As Luck Would Have It (33 page)

Boredom was not going to be a problem, at least not right away.  The phone rang frequently from concerned friends and relatives, but mostly it was the reporters who wanted to interview me.  Before I left the hospital, I'd talked to someone from the
Chicago Tribune
, but otherwise had not felt like continually telling people that I had no idea what happened, or trying to find some way to answer the ubiquitous question of how it felt to be the lone survivor, when so many others had perished.  The thought of it even sent waves of anxiety and depression through me.  I tried so hard to picture the other passengers or remember some small thing that I could grab on to.  Had I been upgraded to first class and had a flight attendant offered me something to drink while the others were still boarding?  Or was I crowded in coach, maybe in a middle seat even, and had the person next to me tried to make small talk or maybe offered to share a snack with me?  Were there children seated near by, little ones whose lives were swept away with those of their parents, with so much left unaccomplished as far as they were concerned, with the only comfort possible being held tightly by their mother or father as the drifted away together?  Would I ever remember any of them?  Many of their pictures were in the paper or on TV, but all were total strangers, faces that brought up no form of recognition.

The very next day, I had two unexpected visitors appear at my apartment; Mr. Finnernan and his wife Sally.  They had been in town visiting their only son, who remained in the area after finishing college and lived only a mile or so from me.  I made coffee and we sat at the dining room table; Sally had brought me some food, including a pound cake that I sliced into and put out for us to try.  They also gave me a copy of
One Hundred Years of Solitude,
by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.  I was quit flattered by the
gesture and
listened with interest as Sally talked about the texture and symbolism in Marquez's writing, his fascination with metaphors and the fatalistic repetition of history throughout the story.  If I liked it, she had some other authors she could recommend.  It hit me suddenly; who was this woman?  I'd met her several times before at company functions and always thought she was rather dull and nearly impossible to make intelligent conversation with.  She was nothing like that; she was articulate and engaging to say the least.  Had she changed that much since I saw her at the office Christmas party two yeas before, or had I just not been paying enough attention to her?  I mentioned that I had read a couple of books by Carlos Fuentes, and she said she had as well, and enjoyed them.

Mr. Finnernan offered that he had been so busy after the promotion to New York that he had little time for reading.  He talked about some of the fundamental business strategies the company was exploring and how the impact of the economic recovery had bolstered a lot of the ideas that his group had been working on.  I had never seen him so enthusiastic or so expressive about work related subjects; I always viewed him as a marginal, barely competent financial manager,
someone content to plod
his way through without providing much in the way of inspiration.  But he seemed quite proficient and confident when he talked about the changing direction of our organization.  How long had I been knocked out for, and how had his social mannerisms changed so much since he left Chicago just one year earlier?  He seemed trim and healthier to me as well; his morning workouts at the company gym accounting for that, he explained, when I mentioned that he was looking very well.  They both gave me warm hugs before leaving and promised to keep in touch and have me to dinner with their son the next time they came to town and I was fully back on my feet.

I was tired when they left and my head was hurting now.  I took an Oxycodone from the bottle the hospital had sent me home with, and then went to the den to see if there might be anything worth watching on TV in the middle of the day.  I was drifting in and out from the effects of the narcotic and my dreams were fitful and disturbing; strange visions of people I didn't know asking directions to places I'd never been to, ending finally with someone breaking into the apartment and stealing the food the Finnernans had been so kind to bring over.

When I got up finally, it was dark and I had no idea how much time had passed.  There was a banging on the door; it was Joseph back from his business trip with his boyfriend.  They sat out in the living room while I pulled myself together, then I opened a bottle of wine and poured just two glasses, afraid to mix alcohol with the drugs I was taking.  On the way out of the kitchen, I
started to toss
the Oxycodone into the trash; hell, the pain wasn't that bad
,
but
then thought better of it since the prescription had no refills and I might
be in need of
something stronger than Tylenol later.
  Tomorrow though, I'd have a glass of Scotch if I damn well wanted one; a cigarette t
oo, though I still didn't have the slightest
desire for one of those,
which dumbfounded me.

Joseph said I looked like shit and after I thanked him for the compliment, I asked him how cute he thought he would look if he crawled out of a crushed airplane into freezing water with a cracked head just four days earlier.  The two of them laughed at that; true enough they agreed and they both put their arms around my shoulders as if I needed help walking back to the kitchen where the rest of the Shiraz was waiting.  I stared at them for a minute, relieved that they seemed more or less unchanged since the accident; Joseph with the same crooked smile and high pitched giggling; his boyfriend as enthralled as always just to be around him, his eyes still as wide as a schoolgirl's on her prom night.  I saw clearly what a good couple they made and how happy they were, and although I'm not sure I would ever have totally admitted it to myself before, I was pretty happy about it
now
too
and was grateful to have them there with me
.

Gradually over the next
several
weeks at home, two things seemed to change in more or less direct proportion to each other; the headaches subsided in frequency and severity, and my brain was fusing the requisite connections so that my memory might make its return.  It came at odd times in waves of recalling, small bits at first, but later, bigger
chunks
that snapped together like jigsaw puzzle pieces, until the pictures were
fully
formed in my mind.  Now I remembered many of the details of the flight, particularly the terrifying and dizzying tumbling of the jet and the awful sensation that shook me to the bones when it finally slammed its way into the water.  The sound of the frightened and screaming passengers interrupted my sleep and startled me awake at night, and I was forced to consider the possibility that these nightmares might now become permanent, like a concentration camp survivor tortured by a lifetime of horrifying dreams.  I tried hard not to think of the individual passengers, but they unmercifully seemed to find me instead; the faces of people milling around the gate area, the flight attendants scurrying about the galley making their hurried pre-flight preparations, the toddler running though the aisle and her parents chasing after.  If I was to be haunted by all of them, there was at least a bit of solace in
hoping
that most went quickly, even peacefully perhaps
, once
the aircraft decided where a good place might be to lay them
down
.

If luck had been watching out for me yet again, what might it decide to do for an encore?  How would one pay
for any of this, for
being the only one to survive out of more than 150 who could not?  These questions seemed to trouble me at times almost as much as the accident itself; how could I have possibly escaped such a colossal tragedy yet again, this time against such overwhelming odds, like drawing a straight flush on the first hand dealt, or stepping from the basement to find that the
hurricane
had ripped to shreds every single house for blocks on end, but had only broken a window or two on just the one I had sought protection in.  It was 46 years now since my parents were taken from me, and I missed them
so fiercely
still to this day, but what would luck now demand in return for all that had happened since then; would it extract my soul in exchange?  Could it ever provide me
with peaceful sleep without the fearsome nightmares?

I remember one
weird and
frightening
dream in particular. 
For the weeks when I was not allowed to drive, I
had been in
the habit of taking brisk walks every day, both to kill time and provide
me with
some regular exercise.  In my dream, I had walked just a few blocks from
home
when somehow
I
found myself completely lost.  None of the buildings looked familiar and when I tried to retrace my route, there were no recognizable landmarks to guide me; the more I
walked
the more alien my surroundings
became. Suddenly, an elderly man who I did not recognize appeared as if out of nowhere
.  He wo
re a dark suit and a derby-styled hat.

Hello Clifford, how are you feeling?  I’m sorry sir, but do I know you?  By now you should know me very well, even if we have
never
been formally introduced.  I don’t believe I have ever seen you before sir, and how did you know my name?  I know all there is to
know about you, even more than your friend Joseph does.  Please let me introduce myself; my name is Luck.  Glad to meet you, Mr. Luck.  What an unusual name, I thought, but with a name like that, perhaps he could be of use to me.  Sir, I seem to be lost and unable to find the way back to my dwelling, can you point me in the right direction possibly?  Why of course, come with me.  We walked just one block and when we turned the corner, the apartment
building
was right in front of me.  I was very relieved to be home again
as you can imagine.  You were never lost Clifford, maybe just confused.  I
was totally
disoriented, thank you so much for helping me sir.  I turned to say goodbye to him, but there was no one there.  Mr. Luck, where
are you?
  But there was
no answer
.

As I walked towards the apartment, I noticed someone
waiting
out front; probably it was Joseph bringing me groceries after work.  When I called to him, the man turned around and I saw that it was Jamie Dobbs waiting there. 
What’s the matter Andrews, looking for your fagot boyfriend again?  He
looked much like I had remembered him
and  had that same evil gaze
that I recalled
so clearly.  I wasn’t looking for anyone Jamie, especially
y
ou.  He walked towards me slowly and extended his hand for me to shake;
let’s make up and be friends, Clifford
, what happened before was so long ago
.  I reached for his hand and just then he swung his fist without warning and connected with a solid blow
to
my face, just under my left eye.
I landed flat on my back on the sidewalk and
could not move or see anything, the blood filling my eyes
just like that time in the school yard.
  H
e stood over me, punching and kicking
, until I heard him laughing and
suddenly I was alone
, sweating and shaking in my bed.

*****

It was
more than
two months
before I was finally cleared to return to work; the neurological tests not totally conclusive as far as the experts were concerned even then.  But I kept begging them to let me try to work not only because I was tired of sitting at home, but also because the cognitive changes I was experiencing were unsettling to say the least.  Knowing quite a bit about me by this time, you might expect that I would be glad to take the doctors up on a conservative treatment protocol and stay off work for as long as possible, but actually I was looking forward to getting back to the office ever since
the visit from Mr. Finnernan. 
I was curious about the proposed changes he had mentioned and wondered what differences I might notice since I had left.  I actually felt somewhat enthused, at least a little bit, about the prospect of being part of the office environment once again.

My memory had not completely returned and I was still experiencing intermittent symptoms ranging from fatigue to ver
tigo.  I still felt a certain sense of confusion
and
had difficulty concentrating on one thing at a time, but
I
was completely lucid and had never been prone to hallucinations, so I could find no rational explanation to account for what happened once I settled into my office that
morning
in
mid-February
.
The place was buzzing with activity; people were busily convening and reconvening; everywhere I looked there seemed to be planning and organizing all around me from the moment I sat down at my computer.  Within just a couple of hours, nearly everyone I knew stopped by to welcome me back, but more than that, they were engaging me in projects and assignments that they were involved with, eagerly asking my opinions on issues that were on their minds.  It was draining and energizing at the same time.  Why were they suddenly so interested in their work, and what could have possibly given them the idea that I would be
?