Girl in the Arena (4 page)

We head for the cafeteria, where we sit by the big picture windows and look at the lights of Boston reflected on the Charles. A tour boat is anchored at its helm. The stern makes a slow arc across the water as it’s pushed back and forth by the current. This always has a calming effect on Thad. We eat french fries in paper cups and watch our reflections in the glass as we become full and satisfied.

Live musicians play jazz and the IMAX lines bulge. After we’ve slurped up all the Coke we can manage, Thad takes my hand and pulls me through the lobby into the turnstile where we show our passes. The crowds have already thinned out, so pretty soon there’s no waiting to punch buttons, lift handles, open drawers, move levers, spin wheels. We ride up the escalator until we’re right there in his favorite place: The Playground. Here Ping-Pong balls are sucked up air tubes, people watch their heartbeats on monitors, and try to outrun a sequence of flashing lights. In one room kids leap into the air and if they time it right, they can see flat shadows of themselves frozen on a blank white wall until those impressions start to fade, and then they press the light button again and start over.

The only exhibit Thad likes is the one where he can make a small digital recording of himself on a monitor. He likes to get it to replay and replay and that makes him laugh some and then he says, 
I love that. 
Though we could certainly make videos at home, I think there’s something about the silliness of hamming it up around other people that has a particular draw for Thad.

My brother sees a lot of specialists and physical therapists. He was put on meds when he was four. I call them 
elevator 
drugs. Without them he seems to flatten out in a way that worries Allison. I know that side effects are part of life, but Thad’s biochemistry mixed with the drugs, produce, well, he fires off this steady stream of predictions now like a crawl at the bottom of a screen. You don’t want to pay attention to all of it but you do. Beautiful and crazy oracles ride up from the basement of his brain and spill out of his mouth in frequent spurts. He feels compelled to share this stuff with me, as if I’m the local translator or the seer’s assistant, and I do my best to take it all in.

Thad looks into the video screen, presses the green button, and the monitor starts to count down from three, signaling that he should get ready for his ten-second personal recording. When it hits zero, he looks into the tiny eye of the camera embedded at the top of the screen and says, in this way that some people would mistake for deadpan, —I’m the most famous person you’ll ever meet.

Then he stares, waiting for the tape to stop.

He presses the replay button and there’s Thad, his large head and the precise teeth marks in his chapped lower lip.

—
I’m the most famous person you’ll ever meet.

Then: the stare.

We both laugh. I tell him how professional he looks.

He says, —I love that.

I count twenty-five additional replays until I say, —I think the show on electricity is about to start. Let’s go see the Tesla coil.

When that doesn’t work, I recommend the Nancy Drew computer game with the eerie androids, the 
Lord of the Rings 
exhibit, the new butterfly room.

—If we’re really still, the butterflies might come and land on us, I say. —I know you’d love that.

But we are in the ritual and we will be here until he finally looks at me and says, —Can we see Mom now?

This means he’s tired and ready to go home. As I take his hand and we walk back toward the escalator, I tell him people will come by and press the replay button and they will see the most famous person they’ll ever meet, if they’re lucky enough to meet him someday.

Thad likes hearing this and asks me to repeat it a couple of times, which is more like fifteen or sixteen.

Later, when I’m helping him with his seat belt out in the parking garage, I say, —We had fun tonight, didn’t we?

And he says, —We had fun tonight.

Thad is not by nature someone who smiles a lot, but I can tell when he’s content. We take Memorial Drive back, less lights—or a different kind of light in any case—less neon.

—We’re going to go to the stadium tomorrow, I say, looking at Thad in the rearview as we pass MIT. Because suddenly I realize someone better explain things to him.

He says, —Tommy’s fighting.

It’s not like him to remember this kind of thing, even if he’s told it many times over, so I know he has to be worried. I’ve noticed Tommy has been spending more time with him lately.

—Tommy’s going to lose this, he says.

He points with his right hand but I’m trying to keep my eyes on the road, so I don’t get what he’s talking about at first.

—What’s Tommy going to lose?

—This.

When I tell him I still don’t get it, he becomes agitated and then he waves his hand back and forth.

So I wave back at him in the rearview, thinking that’s what he wants.

—His hand, he says.

—Tommy’s going to lose his hand? I say, and stop waving.

—Tommy’s going to lose his hand, he says, letting out a deep breath.

I know the horrible things that happen in the arena, but there’s something about this information coming from Thad. Allison shouldn’t take him to competitions. We’ve had endless fights about that. But she says that’s what she has to do—it’s in the GSA Bylaws—and when she starts talking bylaws, there’s no reasoning with her.

We go past Harvard now, Dunster House, and farther up the fat white trees that line the Drive. The traffic slows and we can hear Friday night sounds from the Square. I have to wonder if my friend Mark is there raising hell with his boys before tomorrow’s fight.

—We’ll be home soon. Maybe you and Tommy can soak in the tubs tonight before Mom tucks you in, I say.

But when I look back, I see Thad has already fallen asleep. Tommy will carry him upstairs when we get home, even though he’s so little and Thad is such a big boy. Allison will make sure his night-light is on. She’ll put a glass of water on his bedside table in case he wakes up thirsty. Then she’ll unfold his green and yellow plaid blanket and tuck this in so he doesn’t wake up cold in the middle of the night. She will look in on him a couple of times before she goes to bed to make sure he hasn’t had a nightmare or kicked his covers off. He can get pretty scared if he wakes up alone. I think he forgets that we’re just down the hall.

CHAPTER 4

I wake up the next day to the sound of the LAWNMOWER. Even though my head is still glued to my dreams, this is way too familiar. I get up and go over to my window seat overlooking the backyard. Tommy’s got that antique mower going again. I worry that he’s going to snap. It happens to Glads sometimes.

I watch him move from the shade into the sunlight and back again. It’s a hot day already and his skin—he’s got this kind of shine, like a horse’s coat when he’s been overworked. I want to rush down there and ask if everything is all right, but he seems oddly content mowing up and back. I decide not to break his concentration. But I’m thinking: this is one much-mowed lawn. When Tommy was out there yesterday, he trimmed the exact same swath.

Tommy skirts the cypress tree now, the mower slowly eating into the bark of the thick exposed roots—could anything test Allison’s patience more?—then he stops abruptly. Dropping the handle, he walks to the middle of the lawn. He looks at the ground and then right up at my windows. He waves. Not his usual burst of pleasure, but an almost regal motion. I raise my hand to wave back, when I realize his face is almost expressionless and his body appears to be shifting in the breeze. How can I say this? It’s not that he’s swaying from the hips or dancing to something on ear buds. It’s more like his whole image is rippling.

Then I get it.

I get the whole damn thing.

Allison is running the Living machine.

All this time I’ve been looking at a virtual man, a false father.

I sprint down to Allison’s bedroom.

She signed us up for Living a few years ago. For the cost of a movie download—equipment sold separately—we are able to invite movie stars, athletes, or even despots, famous dead despots if we want them, and a variety of Glads into our home for a bit of genuine 
living
. That’s how the Living machine started, as a safe way to train against some of the world’s best Glads. And it’s definitely a recruitment tool: “Not every young boy has an arena, but if he has a backyard and the Living machine, he can 
learn the moves
.”

Living is virtual reality without goggles. Caesar’s Inc. was in on the launch and has large holdings in the company that produces the equipment as well as the media that the machinery runs. Soon they realized they could add a roster of celebrities. The historical and artistic figures followed.

When Allison lost her fourth husband, Truman, there was a sizable pension, since he had been willing to fight hyenas. Most Glads prefer not to. Allison has never been one to hold on to money. The remarkably expensive equipment arrived in three large boxes with ample warning labels about the use of lasers and what they can do to wall insulation and the cerebral cortex if used improperly.

It took days to put it together and we had a couple of falling-outs over the directions. But once we had it up and running we were able to have dinner with an early Scarlett Johansson, or a projection of Scarlett or a distillation of Scar—we called her Scar—that was very lifelike. I got up from my chair and went over to where Scar was poised, her fork and knife about to dive into her new potatoes. I touched her lips and though they were without real substance, there was a distinct feeling of moisture on my fingertips. She pushed my hand away, or the equipment pushed my hand away, or something in my psyche pushed it away. It’s a powerful piece of equipment, though sometimes I wonder if Allison has the settings right.

Scar said, —
I’m still eating
.

That was kind of spooky.

We played Foosball with John Lennon, watched Oliver Stone’s 
Iraq 
with Condoleezza Rice, and painted Christmas gifts with Van Gogh in English translation: placemats, small wooden boxes, and decoupage wall plaques.

When it was my turn, I asked for Einstein because I wanted to get a better handle on time. It wasn’t about a school assignment and I wasn’t, as Allison claimed, trying to be lofty. I had begun to feel that time would always move at an unwanted pace—too fast in good moments, too slow when Allison is in despair. But when I started to press to get Einstein, Allison discovered that her sixth husband, Diesel, had been added to the Living catalog. She moved the bulky equipment into her bedroom and only turned it on late at night when she imagined I was sleeping.

Now I throw open her bedroom door and find her at the window, the Living machine going full blast. She turns as I fly into the room.

—What are you doing? I ask.

—Shh, she says, pointing to Thad.

He’s fast asleep, bathed in anime colors streaming from the silenced TV. Thad loves anime. Allison pulls me out into the hallway.

—Where’s Tommy? I ask.

—He’s already left for the stadium.

—Don’t you think he’d be a little upset to learn his double is out there gardening while he’s getting ready for the toughest fight of his life?

—What’s that supposed to mean?

—It means you should leave some things alone.

—You don’t understand, she says, and starts to turn away again.

—Then make me understand.

—If Tommy dies, I become this 
thing
, this widow for life. I’m not even supposed to fraternize with men once he’s gone.

Tommy is the seventh and seven is the limit, I know. That’s it on this earth, according to the bylaws. 
No woman is allowed marital congress with more than seven gladiators, 
Bylaw 116. And 
Gladiator Sport Association Widows
, 
GSAWs
, 
are not permitted to fraternize with common men, 
Bylaw 118. Allison knows she could lose her GSAW Financial Remuneration Fund if she goes against the rules. Each year she’s been in the GSAW, and with each Glad husband she’s married, her share has grown. But the fund can be demolished by flagrant misbehavior, mine as well as hers.

—Tommy’s not going to die, I say.

She begins to pace back and forth in front of the photo gallery she’s made of our hallway. Most pictures are groupings of Glads, like swarming class pictures, and in each, one of her husbands is to be found.

—Okay, worst case. You petition Caesar’s Inc. and you challenge the bylaws, I say.

—You don’t get it. I read through the new bylaws again last night. Petitioning isn’t allowed. And if I’m out making a living , who’s at home with Thad? And God knows 
you’ll 
probably take off.

—I’m not taking off, I say. Because right now, we just have to get through this match. She seems to calm a little and she puts her hands on her hips and looks back toward the bedroom.

Now. 
I’m not taking off 
now, 
I think.

—I was only testing to see if Tommy’s Living version is anything like him. I meant to just turn it on for a minute.

She looks at me with an almost timid expression.

—Did you see? I had him wave at you, she says. —I think he was nice and sharp, don’t you? But I’m not so sure about his expression. I think he’s missing some quality. I don’t know what it is.

—Humanness, perhaps? I hate to tell you, but Living is intended to be a game, something people do for entertainment, for fun. You can’t have a virtual husband. That’s just not right. And even if that’s what you want...

—I don’t, she says, looking contrite.

—Well, even if you did, you can’t tell me that would be good for Thad.

—I could turn the volume down, she says.

I hope she’s deadpanning me.

—You want him to have a quiet father who vanishes if we blow a fuse? I ask.

—Someday when you’re a mother, you’ll get it, she snaps.

—I’m going downstairs, I say.

I get why she’s so crazy right now, but I don’t have to stand around in the line of fire.