Bobby shuddered. They were aspirating the marrow now. He tried to tune out, drop out, replay the conversations, escape the pain. “Is this because of Agent Orange? I was exposed. I ... I just confirmed that.” “We can’t prove it, Bob, but too many young guys are in here ... too young to be this ill. And the missing chromosome ...” “Was I born with that? Was this inevitable? A rendezvous with medical destiny because ...” “No. You could not have been born missing the seventh. You would have been spontaneously aborted. This is an acquired syndrome. The missing chromosome is highly significant. Agent Orange is a causitive factor.”
Decreased hemoglobin, decreased white cell count, decreased hematocrit, decreased platelet count, decreased red cell count, decreased cellularity, deletion of the seventh chromosome—a complete reduction in all aspects of the blood-forming system—pancytopenia/aplastic anemia—all messed up. “We found leukemia, but it’s such a low percentage we can’t truly call it leukemia nor can we treat it as leukemia. It is, however, preleukemic.”
Conversations: “Mark.” On the phone to Mark Tashkor. “Mark, this is what they’ve told me. I’m preleukemic. Agent Orange is a causitive factor.” “Bobby, I can deal with the IRS. But the VA and this medical stuff ... Bobby, you need a medical lawyer.” On the ward with other vets. “Hey, Man, you’re lucky.” “Lucky?” “Yeah, Man. You talk to the other guys around here. Wait till you’ve been here as long as I have. You’re lucky, Man. It’s just you, huh?” “Just me?” “Not your kids. Your kids are healthy, huh?” “Yeah.” “You’re lucky, Man. Two guys died in hemo last month. Two brothers, Man. Nam vets, like you. Not these old geezers from WW Two, Man. One succumbed to leukemia, one to complications of testicular cancer. They were lucky, too, Man. Not like Boyer or Doone or Soloman or Rozini.” “Who are they, Man?” “Their kids, Man. Fahhcked up!! Boyer’s daughter is six, Man. Six years old. Still don’t weigh ten pounds. Doone’s kid is so hyperactive she needs twenty-four–hour, in-sight care. His wife takes the day shift, he takes the night. The kid’s never slept. Never. Not once. Climbs the walls. All kinds a birth defects, Man. You remember thalidomide. Same kinda shit.”
Bam! He lies perfectly still, on his side, his legs, body beneath a gray-green shroud, his right hip protruding, white, like a flag, easy to see, seeable from the treelines of the sound, the sea, from the hills, from wherever the attack has come, has come like a wave rumbling unseen, slamming into his hip, the pain exploding upward. He feels, hears the bone being crunched, feels the shards, the chips, sees the syringe, the red swirl, the masked people hovering. He does not move, does not dare move. They are firing at him, he submerged beneath the gray-green shroud except for his blasted white flag hip and his head, trying to keep his head up. He coughs. Immediately pain grabs him, grabs his face, contorting, biting his eyes, his retinas, then falling, letting go, losing, the small room coming back into focus, the masked people pushing, shoving, moving away, leaving him empty, sucked dry of what he’d been, of the good he’d been, of what he’d done, of virtue, pride, courage, liberty, elation, sucking out the unself, leaving only self upon which to focus.
Escape! This is not me, not my disease, but a disease that has inhabited me and I must evict it. Evict!
“How’s Josh?”
“He’s fine. I think he misses you.”
“I miss him too. Are you coming up Friday?”
“I think so. Tony said he’d stay with the kids. I don’t want to leave them with Blue Dog. He took them out on the ice yesterday. I don’t think it’s safe. It just hasn’t been that cold this year. I’m going in for Mrs. Ploffkin Friday morning so I won’t leave here until after three.”
“Be careful, huh?”
“I will. Ty said he wanted to come up. He said he has to come up. Has to tell you something. Anyway, he said he’d drive his Caddy.”
“Good. Better than Granpa’s Chevy.”
“What was that stuff they’re giving you again? I want to ask Linda.”
“Deca-Durabolin. It’s an anabolic steroid. It’s supposed to promote tissue building. But, God, my ass is sore. It’s all black and blue. Can you stay through Monday?”
“We don’t have enough money ...”
“There’s a family here named Boyer. They’ve a little girl who’s really ill. They rent out rooms to visitors. It’s cheaper than the motel.”
“What if I get called to sub?” Then anxiously, “What’s Monday? Are they doing something ...”
“A transfusion. That’s all. I just want you here.”
Saturday, 16 January 1982, 4:00 P.M.—”You finally got here.”
“Hey. Yeah. How are you feeling, Captain? Sara didn’t get away until five because some kid had some problem. Then this morning I had problems with the Caddy.”
“Oh.”
“Fuel pump. Nothing serious. Tony put in a new one. Just ate up the time. Sara’s downstairs talking to Joan Boyer.”
“Good. They seem really nice. I bet their place is nice ...”
“Come on, Captain. How you really doing?”
“I—” Bobby snapped, “I’m pissed as fuckin hell.” He jerked forward, peered at the door checking for Sara. Ty’s head, too, snapped over, then back to Bobby who was settling back into the propped-up pillows. Quietly Bobby said, “Fuck it, Ty. This sucks. This just sucks. One of these perverted assholes came in here and said I should have my nuts chopped off. Asked if I wanted to see a shrink.”
“Yeah. Stop the testosterone production which is facilitatin the growth of the cancer.”
Again Bobby leaned forward. He furrowed his brow.
“I ... ah ...” Ty laughed. “Ha! I ever tell ... Nah. I never told nobody.” Ty’s voice became conspiratorial, his eyes searched Bobby’s eyes. He pulled up a chair. “They took one a mine when I was in prison.”
“What!”
“Yeah. Sshhh. Testicular. I ... ah, Man, I—I wanted to tell you—”
Bobby interrupted. “You’re okay now?”
“Yeah. They ... When they took the nut it hurt but nothing like the radiation treatments after. That was like being cooked. Like being slow fried. But ... I ... Look, I done some stupid things, Captain. I—”
“But you’re okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. I’m never going back. But wait a minute ...”
“I want to hear more about that. You know about that? There was a guy here, before I got here ... Sara!”
Sara and Ty stayed until eight. The three chatted, talked about Josh, about the IRS, Sara dismissing the topic with a quick, “I can handle it,” about California. Surface talk as if they were simply old friends meeting by chance in a supermarket aisle, husband and wife restrained by the room opening to the busy corridor, the lack of privacy, and by Ty’s presence. Ty, too, was restrained, needing to confess but unable to tell Bobby ... awkward, ashamed, never believing it could have come to this, postponing his tale, his reasons, justifications, looking for the right moment.
The right moment did not come on Sunday. Sara and Ty had stayed with the Boyers’, had seen their sparse quarters. Joan Boyer was renting rooms to raise money for medical expenses that no one could cover, was accepting experimental treatments for her daughter Tara, was letting Tara be a “research patient” because without money, without that arrangement, and the other—“We got divorced so I could qualify for welfare. You could do the same”—there would have been no treatment at all. That had shocked Ty, shaken him, he wanting so badly to make amends, yet knew, thought, what he’d done, where he’d taken Bobby, the vets, High Meadow, was not amendable any more than Tara Boyer was amendable. Ty felt ashamed because he could not just blurt it all out. Instead he blathered about sales, about clients, about home and homes—“I talked to your mother, Captain. She don’t seem so angry anymore.” Then he became taciturn, then rude, giving Sara and Bobby no time to be alone, resentful when Bobby suggested he check out the area, do a lone recon, Bobby thinking let me touch my wife without you present even if I don’t have the strength
to do more than hold her hand. That too went unsaid. So too did Sara keep to herself Noah’s terrible nightmare of Thursday night, and the fact that on Friday it had not been “some kid” but Noah who was terrified to let his mother go, who clung to her all night and only parted because on Saturday Uncle Tony brought cousins Gina and Michelle, and Noah needed to be seen as strong in their presence. All three, Bobby, Sara and Ty, were sure there would be better opportunities on Monday to speak openly.
Then Monday: Bobby was hooked to an IV drip. Sara and Ty, not looking at each other, not talking to each other, in chairs on opposite sides of the bed, vied for his attention. A few vets, patients, had popped in, exchanged greetings, news—“Hey, Man, they say your crits all the way down to nineteen.” “How’d you know?” “Aw, you know, Man. They hooking you up?” “Yeah. I’m supposed to get four units. Then if it maintains, they’re going to let me go.” “Go for it, Man.”
A nurse came in with the tray and setup for the transfusion, Bobby’s third. She was very pleasant. A second nurse came, checked the setup. He too was pleasant. “Wilcoxson will be up in a few minutes,” he said. “He wants to talk to you before we plug you in.”
Bobby nodded. “Okay.”
“Will this take long?” Sara asked.
“Not too long,” the nurse said.
“We’ve got a five-hour drive,” Ty said. “Thought we might get on the road by noon. It’s too cold to be on the road at night.”
The nurses left. There was crying in the hallway. “Ty,” Bobby said, “shut the door.”
“What’s—”
“Sshhh. I think he might have died. I didn’t think he was going to make it.”
“Who?” Ty asked.
“Old guy across the hall. World War Two vet. I don’t know what’s going on but I think they took him to surgery last night. They brought him back with oxygen. I’m not sure what his complications are.”
“Poor man,” Sara said.
Doctor Wilcoxson knocked, entered, along with the first nurse. Bobby introduced Sara and Ty. Wilcoxson asked them to step out for a few minutes while Bobby was hooked up on one side and while the nurse drew a few vials of blood from the other.
Very relaxed. Very confident. Very matter of fact.
In the hall the visitors watched the family of the old vet amble away. His room door was closed, sealed. The hallway was dim, the air stuffy, the floor gritty. At the end of the hall was a south-facing solarium waiting room. Even from six rooms back, Sara and Ty could see the brightness, the distant treetops, the water of Long Island Sound. Like a current it pulled them, they still barely acknowledging each other, resentful of each other yet in the same boat, shuffling, meandering, being cautious to keep their eyes out of other patients’ rooms, moving toward the solarium.
Suddenly, behind them, there was noise, scurrying. People running to Bobby’s room.
“Stay here,” Sara ordered. She ran. Ty froze.
Inside Bobby was twitching, his temperature rising, his breathing hesitant. In seconds he began convulsing, his back arching, his entire body in spasms—“Shit. Transfusion reaction.” “Temps one-oh-five eight”—his lips, fingernails turned purple, blue. Sara, in the doorway, began trembling, her arms shaking violently. Ty now was behind her, watching too, seeing too as Bobby’s face contorted, as they forced his head back, forced in an airway, then a nurse, seeing Sara and Ty, shut the door, sealed the room.
It may have been minutes, maybe hours, back and forth, the pendulum of the clock not marking time, the light in the solarium growing dim, a phone call to Linda, another to Tony, trying to remember what the doctor had said, trying to repeat it. And to Joan Boyer, “Can we stay one more night?”
“Oh God! Oh God! God damn it. What kind of God are you?! If you’re so all powerful why are you letting this happen? Oh God! Please. Give him one more day. Please. Give him one more sunrise.”
“One more first light.” Quietly, not to each other, yet in each other’s presence.
“Please God. Let him see his children one more time. I should have brought them. Let him see High Meadow one more time.”
“You son of a bitch. You lettin all these dregs hang on. You lettin all these druggies live a hundred years drinkin their rotgut wine, shootin up, fuckin everybody over. You The Man. Take me. I’m worthless. Look what I done. Look what I done to the Captain. He saved lives. He saved my life. I set im up, Man. It was me.”
Then it was dark. From the solarium they could not see the leafless trees, and Long Island Sound was but a darkness beyond the twinkling of streetlights, car lights, house lights, starlights.
Tuesday, 16 February 1982—What will I teach him? he thought. I don’t even know his name. Low lights. Quiet. Linda sleeping now. I’ll teach him that if he leaves a light on, everyone can see him but he cannot see anyone. Geez, no! Not yet. He’s so terrific. Linda’s really something. He’s got to be named for Jimmy. Name him for Pop, too. Or Thorpe. Or MacIntyre. We could name him after Bobby, but ...
“Babe, are you still here?”
“Right here. You can sleep if you want.”
“Do you want to call him Tony?”
“No.”
“Robert?”
“Maybe.”
“Your father’ll be hurt.”
“We could call him Robert John.”
“And James.”
“Three names?”
“As many as you like.”
“Then I’d call him John James Robert Rick Dennis Emanuel Pisano.”
“Then that’ll be his name. But let’s call him Johnny.”
Forward. Life. Time. Momentum. A steamroller. A freight train on new track rolling smoothly forward, downhill, the momentum of a million boxcars, a billion lifetimes, following the dips and rises, downward, pushed, unstoppable, the same track only different cars, different views sought, taken, through the narrow slits between the boards. Such limits! Such desire to see more, know more, take more in.
It was a warm winter. The pond froze, thawed, refroze. Warm for a winter in the Endless Mountains. Ty returned to the original cabin on the far side of the pond. Through the remainder of January he’d brooded. I done this. I brought this on him. On em all. Like I pulled the trigger. Like I ...
In early February it had rained, cleared, become cold enough for Ty to cross the pond when he came in, but not cold enough for Sara to trust the ice, to allow Tony or Blue Dog to take the children skating. Then it had snowed, heavy, wet, sinking the ice. Then again it had cleared, cleared for Johnny’s birth they all said, so, like old times, they blasted the air raid siren to shake the town and the mountains and the firmament and they partied but Ty did not stay to party but crossed the pond again, feeling the ice sag, aware of the muffled fracturing under the crust of snow, aware of his weight causing the fracturing, pausing, wishing he could stand lighter, looking back at the path he’d made, thinking he should retreat, take the trail around the pond, through the woods, hating that trail, hating himself for having made the cabin his hootch, his place, his lonely place, estranged, alienated, in a self-imposed exile in deep woods beneath a howling winter wind that scared him, frightened him the moment he’d moved in, had, at night at least, never ceased frightening him.
Again it warmed. Again it cooled. They said Bobby would soon be coming home. They said he was in remission—a decrease or subsidence of the manifestations of the illness. Decrease of manifestations! Not reversal, not cure, maybe not even getting better. They said he was 100 percent transfusion dependent. Remission was a plateau, a terrace on the hillside where the freight train rolled more smoothly, where it did not accelerate, where the multiple and varied androgen treatments worked temporarily.
Ty Mohammed sat in the cabin. It was Monday, 22 February 1982—sixty years to the day from Brigita Clewlow’s marriage to Pewel Wapinski. It was evening, dark, cloudy, cool, raw. Ty Mohammed sat wrapped in a blanket, brooding, confused, angry. Why had Bobby done this to him? Why had he become ill, frail, unable to sustain the
battle? Ty hadn’t wanted to put him out of business. That had never been his intention. Nor had he wanted the vets to leave. They’d been a kick. They’d been suckers but he needed them. The cheaper they worked, the more he sold, the more he made. His piece of the pie. He deserved it. And hell, without him, Ty Mohammed, they’d have gone belly-up long ago.
Ty pulled the blanket tighter. He did not want to get up, to go to the back room, to the bed. It was colder there. He was already too cold. He didn’t even want to use the bathroom, even though he had to pee and the pressure kept his thoughts fragmented. God damn Travellers! Him and his “research.” Only twelve point one percent of the KIAs! Where’d he dig that up? And why’d he say it? Betrayer! Oreo! Judas! Makes no damn difference. The Man, The System, set against us. And Rodney, fuckin changin sides, sidin with them racist mothafuckas. Shee-it. Near three billion dollars a year on disposable diapers! Then lay-offs. They just automatin so they can keep the pie to themselves. Keep the minorities in minority housin. Won’t let a man work! Cut off his nuts. That’s what they do. Agent fuckin Orange. They all think they got it. How many have a nut lopped off?! How many got sores from some herpetic clit? Time I go. I know my way back to San Jose. Left some works in a flop house there. Left a psycho-bitch there. Black on white, Man. Don’t go judgin a book by its color or a man by the shade a his skin for deep down we all brothers. There as much in black as in white, or white as in black. Dig it! We dealin on them suckers. On them suckers dealin on us. For real! Defoliants! They gettin their piece a the pie. That’s all I was tryin ta do. That’s all.
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