a ballerina he said that only whores become ballerinas and also I was plain in the face. I got married and that was that.

  This negative force no longer hampers me because Daddy capped from a stroke in ’79. At the funeral I cried along with Dot and Peg but we were all secretly relieved that he had finally capped.

  GRANNY DECODED AT last, Joel thinks, triumphant. All these years Hazel’s been torn between dance and domesticity, just like the girl in The Red Shoes, and her thwarted passion has expressed itself as crankiness.

  He runs upstairs. Granny’s in the bathroom. He knocks.

  “G’wan! I’m taking a shit!”

  “Granny, I understand now.”

  “Understand what? I’m taking a shit. And it’s my first one in a week so don’t wreck it for me.”

  “No, I mean, I understand about your — your bitterness over not being a ballerina.”

  No response. Joel calls to her twice. Finally, a flush. Hazel opens the door. Her face is all veins and menace.

  “Have you been snooping around in my things?”

  “No! Just what was lying out in the basement.”

  “I don’t have nothing lying out in the basement. You went through my personal things. I feel like I been raped.”

  She puts a hand against the hall wall. Joel can’t tell if she really needs the wall for support or if it’s just for show.

  “Granny, I’m trying to say that I understand. I’m torn between artistic expresion and romantic fulfillment also. Like in The Red Shoes. Have you seen the movie? Have you heard the Kate Bush record of the same name? So good.”

  “You get out of my house! People don’t talk to other people about their personal ballerina things. I never felt so raped. Even when I was raped!”

  “I’m just trying to reach out. I wasn’t trying to rape you, Gran.”

  She pokes him. Pokes him down the hallway and through the kitchen.

  “Out! Out! Out!”

  “Please don’t throw me out. That would be twice in one night. I’m starting to feel really … not seen, and not heard. Please? I love you, Granny. I love your passion for ballet.”

  “Stop. It’s like a knife up my privates! You go and get your cruddy knapsack and get the hell out of here. You got five minutes.”

  Hazel staggers to the back of the house, slams a door and locks it noisily.

  In the basement Joel finds a heavy, black rotary telephone and calls Edmund. Edmund answers with his usual “Edmund speaking.”

  “It’s just Joel, hi. I know it’s super late and you’ve moved on with a new lover, and actually I’ve also moved on in a big way, so that’s really great, but I just had an argument with my grandmother and I feel all — Yeah. I continue to experience crisis. How are you?”

  “I’m great. Busy. It is truly astonishing, how much there is to do and get done, when you really inspect your life. They’re doing some construction next door, so my days and nights are punctuated by pounding and sawing and drilling, all day, all night, 24/7, which you’d think would be illegal, but. Wait. You said you’re in crisis? When you say ‘crisis,’ do you mean crisis crisis as in ‘Hey, I’m in crisis, where is the ice cream truck right this minute?’ or do you mean crisis crisis as in “I’m in crisis, turn me over, what about Linda?’ sort of thing.”

  “I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

  “Really? Oh no!”

  “Edmund, are you okay? I’m worried that you’ve — have you had a stroke?”

  Edmund whoops away from the phone. Joel hears a circular, swooshing sound; Edmund may be swinging the phone around by its cord like a lariat.
/>   “‘Have you had a stroke?’ she says! That’s one for the photo album of all time. No, I have not had a stroke. I think laterally these days. My whole thought process is much more intricate and mystic. It’s been a very expansive time of late. Now I sound like something that fell out of Grace Slick’s purse. Forgive. I’m going to stop talking now. Now. No, now. Shhh. Tell me about your crisis.”

  Joel hesitates to speak, fearful of fuelling Edmund’s mania. This yapping loon is so unlike the slow, lilting man he first knew.

  “My mother, who is insane and totally dying, threw me out of the house for no reason. So I went to my granny’s. And now my granny is throwing me out of her house for being supportive of her lifelong dream of being a ballerina. I’m homeless. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Hmm. That part of Ontario is quite pastoral, isn’t it? Why don’t you camp out?”

  “I don’t know how to camp. I was hoping that I might be able to come and stay with you. I have enough for the bus to Toronto. Even if I could sleep in, like, a closet or whatever. I know you have a new love interest, and even though that destroys me I’d still be grateful if you’d have me.”

  Edmund hems and haws aloud, like in a radio play. Granny bangs on the ceiling.

  “Or even in your backyard? Seriously.”

  “You know, Joel, my life is so busy these days. My house is a hive. I really don’t think you’d be comfortable here. And, as you said, I really am so immersed in my new relationship. You’d be better off camping in the bush.”

  “No, I wouldn’t.”

  “Or take shelter in a church.”

  “Please? Please, Edmund?”

  “Please don’t — say my name, tenderly. I can’t. Whoa, yeah. I’m off now. There’s a pie. I need to make. Talk soon.”

  Edmund is off the phone before Joel can try to plead in an untender way. He grabs his knapsack. He is homeless in his hometown. He tries to picture himself pitching a tent, making a fire. He can’t.

  20

  OLD FRIENDS IS WHAT IT’S all been about of late. These past weeks, darting here and there with Binny, getting the meth from the meth people, finding new meth people when the usual meth people run out, doing the meth, nude amid candles and dildos in this condo or that — Edmund keeps encountering acquaintances he hasn’t seen for years, men he’d assumed were dead. But they aren’t dead; they’re on disability and meth. Hollow-cheeked, dentured, prone to edema of the lower legs, stocked up on fancy groceries that go uneaten, breathless, fidgety, forever pushing pampered cats out of the way with fat, slippered feet, these guys are all in pretty rough shape, but it’s great to see them again. As they leave these candlelit condos after three-day binges, Edmund will fill Binny in on who these men are, or were. That guy was almost the mayor, twice. That guy used to have his own cooking show.

  Yesterday, might’ve been the day before, but definitely recently, Binny pulled Edmund into somebody’s bathroom and declared his love and loyalty. “I’d die for you, I’d fry for you,” he said. Edmund returned the vow, in a high, disco whisper. He isn’t sure that he does love Binny, but they get along magically well when they party. He thought he definitely did love Binny for a stretch there, when they came together in Edmund’s many rooms, all giggly possibility. As the days went on — days of getting high, speeding for forty-eight hours or more, then crashing, sleeping, trying to stave off the pummelling despair as dopamine levels flatlined — their relationship suffered. It’s impossible to enjoy another person when your only thoughts are of suicide, or more meth to eclipse those suicidal thoughts. They are an affectionate couple, bound together by meth. Maybe that’s not the optimal foundation for a relationship, but it really could be worse. It could be based on duty, or guilt. That kind of relationship is truly sick.

  And the sex is … well, not technically extraordinary, what with everyone impotent from the meth, but the aura of erotic possibility is constant and powerful, and it insists that Edmund and Binny abandon all else in pursuit of marathon group sex. This is an arduous task; there has to be at least one guy in the group amenable to either taking Viagra (which means no poppers, lest they have a heart attack) or fucking straight while everyone else is fucked up. When the details all line up, though, and marathon group sex does happen, you instantly know that this sex, with these people, on this drug, is the sweet spot of all mortal experience.

  During these sessions, in dark apartments made muggy and hot to counter cold hands and feet, Binny becomes a squalling primate, while Edmund babbles. Binny becomes insatiable, endlessly able to accommodate cock after cock, while Edmund becomes not so much insatiable as insatiably interested in the topic of sex. He talks non-stop about sex. As Binny is penetrated by a procession of people and objects, Edmund curls up like a mermaid on the side of the bed and colour-commentates: How does that feel? Surely that’s far too large for even you to take. What an achievement. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a sparkly dildo before. Wow. Look at that. Oh my goodness. And that is not a small fist, either. Well done. Way to go.

  They’ve met up with some S&M tops. Binny found them too polished, with their leather outfits and prissy rules — when one of them launched in on the dangers of bipolar currents near the heart area during electric play, Binny screamed at him to just shut up and plug in. If there is no real threat that Binny might be maimed or murdered he starts to lose interest. He likes it rough. Brutally rough: no cloying cat-o’-nine-tails for him; he wants the shit thoroughly kicked out of him, by an amateur with a real grudge. This tall order has been almost impossible to come by; there was one guy, a paunchy older guy with a big mole on his forehead like Aaron Neville’s, who delivered one punishing backhand to Binny’s face before going soft (on all fronts) and apologizing profusely.

  Binny tries to goad them, exhort them to really slap, really punch, really choke, he can take it, he’s a nasty boy who needs killing. They’ve often been asked to leave, the torture bottom and his yapping pimp. All those long, ear-popping elevator rides, the two of them silent, panting and studying themselves in the mirrored walls and ceiling.

  When they crash, they crash in unison and sleep for two days, always two, rising periodically to chug orange juice and maybe stand for a moment, vertiginous at the sight of the stove, the sad stove, and the fridge, the sad fridge. At one point, they’re both up at the same time; Binny asks Edmund if there would be any way Edmund would consider beating him up a bit. This annoys Edmund. He’s feeling the same dejection that Binny is, but he’s sleeping it off, not begging for a beating. “Bear the brunt!” he barks at Binny and goes back to bed.

  Finally Edmund is lucid again. There’s a voicemail from Lila.

  Eddie, it’s Lie-Lie. I was just going to say “I have some bad news, please call me,” but I behaved so atrociously last time we saw each other, I realized you have every reason not to want to call me. I’m so, so sorry for the way I acted towards your friend. I was judgmental. Forgive me. Not just because you’re a very dear friend but also because — I — we, we lost the baby. They saw that all of his organs were on the outside of the body and his little spine was all twisted. I gave birth to Israel. He came out sleeping. He’d already passed away. We’re hurting, Eddie. Please call me. I love you.

  He calls. He gets Marci. He tells her how sorry he is for her loss. She thanks him — is it just him, or is she being chilly? — and hands him off to Lila. Her voice is small and froggy, a cried-out voice.

  “Oh, my Eddie, are you still my friend?”

  “Always, always! How can I help?”

  “Just come see me. Please come see me. I need to see a friendly face. Marci — I think Marci’s mad at me.”

  “That’s not true. She’s just grieving.”

  “Can you come over today? Please come over.”

  “Definitely. Just give me a bit. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Is it okay if I bring Bernard?”

  She pauses. “Umm, sure, o
f course. I owe him an apology.”

  After they hang up Edmund runs a dishrag under the faucet and wipes down the kitchen surfaces. He thinks back to his old, fallow life after Dean, before Binny. Quiet days, the long slats of winter light that fell across his body as he watched television — what was so sad about that? The lassitude, the small gnaw he felt then was blissful compared to the cold immobility that now binds him to his bed between binges. He would like to see Lila. A nice visit could be curative. She’ll get the chance to assuage her conscience with Binny, and he’ll get the chance to brush against his old life. He would have to be high, though. Lila and Marci and Lila and their dead baby. He’ll have to be high. Binny has to be there. He doesn’t do anything without Binny now.

  “We’re going to Lila’s,” Edmund says to Binny, who is flossing his teeth and watching porn with the sound off.

  “Who’s Lila? I don’t generally like to party with girls.”

  “Lila, you know, who you had that unfortunate run-in with a little while ago. She feels terrible about the way she acted.”

  “That fucking bitch. Good, I’m glad she feels terrible. That really fucked me up.”

  “And she wants to see you so she can apologize.”

  “What, she wants me to go to her like a fucking royal subject? Fuck that. She wants to apologize to me, she can come see me.”

  “Binny, she lost her baby.”

  “Where?”

  “No, I mean, she miscarried.”

  “Oh. Well, that’s shitty, but still.”

  “She would be grateful to receive your wonderful, positive energy.”

  Binny loosens a little. Edmund feels a pang of guilt for homing in on Binny’s need for approval.

  “Did she really say that she thinks I have positive energy?”

  “Yes.”