He used the electrical tape to attach the plaid blanket so that it completely wrapped around the plastic box with the bricks inside. He opened the back door on the passenger side and put the blanket and box inside.
Carla’s rhythmic prayer continued, “…pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace…”
Max left the back door open and opened Carla’s door. He spoke into her small perfectly shaped ear. “I want you to sit in the back.”
She looked into his eyes, but continued in a whisper, “Blessed art thou amongst women. Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus…”
“I’m just going to move you to the backseat, that’s all.” Max undid her belt and pulled her halfway out of her seat, lifting her by her clenched arms, rigid from her posture.
“No!” she shouted and fought against him, interrupting her prayer at last.
“I’m not getting you out of the car. Just getting you in the backseat.”
He pulled and this time she came out, although still stuck in her pose, arms locked, hands entwined into a fist she kept at her mouth. Her eyes darted from side to side warily. “Holy Mary,” she whispered frantically as he guided her to the rear, “Mother of God, pray for us sinners—”
Max put her in the back, positioning her in the middle where there would be no obstruction from the bucket seats and pulled the lap belt across her, locking it. He took the red box and slid it onto her lap.
She stopped praying at the feel of the weight. She looked down at the box, stupefied.
“That’s your baby,” Max said. “Hold him upright.” He lifted the box so it would stand on its side. It came up to her chin which he imagined would be about right. “This is Bubble. This is your chance to hold on tight and save him.” Max shut the back and front doors. He raced around to the driver’s side, watching her through the window, worried she would balk. She dropped her head to study the blanket. Her black curls covered the top and her face. But she held onto the blanket and box.
Max got into the Saab, put on his seat belt and started the car in a hurry. He pulled out into the street and shouted at her: “Did you pray in the plane?”
No answer. He saw the road was clear. He pushed on the accelerator, watching the speedometer. At fifty miles an hour that should be enough for a test and yet perhaps not enough to get himself squashed. He glanced in the mirror. Carla’s face was white, her eyes wide and pitch-black, staring at him with grave attention.
“Did you pray in the plane?” he shouted.
She shook her head.
“Hold on to him tight! Pray to God to give you the strength to save your baby!”
Three blocks ahead the road curved to the right, around a brick warehouse wall. If Max went straight they would smash into it. Nothing was parked alongside to obstruct a direct hit. They were going forty miles an hour. Max pressed the accelerator.
“Pray and hold on!” he shouted and glanced at the rear-view mirror.
Carla lowered her eyes. “Hail Mary—” she whispered. She folded her arms around the box, crossing past each other, each hand gripping the opposite side, holding it tighter than she could possibly have held her child.
Max glanced at the speedometer as the wall loomed—he saw the word PRODUCE written in half-faded red letters—and noted that he had already gone past fifty miles an hour…
Too fast for me, he realized. I’ll die. Pray for me now at the hour of my death. He shouted, “Hold on to your baby!” as they hit the brick wall.
AFTERLIFE
19
Carla felt Bubble break away from her. He slipped the entwined grip of her fingers, flung her arms wide and flew out of her lap. Her body tried to follow him, but only the top half could. Her head passed between the front seats. Her cheek gently touched a bloody face that had turned toward her to make a plea. It belonged to Max. Max disappeared. She was yanked to the rear. A hand whacked the back of her head, the way the Sisters at school used to hit her if she talked in line. There was deafening noise, like countless drawers of silverware emptying at once on a tile floor. Yet she kept on thinking through it all, “He couldn’t stay. I couldn’t hold him.” Even in the quiet aftermath—all she could hear or feel was something spinning behind her—a corner in her heart opened to a glad feeling of comfort.
“You see—” she heard Max say.
She opened her eyes and screamed. A strange face was staring at her.
“You see…?” it mumbled. Max’s hand pointed at the smashed windshield: the glass was gone, replaced by bricks; the frame had buckled at the top and sides. The blanketcovered box was where the rearview mirror used to be, stopped from flying out of the car only because of the brick wall. The box looked to be half of its original size.
“You see?” Max mumbled. His face was covered with blood. “You see?” he repeated. He slumped, his pulpy cheek resting on the bars of a twisted headrest and mumbled, “Nothing…” as he lost consciousness.
Carla pulled at her seat belt. He was badly hurt, maybe dying. She shoved at all the things around her—tiny pieces of glass, a long metal rod, a large brown plastic funnel—and pushed at the crumpled rear door. People were nearby. She called to them as she got her door partly open. Someone took her hand and pulled. She fell out onto the ground. The Saab was several feet in the air, halfway gone into the building. Its exposed rear tires were spinning.
“Help him!” Carla shouted at the man who had gotten her out. A woman ran toward them. She moved in a funny waddle, both hands covering her mouth. Carla yelled at her—and at each person as they appeared—to get them to do something. They just stood and stared. Poor Max was dying, stuck up in the wall, slumped toward the remains of the box, his body squeezed into a tiny space, bright red blood washing down his forehead and nose—and no one made a move. Carla tried to get up to what there was of his window (it seemed to be only a quarter of its original size) to comfort him; but she couldn’t get a grip. Finally someone told her an ambulance was on the way.
Fire engines, police cars and two ambulances arrived after what seemed like hours. They urged her to sit in the car or go to the hospital, but she didn’t make the same mistake twice; she told them Max was her husband and she wouldn’t budge until they got him out.
The paramedics hovered around the wreck, unable to figure out how to reach Max. They were shooed away by the fire department. Two of the firemen, elevated on a platform attached to the engine’s ladder, were maneuvered toward the wreck. They carried what appeared to be a gigantic chain saw.
“Stop the bleeding!” Carla yelled at the paramedics.
They didn’t respond. Everyone was focused on the two firemen and the machine they planned to use to open what was left of Max’s door.
“They have to cut him out of there, ma’am,” said a young cop with dirty red hair and fair skin covered by pimples. He moved to lead her toward his police car.
“Stop the bleeding!” she yelled and got away from the cop. She ran up to the advancing platform that carried the firemen and grabbed hold. She could hang on to it and her feet would still reach the ground. They stopped the engine immediately. It had almost reached the wreck anyway. “Stop the bleeding,” she yelled at them.
“They can’t get up there,” one fireman argued.
“Get outta the way,” the other said.
“Let me try and put something on the wound!” a paramedic called to the firemen. He touched Carla, she let go of the ladder and he clambered up, using part of the platform and part of the broken wall and finally part of the car for his footing. Perched up there he bandaged Max’s forehead. Max was unconscious; his head lolled as if he were dead.
Carla got down and watched from below. “Is he alive?” she called up.
“I think he’s gonna be okay,” someone said to her. It was the cop with pimples. What did he know?
Another paramedic came rushing with a plastic pouch of liquid and an IV. He handed the needle and line up to his colleague, who got it into Max an
d strung the feed around the collapsed roof to the other side. They did it fast and got down so the firemen could use their enormous metal claws. The machine made a hideous tearing sound, as if it were murdering the car.
“Are you Mrs. Klein?” the pimpled cop said to her during the agonizing wait as they worked on the car door.
“Yes,” she said, afraid they would take her away if she admitted she wasn’t related to Max. The cop asked what had caused the accident; Carla told him the wheels had suddenly begun to skid and Max couldn’t control the car. The cop argued with her. He said there weren’t any skid marks, that it looked like they must have been going very fast and straight at the wall.
She said, “My husband may be dying. I have to pray for him.”
She didn’t. She thought about praying for Max, but she didn’t. She leaned back on a police car and looked up at the sunny blue sky. She watched her bream make small clouds in the pretty air. It was crazy—she felt good.
They carried a limp Max out of the car, swaddled and still, as if he were a newborn. She pushed her way—they halfheartedly tried to stop her—into the ambulance and sat beside him. By then the paramedics had wiped most of the blood off his face. It was puffy all over. His nose was broken. He looked as if he’d been in a heavyweight fight. She felt pain for him and was amazed at what he had done for her sake. His eyelids were puffy, his cheeks had swollen his head into a square, and his lips had been spread wide. Just before they reached the hospital, he opened his eyes as best he could through the thickening lids.
They focused on her. He didn’t seem scared or in pain. The pale blue of his eyes was thoroughly washed out by the sunlight coming through the window. He looked at her expectantly, waiting for her to say something.
“I understand now,” she said and that seemed to be what he wanted to hear. His mouth creased in a pained smile and he passed out again.
She waited until she had to before she called Manny and told him what had happened. First, the doctors checked her and said she was okay. They also said Max had a severe concussion and there was some danger of his brain swelling too much. That was what the doctor actually said. She thought the brain swelling sounded made up, possibly to conceal a more dangerous fact.
She especially thought so when the doctor went on to say that they might have to do surgery on the skull to relieve pressure and they needed permission to go ahead if necessary. That was when she told the doctor that she wasn’t Max’s wife. He blinked and said in a low but somehow threatening tone, “How do I get in touch with her?”
Carla promised to get him what he needed if she could make a phone call. The doctor showed her to a waiting room with a pay phone and said he would be back in ten minutes. She called Manny.
“I’m coming for you,” Manny said sternly, as if making a threat. “Stay there,” he added.
“No,” she said. “You’re going to call that lawyer, the one who’s working for us. He’s his lawyer too. Tell the lawyer to call his wife and tell her that her husband is okay but they need to talk to her. I’ll give you the name of the doctor for her to call.”
“I don’t want to,” Manny said darkly.
“Don’t want to what?”
“Call Brillstein.”
“Why not!” Carla demanded.
“I don’t know,” Manny said.
“You call. Make sure you explain everything to him. Tell him it was just an accident. Tell him Max is alive but he’s got a concussion and his wife should call the doctor.”
“Then I’m coming for you,” Manny said.
“Then you come for me. But don’t bother if you don’t talk to the lawyer first. It’s a matter of life and death. And make sure you don’t let the lawyer scare the hell out of his wife.”
“Okay,” Manny said.
“Oh. And when you come here, bring some food.”
“Food?” Manny mumbled something in Spanish away from the receiver so she couldn’t hear. She knew what all his favorite curses meant. When his voice returned it was louder than ever: “What for?”
“We’re not leaving until I know he’s okay. And I’m hungry.”
She stayed in the small waiting room where the doctor had taken her to make the call. It was painted light blue and had a window with a view of a narrow shaftway and large air-conditioning ducts. She sat on a black plastic chair attached by a chain to two others. There was nothing to look at in the room except for the pay phone she had used to phone Manny and a poster explaining how you could be helpful to recovering heart attack patients. She kept expecting the cops to arrive, angry that she had lied to them. The doctor showed up much later than he had promised he would. He said he had talked to Max’s wife and had permission to do the surgery. He said Max was running a fever but that was normal because of the swollen brain. He also said Mrs. Klein had explained everything about Carla and Max.
Carla wondered what Max’s wife had explained; she didn’t ask.
While she waited, she thought about Max’s injured brain. Max was already so smart the idea of his brain swelling sounded all the more painful to her. She knew that was ridiculous; it made her laugh at herself; she felt lighthearted. She knew she ought to be ashamed of her mood. Although she was frightened about Max’s health, she was giddy, eager for action.
Brillstein arrived first. “Here you are,” he said as he entered, his small eyes scanning to make sure no one else was about. “Quickly. What happened? Just between us.” Brillstein put the flats of his narrow hands together and rubbed gently. The furtive sound of their friction was like a small animal digging a home for itself. He glanced back at the door suspiciously and then at her. “What did he do? Try to kill himself?”
Carla didn’t like him. She couldn’t understand how he could be Max’s lawyer—it made perfect sense that he was Manny’s. “How did you get here so fast?” she asked. It couldn’t have been more than twenty minutes since she had spoken to Manny.
Brillstein’s hands stopped. He cocked his head to the right and stared at Carla as if he had just noticed something surprising. After a moment, his mouth sagged open. The worry in his beady eyes went away. They seemed to widen and become curious. “Luck. I was in Staten Island when your husband beeped me. Incredible luck. I’ve been lucky lately.” Brillstein backed away. He leaned against the phone, resting one arm on its top. “I don’t know why everything’s been breaking my way. Don’t want to think about it, you know? Jinx it. How are you? You look very well for someone who’s crashed into a brick wall at fifty miles an hour.”
“I’m okay,” Carla said, now feeling a little uncertain of her dislike for Brillstein.
“Listen. We don’t have much time. I bought us some by telling the cops not to bother you now about the accident report. They may call you tomorrow or maybe I can deal with them. But still, Mr. Klein could be in trouble. I’m his lawyer. He picked me to represent his interests. You know that. He trusts me. I’ve got to know—what happened?”
“He didn’t try to kill himself. He was proving something to me.”
Brillstein nodded. He gestured with his right hand, a slow wave from her to him, silently asking for more.
“He was showing me I couldn’t hold on to Bubble no matter what.”
“Hold on to your son?” Brillstein shook his head with his eyes shut as if he were struggling to wake up; abruptly he opened them and his head was still. “You mean in the plane crash.” Carla nodded. Brillstein looked astonished. “Didn’t you know that? I told you it wasn’t your fault. They should have had a working seat belt in his seat and of course you couldn’t have held on, especially in a plane crash—”
For several seconds Carla had been shaking her head no to alert him he was on the wrong track before Brillstein finally noticed and stopped talking. He shut his lips and nodded at her. “I opened my hands to clap when we started to land,” Carla told her secret calmly. “When it looked like everything was going to be okay, I started clapping. I wasn’t holding on to him tight.” She could say all that
without crying, without rage. She felt sad, she still felt Bubble’s sweaty head bobbing under her chin, but she was able to keep on talking to the short nervous lawyer and hold together. “Also,” she said after a swallow, “I always thought he must have been alive in there. After I got out…while it burned. I always thought—”
Brillstein shook his head firmly. “He would have been killed instantly.”
At that Carla had to cry. She covered up and let go. Only the sad fact of her loss was in her heart—no pain. She felt something soft brush against her cheek. Brillstein was offering tissues. She had just finished using them when Manny came in. He was carrying a white bag with Burger King written on it.
“She asked me to bring food,” he explained defensively to Brillstein instead of saying hello.
“Give it to me,” she said.
“At least she’s talking to me,” Manny commented to Brillstein as he passed him to give Carla the bag.
Carla was annoyed by what Manny had brought. He knew that she didn’t like fast-food crap. Even wrapped in foil inside the paper bag the hamburger’s smell was nauseating. She took out the French fries and the Pepsi.
“Here,” she held the bag with the hamburger still inside to Manny. “You can throw this out.”
“Throw it out yourself,” Manny said. He leaned back against the wall underneath the heart-patient poster and slid down onto his haunches.
“I’ll take it,” Brillstein said, obviously nervous that they were going to get ugly. He grabbed the Burger King bag. “I’ll check on what’s happening and come back. We have to talk more about the seat belt and everything,” he added in a solemn tone.
“What?” Manny said to the lawyer as he left. Brillstein didn’t respond. Manny said it again to Carla after the lawyer had gone. “What?”
Carla ate a french fry. It was hot and salty—she liked it. “Thank you,” she said about the food. She took a sip of the Pepsi.
“What the fuck is going on?” He said this hopelessly, sliding down even farther onto his heels. He put his hands in his jacket too. He had made himself into a ball, all round, hiding any part that could be wounded. “How did you get into this accident? What are you doing to yourself?”
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