by Ulf Wolf
An ocean of constant process.
And into this ocean I have settled. It is a little unsettling.
I feel, of course, that I’m wasting time, waiting for Ruth to grow. But what were the options? It’s not as if I could pry someone loose from an adolescent body, or even adult—not ethically, anyway. The game here is you enter through this, the newly born. And—for better or for worse—you stick with it—literally.
Of course, at this stage of possession the typical possessor is not aware of possessing anything—too busy drowning in the body-sea, and will not surface for years. But I am Siddhattha Gotama, I am Giordano Bruno, I am Ruth, I am the Buddha Gotama, and I don’t drown. This is both blessing, and price to pay: for in this constantly shifting slough of an ocean, I am fully aware.
Aware of the little bed I lie in, comfortable and mostly drowsy. Aware of my room—light blue walls with stars and far too many moons pasted to the darker blue ceiling (Melissa insisted upon it). My room is on the ground floor—the only floor—of a very nice house in the city of Pasadena, California. It lies south of the freeway, as Charles likes to point out to friends and family (Pasadena is a city with a dual reputation: north and south of the freeway, south the less affordable), and is built from brown wood. It sits on a large lawn, which I am sure will need a lot of watering come summer.
And I am aware of the many needs of the little body, its frequent hungers and thirsts, and of course the frequent needs to dispel—which I can do at will and at any time; I’m supposed to do just that, and Melissa is supposed to clean me up. It’s an odd and a little embarrassing arrangement, but I remember it well from earlier little lives.
I am aware of my parents, Melissa and Charles, and of their troubles. And not only am I aware of them as human beings—I hear them talk often—but also as souls: I am aware of their inner landscapes, their images and thoughts and turbulences that sail like white and gray and sometimes rosy clouds across Melissa’s sky, and mostly like dark thunder across Charles’. These many clouds move in and out of view and obstruct outlook and reason for these poor people.
These poor humans.
I am aware.
:: 26 :: (Still River)
Charles answered the phone.
“Yes?”
“Good morning, Charles. This is Ananda Wolf. I’d like to speak to Melissa, please.”
“She’s asleep.”
Why Charles always seemed on the edge of complaining, Ananda had yet to figure out.
“Ah. Is she doing okay? And Ruth?”
“Mother and baby are just fine, Mister Wolf.” Meaning, as far as Ananda could tell: please hang up and don’t bother us.
“Perhaps you could let her know I called. And tell her that I might come down to see her and Ruth soon.”
“There’s no need for that.”
“Melissa has asked me to.”
“I know.”
“So, perhaps in a week or two?”
“There really is no need.”
“I realize that. It’s no problem.”
“I will let her know that you called.”
And in the middle of Ananda’s “Thank You” Charles hung up, without another word.
Ananda did, too. A little worried for mother and child.
:
Melissa called him back later that morning.
“Ananda. Charles said you called.”
He could tell that she was upset. “Yes, I did.”
“I had to drag it out of him,” she said. Then added, “I heard it ring.”
“What happened?”
“I’m not really sure. He is being difficult.”
“How difficult?” he asked, not knowing how better to put it.
The line went silent. Ananda could hear her breath, short and urgent.
“Are things all right?” said Ananda into the silence.
“No,” she said then. “No, things are not all right.”
“He is not abusive?” said Ananda.
“No. Oh, no. Not physically, if that’s what you mean. He just isn’t,” and she hesitated. “He just isn’t with us. As if Ruth were a burden, that he is now blaming me for.”
“Has he said that?”
“He doesn’t have to say it. It surrounds him like a cloud. I thought he was going to be happy about it, that things were going to grow more loving, more honest, between us once Ruth arrived. But it’s just the opposite, he’s more distant. He’s broody.”
“But he is not,” and Ananda—thinking of Gotama—cast about for the best way to put it. “He’s not a danger, is he?”
“No. Heaven’s no. He’s morose and not very pleasant to be around, but he would never, no.”
Ananda believed her, and felt relieved. “I’d like to come down and see you.”
“That would be nice,” she said. “That would be very nice.” Then asked, “How is the book coming?”
The book. Yes. The book. “Fine,” he said. “It’s coming along just fine.”
“I’m glad,” she said.
“I’ll call again soon,” he said.
:
Ananda had barely hung up the phone when Ruth spoke, Gotama making nothing of the distance between them. “She is worried,” she said.
“Yes, I can tell.”
“Coming down would not be a bad idea. And sooner rather than later. She does not see how upset Charles really is beneath the morose surface.”
“Is he a danger?”
“I doubt he is, but he could be, yes.”
“I’ll make the arrangements,” said Ananda. “Do you think I should come to stay for a while?”
“How long is a while?”
“Weeks, months.”
“No, I don’t think so. Not yet at any rate. But she needs you right now.”
“I will book a flight.”
“That would be good.”
:: 27 :: (Pasadena)
Charles was not happy to see him, and was not going to any great lengths to conceal it. Melissa, the very opposite.
“Mister Wolf,” he said, answering the door, making it sound like an accusation.
“Mister Marten. Charles. Good to see you again,” said Ananda, offering his hand, which Charles took, more by reflex than by courtesy. A huge hand, Ananda reflected and not for the first time. Charles had been a quarterback, or was it wide receiver, in college, one or the other, where hands this size apparently were of some use.
Charles let go of Ananda’s hand the moment he realized he was holding it, as if burned. “Yes,” he said.
“I’ve come to see Melissa,” said Ananda. “And Ruth.”
“I gathered,” said Charles, but only after a brief internal debate stepped aside to let Ananda into the house.
And there they were, the Buddha Gotama and his mother, in the living room doorway, Ruth cradled in Melissa’s arms, wide awake and looking directly at Ananda with startlingly blue eyes. So blue they seemed to carry their own light.
“Melissa,” said Ananda.
Melissa smiled, and waved with the fingers of her right hand the way friendly young women do. He crossed the entryway and looked down at Ruth, all pink face and blue eyes still fastened upon his. “And Ruth,” he said.
Melinda held up her daughter to give Ananda a better look. Motherly. Proudly.
“It is good to see you again, Ananda,” thought Ruth into the privacy of Ananda’s universe.
“And you,” answered Ananda over the same path, and as clearly into Gotama’s universe.
“I’m late,” said Charles arriving back from the inside of the house, now carrying his briefcase and coat. Then, half-way through the outside door, he turned: “There’s a chance I’ll have to go down to San Diego today. Might be late.”
Melissa lost her smile, looked up and nodded that she had heard.
“Don’t wait up,” said Charles.
“I won’t,” said Melissa.
Charles did not slam the door shut behind him, but he pulled it twice to ensure it was trul
y closed, as if the lock might have a habit of acting up. Satisfied that the door was indeed shut, the sound of Charles’ footsteps carried him away from wife and child and for the dog-eat-dog of law.
“He works long hours,” said Melissa as if Charles had called for an explanation.
“It cannot be easy,” said Ananda, “to work for your father.”
“Especially his father.”
“He set high expectations?”
“He sets unattainable expectations. That’s what I think.” Then she entered the living room, inviting Ananda to follow. She sat down, and looked at Ruth for a long silent moment, then said, as if this had been on her mind ever since Ananda arrived:
“She doesn’t cry.”
Before Ananda could answer, or even think of one, Gotama’s thought spanned the room to where he sat.
“I know,” he said. “I am supposed to cry.”
“Yes, you are,” Ananda replied. “You must not frighten her.”
“What did you say?” said Melissa, startled out of gazing at Ruth.
Neither Ruth, nor Ananda, answered, on any plane. But they both wondered the same thing: She had heard?
Then Ananda collected himself sufficiently to answer her, “That makes for nice, restful nights. Doesn’t it?”
“Well, it should,” said Melissa. “But then I worry instead, and that keeps me awake.”
“She doesn’t cry at all?” said Ananda. As much to Melissa as to Ruth.
“No, she doesn’t cry at all. She has never cried. Not even at the hospital, one of the nurses told me. She didn’t even cry when she, well, arrived.”
“She didn’t?”
“No.”
Ruth looked at Ananda. Guilty as charged, and not proud of it was what Ananda saw.
“Have you asked Doctor Ross?” said Ananda, after a brief reflection.
“No.” She said, “She’s not her pediatrician.”
“Ah. Does she have one?”
“Of course,” said Melissa, with a quick glance from Ruth to Ananda. “Doctor Fairfield.”
“What does he say?”
“She. Beverly Fairfield.”
“Sorry.”
“You couldn’t know.”
“Did you ask her?”
“Not yet.”
“It’s probably nothing to worry about.”
“She’s almost three weeks old,” said Melissa. “From what I’ve found on the Internet, it’s very unusual. And not even when she was born,” she added.
“But not dangerous? Surely?”
“No, not that I have found, just very unusual.”
“I’d ask Doctor Fairfield about it.”
Melissa, seemingly caught in another thought, said, “I’ve tried to explain this to Charles.”
When Ananda said nothing, Melissa went on, “You know what he said?”
“No.”
“Well, he apologized, of course, said it was a bad joke, and that he really didn’t mean it. And that he was tired, so he didn’t really think about what he was saying.”
“What did he say?”
Melissa had trouble telling him, but in the end managed. “Let sleeping dogs lie. That’s what he said. Let sleeping dogs lie.”
Ananda was a little shocked at that, at the insensitivity of the man. But perhaps he should not be surprised, he thought. It seemed like par for the Charles course.
“That was a bit insensitive,” said Ananda.
“It was very insensitive,” said Melissa. “And I told him so. That’s when he apologized. Even he saw that that was a stupid thing to say.”
Ananda said nothing.
“Then I tried to explain to him how worried I was about it.” Melissa briefly looked out the window, eyes shiny with tears not yet arrived, and Ananda was struck by how her eyes, too, like Ruth’s, now seemed to hold some internal light. Then, seeming to address the sky outside, “He listened for a while, I could see that he made an effort.”
Then she turned to face Ananda again, “But I could also see that to him this was not a problem, and that he listened—or appeared to be concerned—just to make me feel better.”
Ananda almost said “Well, that’s always something.” But he didn’t. Instead he said, “Do you want me to talk to him?”
He could almost feel Gotama shake an invisible head at that. Matching Melissa’s blond hair swaying back and forth as she, too, shook her head. “No,” she said. “He wouldn’t listen to you.”
“He doesn’t like me, does he?”
“No.”
Ananda nodded. He knew that.
:: 28 :: (Pasadena)
It is an odd sensation to have a body go to sleep on you.
One moment it’s quite awake, everything’s working just fine: ears, eyes, bowels, lungs, heart, just humming away like the incredibly well-designed pieced of machinery they are. Then, for no apparent reason—other than, perhaps, over-contentment—curtains are rapidly pulled shut and, if you don’t manage to scramble out of the theater before they lock the doors, suddenly all is one black and deep oblivion.
I did manage to scramble out of my head before sleep arrived like a hastily assembled midnight, and now I watch her, this little body of mine—which really has no reason to cry, and seems well aware of that—lies oblivious to all but the tick-tick-tick of a tiny heart. There’s a gentle almost smile on her face, and those lashes: Charles’s dark, long lashes. She will grow a startling face, this Ruth of mine.
Melissa is talking, and Ananda is listening. He is a good listener, my Ananda. And Melissa, as she unburdens, finds a peace in being heard and understood. I see the bond forming between them, and that is precisely why I needed Ananda to come down in person.
:: 29 :: (Pasadena)
Melissa was putting Ruth’s little socks away when someone came into the room and now stood behind her.
Watching her.
That was the sensation. Someone was watching her. She felt eyes.
Socks still in hand, she turned very slowly—and very afraid now, for she had heard no one enter the room. The one watching her made not a sound. She turned all the way to no one there, to empty bedroom. Only Ruth, shifting now in her bed to look at the ceiling.
Aware of her heart racing, though beginning to slow again, and aware of perspiration forming on her brow, Melissa stood stock-still for many breaths, listening hard to the noises reaching the very attentive. But there were no footsteps hurrying away from beyond the door among them. Only her own breath, and Ruth’s, and distant sounds of outside world—the muted growl of an engine angrily up the street, the distant waterfall of freeway, a thin call of anxious bird, and its answer. And her still slowing heart.
Ruth turned her head again, away from the ceiling (and its paper cosmos) and back toward Melissa, six-weeks-old eyes falling into and holding Melissa’s equally blue ones in an embrace far too mature.
Melissa did not notice at first, but her heart did and seized on this something unnatural, this very alive glance that spoke of intelligence and curiosity, concern even, and alarmed it shook several times as if to wake its owner, then began racing again.
Ruth, as if noticing the telltale heart, looked away, past Melissa, and out the window, to decipher cloudy secrets.
Melissa had yet to move.
:: 30 :: (Pasadena)
“Charles.”
Charles, chewing carefully the way his mother had taught him, did not respond immediately. He finished chewing first. In fact, made a point of it. Then he said, “Yes?”
Melissa drew a deep breath but seemed to think better of it.
“What?” said Charles, looking at his wife.
“You know how you can tell,” began Melissa, but did not continue.
“You know how you can tell, what?”
Another intake of air by Melissa failed to produce a finished sentence, and Charles, knife and fork suspended above his plate of food, began to cloud. Darkly. “You know how you can tell, what?”
“You know how you
can tell when someone’s looking at you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Someone’s looking at you from behind. You can tell.”
After a brief pause, Charles said, “I don’t see how.”
“You don’t?”
“I don’t see how you can tell that.”
“Well, you can.”
“If you say so.”
Melissa took a long look at her husband, as if searching for something, or someone. Charles, in turn, waited what seemed to be a required number of seconds, then arranged another bite onto his fork, brought it to his mouth, and began chewing.
Melissa, too, looked down and returned to her meal.
Ruth, in her portable cot on the floor by the door looked from one of her parents to the other.
:: 31 :: (Pasadena)
“Charles.”
To my ear she sounds part apprehensive, part uncertain, though perhaps mostly discouraged—as if she does not hold much hope that her husband will understand; but Charles, chewing away, does not seem to notice.
I realize that I have been careless, or inconsiderate, or both.
She does not know for certain, for that is one of the conditions of being human, one of their shackles. She does not know, but she is afraid that what she fears is true. This amidst doubts that tell her not to look closer, to let go, to dismiss. For what if it were true? This thing that cannot be. And what cannot be, cannot be true. This is what doubt preaches, that is its mission.
Her startled, searching, frightened eyes have met mine and at least this once I did not veil my curiosity in time—she saw this, this mature interest so impossible in a human only six weeks old.
“Yes?” he says, but not until he has finished what he was doing—for what Charles does must not be interrupted. I am not sure how much mastication his mother may have prescribed per bite, but he is staying true to that amount.
