by Ann Tatlock
He swallowed. She watched his Adam’s apple travel up and down the length of his throat. There was a scar there now, near the hollow of his neck, from the ventilator that had breathed for him while he was still in the hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. He’d been weaned off of it, which meant he had improved. Who knew what other improvements he might make? She was a patient person; she was willing to wait and see.
Very slowly, as though talking to a child, Seth said, “I’m going to close my eyes and rest now. When I open my eyes again, I want you to be gone. Go back to Troy, Jane. Go back and make a life with someone else. I don’t want you coming back here.”
She gazed at his face, the face she knew so well and had loved so long. She wanted to reach out her hand and touch his cheek, his brow, but she didn’t dare. His eyes were closed; she had been dismissed.
“Seth,” she said, “just do one thing for me. Tell me you don’t love me anymore. Tell me that, and then I’ll go away.”
His eyelids trembled and his jaw tightened, but he didn’t speak.
“I’ll be back tomorrow,” she said.
She saw the tear that slid down the side of his face. She turned to go without brushing it away.
3
Pritchard Park was a small triangular oasis situated near the center of downtown Asheville. The park, like the city itself, was no respecter of persons. All were drawn to it at one time or another—the locals, the tourists, the wealthy, the homeless, young Goths, aging hippies, radical intellectuals, raging alcoholics, lovers, the lonely, families, drifters, and dreamers. They all came and sat in the shade of its few scattered trees, settling themselves on the benches or the natural boulders, or on the concrete tiers that dropped down toward the bricked center square that, on Friday nights when the weather was warm, served as a dance floor for those inspired to motion by the synchronized drumming.
Jane sat on the sun-warmed concrete facing the tier where several dozen people sat beating out a rhythm on bongo drums and conga heads. Others tapped out the tempo using wooden claves, while still others added an unobtrusive backup with shakers and cowbells. On and on it went, the rhythm played over and over, with seemingly no beginning and apparently no end. The dance floor was crowded with men, women, and children in a vast array of dress and undress, swaying, jumping, gyrating, and spinning, as though even the fairest of them had roots that ran deep into an ancient tribal culture. One man with dreadlocks down to his waist managed a series of improbable somersaults and back flips, then grabbed a partner and joined her in a dizzying array of staccato-like dance steps. Jane watched in amazement, only vaguely aware that her right foot tapped along with the rhythm. The drumming had a hypnotic pull that lulled the listener in and took her to places unknown, just as the tug of the ocean might carry a swimmer out to sea.
“They say it helps connect them with the universal mind, or some such thing.”
Jane turned toward the voice. “Diana! How long have you been here?”
“Just got here. Sorry I’m late.” Diana spoke loudly over the drumming and squinted momentarily against the sun as she sat down on the tier beside Jane. “I got caught in a very long and very tedious staff meeting about grants for the biology department next year.” She gazed skyward in a gesture of disgust, her brown eyes looking weary behind the rectangular lenses of her dark-framed glasses. Her auburn hair was cropped short in a no-nonsense style, as though outward appearance was a frivolous time waster if one was a tenured professor.
“That’s all right,” Jane assured her. Glancing at her watch, she added, “Is it seven thirty already? Wow, I lost track of the time. I’m afraid I got kind of swept up in the drumming.”
Diana nodded. “That’s the point, I think. You’re supposed to let it carry you off into the cosmic consciousness.” She paused and smiled. “It boggles my scientific mind, but it’s fun to watch. They all seem to be enjoying themselves.”
Jane looked out over the crowd, then back at her friend. “Where’s Carl?”
“Grading term papers.”
“On a Friday night?”
“You know Carl. Work, work, work. He won’t be able to leave for Europe next week unless he has all his ducks lined up in a row, feathers all fluffed and shiny. But he sends his apologies for skipping out on dinner tonight.”
“That’s all right,” Jane said again. “If I were going to spend the summer in Europe, I’d want to have all my ducks in a row too.”
The two friends fell quiet for a moment, but it was a comfortable lapse in conversation for them both. Diana Penland was as close to an older sister as Jane Morrow would ever have. They’d known each other since Jane was a child and Diana a young teen, going back almost twenty years now. Diana’s parents, both avid antique collectors, had begun staying at the Rayburn Bed & Breakfast in Troy not long after Nell Rayburn Morrow, Jane’s grandmother, had made the first rooms available to the public in the 1980s. They would come down from Asheville for the weekend, or sometimes for as long as a week in the summer, which gave the girls plenty of time to get to know each other. While her parents perused the shops around Troy, Diana preferred to stay at the Rayburn House with young Jane, rummaging through the attic for treasures or playing board games in the parlor.
Diana patted Jane’s hand and leaned a little closer. “Was it a bad day?”
“Awful.”
“I’m sorry, Jane. What did Seth say when he saw you?”
“He told me to leave and not come back. He said a few other things, but that was the gist of it.”
Diana nodded. “So what are you going to do?”
“I’m going back, of course.”
Jane waited for her friend to respond, but Diana didn’t say anything. With one final climactic thud the drumming stopped. The silence was jarring. A moment passed before the crowd applauded, as though they had to shake themselves free from the rhythm’s hypnotic grip. Jane wondered who the lead drummer was and how he or she had signaled everyone to stop. There had to be some method to this music, but she couldn’t imagine what it was. A few more minutes went by before a single drum began to sound, digging around for a tempo and finally finding it. The other musicians soon followed suit, and the drum circle was back in full swing.
“Listen, Jane,” Diana said at length, “are you very sure you want to marry Seth? I mean, you’re twenty-five years old. You have a lot of life ahead of you. No one would blame you, you know, if you backed out of the commitment. Maybe if you were married it would be different, but you aren’t married yet.”
Jane turned toward her friend, eyebrows raised. “I have no intention of backing out of my commitment. I’m engaged to Seth, and I intend to marry him.”
“But, sweetie, that means spending your life taking care of someone who can’t do anything for himself. Is that really what you want?”
“What would you have done if it had happened to Carl? Wouldn’t you have married him anyway?”
“Well, honestly, I’m not certain I would have. Carl is an artist, a sculptor, a college professor. So much of our life together revolves around academia. We may be in different fields, but our teaching, our work . . . it’s central to our lives. If Carl couldn’t use his hands to create art and to teach his students, well . . .”
“But he would still be Carl.”
“I’m not so sure.”
Jane shook her head. “I can’t agree with you there, Diana. Seth is still Seth. He’s still the man I fell in love with. Nothing changes that.”
“But he has changed, sweetie. Surely you can see that. Maybe not on the inside, but . . . his body isn’t his body anymore.”
“No? Then whose body is it?”
Diana sniffed out a chuckle. “Come on. You know what I mean.”
“Listen, Diana, you’re supposed to be on my side in this, remember?”
“I am on your side. I want what’s best for you. That’s all. I want to make sure you know what your life would be like being married to a quadriplegic. I mean, the day-to-day routine of car
ing for someone—”
“I’ve done little else for the past six months other than read about spinal cord injuries. I’m pretty sure I know what’s involved.”
“Only in theory.”
“Maybe. But I’m ready to practice.” Jane looked at her friend for a long moment. “Thanks for letting me stay in your house for the summer.”
Diana smiled and shook her head, seemingly unaware that Jane was changing the subject. “You don’t have to thank me, you know. You’re doing me a huge favor. Not only will I know someone is watching the house, but taking care of Roscoe and Juniper too, which is far more important. What would I have done with them otherwise—put them in a kennel for the summer? I’d have sooner stayed home from Europe than put my babies in a kennel.”
“I’ll take good care of them.”
“I know you will. So I should be thanking you for allowing me to go off to Europe and play for three months without worrying.”
“Play? I thought you were going to work.”
Diana laughed. “It’s Carl’s fellowship. He’ll be the one doing the research. I’m just along for the ride. I intend to have fun and do as much sightseeing as I can, even if I have to do it alone.”
“Maybe you’ll end up meeting some other expatriates and you can spend the summer traveling with them.”
“Maybe so,” Diana said, “though I don’t imagine Carl would be too happy about that.” She shrugged and looked toward the drumming circle. Jane followed suit, and for several minutes they simply listened and tapped along. Finally Diana said, “What if you do decide to stop seeing Seth? You really won’t have any reason to stay in Asheville. Will you want to go back to Troy? Because if you do, I don’t know what I’ll do with Roscoe and Juniper.”
“Don’t worry.” Jane shook her head. “I’ll be staying in Asheville this summer, no matter what. There’s nothing for me to do in Troy when school’s out, except lesson plans, which I can do just as well here as there. I’ll be teaching third grade next year instead of second. Did I tell you?”
“No, I don’t think you did.” Diana took in a deep breath and let it out. “Listen, honey, if marrying Seth is what you want, I’ll support you completely.”
Jane smiled and gave her friend a small nod. “Thanks, Diana. Yes, it’s what I want. And I still want you to be my maid of honor. Are you in?”
“Of course I’m in.”
“Anyway, it’s possible Seth will regain some movement, you know. He may even walk again someday. I mean, really, Diana, there’s all sorts of research going on. Who knows what kind of advances will be made in spinal injury treatment. Someday I imagine there will even be a cure for paralysis. Maybe in our lifetime.”
“I suppose it’s always worthwhile to hope.”
“Of course it is. You know me—always the incurable optimist. Accentuate the positive and all that.”
Diana laughed. “Well, Miss Accentuate the Positive, are you hungry?”
“Famished.”
“There’s a lovely Thai restaurant right up the street at the Grove Arcade.”
“Sounds good.”
“There’s even a very fat smiling Buddha at the entrance to welcome you.”
“As long as he’s happy, it works for me.”
The two women pulled themselves away from the drumming circle and started up Haywood Street. There the summer throngs were strolling, passing in and out of shops and bakeries and the old Woolworth’s that was now part art gallery, part 1950s-era lunch counter. At the corner of Haywood and Battery Park Avenue, Jane and Diana turned left and started up the slightly inclined street where the restaurants began. From there to Page Street and the Grove Arcade, crowded tables spilled out of cafés and onto the buckled sidewalks. The air was heavy with the scent of food and the colliding voices of a hundred conversations. At length, the pounding of the drums receded, replaced by the ringing of bells. The music came from somewhere overhead, somewhere above the street noise and the busyness of the city, and as they approached the Grove Arcade, Jane became aware that she heard not only the bells, but the words to the hymn being played by the carillon. They bubbled up from memory, coming to her conscious mind in Laney’s strong, clear voice.
O the deep, deep love of Jesus,
Vast, unmeasured, boundless, free!
Jane laid a hand on Diana’s arm. “Where are the church bells playing?” she asked.
Diana paused to listen. “Oh, that’s the old Catholic church at the end of Haywood Street, the Basilica of St. Lawrence. Pretty, isn’t it?”
How He watches o’er His loved ones,
Died to call them all His own. . . .
Jane nodded. “Beautiful.”
As she gazed down the length of the sidewalk, busy with pedestrians, diners, waiters, and a lone cop patrolling the street, she was surprised that no one else appeared to notice the bells. It seemed everyone should have stopped whatever they were doing to listen for just a moment, though no one did. No one seemed aware at all of the song rolling out of the belfry, though the bells went on stubbornly ringing, their notes drifting down like absolution over the dusk-shrouded city.
4
Jane was determined to make her way up to the fifth floor, but she wasn’t quite ready yet. She needed some time to collect her thoughts and calm her nerves. A little walk might help, a leisurely stroll through the maze of hallways in the VA medical complex. Like yesterday, the halls were busy with the two-way traffic of veterans coming and going to appointments at the various clinics that fronted the hospital proper. Unlike yesterday, no one sat at the piano in the atrium; the lobby was quiet, save for the murmuring hum of voices and the tapping of dozens of footfalls on the linoleum floor.
As Jane walked, her eyes swept over the crowds in search of an empathetic soul. She longed for someone she could pull aside and ask, “What should I do? What’s the right thing to do?” Because today she didn’t feel nearly as sure of her future with Seth as she had sounded yesterday with Diana.
She had lain awake a long time in the night, thinking about what Seth had said. “I always knew I might not come back alive, but I never dreamed I’d come back like this.”
Before he left for Iraq, Jane had willed herself to believe he would come back and they would simply pick up where they’d left off. She didn’t think of injury, and she didn’t think of death. She envisioned no scenario other than that of Seth completing his tour and coming home. After all, that was the ending that played itself out in real life more than any other ending. She’d seen it a hundred times, on the news, in the papers, on the Internet—returning warriors swept up into the arms of their loved ones who had come to airports and bus stations to welcome them home. That’s how it would be for her and Seth.
Only that wasn’t how it was at all.
He had come back, but he was different, and maybe that changed everything. Maybe Seth had survived but the dream had been lost. Maybe the best thing she could do for him would be to acknowledge the end of their relationship and say good-bye.
After wandering through a tangle of unfamiliar corridors, Jane pushed open an exit door and stepped into a spacious courtyard. Carefully tended flowers bloomed in a variety of gardens around the grounds, and a brick path led from the door to a large white gazebo at the center of the yard. Jane walked to the empty gazebo and sat down. The June sun was at its height, but the little structure offered up its shade as a refuge. Roses sprang up beside the railings; Jane paused to smell one red blossom. The subtle fragrance, tender and sweet, was comforting.
If I don’t marry Seth, Jane thought, I’ll go on living, and it will be all right. After all, I lived for years without him.
If one could call it living. Jane sniffed. Who was she kidding? It would be more accurate to call it . . . what? Striving? Trying very hard to push against the loneliness, the emptiness, and all the unanswered questions that came with adolescence and young adulthood. Trying very hard to fill the void with all she believed to be good and perhaps even eternal—music, a
rt, poetry, nature, beauty in all its varied forms. Yet for all her effort, she had failed repeatedly. She was, she realized, the woman in Sara Teasdale’s poem, the seeker of beauty whose heart was empty.
Oh, is it not enough to be
Here with this beauty over me?
My throat should ache with praise, and I
Should kneel in joy beneath the sky.
O, beauty, are you not enough?
Why am I crying after love?
The poet knew. One can try to be noble, but the heart won’t be fooled. It wants what it wants. The heart has a narrow appetite. Only love will satisfy.
“Oh, excuse me. I didn’t see you sitting there.”
Jane gasped silently, startled by the voice and by the tall dark figure leaning into the gazebo. He was the man she’d seen yesterday, the one who had stepped out of the room filled with laughter, who had passed her in the hall, who had the kindest eyes she’d ever seen.
Jane recovered quickly and, smiling, said, “Please, don’t let me bother you.” She waved a hand toward the bench running around the interior of the gazebo. “Have a seat if you’d like.”
The man nodded, his eyes twinkling. “Thank you.” He sat and stretched his long legs out in front of him. He wiggled his feet and sighed. “Sometimes the old dogs get tired. Seventy-four years is a long time to have to carry me around, after all.”
Jane chuckled. “I suppose it is.” She stared at the worn leather of his Oxfords, amused at the way the laces were knotted together in several places. It did indeed look as though he’d been walking in this very pair of shoes for more than seventy years. “I saw you yesterday. Up on the fifth floor.”
“Yes.” He lifted his chin in recognition. “You were on your way to see Seth?”
She was momentarily surprised. “Yes, I was. Do you know him?”
“I’ve met him. Briefly. He doesn’t want to talk much. Are you his sister?”
Jane held up her ring shyly. “His fiancée.”