“Henry! That’s amazing! You must be so happy!”
He shrugged and slipped into bed, wearing his usual hospital uniform. “I don’t care,” he said. “One way or the other. It seemed like a thing to do, so I did it, but it doesn’t mean anything to me. The voices I hear are not my voice. Who knows whose voices they are, anyway? I am just the conduit: the mad, empty vessel they have chosen to fill.”
“But they’re your poems, Henry. No one else could have written them.” She climbed into bed with him and set the alarm. “Oh god, I’m going to get about three hours sleep. I must stop doing this. I must get more sleep.”
Henry stroked her head. “I am sorry you were worried,” he said. “I love you, Megan.”
It was the first time he’d said it like that.
“I love you too, Henry,” she said sleepily, snuggling into him. “And even if you are not, I am very excited about your book.”
She kissed his face and was startled to find it wet. “Henry. You’re crying.”
“Tough day,” he said. “Some days just are.”
The book was published in spring and it was memorable for two things: Henry’s spectacular meltdown and Megan’s realization that she was pregnant.
Shortly before the launch, Henry’s behaviour became increasingly erratic.
“But how can you tell when he’s never done things the normal way?” Megan’s mother asked, reasonably.
“Because there’s a normal, even for Henry, and this isn’t it. Are you and Dad coming to the launch?”
“Of course we are. Maybe we can take the two of you out for supper before or after?”
Megan sighed. “I’ve no idea, Mom. I’d love to. But, to tell you the truth, I’ve been feeling exhausted lately. I’ve been trying to get more sleep but it’s not easy.”
It was then that she recalled her two missed periods, but she pushed the thought out of her mind. “Maybe things will get back to what they were once the book launch is over,” she said hopefully.
“I’m sure they will,” her mother agreed. “Are Henry’s parents coming?”
“I don’t think they even know about it. He said you two are more like parents to him than his ever were. Oh Mom, I don’t have a good feeling. I’ve been smoking so much that I feel sick all the time. I must cut down and eat better. I feel like throwing up.”
“Not pregnant are you?” her mother asked jokingly and Megan went cold.
“Of course not,” she said heartily. “Just not taking good care of myself. I will, though, once the launch is over.”
The launch night came arrived and Henry was nowhere to be seen.
“Is he coming?” the editor asked Megan an hour after the event had started.
Megan shrugged. “I can’t tell you,” she said. “You know Henry.”
“I thought this meant something to him,” the editor snapped. He was angry. “It’s important that he’s here. We need him.”
“Well,” Megan repeated, “you know Henry.”
Henry chose that moment to arrive, and he wasn’t in a good state. He was wet and filthy and wild-eyed, and his hair was matted.
“I found him,” Bob said, the one who would be Zimmerman. “I know a few of his haunts and I tracked him down.”
“Which might not have been the best idea,” Megan commented and the editor agreed.
“Henry!” The editor called out to him. “Are you up for a reading?”
Henry rolled his eyes at the ceiling and swayed.
“Meg? Is he all right?” Megan’s mother arrived at her side with her father in tow.
“I don’t know, Mom,” Megan said and she sat down.
The evening was going where it was going and all she could do was watch. She drank beer from someone else’s glass, and shrugged when some snotty girl shouted at her.
“Come on, Henry,” the editor urged and he led the writhing Henry up to the stage.
“Here he is,” the editor announced. “Our genius poet, here at last! Come on, Henry! Honour us with a reading!”
Henry stood under the spotlight, swaying, and the whites of his eyes showing.
“He’s always so dramatic,” the snotty girl commented. “Such a drama queen. I can’t understand what the fuss is about, his so-called brilliance, blah-di-blah.”
Megan was sorry she’d finished the beer or she would have tossed it at the girl. She looked around but there wasn’t anything else she could throw.
Meanwhile Henry hadn’t progressed from eye rolling to spouting verse and Megan wondered what the editor would do next.
It didn’t help that the crowd had picked up a chant: “Henry! Henry! Henry!”
Henry shrank back but then he opened his eyes and seemed to focus for a moment. The editor seized the opportunity to thrust a copy of the book into his hand. Henry turned the book over this way and that, examining it.
“Read! Read! Read!” The crowd chanted.
A small smile crossed Henry’s face and he looked like a child finding that extra present under the tree, which Megan thought was how he had been at Christmas, when they were all together, and Dad had hidden that last one especially for him.
Henry held the book wonderingly and then he tugged at the drawstring of his hospital trousers and he let the filthy garment fall to the floor. He flipped the book open at the centre and he took his penis in his hand and proceeded to piss on the pages, carefully drenching the book with yellow urine. A flood fell from the pages and onto the stage.
When he had finished, and the piss seemed to go on for a lifetime, he snapped the book shut, spraying those close to him. He laid it very carefully onto a small table. Then he pulled up his trousers and tied the drawstring with a neat bow. He slowly closed his eyes and leaned in towards the microphone.
The crowd, already silent, didn’t move muscle. Not even a chair creaked.
“Empty.” Henry said. “Empty.” He opened his eyes and looked at Megan. Then he pushed through the crowd and made his way out into the night.
“Fucking genius my ass,” the snotty girl said. “Although the rumours are true, he’s hung like a donkey, I’ll give him that.”
Megan wanted to slap the girl but she got up and went up to the stage instead. She gingerly picked up the drenched book, and dropped it into a small plastic bag she had found in her purse.
“Come on,” she said to her parents. “How about we go and get that supper?”
“Are you okay, dear?” her mother asked. “Goodness me, poetry readings have changed since my day.”
“They’re not usually like this,” the editor remarked, overhearing her. “But look, the book is selling like hot cakes. It’s a good thing I printed double the usual run. Trust Henry to do something utterly original.”
“And utterly disgusting,” the pub owner said, his hands on his hips. “I’ve had a lot of acts up here but no one ever pissed on my stage before.”
Megan left the editor to deal with the outraged owner and she and her parents threaded through the crowd and out the door.
They stood outside in the fresh spring evening, looking for Henry but he had disappeared.
“I’m worried about Henry,” her father said. “That’s the most out-of-it I’ve ever seen him.”
“I’ve seen him like that once before, Dad,” Megan admitted. “I just didn’t want to worry about it. Let’s not talk about it, okay? Please. I can’t. I need to tell you both something.”
“You’re pregnant,” her mother stated and Megan nodded.
“I am,” she said.
Henry stayed away from home for a full week after the disaster of the launch. It was not an unmitigated disaster; his book was already on its way to a second print run.
Megan’s parents had been supportive when they heard she was pregnant but they were also concerned.
They had gone to d
inner as planned after the book launch but the mood was somber.
“But dear, how will you make a living?” Her mother asked. “A baby is full time and you can’t rely on Henry. He’d be a danger to the child. How far along are you?”
“I think about six weeks,” Megan said and she ordered a rare steak and wished she could have a cigarette. “I know, Mom, I know.”
She could see her parents thinking, each engaged with their own scenarios, and while they busied themselves with plans and concerns, she ate her steak and her baked potato and her bread roll. She finished her beer and ordered a second pint, her glance ordering her mother not to say a thing.
Her mother picked at a salad. “Have you told Henry?” she asked and Megan shook her head.
“I’ve been trying not to think about it. I missed a pill here and there, and a couple of periods, but there’s been so much stress lately and I was hoping maybe I missed my periods because of the stress. It happens. But then you mentioned it earlier this evening, and I think you’re right, so we may as well face the facts.”
“Well, you’d best have a doctor confirm,” her mother said distantly. Megan bit her lip and nodded.
Her father was pale and she thought he looked old and tired. “You’re so young,” he said, shaking his head almost imperceptibly.
“How do you feel about it, dear?” her mother asked.
“I never thought about having a kid. And even now, I don’t feel like it’s real. Maybe it will sink in once it starts to grow. I don’t know.”
“I like Henry, you know I do, but this…” her father added.
“I know, Dad,” Megan said. “Maybe I’ll get lucky and miscarry or something. I don’t know. Maybe it will never be real.”
“It’s real, Meggie,” her mother said gently, “and the sooner you accept it, the better.”
Megan pushed her plate away. “I’ll have a double hot fudge sundae,” she said to the waitress. “With extra whipped cream.”
She eyed her mother, daring her to comment, but her mother folded her arms and sat back.
“Times like this I wish I still smoked,” Ethel said and Megan’s father grinned in agreement.
“It’s my worry anyway,” Megan said, drumming her fingers on the table. “Mine and Henry’s.”
Her parents exchanged a glance. “We understand that, dear,” her mother said, “but we’re here if you need us.”
Megan scowled and wished her dessert would hurry up.
“I want to show you something,” her father said over the phone, two months later. “I’ll come and get you, Meggie, and Henry, if he’s there. Can you come out tomorrow?”
“Yeah, sure Dad,” Megan said, rubbing what she was referring to as her baby bump. The truth was that she hadn’t been able to stop eating since the poetry reading and the pounds had piled on faster than she had thought possible. She was like a furtive addict, cramming food into her mouth at every opportunity. She felt like the Titanic, already huge, and as hell-bent for catastrophe as that giant ship. “Sure. If Henry’s here, I’ll ask him to come with us.”
Henry had not reacted well to the news of Megan’s pregnancy and his solution was to stay away and take more drugs. His episodes of eye-rolling had increased even when he was home and Megan began to find him increasingly distasteful and ugly.
“Look at you,” she said during one of his fits, although she couldn’t be sure he could even hear her. “You look like a mad person, a crazy, homeless mad person.”
Her solution was to eat and smoke and drink and she constantly felt sick, unsure if it was her toxic diet or her pregnancy or her new loathing for Henry.
“Crazy person,” she’d say as she waved her spoon at him, her belly three times bigger than it should have been.
“Henry? Can you come with us? Please?” Her father asked him the next morning. Henry followed them down to the car like a suspicious stray dog. Ed opened the rear passenger door and Henry peered inside for a moment and then clambered in. Megan, sitting in the front seat, didn’t say a word.
The drive to Scarborough took over an hour through the traffic and no one inside the car spoke the entire way, each staring out a different window, each in a different world.
When they got to her parents’ home, Megan immediately sensed something was different. She baulked at going inside but her father put his hand on the small of her back.
“Come on Meg,” he said. “It’s going to be fine, you’ll see. Come on, Henry, you too, come on in.”
Downstairs first, her father said and he led them down into the basement, with Ethel following.
“What happened here?” Megan was startled. Her father’s expansive former workshop was entirely gone and in its place was a furnished apartment, with a small washroom, a bedroom, and what was clearly intended to be a baby’s area at the side.
“What is this?” Megan asked.
“Upstairs, Meggie. Now.” Her mother’s voice housed no room for discussion. “Kitchen table talk, now. You, too, Henry. Up you both go.”
Kitchen table talk meant serious business, Megan knew that. She shut her mouth, followed her mother and sat down meekly.
When they were seated, her mother began. “You know, Meggie, that we’ve always loved and supported you and never questioned you. And we love Henry like a son. But it’s not about the two of you any more. Do you understand that? You’ve gone beyond that and whether or not you meant it to happen, it did, and now, someone needs to step up. And if you can’t step up, we will. Because this is not about you. This is about a sacred life you are carrying. Megan, you need to come home and live with us. We’ll help you through your pregnancy and the first thing you’ll do is start eating better. I don’t care about ‘eating for two,’ you’ve been eating for six! And you need to stop smoking, at least until the baby is born. And then, once the baby is born, you will carry on living here. A newborn is no joke, let me tell you. You’ll be grateful for our help.”
“A prison,” Megan managed to say. “You’ve built me a prison.”
You did that all by yourself, her mother wanted to reply but she didn’t.
“No, Meggie, not a prison, a support system. Try to see it that way, okay? Now Henry, you can stay here too but you need to go to the hospital and stay there for a bit. I’ve spoken to some people about you and we can take you there now. You need help, Henry.”
Henry, unlike Megan, looked relieved.
“Help,” he repeated, rubbing his face, his hands and fingernails filthy. “I’ll try. I’m so tired. I can’t sleep, and I am so tired. Will they help me sleep?”
“Yes, they will. And then you can come back and stay here.”
“I’ll take you now,” Ed said and he stood up. “And then I’ll go and clean out your apartment,” he said to Megan.
“I’ll come with you, Dad,” Megan insisted.
“We’ll all go,” her mother said and she stood up. “We need to get Megan registered at the hospital too.”
“What about my job?” Megan asked. “And my apartment?” Although she didn’t want to admit it, the thought of being told what to do, being guided through this horribly frightening time, even being told what to eat, was suddenly an enormous relief.
“You can phone your supervisor and say you need to resign from work because of the baby and that you are moving back home. Dad will go and take care of your apartment. If you like, you can go with him and help him pack things up. Come on, Henry. Let’s go.”
On the way to the hospital, sitting in the backseat of the car, Megan turned to Henry. “Earth to Henry,” she said, and he smiled.
“I’m sorry, Meg,” he said. “I didn’t mean to get this messed up. I thought I had everything balanced. I thought I had it under control.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I’ll try to do better too.”
“Are you still my girlfriend?”
he asked her.
“Yes, Henry,” she said, her hand on her belly. “I’m still your girlfriend. Will you be okay in hospital?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Will you come and visit me?”
She nodded.
“We will too, Henry,” Ed said loudly from the front seat. “You kids aren’t alone in this.”
Megan wanted to thank her parents but she couldn’t find the words.
Henry seemed to know what she was thinking and he took her hand and they sat like that, all the way to the hospital, clinging to one another right up until the nurse led Henry away.
At the end of a long corridor, Henry turned and lifted a hand goodbye.
Megan waved back and then he vanished.
Megan’s mother took her arm. “Come on, Meggie. Time to get you checked out.”
What had looked like salvation soon became hell. Ethel took Megan for long walks, and monitored her diet, her smoking and her sleeping.
Henry was sent to detox and then began a long series of tests and experiments to see which diagnosis and medication suited him best.
“Everything hurts,” he said to Megan when she visited. “My skin hurts. My tongue hurts. My eyeballs hurt. It hurts to breathe. They don’t understand anything I tell them. They interview me in pairs — new people, the same people — asking new questions, the same questions. They have no idea about any of it. I swear they are crazier than me. I hate this place. I hate them. I can’t sleep. I can’t stand to be awake. The noises, oh. Meg, the noises these people make, they are not human. They’re not human, but then I am in here too, so what am I?”
She wished she could touch him but contact was forbidden.
“My life’s not much better,” she said. “Mom gets me up first thing, and my whole day has a schedule. I have to eat my horrible breakfast, then go for a walk, then study things about the baby. Then I get an hour to myself, then lunch, then a walk. Then we go shopping for something for the baby, like that’s my big reward, going to the mall, and if I’ve been really good, Mom lets me gets me a sorbet. Then we go back home and I can watch TV. Then Dad comes home and we have supper and then I watch TV till eleven and then it’s lights out. And no smoking. It’s ridiculous.”
The Nearly Girl Page 6