5
Sleeping and Waking
AT THE end of his dream he fell or flew. Fall or flight, free or pursued, he could not say which, only that he hurtled or was sucked through space; but in his dream he knew he must know (as he must know awake), and he questioned his sleeping body. The legs, arms, head of his dream were calm; and his heart stroked on calm of fear or dread (his actual heart, the heart in his dream), flushing through him the news that he would be spared, that he would rush on, then a cord would rein him, arms or nets stretch to bear him, stop him in time. And he was stopped at last but not by arms, by one word said in an unknown voice—“Lucas” his name—trapped in terror, the voice a mouth on his helpless chest, dull-toothed, draining. He must wake or die and, asleep, he began to flail—at first with his will, then with actual arms against hot dark till he woke on his numb left side, in bed, his right hand fallen on her hip he had struck, in what light there was.
It was night, would be night for hours (he sensed it through blinds, saw it above in the well of the ceiling); but the room was red from the low gas fire that had burned on beside their sleep—another threat that had spared them, done only the duties of fire. The air was stifling and both their bodies though dim were clear. That had been her purpose. When they had stripped and were ready, she had said, “Let it burn. I can see you plainly.” But sleep after eight weeks smothered his force, and soon they had turned into separate chaos. Now he saw. Maybe this was her purpose—not the sight of love but that he see her, separately drowned, raw to whatever might strike or seize.
So he saw—knowing he was safe, knowing from her breath, her tamed smell, that she slept, that his dream was his own, his hand unfelt. She slept on her right side toward him, and up from his hand she was mainly dark for the fire was beyond her. Only the crest of her side was lit—jack-knifed legs, the hip he pressed, sunken waist, the left arm splayed behind her—but he forced his eyes to her face. Then from six years’ memory he remade it slowly—in stiff black hair a white heart of skin (smooth still but taut) cut by tiers of what now seemed wings—her upward brows, shut eyes, lashes (all wings to leave), a long top lip crouched even in sleep like the edge of an unstitched wound, a full bottom lip almost Negro brown, color of the first real scar beneath in the boneless pit of her neck where twenty years before in child’s pneumonia a silver pipe had saved her life, color of the rounds of her breasts raised now, stretched by the backward cast of her arm, lighter only in color than all her hair, than her folded center a hand’s breadth below his hand.
His eyes stopped there. For a while it seemed a resting place—dark core of a dark room, harbor, home, socket of his life. From which his life was wrenched eight weeks before, by her, for her own blind reasons which she had not told, would not, maybe could not.
The question was why? and he did not know, had still after eight weeks failed to ask, not knowing whether he had the right, whether six years gave him the final right to save her life, fight off the death she had tried to choose, might choose again when she woke. But she slept on beside him, beneath his hand; and seeing, he thought of sleepwalkers, oracles—answerers. And because he was free in this brief safety, he said to himself that if she would sleep, lie dim and drowned, he would rise to her ear and ask for her reasons, ask who was innocent? guilty? why?—force her answer, know before she woke.
She moved. Before he could ask or smile at himself, she turned away, crushing her left arm beneath her, sliding dry beneath his hand till she stopped nearly flat, his hand on her core. He let it rest, straining with eyes—jaws, even—to hold it calm, not to move or demand what time after time he had silently demanded, got. Then she seemed to flicker in that one place as animals choose one muscle from thousands to twitch beneath a fly—or a wanted hand. He thought she had waked, was conscious and waiting for his demand, demanding his need.
He would not, not demand, not ask for this so simply offered when he could not ask for his desperate need—her reasons, the blame. He took his hand to his own hard flank which, shielded by her, was colder—but was his, to count on. And free from his weight, she moved again, flatter, face to the ceiling, eyes and lips shut. He saw that—her face—heard her doubtful breath begin again. She had not waked. So he raised himself on his elbow above her, lowered his face till her frail breath touched him.
She frowned—the way his mother had frowned at the rise of death, from her belly a wave of dead blood flung blue toward her throat, thrusting chin, locked teeth, pressed eyes. Helpless, he only watched it rise, take not only her face but whatever mind worked on under sleep, telling himself it would leave as it came. But it held her, her face a mask, mirror—simply—of the only death he had watched, his mother’s. Yet it was a mask, not death itself. Her lungs sighed on. He must wake her though, spare her this ordeal whatever it was. He could do that—but slowly, gently. He laid his face to her breast and, rocking his jaw, kneaded the flesh above her heart, the shielding bones, with the stumps of his beard—and forced a word, one sound, from her dream. It was a dream. He knew that now and whatever her dread, old or new, he would let her bear it, riding above her, one ear to her heart, one cocked for another word, her answer. “Whatever she says, if she speaks again, let it be the answer.” He said that clearly though silently. “I will take what she says as her reason, her blame, and use it to save her, if she will speak.”
She said his name—“Lucas”—aloud but in nothing like her daily voice, in the voice that had come at the end of his dream to break his fall.
He could break hers—and would. The question was why? but the answer was who. She had answered “Lucas” which gave him the blame but also the right and duty to save her. He rose from her chest to his knees above her, turned to face her, straddled her body at the parted calves, then bent, extended her hid left arm and kissed the two scars parallel as rails where she had slashed her veins eight weeks before. He felt her waking rise beneath his lips. For the final moment in all his life, he was safe, alone, free. Now he must look, take her open eyes (her answer his secret)—must and would. Then he could start his pitiful humping amends.
6
Morning Places
AT FOUR in the morning, having ceased to hope, he flings himself onto shallow sleep, random beside her—no rest but a flailing, oaring dumbness that leads him in terror, total dark, to the pitch of abyss where he wakes, fingers clawed against fall, heart seized. But attentive, attending, in every pore, straining to name this room, bed, woman beside him. Her slow breath crosses the air between them, chills his side but places him—“Home, our bed, my wife beside me.” Saying that seems a form of stripped prayer, the core of surrender, “Your will. Yours.” Then sleep is allowed him. He falls back from her and sinks for an hour, thoughtless, mute, gladly drowned. Then at five—the room still black, no sign of day—he bares this dream to himself in his clear mind’s voice as carefully, slowly, as if it were new, were made this moment at whosever will to strengthen his rest, were never true.
“I lie asleep in my home, our bed, my place beside her—her at my left eight inches away but separate from me in all her length. I lie on my back as now, eyes shut; yet I have other eyes that lift through dark and witness from above, with no wish, will, fear or strength. So I see her waken, her eyes click open, all pupil for the dark but also fearless—yet willing and strong and looking only up, not to my still body. Her first move is speech. Her lips make five words but I cannot hear, only witness her readiness. She gathers her arms (winged above her head), her scattered legs—touching me no more than if I were fire—sliding left from me and, to spare me, rises as though she were weightless, jarring nothing as she goes—white gown, bare feet, bare arms, hands at her sides, fingers calmly spread. Past our door, she has left my actual body—all that might have saved her—but the eyes of my dream are allowed to stand in that door and watch her go twelve counted steps, stop, raise her hand to a light, a mirror—I see her ready face and cannot move, do not wish to act—a cabinet, a blade. Then that blade lowered to the b
end of her left arm—bare, no bone between her life and her. She opens a line and before the astonished blood can start, opens a second, parallel above it as though it were ruled. She stretches the arm at her side, pumps her fist. Her feet, the floor are wet with her life. Then she turns toward me—the eyes of my dream, my hidden body—and takes the first steps, her arm now bowed at her chest, blood blooming suddenly as if from her breasts, heart, belly, core; red blade still in her red right hand. I see that and only count her nearing steps. On the fifth she begins to become something new—on her face at first which is not the face she carried away nor the face we have made in these six years but her early face and for two steps armed with that face like a sword. Then she bears a sword. The blade enlarges upward in her hand, its blood now fire—all her blood streaming fire, her arms sucked up into metalled wings, feet shod, heart shielded, riveted, only her early face unchanged. Having only eyes, I cannot fear; but at her last steps, I lose those eyes and am only my sleeping self in dark till I wake on my back in scalding heat. Stood above me, straddled my knees, scalding my face, bare chest, covered heart, is what she became in the last few steps, what I have known since a child as an angel and—by its face no longer hers, neither man nor woman’s, its black eyes steady discs through the heat, its red mouth sealed to question or plea—a final angel, judge and killer. Yet its sword is upward, clamped in gloved fists; and its eyes though set are not on me but over my head, beyond through paper, plaster, lathing, stone. By that I am strengthened to ask its will. I say ‘What is your name?’ No answer, waver, flicker of notice. I say, ‘Am I the man you have come to find?’ It moves at that, forward both legs till between its ankles it presses my unguarded flanks. ‘Why have you come here?’ and knowing its mission, still, ‘What do you need from me?’ Its lips have vanished. Beneath its nose it is smooth to the chin. ‘Take what you need.’ I lie fully back, lift my chin to bare my throat, extend the tender pit of my arm. And it takes my offer, bows to its need. Its fists untwine, the sword of its own weight sinks toward me. These eyes are blinded but I wait for its stroke, lips sealed against cry. It is on my mouth—the stroke—and my lips part behind it like edges of a wound; but what I issue is speech not blood, one word ‘Pardon’ as the sword lifts. The stroke has forced me to say it once and, sparing me, compelled me to say it always—‘Pardon,’ that flatly, both plea and gift. My blindness continues but the heat recedes; and then I am seeing again’the ceiling. Still flat, I jerk my eyes round the room. There in the far corner, cooling and clearing, stands she again, her simple self, a younger she, unarmed, clothed in her early beauty (sword enough) yet bleeding in reach now and beckoning to me with her whole wrecked arm. Her force sucks at me like a need to fall. I lurch to rise, to rush to save her; but my heart refuses, inhales its blood, jells it within me. I may not go, not save her life; but with all my force I reach my knees, free my voice, tell her ‘Pardon,’ saying to myself, ‘must say it always. But she must listen, must separately witness my plea for pardon, gift of pardon, our constant death. We both are victim, judge, killer, witness, our simple selves.’”
She has witnessed at least the end of his dream—or heard it, waked at its sound. For the word was actual, spoken aloud. But asleep, she heard the sound not the word; and awake to receive it, she strains to retrieve whatever he has offered, demanded. There is only quiet, the sough of their opposite breaths; but she sees at the window (through blinds, curtains) the signs of day, the world taking hold, the pieces of this room taking their morning places after chaos—chest, chair, table, bed, he flat beside her sounding asleep. She lifts to her right elbow to see; but his black eyes are open, steady, upward. He does not try to meet or avoid her. She thinks he has waked and struggles for his dream. She tells him “You spoke.” He nods once slowly. “What did you say? What did you dream?” No nod, waver, flicker of notice. Only his eyelids clamp on themselves as if force would thrust him again into rest. She says, “Go to sleep. We have two hours yet.” She falls to her back, turns on her belly, lays on his bare chest her bare left arm. The scars in the hinge of her arm feed there.
MICHAEL EGERTON
HE WAS the first boy I met at camp. He had got there before me, and he and a man were taking things out of a suitcase when I walked into the cabin. He came over and started talking right away without even knowing me. He even shook hands. I don’t think I had ever shaken hands with anyone my own age before. Not that I minded. I was just surprised and had to find a place to put my duffel bag before I could give him my hand. His name was Michael, Michael Egerton. He was taller than I was, and although it was only June, he already had the sort of suntan that would leave his hair white all summer. I knew he couldn’t be more than twelve. I wouldn’t be twelve until February. If you were twelve you usually had to go to one of the senior cabins across the hill. But his face was old because of the bones under his eyes that showed through the skin.
He introduced me to the man. It was his father but they didn’t look alike. His father was a newspaperman and the suitcase they were unpacking had stickers on it that said Rome and Paris, London and Bombay. His father said he would be going back to Europe soon to report about the Army and that Michael would be settled here in camp for a while. I was to keep an eye on Mike, he said, and if he got to France in time, he would try to send us something. He said he could tell that Mike and I were going to be great friends and that I might want to go with Mike to his aunt’s when camp was over. I might like to see where Old Mike would be living from now on. It was a beautiful place, he said. I could tell he was getting ready to leave. He had seen Michael make up his bed and fill the locker with clothes, and he was beginning to talk the way everybody does when they are leaving somewhere—loud and with a lot of laughing.
He took Michael over to a corner, and I started unpacking my bag. I could see them though and he gave Michael some money, and they talked about how much Michael was going to enjoy the summer and how much bigger he would be when his father got back and how he was to think of his aunt just like a mother. Then Michael reached up and kissed his father. He didn’t seem at all embarrassed to do it. They walked back towards me and in a voice louder than before, Mr. Egerton told me again to keep an eye on Old Mike—not that he would need it but it wouldn’t hurt. That was a little funny since Michael was so much bigger than I was, but anyway I said I would because that was what I was supposed to say. And then he left. He said there wouldn’t be any need for Mike to walk with him to the car, but Michael wanted to so I watched them walk down the hill together. They stood by the car for a minute, and then Michael kissed him again right in front of all those boys and parents and counselors. Michael stood there until his father’s car had passed through the camp gate. He waved once. Then he came on back up the hill.
All eight of the boys in our cabin went to the dining hall together that night, but afterward at campfire Michael and I sat a little way off from the others and talked softly while they sang. He talked some about his father and how he was one of the best war correspondents in the business. It wasn’t like bragging because he asked me about my father and what my mother was like. I started to ask him about his mother, but I remembered that he hadn’t said anything about her, and I thought she might be dead. But in a while he said very matter-of-factly that his mother didn’t live with him and his father, hadn’t lived with them for almost a year. That was all. He hadn’t seen his mother for a year. He didn’t say whether she was sick or what, and I wasn’t going to ask.
For a long time after that we didn’t say anything. We were sitting on a mound at the foot of a tree just high enough to look down on the other boys around the fire. They were all red in the light, and those furthest from the blaze huddled together and drew their heads down because the nights in the mountains were cold, even in June. They had started singing a song that I didn’t know. It was called “Green Grow the Rushes.” But Michael knew it and sang and I listened to him. It was almost like church with one person singing against a large soft choir. At the end the c
amp director stood up and made a speech about this was going to be the best season in the history of Redwood which was the finest camp in the land as it was bound to be with as fine a group of boys and counselors as he had sitting right here in front of him. He said it would be a perfect summer if everybody would practice the Golden Rule twenty-four hours a day and treat everybody like we wanted to be treated—like real men.
When we got back to the cabin, the other boys were already running around in the lantern light naked and slapping each other’s behinds with wet towels. But soon the counselor blew the light out, and we got in bed in the dark. Michael was in the bunk over me. We had sentence prayers. Michael asked God to bless his father when he got to France. One boy named Robin Mickle who was a Catholic said a Hail Mary. It surprised most of the others. Some of them even laughed as if he was telling a joke. Everything quieted down though and we were half asleep when somebody started blowing Taps on a bugle. It woke us all up and we waited in the dark for it to stop so we could sleep.
Michael turned out to be my best friend. Every morning after breakfast everybody was supposed to lie on their beds quietly for Thought Time and think about the Bible, but Michael and I would sit on my bed and talk. I told Michael a lot of things I had never told anyone else. I don’t know why I told him. I just wanted him to know everything there was to know about me. It was a long time before I realized that I didn’t know much about Michael except what I could see—that he didn’t live with his mother and his father was a great war correspondent who was probably back in France now. He just wasn’t the kind to tell you a lot. He would listen to everything you had to say as if he wanted to hear it and was glad you wanted to tell him. But then he would change the subject and start talking about baseball or something. He was a very good baseball player, the best on the junior cabin team. Every boy in our cabin was on the team, and it looked as if with Michael pitching we might take the junior title for the Colossians. That was the name of our team. All the athletic teams in camp were named for one of the letters that St. Paul wrote. We practiced every afternoon after rest period, but first we went to the Main Lodge for mail. I got a letter almost every day, and Michael had got two or three from his aunt, but it wasn’t until almost three weeks passed that he got the airmail letter from France. There weren’t any pictures or souvenirs in it, but I don’t suppose Mr. Egerton had too much time for that. He did mention me though I could tell by the way he wrote that he didn’t remember my name. Still it was very nice to be thought of by a famous war correspondent. Michael said we could write him a letter together soon and that he would ask his father for a picture.
Collected Stories of Reynolds Price Page 11