“Ready?” he said. “Just hold on.” And, without waiting for an answer, tugged at my hand, dragging me into the deep. The terror was under my feet, where there was nothing. Nothing but the swirl of my mind, spinning in the grip of my daddy’s hand. Just hold on, I told myself.
The white waves crashed around us, brutal and spitting. And what fools we were, rushing to meet them! I must’ve opened my mouth in horror, or to say something, because suddenly it was full of salt, burning, when my father yelled, “Dive!” and let go of my hand.
I saw him disappear into the monstrosity of the sea at the same instant I was struck by it, tumbling me over and over in a ridiculous, unending somersault. I rolled and spun, the sea filling my mouth and ears, my eyes, wide open.
Finally I hit the shore. The sand ran inside my bathing suit, into my ears, finding the hidden folds of skin like biting teeth. I hit the shore in a heap. My eyes stung from salt that cut like glass. Then the tears were gone. In their place for anyone to see was a new terror. My father.
“You didn’t dive!” I heard him say. “If you don’t dive, you sink, you get pulled under! You end up like this.” I saw his hand above me as I sprawled across the sand. His mouth was wide, just like the sea, and spread into a grin.
“You said hold on.” I was on my knees, wiping the sand from my unsmiling face.
“I dove under, and then when the wave passed, I could stand,” my father said. “I thought you were with me on this.”
“But you said hold on.” I hated him. “I thought you were with me.”
“But you can’t hold on and dive. You need both hands to dive.”
“Why didn’t you say so before?” What I hated the most was that I had believed him. “You lied to me.”
“No, please.” He laughed and reached to help me stand up. “I didn’t lie. I just thought you would know . . . but you . . . it’s my fault.”
I would not let him help me and twisted from his grasp. “But you know what, V? Next time, you won’t forget.”
I might never forget, that’s what I knew. I didn’t know what else I’d remember.
Roaring
The bloody sheets are still on his bed. When we left the hospital last Friday, Edward moved into the guest room upstairs at home and Dad took my brother’s room on the first floor. It was obvious that my father wouldn’t be climbing any stairs. We lived this new way for all of two days. One weekend. Today is Monday, my dad is back in the hospital, and the bloody sheets are still on his bed.
| | |
Last week, following Thursday’s dreadful scene full of fever and rash and delirium, Dr. Sweeney and the hematologist appeared in the room. They said there was nothing else they could do if my dad refused to try the plethora of experimental medications that was available. The plethora? My dad was not experiencing any active infections at this time. Nobody said anything about a cure.
“So I’ll go home,” my dad said. If you feel you’ll be more comfortable there. Private-duty nurses, hospice, alternatives were available. They were very careful about how they said all this, but every word was exaggerated. Alternatives blared loud as a car horn. My dad said, “If I’m going to die, I’ll do it at home.” That’s when the doctors blinked, like my dad was a bully tossing sand in their eyes, and they looked away.
But nobody said he was going to hemorrhage. Or that he would sleep all weekend and then his blood would stop clotting and start spilling out all over the sheets.
And my dad said, not like this. I’m not going like this, covered in blood; he said it. He had just woken up. It was this morning. Both blankets, since he was always cold, were soaked in blood. We all stood there, gaping at the sight, as if we had been wounded. My dad groaned. That’s when I grabbed the blankets and my mother grabbed my dad’s robe. Edward ran outside to start the car. Baby Teeth had already left for school, which was a relief. We rushed back to the hospital.
| | | | | |
That was this morning, all the blood. And now it’s afternoon. I’m walking along the street trying to remember and forget everything at once. I don’t want to forget anything about my dad. I don’t want to remember this morning. The sun is shining into my eyes in such a way that I’m blind if I tilt my head. I even want to remember that. It’s Monday afternoon, after school. I wish I could forget how heavy those blankets were. I went to school today.
I saw Jane in school and told her that I was going straight back to the hospital with Edward this afternoon. That was a lie. I’m going home to meet Edward and Baby Teeth first. When I get home, what I’m going to do is take the bloody sheets off the bed. I don’t want Baby Teeth to see that.
What I told Jane is true enough. The real truth is that I just can’t stand the thought of being near her today. When I’m with her, I feel like stuff is being dragged out of me. As I’m being emptied, another part of me fills with worry. Will she kiss me again? When?
| | |
I wonder if it matters to her as much as it does to me. She said she wanted to do everything once. Like Rimbaud. Rimbaud wanted to do everything once. Is that all? I don’t really know what she meant by that. “Nobody’s serious when they’re seventeen.” That’s another Rimbaud line. What about fifteen, I wonder. What’s that supposed to be like? How serious are we now? I read that Rimbaud stopped writing when he was nineteen. He was “disillusioned.” Why? It’s hard to find the true meaning in things. Especially what Jane means. I can’t wait to be with her, but then I can’t stand it when I am.
So I walk along, blinded by the day, when a car races by at a phenomenal speed, the radio blaring impossibly loud. It stops me, foot in the air. When I hear it, I want to remember how it came out of nowhere, into my thoughts at the moment I was thinking about Jane, practically blind. Even though I can’t see it yet, I want it to mark the moment, like a gunshot marks the start of a race. I want to remember this moment in ten years because it seems so important, the ground vibrating beneath my feet as I stand, marking. Perhaps in ten years I will know what it means. So what is this feeling? It’s not longing for the past; that’s nostalgia. What about the opposite of nostalgia? Longing for the present? But if I’m not already in the present, where can I be?
| | |
That’s when I hear the roaring. Initially I think it must be the noise inside my own head. The noise of confusion. Then I hear a big slam. My head is bent into the blind angle, so I can’t see anything at all. I jerk reflexively at the roaring. The slamming car door. I look up. The green VW. THE GREEN VW. The murderous Lucky-wrecking car. Outside that door is Eileen. The car roars away.
“Hey, V.” Eileen tries to smile. “Saw you by accident.”
“What! Whose car is that?” It is my head that’s roaring.
“Listen, I know it’s been a while, too long, I know, but we really need to talk.” Eileen’s eyes have widened as she looks at me.
“Whose car is that?”
“Look. I didn’t know what happened.” She also looks ready to run, her legs bent forward, heels off the sidewalk.
Like an animal, my mind says. “Who’s driving that car?” I say.
“I can’t believe it myself, V. I’m just getting a ride home and suddenly Grant is telling me everything about some ground-zero morning—you know, like bad—and a dog got hit and I say ‘What, you mean V’s Lucky?’ and he begs me not to tell you—” She finally takes a breath.
“Stop!” I say. “What are you talking about?” The words sound like they’re coming from the ground, not anywhere near my mouth. It’s all so far away. “Sullivan was there? Whose car is it, Eileen? Please?”
“Shit, V.” She stops, stares at the sidewalk. “Grant.”
“That’s Sullivan’s car?” Ground zero? Did I hear that?
“It’s his father’s car, but he didn’t mean it. Lucky came out of nowhere. He really, really didn’t mean it.” Eileen’s heel kicks the ground.
“Sullivan . . . How do you know what he meant?” Something’s rumbling beneath my words, like a train
slowing down.
“I know because he just told me; what do you think, he’s some kind of killer? We just passed you and he just told me.”
“In Sullivan’s car? You?” Why am I asking these imbecile questions? It’s like my brain is slowing down. Out of nowhere, she said.
“I was getting a ride, V, ’cause I missed the bus, and you know how I hate to walk alone.” Eileen starts to whine. A picture flashes behind my eyes. In my mind I kick her.
I shake my head and look down the road, after the car. I can’t believe this. Why not? It’s not true.
“Why? Why did he wait so long? Why didn’t he tell me?”
“Are you kidding? He’s scared of you. He says you hate him.” She’s leaning forward. She’s too tall to be a liar.
“Sullivan is scared of me?”
“That’s what he said, V.” Those eyes, like puddles, so unlike Eileen.
“What?” My head hurts. Why did Sullivan ask me where Eileen was? And why does Eileen want to believe him?
“You’re lying,” I finally say.
“What did you say?”
“You’ve been lying to me for weeks. Every time I see you with that stupid hat on, it reminds me. Where is the ratty thing today, anyway?” I say. “I have news for you, Eileen. I just figured out where you were the day Lucky got hit. So that’s why you’ve been such a nasty bitch—because you feel so bad for taking off when it happened, is that it? You didn’t come to my place that day. Did you jump on the bus? Is that it? Is that it?”
Eileen’s eyes are wet. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but you have incredible nerve, calling me a liar. And so sorry you don’t like my hat, like you are the fashion plate of the universe!”
“So you saw the whole Lucky accident, and you ran away. You’ve known for weeks . . . That’s it, isn’t it, why you’ve been acting like such a jerk? Why you’ve been avoiding me?”
Eileen straightens up. When she does, she’s taller than me. I’ve always hated that. “You’re the jerk, Virginia. I wasn’t even there. I went to the dentist that morning; don’t you remember? I wasn’t even near the bus stop.
Don’t you remember? Loretta told me. Loretta was there, on the bus. I called you from school, V, as soon as I knew. You didn’t go to school that day.” Her eyes fill, and Eileen starts crying. “I called you the second I heard. You were so upset I didn’t know what to say. Don’t you remember that, you jerk?”
I do. I remember. Sprawled across the floor the day Lucky got slammed, shaking so bad I couldn’t hold the phone, I couldn’t talk. Just before that horrible conversation with my mother. Something inside me drops, and I start crying too, standing on the sidewalk. “I’m sorry—I forgot. I forgot you called. I thought you just left. He asked me where you were.”
“Who asked you?” Eileen says, hugging me.
“Sullivan.”
“You’re kidding. What? What’s wrong with him?” She looks down the road, wipes her eyes. “And you thought I did? I can’t believe it. What’s wrong with him?” As I look at her, her eyes are no longer wet, but they’re not the same. “You tell me,” I say.
Rush
I remember the sheets. “Listen, I have to go.”
“Do you have to go now? I really need to talk to you.” Eileen looks at me. “Oh, it’s your dad, isn’t it? I’m sorry, V.”
I just nod. Maybe that’s enough communication for one day, I think, since I feel all weak—even my ears are weak, as the sound of Eileen’s voice wobbles in—like I might crumble into an irreparable pile of bones if I’m faced with any more truth.
“I’ll call you later.”
“You what?” I say. Part of me doesn’t believe those words, since I haven’t heard them in so long.
“There’s some other stuff have to tell you,” Eileen says.
“You mean it?” Another part of me really wants to believe her.
“More than anything.”
But maybe, some other part says, it’s stuff I don’t want to hear. Maybe my ears are tired.
| | | | | |
Nobody else is home yet. I have time to wash the sheets, the blankets. But wait—where’s Lucky? Not in his waiting-to-go-out spot by the door. Why not? I call him. Nothing. He’s in front of Edward’s bedroom door. He’s chewing at his cast—there are white bits littering the carpet. Oh, poor dog. At least the cast is coming off in a few days. “Somebody around here hire a guard dog?” I say in my special canine voice. He growls.
I stop walking toward him. “Are you growling?” Yes, he is. He’s never done that. “What’s wrong?” I ask. Then I realize—it’s the blood.
My voice starts out normal. “It’s only me, Puppyhead.” My hand is in slow motion, reaching for the door. “If you bite me, I’ll lose my mind. Promise.” It’s a whisper. Lucky barks sharply as he rises and shakes himself out as if he’s fled the driving rain. He limps away. “So,” I say as my hand grasps the doorknob, “animals go crazy too.”
When the door opens, I understand. The air itself is an anchor, weighed down with the thick stench of dried blood. My throat closes. My nostrils burn as if the air itself is burning. What smells like this?
If metal burned, it would be like this. But no. Metal is cold. A dreadful edge, as if I’ve bitten something sharp and bitter, like a rotten pepper, wells up in my eyes. It’s the memory of the morning Lucky got hit. This morning my dad’s blankets were the brightest red. This afternoon they’re a dark, streaking brown. This morning the blood was warm. Now it looks like rust.
I don’t want to see this. The hot shock rushes through my limbs. I go numb. This is somebody else’s life. Stop—there must be a reason I’m here. But I don’t want to see this. But I don’t want Baby Teeth to see it even more. Okay. Before I know it, I roll it all into a big heap, I race through the hall, and throw it all down the basement stairs. I race down the stairs, spill detergent into the washing machine. I squeeze the stuff inside and shut the lid. I can breathe again.
| | |
I walk around the basement, shaking myself, just the way Lucky did, trembling my way back to life. The machine sloshes as it spins—it sounds like boots in a deep puddle. I notice that my mother has added more boxes to the piles of stuff she keeps everywhere. She can’t throw anything away.
I see some photo albums sticking out of a box. I lift one from the pile, and the faded black leather crumbles into uneven pieces. I open the book and see pictures of my mother as a kid. I think I’ve seen them before, among the piles in the den cabinet, but as I turn the page, I don’t recognize them.
In one picture, my mother and her sister are sitting on the steps of their Brooklyn brownstone. I’ve been there—it’s Pop’s old house. I recognize it by the building’s faded brick. They’re wearing black dresses and little black shoes. And both of them are wet, their long dark hair soaked and stringy around their shoulders. My mother is maybe ten years old. When is this? I keep looking. There’s something wrong here. It’s raining. Why are they sitting outside in the rain with no umbrellas? They look like the most miserable kids in Brooklyn.
I hear the phone ring upstairs. The washing machine spins. Good. Where are my siblings? I run up the stairs to answer. It’s my mother.
“Virginia, Dad’s better. The hemorrhaging’s stopped—for now.”
“Great! What”—I’m out of breath—“what do you mean, for now?”
She pauses. “All those drugs! Nobody can predict anything.”
“So are the doctors there? Is Dad awake?”
“No . . . the drugs . . .” Her voice trails off. “Is Edward there yet?” She pauses. How can silence be like a storm?
I finally say, “Not yet.” There’s something wrong, and she’s not telling.
“Okay, everybody stay home. Let Dad rest.” I can hear her sigh. “Your sister had chorus again, right? She’s a soprano, isn’t she?”
“Maybe, I’m not sure,” I say. Is this my mother?
“I think so. And send Edward out for pizza, or
whatever.”
“I will.”
“So I’ll be home later; I’m going to wait for Dr. Sweeney again.”
“Mom!” I just want to say something.
“What is it?” I can imagine the expression on her face, same as the picture. The rumpled, sad mouth.
“What do you want for dinner?” I say.
“Oh, I don’t care. It doesn’t matter.” She hangs up.
What did I want to say? Maybe yes, it does. The phone rings again.
“Hello,” I answer.
“Same to you,” Jane says.
“I was just going to call you . . .”
“Does that mean you can meet me?” she asks.
“End of the driveway,” I say.
“When? Don’t waste any time.”
“What? Five minutes.”
I write a note for Edward and Baby Teeth about Dad.
I wait five excruciating minutes before I walk outside.
“How’s your dad?”
“Better, supposedly. For now.”
“Oh good! Good good good!” she calls into the sky, but then she looks at me. “So what is it?”
“How do you know?” I mumble, already burning.
“Your face, V. What is it?”
Sometimes I hate when she calls me V. Again I can’t look into her eyes. “I have to go,” I say. It’s not even close to dark. What am I doing?
Dive Page 13