The Ryer Avenue Story: A Novel

by Dorothy Uhnak

  But she still couldn’t understand the whole routine of offering up pain to Jesus. It seemed to Megan that he had enough of his own pain without everyone piling on more and more.

  The first time she saw the brace, she felt her heart thump against her rib cage. Her breath caught in her throat. She didn’t hear the words the doctor was saying, just the pleasant humming of his voice. He was explaining the brace to her; she knew that because he was pointing and handling different parts of it, showing her how to fasten and unfasten the various buckles.

  “Okay, Megan, let’s give it a try. It’ll be a little strange at first. We’ll get to the shoe later. Let’s see this leg, kid.”

  He was a young doctor, about her oldest brother’s age. He was tall and thin and had a beak of a nose, thin lips, small eyes beneath thick lenses. His long white hand flipped the cover off her lap and he knelt next to her wheelchair and reached for the withered, shapeless tube of a leg.

  “Now watch, because this is something you’ll do every morning and …”

  Megan didn’t think, she just acted. Her right hand shot out, caught the unprepared young physician squarely on the chin. Taken more by surprise than by force, he toppled backwards, flat onto his back. The brace flew from his hand, right at Megan. She caught it, raised it over her head and flung it, this time with great determination and force, across the room, narrowly missing a nurse who had just entered the room.

  The doctor, his smooth face gone white, stood up carefully, shook his hands at his sides, flexed his shoulders, adjusted his body. He stood in front of Megan, whose breath came in short, hard gasps and he waited, silent for a moment, getting his own anger under control.

  “Okay, champ. Do I take this to mean you do not want the brace?”

  She glared, her lips tightly compressed.

  “Well, then. So be it. But I would like to say that a simple ‘I don’t want it’ would have sufficed.” He started to leave the room, motioned to the nurse to take the brace and wait in the hall. He turned and faced Megan. “But lemme tell ya, kid. If you weren’t in that chair and if you didn’t have that leg, I’d knock the shit out of you for doing that to me.”

  He didn’t wait for her reply, didn’t see the startled expression, didn’t realize she was impressed. It was the first time anyone had spoken to her as though she were still Megan, a pretty tough kid, not Megan-with-the-leg.

  No one brought the brace to her again for a few days. It took them that long to realize that Megan Magee wasn’t eating. She was hiding food in tissues and flushing it down the toilet. She was living on water, and her thin face began to look emaciated. That was when they sent for her father.

  Frankie Magee never messed around. He went right to the point.

  He held the brace in his right hand as he jerked her wheelchair around to face him.

  “We gonna do this easy or the hard way? Let me know right now, because I haven’t got time for games.”

  Megan felt the hot tears spill over, cutting down her cheeks. She smeared them away with the back of her hand.

  “Daddy … I … hate that thing. I …”

  “You don’t want it?” He leaned in close to her, his dark blue eyes narrowing. “Be sure now.” She started to speak, but he held his hand up. “Listen to me first, then you tell me. If you don’t want it, goddamn it, there are poor kids who’d be glad to get it. This was made for you, but it can be adjusted. So if you don’t want it, fine. But then you tell me that you’re willing to spend the rest of your life sitting on your skinny little ass in that goddamn wheelchair. And we’ll take you home right now and your mom and your sister and your cousins and aunts will all take turns pushing you in that damn chair. They’ll take you to the park and stick you under a tree and your little sister can teach you needlework and your mom can teach you how to knit and you can sit all day long and learn crafts.

  “Or you can put this damn ugly heavy thing on and learn how to walk with it. It comes with a big heavy club-shoe, and then you can walk or hop or drag it along or any other damn thing. It’s up to you, Megan. You gonna let your whole life revolve around that poor pathetic thing of a leg or just say the hell with it, and get on with being Megan. Now,” he said fiercely. “Now you tell me what you want. Because that’s exactly what you’re gonna get.”

  She held her breath. She knew he meant it. Frankie always meant exactly what he said.

  “Can you show me how to put it on?”

  He dropped the brace in her lap. “That’s what they got doctors and nurses for.”

  He left the room without another word, came back within minutes. Everything about him changed. He was calm and smiling, his voice warm and loving.

  “See you Saturday, redhead. And, Megan, for the love of God, eat a little more. You’re beginning to look like a ghost.”

  During the four months Megan spent at the rehabilitation hospital in Westchester, Patsy visited her once. Her brother, Carl, a college freshman, was on his way upstate to Colgate, driving his brand new convertible, and he gave his kid sister a break: Go ahead, visit with the cripple for a half hour, then I put you on the bus back home.

  “I can only stay a half hour,” were the first words her best friend said to her. They hadn’t seen each other in more than two months, and both girls felt awkward and ill at ease.

  Megan wasn’t fully ambulatory yet, and the therapy was painful and intense. She sat up in her wheelchair, breathless at Patsy’s visit. They treated each other like strangers.

  Patsy told her about some girls at her Pennsylvania camp who had gotten polio. One of the younger girls had died; two others were in iron lungs.

  “They got any iron lungs here? You been in one, or what?”

  Megan told her, “Some kids, down the hall. They just lay there all day long and look into a little mirror. The iron lung, it’s like a great big barrel. It makes awful noises, to help them breathe or something. It’s pretty bad.”

  “Could we take a look? Could I push you down the hall to the room where they are?”

  Megan caught a fierce gleaming excitement coming from Patsy. “No, we’re not allowed.” Aware that Patsy kept glancing at her leg, Megan pushed the cover aside, exposing the withered limb. “Go on, take a good look.”

  Patsy leaned forward, reached out, but stopped short of touching Megan’s shrunken right leg. “Wow. How’d it get so skinny?”

  “Atrophy. The muscles shrink. They stop working, so they shrink. Go ahead, take a close look, it’s okay. It’s not catching anymore.”

  Patsy got to her knees, ran her fingers lightly over Megan’s useless leg. She looked up, her face puzzled. “Is it ever gonna be okay?”

  Slowly, Megan shook her head. “No. Not like it was. But I will be okay.”

  Patsy ignored this. “Jeez, Megan. How does it feel? You know. To be … to be a cripple?”

  Quietly, Megan said, “It feels wonderful, Patsy. Really great. It’s terrific. Anything else you want to know?”

  Patsy stood up and shrugged. “I just asked.” She looked at her watch. “My brother is waiting outside. Ya oughta see his car. Red with a white canvas top. Brand new. But he already got scratches on it. What does he care? Papa Steigler buys darling Carl another one, it gets too beat up.” She sat on the edge of the chair. “He said, Papa Steigler, that he’ll get me my own car, my own brand-new car, when I graduate high school. Three years from now, can you beat that? And send me to college? Hell, I just want the car, the hell with college. I’ll fake it, yeah, I wanna go and get educated some more. Like fun. Who the hell wants ta go to college?”

  “I want to go to college,” Megan said. It was the first time she’d ever said anything like that. She wasn’t even sure she meant it.

  “You do? What the hell for? I mean, you don’t meet some guy by the time you’re a high school senior … ummm …”

  “Is that what you’re hoping to do, Patsy, meet some guy in high school and get married and that’s it?”

  “Look, Megan, a lot of things are d
ifferent for me this year. Papa Steigler got me into this dancing class on Long Island on Saturday afternoons, social dancing with some boys from prep schools. It’s not as bad as it sounds. Some of them are real jerks, but some of them are pretty cute. And they take you for soda and stuff, after. Papa Steigler says …”

  “Terrific. You Papa Steigler’s little girl now? He gonna ‘adopt’ you, too? You gonna be Papa Steigler’s girl-Carl?”

  Patsy clenched her fists; her chin went up. It was the first familiar expression Megan had seen: combative Patsy.

  “Nothing like that. Listen, I gotta put up with a lotta shit from everybody, okay? Always telling me how to do everything, how to eat and dress and sit like a lady and all that crap. But I figure, hell, I do what they want, I get what I want. I get plenty of clothes and books and money and stuff. What the hell? You think I turned into one of the dopey-girl types, all la-di-da, around the boys and act like a jackass? That what you think?”

  “Christ, I hope not.” Finally she was talking to Patsy, her pal. “But listen, if you do go to college, I mean if that’s what it takes to get the car, what’ll you take up?”

  Patsy shrugged. “I dunno. Gym, maybe, you know, study to be a gym teacher. Boy, Megan, wouldn’t that be something? I’d run the gym, have the whole place to myself sometimes, a pool and all, and I’d invite you over and we could …”

  She stopped speaking abruptly, couldn’t meet Megan’s eyes.

  “Hey, that’s okay. Hell, I’m not gonna be stuck in this chair all the time. I got this brace and shoe and I practice every day. I’ll get to move pretty fast after a while. Remember? ‘Marvelous Megan’? I’ll strike back, right, ‘Peerless Patsy’?”

  Patsy shrugged, not caught up in her friend’s enthusiasm. “Dumb nicknames. Kid stuff.”

  “Come on, Patsy, lighten up, okay? Listen, I can still swim. Three times a week we have water therapy. Gee, in the water, it’s just like it always was.”

  Patsy glanced at the shriveled leg. “Yeah, but it’s not the same, is it?”

  Megan glared at her friend. “Shit. Thank you very much, you jerk. I didn’t realize it wasn’t the same. Thanks for telling me. I appreciate it.”

  “Hey, don’t get mad at me. It isn’t my fault that you—”

  “Right.”

  “Listen, I better get going.” And then, remembering the gift she’d brought with her, she extended the Krum’s candy box. “Jeez, I almost forgot. My mother bought this for you. Candy. Carl said we oughta just eat it ourselves, you’d never know the difference.”

  “What a guy, Carl. Tell you what, Patsy.” She tossed the box back at her friend. “You and Carl eat it, okay?”

  Patsy held the box of candy tight against her thin body. She met Megan’s tough-guy, tight-lipped, teeth-grinding, don’t-fuck-with-me expression, which usually preceded a punch or a shove.

  Matching her belligerence, Patsy said, “Well, shit, you don’t have to be nasty about it, Megan. I mean, I didn’t have to give you the candy. And I didn’t have to come and see you.”

  Impulsively picking up the challenge, Megan said, “Right. And you don’t have to come again.”

  Patsy shrugged. “Fine. If that’s how you feel about it, the hell with you.”

  They’d had arguments before, times when they avoided each other, but sooner or later they’d always get back together and neither of them would remember or care what the problem had been in the first place. This was different and they both knew it.

  After a few weeks, Megan wrote to Patsy. She told her all that was happening: the new therapy, the ease with which she now could get around with her brace, the quick progress she was now making.

  So many things happened during the day, so many small and large incidents, funny or stupid, provoking anger or amusement. Megan hadn’t found any special friend at the rehab center. They were just a bunch of hurting kids, self-involved, damaged, angry or self-pitying and defeated. She needed to share so much stuff with Patsy. Hell, if she’d been home, they’d have been back to being good friends long ago. Their fights and make-ups had been going on for years, since she was six and Patsy was seven. She told Patsy that she missed her.

  Dante came up to visit her every month or so, either hitching a ride with her father or by bus. He wrote her a long letter every two weeks, telling about his life among the geniuses at Regis, the Catholic honors high school he now attended. He sent along lists of books he was reading that he thought she might enjoy. He knew her father had given her a small portable radio and he listed programs she should listen to under the covers late at night that would scare the hell out of her.

  The day she received Patsy’s reply to her letter, Dante arrived for a pre-Christmas visit. He was loaded down with gifts her mother had sent—practical things, hand-knitted sweaters and mittens and hats; small packets of candy from her little sister; a book about baseball from her oldest brother; a stack of baseball cards from her cousin Charley; a missal from her cousin Eugene. Her parents would come up the day after Christmas, bringing more loot.

  Dante scanned the empty room, dumped the packages on her bed, then found her sitting in the dayroom, facing the window. She barely nodded when he greeted her.

  He pulled up a chair and touched her hand lightly with his fingertips. “Bad day, kiddo? Or are you mad at me for something?”

  Megan shrugged.

  “I got some good stuff for you. Couple of things from your family. And a great new game, from yours truly. We can play it together later.” No response. Dante tapped her hand impatiently. “Okay, pal, what’s the deal?” Again, she shrugged. He poked her shoulder playfully, put his fists up, ducked his head. “Okay, slugger, let’s have it. You’re mad at me because, mmmmm, because I’m so good looking and you’re not? Because I got elected president of the student council? No. Couldn’t be that, ’cause I wasn’t elected. Narrowly defeated, but no dice. I give up.” Finally his voice was serious. “What’s going on, Megan? You hurting? This just a bad day, or what?”

  Megan reached into the pocket of her shirt and pulled out a folded, crumpled letter. Wordlessly she handed it to him. She kept her face averted while he read it. It was from Patsy.

  Dear Megan,

  My life in high school is great. I thought it would be terrible to be in an all-girls school, but it isn’t. When you were my only friend, you never really gave me a chance to make friends with other girls. We just hung around the boys.

  Well, I’ve learned to make myself look good—the girls show each other make-up and hair styles and stuff—and I know some boys now—not the same way as when we were a couple of tomboys. You might be surprised to know I have gone on dates—real dates—to the Paradise and then to Krum’s. For ice cream sundaes and stuff. If you hadn’t got polio, I would still be on the outside just making fun of everyone. Well, it is much better being one of the in-crowd and I am very popular and having a lot of fun.

  I feel sorry for you that you won’t have the kind of life I’m having, with boys and dates and all. But I guess you’ll just have to make the best of it. I can’t imagine how you can stand it, but I know you are very brave.

  Very truly yours,

  Patricia Wagner

  Dante whistled softly between his teeth, then carefully folded the letter and handed it back to Megan.

  “Did you write back to her?”

  Megan nodded. “Ten pages long.”

  “But you didn’t mail it, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Good. Megan, look at me. C’mon, for Pete’s sake, it’s Danny you’re talking to. I’ve seen tears before. You’re entitled. She’s a little piece of shit, isn’t she?”

  Megan shrugged.

  “Okay. Tell me how you feel about Patsy.”

  In a soft, breaking voice, Megan said, “I miss her.”

  “The girl who wrote you this letter. You miss her?”

  “No. Not her. I miss my pal, my buddy. I … you know what, Danny? When we were eight and nine years old, Pats
y and I wrote a letter, a pact, like kids do, and then we stuck our fingers with pins and squeezed out the blood and signed the letter. An oath, you know? That we’d always be friends, forever, until we die.”

  “That was kid stuff, Megan. You’re fourteen years old now.”

  “Well, I keep my word.”

  “Not everybody does. Besides, people change. Patsy’s changed. Or maybe she’s finally who she really is.”

  “I feel left behind.”

  “Then you gotta catch up, kiddo. You gotta catch up with yourself. You’ve done pretty damn good, from when they first brought you here to now. Christ, I thought you were gonna die, first time I saw you. Look at you now. You swim and exercise and get around like a bat outta hell. When you leave here, you’ll be back at school, you’ll get back into your real life and—”

  “I don’t have any friends, Danny.”

  “Well, thanks a whole helluva lot, pal.”

  “I didn’t mean that. Just, well, you’re a boy and now I’m growing up and … you know.”

  “You dumping me?”

  “No. But you will. Dump me.” There was a small silence. “Sooner or later.”

  “You think my middle name is Patsy? Listen, kiddo, get this straight. You’re my friend, like Gene and Charley and Ben, and some new guys down at Regis. I trust you. You know that. And there aren’t too many people in the world you can really trust. You’re someone special, Megan. Listen, why the hell do you think I bother coming all the way up here to see you?”

  Megan grinned slowly and shrugged. “Because I walk funny?”

  He knew she’d be okay, at least for now. “Damn right. Funniest walker I know. Now get the hell up out of that chair and let’s take a funny walk outside. I need the fresh air. And a good laugh. Then maybe I’ll buy you a hot chocolate. If you walk funny enough to make me laugh, that is.”

  They spent the afternoon together, talking, arguing, comparing notes: her tutor wasn’t too bad; his classes were very tough. They didn’t seem to run out of things to say, and when he told her good-bye, he caught the hesitation, the holding back.