The Railroad

by Neil Douglas Newton

  Eileen stared openly. Megan moved her head slightly to look at me and the gorilla.

  “Does Megan have any immune system problems?” I asked.

  Eileen’s eyes widened. “No.”

  “Okay. There’s Echinacea in this.” I leaned forward. “Megan, I know I’ve been out a lot but now all of my time is going to be spent making you better. Is that okay?”

  The only reaction was a slight turning of the head. “Okay. This is the doctor.” I placed the gorilla in Eileen’s lap so that it was sitting up and facing Megan. “Now the doctor wants you to drink this. It’ll make you feel better. Less pain. You may want to sleep but that’s okay.”

  “What’s in it?” Eileen asked.

  “My cousin is a homeopathist. I know what you’re thinking. I thought she was a nut until I had a really bad cold and she bugged me until I drank this. Then I found out what was in it.” I handed it to her. “Let Megan drink it slowly. It probably doesn’t taste that good so I might have to get her some soda.”

  Eileen looked at me and at the cup, weighing the situation. Then she shrugged and stood up, guiding her daughter into a sitting position. Kneeling before Megan she put her hand behind her head. “Take a sip, baby, slowly.”

  Megan didn’t seem very interested in the proceedings but did what her mother asked. Twenty minutes later Megan was lying drowsily against her mother's side, clearly sleepy, but more alert. She seemed interested in the show she was watching. I was in a kitchen chair a couple of feet from Eileen, watching the little girl. Ten minutes later, Megan was sleeping, her breath not at all labored, her body relaxed.

  Eileen spent the next few minutes stealing glances at her daughter, a confused look on her face. Then she turned to me and gave me an odd look. “You’re a strange man, Mike.”

  “I won’t argue.”

  She nodded. Then she chuckled softly and shook her head.

  *

  I’d bought a good supply of the herbs; they carried us through a few more days. By then Megan showed signs of recovering. She’d get tired after a few hours of being awake but she was a lot more involved in what was going on. When Eileen was tired or needed a break, I’d sit with Megan. After the first few times, Megan put her head on my lap and fell asleep.

  About five days later Megan had recovered completely. To my complete surprise I found that I was expected to let her lie on my lap for at least two hours a day, despite the fact that she wasn’t sick anymore. This was her idea, not her mother’s, and not mine.

  As much as I had detested the little brat only a couple of weeks before, I found that with her on my lap I became sleepy and more relaxed than I had in months. After a while I had my appointed “lap hour”, usually during one particular kid’s show that was in syndication and was on seven days a week. I was shocked by the whole thing, but stopped examining it after a couple of days.

  *

  One day I was about to sit down on the couch in preparation for the lap hour, when Megan stopped me, “Could you make me hot chocolate? With milk please?”

  I was taken aback. Where had this polite child come from? “Okay,” I answered. From the corner I noticed her mother staring at both of us. Something told me that this wasn’t something that needed to be analyzed so I went with the flow and made the hot chocolate without any comment. When I came back, Megan directed me to put the cup on the lovely scarred coffee table I’d bought years before. She got on the floor and waited until I sat down. Then she leaned back on my legs and took small sips of the hot chocolate while she watched the show.

  *

  Morning brought a breakfast filled with bad food and silly little girl games. Lunch saw us playing one of the many board games I’d stocked up on over the years, many of which I had stored there once my mother decided to clean out her basement. Megan got to the point where she would announce what our daily activities would be and demand that we participate. It was a nap at eleven, lunch at 12:30, a game of operation at two, a movie at four. If I plead tiredness, she’d drag me from the couch to the floor where we’d set up our games. I actually found myself sleeping less and getting up earlier. Even the alcohol seemed to be taking a back seat to family-hood.

  One night shortly before Eileen was to make her next call to The Railroad, she gave me a pretty elaborate shopping list. She was going to make her famous Veal Oscar. She fussed over the list for a half an hour and finally, grudgingly, relinquished it to me. Megan looked wistfully at me as I left the house, though I couldn’t tell whether she missed me or if she wanted to take a ride and get out of confinement.

  Something happened that night. I suppose that it shouldn’t have seemed so strange; the sexual tension between Eileen and I had been growing for days and we were almost never out of each other’s sight. It started out rather innocently; Megan made herself busy with a show that she watched each night at 6 and Eileen and I worked in the kitchen. We sipped at some wine I had bought, something that, contrary to my earlier purchases, had a cork.

  After a glass each we were at the height of silliness, throwing little pieces of food at each other, hiding kitchen implements that the other needed, singing songs too loudly. Megan even came in one time to stare archly at us, as if she wasn’t sure she approved of her mother’s behavior. Then she just walked back out to the living room and watched her show.

  It was the mushrooms that did it. Mushrooms, for the uninitiated, are the funniest of foods. They look phallic and they make excellent missiles. I was cutting up some onions when I felt a resounding phung on the back of my head.

  “Score!” Eileen shouted, waving here spatula in victory.

  “Your child is going to come in here and she’s going to be disappointed in you.”

  “Nothing new there.”

  We both stood in silence as the importance of what she’d just said hit us. But somehow it didn’t set either of us into a permanent funk. Eileen began singing to the small boom box I had in the kitchen. It was some “Hits of the sixties” thing I’d bought for a dollar at a local flea market. Jay and the American’s "Come a Little Bit Closer" had come on and Eileen began to belt it out while dancing to the tune. When I joined her, she sneered at my singing voice and turned up the music.

  “Turn it down, Mom!” a voice shouted from the other room. “I can’t hear anything!”

  Eileen, seemingly drunker than I thought, responded oddly by dancing to the kitchen door and closing it. “I want to sing!” she told me, smiling somewhat idiotically.

  We began an odd ballet. We were sharing various kitchen implements and when one of us put one down, the other would inevitably come to get it. The first few times it happened we were sober and graceful enough to avoid collision. Finally, it happened.

  I had leaned over her shoulder to get something from the counter when she turned around and banged into me. I staggered back against the sink and managed to recover myself. “My, you’re delicate,” she told me, her face very pink.

  “And you are a klutz.”

  “Oooh! Big New York word. Klutz.” She let it roll off her tongue. “Not a word I grew up with. We don’t say such words in the suburbs.”

  “Well I never go to a mall.”

  “Oh! Touché!”

  We smiled at each other for a moment, and then went back to cooking. The next time she came back to the counter for a knife, I gently backhanded her across the mid-section without looking around. She stumbled back and caught herself on the sink just as I had. Her eyes showed theatrical mock-astonishment. “You are a violent man!” she screeched. I turned around and was immediately pelted with another mushroom. I shook my knife at her but continued working on cutting broccoli.

  It degenerated into a game then; each of us would get a nudge from the other when we went toward the counter which would immediately be followed by the victim lobbing some piece of food at the other. Finally it degenerated into a food fight.

  When Megan finally came in there were pieces of broccoli sticking to the walls and floors. Mushrooms were ly
ing in the mixing bowls, perched on the top of the refrigerator, in the sink. We were both panting and laughing. Megan looked from one to the other, her eyes widening. “What are you doing?”

  “Cooking,” I answered simply. Then both her mother and I began to laugh.

  “You’re both drunk!” the little girl observed, horror dripping from her words. This made us laugh even more. The door slammed suddenly and she was gone.

  “I guess we aren’t being nice,” I pointed out.

  “True,” Eileen agreed.

  Then we began to giggle again. After about five minutes of that we went back to cooking.

  For a time things seemed to have returned to normal when, out of the blue, Eileen took another swat at me as I walked by to get a garlic crush. I staggered back for a second and then stood back up and launched a poke in her side. I guess between the wine and my flush of excitement, I used a little too much force; she backpedaled and seemed in danger of falling.

  I grabbed her without thinking and pulled her toward me. That was the end.

  She stared up at me, her hair across her face, looking very vulnerable and frazzled in an appealing way. We locked eyes that way for a moment and then we were kissing.

  What can you say about a kiss like that? I had just come from months of self-exile. She had started her journey into an unknown future after what might have been years of fear and self-loathing. Everything went into that kiss. When it was over it left both of us shaken and frightened.

  “Oh god,” Eileen said.

  Half an hour later I walked out of the kitchen carrying the salad. The rest of the food was already on the table. Eileen was drinking coffee and wearing a prim and controlled expression. I wondered if there was red creeping into my face.

  I spent the next hour using Megan as a barometer, stealing glances at her to see if she had noticed anything. Sometimes I thought I saw an odd set to her jaw but that could have been guilt coloring my judgment.

  Eileen and I did our best not to look at each other. Occasionally our eyes would brush, and we’d immediately look away. To my relief, Megan spent most of the hour discussing the ins and outs of the TV show she’d just watched. I nodded appreciatively and managed to throw in a remark once in a while. Her mother did the same; things seemed to be okay and I felt myself relax.

  I had allowed myself a glass of wine, thinking that the heat was off. Then Megan asked me if I was sick.

  “What?” I countered, immediately suspecting that something was wrong.

  “You keep looking up in the air. You look like Mommy does when she has an allergy attack.”

  I smiled despite myself. “I’m just tired Megan. I’m not used to getting up so early.”

  She gave me a look. Then she turned to her mother. “Should I feel his head, Mommy?”

  Eileen smirked. “I think he’s okay, honey.”

  “I think he looks funny.”

  “That’s been said before,” I joked lamely.

  *

  The night before Eileen had to make her next call to The Railroad things went pretty much as they had for the past few days. We’d gotten to be a little more of a family again but certain things were omitted from our conversation, such as things we’d like to do in the future. There was no talk of Disney World or how someday we’d like to see the Grand Canyon. Hot air ballooning, which had come up repeatedly in those first few days of family-hood wasn’t mentioned.

  And then Megan came out and asked if I’d read her a bed time story.

  I felt my throat fill with something unnamable and I jerked a look at Eileen. Somehow I didn’t think that Megan was subtle enough for the classic good-bye gesture so it had to mean something more, something that was potentially dangerous.

  She held us with her eyes, seemingly like a challenge. Had she decided that I was her best bet and she was trying to force her mother’s hand?

  “I can read you a story,” Eileen said, saving the day.

  “I want Mike to do it.”

  “Megan…”

  “I want Mike to do it!” Her face was all little girl mad and I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach.

  “I can read to you, Megan,” I told her. “But don’t you want your Mommy to read to you?”

  “I want to hear The Red Balloon.

  I almost gasped. That had been one of my favorite movies as a child; I supposed someone had made it into a book. But what was worse was the subject matter, a little boy who’s persecuted by children and adults alike, who is finally taken away into the sky by balloons, escaping his torturers. It sounded ominous and yet I knew that Megan couldn’t have consciously chosen it just to make a point.

  “Eileen?” I asked, deferring the question to her.

  “You always have me read to you,” she told her daughter.

  “I want Mike to read to me.”

  Mommy and I exchanged glances. Did this little girl sense something that we didn’t or was she simply afraid of going out on another dark journey. Was I a port in a storm?

  “I’ll read to you if you want,” I told her. How could I say no?

  Something made me turn to look at Eileen. As I’d expected her face betrayed her emotion; she was angry and I’d have to say scared. She must have realized that I’d been watching her because she suddenly put on a neutral face. “I think I’d like a glass of wine, Mike. Do you think you can get me one?”

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. If you could get me a glass of wine, I’d appreciate it.” It was said with a mother’s voice. This wasn’t about me, it was about Megan. I gave in to the maternal authority and headed to the kitchen.

  We’d been drinking less wine in the last few days and no bottle was open. The kitchen was still an obstacle course with all the activity it had seen and it took me a few minutes to find the corkscrew. As I mused on the advantages of screw top bottles I heard the muffled sound of raised voices; Megan was arguing with her mother. I waited a while until I went back in, hoping the argument would burn itself out. I poured myself a stiff Laphroaig and drank it. When the argument showed no sign of letting up, I finally got tired of waiting and took the glass of wine into their bedroom.

  Eileen was crying and Megan was staring somewhat angrily out the window. I put the glass of wine on the night table by the bed and stood uncertainly, wondering whether I should leave.

  “I’m sorry, Mike,” Eileen said. “Megan is being bratty. But she knows what’s right and how she should act.” She seemed to be talking more to Megan than to me.

  “I’m sorry, guys, but I don’t know what this is about?”

  “Nothing. It really isn’t your problem. I thought you might have heard.”

  “I didn’t. Do you want to tell me?”

  “No. Let’s forget it.”

  Megan jumped up. “Tell him, Mommy.”

  Mommy winced. “Megan, you can’t just decide to ask for things like that. We’re here because Mike is helping us.” She threw up her hands. “This is not your decision to make. I want you to go to sleep and forget about this.”

  “No!”

  “Megan! Who do you think you’re talking to? I have enough on my mind without you throwing a tantrum.”

  “I don’t care. You don’t have any good ideas. You don’t even know where we’ll stay. Those people could hurt us. You don’t know!”

  “Megan, this is really getting on my nerves.”

  “I don’t care.” The child turned to me. “Mike, I want to stay here with you. Now I said it. Big deal.”

  I let it hit my mind and, to my surprise, it didn’t shock me. I guess I’d been playing with the idea, on and off, for days. In my more frightened moments it had seemed awful; taking two fugitives into the disaster of my own life. Or, worse yet, keeping them within miles of the place they were running from. It seemed a bad trade-off on all sides. And yet, though I had never fully admitted it to myself, I was considering it.

  I studied Eileen’s face, wondering if the idea had crossed her mind or if she’d d
ismissed it out of hand, not wanting or needing me enough to consider it. Our kiss? That was all it was; things like that happened between people all the time. Her face gave away nothing and I felt like a fool.

  Megan’s eyes bored through me. “I don’t know if that’s a good idea, Megan. I don’t know if that’s what your mother wants. I’m not sure if it would work.”

  She turned to her mother. “Tell him you want to stay, Mommy.”

  “Megan…” her mother said, a hint of warning in her voice.

  Megan sat down and stared out the window. “I don’t care anymore.” And with that she began to sing a song I’d never heard. All I knew was that it was loud and raucous and it was designed to drown out anything we said.

  Eileen’s face fell. Though she looked at me, I couldn’t read her eyes, so I went into my bedroom.

  *

  Later on I came out of my bedroom to find the living room empty, though the sounds of argument drifted through the walls. I sat down, turning on the television. I had resigned myself to the fact that they were leaving, wishing it would happen and dreading it at the same time. In a sense, they were already gone; there was a wall between us and they already seemed like strangers in my house. They were just an alien noise beyond the wall to my right, people who would be gone sometime tomorrow. I did my best to concentrate on the Marx Brothers movie I was watching but I found that my attention was fading in and out.

  It was a time for whiskey, or so I told myself angrily. I’d killed perhaps a third of a bottle in my room, realizing it was the first time in days that I’d consumed that much. Though the expected numbness came, there was an undertone of discomfort that kept gnawing at me. I put the bottle down, realizing that I could get seriously shit-faced in the name of my anger and disappointment and that wasn’t what I was looking for. Eileen and Megan would be leaving whether I drank or not; I had to get used to that and drinking wouldn’t help.