Frank

by Fred Petrovsky

  I found Amanda in my room.

  “Hi, sweetheart,” I said, holding her, kissing her, but she did not return my embrace. Usually an amazingly understanding woman, she has always known when to ask about my work and when to leave it alone. I’ve prided myself on not bringing work home emotionally. Even when she would ask how my day was I would probably rather not talk about it. I’d say something innocuous like, “Fine,” and hope that would satisfy her.

  But that was gone now.

  “It took me ten minutes to get out of the driveway this morning,” she said to me sternly. “That public relations fool of yours made me drive completely out of my way before clearing me to come here. He’s afraid I’ll be followed. Did you know that?”

  “I’m sorry. It’s just a precaution.”

  “They are camping out on the front lawn. I’ve got those huge television vans with satellite dishes on top lining the street. The neighbors won’t talk to me.”

  “I’ll call the police. I’m sure we can have them removed.”

  “I tried that. But they keep coming back. Sid, I can’t even think anymore. I’m afraid to answer the phone. Do you know what Stephen asked me today? He wanted to know if we were going to stay married.”

  “Sorry,” I said, reaching out, touching her. She pulled away. “What did you tell him?”

  “What do you think? I told him that he was silly and that of course we were staying together. He’s been through that before. He doesn’t need it again.”

  “Did you mean it?”

  “Mean what?”

  “When you told him that we’d still be together.”

  Her eyes welled up. “I don’t know, Sid. You can’t come home. I almost can’t go out.”

  “We’ll move you and Stephen into a hotel somewhere for a while.”

  “I don’t want that for him.”

  “I didn’t mean for this to happen,” I said.

  “But wasn’t it inevitable? Didn’t you know this would happen to us?”

  “No.”

  She wiped her eyes. “I miss you. Miss things the way they were. You were making so much progress with Stephen. Now that’s all gone now. I caught him with matches again. He asked about his real father three times yesterday.”

  “Maybe it’s a good idea if you sent him over there. Roger would take him for a while, wouldn’t he?”

  “Is that what you want? Do you think it’s that simple? Just send Stephen away for a while and everything will be okay?”

  “It was just an idea,” I said. “Besides, Len says everything will blow over soon.”

  “How soon. Tomorrow?”

  “I doubt it.”

  “Last night I got a call from my sister. She’s been contacted by eight newspaper people wanting to know about you.”

  “What did they want to know?”

  “That’s not the point,” she said. “The point is that all of our lives have been turned upside-down.”

  “Don’t you think I know that? I do nothing but think about that every minute of the day.”

  She pulled a magazine from her purse. “Did you see Time?”

  “Yes,” I said, in an effort to keep her from holding it up. The cover featured a full-color picture of me with THE REAL-LIFE DR. FRANKENSTEIN in bold red letters on it. The picture had been taken of me at the news conference and I think it made me look awful. My eyes were downcast and my face looked drawn and sinister. Couldn’t they have used a better photo?

  “I don’t know what to say. I wish there was something I could do. Do you want to stay here for a while? Want to cuddle?”

  She grew quiet. “That would be nice, Sid. That would be something normal to do. But I can’t. I have to pick up Stephen.”

  “Will you come back later?”

  “I can’t.”

  “Maybe I’ll come home.”

  “With all those reporters? That’s exactly what they’re waiting for.”

  “I can sneak in the back.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know. Just an idea. Wait for me.”

  “Wait for you tonight or wait for you in general?”

  “Either one, really.”

  * * * *

  After Amanda left I wandered around the warehouse and found Catherine sitting in one of the chairs we’d set up in sort of a living room area.

  “I was waiting for you to come out. Your wife didn’t look happy. Is everything all right?”

  “No,” I answered her truthfully, all pretenses falling away. “She’s upset. She has every right to be.”

  “She’ll come around. Maybe I’ll talk with her.”

  “What would you say?”

  “I’d invite her to talk with Howard. She hasn’t done that yet. Howard’s asked about her. I think it would be good for her.”

  “I hadn’t thought about that,” I said.

  “There are a lot of things you haven’t thought about. I’m worried about you. So is Howard.”

  “Don’t be. I’ll be fine. Don’t forget who the patient is here. Let me do the doctoring.”

  “Let me ask you a question,” she said. “If you were a patient, would you let a doctor operate on you or even care for you if he were mentally unstable?”

  “I’m not unstable, Catherine. Come on.”

  “Answer my question.”

  “No, I wouldn’t. Of course not.”

  “Then get yourself together.”

  “I’m fine,” I laughed. “What are you talking about?”

  “Take a look in the mirror. Listen to yourself. Your vision is gone. Your confidence is gone. Your infuriating passion for controlling everything is slipping away.”

  “You’re being dramatic, Catherine.”

  “I am not. You know it’s true.”

  “My job is to take care of my patient. Of Howard. I’m doing that. He’s doing well.”

  “We need a lot more of you than your medical expertise. Your heart, for starters. I need you to be strong for us. Howard mentioned it to me just a while ago. He’s worried. He can tell that you’ve changed. He said you wouldn’t listen to him.”

  “That’s silly.”

  “Is it? He said that to me. And that’s all he has, really. He can listen. His universe comes to him through his ears.”

  “What’s this about?”

  “He said there was something he wanted to tell you but you wouldn’t listen.”

  “I have all the time in the world for Howard. You know that.”

  “I’m not so sure about that anymore.”

  * * * *

  I went to Howard again and tried to be as calm and professional as I could. “What’s this all of a sudden about me not listening to you?”

  “You wouldn’t,” he said.

  “Howard, I’ll sit here all day and talk with you if you want.”

  “I think you’re listening to other voices in your head.”

  “What do you want to say, Howard? I’m here for you.”

  Howard asked me, “How do I look?”

  “You look great.”

  “You can tell a lot about my outside.”

  “Of course I can,” I said, wondering where he was going with this.

  “But you can’t see inside,” he said.

  “You’re right, I can’t,” I said, humoring him.

  “I’ve changed.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m smarter than I used to be,” Howard explained. “I have all the time in the world to think things through, to ponder them and take riddles in different directions. I play with them. Move them around. I have the time to follow every thread to its logical conclusion. It’s like a maze in here. But it doesn’t matter if I hit a dead end. I just go back to the beginning and take another route. Catherine reads me word puzzles, and I crack them all.”

  “That’s interesting.”

  “What I wanted to say earlier is that I know how to help you.”

  “Help me with what?”

  “With the
way you’ve been turned into a recluse.”

  “It’s not that bad. It’s a trifle. I’m not concerned in the least.”

  “You are not a very good actor,” he said. “But here’s what I’ve worked out. All the focus is on you because that’s all you’ve given them. You need to shift them to me.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Yes, you do. You understand better than anyone. All you’ve given them is a doctor that has transplanted a brain and created a monster.”

  “You’re not a monster.”

  “They think I am. Because they don’t know me. They fear me because they don’t understand me. They need to see me. To understand me. To talk to me. Your face shouldn’t be in the magazines. It should be mine. I can make them understand. I can bring compassion and intelligence to the table.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” I said, and was being totally honest with him. He was right. “You would do this?”

  “Yes,” he said. “It’s something I can do. An action I can take. Don’t you see? I don’t have to be able to walk to affect people. Catherine suggested I speak with your wife, too. I think that’s a great idea.”

  “She might be afraid. I think a lot of people will be scared of you,” I told him.

  “Are you?”

  “Of course not.”

  “They won’t be either. Catherine tells me that my appearance is pleasing. Frank was handsome.”

  “Yes, he was.”

  “Then let me talk with them,” said Howard. “Let me put a face to their cruel words.”

  19: Howard Lavery

  I spend a lot of time thinking about life and what it is and how I fit into my world. I know these are things that philosophers have been debating for thousands of years. But now I have a lot of time to ponder these questions for hours on end. I’m pretty good at it.

  For the most part, I go back and forth between two sets of logic.

  I often believe that life is nothing more than a simple biological accident. We live and die in great bursts of mental and physical energy in exceedingly short duration. We run around and act upon things and do everything we can to stave off decline and death, but can never be successful. There is no meaning to life, as I see it. That’s what prompts people to create religions and organize themselves and attach labels to material objects. But all the while we thinking organisms are nothing greater than ants and elephants, though we’re made to think we’re superior because we can reason and manipulate our environment. There is nothing greater than ourselves. It’s a sad existence, really, and one that emphasizes chaos, gluttony, and hedonism.

  In my cocoon this jaded view makes sense. In here, I can reach out to larger spaces and zoom out and fly away. It’s easy for me to see that life amounts to very little. There are many people who raise their voices, plan schemes, and try to prove their importance. Sadly, there is also much suffering. All who are living will die, and their children will die, and it goes over and over. All the incredible energy fields inside people’s heads cease, replaced by those of succeeding generations. But nothing changes. Nothing really matters or is lasting. We try to make sense of what we are doing. We scurry about and talk. But the meaning in this life is that there is no meaning. There are no consequences. There are no overriding and all-encompassing things like fate or judgment. And that’s why much of the time my darkness is desperate and suffocating. It makes me want to pull everything out of my body and fade away. If only I could. I haven’t the courage to ask them to let me go. It would hurt so many people who are counting on me.

  It’s the very people who love me who make my existence so bleak sometimes, because I love them so dearly. I think of them constantly. I want to be with them. To talk with them and laugh with them and do things. I want so much to walk among them and kiss them and touch them and bask in the natural, everyday rhythms of life. These are actions I never appreciated when I was well. Now, memories are all that I have. I feel so sorry for myself sometimes. All that I was and all that I ever will be has been cornered and caged. I want to reach out. My love for my family and friends is a large part of my prison because I can never embrace them. But all I do is think about them and what we used to do and the conversations we had and the restaurants we went to and the surprise birthday parties. I think of everything I will never do again with them. If only I could forget, I would be happier. I am a lousy excuse for a human being. At times I’m convinced that my existence is less than a life. Dogs live much better than I do.

  On good days, however, I can sort of see that life is full and rich and purposeful, and I’m at the center of it. This is a world in which things matter, in which people do things that make a difference and hold sway. We live our lives trying to build a better nest for our children. In the afterlife, we bow down and are judged by an enveloping white light and are given new tasks and lessons to learn before being reduced back into spirit form and released into a new womb. Everything we do fits together perfectly. If one person moves this way another moves out the other way in exquisite synchronization, likely without awareness or understanding. Every minute of every day is filled with moments that seem to be coincidence but are not. They are part of a larger plan that has meaning. We are all growing toward a larger energy that speaks of love and wholeness. That’s the best way I can describe it, and it makes sense for me, brings me peace, allows me to rest easy and bask in the generous warmth of life.

  The love that my family has been able to surround me with is evident and so very comforting. I feel their presence constantly. I know they are battling their own colossal struggles, though much of that goes unsaid. When Catherine sits with me, I feel her love. She holds my arm and hand and works my limbs.

  * * * *

  Today was rich, rewarding, and full because three new people came to see me, breaking the monotony and plunging me back into life: Earl Baldwin, Amanda Bernstein, and Dave Hueger. Each brought respect and something that I could act upon. Situations in which I was needed. Decisions for me to make. Conversations in which I was an active participant. I seem to no longer be relegated to a slab. I am an integral part of my treatment and the swirling activity that has become, as had been predicted, a seminal event.

  One of the reasons I feel optimistic today is that I can see better.

  Not really. I can’t see anything at all. I can’t make out any shapes. Nor can I sense any depth. But the faint sensation of light that I have been experiencing for quite some time has blossomed into something I can only describe as sight. What exactly can I see? Nothing. Probably never will. But when the room is dark I can tell. And when lights are turned on I can see a whiteness of some sort. When an object is placed before my face I can detect its nearness and see something close to a shadow. It’s nothing really other than an annoyance, because it serves no purpose.

  For a long time I didn’t tell anyone about it. Not even Catherine. I didn’t want to raise her expectations. But there’s no use hiding any progress I make from now on because such improvement is so very difficult to hide. Those closest to me can tell when I’m feeling different almost before I can. They are better able to let me know when I’m coherent or in a dream.

  Dr. Bernstein calls my sight sensation reanastamosis. He was thrilled, of course, with this development, though annoyed that I’d not told him sooner. Still, he took great pains to quash my expectations of sight.

  “Don’t get excited, Howard,” he told me. “There are one-point-five million axons in each optic nerve. And half of each nerve crosses over into the brain. I don’t know what’s really happened here, but it seems that a tract has found itself to another nerve ending. Or the rods might be involved in this as well. Establishing sight again is impossible. But I don’t know what’s brought this on.”

  I didn’t care. I had feeling in my arm and could almost move it. I could sense light. And perhaps most important, I was interacting with my environment and making a difference once again in people’s lives.

  * * * *

 
; When Neil asked if he could bring Earl Baldwin to see me I answered, “Of course. Why haven’t you brought him sooner?”

  “We’ve been protective of you, Dad,” he said, sounding a bit bewildered.

  “Protective of what?” I asked. “I can hear questions. I can answer them. What are you protecting me from?”

  “From whatever,” he said. “From the public. From the media. From the thousands of people who might abuse and take advantage of you.”

  “Earl won’t take advantage of me,” I told Neil. “I’d trust him over most people I know. And from now on, no protecting me. All this managing and shielding is driving me crazy. Let me back in the world, Neil.”

  I’m not sure he understood. Neil’s a good son. I’m proud of him. He took charge of my business affairs after the accident. Although I’m sure his taking over the gallery was motivated by guilt, he’s a virtuous person who is only now really coming into his own and faced with some of the same self-doubts and questions that I’m going through. When he visits me he spells his mother or the doctor and, on occasion, gives me one of my scheduled injections. Though we only talk sporadically, just knowing that he’s walking the floor of the gallery has brought me much comfort and makes me feel closer to him than ever before. I think we’re getting along better now than we have in years. It’s ironic that it took something like this for us to adequately respect and understand each other.

  Neil brought Earl to see me. Oh, I wished I could see him. Earl’s scraggly, bearded face would have been great medicine. I’d have smiled and laughed just seeing him come in the room.

  “How are you, Earl?” I asked, wishing I could put an exclamation mark after his name.

  I didn’t hear Earl at all. He didn’t answer. I waited a long time then asked, “Are you there? Why aren’t you saying anything?”

  “I don’t know,” I finally heard Earl say, and I was overjoyed at hearing his wonderfully high-pitched voice. “I can’t believe it. It’s the most incredible thing.”

  “It’s okay,” I said. “It’s me, you old fart head.” “Fart head” was an affectionate name that I’d given Earl years ago for his propensity toward flatulence. If you smelled something awful, it was Earl. I don’t know what he ate, nor what his digestive system did differently than others, but he couldn’t help but fart a lot. He was a bit embarrassed by it, and had devised secret ways of expelling his noxious gas without people knowing. He was always going into other rooms and returning. Between us it was a joke. In a way, he was proud of it. He liked it when I called him fart head. “Thanks for coming.”