When We Argued All Night

by Alice Mattison

  —Bathroom.

  —You need to go to the bathroom?

  —Bathroom.

  —Did they bring you a bedpan?

  —Bathroom.

  —Did they give you breakfast? Did you have something to eat?

  —Bathroom.

  No, the nurse told her, he didn’t mean he had to go to the bathroom. Sometimes they just say the same thing over and over, she said. They don’t know what they’re saying. Brenda tried to distract him, talking about David.

  Artie said, Did he go to the bathroom? Did you go to the bathroom? You have to go to the bathroom.

  Hours passed. Nobody looked at her. Maybe they were giving her privacy, which was not what she needed. Nobody could tell Brenda what was wrong, nobody seemed to understand that it had happened all of a sudden. But had it happened all of a sudden?

  BW: Looking back, why do you think you joined the Communist Party?

  HA: I joined to impress my friends. But sometimes we do the right thing for the wrong reasons.

  BW: Why was it the right thing?

  HA: Things were different. It was the right thing. Later, Communist turned into a dirty word. The Russians didn’t do it. Stalin—you can’t imagine.

  BW: What can’t I imagine?

  HA: Ideals turning to blood. The loss. We have never regained—maybe in the sixties, for a minute—the optimism. There’s no protest without optimism. You protest—do you understand me?—when something could change.

  BW: But we still have antiwar marches—protests . . .

  HA: No, nothing like that. Nothing. When I lost my job—

  BW: As a teacher?

  HA: Nobody knew why. We should have been heroes, but the time was over. We were just dirt to be mopped up. Later, they said, Oh, you weren’t the dirt; we made a mistake. Big deal.

  BW: Is that why you didn’t go back to teaching?

  HA: Didn’t go back? I was a teacher all my life.

  BW: In college. I guess you weren’t going to give up a college teaching job to go back to teaching high school.

  HA: I suppose I should have. I’m not a good person, never was. I had to do what I could as an essentially selfish person. That’s what I should have called the book. Fool has nothing to do with it. I should have said, A Selfish Man and His Principles.

  Artie was sent from the emergency room to a nursing home, then back to the hospital two weeks later when he seemed to be having a heart attack and dying. Carol flew in from Michigan, and she and Brenda sat by his bed. After three hours of silence, Artie said, There’s no question the reduction of problems will increase.

  Brenda laughed.

  —He’s alive? Carol said, looking at Brenda. He’s going to stay alive? Carol was slim and blond; her hair was dyed and curled, and her tears were more touching, Brenda felt, than the tears that fell down her own square face, under her short gray rumpled hair. Artie didn’t die, and the doctors decided it hadn’t been a heart attack after all, but an infection. Carol left.

  He lay in a sunny hospital room, where Brenda spent day after day, phoning Jess each night. One morning Artie said, I want to be that same old age as Harold.

  Harold’s birthday had already happened. Artie’s would come in a week. She said, Ninety-four?

  —Yes. Then, enough. Living like this is no fun.

  BW: Was there anything you could have done to prevent your son Nelson’s suicide?

  HA: When he was two. When he was ten. Sometimes you shouldn’t tell yourself there was nothing you could have done. Sometimes there are things you could have done. I can say I didn’t know it would happen, but from the time he was a teenager, I knew it would happen.

  BW: Do you have advice for the parents of children with mental illness?

  HA: Such as, don’t beat up on yourself? My advice would be, Beat up on yourself. But nobody needs advice to do that. Everybody can do it already.

  BW: In your book, you say that the best thing in your life has been your wife, Naomi, but that falling in love with Naomi caused Nelson’s death.

  HA: Do I say that?

  BW: You imply it.

  HA: So what do you want from me?

  Clothing that’s halfway between theirs and ours, Artie said to Brenda. She’d gone home for a few days and had returned. Then, When your women and my women are together, what is the relationship?

  She was baffled. What do you think?

  —What do you think, and what do the girls think?

  She decided they were combining their staffs, like King Lear and Goneril, but perhaps with less friction. She said, I think they’ll get along, and we can deal with problems as they arise, and he nodded and quieted. The days were boring but pleasant. David came when he could. She and her father conversed—how urbanely and politely!

  He said, All night it came to me that I was going between Evelyn and . . . trigger finger. Do you know who trigger finger is? Trigger finger is Brenda.

  That afternoon he was tired and petulant. The room felt small and stuffy. Artie said, Confusion, confusion, confusion.

  Later, Why did they play so many tricks on us?

  Later still, Green paper, green paper, green paper.

  —Do you want green paper? Brenda said. Do you remember something about green paper? She hushed herself.

  —Sick, Artie said. No sick. Sick. No sick. Sick. No sick. Confused.

  —You’re confused.

  Time passed. Brenda, he said. Brenda, Brenda, Brenda, green paper Brenda. Green paper, green paper . . . really happened.

  Then, Yellow paper, yellow paper . . .

  A nurse took his vital signs. I don’t want to live, he said.

  The next day he said, Yellow, yellow, yellow, and circled his hand in the air as he said it. Brenda Saltzman, he said then. Pink paper. Carol. Green paper. No release. Green medicine in red paper. Must bus. Green paper.

  —Who are you? Artie said abruptly, looking right at Brenda. David had stopped by after work and stood near the window.

  —Brenda.

  —Who?

  —Your daughter.

  He said, Daughter has d, g.

  —Yes, d-a-u-g-h-t-e-r.

  —So why didn’t you give me the d g medicine?

  —I don’t know how, Brenda said.

  He laughed weirdly.

  —Are you laughing?

  —It’s funny. David, take over. Be smarter.

  The next day there were more words. What do I do now? Artie said.

  —Just rest.

  —Where do I rest? How do I rest? My right foot is locked up. Then, No, he said. Terrible feeling. Oh, my God. This is the worst.

  BW: You are primarily interested in political life, but you taught literature and wrote books about literature. Why is that?

  HA: I am interested in literature. I hate public life. As citizens, we must pay attention to public life, just as we must pay attention to private morality as human beings, whatever our interests.

  BW: You hate public life? Really hate it?

  HA: Yes.

  BW: Does literature relate to politics?

  HA: Literature is dangerous. It tells us things are more complicated than is convenient. You can’t make policy if you think all day about literature. Literature professors who won’t sign the petition because they don’t like the semicolon.

  BW: But doesn’t literature teach us how to be moral?

  HA: No.

  BW: That’s not true! You’re not telling the truth about what you think.

  HA: How do you know what I think?

  BW: I read your book. I read all your books.

  HA: I am tired.

  BW: Is it too much? Should I come another day?

  HA: How is my friend?

  BW: My grandfather? He’s in the hospital.

  HA: What does literature tell me to do when my friend is sick?

  BW: You could go see him.

  HA: Does literature tell me to do that?

  BW: I don’t know.

  HA: Are you cr
ying?

  As Brenda walked through the corridor toward Artie’s room, a nurse said, He’s pretty wild.

  —Could I tell you something? she said, when she came in. It was his ninety-fourth birthday.

  He said, No, no—not now. I’m in a very difficult game.

  Artie had been taken out of bed and put into a lounge chair with a tilted back. A tray table crossed his lap, maybe to keep him in one place. His legs were stretched out on the footrest, and Artie flexed his feet alternately, rhythmically, with the agility and control of an athlete. He said, I want to tell you how I got into it. It’s very bizarre.

  Brenda sat opposite in the straight chair. Artie never stopped flexing and straightening his legs and feet, alternately. Then he said, Quarter.

  Then, You can make a day’s pay out here. I saw five quarters.

  She understood something. You’re picking up quarters?

  —Yeah. He paused, concentrating. Then he said, Look at that fish!

  Finally, Brenda understood. He was in a pedalboat. What’s the fish doing? she said.

  —Not that, the way it looks. So tempting, he said. But after a while, he said, Well, I want to get out. Suppose you wanted to go somewhere right now, what would you do?

  —I’d take the subway to David’s and pick up my car.

  —Forget I asked you. He called to invisible people to his left and right. Do you want a boat? Do you want this boat if I get out?

  After another pause, he said, I had no idea this was competitive—but they’re scoring.

  —Is it a race? Brenda said.

  —No, but they’re always counting time. People were watching. One gave me a white paper, one gave me a black mark . . .

  When a nurse came in, he demanded to get out of the boat.

  —It’s a chair, Mr. Saltzman.

  —So how can I get out of this chair? A minute later it was a boat again. You want this boat?

  To Brenda, Is this boat riding or staying put?

  Brenda said, It’s tied up.

  He said, Let me sit on it for a while. His feet stopped. Then, What do they charge for it? Is your boat sitting or perched on a small boat? I seem to see something underneath.

  It was compelling. She said, Do you think we’re in a lake or a river?

  —A pond, but I’m just wondering if those little boats are going to move. Rapidly and lucidly, he explained that it wouldn’t be a problem if the boats were going to stay where they were, but if they were going to move, he needed to know so as not to collide with them. What is the usual ride? he asked.

  —An hour, Brenda said.

  —How are my touches?

  When she asked for an explanation, he said, One boat touches another. Is the guy going out behind me to the left?

  —He’s at a good distance, she said.

  —This is comparable to playing tennis on Sunday morning. Brutal. Absolutely brutal. As a matter of fact, I think I wouldn’t do this on Sunday. She could see the pond, the boats going back and forth, the difficulty of moving without colliding with another boat. When the aide came in with lunch, she seemed to be from another plane of existence, but her father said agreeably, I had orange juice and Jell-O and a combination of a sandwich that was quite good.

  Next he said, Try to move a boat over and open up a space for boats. It would be good if you could take yours and move it over.

  Suddenly, after a silence: The number of faces I recognize but really don’t know just who they are—but I know they’re from New York—is unbelievable.

  After another silence, he said, I don’t have the patience for this. Then, I don’t understand this peculiarity. When it’s very warm and I’m speaking a lot, my voice goes down and I can’t whistle.

  —Try, Brenda said. He pursed his lips in the old way, but there was no sound.

  She had worked out that the game was something like bumper cars: he had to avoid being touched by other people’s boats. But it was good to be on the lake. She said, Remember the lake in the Adirondacks?

  —Oh yeah. Those were lovely years . . . The look of the lake . . . Why don’t we move a few of the boats? There’s a big space here.

  At last, Brenda agreed they should move the boats. He tried to get up, and she suggested that he supervise while she did it. She said, Okay, I’m moving the first boat. Now I’m moving another boat . . . He was calm. They discussed the weeks at the lake. The most refreshing feeling, Artie said.

  Someone knocked at the open door. It was Harold. Brenda jumped up to kiss him. Shall I leave you two together?

  —Oh, no, Harold said. I won’t stay long. He carried a newspaper and a book, and he put them on Artie’s bedside table. Brenda saw that it was his new book, A Fool And His Principles.

  —Artie, Harold said, leaning over the lounge chair that was a pedalboat.

  —How are you? Artie said.

  —How are any of us? said Harold. How are you?

  —Who needs it? said Artie.

  —I know what you mean. Harold took his hand and held it with both his hands. Happy Birthday, he said. I brought you my book. He moved Artie’s hand up and down, then leaned forward and held it to his cheek. When he let it go, he sat down on the bed. His head was down, and he brought out a small package of Kleenex from his pocket and blew his nose.

  BW: What do you want people to remember about your life and your ideals?

  HA: No one will remember them.

  BW: But if they did?

  HA: I’m sorry. You make me think of my dear, difficult friend, your grandfather, and I become difficult because he no longer knows how. I will give you a straight answer. I would like to be remembered as someone who was worth the trouble. I would like people to read Henry James and the rest. I would like people to think about trying to make things better, even though it’s complicated and there is another way to see everything. People suffer. We must end suffering, when we can. When we can without lying.

  Tentatively—experimentally—Artie died. It was as if his body had rolled off the edge of a cliff, then come to rest on a short ledge over water. Something might have brought him back; he even knew as much. Desire was gone, anger was gone, but knowledge (without words for what he knew) continued. Nobody came, nobody touched him, and after a time his body tipped off the place where it had paused, and he was nowhere.

  3

  We could stop for coffee, Brenda said.

  —Do you want to? said Jess.

  —I don’t have the energy to get out of the car.

  —I’ll bring you some, Jess said. She was driving. Brenda knew every place between New York and Concord, New Hampshire where you could get a decent cup of coffee not too far from the road. I think at the next exit, she said. They were somewhere in Massachusetts.

  When they stopped, Brenda wanted to get out. It was a cool day for July, and a damp wind blew into her face. They walked together through the parking lot. Then she said, I need to get back into the car. Is that okay?

  —Sure, Jess said. Brenda had imagined someone asking them what they wanted. She couldn’t speak to one more person.

  Jess brought coffee and an enormous cookie. They broke off chunks, handing it back and forth. Brenda said, Harold is so sad. He had spoken, that morning, at her father’s memorial service, looking as if any touch could knock him down. His wife handed him into and out of his chair, but his voice was sure. He told stories about Artie that Brenda had never heard. She said, I didn’t think there was anything I didn’t know.

  —I thought even I knew all the stories, Jess said. Artie used to call her Daughter-in-law, as if it was her name. Hey, Daughter-in-law. He had never stopped finding it interesting that he had a daughter-in-law, though he had no sons.

  Jess put her cup into the holder and pulled out of the parking lot.

  —Do you want more cookie? Brenda said.

  —You finish it.

  —It’ll make me fatter.

  —Medicinal purposes. She signaled to return to the access road and then to the highwa
y.

  They were silent. I thought he’d be there, Brenda said. When I pictured my father’s memorial service, I imagined him at it.

  —That’s funny.

  —Or at least I thought there would be trouble—people quarreling, misunderstanding each other on purpose.

  —Mmm, Jess said. That he’d be there in spirit. She changed lanes. They were in the part of Massachusetts where the traffic thinned out. She said, It was a tame gathering. A little boring.

  —That’s all the family I have left now, the nice ones, Brenda said. My perfect sister and her perfect husband and children and grandchildren.

  —David’s another one, Jess said.

  —I’m the only disreputable family member left, Brenda said. But even I was good. I was good to all those cousins.

  —I love your family, Jess said. I want family. Jess’s parents were dead. She had a brother she rarely saw. She hardly knew her cousins. Brenda got e-mails from cousins whom she liked. They’d turned up; they’d spoken politely to Jess. What did she want, criminals insulting one another? I don’t know what I want, she said.

  —You want your dad.

  —Oh, I don’t think so. It’s a relief. She couldn’t put it into words, what was missing, what she couldn’t do without. I don’t feel alive if nobody’s yelling, she said, though that wasn’t it.

  Before going home, they picked up the dogs at the kennel. Brenda waited in the car. There were three, big old Abby and two middle-sized, younger dogs, one brown, one yellow. They bounded into the car, licking her and thumping their tails at her face and breasts. Okay, guys, okay, she said, but she was smiling and crying, her sunglasses knocked off into her lap.

  At home, they carried their bags into the house, the dogs running ahead. Brenda set her bag down. They’d been gone for two nights, but the house felt as if it had been empty longer. She sat in the chair nearest the door. Jess went through the house and opened the back door so the dogs could go into the yard, which was fenced. While they were outside, she brought her bag upstairs. She came down again. Her footsteps on the stairs sounded old. Then she went out the front door to the mailbox. Brenda was hungry. Jess returned with a fist of mail, catalogues and flyers. One of the dogs was barking: Lulu, the young brown dog. Jess didn’t go to the door, and Brenda didn’t get up. Lulu barked some more, and then the other two joined in. Still Brenda didn’t get up, and Jess leafed through the mail, brushing her hair off her face. Jess had worn a suit to the memorial service but had changed into shorts for the drive. As she grew older, she was bonier, rangier, like an old New England farmer’s wife. At last, Brenda stood to let in the dogs.