My Famous Brain

by Diane Wald

  “Neat,” I said. “But don’t you hate living that sort of lie just because of someone like Mussel? Why bother? Especially these days—probably very few people even care that you’re gay.”

  “I know, I know,” said Rath, shaking his dapper head, “But it’s just a habit now for me … and for Denny it’s a very necessary evil.” He paused for a gulp of coffee, “Denny’s an executive in a very uptight company. He believes he needs to stay in the closet.” Don sighed and smiled. “It’s different for everybody.”

  “You love him dearly.” I didn’t know why I said that, to a veritable stranger, but Rath’s sincerity had touched me.

  “Yes,” he said. “You see.”

  After a momentary embarrassed silence, both of us began to speak at the same time. I begged him to continue.

  “Well, to get back to our topic supreme,” he grinned, “now that I’ve upchucked my grisly story all over our clams, are you going to tell me the real reason you wanted the dirt on the old boy?”

  “God, Don, I wish I could. I’ll tell you as soon as I can. It involves another person, that’s the only reason I can’t let it out now—it’s not that I don’t trust you.”

  “Okay,” he said. “But I hope you’ll be careful, whatever you’re up to. Christ, Jack, you haven’t even started work yet and you’re already up to your neck in muck!”

  I hoisted my coffee cup in a toast. “To muck,” I said.

  Rath grinned at me, raising his own. “To muck and its rakers!”

  9. Sleeping with Edith Wharton

  My illness was formally diagnosed shortly before Frances decided to divorce me, but I had known for months what was happening. Even though I’d not pursued an MD, I knew a great deal about medicine, and I was pretty sure there was no hurry about getting the official word. I dealt with the knowledge that I almost certainly had a brain tumor privately, gradually, and with a certain amount of wonder mixed in with the anger and pain. The only thing I didn’t know was whether it was malignant, but it probably didn’t matter. In those days, treatments and surgeries were primitive compared to what became available in later years. I remember feeling, at first, like a character in a sad novel, like all sorts of fictional characters I’d enjoyed—most of them heroic, if tragic, and stiff of upper lip. I did not tell Frances my secret until the divorce was over and I’d moved out of our house, knowing that she would feel obliged to care for me until the end, and knowing that, scorning me as she did, no loneliness or hurt could be worse for me than being imprisoned under her roof when I became helpless.

  It started slowly. Always nearsighted, I began to need stronger and stronger prescriptions with increasing frequency. Sometimes there was a dull pain, like an ordinary sinus headache, and sometimes a shooting, piercing one that would momentarily cause me to gasp. Occasionally I would have a little trouble with my balance, or I would suddenly experience a peculiarly bitter taste in my mouth, or a sickeningly sweet one. Now and then I’d hear loud noises that weren’t there, or a memory from my childhood would, like a hologram, transfer itself to the world in front of me for a moment or two, blanking out all else.

  But after a month or so, the more bizarre symptoms ceased, and only the nagging headaches and some vision problems remained. While I utilized various self-hypnosis techniques to diminish the headaches whenever I could, I knew I needed something I could take when I was unable to work and couldn’t stop and take the time to meditate. So I took a trip to see Dr. Gerald Hamilton. I planned to stay in New York at least a couple of days, telling everyone I would be attending some lectures at Columbia.

  Gerry and I were buddies from college, but I hadn’t seen him in years. When I went into his office he said, “What have you got, Jack?” and I told him. He nodded. He sent me to the hospital for the needed tests, but both of us knew what they’d tell us. The tumor was not malignant, but it was inoperable, and there was no telling how long it would take to permanently humiliate, incapacitate, and kill me, in that order.

  “This sucks, Jack,” Gerry said. “Did you come all the way to me in New York because it has to be a secret?” He was wise and direct, as always. He was also sweet; while I sat in his leather office chair looking over the test results, he stood behind me and kneaded my neck muscles like a concerned lover.

  “For a while,” I said, “A secret for a while at least. What can you give me for pain?”

  He sighed, and I returned his chair to him. “If only we could operate, but the optic nerve is too involved: no surgeon would touch you the ways things are now. I wish you had come in sooner, but by the time the symptoms appeared it was probably too late already. I only say that so you won’t torture yourself about letting things go.”

  “I know,” I told him. “I know. I came to you for secrecy and for affirmation of my suspicions, but mostly for medication. What have you got that will take the edge off the pain but leave me able to function as normally as possible?”

  “We’ll work up to the really hard stuff when you need it. For now, take this prescription to the pharmacy downstairs. When you run out, call me. I take it you don’t want to get refills locally. When you need something stronger, call me then too. Call me whenever you want to.”

  He got up and stood with his back to me, looking out the window, and there was a long silence. I figured he was crying, so I threw my shoe at him.

  He laughed and called me a fucking idiot and we embraced. Men who first meet each other as boys remain so, when they are together, all their lives.

  “Thanks a million, Gerry.”

  “Take care. Don’t drink with the pills. Don’t drink at all if you can stand it. I’ll pray for a miracle.”

  “Me too,” I said. I then went out to my car and cried myself, for the first time, about my situation. It didn’t seem real until just then—until someone else knew about it. I thought about Harry and Mark, and how I would never go to their graduations or weddings, and I wondered if, had I tried harder, I could have, at some point, won back the Frances I had once so loved. I thought of all the things one would naturally think of under a finally realized death sentence, and then, for the first and last time, I got deliberately drunk.

  I don’t even like to drink all that much, and I had never done what I did that night, but perhaps it was the unreality of it all that prompted me to behave like a character in a made-for-TV feature. There was a friendly looking little saloon right around the corner from Gerry’s office, and I took up residence in a comfortable booth and tied on a big one. I knew I was going way over my limit, but, interestingly, the liquor seemed to have very little effect on me, except for cheering me up a little. I was able to move to the bar and watch the last half of a Mets game like any normal guy. It was a bizarre evening.

  But I did wake up the next morning with what I dubbed “The Last Hangover.” I’d been to the edge and looked over, and I wasn’t going to drink anymore. When my symptoms began to subside, I took myself off to the New York Public Library, and stayed there most of the day, reading a book I’d been meaning to get to for some time. I had a copy at home, but suddenly there it was on one of the library tables, under one of those lovely, green-shaded lamps, as if it were waiting for me to stop by: The Age of Innocence. I fell asleep in the brilliant and understanding arms of Edith Wharton.

  10. Eliza Accepts Two Books

  Sometimes I got really tired. Even before I allowed myself to admit that I was ill, I found myself becoming wearier and wearier, until sometimes, alone in my office on one of those grey, damp, seagull-filled winter days, I would nod off like big goofy dog, right in the middle of something I was reading or writing. One of those times, I’d napped off somewhere in the middle of an article on bipolar disorder in adolescents and had wakened with a start to an entirely silent world. I shook my doggy head and limbs and wondered what had roused me. Leaning over to the window and parting the venetian blinds, I realized it had been not a noise, but a presence: Eliza was walking quickly along the long path from the library to the main quad, her
head bent down (she was wearing the funny multi-colored beret with the big tassel again—something she once told me she had crocheted herself “in a whimsical mood”) and her stack of books clutched close against her chest. No one else I knew walked as fast as Eliza; she seemed to be, like the March Hare, perpetually late for some “very important date.” The truth was that she was so well organized she was really very rarely in a hurry. I guess she was simply a driven soul, but I never really found out what was driving her; indeed, there was so much about Eliza I really never was able—or had time—to discover. She ate quickly too; and read quickly, and probably drove too fast as well—too fast, but very carefully. I often thought I had her pegged, but I know now I was quite a fool to think so. Sometimes I would wonder if Eliza made love with the same intensity she showered on everything else; then I would tell myself that was purely an idle question.

  I knew if I put on my coat immediately, I would be able to plant myself casually outside the humanities building just as Eliza passed by, and we could have one of our “accidental” encounters. I felt I had a right to do this: after all, hadn’t she willed me awake? I smiled to myself; I really believed that so-called nonsense—that is, I believed that the psychic bond between Eliza and myself was not nonsense at all. It really existed. I pondered that miracle as I rushed down the back stairwell, pushing my arms into my coat sleeves and trying to decide whether I should ask her to coffee or merely chat with her for a few moments before taking myself off on some bogus errand. But, alas, I had missed her.

  I had discovered the link that Eliza and I shared early in our acquaintanceship, when she was taking my intro to psychology class. One day, early in the term, we were discussing various types of creativity, and students were offering examples of creative individuals. Someone said Picasso, someone said Leonard Bernstein, someone else said “all poets.” Eliza had been even more silent than usual that day, so I decided to draw her out. “Who’s your favorite poet, Eliza Harder?” I asked her. She never seemed surprised to be called on, always lifted her head, flicked back her curtain of thick unruly hair, and said something quickly and definitively, as if she’d been the one to volunteer a comment. She looked at me and smiled. “Kenneth Patchen,” she said, without even taking a breath.

  I still remember how it felt to hear that. I couldn’t believe it. I don’t think anyone else in that room even knew who Kenneth Patchen was (it’s true there were only a few English majors in the group, but even so …), and certainly, even if some student had heard the name before, it was extremely rare to find any person who had even read one of his works, much less someone who would name Patchen as his or her favorite poet.

  As for me, I’d been strongly attracted to his writing since my early youth and had collected almost all of his strange and beautiful books in hardcover first editions, when they were easy to come by. I considered that Patchen had initiated me into the world of true imagination, and I held his writings closest to my heart. That this Eliza, this student to whom I was so inexplicably drawn, but about whom I as yet knew next to nothing, should name him her favorite as well, was something of a miracle to me. It made me shiver, and I must have given Eliza a very funny look indeed, for with a charming and quizzical smile she said to me, “Wrong answer?” The class, which had fallen silent, laughed, as did I.

  “Not at all,” I said. “A very good choice. I’m a Patchen fan myself. I have some rather rare books of his you might be interested in; I’ll bring them next week.”

  Eliza beamed at me. I don’t know what the rest of the students were thinking; I should have considered that. And I should have introduced the class to Patchen there and then, but I couldn’t—I was feeling too stricken with delight at the recognition of a kindred spirit, so I merely continued our original discussion, although it was hard to concentrate on anything but Eliza. When class was over, she scooted out invisibly, as she’d always done.

  The following Tuesday, I lugged my entire Patchen collection—some ten or eleven books—to class, and when Eliza was taking her seat, I asked her to wait for me when class was over. I was very excited. I had already decided to make a present of the books to her; it never crossed my mind that she wouldn’t accept them. When I emptied my satchel onto the desk after class, Eliza’s eyes lit up like twin votive candles; I had not seen such an expression since my son Mark saw a butterfly emerge from its chrysalis one spring morning long before. She handled the volumes carefully, saying things like “Oh, I’ve never seen this one,” and “Oh, this is a first edition,” and often, simply “Oh!” Finally, after she had laid out the books across the desk so she could look at them all at once, she looked at me shyly. “May I borrow a couple?” she said.

  “They’re yours,” I told her. She simply stared at me; I could read nothing in her expression.

  “Oh no,” she said. “No, no, Dr. MacLeod. But I would love to borrow one or two—the ones I’ve never seen. I promise I’ll be very careful with them.”

  I decided not to argue with her; I wanted her to feel at ease. “Of course. Take as many as you like. And keep them as long as you like. I love him myself, as you can tell, but these books have sat on my shelves untouched now for a long time. They’d be pleased to go home with you and be appreciated again.” I didn’t tell her I’d memorized several of them, though I’d wanted to: she didn’t know me well at all, and I didn’t want to scare her off. Of course, that wouldn’t have scared Eliza at all—she would have been fascinated by such a thing—but I didn’t know it then.

  She selected two prose works, The Journal of Albion Moonlight and Sleepers Awake, and I convinced her to take two volumes of poetry as well, and after some shy thank yous and goodbyes, she took herself away to wherever she’d come from. I found out later, from Eliza herself, that she’d fairly sprinted to the boarding house where she was staying, so eager to examine the books that she’d forgotten about her evening meal, which she usually took in the dining hall on campus. I had planned to tell her of my passion for Patchen, of how I had discovered him, of the influence he had had on my life, but oddly, although we had exchanged but a very few words, I felt she’d understood the whole story. It would not be the first time I’d get that feeling.

  The very next week Eliza returned my books. I pleaded with her to keep at least a couple of them, and she finally accepted. Her gratitude was humbling; I was so delighted to have made her happy. I asked her to come talk to me about them sometime, and she said she would. I remember going home that night feeling as though I’d kissed her, but never imagining that someday I really might.

  11. Dinner with Al Capone

  I was getting undressed for bed one night, during the week’s grace from her persecutor that had been granted to Sarah Bowe, when Frances mentioned casually to me that she had invited Wally Mussel to dinner. So bizarre was her statement that my mind was catapulted for a moment or two into something like complete confusion—a state I can only compare to that curiously vivid instant between waking and sleeping that one experiences now and then when overly tired or feverish or drugged. When full consciousness returned to me, I had already formulated some rather grand, if obvious, questions: How did Frances know Mussel? Why was he here in Vermont? When was this dinner to take place? Was I glad of or terrified by the prospect of meeting him, knowing what I knew?

  I turned on Frances with what must have been startling intensity.

  “WHO?” I asked, my voice crumpling a little under the weight of my emotion, and then, without waiting for an answer, “How did this happen?” I stood there in my undershorts feeling both ridiculous and on guard. Frances gave a short laugh.

  “Well now, Jack,” she said. “I thought you’d be pleased. What’s that look for?” She picked up some items of clothing from a chair and began folding them. “Actually, it’s a very funny story. I went to lunch at The Blue Cafe today with Margaret and Anna, and we chatted in the parking lot for a while before leaving. They’d just driven off together when I realized I’d locked my keys in the car; I coul
d see them lying on the seat inside, in fact. I was just standing there trying to decide what to do next when this nice gentleman asked if he could be of any assistance. I told him the problem, and he got some kind of nifty tool from his own car and had the window open in no time at all. I thanked him profusely of course, and we chatted for a minute, and then I noticed his license plates were from New Jersey. I said we were all about to move there, mentioned NSU, and … voila! He revealed himself to be your very own department-head-to-be, in this neck of the woods for a conference.” Frances stopped for a moment. “Isn’t that odd—what kind of conference does anyone have up here? But anyway, Jack, what else could I do but invite him for dinner?” She looked at me coyly. “You should be thanking me, dear, not acting as if I’d invited Al Capone.”

  “You might as well have,” I wanted to say, but I had to muster all my wits to avoid putting Frances on the defensive; one thing I certainly didn’t need was a lot of questioning from her.

  “Sorry, Frances, I was just so surprised” I said. “I’m glad you were rescued. When is he coming?”

  She smiled at me almost sincerely. “Tomorrow night,” she said. “As I told you, he’s only here a couple of days, for a conference.” And then, in an extremely odd tone of voice, “Such a nice man.”

  I climbed into bed feeling as though I were climbing into a coffin. Everything was just too crazy all of a sudden: Sarah, Wally, Donald Rath, and now this weird side Frances was displaying. Could her last comment really have meant she liked this guy? I wasn’t in love with Frances anymore, it’s true, but neither did I consider her a fool. She’d always shown good judgment with people before. I was thoroughly confused. I thought I would never fall asleep, but strangely enough I did: I fell immediately into a deep, dreamless state that sailed me effortlessly into morning. When I woke up, Mussel’s name was already on my mind.