by Charles Bock
His arms opened up, toward the rest of the room. “This is their celebration. A bunch of papers with codes are floating around. I guess you write out your name. On the key, each letter corresponds to a number. So you can convert your name to BASIC, binaries. Then you’re supposed to go around the party, introducing yourself to everyone with your code. Since it’s my bright idea, I’m kinda obligated to be here.”
New papers had been brought out onto the counters. Alice grabbed one, bounced a bit in place. She read the code keys, thought for a second.
Immaculate, scripted capital letters followed:
ONE.
The invention of fire
TODAY’S AIR-PUFFED MANILA envelopes included one state-of-the-art multimedia magazine from a group of upstart culture peddlers, and two samplers with the first level of a different three-dimensional role player game. Each mailer represented millions of lines of code—written over months, perhaps years—burnt onto compact discs, and sent out by other hungry young programmers with ambition and dreams and hustle to spare. It was a little depressing, when Oliver thought of it. So Oliver didn’t. He separated the mailers from Alice’s fashion glossies, ignored whatever subscription cards fell loose.
The hidden, smaller envelopes were where the action was. Hospital billing departments sent out statements starting on the twentieth, he knew. Usually the queasy feeling began in his stomach around the twenty-third, kicking up a few notches whenever he got near the mailbox. Especially dreadful was the sight of an official-looking, sky-blue envelope, stuffed fat with pages of billing procedures. Today had none of those. The only hospital bill was a thin envelope, even lighter blue, a type he’d grown accustomed to. This one contained a short payment request: seven hundred dollars, for Alice’s visit of April 11. Across the page, red letters warned: if this amount remained unpaid, the balance would be forwarded to a collection agency.
Oliver paid minimal attention, sorted through today’s avalanche of communications from the insurance companies. Among them, the monthly statement for April; a small packet listing procedures that had been covered for the April 11 visit; some one-page quickies explaining why certain payments for the April 11 visit had been adjusted upward, thereby reducing Oliver’s responsibility; some other quickies explaining why certain payments for the April 11 hospital visit had been reduced, thereby increasing his responsibility….
And a new thing. This envelope lemon yellow. The same shade as the florist’s business card. Oliver’s knees went weak.
But no. It was just from some medical place he didn’t recognize.
—
Entering the apartment, the first thing he saw was that Doe had applesauce all over her face and her bib. She’d turned her tray into a giant shining swamp. Her bright eyes gleamed; she smiled big and wide at Daddy, rocking back and forth in her high chair, then doing little jumps, and Oliver’s fury abated, a tad. He was about to shout hello hello, the way his father always used to. But the kid started making an even bigger mess now, flinging more applesauce.
Next to the high chair, globs dripping off her curls, Alice’s mother looked exhausted and miserable. Someone else was there as well, someone new: brunette, young, Oliver didn’t recognize her.
“This is Samantha,” Alice’s mom said, trying to sound pleasant. “She’ll be helping after I head back.”
Not bad looking: severe bangs, a nose maybe a bit too long, but eager eyes, a well-meaning smile. She held a spoon and the tin. Her efforts had also been rewarded with applesauce: her chin, hands, sleeves coated in it.
Oliver welcomed the girl into his home, but his smile felt odd, and he knew it must have looked halfhearted, and he needed to move, forward, respectfully, but still hurrying, that crumpled letter dangling from his hand.
—
Comforting chimes and wind instruments—soft harmonic sounds came from the other side of the bedroom door, and this irritated him. He pushed in, ready for the usual deal: low lights, a few votive candles along the sill. But not this whole scene: Tilda on the yoga mat, in a beige leotard and caramel-colored sweatpants—kneeling on one knee, reaching upward with both hands, toward the sky. Skin was everywhere exposed, flushed and clammy, and the image brought to mind some ancient wildebeest, heaving and covered with morning dew.
Beyond her, Oliver saw his wife dangling off the bed’s front corner. Wearing her shades, Alice had one of his baseball caps on backward. She was working to keep her arms raised, as if trying to signal a touchdown. She’d gotten both hands above her shoulders, but her elbows were bent, her biceps trembling.
“Seven,” Sparrow said.
From the front of the bed the healer kept modeling a perfect warrior pose. “Breathe. Keep holding it. And exhale. Okay, eight…”
Now Oliver became aware of an aroma, familiar, certainly not incense. Did he really want to believe they were in here baked, doing yoga?
“Remember how that goddamn ER doc wouldn’t let you go with me?” He couldn’t wait any longer. “Well, get your clown shoes on and join the circus.”
Alice remained focused, mouth rigid with concentration.
“Your policy didn’t cover the ambulance ride. Just got the bill. Guess how much.”
She held her pose. Exhaled.
“Twelve hundred dollars. Clown shoes, right?”
The lenses of her sunglasses black, blank.
“I mean, in the large scheme it’s nothing. Only you’d think—”
“I can’t worry about that right now.”
“—the sheer balls—”
“Oliver,” she said.
Don’t overreact, he reminded himself, though his face was hot. Sure. Let them invade every room. Let them have their rituals, their clucking empathy. He retreated from the new age coffee klatch, their baked stares of disapproval. Storming past Alice’s mom, he registered the concern in her expression. Oliver surged with the desire to bark her away, rid himself of all these goddamn women.
Out of the apartment, he jabbed at the button, bounced on his feet, and punched his hands in his coat pockets, discovering that he was constitutionally unable to stay in this hallway for the thirty seconds it would take that rickety bitch elevator to creak up.
—
The Brow was in the other office, in front of his terminal, shoulders hunched forward, neck jutting. From behind he looked like a shaggy, concentrating turtle.
Had to be a good sign. Maybe even a breakthrough.
Oliver started toward the closest terminal. Low sounds met him. The stanza was rhythmic, short, and muddled—a series of low chords repeating in a manner both monotonous and propulsive. White conical speakers, each located on a side of the terminal screen, further muddled the sound. Still, Oliver recognized that short finger-tapping riff—straight from the eighties with its cheese factor.
And on the monitor, visible around the Brow’s body, that abandoned space station—its industrial background, its darkened caverns—was every bit as familiar.
Angles went jittery, red orbs flying past and lighting up the screen.
That goddamn centered hand, returning Taser rounds of fire.
“Enough with fucking Doomguy,” Oliver said.
He asked the Brow to email him files of the previous day’s work. It wasn’t a request.
He withdrew from his pocket the small pad that served as the repository for his scribbled coding changes—each note purposeful, just two or three keywords, as few symbols and numbers as possible, the hope being that concision would engage him, force his mind to re-create the bulk of his old work, trampoline him into a strong workday.
He learned nobody had called from the house.
He lay lengthwise on the couch, unfolded his laptop.
Of course it was a given Alice shouldn’t be dealing with money stuff—he was completely wrong to even bring it up. But was he supposed to just stuff every concern inside him? He takes care of her and she gets to decide his worries are of no concern? Meanwhile, if she’s always crying how that kid’s so i
mportant, then why is some nobody shoving applesauce down Doe’s yap while Mommy’s getting high in the drum circle?
He grabbed a soda from the fridge, paced the office, unscrambled his headphone cord.
In the notebook, besides his scribbled notations and ideas, were pages of columns: the costs of the taxis he and Alice took to and from hospitals on appointment days, untold amounts of money that had been set on fire. Plus totals for however much they still owed New Hampshire. And were still trying to get a final tally on the out-of-network costs from the old policy at Whitman. Two grand a month going up in smoke for the new family policy. Another six hundred for rent on the new office. In addition to his regular monthly nut. And the fifteen an hour he was paying that idiot to play videogames. Plus a hundred a session, plus expenses, for that fucking healer. Whatever that tight little tush of a nanny was going to pull, also full-time.
Then again, more than a few friends owed six figures from college and grad school.
And pretty much the whole goddamn nation lived with debt, no?
They’d find a way. The immediate answer was to get Generii to market.
—
More than a few afternoons he’d moseyed past those workrooms. Cavernous spaces, usually, with naked lightbulbs hanging from overhead wires, minimalist style to the desks and lamps. Alice was inevitably working on some garment, her hair messy and in a scrunchie, that lovely mouth holding a swatch of pinned fabric. Even in splattered designing overalls and a little tee beneath, she’d look astonishing, good enough that deliverymen and sales reps would hang around, searching for excuses to chat her up. But whenever a member of the species Modelus dramaticus arrived—for a fitting; for a shoot; to get sized, pinned, or altered; to drop off whatever garment needed to be returned—their ethereal natures were obvious, as was their growing cynicism, blasé attitudes acting as both protective wall and mask. Every bit as apparent to Oliver were Alice’s earthbound and worldly curves, her face’s open nature. Oliver not only found humor but took joy in how little Alice cared for the implicit pecking order between freelancer and model, whether it was Alice volunteering her thoughts about the lines of a dress she was hemming while one of the swans lingered around her table, or asking about the mass-market paperback that happened to be peeking out of some teen’s three-thousand-dollar shoulder bag, or complimenting the ballet flats this girl was wearing around town. Oliver would watch her engage with and draw out these children, and the difference between her—this almost-plump, thoroughly decent woman—and those spoiled, fawnlike babies made him swell. He felt a clumsy pride, being the guy who was dating her, the man whom she chose to hang around, whom she undressed with and shuddered for and collapsed on and then looked at with such intimate wonder, that intense purity.
Her affection elevated him as well, turned him toward those better angels. Through the power of her smile, he became less confrontational toward others. Enabled by the faith of Alice’s goodwill, he was able to make small talk at a social event. Oliver still could jam his foot into his mouth; he still had a propensity for saying the exact wrong thing. At least now he would be aware; now he’d apologize. And the more time he spent with Alice, the more Oliver realized he needed to up his game even further. Become that much more attentive to personal grooming. Be solicitous toward others. At least pretend to be attuned to the world and culture at large. If he wanted to keep this amazing woman looking at him like that, to somehow make this luminous creature his, he had to become kinder.
It would be the greatest trick of all time.
—
Twilight was spreading its desultory magic as he crossed West Tenth. Grayness and barrenness everywhere, just too much; he wished someone would unleash a high-pressure hose, blasting away the neighborhood’s grime and brokenness. How had this shithole seduced him? How much emotional capital had he invested, convincing Alice this was the best place for them? All the money and sweat he’d devoted to being here. Here?
Oliver’s head swiveled; he checked in each direction. Any asshole lurking in those side streets? All that turned up were a pair of undernourished teenagers spraying complicated graffiti onto the side of an eighteen-wheeler. Their jokes did not pause when Oliver passed, and this furthered his rage, his body knifing through air that was unseasonably sticky.
Maybe halfway down crumpled and forsaken Gansevoort, a distinguished couple emerged from a small saloon. Possibly they’d visited the son they were supporting at the bar where he worked part-time. Holding hands, they walked toward the lone working streetlamp, underneath which, it was apparent, the front headlights of their Cadillac had been destroyed, its bumper half-hanging. The aged man stomped his right foot in place. His wife looked at him in horror, said his name out loud. As if on cue, a police car approached, slowed, cruised onward.
Oliver didn’t know where he was going, had no specific purpose. Maybe he’d head for the comfy nooks and cramped sidewalks of the West Village, lose himself gazing through the windows of tasteful boutiques where doctors purchased brocaded knickknacks for mistresses.
But if he was to survive this next half hour, he had to get away from the stench. The frozen death.
He smelled the smoky aroma of roasting peanuts from across the street. He could see the vendor scoping the teenybopper bridge-and-tunnel girls coming out of the PATH station, passing the minutes until he could push his cart toward its nightly storage facility.
On the side of a bus stop a poster showed a black woman adorned in a headdress, dashiki, and multicolored earth-tone pattern, looking so stereotypically African it almost hurt the soul. She offered relief, 900-737-3225, the Psychic Friends Network, $3.89 a minute.
Muscled young men in T-shirts from a corporate basketball league were tossing a basketball and quoting hip-hop lyrics. Coming from the opposite direction, an elderly woman wrapped her basset hound’s shit in a plastic bag.
Oliver let himself be distracted by all this: classical white American southern Protestants and preening goths and carefully put together burnouts, all of them without any awareness other than their own concerns. A particularly civilized and gorgeous and sophisticated couple caught his eye. They sauntered at a leisurely pace, motioned toward one another with their hands, made warmly funny comments. Their subject? Where to go for dinner.
Oliver marveled. Like he was witnessing the invention of fire.
—
He was heading back home when he noticed two women exiting a discount wig shop. Minuscule skirts and long legs, shapely in fishnets, made them impossible to ignore. One woman was pulling at the other’s plastic bag. The second was slapping back, laughing, telling her not to play.
“What you looking at? Oh, it’s sweet hubby.” A smack of gum. “Hey there, sweet hubby.”
The second one joined in. “Yo, sugar.” Her Adam’s apple throbbed.
“Oh,” said Oliver. “Oh.”
“Don’t act like you ain’t know.”
“Hey, Donette—” Oliver said. “Michelle.”
“Yeah, I know you seen this good stuff, baby.” Extending the gum from her mouth, the first teased out a long slick line, sucked it back in. “How that lovely wife of yours holding up?”
What could he say? What was there to say?
There was this to say
“I love you more than life.”
Oliver watched her compose herself: cap off, sunglasses off. Bare head. Her eyebrows gone so that the ridge of her forehead was apparent, patches of dried skin patterned like small scallops at her nearest temple. She was wincing, etched grooves at the corners of her eyes, gunky and glistening, lashes fluttering.
Still she focused across the room, finding the camera.
“Your birth was without a doubt the greatest thing I’ve experienced,” she continued. “I’m so grateful I had support: my doula, Oliver, all my friends. They allowed me to go without any pain meds. I’m so grateful. I was lucky enough to receive the gift of feeling you exit my body. That sound and feeling, lump, thump, bump.” She laughed.
“I thought it would go on forever. There was so much baby. So much of you.”
Her hand rose, long fingers caressing her cheek. Alice’s voice was winsome. “Seeing your face for the first time, that was the single best moment of my life. Finding out you were a girl…I fell so deeply in love….I couldn’t sleep that night, after you were born….I just kept marveling at you, holding you.”
It seemed she might cry. Instead she said, “I am so blessed to have had that experience.”
Her concentration broke, and she emerged from what might have been a trance, bald head gradually rising. Looking reedish and mystic, she spent a moment taking in the chaos around her on the bed: note cards scattered atop the throw quilt’s ragged panels, a small brass statue—some kind of mutant elephant—knocked on its side. Directly in front of the covered lumps that had to be her legs, a yellow pad with bullet points was propped on a throw pillow.
“I had an order to what I wanted to say,” she thought out loud. “But I don’t think, what feels organic—”
“You’re doing fine,” Sparrow replied, without looking up from the viewfinder, the video camera mounted on a tripod.
Alice covered her eyes with a cupped hand, checked with Tilda.
“What you said was beautiful.” Her voice came from behind the light source. “Go on, honey.”
She understood, looked at nothing, inward perhaps—opening a drawer in her mental desk, peering at its contents. Eyelids lowered, stayed shut. Now a thin smile widened her lips, chapped and blistered.
“When you are asleep, my Doe dear, I watch how trusting you are. I just bask in your breathing, that face I love more than life, that face that is life to me, it’s…it…” Alice sniffed, crinkled her nose. Lids opened onto black diamonds, wet and sparkling. “It means so much to me.” She directed her attention toward the camera now.
“Since falling ill, I have kissed you so many times. I have always known that the moment would come when I can’t kiss you anymore. If I look for too long it becomes impossible to appreciate the sight of you. I can’t enjoy the moment. But, my dear sweet girl, please know what I am saying. The pain of your face is not your face, just the fact I have to be away from it.”