Dig, p.17
Dig, page 17
“Who are you?” I ask.
“I’m The Freak. Who’re you?”
“CanIHelpYou?, I guess.”
“You’re not really in love with him,” she says. “You just have a bond is all. It’s normal. Girls our age just want to find one guy who isn’t out for pussy or a blow job.”
“Um.”
“Too harsh?” she asks.
“Don’t know. Could be accurate. Not sure,” I say. I remember her name from the night Ian and I tripped in the park. Hard to forget a name like that. “Is that what the shoveler guy wants from you?”
She blows her nose and I wonder if she’s crying. Can’t hear it in her voice, but it sounds like the kind of snot that only happens when you cry. “I don’t know what he wants from me. I just showed up one night to help him and he thought I was the meaning of life or some shit.”
“Oh.”
“I’m hungry. Any chance you can give me some food when we get out of here?”
I think about what I just did. How I put mop dirt on a sandwich. Crossed the line. “Sure. What kind do you like?”
“The kind with the cheese on it. The gooey cheddar from the can.”
“You want fries with that?”
“Potato cakes if you have some.”
That’ll be a pain. We usually make those fresh. But I say, “Okay.”
We meet at the sinks and look at each other through the reflection in the mirrors. She was totally crying in the stall—her eyeliner is a mess. “You’re pretty,” I say.
She laughs. “Don’t go falling in love with me, now, too.”
Jake & Bill pick up Bill’s check
Jake and Bill Marks pull into the parking lot of the bakery. Saturday half shift, so there are plenty of spaces. Usually Bill tells Jake to stay in the car, but this time he says, “You coming?”
If Jake knew how to use the word prelude in a sentence, he’d describe this invitation as a prelude to a gathering. Bill doesn’t usually keep his promises, so Jake appreciates this.
Jake’s only met two guys who work with Bill. Seemed nice enough. Bill’s always talking about his best buddy, a guy named Jeff—“short for Jefferson Davis, motherfucker!”—who’s worked there for, like, ten years and showed Bill the ropes when he started working there two months ago. Jeff can’t be in the wedding party because he’ll be out of town or something. Jake’s never met him, but he hates him because Jake’s supposed to be Bill’s best buddy. Jake knows Jeff’s working today because Bill talks a lot about Jeff’s bright yellow short-bed pickup truck and the truck is parked diagonally in the corner of the lot across four spots. It has an Iron Cross decal on the cab’s tinted back window and a small symbol on his license plate holder that says he donates to the Fraternal Order of Police.
“What’s up, fuckers?” Bill says, high-pitched and loud when he walks in, so everyone in the place can hear him, even with the exhaust fan whirring.
Jake’s stomach twitches. How many guys here know?
A bunch of guys grunt back at Bill and keep working. Jeff stops what he’s doing and approaches with his hand out. They shake hands arm-wrestling style, and Jeff doesn’t take his eyes off Jake.
He knows.
“Hey,” Jake says.
“Been looking forward to meeting you, son,” Jeff says, and Jake doesn’t like it because Jeff is only five years older and he’s acting like he’s some old man.
Jake knows what Jeff’s done. Jake knows Jefferson D. Kirwin is on the registry. He knows Jeff brags—more where that came from. Only got caught on two.
Jake hasn’t been caught on one yet, and the minute Jeff calls him son he’s sure there won’t be a second. Wishes he could go back in time and undo the first. Bill knowing was one thing, but this is different.
Marla & Gottfried Can’t Believe Their Luck
Marla and Gottfried Hemmings have more than ten million dollars in the bank. As they sit in the emergency room waiting area, Gottfried looks at the other people waiting there, wondering how much they have in the bank. He doubts anyone there has what he has. Even his own brother doesn’t have what he has—what with having to secretly support the Mexican girl from shipping and the daughter they had on top of his own family all those years—John was too busy to learn about how to sell off his share of the farm. Missed the boom, spent the money, ended up living on a single acre in some development last time Gottfried knew.
He’s not sure what to think about his luck. He worked hard, sure, but no harder than people who dig ditches all day. His father used to tell him that if he didn’t do well in school, he’d end up a ditchdigger. Now we have machines that do that and more people without jobs.
Gottfried tries to pick out the people without jobs from the waiting room selection. The mom in fleece pajama pants and ripped-up sneakers with two kids under four. Definitely. The man clutching his arm in his gym clothes. Probably loaded. The girl who looks like she’s in college in shoes too expensive for her age. Unemployed and spoiled. An African American father sits quietly with his two boys, one of whom has a bandage over his eye. Gottfried can’t get a read on the man. He’s dressed in a short-sleeved plaid button-down shirt and a pair of khakis. Probably a teacher.
When Marla is called to be seen, Gottfried helps her walk to the triage area and smiles at the teacher man and his sons. He even winks at the littler one—probably five years old—and makes a funny face. The kid makes a funny face back, and Gottfried feels good about that.
Triage is a series of rapid-fire questions from a seemingly exhausted and unfazed nurse. What happened? How long ago? Are you on blood thinners of any kind? Are you dizzy? How’s your vision?
“It felt like a sort of panic attack,” Marla says.
Gottfried feels shame, then. It could be the fact that Marla whispered it or the fact that it’s been their secret for nearly fifty years—Marla’s panic attacks. Their family doctor said it was just the stress of raising so many kids. Gave her some pills. Usually she’s fine. But sometimes she wasn’t fine.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asks.
The nurse and Marla look at him as if he were having a different conversation than they are. The nurse is fitting a hard plastic neck collar onto Marla.
“I could have gotten you one of your pills,” Gottfried says.
Marla can’t turn her head to face him, so she stares at the ceiling and says, “You were so busy eating your fried chicken.”
* * *
Marla has to get a CAT scan and the nurse puts them in a room with a curtain and says she’ll be back to let them know how soon she can go up to radiology.
Gottfried doesn’t know what to say, so he sits quietly and looks at a poster about diabetes. He lasts about a minute. Never could sit still.
“I’m going to go find a bathroom,” he says.
Marla just raises her hand in a wave.
Gottfried really doesn’t have to go to the bathroom, but he asks a staff member where it is anyway so Marla can hear him. He walks in that direction, but then takes a rogue right turn toward what looks like a way outside. He wants fresh air.
And then he sees the most remarkable thing. A girl—a tall and skinny teenage girl—walking around in a red-sequined gown over her clothes. She’s a bit old for dress-up. Maybe she has mental problems.
The girl seems to be doing some sort of dance with herself. Gottfried feels joy from the girl. Joy he hasn’t felt in decades. Joy Marla wouldn’t allow. Or he wouldn’t allow. He’s not sure which. As he watches the girl twirl, he isn’t sure who to blame for what happened to him and his wife. He wishes he were a teenager again and that he could twirl and play dress-up. He wonders why he thinks this isn’t allowed for men his age. They’d call me demented and lock me up in a home.
Growing up ruins everything.
Loretta’s Flea Check
“I’m going to need to see your ankles,” the nurse says. They haven’t been back to see Loretta’s mother yet. They’ve stopped in some sort of business office smaller than the living room in their wagon. The sign on the door says EDUCATION.
Loretta stops spinning in the hallway and puts her lunch box down on a swivel chair and yanks up her red-sequined gown, then tugs on the leg of her jeans to show her ankles. Her socks are gray from wear and washing. Loretta thinks: This is just another audition. My ankles will get the part, for sure.
The nurse composes herself. “How long have you had these bites? Would you mind if I put something on them? Are they itchy?”
Loretta thinks. “They itch a little. Not bad, though.”
“Your mom has some bites, too.”
“Yeah.”
“You have pets at home?”
“No. No pets.” Loretta feels bad saying that. But no one understands that fleas can be pets. Can be friends. Can be talented performers. Can be world famous.
“When did they start?” the nurse asks.
“When did who start?”
“The bites.”
Loretta doesn’t remember a day without bites. “About two months ago,” she lies. She turns the page in her script and it’s blank. So’s the next one. And the next. And the next.
* * *
Loretta’s mother hugs her for more than a minute. Loretta notices that her mother has a bruised face—it’s a weird bruise, though. It’s one big bruise and not the smaller kinds that blend into one another like usual.
“Where’s Dad?” Loretta asks.
Before her mother can answer, the nurse says, “He’s not going to be back. You two have all the time in the world.” The nurse pulls up a chair that looks sterile and yet comfortable and puts it next to the bed and then she leaves.
Loretta’s mother doesn’t say anything for a while, and Loretta feels the curse inside of her. Two curses, really. It’s been a day since she had the fleas out for exercise and food. And it’s only been two hours since she, you know. She notes the private bathroom in the room and figures she can take care of both inside it.
“Your dad isn’t going to come back,” Loretta’s mother says. “Not to here and not to anywhere.”
“Okay.”
“We’re going to go live somewhere else.”
Loretta doesn’t understand somewhere else. She’s lived in the wagon on the lot her whole life. “Somewhere like where?”
“Not sure yet.”
“Can we still live in the wagon?”
Loretta’s mother starts to cry a little. “No. No wagon.”
“Can I still go to my school?” Loretta doesn’t know why she asks this. She saw it once in an article about parents divorcing and the questions kids ask. This is a normal question. Loretta isn’t normal, so she figures she should at least seem it while her mother is crying.
“I’m not sure,” her mother answers. “We have a lot of options.”
“That sounds promising,” Loretta says.
And her mother smiles.
The audience is waiting for the big moment, but there isn’t one. Loretta just sits there, the machines attached to her mom beeping, and an occasional flea jumping up from the bed.
Eventually Loretta asks, “So what happened?”
“I can’t even tell you.”
“You can tell me anything,” Loretta says.
“I—I don’t even know you.” Her mother sobs this out and takes a few deep breaths.
“I’m Loretta. Ringmistress of the best circus you’ll ever see. I’m also skilled in the basics of ninth-grade education—grammar, biology, geometry.”
“Ringmistress?”
Loretta stands up and shows off her new dress. “Isn’t it perfect?”
“It is, I guess. I can shorten those straps for you.”
Loretta’s confusion shows on her face. She looks at the IV unit and wonders what the hospital was giving her mother to make her able to sew. Loretta wants some, too.
Her mother asks, “When was the last time you took a bath?”
“A bath or a shower?”
“Either.”
“I took a shower three days ago. Or four. Something like that,” Loretta says.
“The bathrooms here have those walk-in bathtubs.”
“Are you staying awhile?” Loretta asks.
“Seems so.”
“Am I staying with you?”
“This is no place for a kid,” her mother says.
“But if I’m not staying in the wagon and I’m not staying here, then—”
“Be patient. We’re working it out.”
“No foster parents. Right? You’re not going to put me in with strangers.”
“No foster parents. Promise.”
Loretta pulls her chair so close to the bed that she can rest her head on her mother’s chest. “So what happened?”
“I—last thing I remember was not being able to breathe. Something tight around my neck. I really don’t know.”
“Is Dad with the police?”
“Yes.”
Loretta takes a few seconds to answer. “Good,” she says.
The audience relaxes its shoulders.
A light knock sounds from the doorway. An older man pokes his head into the room. Loretta recognizes him somehow and can’t figure out how. The audience knows him only from holidays and birthday parties back when Loretta was young.
Malcolm Discovers Sixty-Five Miles per Hour
Sixty-five miles per hour is a death wish. I seriously don’t know how anyone does this without having a mental breakdown. I’ve almost turned around twice but you can’t turn around on a highway and only now that I’m driving do I realize I don’t know the roads around my town as well as I thought I did.
As a kid it was all about landmarks. The sign for the sheepskin store meant we were going camping. The road with the falling rocks sign and the river to the right meant we were going to the pool. Mostly, I counted mile markers.
Everything is different once you’re driving. Mile markers? I don’t think I’ve seen one on this road. Can’t read billboards. Have to keep my eyes on my lane.
Growing up must ruin everything.
By the time I’m doing sixty-five for more than four minutes, I make a promise to myself. I’m moving to Negril, going off the grid, and I’m never getting a car.
The GPS voice on my phone tells me to take the next exit. It’s a giant loop exit so I slow down before I get to the off-ramp and a car slides in behind me and lays on his horn so hard I go numb and my sinuses clear from the surprise. I pull onto the ramp’s shoulder and let him pass me. It was a her, actually. She seemed really angry for no reason.
Everybody rushing. Breathe in peace, breathe out stress.
Everybody complaining. Breathe in peace, breathe out stress.
Everybody dying. Everybody around me dying and me not allowed to feel a thing about it like I’m some kid who still counts mile markers. Breathe in peace, breathe out stress. Fuck breathing. Fuck peace. My family is dying and it’s the weirdest feeling in the world because I was already alone. What’s this, then? Ultra alone? Super alone? Mega alone?
If I was a superhero, my name would be Lonerman. My superpower would be the Existentialism—a ray I could shoot out of my hand that renders people powerless to face anything but their own personal pointlessness in an absurd world.
Lonerman pulls back onto the road when he’s sure no one else is entering the exit ramp. He gets to the stop sign. He follows directions all the way to the hospital. He parks in the parking garage and gets out of his grandmother’s car. He is alone in the world and not alone in the world at the same time. The responsibility on his shoulders is so heavy he can’t breathe in peace or breathe out stress. His diaphragm is crushed with the weight of knowing that if his father is dead, then he will be the only one left.
That’s a nice daydream and everything, but I can’t bring myself to pull out onto the road again.
I look around the dashboard and find the hazard lights and press the button. I can see the rhythmic pulsing of the lights and the BMW feels like it’s breathing. I turn up the heat even though it’s not cold outside. I’m cold inside. That’s my problem. Lonerman has always been cold inside. Even when he’s on Negril’s seven-mile white sand beach. Even when he’s kissing Eleanor.
I feel something familiar. Something like I ate bad shrimp. Something like I swallowed the weight of the world. I am digesting Dad’s cancer, and my system is rejecting it. I try to open the driver’s side door, but I’m locked in by BMW engineers. I can’t see the buttons on the armrest. Saliva starts flowing. I swallow.
Lonerman swallows it down. Swallows everything down. Lonerman has been swallowing everything for fifteen years like a wave hit and he’s bouncing around under the surf trying to find a way up. Salt water and pineapple. That’s what it tastes like—swallowing everything. Salt water and old fish. Salt water and force-fed lamb chops.
I lean into the passenger’s seat and it all comes up in heaves.
I have just vomited on Marla’s BMW leather seats.
The other stuff comes out of my mouth—the pineapple and the old fish and lamb chops. The salt water comes out of my eyes, though. Steady and streaming like tropical rain that doesn’t stop for days.
The car stinks and I turn the heat off. I find the window buttons, and I roll them all down. I close my eyes so I don’t see the flashing hazard lights, and even with my eyes pinched so tightly, the tears keep coming. I reach in the back seat for Marla’s tissue box and she only has four left. I use one to wipe my mouth and chin. I use another to wipe my eyes and blow my nose. I turn on the interior lights and I look at the puddle of vomit and know that two tissues won’t make a difference.
I take off my sweatshirt and clean up as much of the vomit as I can and then I toss the sweatshirt out the window. I know there’s a car wash near here. The kind with the rainbow soap bubbles. I want to go to the hospital, but I know leaving vomit to dry in an emetephobe’s car is like leaving a million spiders in an arachnophobe’s bed.
