Arc of the Comet

by Greg Fields

  On his way back down the boardwalk, after he had had enough of this melancholia and was heading back to his car, he ducked into a restroom. He had not seen another soul all night, so he stopped dead in his tracks when he saw the two men inside, one leaning back against the sink, his pants to his ankles, the other kneeling in front of him. Reg did not move; he could not move. He could only stare, transfixed, hypnotized. The standing man kept his hands on the back of the kneeler’s head. He looked Reg Coleman in the eye, smiled and winked.

  “What do you say, stud? Look like fun?”

  Reg Coleman’s pulse quickened, his knees and elbows weakened. He swallowed hard, but he had no impulse to flee. Urges hidden away yet all too familiar, all too definable, held him there. Dante in the lower ring of a personal Inferno, but Dante not repulsed, feeling the Inferno burn alive within him.

  “Come on, stud. You’re looking pretty sharp. Come on. You know you want to. I can read those pretty eyes of yours.”

  It would all be anonymous; no one need ever know. A test, maybe, to see if there was anything worth salvaging. A chance to sample the pleasures, at last to be a part of them and then, when completed, to walk away a changed man. The pleasures drawing him onward, drawing him outward. Reg Coleman, his mouth dry, did not flee. He took a step forward, into the bowels of the restroom, into the bowels of the scene before him, into the bowels, the deep, stinking, rancid bowels, of what he ultimately knew himself to be.

  ***

  When Reg Coleman returned to campus at the end of the winter break, his outward nature had been stripped clear of any frivolity. He wanted none of it. Instead he immersed himself in consideration of his own fate, his own future, whether he had any and, if so, what form it might take. Reg had always been made to accept the traditional values. These had failed him. He had twisted them, made a mockery of them, forged them into the keenest blade upon which his very soul had become impaled. The incident on the boardwalk had provided the last piece of evidence, the final confirmation, of a metamorphosis at which the young man could only wonder. And now that it was finally complete, what happens next? The confirmation stunned him, and kept him stunned.

  Reg Coleman had skipped dinner this evening in March. He had, in fact, skipped his two afternoon classes. Instead he had locked himself in his room and taken from his closet a fifth of the cheapest whiskey, pulled his chair around to give him a view of the river, and drank straight from the bottle.

  It had been nearly three months since the incident. It seemed sharper to him than ever. And, in the last analysis, he had to admit to himself that he was what he was. There could be no changing it now. Too late for that.

  Reg drank through the afternoon and into the evening. His Falstaffian roommate would not disturb him: Rosselli would be at the chemistry lab all night. Nor would anyone else intrude. Over the past few weeks he had managed to alienate virtually all of his erstwhile friends through a complete lack of animation. It was time for some conclusions. Reg counted the hard realities of his life. It all depressed him, weighed almost physically on his slight frame so that he sagged in his chair. He drank some more.

  He had been depressed for months, for years, really, and nothing had come close to bringing him out of it. To the contrary, with every step along his pathway he sank deeper. No part of him, nothing, nothing, was as he wanted it to be, and there was scant possibility for correction. Every task he had undertaken had ended in failure; he went through life without love, without assurance, without accomplishment. He had no family. His friendships were superficial, nor would he allow them to be anything but. There was no Clinton Davies here. And now, at last, he had abandoned the final shred of his pretension. The traditional normality he had been taught to worship turned out in the end to be a false god.

  Reg Coleman sat at his desk, drunk, disoriented, immersed in self-loathing and devoid of any hope of ever pulling himself out of the muck. Without hope, what remains? He saw himself as a pitiable, grotesque creature, and so it would continue for as long as he lived.

  The young man stood and stretched. He glanced at the clock near his bed: 10:07. Rosselli would be coming back soon. Reg was extremely drunk. He had to steady himself on the bookshelf over his desk. A resolution had presented itself to his soggy mind, drastic perhaps, but logical enough. He would have to bring himself to act on it. The fifth of whiskey had only an inch or so left in the bottom, yet despite the huge amount of liquor he had consumed, his senses felt acute. That was fitting, and the young man congratulated himself.

  ’Yes,’ he thought. ’An idea. How simple, how very simple. Pity I had not thought of it before. I would have saved so much time.’ He moved to the door, bounced against his dresser, caught himself and straightened up. As he opened the door the light of the hallway scalded his eyes. He stumbled across the hall to the restroom to look at himself in the wide mirror there. Reg leaned hard against the sink and brought his face close to the glass. The reflection swirled before him. He noted that his eyes were redder than he had ever noticed them before, and he was very pale. But no matter now. It was not the time to be bothered by any of that.

  Reg Coleman stepped outside the restroom and walked into the lobby. Unusual for a weeknight that no one would be seated there in the gaudy plastic-covered couches and chairs. Reg could hear voices up and down each hallway, loud, profane shouts of young men bored with study and wanting to break out for a while. Nearly every night around this time they spilled into the lounge, to sit and talk, to wrestle, to throw a football around the room. Oddly, though, not tonight, not yet, and Reg felt relieved.

  He walked through the glass doors that opened from the lounge onto the balcony. The sharp night air struck him flush, a slap in the face. Often he came out here to watch the river, to feel the same night air. He still did not feel steady—his drunkenness caused him to wobble as he walked—but his will stood firm. His pulse was normal, his palms dry. Behind him he noticed two people come out of the hallway opposite his own. He could not be certain if they noticed him there on the cold balcony.

  ’Yes’, he thought again. ’A resolution. And how very simple.’

  He hooked his left leg over the railing. Reg looked six floors below him to the dormitory’s parking lot, then raised his head to look across the river. In the distance he could make out the familiar lights of New York, the spear of the Empire State Building and the surrounding glare. He took a deep breath, felt the cold, brittle air pierce his lungs with a sharp stab, then exhaled slowly.

  ’It’s very fine up here,’ he thought.

  Reg Coleman sat for a few moments straddling the rail. Behind him he heard voices growing excited all of a sudden. One he recognized as Tom McIlweath’s voice, calling his name.

  No more delays. An answer now to all his loathing. Reg leaned to his left and released the rail with his right leg. For a split second he felt weightless, a free man at last unfettered from all judgment, from all condemnation. A giddy exuberance raced through him. As he tumbled he noticed the black sky with only a handful of white pinpricks scattered across it. In his joy he imagined himself to be one of them, a droplet of light released from smothering darkness. A freedom to this, so rare and all too short, until the solid, heartless asphalt rose to meet him.

  ***

  In New Brunswick the last spasms of winter had wriggled and died by early April. The weather at once grew warmer; snow fell no more, and that which had covered the ground off and on since December melted away.

  To Tom McIlweath and Conor Finnegan, spring came suddenly. It crept up on them before they had a chance to notice, so wrapped they were in their own affairs. Neither had paid heed to the subtle changes around them. They took for granted that college life would continue ad infinitum as they had first encountered it: cramped, soggy, cold and demanding. They had quiescently accepted their routines as they were, so when spring at last sent forth its quick, tethery fingers, they were surprised and pleased. Their last few weeks on campus would be bathed in mellow satisfaction, a peaceful
, all-enfolding serenity that springtime often commands.

  The swim season had ended for Tom McIlweath, and it had been glorious. The team had not done well at all, but McIlweath had done his best, always, and had finished the year by placing fourth in the 200 butterfly at the NCAA Eastern Regionals. He now owned three college records and felt capable of several more. His teammates had voted him their most valuable swimmer. Even in his characteristic modesty he recognized that they were probably correct. As a freshman he had accomplished far more than he had ever envisioned. With time he would continue to improve and so, in the season’s wake, he dared to dream dreams for himself, possibly even the Olympics. The spring for Tom McIlweath dawned gently sweet as he played with his own ambitions. He had come to college a disoriented young man; within these several months he had honed a self-definition—academically, athletically and socially—and so felt better about himself than ever before.

  For Conor Finnegan, the year had been more of a struggle than he had anticipated. It had hit him squarely in the autumn, and staggered him. He had flown home for the holidays, reeling under the blows of unfolding uncertainties. But there he had regrouped. Confidence reinstilled through honest reflection and the familiarities of friends and family, he returned east in January to plunge ahead, this time more cautiously, more aware of his limitations. His appointment to the senator’s staff provided a significant confirmation of his unique quality, something he sought almost desperately throughout the year. Now he had it again, a perfect complement to his growing academic reputation and his expanding circle of friends.

  Those who knew the two young men generally respected them as distinctive individuals, unusual in dimension, despite their early identification as “The California Twins.” In the eyes of their common friends, Finnegan and McIlweath both possessed a character that compelled appreciation. Of the two, McIlweath had the more even temper. He was the harder worker, the quietly intelligent one in whom most people on their floor had found it easy to confide. McIlweath was diligent, persistent, talented, and humbled. He inspired trust.

  Finnegan was more outgoing, but his did not seem a false friendliness, for he, too, exuded a subtle compassion. Finnegan could be given to moods; at times he could be sullen and withdrawn. But these instances were rare. He customarily bounced through his days with a buoyancy born of his brimming self-confidence. He had also developed a reputation for brilliance, particularly during the second semester. Of all those on the floor, Finnegan seemed to have the quickest wit, the sharpest mind. He achieved excellent grades without much fuss. The fact that both he and McIlweath had left their homes to travel across country for the experience also caught their friends’ fancy, few of whom had ever spent much time with anyone from the mythical west. They were a unique pair, these two. Their friendship came to be a valuable commodity.

  For McIlweath and Finnegan, the year had proven to be uncommonly rich. It drew to a close now through a brilliant springtime. The days grew longer. Along the river, turtles came out to sun themselves on the rocks; they could be seen from the dorm windows. The trees around campus blossomed with delicate white and pink buds, and the air carried the pungent sweetness of vernal grass. Birds sang in the trees along the towpath under their rooms. They woke to that sound nearly every morning, the trilling coming through windows left open to bring in fresh night air. In all it was a spring they had never known in the suburban sterility of their paved youth.

  As soon as the weather relented, Finnegan and McIlweath began to go for long runs whenever they could find the time together to do so. Each was in relatively good condition, and running would keep them so. Moreover, it cleansed their young minds. The areas around campus presented some outstanding backdrops for their runs. Finnegan particularly liked the towpath along the river, a narrow ribbon of land separating the Raritan from the Delaware Canal. The towpath went on for miles, stretching into the remote wooded lands bordering the town. Often Finnegan would run by himself along this way, seeing no one and hearing nothing but his own footfall. Once, after an especially long run in winter, he had stopped to watch the river. In the late afternoon chill he could see his breath, but more, he watched in wonder as steam rose from his panting body. He had never seen such a thing, and the scene remained in his memory—the stark trees, the brown river, and the steam.

  Late one Sunday, before dinner, McIlweath sprang into Finnegan’s room. “You feel like a run, Conor?”

  Finnegan put down his book, a dull piece on Thomas Hobbes, stood and yawned. “Yeah, I should do something. I’ve been sitting around all day. Where should we go?”

  “Let’s head up to the stadium.”

  “What’s that, about three miles?”

  “Should be. Up and back, we can handle it.”

  “Let me get changed. How cold is it?”

  “You’ll need a sweatshirt.”

  Finnegan changed into his running gear and met McIlweath downstairs in the lobby. After some stretching they started out. Finnegan did not especially enjoy the demands running placed upon his body, although he liked where it took him. He savored the relative solitude and the serenity that solitude imparted, but he regarded the actual process, the placing of one foot in front of the other, as tedious. The ground pounded his feet and made his shins ache; he grew short of breath until he found his rhythm, the familiar knife finding his side too often; his arms grew weary and weak with their swinging. He could always keep up with McIlweath, who was physically better suited to running, but the effort exacted a toll. Only later, after returning to the dorm and taking a long hot shower, did he feel any renewal. When running alone, Finnegan most loved to stop and rest in the most remote place he could find. There, in a quiet that was unattainable on campus, he truly felt at peace, and dominant. It was for those scattered moments that he met the challenge of running at all.

  Tom McIlweath fought no such battles. He could run all day, or so it seemed, and when he finally stopped he never appeared to be breathing very hard. McIlweath ran in long, regular strides, his heels never touching ground, his torso bent slightly forward, his breathing marked by an unbreakable rhythm that lent a pattern to his work. McIlweath ran the way he swam.

  They ran down George Street to the old grating paved bridge and picked up their pace as they crossed it, the cars clattering close by them. On the other side they cut diagonally across Johnson Park, the grass at last soft beneath their strides after the hard New Brunswick asphalt. They kept their eyes fixed on the ground in front of them to avoid the marshy places. At the edge of the park ran two low fences, over which they hurdled side by side, onto River Road. After three-quarters of a mile they headed to their right up the long and rather steep drive that led past the old Rutgers Stadium. Beyond, the land opened up into broad green playing fields for baseball and lacrosse. The math and science buildings of the Busch campus, a mile hence, loomed over the entire scene.

  Finnegan gestured ahead. “Let’s go to the road,” he panted, indicating an access road about 400 yards to their left.

  “Okay,” replied McIlweath evenly, his voice showing no strain.

  Finnegan felt winded, his limbs leaden. He plodded ahead with a regular but thick step. McIlweath at his side kept gliding along.

  Finnegan at once picked up the pace and, as he did so, took two long deep breath before creating for himself a tight rhythm of arms, legs and lungs. McIlweath was caught by surprise by Finnegan’s burst. He scrambled to catch up, but Finnegan had shot ahead and kept pushing harder. He was sprinting now, legs kicking high, arms pumping near his neck, his eyes fixed rigidly on the thin gray asphalt finish line. He did not know how far his friend was behind him. He focused on the line in a manic desperation to reach it first.

  McIlweath, though, had regrouped. He lengthened his stride in pursuit. He leaned forward, looking at the right shoulder that had exploded past him. Finnegan was about fifteen yards in front. He settled into his own sprint, counting on his longer strides to close the distance. The access road lay no more tha
n 100 yards ahead of them now, the rolling ground before it falling and rising under their steps.

  With fifty yards to go McIlweath had pulled to within a stride of Finnegan. He looked at his friend, struggling now, his rhythm breaking down, running on sheer courage. He could be caught. McIlweath knew it. He brought himself alongside Finnegan but did not pass him. Their right feet hit the access road in unison.

  They both trotted a few strides before Finnegan stopped, leaned over and grabbed the ends of his shorts. His breath came in groping draughts. McIlweath slowed to a walk, his hands on his hips. He too was short of breath, but he could recover himself more gradually. He walked in a broad circle for several minutes until Finnegan at last came up to him. He smiled warmly, the perspiration dripping down his nose and off his chin.

  “I thought I had you there at the end.”

  “Me, too. Let’s start walking back toward the stadium. We can rest up and head back from there.”

  North of the stadium they paused. Finnegan filled his lungs, the sharp pain that had cut them apart earlier now subsiding.

  “Hold on for a second, Mac. I want to take a look at this.”

  “At what?”

  Finnegan pointed across the river. “At that. At the campus. At New Brunswick. At everything. There it is, Mac. All before us.”

  And so it was. They both looked then through a berry-blue sky. The sun pushed a last swath of orange to their right, and across the river, under a darkening cover, sat Rutgers and the town, all the life they had created for the past several months. They picked out the stately brick of the dormitories and the library, the clean spires of the old classroom buildings on Queen’s Mall, the tops of the fraternity houses, all punctuated by a nascent vernal greenery. Then beyond, the smoky city—smokestacks here and there, the tall buildings of the commercial sector, the black brick of the decrepit unreconstructed houses near the river, the jabbing four-pronged tower of the city’s largest and oldest church. It all sat before them, an Impressionist still life, uncaptured, fleeting and too soon gone.