A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (5 page)

Trip to Chicago (research).....................$850.°°

Trip to San Francisco (research).................$620.°°

Food (consumed while ostensibly writing)........$5,800.°°

Sundries.................................$1,200.°°

Laser printer...............................$600.°°

Paper....................................$242.°°

Postage (to send manuscript, for approval, to siblings Beth (somewhere in No. California), and Bill (an advisor to the Comptroller of Texas, in Austin), Kirsten (San Francisco, married), Shalini (living at home in L.A., doing well), Meredith Weiss (freelance wardrobe stylist, San Diego), Jamie Carrick (in L.A., part of management team for Hanson, a popular music outfit),
“
Ricky
”
(San Francisco, investment banker—high-tech IPOs), etc. etc.).....$231 °°

Copy of
Xanadu
Original Movie Soundtrack.........$14.
³²

Information retrieval service (unsuccessful attempt to

retrieve two years
’
worth of journal entries from

external hard drive, expired)....................$75.°°

Net total.............................$39,567.
⁶⁸

Which still isn
’
t so bad, come to think of it^more than the author, who is not a pet owner, can spend. Therefore, he

pledges some of it to you, or at least some of you. The first 200 readers of this book who write with proof that they have read and absorbed the many lessons herein will each receive a check, from the author, for $5, drawn from a U.S. bank, probably Chase Manhattan, which is not a good bank—do not open an account there. Now: how to prove that you have bought and read the book? Let
’
s say we do this: Take the book, which you are required to have purchased*—enclose your receipt, or a copy of the receipt—and have someone take a picture of you reading the book, or maybe putting it to better use. Special consideration for a) the inclusion in the picture of a baby (or babies), as everyone knows that babies are nice; b) the inclusion in the picture of a baby with an exceptionally large tongue; c) pictures taken in exotic locales (with the book, remember); d) pictures of the book being rubbed against by a red panda, a small bear + raccoon-looking mammal, also known as the
“
lesser panda,
”
native of central China and frequent-rubber-againster of things for marking

It should go without saying that if you
’
ve checked this book out from the library, or are reading it in paperback, you are much, much too late. Come to think of it, you may be reading this far, far in the future—it
’
s probably being taught in all the schools! Do tell: What
’
s it like in the future? Is everyone wearing robes? Are the cars rounder, or less round? Is there a women
’
s soccer league yet?

of territory. Do NOT FORGET TO: center yourself, or whatever your subject, in the picture. If you
’
re using an auto-focus camera with a 35mm lens, get closer than you feel you should; the lens, because it
’
s convex, has the effect of backing you up 5-8 feet. Also: Keep your clothes on, please. Those readers who are savvy enough to have picked up a copy of one quarterly publication in particular will already know the most expeditious address to receive this free-ish money (though that address is only good until maybe August 2000), and will therefore be at an advantage, timewise. Otherwise, send your tasteful photographs to:

A.H.W.O.S.G. Offer

Vintage Books

299 Park Avenue

New York, NY 10171 If, by the time the author receives your letter, he has already distributed the 200 checks, good fortune may yet strike. If your picture is amusing or your name or hometown unfortunate-sounding, and you include a self-addressed stamped envelope, he will put something (not money) inside the envelope and will send it back, because he does not have cable, and needs diversion. Now.* The author would like to acknowledge your desire to
get
started with the plot, the body of the book, the
story.

Interesting story: My father once related how he and his friend Les had come up with a way, when stalling for time in a meeting or deposition (he and Les were lawyers [Les, alive and well, still is a lawyer]), instead of saying
“
Urn.,.,
”
or
“
Uh...,
”
one could say
“
Now...,
”
a word which accomplishes two things: it serves the same stalling purpose as
“
Um...,
”
or
“
Uh...,
”
but instead of being dumb-sounding offputting, it creates suspense for what is coming next, whatever that might be, that which the speaker doesn
’
t
yet
know.

He will do that, and, contrary to what was said in D), he will be giving you, for a good 100 pages or so, uninterrupted, unself-conscious prose, which will entertain and make sad and, here and there, hearten. He will get on with that story any moment now, because he recognizes when the time has come, when the time is right, when the getting
’
s good. He acknowledges the needs and feelings of a reader, the fact that a reader only has so much time, so much patience—that seemingly endless screwing about, interminable clearing of one
’
s throat, can very easily look like, or even
become,
a sort of contemptuous stalling, a putting-off of one
’
s readers, and no one wants that. (Or do they?) So we will move on, because the author, like you, wants to move on, into the meat of it, dive right in and revisit this stuff, because it
’
s a story that ought to be told, involving, as it does, death and redemption, bile, and betrayal. So dive in we will, after a few more acknowledgments. The author would like to acknowledge the brave men and women serving in the United States Armed Forces. He wishes them well, and hopes they come home soon. That is, if they want to. If they like it where they are, he hopes they stay there. At least until such time as they want to come home. Then they should come straight home, on the very next plane. The author would also like to acknowledge the makers of comic book villains and superheroes, those who invented, or

at least popularized, the notion of the normal, mild-mannered person transformed into mutant by freak accident, with the mutant thereafter driven by a strange hybrid of the most rancid bitterness and the most outrageous hope to do very, very odd and silly things, many times in the name of Good. The makers of comic books seemed to be onto something there. Now, in a spirit of interpretive
glasnost,
the author would like to save you some trouble by laying out a rough guide to a little over half of the metaphors in the book. (Next page.) The author would also like to acknowledge his propensity to exaggerate. And his propensity to fib in order to make himself look better, or worse, whichever serves his purposes at the time. He would also like to acknowledge that no, he is not the only person to ever lose his parents, and that he is also not the only person ever to lose his parents and inherit a youngster. But he would like to point out that he is currently the only such person with a book contract. He would like to acknowledge the distinguished senator from Massachusetts. And Palestinian statehood. And the implicit logic of the instant replay rule. And that he too is well aware of all of the book
’
s flaws and shortcomings, whatever you consider them to be, and that he tips his hat to you for noticing them. And come to think of it, he would actually like to acknowledge his brother Bill after all; his brother Bill is such a good
man. And this book
’
s gracious and trusting editor, Geoff Kloske, and Mr. Kloske
’
s assistant, Nicole Graev, who has her vowels transposed but is otherwise very nice. Also C. Leyshon, A. Quinn, J. Lethem, and V. Vida, for the assuaging of fears, not to mention Adrienne Miller, John Warner, Marny Requa and Sarah Vowell, whose readings of this book before it was readable were much appreciated (even though, come to think of it, the author did toss Warner $100, which makes his acknowledgment kind of unnecessary). And once again, all the people who star in this story, especially Mr. C.M.E., who knows who he is. Finally, the author would also like to acknowledge the men and women of the United States Postal Service, for performing a sometimes thankless task with great aplomb and, given the scale and scope of the endeavor, with stunning efficiency.

Here is a drawing of a stapler:

xlv

I.

Through the small tall bathroom window the December yard is gray and scratchy, the trees calligraphic. Exhaust from the dryer billows out of the house and up, breaking apart while tumbling into the white sky.

The house is a factory.

I put my pants back on and go back to my mother. I walk down the hall, past the laundry room, and into the family room. I close the door behind me, muffling the rumbling of the small shoes in the dryer.

“
Where were you?
”
my mother says.

“
In the bathroom,
”
I say.

“
Hmph,
”
she says.

“
What?
”

“
For fifteen minutes?
”

“
It wasn
’
t that long.
”

“
It was longer. Was something broken?
”

“
No.
”

“
Did you fall in?
”

“
No.
”

“
Were you playing with yourself?
”

“
I was cutting my hair.
”

“
You were contemplating your navel.
”

“
Right. Whatever.
”

“
Did you clean up?
”

“
Yeah.
”

I had not cleaned up, had actually left hair everywhere, twisted brown doodles drawn in the sink, but knew that my mother would not find out. She could not get up to check.

My mother is on the couch. At this point, she does not move from the couch. There was a time, until a few months ago, when she was still up and about, walking and driving, running errands. After that there was a period when she spent most of her time in her chair, the one next to the couch, occasionally doing things, going out, whatnot. Finally she moved to the couch, but even then, for a while at least, while spending most of her time on the couch, every night at 11 p.m. or so, she had made a point of making her way up the stairs, in her bare feet, still tanned brown in November, slow and careful on the green carpet, to my sister
’
s old bedroom. She had been sleeping there for years—the room was pink, and clean, and the bed had a canopy, and long ago she resolved that she could no longer sleep with my father
’
s coughing.

But the last time she went upstairs was weeks ago. Now she is on the couch, not moving from the couch, reclining on the couch during the day and sleeping there at night, in her nightgown, with the TV on until dawn, a comforter over her, toe to neck. People know.

While reclining on the couch most of the day and night, on her back, my mom turns her head to watch television and turns it back to spit up green fluid into a plastic receptacle. The plastic receptacle is new. For many weeks she had been spitting the green fluid into a towel, not the same towel, but a rotation of towels, one of which she would keep on her chest. But the towel on her chest, my

sister Beth and I found after a short while, was not such a good place to spit the green fluid, because, as it turned out, the green fluid smelled awful, much more pungent an aroma than one might expect. (One expects some sort of odor, sure, but
this.)
And so the green fluid could not be left there, festering and then petrifying on the terry-cloth towels. (Because the green fluid hardened to a crust on the terry-cloth towels, they were almost impossible to clean. So the green-fluid towels were one-use only, and even if you used every corner of the towels, folding and turning, turning and folding, they would only last a few days each, and the supply was running short, even after we plundered the bathrooms, closets, the garage.) So finally Beth procured, and our mother began to spit the green fluid into, a small plastic container which looked makeshift, like a piece of an air-conditioning unit, but had been provided by the hospital and was as far as we knew designed for people who do a lot of spitting up of green fluid. It
’
s a molded plastic receptacle, cream-colored, in the shape of a half-moon, which can be kept handy and spit into. It can be cupped around the mouth of a reclining person, just under the chin, in a way that allows the depositor of green bodily fluids to either raise one
’
s head to spit directly into it, or to simply let the fluid dribble down, over his or her chin, and then into the receptacle waiting below. It was a great find, the half-moon plastic receptacle.

“
That thing is handy, huh?
”
I ask my mother, walking past her, toward the kitchen.

“
Yeah, it
’
s the cat
’
s meow,
”
she says.

I get a popsicle from the refrigerator and come back to the family room.

They took my mother
’
s stomach out about six months ago. At that point, there wasn
’
t a lot left to remove—they had already taken out [I would use the medical terms here if I knew them] the
rest
of it about a year before. Then they tied the [something] to the [something], hoped that they had removed the offending portion,
and set her on a schedule of chemotherapy. But of course they didn
’
t get it all. They had left some of it and it had grown, it had come back, it had laid eggs, was stowed away, was stuck to the side of the spaceship. She had seemed good for a while, had done the chemo, had gotten the wigs, and then her hair had grown back— darker, more brittle. But six months later she began to have pain again—
Was it indigestion?
It could just be indigestion, of course, the burping and the pain, the leaning over the kitchen table at dinner; people have indigestion; people take Turns;
Hey Mom, should I get some Turns?
—but when she went in again, and they had
“
opened her up
”
—a phrase they used—and had looked inside, it was staring out at them, at the doctors, like a thousand writhing worms under a rock, swarming, shimmering, wet and oily—
Good God!
— or maybe not like worms but like a million little podules, each a tiny city of cancer, each with an unruly, sprawling, environmentally careless citizenry with no zoning laws whatsoever. When the doctor opened her up, and there was suddenly light thrown upon the world of cancer-podules, they were annoyed by the disturbance, and defiant.
Turn off. The fucking. Light.
They glared at the doctor, each podule, though a city unto itself, having one single eye, one blind evil eye in the middle, which stared imperiously, as only a blind eye can do, out at the doctor.
Go. The. Fuck. Away.
The doctors did what they could, took the whole stomach out, connected what was left, this part to that, and sewed her back up, leaving the city as is, the colonists to their manifest destiny, their fossil fuels, their strip malls and suburban sprawl, and replaced the stomach with a tube and a portable external IV bag. It
’
s kind of cute, the IV bag. She used to carry it with her, in a gray backpack—it
’
s futuristic-looking, like a synthetic ice pack crossed with those liquid food pouches engineered for space travel. We have a name for it. We call it
“
the bag.
”

My mother and I are watching TV. It
’
s the show where young amateur athletes with day jobs in marketing and engineering
compete in sports of strength and agility against male and female bodybuilders. The bodybuilders are mostly blond and are impeccably tanned. They look great. They have names that sound fast and indomitable, names like American cars and electronics, like Firestar and Mercury and Zenith. It is a great show.

“
What is this?
”
she asks, leaning toward the TV. Her eyes, once small, sharp, intimidating, are now dull, yellow, droopy, strained—the spitting gives them a look of constant exasperation.

“
The fighting show thing,
”
I say.

“
Hmm,
”
she says, then turns, lifts her head to spit.

“
Is it still bleeding?
”
I ask, sucking on my popsicle.

“
Yeah.
”

We are having a nosebleed. While I was in the bathroom, she was holding the nose, but she can
’
t hold it tight enough, so now I relieve her, pinching her nostrils with my free hand. Her skin is oily, smooth.

“
Hold it tighter,
”
she says.

“
Okay,
”
I say, and hold it tighter. Her skin is hot.

Toph
’
s shoes continue to rumble.

A month ago Beth was awake early; she cannot remember why. She walked down the stairs, shushing the green carpet, down to the foyer
’
s black slate floor. The front door was open, with only the screen door closed. It was fall, and cold, and so with two hands she closed the large wooden door, click, and turned toward the kitchen. She walked down the hall and into the kitchen, frost spi-derwebbed on the corners of its sliding glass door, frost on the bare trees in the backyard. She opened the refrigerator and looked inside. Milk, fruit, IV bags dated for proper use. She closed the refrigerator. She walked from the kitchen into the family room, where the curtains surrounding the large front window were open, and the light outside was white. The window was a bright silver
screen, lit from behind. She squinted until her eyes adjusted. As her eyes focused, in the middle of the screen, at the end of the driveway, was my father, kneeling.

Its not that our family has no taste, it
’
s just that our family
’
s taste is inconsistent. The wallpaper in the downstairs bathroom, though it came with the house, is the house
’
s most telling decorative statement, featuring a pattern of fifteen or so slogans and expressions popular at the time of its installation.
Right On, Neat-O, Outta Sight!
—arranged so they unite and abut in intriguing combinations.
That-A-Way
meets
Way Out
so that the A in
That-A-Way
creates
A Way Out.
The words are hand-rendered in stylized block letters, red and black against white. It could not be uglier, and yet the wallpaper is a novelty that visitors appreciate, evidence of a family with no pressing interest in addressing obvious problems of decor, and also proof of a happy time, an exuberant, fanciful time in American history that spawned exuberant and fanciful wallpaper.

The living room is kind of classy, actually—clean, neat, full of heirlooms and antiques, an oriental rug covering the center of the hardwood floor. But the family room, the only room where any of us has ever spent any time, has always been, for better or for worse, the ultimate reflection of our true inclinations. It
’
s always been jumbled, the furniture competing, with clenched teeth and sharp elbows, for the honor of the Most Wrong-looking Object. For twelve years, the dominant chairs were blood orange. The couch of our youth, that which interacted with the orange chairs and white shag carpet, was plaid—green, brown and white. The family room has always had the look of a ship
’
s cabin, wood paneled, with six heavy wooden beams holding, or pretending to hold, the ceiling above. The family room is dark and, save for a general sort of decaying of its furniture and walls, has not changed much in the twenty years we
’
ve lived here. The furniture is overwhelmingly
brown and squat, like the furniture of a family of bears. There is our latest couch, my father
’
s, long and covered with something like tan-colored velour, and there is the chair next to the couch, which five years ago replaced the bloodoranges, a sofa-chair of brownish plaid, my mother
’
s. In front of the couch is a coffee table made from a cross section of a tree, cut in such a way that the bark is still there, albeit heavily lacquered. We brought it back, many years ago, from California and it, like most of the house
’
s furniture, is evidence of an empathetic sort of decorating philosophy—for aesthetically disenfranchised furnishings we are like the families that adopt troubled children and refugees from around the world—we see beauty within and cannot say no.

One wall of the family room was and is dominated by a brick fireplace. The fireplace has a small recessed area that was built to facilitate indoor barbecuing, though we never put it to use, chiefly because when we moved in, we were told that raccoons lived somewhere high in the chimney. So for many years the recessed area sat dormant, until the day, about four years ago, that our father, possessed by the same odd sort of inspiration that had led him for many years to decorate the lamp next to the couch with rubber spiders and snakes, put a fish tank inside. The fish tank, its size chosen by a wild guess, ended up fitting perfectly.