“Oh, what a dear you are,” his aunt says when he tells her the problem has been cleared up. “How about I fix us both a little something to eat after my shower?”
“That’s all right, Aunt Jewel. I just had breakfast.” This is a lie. Mead is actually quite hungry. Would, indeed, enjoy having something to eat but can think of nothing in his aunt’s kitchen that he would feel safe putting down his throat.
“Oh, but you can’t leave, Teddy. I haven’t seen you since you got home. You have to tell me what you’ve been up to. I’ll only be a minute. Please stay.”
How do you say no to a woman in pink curlers whose son has just died and whose funeral you missed?
Aunt Jewel closes the bathroom door and, as soon as the shower turns on, Mead hurries downstairs to call the store. To call for backup. “You’ve got to get over here, Dad,” he says into the receiver. “You’ve got to see this with your own eyes to believe it. Aunt Jewel needs help and she needs it now.”
AUNT JEWEL ENTERS THE KITCHEN looking no different than before her shower. She is wearing the same nightgown and the same pink rollers in her hair, the only indication that she has taken a bath at all being the ringlets of wet hair at the nape of her neck.
“My, my, my. Look how you’ve grown,” she says and takes hold of Mead’s hand. “Why, you were just an itty-bitty thing when you first went off to that big-city university. I was so worried. I was afraid you wouldn’t manage up there all alone.”
“You were?”
“Sure. And I aired my concerns with your mother too. Told her I thought it’d be better if you waited a year. Grew up a little.”
“I’ll bet she took that advice really well.”
“Wouldn’t speak to me for six months.”
Mead laughs. If not for the dirty dishes, unwashed clothes, and tumbleweed-size dust balls in every corner, he would think his aunt just as sane as the next guy. Maybe even more.
“Come. Sit down,” she says and pats the seat of a kitchen chair, then opens the refrigerator and takes out the half-wheel of cheese and box of saltines. To make room for them on the table, she has to stack a few of the dirty dishes one on top of the other —a real juggling act at this point —then cuts a slice of cheese off one end of the wheel, places it on a saltine, and hands it to Mead. The cheese is dry and hard on the side that was exposed to the air inside the refrigerator. Mead hesitates, but only for a second, then pops it in his mouth and chews and coughs when a fragment of saltine lodges in his airway. He coughs a second time but the damned thing just won’t budge.
“Let me get you some water,” his aunt says and walks over to the sink. She lifts a glass out of the pool of gray sludge, fills it under the tap, and hands it to Mead. Dysentery. That is the word that goes through his mind. He sees himself in a couple of hours, rolling around on the floor in pain, running to the bathroom every fifteen minutes. But he takes the glass from her anyway. From his nurturing aunt. The mother with no child left to pamper. He takes it from her and sips it so she can feel like a mother again. Even if just for a moment.
“There now, isn’t that better?” she says and pats his hand.
Mead nods, then starts to cry. Not from choking on the cracker but because he realizes that he has been acting as crazy as his aunt, pretending that everything is fine when in fact it is not. Sitting here in her fucked-up house drinking toxic water when he should be sitting at the desk in his dorm room writing his valedictory address. It’s just so unfair. Life is so unfair. Why did Percy have to choose that day to come visit him? Why did Mead have to cross paths with Herman? If only he had waited another year before going off to college, grown up a bit first as his aunt suggested to his mother, then maybe he wouldn’t have even run into Herman Weinstein in the first place. Simple as that. But he didn’t wait. And Percy did choose that day. And Mead did run into Herman. And so here he sits in his aunt’s fucked-up kitchen, both their lives in shambles.
A WHITE HEARSE IS PARKED AT THE CURB, FEGLEY BROTHERS inscribed across the side of it in gold lettering. A middle-aged man is seated in the front seat, on the passenger side. “Who’s that sitting in the hearse?” Mead asks his father.
“Dr. Breininger. He’s a psychiatrist. And it isn’t a hearse, it’s an ambulance.”
Mead studies the doctor’s silhouette. Stern. Impassive. His thoughts a secret from the world. A man like Mead’s father who has seen more than his fair share of what the rest of us go out of our way to avoid. “Did he bring along a straitjacket?”
“Yes, but I doubt we’ll have to use it. Jewel doesn’t seem to be in much danger of hurting herself.”
“Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of Uncle Martin, about how he is going to react when he comes home and finds us here.”
Mead’s father gives Mead an I-don’t-think-that’s-very-funny look and steps past him into the house. But Mead didn’t mean for it to be funny. He is dead serious.
His father takes a tour of the house, walking from room to room, assessing the situation, weighing his son’s comments over the phone against his own perceptions. By the time he enters the kitchen, where Jewel is helping herself to a cheese-and-saltine sandwich, he has seen enough to know that Mead was not exaggerating. Not even a little bit. She rises to her feet and says, “Lynn, what a pleasant surprise. Teddy and I were just enjoying a little snack, would you care to join us?”
“Jewel,” Mead’s father says, “when was the last time you did the dishes?” But he might as well have said, “Jewel, have you lost you’re frigging mind?” Because his straightforward question changes the atmosphere in the kitchen from one of ignorant bliss to one of uncomfortable self-consciousness. Jewel looks around as if seeing the kitchen for the first time in weeks.
“And the dining room,” Mead’s father says, pouring salt into an open wound. “It looks as if you haven’t cleaned up in there since the funeral.”
Jewel’s eyes fill with tears. “Martin said I didn’t have to, he said I could wait until he gets back. But he hasn’t gotten back, Lynn, and I’m beginning to get worried.”
Mead’s father wraps his arm around Jewel and eases her down into a chair. “He just went to St. Louis, Jewel. He’ll be back later this afternoon, don’t worry.” She pops back up and says, “Really? You have no idea how relieved I am to hear that, Lynn. I’ve been waiting so long. Too long.”
“Okay, well, you just sit here and relax,” he says and eases her back into the chair, “and Teddy and I will start cleaning the house up, how does that sound?”
“You can’t!” Jewel says and pops up out of the chair again. “Not until after he gets here. All those people. They came to his party and brought all that food. They were so thoughtful and generous. He has to see. He has to see how much everyone loves him. If you clean it all up before he gets here, Percy will never know. And he’s got to know, Lynn, he’s got to know how much people love him.”
Talking rationally to an irrational person is a waste of time. Mead’s father knows this all too well from working for so many years with so many people in mourning. So instead of talking, he pats Jewel’s hand, nods as if he understands, and eases her into the chair yet again then sits down himself. He looks exhausted. As if he is trying to wrap his head around the size of this one. Mead places his hand on his father’s shoulder, as a way of showing his support, because for the first time in his life he understands —really understands —how hard his father’s job is. How brave and fearless the man is to do what he does for a living: to deal with people in their most vulnerable state.
“Dad,” Mead says but his father doesn’t respond. “Dad,” he says again and shakes the man’s shoulder. His father snaps back from wherever it is he goes at such times and looks up. “Maybe now would be a good time to go,” Mead says and nods in the direction of the waiting ambulance.
His father reaches into his breast pocket and pulls out two blue pills —pills that look like the ones the hospital gave Mead after he hit Forsbeck —and places them in Jewel’s palm. T
hen he picks up the glass of gray water and says, “Drink these down, Jewel. They’ll help you sleep.” And even though Mead is pretty damned sure his aunt has done little but sleep and dream about Percy for the past three months, she swallows them down and then allows herself to be eased out of the chair and up the steps to bed.
“How come you didn’t just put her in the ambulance?” Mead asks when his father returns.
“Because that is a decision only your uncle can make.”
“You’re kidding, right? I mean it’s not like the man hasn’t known what’s been going on around here all this time. Do you really think he’s the best one to judge?”
His father pulls a pair of rubber gloves out of a kitchen drawer and offers them to Mead. “Would you prefer to wash or dry?”
“What I would prefer to do is to get the hell out of here before Uncle Martin comes home and blows his stack, that’s what I’d prefer.”
The gloves hit the floor with a loud smack. “My god, Teddy,” his father says. “Do you really think every problem in this world can be solved by running away?”
“What? No, of course not.”
“Well, that sure as hell comes as a surprise to me.”
Mead has never before heard his father swear, never before seen him throw anything on the floor, never before been the target of the man’s anger. “Dad, why’re you yelling at me? This isn’t my fault.”
“Take a look around you, Teddy,” he says and waves his arm through the air. “Do you see this? Do you know what this is? This is what happens when you try to run away from your problems. They pile up all around you, one filthy dish on top of the other. Sure, you can walk around pretending you don’t see them, but the rest of the world will, Teddy. The rest of the world will see your mess even if you can’t.”
“What’re you saying, Dad, that I’ve made a mess of my life? Is that what you think? What the hell do you know about my life anyway?”
“Nothing. I know absolutely nothing because you won’t tell me. You won’t reach out for my help even though you so obviously need it. I mean, how the hell are your mother and I supposed to help you if you won’t talk to us? My god, Teddy, don’t you realize that we love you more than anyone else in this world?”
Mead stares into his father’s red face that can’t be more than twelve inches from his own, then turns and storms out of the room.
“There you go again,” his father says. “Running away.”
Mead stops dead in his tracks, his father’s tongue as sharp as a knife to his back, spins around and stomps back into the kitchen. “You of all people should talk,” Mead says. “I mean, who really has his head buried in the sand around here, huh? Your own brother is completely fucked up, his wife half out of her mind, and you didn’t have a clue. They were right under your nose the whole time and you didn’t have a clue. Even when I told you I saw her dressed up as if for Halloween in the freezer section of the A & P, you still chose to look the other way. God forbid someone around here should admit that there’s a problem that can’t be fixed by doing extra credit. God forbid someone should show any signs of weakness. What a horrible embarrassment that would be, right? It’d only bring shame upon the family to admit human failure, to admit to being anything less than perfect. Best to sweep it under the rug and keep going. Strap on a pair of blinders and pretend everything is fine. Don’t look left, don’t look right, just plow straight ahead. Well, guess what. Surprise, surprise. I’m the only one around here who isn’t wearing fucking blinders.”
His hand strikes like lightning, slapping Mead across the face. It doesn’t hurt so much as surprise. Mead had no idea his father was capable of such emotion; it’s a side of the man he has never seen before. He wasn’t sure it even existed and is relieved to know it has not been lost altogether. But then, like a popped balloon, his father’s anger deflates, replaced by a look of regret, a look that adds years to his face. He stares at the floor, the house so quiet Mead swears he can hear the ants in the next room. Chewing. A million of them all at once.
“You’re right,” his father says. “I screwed up. I admit it. I sensed that something was wrong and didn’t pursue it. I told myself that time was all Martin and Jewel needed to heal. Obviously, I was wrong.” Then he lifts his eyes and adds, “So now it’s your turn, Teddy. Tell me what happened up there at that university.”
Mead meets his father’s gaze. Eye-to-eye. He has never before looked at him like this. Straight on. Man-to-man. His heart thumps in his chest, so loud that Mead can barely hear himself when he says, “I befriended the wrong guy, Dad. I made a deal with the devil and now I’m going to have to pay the price.”
“What guy?”
“Herman Weinstein.”
“You mean that boy your mother and I met? I thought he was your friend.”
“So did I. Or so I told myself. But really I just used him.”
“Used him? That doesn’t sound like you, Teddy, that doesn’t sound like you at all. Tell me what happened. I want to hear the whole story. From the start.”
But before Mead can utter even a single word, the front door flies open and Uncle Martin comes sailing through it.
“GET OUT OF MY HOUSE.” This seems to be the only thing Uncle Martin knows how to say. “Get out of my house.” Mead’s dad tries to explain what happened. The chain of events that led up to now. How Jewel called his house by mistake, trying to get a hold of Martin at the store. How Teddy answered the phone then came over here to help her unclog the drain in the tub. “Get out of my house,” Martin says and Mead’s dad explains that Teddy then called him at the store, concerned about his aunt. (Concerned, that’s the word his father uses. Concerned.) That Jewel is now sleeping upstairs. “Get out of my house,” Martin says and Mead’s dad explains how ashamed he is, that he had no idea what was going on over here. “Get out of my house.” That he wishes Martin had felt he could reach out to his brother for help. “Get out of my house.” That he believes Jewel needs more than just time to heal. “I SAID GET THE HELL OUT OF MY HOUSE!”
Mead’s dad then tells his brother that he thinks Jewel should be admitted to a mental hospital. “Where she can get counseling so she can get better,” he says, all calm and cool. As if he were trying to talk Martin in off a window ledge.
Mead’s uncle goes all silent, like the eye of a hurricane. He looks into the living room to his right and then into the dining room to his left. The front door is still open, and behind him, out by the curb, Dr. Breininger emerges from the white ambulance, slides a gurney out of the rear of the vehicle, and begins to make his way toward the house. He’s about halfway up the walk when Martin explodes, his right arm sweeping across the dining room table and sending the green beans almondine, the beef stroganoff, the chicken noodle casserole, the macaroni-and-cheese, the fruit salad, and hundreds of black ants sailing through the air. The walls become an instant work of abstract art. Jackson Pollock would be in awe. Bowls and plates shatter into pieces. Tupperware bounces and rolls across the floor. Martin winds up for a second assault on the table but before he can inflict any more damage Mead’s dad jumps into action and wraps his arms like a straitjacket around his brother. A struggle ensues. Martin scoops up a handful of whipped potatoes and mashes it into his brother’s face. But Mead’s dad refuses to let go and both of them end up on the floor, his uncle pinned under his father. And then it ends. Just like that. Martin stops fighting and goes limp, his anger having suddenly converted into tears. Mead turns away then. Not because he is embarrassed by his uncle’s display of emotion but because he understands, intuitively, the importance of maintaining one’s dignity at a time like this.
While the two grown men are still lying on the floor, Dr. Breininger sticks his head through the open front door and says, “Excuse me, but can someone please come help me get this gurney up the steps?”
MEAD’S MOTHER GOES WITH THEM, with Aunt Jewel and Uncle Martin and Dr. Breininger to the mental hospital in St. Louis. Mead’s father called her while, upstairs,
Martin and the good doctor roused Jewel from sleep and got her onto the gurney. She arrived in what seemed like seconds. Didn’t even put on lipstick first. She held on to Jewel’s hand as the gurney was rolled across the front lawn, then sat in the back of the ambulance and wouldn’t let go. Mead tries to remember the last time his mother held his hand like that and, for a second, feels jealous. But only for a second. Then he picks up the rubber gloves his father threw on the floor and turns his attention to a more important matter. Namely, cleaning up the mess that used to be his aunt and uncle’s home.
He starts where he and his father left off: with the kitchen sink. The drain belches a few times as murky water pours down its throat, then Mead refills the basin, squirting pink liquid detergent into a stream of clear tap water. Hot water. Hot enough to scorch bare skin. He soaps up a plate, rinses it off, and sets it in the drying rack.
His father steps up beside him, lifts the plate out of the rack, and begins drying it. Mead grabs a second dish, soaps it up, and waits for his father to ask him to expound on his earlier confession. To spill his guts. To confess his sins. Only his father doesn’t say a word. He just sets the clean plate in the cupboard and waits for the next one, waits for Mead to start talking when he is good and ready.
God, how Mead hates that. How his father always has to play the role of Mr. Patience. Mr. Sensitivity. Mr. Understanding. Mr. Holier-Than-Thou. A bubble of anger wells up in his chest but Mead fights to keep it down because it is inappropriate. For another time or place. Not now. Not when his father is still upset about his brother. And Jewel. Mead is being petty. Childish. He knows this but he can’t help it. He tells the bubble to go away but that just makes it grow bigger. Mead feels as if he is going to burst. As if he can’t breathe. Rinses off the plate and throws it into the drying rack.
Life After Genius Page 32
