by Ann Pearlman
“You think it’s a spider bite? It looked like it might be at first.”
Dr. Shapiro carries a laptop and opens it on the small shelf that juts out from the wall. “Could be.” She starts scanning Troy’s medical chart. “I see you had a sinus infection back in September.”
His summer cold started in June and still stuffed up his nose in August.
“Dr. Grey put me on some antibiotic, cephalosporin, I think.” Troy tries to sit up to establish command and adult presence in the small room. “Was that it?” He turns to me.
“Yes. It’s here.” Dr. Shapiro taps the computer screen.
She seems to be about our age. Her nails are polished with clear gloss, and small gold hoops grace her ears. She stands to reexamine his shoulder. The swollen area has grown since we left home. His flesh is deep purple and thick bloody pus trickles, dissipating in the curly hair on his chest. Her face is smooth and unlined as she asks, “Can you raise your arm?” She reveals no alarm or disgust.
Troy raises his arm only chest high.
“Well. First we’ll need a biopsy and some blood to see what infections you may have. Meanwhile, we’ll start you on an IV of an antibiotic, vancomycin.” She turns to me. “Do either of you have any open wounds or any similar pimples?”
“I don’t.” I’ll examine myself carefully when I take my next shower. “I haven’t noticed anything on Rachel.”
“A booboo here.” Rachel holds onto the edge of the hospital bed and lifts her knee. The doctor views a scrape healed long ago into a thin white scar.
“That must have hurt.”
Rachel’s eyes well with the memory as she nods her head.
The doctor opens a cabinet and retrieves a surgery kit, leaves the room, and returns with a syringe. “This will numb it for awhile,” she says to Troy.
The male nurse enters carrying an IV pole and asks, “Which do you want, the right or the left?” He wiggles the IV tube back and forth.
“Left, I guess.” Troy lies back on the flat pillow, chest exposed, the pus, an orangey trickle, close to his nipple. Troy’s voice is faint, and the pale green blanket covering his lower torso and legs smooths the edges of his body so that he appears smaller, as though he is fading into the mattress.
I met Troy when we were thirteen. By fifteen, we were best friends. He hung out at my house all the time, like we were brother and sister, except that Tara sprawled on his lap and Mom was never grouchy with him. One day, we ran into each other at the pool. The pool was within walking distance of my house, and my friends and I had begun to use it as a place to flirt with boys and see who you’d have a crush on that week. I was with Marissa and Jennifer and as we smoothed baby oil on each other’s bodies, we looked at the boys already in the high school we would attend in the fall. Boys who had started to shave. Boys with thick necks and broad shoulders and cupped butts. Boys with a certain swagger and yet a vulnerability that kept us unafraid. Or maybe scared us a bit. They all did except for Troy. Troy didn’t scare me. So Marissa, Jennifer, and I nestled into towel-covered chaise lounges, plugged our MP3 players in our ears, and pretended all we wanted was a golden tan, and to read the latest magazine.
I heard Jennifer say, “Wow. He’s hot. You sure he’s just your friend?” and she poked my arm with her elbow. I opened my eyes and sat up in the lounger.
There was Troy.
I’d never seen him with his shirt off.
He strolled in with two friends, his back turned to me, as they looked around for three chairs together. They couldn’t find them, threw their towels on an empty table, and walked toward the diving boards.
I leaned back on my elbows.
The sun sparkled the water with diamonds.
Troy climbed the stairs to the high dive, strode to the edge of the board, and turned his back to the pool. His arms at his sides, he stood motionless, except to gently test the springiness of the board.
The three of us watched, leaning back on our elbows, our stomachs slicked with oil, our toenails and fingernails glossed and painted a pearl pink. I held my breath.
He raised his arms shoulder height.
(That arm that he can’t even lift now. That arm with the pus running down it.)
I noticed his chest expand as he inhaled. And then, in one effortless motion, he flexed his knees and sprung from the board, arched his back, and flew through the air.
There was a stunning quiet as the entire pool galley stopped chatting, paused between bites of hot dogs, and put down their newspapers. The action froze.
The tips of his fingers pierced the surface of the water so gently it made no sound. He cut through like an arrow, arms and legs together, back arched. Underwater, he flipped a somersault, then stretched with the breaststroke. When he reached the edge, he placed his hands on the lip and, in one motion, heaved himself up, swung his legs through his arms, and stood. Water droplets studded his body, then slowly slid to the cement.
Troy still hadn’t seen us.
“I didn’t know he was a diver.” Marissa pulled a scrunchie off and combed her hair with her fingers, fluffing it full around her face.
“Yeah. He’s hoping to make the varsity team next year.” But I didn’t know he was that precise, that graceful, that in control of his body. How had I not seen this? How come he had not talked about it more? Maybe I just hadn’t listened.
He still hadn’t noticed me. The boy who dove next made a belly smacker. “Ow! That hurt just hearing it!” Jennifer rubbed her tummy.
Back then, Troy was just a few inches taller than me. Then, his body seemed like a slightly different version of my own. He was just a buddy, without the competition and cattiness of a girl.
“You sure he’s just your friend?” Jennifer asked again as she applied sparkly lip gloss.
I shrugged. He started to walk toward the stairs and, finally, saw me.
He grinned and I laughed.
He said hi, but he didn’t come over to us. He continued his trip to the board, climbed the stairs, and this time did a jackknife, once again slicing the surface so the ripples were hardly disturbed.
“Now he’s just showing off.” Jennifer lay back on her towel, opened up her book, and continued reading.
I lifted the back of the chaise higher so I could watch without appearing too eager.
After all, he was simply my friend. Like a brother, as I said. He even fell asleep on our couch one night. Mom was out on a date and she came home to find Troy and Tara sprawled on the sofa, and me sound asleep in a chair, the end of Arachnophobia playing on the TV.
I didn’t have a boyfriend, but I didn’t consider him a potential one. In fact, I pointed out the cute girls in our class. He never said anything. Just shrugged.
I subtly watched him do a somersault and then straighten so he thrust his fingers first into the water, another backward swan, and then a crazy dive in which he stood facing front, turned in midair, and entered the water feet first. He practiced that three times. Each time, he swam underwater and then leaped over the edge of the pool in one bound.
I watched from behind my sunglasses.
I watched from behind my magazine.
He slid from air to water as though there were no transition, as though water and air were the same.
And then he came over to me. He asked, “How do you think my reverse somersault is coming along?”
“Is that what’s that called? You looked great. I didn’t know you were that good.” I smiled.
“I’ve been working on it.” He reached his hand out to me and tried to pull me up.
“What? I’m reading,” I pleaded.
“Come on. Don’t you want to try it?”
Now, I don’t like heights. I can swim laps, but I still remember the burn of a belly smacker when I was ten.
He pulled me up to the low board and helped me get into position. I stood facing him on the edge, his arms on my shoulders. “Look into my eyes. You’re going to sail through the air. Keep your chin tucked down and your
fingertips will slice through the pool.”
I noticed freckles across his nose and the cowlick that sticks straight up at the top of his head. I had never seen him so serious, so earnest.
His palms were warm on my oily shoulders.
I licked my lips.
I looked down. Sprinkled across his chest, sparse but obviously present, was downy hair. Brown, reddish brown. Soft.
He’s a man, I thought for the first time.
I was embarrassed by the thought.
“Now, turn around. And turn your body into a C shape.”
I faced the pool, standing on the edge. He was behind me, his warm hands on my shoulders. My arms were stretched over my head. “Bend down. Arms first. Stay in that C.”
I followed his instructions.
“That’s right. Great, Sky. You’re going to do a great dive. You’ll see. Now just keep going down, and tuck your thumb into your other palm.”
I did it and curved lower, and saw my knees.
“Now your hands are one. Good. Keep your legs together.”
I felt myself tipping.
I plunged through the space and, before I realized I was that close, my fingertips hit the cool water, then my arms, my head, and my legs. I remembered to keep my legs together.
Troy beamed as though I were a child taking her first step. It is the same smile he awarded Rachel years later.
“Wow. That was great. You should join the team with me!”
I rolled my eyes.
He dragged a chaise next to mine, and again I noticed the hair on his chest.
“I think Jennifer has a crush on you,” I whispered while Jennifer stood in the concession stand line.
“You wanna go again?” He didn’t hear me.
“She says you’re hot.”
“Come on, let me teach you how to bounce and then you’ll go higher.”
“Don’t you want a girlfriend?” I pressed the issue.
“Want to swim some laps with me?”
“Nah, I want to finish this article on Britney’s new album.”
He stood and walked to the edge of the pool. His buttocks flexed and relaxed in his blue swim trunks. His suit was spandex divers’ trunks, so I could see the curve of his separate cheeks. How embarrassing.
Now, with the aqua blanket covering his legs and hips, and his chest bare, I notice again the coat of hair on his chest, and his arms.
An IV is in his wrist.
Sometimes, he jokes about his bald spot that grows at the top of his head and has almost resolved the problem with his cowlick.
“Men with hairy bodies are more likely to go bald,” he said.
“They are?” We were in the bathroom sharing the mirror. He added gel to the few strands that remained of his cowlick while I rubbed lotion on my legs.
“Yep. Read that somewhere.”
“I don’t care if you’re bald.” I like the way his hair feels under my palms, under my fingertips, but I don’t care if he’s bald. His smooth head would feel nice, too.
But I do care, oh how I care, about the pus dripping from his shoulder and matting the hair on his chest.
As though feeling my wish, Dr. Shapiro takes a swab of the pus and closes it in a tube, and then wipes the rest away with an alcohol-dampened gauze.
“We’ll do a biopsy and a quick blood exam. Meanwhile, we’ll see if that IV will bring down your fever and lessen the swelling.”
She leaves the curtain slightly open and I pull it shut.
Troy closes his eyes and shakes his head, “What a waste of a night. I wanted to work on the trial next week, and just spend time with you and Rachel.”
“You are spending time with us.”
“I’m here, Daddy.” Rachel sits in the chair in front of the doctor’s desk and pulls Kleenex, pretending to blow her nose. Then she grabs a latex glove and tries to put it on, but that task is too complex and confusing. I roll up the cuff of the glove and put it on her hand. Ghostly plastic hangs from the ends of her fingers. She flaps them, “Look, Daddy, I have long nails.”
I know how ill he is by his absence of wit or comment.
“There’s so much else we could be doing. Even if it’s only eat leftovers and watch TV reruns,” he says, looking at Rachel and me.
I squeeze his hand.
“Why don’t you and Rachel go home. I might be here for hours. I can take a taxi.”
“You want us to leave?”
“No need for you two to spend God-knows-how-long in the emergency room.”
“I want to be with you.”
“How are you going to work tomorrow if you’re here half the night?”
Oh, right. The next day is Tuesday. On Tuesdays, Rachel goes to day care at eight and I start work at eight-thirty.
“Don’t worry about it.” That’s all I say. “You just concentrate on getting well.” In a week, in a few days, this will be over. Ten days of antibiotics and our life will resume as though this night has never happened.
Except I no longer have a job, and Mia’s dead, I can’t help but think.
Troy’s eyes close. His breathing is shallow. Perhaps he’s fallen asleep. Rachel’s ethereal fingers color a snowman purple, and down the hall a man moans, and my heart starts pounding in my throat, neck, and ears.
An hour later the nurse returns and takes Troy’s temperature and blood pressure. Troy seems to have fallen asleep, but immediately complains that he’s still cold.
“I’ll bring you another blanket,” the nurse says as he writes down the numbers in his chart.
“How’s he doing?”
“His temperature is a bit up.”
“Higher than it was a few hours ago?”
“Higher than it was.” The nurse leaves and, a few minutes later, returns with another blanket. “This should warm you up.” He opens it up and flies it over Troy. It falls around him.
“Aah, that feels good,” Troy sighs.
I touch the blanket and it’s warm.
We resume waiting. Rachel gets cranky, so I pull her to my lap and read from the book I brought. She twists and struggles, momentarily distracted from her exhaustion. I decide to sing her the lullabies Mom sang to me, “Summertime” and “All through the Night.”
Finally, she snuggles into me and pokes her finger in her mouth.
“That’s nice, honey,” Troy says. I sing to him as much as I sing to her. My voice is husky and I can barely keep a tune. Tara’s musical talent comes from her father, not from our mom.
I slide Rachel into her own chair and settle in the hospital cot next to Troy.
“What if I’m contagious?”
“Then I already have it.” I nestle my head on his shoulder, the one that isn’t oozing pus, and slide my hand under the cover and feel his flesh warmed by the blanket and his soft curly hair.
“I love you.”
He squeezes me with his good arm. The one with the IV in his hand. “Always and forever,” he says.
The doctor enters and I bolt upright, as though I’m doing something I shouldn’t be.
First Dr. Shapiro takes Troy’s temperature again while asking him how he’s doing, and then takes his blood pressure. She looks at the thermometer. “Well, your temperature continues to rise in spite of the vancomycin, and we got the preliminary lab results. It looks like you may have picked up a staph skin infection.”
“From a spider bite?”
“I don’t know what it’s from. It looks like it’s MRSA, which means you could have gotten it from anywhere. Fourteen percent of people carry the bacteria for community-associated MRSA.” She rewinds the tubing from the blood pressure cuff and returns it to its holder. “That means people who are not in a hospital or a nursing home.”
“He hasn’t been in a hospital. Oh, we visited a friend in one. Or rather I did.” Could I have brought this home from Mia’s hospital room? A knob in the bathroom? The handle on the water fountain? Brushing up against an infected lab coat? Did I give this to him?
“Or it could be from a gym . . . do you work out? Play a sport?”
“Basketball. But not in a gym.”
“The germ is in lots of places.” She places her hand on her hip. “I noticed that you were on antibiotics for that sinus infection. That particular antibiotic seems associated with the growth of this infection. It lowers immunity to this particular bacteria.” Her words are slow and her voice is deep. She meets Troy’s eyes and then mine, one at a time. She scans Rachel curled into a ball on one of the chairs, her thumb in her mouth and the other hand, still clouded with the latex glove, tucked under her chin. “It’s probably best for us to admit you and continue to drip in antibiotics and fluids and monitor this infection. Meanwhile, we’ll get the complete lab results and see if we can tailor a medication for that specific germ.”
“Can we catch this? Could I have brought this home from my visit to the hospital and given it to him?”
“We’d have to do further testing on you to know that. For now, you should take your daughter home. Both of you take a shower and wash carefully. Check to see if you have any open sores, no matter how small. Clean them. Put antibiotic ointment on them. Cover them. I’m glad your daughter has at least one glove on,” Dr. Shapiro laughs.
I don’t want to leave Troy. But I want to keep us safe.
“Best to leave your toddler at home tomorrow.”
When we leave, Troy watches Rachel as though his heart is being torn out. I blow him a kiss.
“Bye-bye, Daddy,” Rachel says. And then she kisses her fingers and, with several flutters, waves the kiss to him as far as her arm extends.
Troy kisses his palm and blows it to her.
At home, I give Rachel and me both a shower. I search our skin from inches away. No cuts. No pimples. No mosquito bites. Only a smattering of freckles.
I tuck Rachel into her crib and go to the computer. The antibiotic that Troy was given for his sinusitis may have made the germ immune to other antibiotics. Then, the infection would be more virulent and could penetrate his body, creating infections in his bones, joints, blood, heart, and lungs. He could die from bacterial endocarditis or pneumonia. He could develop blood poisoning, cellulites. Nineteen thousand Americans die of MRSA every year. More than of AIDS.
But he’s young. And healthy. His immune system will fight this off.