The Shelf Life of Fire

by Robin Greene

  k

  I sit in the bedroom, on the wicker reading chair. Awake again, late morning. In front of me is my life.

  I can do anything. I can. I can read all day or sleep all day. Eat or starve. Kill myself or write my book. Ambivalence is my middle name. Everything’s complicated.

  When I was almost thirteen, I attempted suicide. My brother had tied me up earlier in the evening, put me in the closet, but this time I decided to protest and scream. And rather than gag me, he let me out. Rushing, I’d stumbled over winter boots and old umbrellas, the heavy coats like woolen ghosts hanging above, the closet dark and strange, full of damp, unfriendly smells.

  Dennis wanted to go out and leave me alone, which was fine with me, but wouldn’t be fine with my parents. Letting me out and giving me a piece of chocolate cake was part of his bribe.

  “I’ll give you a dollar, and I’ll be your slave tomorrow.” Dennis was dressed in jeans, a button-down shirt, and already had his junior varsity jacket on.

  “Where you going?” I sat in the hallway. We’d thrown the boots, umbrellas, and other random items back into the closet. I wore my flannel nightgown but was barefoot. The hall tiles were cold and the front part of the house was dark. My brother hated to leave lights on. He had a kind of quirky fastidiousness. Sometimes he’d go into the bathroom to straighten the towels on the racks or come behind me with a sponge if I left crumbs on the kitchen counter.

  “I’m going over to Marlene’s for a couple of hours.” Marlene and Marc were Evelyn and Frank’s kids. In fact, my parents were out with Evelyn and Frank—to dinner and a movie. Usually, after dinner the four of them would go back to our house or theirs to play cards, but tonight they’d wanted to see a recently released movie playing at Central Theater in Cedarhurst. They were going for drinks afterwards. Because their family lived about twenty houses down the block, we kids keep in close contact.

  “Let me come too,” I said. For years, I had had an on-again-off-again crush on Marc, who was a year older than I.

  “You can’t see Marc,” Dennis said. “He’s spending the night at a friend’s. Marlene’s alone. I want to see her.”

  “Okay,” I said. This was actually the second-best situation. If I couldn’t see Marc, I could read a book alone in the house without Dennis teasing me, which he often did when I read or played my music.

  “Call if you need me. Be good.” Dennis gave me one of his fake, exaggerated winks as he zipped up his jacket and walked to the front door. “Lock it behind me. I’ve got a key. You can stay up until I come home. Take one piece of cake. One piece. That’s it. Mom put it on the top shelf of the pantry. It’s still in the box.”

  “What about my dollar?”

  Dennis pulled his wallet from his front pocket, took out a dollar, extended his hand for me to come get it, a sort of passive-aggressive relenting.

  “What about tomorrow?” I asked. “You gonna do what I say?”

  “Yeah, yeah. We’ll see,” Dennis said. But I knew the slave part of the bargain was already history.

  Then Dennis left. I watched the front door close behind him. I bolted the door, fastened the security chain.

  My mood went black. While Dennis was present, I could hate him. But now, I only hated myself. I hated the life I had—my parents, school, home with Dennis. I felt a weight in my chest, an anchor mooring me to some desperate place in a rough sea of powerfully sad, depressing thoughts.

  What’s the point? I asked myself. What’s the point of anything? Eating? Sleeping? Watching TV? Reading a book? Making friends? I thought then as I think now, remembering.

  I opened the hall closet where I’d been held prisoner and took my winter coat off its hanger. Putting it on, I walked out the back door and into our small yard—a concrete patio mostly, with a little grass around it, beyond which was a chain-link fence that stretched around Meadowbrook Pond, the man-made lake. I sat down on the patio’s rear-facing steps, staring into the calm black water. Stars littered the sky, and houselights from across the lake glittered like colored rhinestones.

  I hugged my coat around me and began to cry. Cold and alone, I began to pray, muttering the Sha’ma Yisrael. But I couldn’t find my faith. I decided there was no God—no heaven, no hell, except the one I was living.

  I sat there for a while, then walked inside, deciding to check the medicine cabinet in my parents’ bathroom, to see if the valium capsules that my dad took regularly to help with his insomnia were there in sufficient number. Perhaps I could end it all. I found two vials—one completely full, the other partially full. I took eight capsules from each, thinking my dad would probably never notice—stupid logic, of course, because he’d figure it out if I ended up dead.

  I put away my coat in the front hall closet, stuffed the sixteen pills into my bathrobe pocket, heading for the kitchen, for a piece of cake, a glass of cold milk. I thought about having myself a little party, and suddenly, I felt liberated, joyful, giddy. I put on my old Meet the Beatles album, remembering how as a young girl Joannie, Linda and I—all best friends in early grade school—would dance to it in Linda Freedman’s finished basement. We’d spend an entire Saturday playing this record over and over again, dancing with each other, practicing “The Swim,” “The Pony,” “The Jerk” to “I Saw Her Standing There” and “All My Loving.” When “This Boy” came on, we’d get dreamy, maybe even tear up, thinking about boys and romance.

  I sat at the kitchen table, devoured my milk and cake, and, after putting my dirty dishes in the dishwasher, I turned the music up even louder and walked to the front foyer, where the large mirror there covered an entire wall. It was “smoked” with streaks of gray and brown, a look that my mother, in particular, liked, for it created a kind of “antique elegance,” she’d said.

  Now, it became the perfect reflection for my mood. I took off my nightgown, bathrobe, and danced naked. I turned up the volume, made a dramatic entrance into the hall, took a bow, made a courtesy, pretending to lift the hem of my skirt, then began a wild, full-on boogaloo.

  After the performance, I apologized to the mirror, my audience, for any inadequacies of my dance routine and left the “stage.” I found my nightgown and bathrobe on the floor, dressed, and walked downstairs to the bar to find something with which to wash down the valium.

  The bar was an elaborate add-on my parents had constructed during the first year we lived in the house. About twelve feet long, with a Formica countertop and wood-paneled sides, the bar had six black barstools lining the front, with liquor cabinets built into the back. None of the cabinets had locks.

  I found a bottle of clear vodka, decided it must be easy to drink, poured out a full glass, and went upstairs. The music still played, loud and crazy. I turned it off, and the new silence changed the whole mood of the house—as if the soundtrack had stopped while the movie continued.

  Gil, our dog, slept on my parents’ bed, and I walked into their room to pet him, to say goodbye. I loved him, and it seemed particularly sad to leave him with Dennis.

  I walked back into the front foyer, with the valium still in my pocket, the glass of vodka in my hand. Watching myself in the smoky mirror, I stuffed the capsules into my mouth, using the vodka to help swallow them. I had to choke them down. I’d never had alcohol before, and this stuff tasted like liquid electricity. I immediately suppressed coughing the capsules up; my throat burned, my eyes teared.

  After I got them all down, I drank the entire tall glass of vodka, although each mouthful fought me. It was awful. I couldn’t imagine why adults drank this for pleasure.

  My head began to swim. Dizzy and sad, I wanted to return to my bedroom, turn off the light, go to sleep, never to wake up. I thought about my parents finding me the next morning. How they’d probably wake up late for Sunday brunch, with orange juice, fresh bagels and bialys—my favorite—lox, scallion cream cheese, and mounds of tomato-and-onion scrambled eggs. Then, there’d be coffee cake for dessert, with a fresh pot of coffee brewing, its aroma filling the kit
chen, bright with morning sun glinting across the lake. They’d open the curtains to the view, spread The Sunday New York Times across the table. My favorite were the magazine and book review sections.

  Dennis might be in the pool room, shooting with the cue stick he’d been given last year as a birthday present. Perhaps he’d have risen unexpectedly early, had cake for breakfast, and would be now practicing Eight-Ball so as to beat my grandfather the next time they played.

  My dad, I imagined, would at some point ask, “Where’s Rae?” At first, my mother would reply, “Let her sleep in,” but by dessert, she’d suggest that someone wake me. Perhaps my dad would volunteer, go to my bedroom door, knock, call my name. When I didn’t answer, he’d call more loudly, “Rae, Rae. We’re having breakfast, sweetie. Come join us.” With no answer, he’d open the door, come over to my bed, put his hand on me, gently try to wake me.

  Soon, he’d find I was cold, even beneath my blanket, which he’d throw back. Then, he’d see I was dead.

  “Ed, Ed, come here!” he’d scream. My mom would dash in, moving gracefully but swiftly down the carpeted hallway to my bedroom.

  “What’s wrong, Bernie? What’s going on?” she’d yell, realizing with horror that something terrible had happened. She’d rush in to find me, throw herself over my limp body, weep like the world had ended.

  I thought all this as I lay on the large Linoleum tiles, crafted to look like Greco-Roman stonework. I was, however, unable to move, unable to walk back to my bedroom so that my mom and dad could find me the next morning.

  Instead, I fell asleep in the foyer, in front of the smoky mirror. I felt very cold, I remember, before I lost consciousness, wishing I could make it to bed. Then, I felt incredibly stupid and blacked out.

  A little after midnight, I woke up. I had puked and found myself in a large puddle of mushy orange-brown vomit. My bathrobe and nightgown were soiled, and neither Dennis nor my parents were home yet.

  I got up, and with difficulty, pulled off my clothing, dumping them in the bathtub. Naked, I stumbled into the kitchen, pulled out the roll of paper towels from its dispenser and a paper bag from under the sink so as to clean up my mess. I did my best to scrub the stinky place with an old sponge, tossed it into the paper bag, and sat down in the bathtub to run the shower, wash myself and my vomit-stained clothing before stuffing them wet into the washing machine. Finding an old pair of flannel pajamas, I took the paper bag to the outside trashcan. We had two large trashcans with metal sleeves sunk into the pavement—my parents had paid masons to construct these so that our unsightly garbage cans wouldn’t be visible or stink from the patio. I lifted the heavy lid of one of them, folded the bag up tight, put it in.

  The night was cold and clear, with stars and the moon out, shining on the still surface of Meadowbrook Pond. My head throbbed something fierce, but I felt clean—amazed and happy to be alive. I will live, I decided. God had given me another chance.

  I promised myself that I’d study hard, get excellent grades. I’d read important books about the world around me so that I myself could grow smarter, stronger, more powerful. And I’d write—poems about my torture, about how my friends hurt me, about my pains, joys, my private thoughts. Already I felt strong—a girl with resolve, a plan, a purpose.

  twenty-two

  A little over two weeks have gone by since Nick left. I’ve been alone, making some progress on my book, but not doing much else. I’ve gone to school to catch up with a few end-of-semester chores, checked on the Writing Center, etc. Nick has been calling just about every day, but he skipped yesterday, and our conversations are very brief because he doesn’t have cell phone service and when he calls he must use the retreat phone, which isn’t very private, and others are usually waiting to use it.

  It’s morning now, a Wednesday; I’m sitting at the computer. Rain is forecast. I’m in my nightgown and bathrobe, feeling off balance.

  My novel—I now know—is going to be about a woman who tries to reconcile the pieces of her life—her past and current life—so that she can move forward, become whole. The narrator is a writer, and she can’t seem to gain traction toward self-understanding. Yes, the book will be autobiographical, but not completely.

  I sit at the computer, begin typing. I work for four hours, until my protagonist is at the grocery store. She’s got two tomatoes in her hand as she assesses their ripeness. She chooses one, puts it in her plastic carry basket, and moves to the broccoli crowns. Then she stops. I stop, needing a break.

  k

  It’s afternoon. I’m walking Jake behind the university. Since we can’t walk through the lovely woods because of the ticks, we walk again around the baseball field, the football practice field, behind a neighborhood that borders the campus.

  Jake limps, and I study him, trying to figure out what exactly is wrong. A hurt paw? His hips? Joints?

  Sometimes his hind quarters shake, quiver uncontrollably. Or he’ll just sit down like he’s taking a short break. “Jake,” I’ll ask, “What’s wrong?”

  But right now, he’s upright, happy, wagging his tail, sniffing the borderline between the grass and woods, as his back-end quivers momentarily—but then stops. He’s just old, it saddens me to think.

  Pausing as Jake pees, I realize that I haven’t really spoken to my friends in well over a week. My best friend, Sonya, is visiting her sister and nephews in Florida for most of the month, I remember. Also, I remind myself that Nick didn’t call last night—okay, but I’ve grown dependent on his brief check-ins. Hopefully, I’ll hear from him today because writing is like listening to ghosts. And without some real voices soon, I might go crazy.

  I make the turn around the baseball field as two young men throw a hardball back and forth. They’re dressed in shorts, tee-shirts, and they’re wearing mitts. I hear the thump of the ball as it’s caught. I watch each young man shift his weight and bring back his arm, wind up, then power the ball through the air. Thump, it lands in the glove. Very satisfying, deceptively easy. I stand by the chain link fence, Jake’s nose buried in a patch of clover, and think I made you do that.

  As we walk back to the car, Jake is in a slow trot beside me. The hot air is humid, thick, but suddenly, for no reason, I’m feeling good. Then, as I slip into Ruby, a thought occurs: my dad is dead, and like an enormous Atlantic wave, the thought crashes over me. Triggered by the boys playing catch—something we did when I was a girl—I long for him—the father of my early childhood. Not the dad with dementia, with deafness. Not the one who turned away from the world when his life went bad. Not the South Shelburne or Florida dad who allowed his son to steal from him. Or who watched TV all day. Not the man who lost himself to duplicate bridge and to grade C movies. Not the indecisive dad who had trouble ordering his early bird dinner—the one who’d find everything on the menu so tempting that he’d usually change his order a half-dozen times, driving the waitress crazy.

  The last time my parents came to visit us in North Carolina, we took them out for dinner at The Olive Garden—one of their favorite restaurants. They were already nearly broke, so my mom had stopped paying for automobile insurance, and they made the twelve-hour trip up from Florida without any. Somewhere off I-95 in Georgia, she’d backed into a car in a strip mall parking lot by a McDonald’s, where they’d stopped for lunch and a restroom break. But without insurance, they basically hit-and-ran. Dennis’s older daughter Julia—then about ten—was with them. Will is about eighteen months older than Julia, and with my mom’s efforts, the cousins had become friends. Nick and I both liked Julia, a sweet, loveable girl.

  Soon after that visit, everything fell apart. Dennis’s heavy gambling and stealing bankrupted my parents’ businesses, bankrupted them, until they lost everything. There were a series of apartment rentals, evictions for non-payment, and moments of extreme desperation. I never learned everything about those years. Mom never wanted to admit how much Dennis was destroying them.

  During that time, my dad had become ill with non-tremor Parkins
on’s disease, and after many hospitalizations, his health declined until he was placed in a residential hospice in Coral Springs. They were all living in a duplex, but at some point, Lydia moved out, saying that she couldn’t take it anymore.

  Lydia rented her own place, a one-bedroom in Tamarac, and lived there alone. But, ultimately, a few weeks before my dad died, they were evicted and all moved temporarily into Lydia’s apartment because they had nowhere else to go.

  Without the funds to move out, the arrangement held—what was temporary became permanent. Dennis and his estranged wife, my mother, and the two girls continue to live in a six-hundred-square-foot apartment in a working-class area of Tamarac. My mom and Dennis still sleep on the two living room couches—even as Dennis is dying. Lydia sleeps in the bedroom with the two girls on mattresses at either side of her bed.

  I’m sitting in Ruby, having loaded up Jake and turned on the air conditioning, when I see my dad’s face, once handsome, then not so, projected in the sky, his features in cloud and vapor.

  “I’m sorry, Dad,” I say. “Sorry that you became so sick, suffered so, and died.” But his physical suffering had started earlier, when I was sixteen. My dad was diagnosed with acromegaly, a benign tumor impacting the pituitary gland, causing increased bone and tissue growth. His dentist first found the disease by comparing a recent dental x-ray of his bottom jaw bone with an older x-ray. The dentist could see that the jaw had grown and sent my dad to his doctor.

  In the early seventies, the treatment for acromegaly involved spraying radiation at the tumor in the hopes of shrinking it without damaging the brain. My dad had a number of these treatments before a powerful new treatment, involving a linear accelerator, became available at Brookhaven National Laboratories, in Upton, New York, way out on Long Island. Brookhaven, once owned by the National Atomic Energy Commission, had been taken over by the Department of Energy and began subcontracting its facilities to research institutes and to universities. Cutting edge treatments were being offered there as part of clinical trials to patients with inoperable tumors and advanced cancers.