Dive From Clausen's Pier

by Ann Packer

  During those days of sewing I felt distracted a lot. At work I’d suddenly come to myself, a book in hand, a wall of shelves before me, and I’d actually have to shake my head to get myself clear of whatever stage of the sewing I’d been at when I’d stopped the night before. Viktor shot me his usual looks of concern, and I gave him sad smiles, let him think it was all just too hard, having Mike in the hospital—that that was my problem.

  Of course, that was my problem. I knew that every minute, sewing or not sewing, with Mike or not. And he got lower and lower, sometimes barely registered my presence, other times spent whole evenings complaining about little things—why no one had brought a new radio, how tired he was of the pictures we’d put on his dresser—because the big things were too big to complain about, just too big.

  Part of rehab was psychological, and one evening his parents told me that he was refusing to see his therapist, alone or in the group meetings on Tuesday afternoons. They were worried. They’d even gone to see the therapist, and although he’d told them that Mike’s rejection of him was normal, they weren’t comforted.

  Visiting hours were over, and I was sitting with them in the main lobby, talking. Mr. Mayer seemed especially distressed. He appeared to regard the whole rehab process as something akin to an assembly line: muscle tone, mind tone; physical therapy, occupational therapy, psychotherapy; one step after another leading to wellness, or at least to Mike’s going home.

  “It’s a stumbling block, is how I see it,” he said. “He’s got to get beyond this so he can move on.”

  Mrs. Mayer frowned. “Imagine someone coming around and trying to get you to talk about your feelings. You wouldn’t like it, either.”

  “I don’t need it.”

  “What makes you so sure Mike does?”

  Mr. Mayer shook his head emphatically. “Lord, you’d think he’d just broken his leg, that attitude! It’s part of the treatment.”

  Mrs. Mayer turned to me. “Do you think he’s depressed, dear?”

  I nodded, and suddenly I remembered a day with him early in the previous spring—a beautiful day, cloudless, almost soft. It was a Saturday, and after a late breakfast we left my apartment and went to James Madison Park, where we gravitated toward the little playground there, full of children. We sat side by side on a bench and watched, and I let myself slip into a reverie of separateness, of welcome solitude, where I was alone in a place I’d never been before and happy about it. I’d been having such dreams for a while and had mastered the art of slipping away without so much as a flicker to alert him to my desertion. But this time he seemed to know. He glanced at me once or twice, then put a hand on my knee, removing it when I looked at him. “What?” I said, and he shook his head. He stared at the children. “I guess I’m kind of depressed,” he said at last, and then we sat there without speaking: I sat there without speaking. Later that same day we went to a movie, and sitting in the dark I actually fought the urge to reach for his hand, as if my body still needed to be trained in the new habits of my mind.

  Mrs. Mayer was waiting for me to say something. A pair of doctors walked by, and one of them happened to look right at me just then—a kind-looking older man with thick white hair. Feeling his eyes on me, I thought for a moment that he understood what we were going through, and I felt touched, even comforted. Then I realized: we were just another case to him, the periphery of some illness or accident. His understanding was a given, even a barrier. We were alone—alone together and also alone within ourselves, each of the three of us, just as Mike and I had been that day at the park.

  And yet, Mike was doing well physically—all the rehab people said so. He was sitting up for hours at a time, had even managed twice to wheel himself all the way from his room to the physical therapy hall. A few evenings after my talk with Mr. and Mrs. Mayer, I arrived for my visit and found him not lying on his bed but sitting in his wheelchair, a first for after dinner, a heavy strap holding his torso in place.

  “Wow, you’re up,” I said. “I can’t believe it.”

  He gave me a look.

  “What?”

  “Isn’t it ironic? I’m a low quad, and yet I’m up.”

  A week ago he’d reported that he’d heard one of the physical therapy assistants use the phrase “low quad” in reference to another patient with a relatively low cervical-spine injury. The way it irritated him, I was glad he hadn’t heard anyone say “good quad,” an oxymoron I’d heard back when we were waiting for him to awaken.

  I looked around the room. All the Mayers were there: Mr. and Mrs. in chairs opposite the foot of Mike’s bed, Julie and John Junior on the floor to the side.

  “Hard day?” I said.

  “Just the usual.”

  “You seem tired.”

  “I am.”

  Mr. and Mrs. Mayer exchanged a glance, and I moved closer to Mike. “Are there too many people here?” I whispered. “Do you want me to go?”

  “If you want.”

  “What do you want?”

  “Nothing I’m going to get, that’s for sure.”

  I edged over to the bed and half sat on the foot of it. Sitting against the wall, Julie looked sallow, as if she’d spent the summer in a cave—dressed all in black, her skin the color of ivory. She was twisting a thick silver ring around her finger, twisting and twisting. The last few times I’d seen her she’d smelled of cigarette smoke, a sudden, dirty smell when I’d gotten close. Next to her John Junior wore cutoff sweatpants and a T-shirt and looked so much the picture of health, his face still slightly flushed from whatever exercise he’d been doing, that I wondered if it wasn’t his appearance that was bothering Mike, making him think of all he’d lost.

  “I’m practicing,” Mike said.

  I turned and saw that his face had softened, as if he’d decided to try. I felt a huge sympathy for him, just for the work of being visited. Why should he be cheerful? Why anything? The doctors had asked us to report any oddities in his personality, indications of some lingering effects of the head injury, but how could we call moodiness an aftereffect when he could hardly be anything else?

  “Practicing?” I said.

  “Spending more time in the chair.”

  “Is that good?”

  “It’s tiring.” He gave me a one-cornered smile. “How screwed up is it to find sitting tiring?”

  “Pretty screwed up.”

  It was almost eight, and the Mayers began glancing at each other. Leaving was harder when you were in a group, the bunch of you walking out the door without him.

  Julie and John were quarreling about something, I could tell. They spoke softly, but there was something in how little they were moving their mouths that told me there was a disagreement going on.

  Mike seemed to sense it, too. He reached for the wheels of his chair and slowly rotated himself until he could see them. “What are you guys talking about?”

  Julie and John exchanged a glance, and a look of warning came over Mrs. Mayer’s face. She stood up and planted her hands on her hips, fingers splayed over the fabric of her navy blue wrap skirt.

  “Forget it, Mom,” Julie said abruptly. “I’m not lying.” She stood up and faced Mike, her long brown hair hanging in sheets by her face. “We’re going out for dinner,” she said to him, “the four of us, I’m sorry. And John wants to go to that disgusting German Inn, but they have nothing I can eat.”

  Mike gave John an appraising look. “So?”

  “So I like their pork chops,” John said, coloring a little. “They have salad.”

  Julie frowned. “Yeah, an entire head of iceberg with, like, one measly cherry tomato. Yum.”

  “Knock it off,” Mr. Mayer said. He stood, too, and crossed his arms over his chest. “We’ll decide in the car.”

  Mrs. Mayer glanced at me, then turned to Mike. “I’m so sorry, honey,” she said, her eyes full of regret. “I know this must make you feel bad.”

  Mike gave her a disgusted look. “You think I expect you guys to sit around pi
cking your noses when you’re not here? I don’t care.”

  She flushed a little. “I just wish you could come.”

  Mike frowned, but Mr. Mayer actually seemed to consider the idea. He cupped his chin in his hand, stared off into space. “Maybe we should see if you can next time,” he said thoughtfully. “In a few weeks or something.”

  Mrs. Mayer clapped her hands together. “Wouldn’t that be wonderful! I wonder if you couldn’t get some kind of day pass or something.”

  Mike rolled his eyes and laughed harshly. “I’m not in jail, Mom, appearances to the contrary. Anyway, I wouldn’t want to.”

  “Why on earth not?” Mrs. Mayer bit her lip. “I should think you’d love a little change of scene.”

  “When I want a change of scene,” he said, “I tell my buddy here to try channel fifteen for a while.”

  Automatically we all looked at Jeff Walker, who’d been lying there quietly, his father on the far side of his bed, saying something every now and then in a low voice. After a moment, though he’d given no indication that he was listening, Jeff aimed the remote at the TV and a new picture came on.

  “Like that,” Mike said.

  After the Mayers left an orderly came in to transfer him onto his bed. I moved out of the way and watched as she lowered the bed and then unstrapped him from the chair. She stood in front of him with his knees between hers, wrapped her arms around his chest, and slowly raised him till he’d cleared the chair. Then she rotated him around, settled his bottom onto the bed, lowered his upper body onto the mattress, and swiveled his legs up. She was about my size, and I couldn’t imagine how she’d done it, how strong she was. What was going to happen once he was home? How were we going to manage even just the physical part of it?

  When she left I dragged a chair closer and sat down. I was about to offer him something to drink when a tall, dark-haired man with gold-rimmed glasses and a full beard came in. He stood just inside the doorway, wearing jeans and a shirt and tie. Mike took one look at him and stared off to the side, plainly furious.

  “Hey, Mike,” the man said. “How’s it going? Thought I’d poke my head in before it got too late.”

  Mike didn’t respond. He looked straight ahead, his face reddening.

  “Dave King,” the man said, coming over and offering me his hand.

  “I’m Carrie.”

  He nodded knowingly, as if he’d heard of me, had half expected to find me here. He was standing in Mike’s field of vision now, impossible for Mike to avoid seeing unless he truly looked away, which the halo made difficult.

  “Thought we might spend some time together tomorrow,” Dave King said. “Say around four?”

  Mike pressed his lips together.

  “Hey, a simple yes or no wouldn’t be too much to ask, would it?”

  “How about a simple no, then?”

  Dave King shrugged. He watched Mike for another moment and then left the room, nodding at me on his way out.

  “Don’t you want to know who he was?”

  I looked back at Mike. I had a pretty good idea he was the therapist the Mayers had mentioned, but I didn’t say so. “Who was he?”

  “The head guy. Total dick.” I couldn’t help smiling. “How so?”

  “He just is. And if you’re going to laugh, why don’t you just leave?”

  “Is that what you want?”

  Mike’s face went livid and he shouted, “Stop! Asking me! What! I! Want!” He stared at me with his eyes burning, his words bouncing off the hard surfaces of the room and keeping us both absolutely still. Finally the color in his face began to drain away, and he said, quite calmly, “Why do people keep asking me what I want? I want to walk out of here. Christ. I want to walk.”

  The moon was just past full, bright in the indigo sky. Leaving through a side door, I made my way to a bench in a little paved V where two wings of the building came together. I’d left Mike composed but so exhausted I knew sleep would come fast. I sat down and breathed in the night smells, settled car exhaust and boxwood and a faint, moist scent of the lake. How could Mike stand having people at him all the time? The rehab people but also us, his family, me. It had to be a nightmare—on top of what was really a nightmare. My worry about him slipped into high gear, and I felt stripped by the tension of it, just opened wide.

  Worry. It sounds like such an active thing, but it was more as if that picture of him that I’d told him I had—the picture of him that was thinking of him—had fallen to the bottom of an inky well, and through the dark and rippling water I could see glimpses of his distorted face, down so far I couldn’t reach it.

  The exit door swung open, and I heard pant legs brushing together, then a low cough. “… and we can’t have that,” a man’s voice said, and a moment later the man himself appeared. It was Dave King, the therapist. I pressed myself into the shadows, but he looked over and stopped, saying, “Whoa, you may be the first person I’ve ever seen on that bench.”

  I looked in the direction he’d come from, but there was no one else, no one for him to have been talking to.

  “I was having a small conversation with myself,” he said. “Just straightening a few things out.” He came closer and set his briefcase down, then stretched: a self-conscious stretch that suggested a desire to engage me in a casual-seeming but nonetheless significant conversation. Could he have followed me out of the hospital?

  “Nice night,” he said.

  “Yeah, it’s not so hot anymore.”

  He unzipped the briefcase and took out a small, shiny package. He held it in both hands and pulled, and the faint pop of air that followed told me he’d opened some kind of food.

  “Ritz Bits?” he said, offering me the package.

  “No, thanks.”

  “Dave?” he said, and then, “Why, thanks, Dave, don’t mind if I do.” He shook out a handful and then just chewed for a while, the bag crinkling in his other hand. “You know, I’m glad I ran into you,” he said. “How do you think Mike’s doing? Actually, do you mind if I sit down? I feel like I’m blocking your moonlight.” He pushed the briefcase aside and sat down a few feet away from me.

  I didn’t know what to say. Would it be a betrayal of Mike to talk to him? I wasn’t sure.

  “Maybe you’d rather not go into it,” he said.

  “No, it’s OK. He’s really sad. Really sad.”

  He nodded slowly. “Do you know that more by what he’s said or what he hasn’t said?” He spoke without looking at me, and I thought he was being very careful, as if I were a valuable but easily spoiled resource.

  “Hasn’t,” I said. “Well, both.”

  “His parents probably told you he’s decided he doesn’t want to talk to me.” He paused. “As if you couldn’t have figured that out tonight.” He glanced over at me. “Was he much of a talker? Before the accident?”

  “Yeah. I mean, he wasn’t a motormouth or anything, but he talked.” I thought of lying in bed with him after making love, how open and sweet he always was, as if, business over, we could finally chat. Sitting there on the bench, I could almost feel his leg slung over mine, his hand on my stomach, the vibration of his chin on my shoulder.

  “I guess he decided I’m a jerk,” Dave King said.

  I smiled, thinking of the word Mike had actually used.

  Dave King gave me a curious look. “What?”

  I shook my head.

  He reached into the bag again and threw a couple more crackers into his mouth, then leaned down to stuff the bag back into his briefcase as if he were about to take off.

  “He said you were a dick,” I said. “If you really want to know.”

  He straightened up and looked at me. “A dick?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  He was silent for a moment. “Interesting choice of words.”

  “I guess it’s kind of rude,” I said, “but I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by it.”

  He rocked his head back and forth. “Maybe he did.”

  My mout
h went a little dry. “Like what?”

  He leaned back and crossed his legs. “What do you think his concerns are right now? He’s lying up there, he’s got another seven or eight weeks in the halo—what’s going through his mind?”

  Understanding hit hard, and I looked away.

  “I don’t mean to embarrass you,” he said softly. “You’ve probably thought all this through yourself, or maybe you went to the library and found out what you needed to know.” He hesitated. “I mean, there are books that explain the effects on male sexual function of an injury like Mike’s.”

  I stared at my hands. This was the one thing Mr. Mayer hadn’t researched, or if he had, he’d kept his findings to himself. Still, I didn’t have much doubt about it. No motion. No sensation. Twice since the accident I’d woken from dreams so aroused that just turning over or moving a leg had made me come. I couldn’t bring myself to masturbate, though: it seemed too final, like an acquiescence.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve made you uncomfortable.”

  I looked over and saw him watching me with what I could only think of as a gentle look, and to my surprise I found myself sort of liking him. There was something vulnerable about him, and for an instant I flashed onto his home life: a guy living alone in an apartment with lots of spider plants, an aquarium full of tiny, colorful fish. He’d walk over and talk to them as soon as he got home, the room still dark behind him.

  How strange: Kilroy had seen me in the same sure way I’d just seen Dave King. Clear and certain, as if he’d known. I hope Mike wakes to your vigilance and love soon, and that you’ll be well together. His letter was in my dresser, buried in my sock drawer. When I got low on socks I could see the envelope, white against the wood grain, a signal of some kind.

  “I’d really like to find a way to help Mike,” Dave King said. “That’s why I came over when I saw you sitting here. He’s got a rough road ahead of him, and it can help to talk about things.” He stayed still for a moment, then turned toward me and gave me a quick smile. “Well, I should get going.”