Struts & Frets

by Jon Skovron

“So . . . ,” I struggled. “You don’t need any food?”

  “No, no, no! Don’t you see? It’s all poisoned!”

  “And there’s nothing else you need?”

  “What do you think I am?” It came out like a snarl. “Helpless?”

  I didn’t even recognize him anymore. His face was twisted up into a sneer and he moved restlessly around the living room, knocking things over and tripping on piles of paper and books.

  I backed slowly toward the door.

  “What are you doing?” he demanded. “You can’t leave! She’s out there!”

  “I have to go, Gramps.” My voice was high and shaking. “Sorry . . .” I didn’t know what to say, couldn’t tell if he even understood, and didn’t care. I just ran.

  I drove home as fast as the Boat would let me. I practically ran inside the house. Mom was sitting at the dinner table, going through big stacks of paper.

  “Mom, something is really wrong with Gramps.”

  She looked up immediately. “Did you call 911?”

  “No.” My hands hadn’t stopped shaking the whole drive home. The adrenaline just wouldn’t leave me. “He’s not . . . he’s not sick or anything like that. He just . . . he’s really lost it.”

  “Calm down, Sammy,” she said. “Tell me what happened.”

  So as best I could, I told her everything. It seemed to help a little. By the end, my hands weren’t shaking anymore and I was breathing regularly. The whole time, Mom listened quietly. The only time she interrupted me was when I told her about the scissors he had hidden up his sleeve.

  “You’re sure?” she asked. “It couldn’t have been something else? Like his watch?”

  “I—I don’t think so . . .” It had been dark. He had been so wild, so crazy. All I’d been able to concentrate on was getting out of there.

  “Okay, Sammy,” said Mom, she walked over to me and put her hands firmly on my shoulders. “You did fine. Just slow down a little. I’m finishing up the paperwork for the assisted living right now. They told me that as luck would have it, they have a space opening up this weekend.”

  “This weekend? But what are we going to do now?”

  “I’ll check on him tomorrow morning before my first client.”

  “That’s all you’re going to do? You’re just going to let him be a raving lunatic all night?”

  “Sam, did it seem like there was any way you could calm him down?”

  “Well, no . . .”

  “If he’s physically endangering himself or someone else, we can call the police. Is that want you want to do?”

  “Of course not! But he’s like some kind of . . . animal. It’s awful. Just thinking of him being like that all night . . .”

  “I understand that you’re upset, Sammy,” she said. “I’m sorry. There’s nothing else we can do.”

  I lay in bed for what seemed like forever, unable to get the picture out of my head of Gramps looking like some kind of psycho killer. I tried to find that calm control I’d had when I’d taken Joe to the hospital. Right then, I didn’t care if it made me into Robot Boy or whatever. If I could get into that headspace again, I knew I’d be able to go right to sleep. And that was all I wanted. Just to stop thinking.

  But I couldn’t. My brain was like a washing machine, sloshing with all of Gramps’s genetic craziness that had somehow skipped Mom and landed right on me.

  After a while, I couldn’t take it anymore. I got out of bed, grabbed my guitar, and started playing. I didn’t care how late it was or how loud I got, and I guess Mom didn’t either because she didn’t bang on her wall like she usually did. I played until my hand hurt. Until my fingertips were red and raw despite the calluses I’d built up. Then I grabbed my notebook and in a wild spurt wrote the final verse to “Plastic Baby” and it all came together:

  Cain is dead forever.

  Make believe forever.

  Reason doesn’t matter.

  Tell you what I’m after,

  Clothes and smiles of rubber

  Whore instead of lover

  Talk with no conversation

  Live with no realization

  Make-believe is luring.

  Fantasy’s obscuring.

  It’s like feeling through plastic gloves.

  It’s like feeling through plastic gloves.

  And that’s when I understood that I had the title of the song wrong. I hooked in a comma and now it said: Plastic, Baby.

  It wasn’t a judgment.

  It was a wish. Because sometimes I was tired of feeling so much and I just wanted to shut down and not feel anything. But I guess I wasn’t wired that way. All I could do was write about it. Get it out of my head and onto something like paper that I could manage easier. When Gramps and Eric Strom had talked about music being something you just had to get out there, that is what they meant.

  And it worked. When I was done playing, my hands throbbed, my throat was sore, and the neighbors probably hated me. But I didn’t care. Because I lay back in bed with that song still looping in my head, and I went right to sleep.

  The next morning I felt a little better. While I was eating breakfast, Mom said that I shouldn’t worry. That she was going over to Gramps’s house right away and that she’d do whatever needed to be done.

  “Don’t even think about it,” she said. “After all, don’t you have that contest tomorrow night? You need to rehearse with your band.”

  I didn’t know why Mom was suddenly down with me doing the Battle of the Bands. Maybe she felt bad that I was so tweaked the night before. But I wasn’t going to argue. And if the current good fellowship held, Tragedy of Wisdom could actually win this thing. I would talk to them all at lunch and get them hyped for rehearsal.

  That was the plan, at least.

  I was in Ms. Jansen’s English class, my head propped up in my hands as I tried to at least look like I was paying attention. My mind kept wandering off into daydreams. The concert, and our song on the radio, and record labels begging us to lay down an album and us telling them to get lost. Laughing in their uptight corporate faces. Or maybe they would love us so much they wouldn’t ask us to change anything, wanted us just the way we were. So we said okay, okay, we’ll cut your stupid album, but no cheesy videos. And all the while my mom telling me to still try to not flunk any of my classes, and groupies screaming for us every weekend at the local venues . . .

  To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,

  Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,

  To the last syllable of recorded time;

  And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

  The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

  Ms. Jansen had this way of busting into a dramatic reading from whatever thing we were studying at random times to wake us up. It worked pretty well because she had such a loud, ringing voice, and since she was the director of the school plays, she was actually kind of a good actor.

  Now that she was sure she had our attention, she gazed around the room and said, “That is from Act Five of Macbeth, which I know you read last night, yes? Can someone tell me what they think he’s saying in this monologue?”

  Silence.

  “Samuel? How about you?”

  “Uh,” I said. “Sure. Okay. So uh, here’s Macbeth, right? Watching this army coming to get him. He knows that he’s done really bad stuff. He knows his wife is dead, I think. Or at least he’s pretty sure. I can’t remember exactly. And he knows now that all the prophecies the witches gave him were tricks, that they’re all coming true even though they seemed impossible, and he’s going to be beheaded and stuff really soon. He knows all that. What he doesn’t know is if it matters.”

  “If what matters?” asked Ms. Jansen.

  “Everything,” I said. “Did he have any choices ever? Could he have said, ‘No, I don’t want to kill the king’ and escaped all of it? It seems like no matter what he wanted to do, it wouldn’t have made a difference. It was fate. So he’s kind of like, ‘Yesterday, toda
y, tomorrow, what’s the difference?’ because he doesn’t feel like he ever had a choice.”

  “Very interesting, Samuel. And I think in a lot of ways you’re right. What Macbeth has gained is clarity. He’s gotten perspective on how the whole thing fits together, and he doesn’t see a pretty picture. Take this next section, which I think speaks for itself:

  Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,

  That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

  And then is heard no more. It is a tale

  Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

  Signifying nothing.

  Ms. Jansen looked around at us, that drama flair kicking in, letting the words sink into our heads.

  “Have any of you ever felt like that?” she asked. “Like you’ve been miscast in your role in life? Like you’re a . . . what do you guys call it . . . a wannabe?”

  “But isn’t that a cop-out?” I asked. “Isn’t he, like, playing the victim or whatever? Making excuses?”

  “He doesn’t seem to think so,” said Ms. Jansen. “He sees absolutely no hope.” But she’s looking at me like she’s expecting me to argue.

  “So?” I asked. “Which is it? Did he have a choice or not?”

  “Maybe sometimes things happen that are out of your control,” she said. “But you always have a choice in how you deal with it.”

  Then the intercom crackled: “Would Samuel Bojar please come to the principal’s office immediately.”

  Ms. Jansen looked at me questioningly. I shrugged like I had no idea. Because I didn’t. In fact, my pulse was suddenly pounding in my temples. There’s nothing worse than being in trouble for something and you don’t know what it is.

  “You’d better go,” she said.

  I stood up, trying not to look as nervous and confused as I felt. I caught Joe out of the corner of my eye, looking at me with a sly grin. I smiled back and shrugged like, Hey, what can you do? The other students snickered and giggled as I left the classroom.

  When I got to the principal’s office, his secretary gave me a weird look. Almost like sympathy. I’d never been called to the principal’s office before, so I thought maybe this was normal. Like maybe she had a soft spot for troublemakers. Not that I could think of anything I’d done wrong.

  “Go on in, Samuel,” she said.

  I stepped into the room. Principal Scott was sitting behind his desk. He was a big black guy with a furrowed brow like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. Or at least the weight of the high school, which was probably true. Standing next to his desk was our spacey guidance counselor, Mr. Liven. Neither of them looked angry, but they both looked very serious. That kind of threw me. Mr. Scott never smiled, but Mr. Liven was one of those eternally cheerful guys who liked to greet every student he walked past in the hallway by name. I stopped and waited in the doorway, not sure what to do next.

  “Samuel, have a seat,” said Mr. Scott.

  I sat down in the chair facing his desk. It was a little low, so I had to look up at them.

  “Samuel,” said Mr. Scott. “There’s been a . . .” He seemed unsure what word to use. Finally, he said, “An accident. Your mother is in the hospital. She’s going to be fine. But it’s probably best if you go and see her right away.”

  At first I didn’t understand. There was some kind of delay as the words worked their way into my brain. Mom? Hurt? Then suddenly it was really hard to breathe, to get air into my lungs. I had to fight to say, “What . . . what happened?”

  Mr. Scott and Mr. Liven exchanged glances. Then Mr. Scott said, “We don’t really know all the details. We just know she’s stable and has been transferred to a regular room from the ER.” He shuffled some papers on his desk so he didn’t have to look at me. “Do you have any family nearby?”

  “Just my grandfather,” I said.

  They looked at each other again. Then Mr. Scott said, “Would you like Mr. Liven to drive you to the hospital?”

  “No thanks,” I said. “I’ll go by myself.”

  There weren’t that many times when industrial metal really went with my life. But this was one of those moments. The guttural screams and crunching guitar of Ministry’s “Burning Inside” hurled through the open car windows and out into the street as I drove down to the hospital. I didn’t need to think or feel. The music did all that for me, far better than I ever could. I weaved in and out of traffic and made it to the hospital in record time. I walked inside, industrial thrash still humming in my veins as I gave my name to the lady at the info desk, and they told me where to go.

  But when I walked into the room, the Ministry bravado left as quick as it had come. The first thing I saw was that the left side of mom’s head had been shaved bald. Running in a curved line from the top of her head to her temple on that bald side was a row of staples. She was asleep, but I could tell her left eye was swollen shut. There were also a lot of bruises on her face, neck, and arms.

  People had always told me my mother was beautiful. It was such a weird thing to hear and I never really understood it. She was just my mom. But now I finally saw it. I don’t know why it took bruises, black eyes, staples, and a half-shaved head to show me. Why hadn’t I appreciated it before now?

  Then her eyes flickered and opened. She looked at me blankly for a second and I got a sudden sick fear that she didn’t recognize me. But then her lips moved and she said hoarsely, “Sammy?”

  “I’m here, Mom.” I walked over and took her hand, careful not to mess up the IV.

  “I’m sorry, Sammy,” she said, her eyes unfocused. “I’m sorry you have to see this. I’m sorry it happened.”

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “I went to Gramps’s house and the door was locked, like you said. I rang the bell and knocked but there was no answer. I have a key, of course, so I just let myself in. I had a minute to look around. To see the mess. The trash, the puddle of urine in the corner. The rotten food on the table. Then I hear this crazy scream and I see Dad wearing nothing but a white bedsheet wrapped around himself like a toga. He has something in his hand and at first I can’t make it out. Then as he gets closer and raises his hand over his head, I see that it’s a big plumber’s wrench. I should have done something, but I didn’t. I just couldn’t believe my own father could do something like that.”

  She closed her eyes and I thought maybe she’d passed out. But then, with her eyes still closed, she said, “Stupid. I know better. I know what people are capable of.” She opened her good eye again but didn’t look at me. Instead she stared at the ceiling. “He hits me with the wrench. He’s screaming something at me. I don’t know what. I somehow get back to the door and he’s chasing me, hitting me again and again. On the head. On the back. On the arm. Wherever he can. I get outside and he’s still after me. I guess neighbors saw what was happening. The cops show up at some point. He’s not hitting me anymore, thank God. I’m lying on the lawn and he’s just standing over me screaming and waving that wrench around.” She closed her eyes again. “The last thing I saw before I blacked out was that he was so wild, it took three cops to restrain him.”

  Then her eyes slowly closed. I wasn’t sure if she was going to say something, so I just waited. But after a few minutes, she started snoring a little bit.

  A nurse came in and started checking her monitors.

  “Are you Samuel?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “You’ll be able to take her home tonight, but we want to keep her under observation for a few more hours. You can stay with her, but you should try to let her sleep as much as possible.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Where’s my grandfather?”

  She stopped fussing with the monitors. “He’s been sedated.”

  “But where is he?”

  “Well, he’s in the psychiatric hospital right now. He’ll be evaluated and then later moved to an assisted-living facility. The people there will make sure he stays on his medicine and that he doesn’t hurt anyone else.”
>
  I nodded and the nurse left. I sat down next to Mom’s bed and waited.

  The next thing I remember, a nurse was gently shaking me awake.

  “Your friends are here,” she said.

  “Friends?” I said stupidly. I turned to the doorway and there they were: Rick, TJ, Alexander, Joe, Laurie, and Jen5, all huddled together, almost like that would keep them safe.

  The nurse told them to talk quietly and not to wake up Mom, then she left. They stared at me like they had no idea what to do now that they were here. They looked so bewildered that under any other circumstances, I probably would have laughed. But right now it seemed more sad than funny. It was like this room and this experience had separated me from them. Made me different. And even though both sides wanted to cross over, we didn’t know how. And it was like that for a long time, with us just staring like it was an uncrossable chasm.

  Then, Jen5 said, “Okay, okay, enough,” then elbowed her way past the others, walked over to me, and hugged me hard. At first, my body tensed up. I didn’t feel like touching anyone. But as she continued to squeeze me with her strong, thin arms, I started to trust that strength, and so I relaxed and even leaned into her a little. I slowly wrapped my arms around her. Then I put my face in her mass of frizzy blond hair and inhaled that familiar smell.

  “Thank you for coming,” I said.

  She nodded into my chest. Her shoulders started shaking and I realized she was crying.

  I looked at the rest of them and tried to smile, tried to show them I was okay. That it was all okay. They smiled back like they believed me and I really appreciated that, even if it wasn’t true.

  “Thanks, guys,” I said. “I . . . uh . . . I know we were supposed to rehearse tonight, but . . . I, uh . . .”

  “Don’t even think about it,” said TJ. “Seriously.”

  “I just . . . I don’t want to let you guys down,” I said.

  “You need to take care of yourself right now,” said Rick.

  I nodded.

  “So . . . do you need anything?” asked TJ.

  “No, I’m cool,” I said. That almost made me laugh after all. It seemed so dumb to say.