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She just wanted me to know that, tonight, she was to be recalled to the year 2556.
This would be the last time we'd ever see each other, and she just wanted me to know that
she was grateful.
"I'm profoundly grateful," she said. "And I do love you."
And standing there in the hallway, in the strong light from the sun rising outside the
windows, I took a black felt-tipped pen from the chest pocket of her lab coat.
The way she stood with her shadow falling on the wall behind her for the last time, I
started to trace her outline.
And Paige Marshall said, "What's that for?"
It's how art was invented.
And I said, "Just in case. It's just in case you're not crazy."
Chapter 46
IN MOST TWELVE-STEP RECOVERY PROGRAMS, the fourth step makes you write a complete
and relentless story of your life as an addict. Every lame, suck-ass moment of your life,
you have to get a notebook and write it down. A complete inventory of your crimes. That
way it's always in your head. Then you have to fix it all. This goes for alcoholics, drug
abusers, and overeaters as well as sex addicts.
This way you can go back and review the worst of your life anytime you want.
Still, those who remember the past aren't necessarily any better off.
My yellow notebook, in here is everything about me, seized with a search warrant.
About Paige and Denny and Beth. Nico and Leeza and Tanya. The detectives read
through it, sitting across a big wood table from me in a locked soundproof room. One
wall is a mirror, for sure with a video camera behind it.
And the detectives ask me, what was I hoping to accomplish by admitting to other
peoples crimes?
They ask me, what was I trying to do?
To complete the past, I tell them.
All night, they read my inventory and ask me, what does all this mean?
Nurse Flamingo. Dr. Blaze. "The Blue Danube Waltz."
What we say when we can't tell the truth. What anything means anymore, I don't
know.
The police detectives ask if I know the whereabouts of a patient named Paige
Marshall. She's wanted for questioning about the apparent smothering death of a patient
named Ida Mancini. My apparent mother.
Miss Marshall disappeared last night from a locked ward. There's no visible signs of
forced escape. No witnesses. Nothing. She's just vanished.
The staff at St. Anthony's were humoring her in the delusion, the police tell me, that
she was a real doctor. They let her wear an old lab coat. It made her more cooperative.
The staff say she and I were pretty chummy.
"Not really," I say. "I mean, I saw her around, but I didn't really know anything about
her."
The detectives tell me I don't have a lot of friends among the nursing staff.
See also: Clare, RN.
See also: Pearl, CNA.
See also: Colonial Dunsboro.
See also: The sexaholics.
I don't ask if they've bothered checking for Paige Marshall in the year 2556.
Digging in my pocket, I find a dime. I swallow it, and it goes down.
In my pocket, I find a paper clip. But it goes down, too.
While the detectives look through my mom's red diary, I look around for anything
larger. Something too large to swallow.
I've been choking to death for years. By now this should be easy.
After a knock on the door, they bring in a dinner tray. A hamburger on a plate. A
napkin. A bottle of ketchup. The backup in my guts, the swelling and pain, make it so I'm
starving, but I can't eat.
They ask me, "What's all this in the diary?"
I open the hamburger. I open the bottle of ketchup. I need to eat to survive, but I'm so
full of my own shit.
It's Italian, I tell them.
Still reading, the detectives ask, "What's this stuff that looks like maps? All these
pages of drawings?"
It's funny, but I'd forgot all that. Those are maps. Maps I did when I was a little boy,
a stupid, gullible little shit. You see, my mom told me that I could reinvent the whole
world. That I had that kind of power. That I didn't have to accept the world the way it
stood, all property-lined and micromanaged. I could make it anything I wanted.
That's how crazy she was.
And I believed her.
And I slip the cap from the bottle of ketchup into my mouth. And I swallow.
In the next instant, my legs snap straight so fast my chair flies over behind me. My
hands go to gripping around my throat. I'm on my feet and gaping at the painted ceiling,
my eyes rolled back. My chin stretches out away from my face.
Already the detectives are half out of their seats.
From not breathing, the veins in my neck swell. My face gets red, gets hot. Sweat
springs up on my forehead. Sweat blots through the back of my shirt. With my hands, I
hold tight around my neck.
Because I can't save anybody, not as a doctor, not as a son. And because I can't save
anybody, I can't save myself.
Because now I'm an orphan. I'm unemployed and unloved. Because my guts hurt,
and I'm dying anyway, from the inside out.
Because you have to plan your getaway.
Because after you've crossed some lines, you just keep crossing them.
And there's no escaping from constant escape. Distracting ourselves. Avoiding [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]