by Kirk Farber
As I dig, the sweat pours out of me. I’m going through a transformation, but I’m not sure if it’s from life to death or death to life. I feel like other zombies might be approaching soon, around the corner at any moment, each of them lying down in their own graves with dreamless sleep and hopeless sighs. I wonder if I will join them.
chapter 59
Today I wouldn’t mind if a postcard arrived from Tokyo. I might be tempted to travel to Japan, and I hear there’s an entire class of people who live in six-by-three-foot tubes stacked so high they need ladders to reach them. Rows and rows of little tombs, people existing inside plastic cocoons, a city full of morphing insects.
The TV news says a story is coming up that may leave me shocked and dismayed. It’s about my drinking water. I sit through two commercial breaks and still no water story. I wonder if there might be something wrong with our copper pipes, but then the news people return to caution me that it’s about what might be in my actual water. It’s not what I’d expect. One more break and they tell me if I drink enough water, it could have unexpected results.
I go to the kitchen and drink a full glass. And almost exactly as I finish swallowing the last of it, the feeling comes: a woozy, ringing-head sensation. The news was right; it’s not what I expected. Suddenly lilacs are in full bloom in my kitchen. The sweet scent fills me up and ruins my vision. My skin begins to tingle, little electric sparks that flow up my arms and down my spine. And while mentally I feel shocked and dismayed, deep down I’m peaceful. It’s a strange juxtaposition.
“I can’t be late,” a voice says, “they’ll leave without me.”
It’s Mom. Her voice is faint. I instinctively walk toward the basement stairs.
“Mom,” I say, “can you hear me?”
“Let me through, I must get on this bus,” she says.
“What bus, Mom?” I walk down a few stairs and her voice intensifies.
“I’ll be late!”
“What bus?”
“I can’t be late,” she’s yelling now. “It’s important!”
“I can hear you. Let me help.”
“Oh, you all forgot about me and now I’m late. I can’t be late.”
“Where are you going?” I ask. Lilacs have followed me. I can practically taste them, bitter petals on my tongue.
“I must make it there.”
I go down the rest of the stairs and lean in next to the wine bottle thinking that maybe if I’m closer, she’ll hear me better. “Where do you need to be?”
“Don’t act like you don’t know,” she says.
My flesh freezes. Did she really hear me? Was Candyce telling the truth? Somehow this doesn’t make me feel better. “What do you mean? How would I know?”
“Everybody knows the bus to Timbuktu should’ve been here already,” she says, although now it sounds like she’s talking to someone else entirely—some kind of supernatural ticket clerk? “You can’t be late for the Emperor of Japan!”
I don’t know what to do. She sounds upset. I try to console her. “You’ll make the bus, don’t worry,” I say. “It just pulled up, time to get on.”
Slowly the lilacs fade and the voices with it, as if in direct response to my words. My skin loses its chill and my balance returns, and while the trouble seems to be over, I wonder what it means that I’m all alone in my basement squatting over a bottle of wine.
chapter 60
A pair of female bronze legs walk toward me, their gait swift. They seem to have a conviction about them, a purpose all their own, as if they’re disconnected from their body. They are sleek, toned, and strong—not to be messed with. If I weren’t lying under forty pounds of cool earth, I might sit up to take a better look at what rests above them. For now, her top half is hidden in the dark shadows caused by the bright sun behind her. I’m back at the spa because I couldn’t get the shape of my backyard spa right. The contours were all off, the whole aesthetic blown by inferior corners. So now I lie back in a professional outdoor mud spa, a ceramic tub filled with plenty of the good stuff. My phone, ice water, lemon slice, and complimentary towels rest on a nearby table.
My cell phone rings. I manage to squirm one hand to the surface to check the number. I don’t recognize it. Because I seem to be attracting the unknown lately, I’m especially cautious. The two bronze legs have come to an abrupt stop at the edge of my bath. I flip open my phone. “Hello?”
“Is this, uh, is this Sid?” It’s a woman’s voice: soft, misunderstood, friendly.
“Who’s this?”
“Melanie. We met at the coffee shop. If this is Sid.”
“Oh. Jane. Hello.”
“Jane?” she asks.
“No, this is Sid. Hello? Did you say Melanie? Hi!”
I pull my other arm from the muck to shade my eyes. The sun radiates from behind the owner of the legs. It’s Gazelle, and she’s holding my credit card up like a question. “Mr. Higgins—”
I nod. She doesn’t nod back. “Sorry Melanie, I was talking to someone else. I’m, uh, I’m at a restaurant.”
“Oh, maybe I should call another time?”
Gazelle taps her foot, shifts her weight from leg to leg. “We have a problem.”
“That might be better,” I say. “Is that okay? Maybe I shouldn’t have answered. That was rude.” I give Gazelle the okay sign. She’s not okay.
“I thought maybe we could get coffee sometime,” she says.
“Of course, yes. Coffee. I love coffee.” Melanie laughs at this. I love coffee. Very smooth. I laugh too then, for too long. Coffee. Ha ha ha.
I wish I could tell Melanie about how telephone conversations in general make me anxious. I can never express with full intention what it is I’m trying to say. There is so much slippage, so many missed implications and lost nonverbal actions, it’s a bit perplexing.
She says something in a funny voice. “Iced coffee is cool,” I think she says.
She must be trying to be funny, so I laugh because I think it’s polite to respond to her joke. But then I realize I haven’t spoken in too many moments and I’m pretty sure it comes across as a stonewall to her attempt at levity, which she’s using to cover up her surprise over my rudeness of answering the phone when I’m too busy to talk. The silence grows heavier; I feel it press against me.
“Well,” I say, “let’s get together, then. Can you call me back in a little while?”
“Sure I can. Enjoy your meal.”
“What? Oh, yes, very good. Yum-yum.” Does anyone actually say yum-yum?
I clap the phone shut. Gazelle, once a coltish beauty, now towers over me like a megalith, arms crossed, her resolute figure refusing to block the noon sun from my photosensitive eyes. She wants me out. I’m not quite sure what to do, so I take a deep breath and sink below the surface.
chapter 61
The boy doctor who recently gave me stitches now has the pleasure of setting my pinky. He is bursting with questions but too embarrassed to ask them. Questions like: Why are you so dirty? Is this new injury from another fall? Who was the supermodel who brought you in, and why did she tell the nurse to make you pay cash?
And I have similar questions, but not nearly as immediate, although worthwhile nonetheless. Questions like: Who would guess that the Arizona Day Spa has two security staff ready and willing to forcibly extract bad-credit customers from their mud baths? And what were they so angry about? They’ve never had a credit card rejected before?
Chip gently separates my pinky finger from my ring finger and asks if it hurts. Then he touches my elbow and asks if that hurts. He does this touching and asking for a while, and I alter my response from a grunt to a head-shake. In between pokes he looks me over with hangdog eyes. One of his jabs makes me suck air through my teeth. Satisfied, he skips over to the medical supply cabinet, and away from my grimy body.
“Digging a swimming pool,” I loudly offer. The doctor continues his supply search, rummaging through boxes, opening and closing cabinet doors. “Thought I’d j
ump in early, fell on the slope of the deep end.”
He holds up a roll of white tape like it’s found treasure, then grabs a yardstick of metal and foam. He turns to face me. “This will only take a minute.”
As if on cue, a young woman down the hall screams for her life. I jump.
The doctor is unfazed. He’s put in his time down here in the ER. This makes me feel a little better. The woman screams again. “I want to die,” she shouts. “Let me die already.” This, followed by the sloppy sounds of vomit spattering on tile.
The doctor begins his work: focused, intense, but moving with ease. “Kids,” he tsk-tsks. “Too many of them coming into the ER full of alcohol or drugs, or both.” He bends the metal-and-foam bar over my pinky and wraps the tip up with tape. “Wasn’t like that when I was a kid,” he says.
When was that, last year? I want to ask. But he’s doing such a confident job I keep my inside thoughts inside. He seems to have entered manhood in between my injuries. My pinky feels better already.
Then he says, “You’re going to feel a little pressure.”
I wince because I’ve never heard that line and experienced good things afterward.
“I haven’t done anything yet,” he says, and then, quickly, “Okay, here we go.” His squeeze adds the promised pressure, while adding nausea to my list of ailments.
“Extra-strength Tylenol should kill the pain,” he says. “Let me know how that splint holds up.” He clutches my other hand and brushes his thumb over the scar. I flinch. “Looks like that healed really well. You’re a fast healer. Your pinky should be good as new in no time.”
The moaning down the hall winds up again, quickly escalating to a holler. In scolding tones, a nurse reminds the patient it’s her own fault she’s eating barium-chalk sandwiches. “I hate you!” the voice shrieks. “I just want to die!”
My cell phone rings. It’s my new friend Melanie. I can’t answer with all this noise. I pick up my pace going down the tiled hallway, careful not to bump my bionic pinky against anyone. My footsteps echo off the walls. So does the ringing of the phone.
Ring!
Shit. I can’t not answer.
“I hate you, bitch!” the junkie yells. “Go to hell!”
Ring!
Unhappy faces in the hallway. I remember cell phones aren’t allowed in hospitals. Nurses snap their fingers. Doctors shake their heads.
Ring!
“Kill me now!” the junkie screams.
Snap, snap.
Walking faster.
Ring!
“Hey, buddy,” someone yells, “turn off your phone!”
I spin around to confront the yeller, to let them know I’m trying, and promptly slam my pinky into the wall. I suck air through my teeth.
Bright stars of pain.
Pressure, my doctor would call it.
The phone falls silent. I scurry down the hall a few more steps, but see Melanie has not left a message. My escape was in vain. The junkie releases another primal scream. It bounces from wall to wall, off the ceiling and across the hall to meet me with a final exclamation point, as if to transmit the entire hospital’s disdain for me.
My pinky throbs in time with my racing heartbeat, a pulsing radio signal sent out to all who might be listening. Enough already, the signal says, I’ve had enough. The demon junkie laugh-sobs behind me as I step through the automatic doors. Outside, blinding brightness. I squint into the sun. I can already feel a headache coming on.
chapter 62
It was summer when Zoe and I moved in together. Balmy heat. Sticky skin and heavy lungs. Our little love nest was not receiving the cross-breeze we were promised by the landlord. Instead, stale air. I wanted to be as stationary as possible, so I sat at the foot of our futon: slumped shoulders, mouth slack, as if this might make breathing easier. There I sat, waiting for the night to arrive and deliver its cool air.
Zoe was doing something unnecessary in the kitchen. She’d been moving about a lot that day, even in the heat, pacing between the bedroom and the kitchen and the bathroom. Doing nothing tasks. Wiping counters. Rinsing clean dishes. Rearranging items in the fridge. Putting them back as she had found them. Finally, she stopped with the fidgeting.
“Do you remember what your most recent love note said to me?” she called out.
It took a moment for my brain to turn back on. “What?”
“You said you loved doing anything with me.”
“I do.”
“And then you listed everything we do together.”
“Yeah?” By this time, I had slouched into the kitchen. She stood with her arms crossed, looking out the window, a dishrag hanging from one hand.
She turned to look at me then, an accusatory glare. “Do you know what the list was?”
I looked up at the ceiling, then back at her. I waited for her to tell me.
“Watching TV. Sitting on the couch. Eating dinner.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well?” she asked.
“Sorry for enjoying those things with you?”
“We don’t do anything,” she said, and snapped the dishrag in the air. “We sit on the couch. Watch TV.”
“Eat dinner,” I added.
She took a deep breath and let her cheeks inflate with the exhale.
“You’ve been thinking about this for a while,” I said.
“I need to see more.”
“All right.”
“I need to see a lot more.”
“All right!”
“Sid, I want to travel,” she said. “I want to see everything.” She twisted the rag in her hands.
“That’s a lot.”
She shook her head. “I knew you wouldn’t get it.”
“I’m sorry. What do you want to see? Tell me.”
“I want to see the streets of London, the cafés of Paris, the churches of Barcelona, the rain forests of Costa Rica. There’s so much out there. I want to get out of here. I don’t want to sit on this couch ever again.”
“Let’s do it.”
She looked around the apartment, at the walls, at the floor. “You don’t really want that,” she said, then looked back at me again.
“Sure I do.” Her eyebrows rose a little, almost in a hopeful expression, but then it changed to something else, something I didn’t recognize. I tried to get back the hopeful expression. “Let’s start in Costa Rica,” I offered. “Mountains and oceans, hiking and surfing. It’d be great! I hear the monkeys come right up to you like deer at a petting zoo. I love monkeys.”
“I don’t mean—I mean, I guess I don’t want that. I think I need to do this alone.”
“You want to travel the world alone?”
She nodded. I stared at the floor. She was right; I didn’t want that. I didn’t want her to travel the world alone, and I didn’t really see how anyone could want that—to be alone. Maybe there was something I was missing. “Well that’s the last Hallmark card I write my own message on, that’s for sure.”
Her expression remained serious. “I’m sorry. I’ve always felt like I don’t belong here, like where I should really be is a million miles from here. I need to go there.”
“That’s pretty far.”
“Please try to understand,” she said.
I thought at the time that her need to explore might be due to my problem with sustaining happiness, although I never found out if she even knew that it was a problem. But there were times when Zoe and I would be having a happy moment, a sweet occasion like a shared laugh, or simply walking down a sidewalk hand in hand after a movie. And maybe we would exchange an inside joke and smile and kiss and blush like teenagers, or stroll along with the confidence of trusting lovers. When experiencing these moments, my imagination would often take over and finish the scene with something dreadful. A van careening around the corner and masked men kidnapping Zoe at knifepoint. A street thug snatching her purse and shooting us dead. A homeless man asking for money, and after we drop a coin in his coffers, he tosses a
cid in our faces; screaming, we clutch at our melting flesh.
Sometimes when Zoe and I were lying in bed, we’d spoon and drift off to sleep, but my body would twitch and I’d be awake again. I’d sit straight up and look down at her, waiting for her to tell me the news she’d been hiding for weeks but had been afraid to reveal. “What is it,” I’d ask. “What is it already?” And then she’d look up at me with teary, red eyes. “I’m dying,” she’d say, “I’ve only got three weeks to live. I don’t know how else to say it.” And then we’d sit there together, hugging each other, staring at the walls, waiting for them to whisper answers to us, because we wouldn’t have any and there would be nothing else to do.
During our trip to Manhattan, Zoe and I had coffee at a sidewalk café. We were enjoying ourselves tremendously, watching the people, feeling the hum of the city, listening to the languages float by. And this guy kept looking over at us, studying something about us, something that was more interesting to him than the other millions of people on the island. And soon my thought became that he was sizing us up. We were clearly tourists, and after we finished our coffees, we were sure to be stabbed in the park. And why? Because the happy moment was lasting all day long. It was an endless happy moment, an inexplicable thing I didn’t trust—something so extraordinary and awesome that only a complicated, paranoid evil plot could balance out the universe.
So when Zoe asked me to understand about her wanting to travel alone, I nodded. This would make her happy, and maybe she could sustain it better without me around. She touched my shoulder and let her hand slide down my arm until she was holding my hand, and I agreed to try to understand, and I went about pretending it was okay that she wanted to be a million miles away without me.
From then on, the only distance covered was the space between our conversations. When we did talk, it was usually about a new culture or language, or a city that neither of us had visited. Places nobody in our entire hometown had ever visited. National Geographic stuff. Impressive-looking locations. I really did try to understand, but I don’t think I ever got there. What I am beginning to understand is that Zoe never got to where she wanted to go, either. She didn’t make it a thousand miles, let alone a million. In fact, she stopped about three hundred feet from the Highway 20 overpass. That’s what the police report said, anyway. I should ask Zero. He was there.
