by Joan Opyr
Chapter Ten
I should have gone straight over to Susan’s house.
At ten o’clock, Hunter still hadn’t come home. My mother finished her book and went to bed. Nana put her hair up in pin curls and slathered cold cream all over her face. Now I was stuck. I couldn’t leave my grandmother. If Hunter called, too drunk to drive, she’d go pick him up; it didn’t matter where he was or how late he called. Nana was a terrible driver. She’d learned out of necessity at forty-five when my grandfather lost his license for a year. She did everything by the book. Her hands gripped the wheel at ten and two. She signaled for lane changes in heavy traffic. She checked her mirrors constantly. It took her half an hour to drive the three miles from our house to downtown.
Reluctantly, I called Susan. She was still out, so I left a message on her answering machine. I apologized for standing her up and said that I’d see her on Sunday night since I had to work on Sunday morning.
I pulled up a chair and sat down next to Nana.
She pushed her glasses up on her nose and stared at the glowing end of her cigarette. Whenever I suggested that she quit smoking, she said that she didn’t want to get fat. Fat chance. She was at least twenty pounds underweight. The only thing round was her face. The women in my grandmother’s family didn’t wrinkle; instead, their cheeks fell into what my mother called the Abernathy jowls.
Nana had been beautiful as a young woman. She was still beautiful at sixty-four. I had a picture of her in my bedroom that was taken in 1941, not long after she married Hunter. Nana was posed in front of a paper moon, smiling broadly. She was only twenty. I tried to imagine what it would be like to be married at twenty with a high school diploma, no college, and, in two more years, a baby. The idea of it gave me the creeps.
“Why are you waiting up for him?” I asked. “Go to bed.”
“He might come home. Someone’s got to let him in.”
“He’s got a key.”
“He won’t use it, or he won’t be able to use it. He’d rather beat the door down.”
“In which case you’ll hear him when he gets here, so there’s no need to wait up.”
“I have to get to him before the neighbors call the police,” she replied irritably.
“Why? Let him beat the door down. Let the police pick him up. He’s out there somewhere right now, probably driving around drunk. Why don’t I call the sheriff ’s department and give them his license tag number?”
She grabbed my arm. “Sit down,” she said, “and behave. I’ve got enough to worry about without you acting up.”
“So much for all that stuff they tell you in Al-Anon about Let Go and Let God. As long as you keep saving him from the consequences of his own actions . . . ”
“I don’t want him arrested on my doorstep,” she said, making swirls in the ashtray with the end of her cigarette. “And I don’t want you to provoke him.”
“I don’t provoke him.”
“You do. You always want to argue with him.”
“He’s always wrong.”
“Turn on the TV,” she said. “See if you can find something worth watching.”
The dog and I were curled up together asleep on the sofa when the front door opened and Hunter fell in with a crash and a moan.
“Goddamn carpet. Son of a bitch tripped me on purpose!”
“Come in,” Nana hissed, looking around as if she feared the neighbors were all on their front porches, watching. “It’s after midnight. For heaven’s sake, close the door!”
Maurice growled. My grandfather, still lying on the floor, pointed a finger at him. “You shut up, you sawhorse son of a bitch.”
I put an arm around the dog, hooking a finger through his collar. Maurice was an idiot. At five years old, he couldn’t sit, stay, or be counted on not to pee in the house. He had only one talent—he could smell booze on the breath at twenty paces. The dog was infallible, better than a Breathalyzer bag.
Hunter got up on all fours and crawled through the front door, which my grandmother closed and locked behind him. She reached a hand down to help him up, but he waved her away.
“You know why I’m down here, don’t you?” he said sadly, shaking his head. “I am down here because God threw me down, down on the dirty floor.” For emphasis, he slapped the carpet with the palm of his hand, raising a stir of dust and dog hairs. He glared up at Nana. “Is the vacuum cleaner broken?”
“Why would God throw you down?” I said, tightening my hold on Maurice’s collar.
“Because he’s a selfish son of a bitch! I get something, and he takes it away. I can’t have anything.”
“Your god is a jealous god.”
Nana gave me a sharp look. “Get up,” she said, reaching down to take Hunter by the elbow. “You need to go to bed.”
“Not a goddamn thing,” he repeated. “Nothing. Do you know what?”
He was looking at me, so I said, “What?”
“I lost my Masonic ring.” He held up his right hand and pointed to his ring finger. “He reached down and snatched it right off my goddamn finger.”
“Who did?”
“God did, goddamn it! What the hell’s the matter with you, are you deaf? He took my Masonic ring.” He shook off my grandmother’s hand and dropped back down onto the carpet. “I don’t know where it is.”
“It’s in heaven,” I said. “I don’t know why God would want it, of course. His fingers are probably bigger than yours.”
That did it. He staggered to his feet and pointed at me, panting with the effort. “You’ve got enough mouth for another row of teeth. And you,” he shook his fist at the dog, “stop growling at me. I’ll get a shotgun and blow your ugly head off. How would you like that?”
“Come to bed, Hunter,” Nana said, taking his arm. “We’ll find your ring in the morning. You probably dropped it out in the yard somewhere. Come on now.”
He shook her off a couple of times, but she persisted, and soon he was leaning against her as if the bones in his legs had melted away. They began a slow shuffle toward the bedroom, my grandmother cajoling, my grandfather muttering. Maurice had begun to growl again, so I tightened my grip on his collar.
Hunter paused at the end of the sofa and stared at us, his head cocked to one side.
“Go on,” I said quickly. “I’ve got him.”
Maurice put on a good display. He bared his fangs, but I could feel him shaking. Hunter stuck his hands in his pockets and stood there, jiggling his change.
“You going to bite me?” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cigarette lighter. He flipped the lid back and leaned over the edge of the sofa, running his thumb across the sparking wheel.
I blew the flame out. “Do you want me to let the dog go? I’d be more than happy to let him bite your hand off.”
Maurice strained at his collar, twisting my fingers in his attempt to pull himself backward off the sofa. Hunter grinned. He flicked the lighter again and lunged at Maurice, waving the flame in his face.
“How do you like that? I’ll burn you up, you crazy son of a bitch!”
That was it for my fingers. Maurice gave a violent twist and pulled out of his collar. He ran across the room and dove beneath the dining room table, where he backed into the far corner, snarling.
“Ha!” Hunter yelled. “Where you going, boy?”
He dropped down on all fours and crawled towards the dog.
Nana grabbed at the back of his shirt. “Stop it, do you hear me? Hunter, stop it!”
My mother appeared in the door to the hallway and stood blinking at the light. The left side of her nylon nightgown was tucked into the waistband of her underwear.
“What the hell is going on?” she said. “I can’t find my glasses.”
Hunter was stuck. He’d managed to get halfway under the table, but my grandmother had him by the belt and was hauling him backwards for all she was worth. He still held the lighter, the flame on it about three inches high. Every time Nana gave a yank on the belt, the
flame scorched the bottom of the table.
“Come out from under there,” she said.
“Let go of me, goddamn it!”
“Go find your glasses,” I told my mother. “The dog and I are going to make a break for it. If I can get Maurice out of here, we’ll be at Susan’s.”
She squinted at me for a moment before heading back to the bedroom.
My grandmother had lost her grip on Hunter’s belt and been obliged to take hold of his ankle. He’d managed to edge forward so that he was only a foot or so from Maurice’s nose. The dog was in a panic, trying to back up and knocking his head against the bottom of the table. On the side with the missing leg, the stack of books wobbled precariously.
I unlocked the front door and opened it wide behind me. I grabbed Hunter’s other ankle. “On the count of three,” I said to my grandmother. “One, two, three. Maurice! Here boy!”
We pulled a little too hard. The dog slipped between two dining room chairs and ran outside, but my grandfather was farther out than I’d planned. If he’d been a bit quicker, he could have turned over and grabbed us both. Instead, he tried to stand up. I heard rather than saw his head hit the bottom of the table. Hunter had dislodged the stack of books and the table was sloping dramatically. The Olivetti slid towards the far wall of the dining room.
I didn’t wait to find out what happened next. I slammed the front door shut behind me and followed Maurice out into the night.
Chapter Eleven
“Tell me about your visit with your mother,” I said.
“First you tell me what the doctor said.” Abby reclined on the bed with her hands behind her head. She looked as tired as I felt.
“There’s an unidentified mass in his left lung. Could be cancer. The lung specialist wanted to do a biopsy.”
“What for? Your grandfather smoked for, what, sixty years?”
“Longer. He told me he started smoking cigarettes at fourteen. Before that, he and his brothers used to roll up something called rabbit weed and smoke that.”
“Nice. Don’t tell Joe Camel about rabbit weed. So, I’m assuming you said no to the biopsy.”
“I did. If it is cancer, they can’t treat it. He’d never survive radiation and chemo. He’s not going to survive the week; that’s perfectly clear. I told the doctor we wanted palliative care only. I said we wanted him to be comfortable and in no pain at all. Morphine sulfate PNR.”
“That’s PRN,” she said, “but you could have just said ‘as needed.’ You don’t really give morphine PRN. You give it every two-and-a-half or three hours.”
“Shit.” I sat down on the foot of the bed. “I tried to remember everything you told me. I wanted to sound like I knew what I was talking about. Do you think they thought I was just some idiot who’s been watching too much ER?”
She smiled and sat up, edging closer to me. “No,” she said, rubbing my shoulder. “They didn’t think you were some idiot. They thought you wanted to do what was right for your grandfather. They thought you were making a hard but realistic decision. How is your mother taking it?”
“She didn’t say anything. She was just . . . quiet. She has a problem with authority figures—doctors, teachers, cops. They make her nervous. She doesn’t like to be talked down to.”
“Quite rightly,” Abby said. “That’s why nurses are better than doctors. You know the old joke, what’s the difference between God and a doctor? God knows he’s not a doctor.”
“This one, Adkins, seemed okay. The lung specialist was a bit of an ass. Why in the hell would he even suggest a biopsy on someone like Hunter?”
“Some doctors like to cut on people.” She shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe he was concerned about liability. Maybe he thought you’d want to take heroic measures to save your grandfather’s life. Some people want us to do absolutely everything, even when there’s no hope.”
“Nana won’t take a dog to the vet to have it put to sleep. She didn’t take Maurice. One day, he just fell over dead in the backyard, riddled with tumors and lumps and arthritis.”
Abby flinched, and I knew I’d said the wrong thing. I put my arm around her. She rested her head on my shoulder and we comforted each other.
I said, “Louise called, Abby. She said Belvedere’s doing fine. The Rimadyl is already working wonders.”
“It won’t turn back time.”
“Nothing will. How was your visit with your mother?”
She lifted her head and laughed, a genuine, amused, unforced laugh. She said, “How have I failed her? Let me count the ways. My visit was the usual. What am I doing out in ass-end Egypt? Why do I spend all my free time with a crazy white girl? There are jobs in hospitals in Raleigh. There are rich black doctors for nice nurses to marry, even nurses like me who are no spring chickens.”
“Hmm,” I said. “Are there a lot of rich black doctors in Raleigh or, to be fair, the world in general?”
“She didn’t say I’d be spoiled for choice. It was more of a . . . what’s the word?”
“A threat? A carrot on a stick? A remote possibility?”
“That’s it. A possibility. Our conversation ended on a sour note, as it always does. I told her something she didn’t like, she got mad, and I left. Goodbye.”
“More like au revoir. What did you tell her that she didn’t like?”
“The truth.”
I’d arranged to meet Susan for dinner at The Irregardless. The restaurant was a mutual favorite and one I could walk to from my hotel. I’d first eaten at The Irregardless in high school, with Susan, while a three-piece chamber ensemble played a selection of Bach. The menu featured a lot of vegetarian dishes that didn’t interest me and a unique salad dressing that did. Though I’d learned to make a version of lemon tahini at home, it never tasted quite the same.
I arrived first and was seated at table against the far wall facing the door. I ordered a glass of merlot. I would have preferred a domestic beer, but wine seemed more grown-up. I’d last seen Susan when I was a teenager. Sitting in the restaurant waiting for her, I felt like a teenager again. It wasn’t a good feeling. I didn’t want to feel like the same person I’d been then; I wanted to feel dramatically different, older and wiser, a jaded sophisticate who’d lived an interesting, exciting, titillating life. I wanted to be the human equivalent of lemon tahini dressing.
Instead, I could sum up my life in three short sentences. I’d dated a lot, rarely seriously. I’d failed to become a professor of English. I’d recently lost my uterus.
Pathetic. I ordered another glass of merlot. I don’t know what the vintage was, but it tasted like paint thinner.
Susan walked in the front door. I realized with a start that she was thirty-six now. She looked thirty-six. She looked great. Her hair was pulled back into a clever chignon and was just as carefully and expensively blonde as ever. She wore a flax-colored linen sheath with a matching jacket and a necklace of brown and ivory beads. It looked African, like something from one of those non-profit shops that sends all of the proceeds back to Gabon or Cameroon. She spoke to the woman at the front desk, who pointed in my direction. Susan caught my eye and smiled. I smiled back.
Chapter Twelve
Susan’s back door was unlocked. I could hear Hunter on the front porch, bellowing. I shut Maurice in the laundry room and stuck my head out into the hallway. The light was on in Susan’s bedroom and Bella Donna was playing on the stereo.
“Susan? It’s me.”
“I know,” she called. “I’m in the bedroom.”
She was sitting up in bed, propped against the pillows.
“I’m sorry. I know I said I wasn’t coming, but . . . ”
She shook her head. “It’s all right. I unlocked the back door when I heard all the yelling. I guessed you might change your mind. Is everything okay?”
I hesitated. “I think so. He cracked his head on the dining room table. For all I know, he might have a concussion.”
“I doubt it. His head’s too hard.” She climbed out of
bed and rummaged through her dresser. “Here,” she said, handing me a pair of striped cotton pajamas. “The pants on these should be long enough.”
I looked at the pajamas and then at her. “These are men’s pajamas.”
“So?”
“Where did you get them?”
“Hudson-Belk’s. If you want proof, I’m afraid I didn’t save the receipt. Do you want to wear something else?”
“No, I . . . no, these are fine.”
“Wait,” she said, smiling. “You think these belong to Brad. You think he left them behind after spending the night.”
I glanced at the white tank top and bikini underwear Susan wore and shrugged. “I can’t picture you wearing these. You’re not exactly known for your modest night attire.”
She laughed. “Even I get cold from time to time. Are you going to put them on or not? You don’t have to. I only got them out for the sake of your modesty. You’re welcome to strip down to your underwear and climb into bed.”
“I’ll put them on,” I said. “In the bathroom.”
She shook her head. “Suit yourself. Why don’t you have a shower as well? Use the jet massage. It’ll relax you.”
A relaxing shower was that last thing I wanted. Susan’s lack of modesty was going to be the death of me. I shut the bathroom door behind me and locked it. Then I took my clothes off, folded them neatly, and laid them on top of the toilet. I stood for a moment looking from the pajamas to the smooth green tiles of the shower surround. Wanting a shower and needing one were two different things. Perhaps Susan was giving me a hint—I was sure I reeked of cigarette smoke and frantic standard poodle. I turned the water on as hot as I could stand it and stepped in.
I tried three different settings on the showerhead before choosing the one labeled Chopping. The water pounded my neck and shoulders. I pressed my hands against the green tiles on the back of the shower and let hot streams of water cascade down my back. I’d nearly forgotten my own name when I heard Susan knocking on the door and calling to me. I turned the water off and reached for a towel. There wasn’t one. The closest thing I could find was an embroidered hand towel, which meant I could cover my crotch or my chest, but not both. She knocked again.