The Sea Beast Takes a Lover

by Michael Andreasen

  I remember when we did this with your dad. The whole thing seemed weightier then, maybe because there was a live brass band instead of a portable stereo, or because in those days we held cratings in city parks and squares instead of mall parking lots, or maybe I was just young and everything adults did seemed bigger and more important. I remember one of the clowns made me a balloon giraffe, and your father asked, like some do, not to be taken, to be held over till the following year. Next year, he promised, he’d be ready. I don’t remember what you did, if you wept or tried to argue with him, or if you simply stood by like I am now. I remember that he had the good sense to ask only once, but even that small moment of pleading caught me off guard, and I couldn’t shake it for weeks after. When it was time for the helicopter to take off, I couldn’t look, afraid I’d see his face through one of the portholes, which at that time were only big enough to show faces and nothing else. Instead I turned to the clown with the balloons, who of course by then wasn’t clowning at all. He was watching the helicopter and the crate fade into the distance with everyone else, his makeup and rubber nose unable to hide the fact that, despite knowing no one in the crate, and probably attending events just like this one several times a year, he still felt something strong and meaningful watching it go, and as I watched him watch it, I realized what a sin it was to look away.

  I wait with you in the event area while Rosemary takes the boys to get balloons. I’m at least happy to see that people still dress up. All of the adult men are wearing neckties, and it dawns on me now that my powder blue tie with the little crests and coats of arms would have gone well with the suit you’re wearing. Better than the bolo, the hollowed-out sockets of the skull reminding us all in the most tasteless way why we’re here, which I can’t believe Rosemary didn’t consider as she was dressing you. “Should he wear the deer-skull slider?” she could have asked me. “You know, the one that makes him look like the worst sort of backwater lake rat? Or do you have something more appropriate to the solemnity of the occasion?” And I would’ve pulled out the powder blue tie, with its little chevroned shields and rearing lions and fleurs-de-lis, and she would’ve smiled, and nodded, and noted to herself how fortunate she was to have a husband who understands the importance of detail within the context of greater events.

  The two men standing beside us wear burgundy suits and matching ties, like performers in a men’s choir. The son is tall and proud, with a steady hand on his father’s shoulder. The father’s hands shake at his side, but not out of fear. Both his face and his son’s are cheerful and calm, plump and pinch-red in the cheeks, as if this is exactly the day they’d hoped to see from the moment they woke up. I find myself standing straighter just looking at them, and I ease your shoulders against the back of the wheelchair so that you’re slouching a little less.

  “Some crate, eh, Pops?” the son says to the father. “Nothing like Granddad’s. That thing was just a steel box with metal seats and a few glass portholes, remember? And what about his dad’s? Can you believe that once upon a time the crates were actually crates? As in, made out of wood? Not even airtight! Those dads drowned as they sank. Not exactly what I’d call respect for your elders. But harder times, I suppose. This, though—just look at it. Do you have any idea how many psi these reinforced frames can withstand? Boatloads, Pops. Just boatlaods.”

  The father regards the crate with a satisfied expression, as if to say that, indeed, it is some crate.

  “And don’t forget the pressure-resistant window,” the son adds. “You’ll be able to see those dolphins nice and clear. How about that, Dad? Dolphins all the way down, keeping you company.”

  I’ve heard of this—reports of dolphins gathering at the undisclosed location. I want to ask the son privately if this is just something cheerful he’s decided to say, or if he has actual evidence of dolphins, if he knows someone who can confirm it.

  Regardless, I’m hoping that you heard him. Dolphins, Dad. Maybe whales and anemones, too, and great schools of silvery fish. You’re studying Avery’s underwater picture, which Rosemary clipped to your tray with the clips we use to hold the newspaper in place when we think that you might like to look at it. I wish that Avery had drawn a few dolphins swimming alongside the crab and the starfish, to give you a better sense of just how comforting this whole business is going to be. Then I remember the photographs under the drawing. I unclip the edge of the paper, and it furls lazily to one side, revealing the shot of you and me in the canoe, our arms and knees sunburned, our chins pointed intrepidly forward. This, I think, is the image you should be contemplating, and I want to point it out to you, to remind you of that day and all that hopefulness, but you’re not looking down anymore. Instead, you’re looking where everyone else is looking, at a man moving slowly from the check-in desk to the crate, followed by a small assembly of beaming fans.

  It’s Gurdy Bills. Little Winston himself.

  He’s balder and rounder than he was in his mall-opening days, but still has the aura of a television personality, the confident walk and eyes. He wears long white robes and carries an old-fashioned sickle in one hand and a baby in the other. The baby, wrapped in its own little toga, is sucking on what looks like an hourglass. The costume is meant to amuse—Gurdy Bills is, after all, a performer, a comedian—and many laugh and applaud what they see. Even the juggler stops to watch.

  Rosemary rejoins us with the boys in tow, each holding a balloon and a sky blue plume of cotton candy.

  “Isn’t that something,” she says. “With a baby and everything.”

  Standing beside Bills is a less bald, less round man wearing blue overalls and a gelled cowlick. We assume this is his son. After handing off the baby, Bills turns to this man, and the two begin a little recital.

  “It makes me scared,” Bills’s son says clearly, cheating his stance to the side and projecting so that everyone can hear him, “to think that one day they’ll carry you off in one of those big crates, Dad. That one day they’ll drop you into the sea at the undisclosed location with a bunch of strangers. That I’ll never see you again.”

  “I know, son,” Gurdy Bills says. His expression is focused and concerned, and in spite of the ridiculous getup, and the fact that we’re all standing in the middle of a strip mall parking lot, the scene is suddenly intimate. “When you get to be my age, you’ll understand.”

  “I’m not gonna be able to do it, Dad,” Bills’s son says. “I’m not gonna know when or how.”

  “You will,” Gurdy Bills says, a hand on his son’s overalled back. “You will. Just follow your heart.”

  “I love you,” Bills’s son says with a smile.

  “Just follow your heart,” says Bills. “That’s all I’m doing here.”

  “I love you, Dad,” Bills’s son says. Now he’s looking out at all of us.

  “I love you, too, little buddy,” says Gurdy Bills. “I love you, too.”

  Everyone cheers. Even Ernest. He’s smiling and clapping like it’s the best thing he’s ever seen. I wonder if we shouldn’t take Ernest to see more live theater, maybe a show now and then down at that little dinner theater place in Phillipsburg that Rosemary’s always talking about. Maybe it’s the sort of thing that would help him locate something different and good inside himself.

  Then Gurdy Bills raises a hand, and everyone is quiet.

  “We go to see our fathers,” he says. “We are not afraid.”

  And with that, he hugs his son, kisses the baby in the toga and the woman holding him, and climbs the ramp into the crate.

  “How about that, Dad?” I say to you. “In the same crate as Gurdy Bills.”

  * * *

  —

  The men begin to file into line. Rosemary bends to kiss you on the cheek, then sniffles into a Kleenex. Avery cautiously pets your shoulder, afraid to get too close. Noticing his rolled-up drawing, he gently slips its corners back into their clips, the photographs of the fa
mily and our day in the canoe vanishing once again beneath a scribbled ocean. Ernest is looking at you, and while it isn’t exactly a loving look—more of a standoffish look, the look of a gunslinger just before he draws—it’s the last moment you’ll have with him, so I don’t want to interfere. Eventually he tucks his sprig of cotton candy, which by now is just a cardboard tube and a few thin wisps of blue sugar, into the space between your stomach and the tray. As I wheel you off, I want to believe—need to believe—that he was sharing the last of it with you and not just throwing it away.

  We’re at the end of the line because you don’t need a seat. There’s an alcove for your chair and two others in the front row. While we wait, I try to think of some final thing to say to you.

  There isn’t enough time to get into the whole money thing, even though I want you to know I don’t care about that anymore. I could just say that, just say, “I want you to know, Dad, I’m not sore about the money anymore,” but without going into the reasons why I don’t care, why I actually stopped caring a long time ago but couldn’t say so because I needed you to believe I still cared, it would just sound like I’m letting you off the hook. I could promise that I’ll always look after the old family home in Clark County, except, like I said, I’m not sure it’s still there. Besides, I want to send you off with something forward-looking. Something hopeful. Through the window, I can see the other sons whispering into their fathers’ ears, saying soothing, important things. Some are in tears. Some are burying their faces in their fathers’ laps, begging forgiveness for this thing we are about to do, or a worse thing that came before it. Some say nothing. None of the fathers are asking not to be taken, which is rare. Maybe they don’t want to embarrass themselves in front of Gurdy Bills, to be the one blubbering and begging while the great actor sits smiling in his white robes, ready for the plunge.

  I want to know what Gurdy Bills’s son is saying to him. I want to know what you said to your father. I want to tell you not to worry, but I don’t think you are worried. I want to tell you not to be afraid, but there’s no sign of fear on your face. I can’t tell if you’re comfortable. I don’t know if you’re content. You give nothing away.

  Nozzle heads hang from the ceiling inside the crate, waiting to release anesthetic gas when you reach critical depth. I wish Avery could see these. I don’t know if he knows about them, but he should, to understand that we’re not monsters. That we care what happens to you after you drop.

  As soon as I ease your chair into the alcove, you start having one of your fits. Your wrists rattle and your head bangs and you make the same little choking sound you always do. I don’t have Rosemary to help hold you, and if I strap you down now, you’ll stay that way for the entire trip. I try to brace you against the chair, to press my weight against the bucking of your body, hugging you tight as you struggle under me like a trapped animal. You can’t break free. I am so much bigger than you.

  Over your shoulder I can see the other fathers and the last of the sons staring at us. We’re ruining the moment they’re collectively trying to have. But what about my moment? Is this the moment they think I wanted? Is this any kind of send-off for a man who has done, if not great things, then at least good things? Things that he didn’t have to do, was not required to do, and yet did anyway, decently and with only minimal complaint? Doesn’t that deserve its own moment? And yet here I am. This is all I can do.

  You stop seizing. I feel something wet on my shoulder. In your fit, you’ve spit up the ice cream. It’s oozing down your chin in waves of thick pink, dribbling onto your shirt and pants. I don’t carry a handkerchief. Rosemary usually keeps Kleenex in her purse. I take Avery’s drawing off the tray and use it to wipe your face and dab at the little pool in your lap. I can’t look you in the eyes. I just dab until the helicopter’s copilot tells me he’s sealing the doors.

  * * *

  —

  Everyone has been moved to an outer perimeter so that the helicopter can take off safely. It isn’t until I see Avery’s face that I realize I’m still holding his crumpled pink puke-stained drawing. He’s already in a fragile state, and this sends him over the edge. He presses his face into Rosemary’s dress so hard and deep there’s no way he can breathe. This is an old tactic he used to great effect when he was smaller, until I asked Rosemary to please stop coddling him, because it was plainly making him weak, and although I didn’t want a repeat of Ernest, I also didn’t want a son who suffocated himself in his mother’s skirts. But now she picks him up right away, staring at the soggy paper in my hand like it’s a bloody stump.

  This is the last thing we need right now. We should be gathering around one another as a family, relying on our shared love and support to light a path out of this parking lot and back to the happy lives we’ve worked so hard for. Instead, we’re a good three feet from one another, except for Avery, who’s reburied himself in Rosemary’s left breast, gagging on his own tears and shuddering in that baby-mouse way he does. She hands me his balloon like she wants me to go murder myself with it.

  “We’ll wait in the car,” she says, which strikes me as a big mistake. Yes, the drawing thing was also a mistake, but this is so much more important in ways I know Rosemary doesn’t see. This could do real, lasting damage to our son.

  “If he doesn’t see it take off,” I say, loud enough so Avery can hear over his muffled caterwauling and the slow build of the helicopter’s engines, “he might regret it later.”

  Rosemary covers his exposed ear with her free hand and says, “What the hell do you expect me to do?”

  “I just don’t want him to regret not doing the right thing when he had the chance,” I say, almost shouting now so that he can hear me through her hand.

  She resituates Avery on her hip and carries him away as the helicopter separates from the asphalt.

  I still have Ernest. I put my hand on his shoulder as the whirring blades make small cyclones of gravel and trash. Everyone shields their eyes, except for you and the others facing us through the glass. The pilot has a practiced hand. The crate lifts slowly as the cables go taut, with only a slight, cradling rock. Once it’s high enough, we all release our balloons. Ernest lets go of his, and I let go of Avery’s, hoping he’s watching from the car as they become a distant flock of color in a far-off sky. Ernest waves to the crate as it rises. We cannot take our eyes off it, but still, I know he and I are looking at two different things. Where I see a crate carrying my father away, and someday me if I’m lucky, Ernest sees only the resettling of dust, the spinning of rotors, and the might of engines bearing the weight of what is necessary.

  I’m not sure what to do, Dad. It’s all I can think standing here with Ernest, watching you go. I surprise myself by saying it out loud.

  “I’m not sure what to do.”

  It comes out like a cry, the roaring of the helicopter still knocking around inside my ears.

  “Just wave, Dad,” Ernest says, as though it were the easiest thing in the world. And so I do. And it is easy.

  In a few minutes, after the crate shrinks to the size of a punctuation mark, I will uncrumple Avery’s ruined drawing and reexamine it. I will notice for the first time his great care in rendering the starfish, which is perfectly symmetrical along every axis. I will recognize the gas nozzles, which I suppose he must have learned about in school, already emitting the pencil-thin puffs that will make the groaning and buckling of the crate’s hull easier for you to accept. Looking closer, I will realize that there actually is a dolphin in the picture after all. Its blue body is difficult to make out at first against the blue water, but once I have the outline of it—the crisp salute of its dorsal fin, the slender scoop of its fluke—it will be impossible not to see. The grandfather in the crate gazes intrepidly forward, and the space-suited grandson is so happy, so unafraid. I will study this drawing often in the weeks to come, meditating on its many perfections. I will feel sorry that I am the one looking at it, that
it is here with me and not with you, rolled out before you on your tray as the floodlights show you dolphins and marlins, sea breams and hammerheads, and all the other guardians of the undisclosed location, whose waters, we are told, are calm, and patient, and deeper than we can know.

  Bodies in Space

  Observe: the Man of the Future.

  See his stiff neck. His slept-in bed. His slept-on hand.

  The Man of the Future, object of fascination, creature of wonder, scientific oddity, pissing one-handed as the shower warms.

  Note his blinking light. What a marvel! Installed squarely into his forehead by powers unknown, powers only guessed at, a small dot blinking red and steady and true. The alien diode blinks without a clear purpose or design. What does its blinking signify? Of what does it warn? To what astronomical number does it count? What are the portents of its blink-blink-blink, always blinking, just blinking, as it does now while the Man of the Future brushes his teeth, trying not to think about it, not to look at it, to look instead at his teeth, the way the worn pearl of their enamel clashes with the colorless foam until too much hard brushing makes his gums bleed.

  See how he showers and shampoos, doing his best not to touch the blinking light. Notice how he ignores the fear that water and soap will somehow penetrate the border where his skin and the bulb meet, making contact with the circuitry that must surely exist underneath, though its presence has never been confirmed to him, leaving him unable to say for sure whether the act of showering might one day short-circuit his entire brain. Watch him try to put all of this out of his mind by focusing on a new strategy to convince Colette, the Woman of the Future, to stop posting online about their abduction.