by Greg Smith
He recalled a story about an eleven-year-old boy who’d climbed the polar bear enclosure. Had been mauled to death by Teddy and Lucy. The bears had subsequently been shot. Killed by the police. Twenty-one years old at the time, students at NYU, he and Binyak had denounced Juan Perez, the eleven-year-old, for his part in the bears’ executions. Teddy and Lucy had always been favorites of theirs.
His stroll down memory lane wouldn’t have been complete without a stop at Kensington Stables. The brick building on Caton and 8th Street had never been particularly eye-catching. It didn’t look much different. The green sign was gone. He couldn’t remember if the boarded-up windows had always been that way, or if that was something new. He also couldn’t tell if the stables were closed for the night. Or closed for good.
From there, it took only a few minutes to reach their house on Beverly, near East 3rd. The home he and Binyak had grown up in. Church Avenue was a stone’s throw away. He was delighted to see Korner Pizza was still there. Still open. He basked, for a New York minute, in the memories of teen years spent idling away undervalued hours at their local handout. Gorging on ’za. Slurping soft drinks. Grab-assing with the defiant indifference of adolescence. But isn’t that what adolescence was about?
He sat for several minutes on the front steps of the three-bedroom single-family home. No one appeared to order him away. No one seemed to be home. He and Binyak had spent hours bouncing a rubber ball against those brick steps. Whole afternoons playing Stoop Ball.
The recollection filled him with pleasant sentiments.
Stoop Ball. Stickball. Home Run Derby. Running bases. Whiffle ball.
Of all the games, whiffle ball had been Binyak’s favorite. It was a game anyone could play, regardless of age or gender. Binyak had never wanted anyone left out.
Too fatigued to make the trek to Midwood High School, he finally left his childhood turf, headed back toward PS #234. He was exhausted from walking all day, rode the subway to the Chambers and West Broadway station, stumbled the short distance to the school complex.
A trio of volunteers was conducting a hushed prayer-meeting in the sleeping area on the upper level of the compound. They regarded him solemnly, nodded in greeting.
“Care to join us?” asked the bearded young man who’d been reading from The Bible.
The jogger shook his head, silently declining the offer. He settled onto a cot, closed his eyes. Closed the world out.
If we were Biblical brothers, we’d be Cain and Abel, he lamented.
I’d be Cain.
• • • • •
CHAPTER 19
“If we were famous super heroes, we’d be Batman and Robin.”
Aleks was usually the one who began the game. They’d played since they were very young. They called it simply “The Twin Game.”
“The Green Hornet and Kato,” Step quipped.
“The Lone Ranger and Tonto.” Aleks took his turn.
“So now we’re just famous good guys. Nothing super,” Step noted. “In that case, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.”
“Uh, they were outlaws, Step.”
“You sure, Binyak?”
“One-hundred-and-ten- percent certain, Binyak.”
The one-hundred-and-ten percent was Aleks’s way of saying he was absolutely, positively certain about something.
“Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday then.”
“Hmm. Doc is borderline. But I’ll give you that one,” Aleks conceded. “If we were comedians, we’d be Abbott and Costello.”
Either one could start a new category at any time.
“Laurel and Hardy,” said Step.
“Cheech and Chong.”
“Extra respect if you can tell me their real names,” Step offered.
The Twin Game didn’t award points or even have an end objective. The boys played to earn each other’s respect. Which was awarded for coming up with a new entry for an old category or, better yet, suggesting an entirely new category. Or, by answering any challenge the other proposed.
“Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong,” Aleks said with confidence.
“Aaannngh. Wrongo, big bro. It’s Richard Marin and Tommy Chong. But, you were half right.”
“No way,” Aleks protested. “You’re making that up. Richard? Really? I’m supposed to believe that?”
“Only because it’s true. Richard is his first name. Cheech is just a nickname.”
“Where do you get that crap?”
“Confidential.”
“Whataya mean it’s confidential?”
“Confidential, the magazine, dumbass.”
“Who reads that?” Aleks scoffed.
“Only me. And about a million other New Yorkers.”
“Yeah, a million housewives,” Aleks groused. “All right, all right. I guess I believe ya.”
He knew debating with Step was usually pointless.
The boys were sitting on the front steps of their Kensington home. It was summer. 1980. They were twelve years old, would be embarking into their teen years come November. Meanwhile, they enjoyed a summer with their friends. Swimming. Playing basketball. Bowling. Going to the occasional movie. Wandering around Prospect Park. The Zoo. The Ravine. Visiting the Kensington Stables. Spending the rare day at Coney Island. And capping almost every day off with a game of whiffle ball in front of Sticks’ house until dark.
It was an idyllic summer. A time before the angst and drama of adolescence. Before peer pressure and high school cliques. Before girls. They could still be kids. Enjoy a game of Spud. Dress any way they liked. Say anything that came to mind.
“If we were cartoon characters, we’d be Chip and Dale,” Aleks began.
“Fred and Barney,” Step replied.
“Heckle and Jeckle,” Aleks stated.
“Rocky and Bullwinkle.”
“Jonny Quest and Hadji.”
“Good one, Binyak,” Step complimented. “Uh, Bert and Ernie.”
“Technically, not cartoon characters, Binyak. They’re Muppets. So, I’m inclined to decline. I’m not giving you that one.”
Aleks was still brooding over the Cheech and Chong debate.
“If we were cartoon enemies, we’d be Tom and Jerry,” he snidely changed the category.
Step wasn’t going to let Aleks’s sarcasm upset him.
“The Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote.”
“Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd.”
“Spy vs. Spy.”
Aleks had to applaud Step for coming up with that. A new contribution.
“Awesome submission, Binyak! That earns respect. It’s gonna be hard to top.”
The Twin Game had only one rule. No male/female combos. Neither wanted to be Marie to the other’s Donny. Or Cher to his brother’s Sonny.
As they grew older, The Twin Game gradually became more sophisticated. By middle school, the boys were no longer content with such juvenile categories as super heroes and cartoon characters.
“Famous literary colleagues,” Aleks challenged shortly after their fourteenth birthday.
“Hmm,” Step considered. “Sydney Carton and Charles Darnay.”
He’d just finished reading A Tale of Two Cities.
“Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer.”
It was always good to have a couple of submissions in the bank when proposing a topic. Aleks had planned to put Huck and Tom out there when he’d suggested the category.
“That’s so puerile,” Step sneered, showing off his vocabulary. “Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway.”
He’d also recently read The Great Gatsby.
“Hal and Roger Hunt,” Aleks quickly submitted.
Step had never heard of them, was skeptical.
“Who?”
“The Hunt brothers. Hal and Roger. From The Adventure Series. Amazon Adventure. African Adventure. Volcano Adventure. I love those books!”
Aleks’s tastes in literature obviously ran toward the less intellectually stimulating.
“
What are you gonna propose next?” Step criticized. “Frog and Toad? The Tortoise and The Hare? You’re so pedestrian.”
Aleks had had enough of his brother’s snootiness.
“Ooh. Mr. Big Words,” he mocked. “You’re up to what? ‘P’ in your Roget’s Thesaurus?”
“Don’t be so pugnacious.” Step responded, intentionally using another ‘p’ word. “Gene Forester and Phineas,” he added with a hint of haughtiness.
A Separate Peace had been on their reading list the previous summer, was a favorite of Step’s.
“Okay, Mr. ‘Pretentious.’ Last name. For Phineas.”
Annoyed by Step’s arrogance, Aleks hoped to stymie his brother. Step’s furrowed brow indicated he’d given him something to think about, the answer not coming immediately to mind.
“Humph. He doesn’t have one,” Step finally declared, though not with complete confidence. “At least, Knowles never mentions it.”
“Are you absolutely certain about that, Mr. ‘Positive’?” Aleks taunted, popping the ‘p’ sound.
Step considered.
“One-hundred-and-ten percent,” he answered, using his brother’s exaggerated phrase for absolute certainty.
To which Aleks tendered his final submission.
“Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”
• • • • •
CHAPTER 20
Saturday, September 22: Day 11 post-9/11
The stranger Nadia and Griggor now called “Ewan” spent the week after waking up in a near catatonic state, sitting for hours in front of the television. He fluctuated in and out of consciousness, spent much of his time in a mindless stupor. He often couldn’t remember what he’d been doing or thinking just moments earlier. It seemed a purposeless existence.
On the same Saturday the jogger took his hiatus from The Pile, however, the stranger finally showed signs of awareness.
He awoke as he had every morning for the past seven days. In a room he didn’t recognize. He didn’t know who he was, where he was, or what had happened to him. He thoughts were hazy. Arriving like jet liners at an airport. Appearing out of the clouds. Circling the field in a holding pattern. Disappearing back into the clouds. Or crashing and burning.
After the most recent crash landing, he closed his eyes, drifted off in the darkness. A moment later, he regained consciousness. In a room he didn’t recognize. The closed door on the far wall invited opening. He slipped out of bed, walked to the door, turned the knob. The door opened onto a hallway. Nothing out there looked familiar. He closed the door, immediately felt safer.
He walked to the open door on the opposite wall. It led to a bathroom. With a toilet. A shower. A sink. A mirror.
He stared into the mirror at the unfamiliar man staring back. He scrutinized the man’s face. Studied every feature. Peered inquisitively into his eyes. Nothing registered. The face was one he knew he must know. One he must look at every day. Yet, it was a face he found completely unfamiliar.
He felt his beard, wondered why he hadn’t shaved. He touched the sutured area on his head just above his hairline, wondered what had happened. As quickly as those thoughts entered his mind, they were gone. Like wisps of smoke escaping up a chimney flue.
While staring at the face in the mirror, he suddenly lost his sense of awareness again. He simply gazed straight ahead, seeing nothing, perceiving nothing. Just as suddenly, he snapped out of the trance. He had no idea how long he’d been standing there, staring. He didn’t recognize the face in the mirror with the few days’ growth of beard. He touched his shaved, sutured head wound, wondering what had happened. Not realizing he’d already done so. More than once.
He found toothpaste and a toothbrush resting on the counter near the sink, brushed his teeth. Again he lost cognizance. He returned to awareness to find himself holding a toothbrush, staring into a mirror. He strained to get his thoughts together, found it difficult to focus.
He undressed to shower, noticed a tattoo on the inside of his forearm. A black, two-headed dragon. Perhaps an eagle. Some other type of bird. He absently stroked the image with his fingers, wondered about the meaning behind it, again losing the thought almost instantaneously.
He leaned his head against the shower wall, closed his eyes, enjoyed the comforting feeling of the warm water embracing him. He experienced another blackout, came back to consciousness to feel the now tepid water washing over him.
Toweling off, he noticed a tattoo on the inside of his forearm. A double-headed dragon. Or eagle. He examined his entire body, using the mirror to check his back, saw no other tattoos. Nor did he find any injuries other than the one to his head.
He dressed, for what he didn’t know. He didn't know what he would, or should, do. He didn’t know what he’d done the day before. Or the day before that. He had no idea who he was or what he did for a living. He simply had no memory of his identity or his life.
He sat on the bed wondering who he was, what had happened to him, just as he had every morning for the past seven days. For the first time since he’d woken up in the apartment, however, he turned to look toward the sound of someone knocking on the closed door.
A dark-haired woman entered. She was not unattractive.
He’d never seen her before.
Nadia had been waiting for some sign of comprehension from her stranger for days. She was more than mildly pleased to see him turn to look at her as she entered the bedroom. Was tremendously relieved that the stranger had showered and dress himself.
“Good morning, Ewan,” she said buoyantly. “How are you today?”
You-on? Who’s You-on? the stranger wondered. And who are you?
He wanted to ask the dark-haired woman those questions, but they escaped him the instant he’d thought them.
“Do you remember me?” the dark-haired woman asked.
The tall stranger stared at her, expressed no hint of recognition.
I’ve never seen you before, he thought, before lapsing into a moment of total befuddlement. Only to suddenly snap back to the present.
He was in an unfamiliar room. With a dark-haired woman he didn’t know.
“My name is Nadia,” the woman said.
She began her habitual morning introduction.
“You had an accident. You were wandering in the street. I took you in. Griggor stitched you up. You slept for three days. You woke up last Saturday. A week ago.”
The stranger blinked several times.
An accident. Griggor. Stitches.
His mind reeled with fragments of the words the woman had spoken. A myriad of questions gamboled through the maelstrom that was his mind. He opened his mouth to speak, couldn’t structure the thoughts running amok in his head. His mouth and lips moved in a silent stammer. No sound escaped. He cleared his throat, drank from a glass of water on the nightstand, again attempted to speak. He could form no words. Could only make whispered murmurs. Soft, hushed sounds.
“Whuh…Whuh…Whuh…”
He closed his eyes momentarily, took another sip of water, cleared his throat again. His second effort was no better than the first. He looked at Nadia with sad, frustrated eyes, moved his head from side to side slowly, indicating any further attempt at speaking was futile. Touching the wound on his head, he peered at her inquisitively.
Nadia was thrilled the stranger was finally showing signs of awareness. Making eye contact. Attempting to speak. Though she couldn’t understand why he was able to make only a few mumbled stuttering sounds when he’d been able to clearly articulate a three-word sentence just days earlier.
The stranger held his hands out, shrugged his shoulders, pointed to his injury again, awaiting the dark-haired woman’s answer. He’d finally piloted a plane safely to the ground.
“I found you wandering in the street,” Nadia told him a second time. “You’d had some sort of accident. We don’t know what happened to you. We don’t know who you are. You didn’t have any identification. Do you know your name?”<
br />
The stranger opened his mouth again, only to once again seize up, unable to answer. In utter confusion, he closed his eyes, slowly shook his head.
No. I-I don’t know who I am. I don’t know my name.
Nadia was pleased to see the stranger was no longer catatonic. Thankful to see there was intelligence behind the once vacant eyes. That his mind was functioning. She placed a hand on his arm to comfort him. At the same time, hoping to receive a vision. Something. Anything. She sensed nothing.
Probably because his mind is a blank slate, she reasoned.
The stranger looked from the hand touching his arm to the face of the woman attached to the hand. He held her gaze, didn’t understand why he was relieved to see her eyes weren’t blue. His mind suddenly went blank, his own eyes went vacant, the temporary blackout lifting as quickly as it had come on. He stared at the dark-haired woman with the kind green eyes, wondered who she was. A neighbor? His wife?
He found his thoughts beginning to linger longer as he concentrated on verbalizing them. He was able to hold onto a thought or a question long enough to express it, but unable to transform any of it into speech. He could safely land his planes. He just couldn’t taxi any of them up to the proper terminal.
The only sound he could manage was a stuttering, “Whuh…Whuh…Whuh…”
Instead of attempting to speak again, he pointed to the woman, held his hands out, palms up, made a questioning face. Nadia understood the stranger was attempting to communicate via crude sign language. She was certain he was asking her to identify herself.
“Nadia,” she said.
The stranger pointed to himself, again held his hands out, palms upward.
“Ewan,” Nadia answered.
The stranger shook his head no, pointed to himself again, this time waving his hands about the air around his head.
Nadia reasoned that he was telling her he was confused. That he didn’t know who he was.