I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive (12 page)

***

Thanksgiving that year, coming as it did on the heels of a national tragedy, went almost unobserved in much of the country, not that any holiday constituted much more than a slow business day on South Presa. If it weren't for the Macy's parade and the football games preempting Teresa's soaps on the beer-joint TV, it could have been any Thursday.

Sometime Friday afternoon Marge and Dallas abandoned their vigil in front of the TV and drifted back into the daily logistics of running a combination hotel, brothel, and emergency room. By nine o'clock that night, Teresa was busily slinging handfuls of pitchers of draft beer, and Doc had extracted a .22-caliber slug from the hand of a small-time thief who had evidently not heard that it was customary in the barrio to ask the husband for permission to dance with his wife. Then, just before midnight, he scrubbed for the first of three terminations that he would perform before Sunday.

The girl was young and frightened and she sobbed softly through the entire procedure. When it was all over she broke down and bawled, and there was nothing that Doc could do to console her. At his wits' end he hollered for Dallas, but it was Graciela who burst through the door and intervened. Doc's first impulse was to shoo her out of the room, to shelter her from the bloodstained sheets, not to mention complicity in the procedure. But before he could object she climbed up into the big iron bed, cradled the young girl's head in her lap, and began softly singing in Spanish and rocking her like a baby. The girl stopped crying within seconds and the sudden silence rang in Doc's ears as he gazed in wonder at the tableau before him, a living breathing Pietà. Somehow he managed to scribble instructions on a scrap of notebook paper, fold it into a makeshift envelope, and enclose a dozen penicillin capsules while Graciela tenderly helped the girl dress.

That night, without a word exchanged between them, Graciela became the extra pair of hands that boiled the water, rolled the bandages, and changed the sheets, as well as the better half of Doc's bedside manner. Doc was careful to limit her involvement in termination procedures to holding the girls' hands, but she was quickly up to her elbows in all other surgeries, no matter how gruesome. Her English improved daily, but by and large she and Doc spoke very little when they were working, each instinctively augmenting the actions of the other as the situation required. Doc's livelihood had always depended on the consequences of his fellow humans' transgressions, and being no angel himself, he was slow to judge his patients on anything like a moral basis. He did, however, suffer from a low tolerance for stupidity and a temper, which had been exacerbated of late by an inadequate level of opiates in his bloodstream. Graciela compensated for these occasional lapses with a gentler hand and a kind word, and to Doc's amazement she seemed to be able to locate the source of any complaint instinctively, though her methodology left him more than a little uncomfortable.

She simply closed her eyes and laid her right hand over the patient's forehead as if she were checking for a fever, except that her skin never actually came in contact with the patient's. That is, until she opened her eyes and moved her hand so it came to rest directly on the affected area. Sometimes Doc could swear that a wave of relief washed over the face of the afflicted. All of the patients they treated together recovered quickly, too quickly perhaps, most up and able to leave under their own power within hours if not minutes. Once the patient had been tended to and sent on his or her way, Doc knew even before he examined Graciela that he would find her bandage once again soaked through with fresh red blood.

There was a fair amount of talk out on the strip about miracles.

But that, Doc would tell the curious, was ridiculous. He was just a defrocked country doctor of some minor gifts, and Graciela was just a child. A child who, for some perfectly sound medical reason beyond his diagnostic skill, didn't heal very well.

"
She's some kind of sorceress, that's what!" Hank hisses, hovering maliciously above Graciela's cot as she sleeps on her side, her face turned toward the wall. "A she-devil! It ain't natural, the things she can do.
"

"
Natural!" Doc barks, raking his paraphernalia back into the bag. Hank's spoiling his wake-up shot. "Now if that ain't the pot callin' the kettle black!
"

Hank self-consciously descends to floor level, smoothes the front of his jacket, and straightens his tie. "It ain't right, that's all. There'll be a reckonin' for all this somewhere down the road. You mark my words!
"

"
Yeah, well, that's true enough," Doc concedes. "The reckoning part, I mean, but that little girl there will be way behind you and me in that line." Doc looks at his hands, turning the palms down and back up again. "I used to believe that that's why you were here, Hank. To punish me for all the harm I've done in this world.
"

"
What makes you think I ain't?" Hank rasps, trying to sound as threatening as possible.

"
Come off it, Hank. I told you. You don't scare me and you never did. As a matter of fact, I've grown rather fond of you over the years, although you could call in the ghosts of George Armstrong Custer and the entire Seventh Calvary and never get me to admit it to a living human being. At any rate, I've gotten kind of used to you being underfoot, or overhead ... well, you know what I mean. I even miss you some when you're not around. Come to think of it, where
do
you go, Hank? When you're not making a nuisance of yourself around here, I mean.
"

"
Oh, I'm always around. You just don't always pay attention, that's all. Especially since that little witchy girl turned up and glamoured you.
"

Doc cocks his head and closes one eye, as if bringing the apparition into sharper focus will make his ramblings any easier to understand. "Is that what you think? That she's got me under some kind of spell?
"

"
Go ahead, Doc. Make fun. But you'll live to cuss the day that little Jezebel from hell walked through your door. You mark my words!
"

"
Shh! You'll wake her up.
"

"
Oh, don't you dare, Doc. You know she can't
—"

Graciela yawned and stretched, extended her arm as far up as she could reach, then let it fall to the edge of her covers. Then, suddenly, she rolled over and sat up, peeling back the bedspread in one motion.

"There, there. It's okay, child. You had a bad dream is all."

Graciela said nothing, but she knew better. She sensed something between a mood and a smell hanging in the atmosphere that the ghost had only just vacated.

Christmas was a multicultural affair. There was no discussion, no consensus. Nobody invited anybody anywhere. But on Christmas Eve, Marge assembled the ingredients for eggnog according to her daddy's special recipe, which called for copious quantities of sour mash whiskey rather than rum, and poured them into a small washtub. Dallas had spent the day baking sugar cookies shaped like Christmas trees and stars, transforming the boarding-house kitchen into a confectionery wonderland; every surface was covered in a dusting of powdered sugar and glittering red and green sprinkles. Graciela and Teresa made several varieties of tamales, some savory and some sweet, under the watchful eye of the more experienced but arthritic Maria. A pot of frijoles simmered on the stove, filling the air with the aroma of cumin and red chili.

Doc and Manny went out and bought a tree, one of the last half dozen on the lot, a little flat on one side but priced to move as the sun set on the last shopping day before Christmas.

The delegation assembled at the beer joint just after dark and decorated the tree with strings of popcorn and pull-tabs and multicolored lights appropriated from their year-round position behind the bar. The joint was open but there was nobody around. Doc, Manny, and Santo broke out the dominoes and started up a game at the table in the back. Teresa loaded the jukebox with quarters and punched in both sides of every Christmas record on offer. Unable to interest any of the men in joining her in a two-step to "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree," she grabbed Graciela and walked her through the steps.

Graciela was a natural. Within minutes she glided effortlessly from corner to corner of the tiny dance floor, creating delicate floral tracings in the fresh sawdust beneath her feet. Teresa had only to imply a turn or a spin and Graciela was there, pirouetting beneath her up-stretched arm like an exquisitely animated marionette, stopping and changing direction without missing a beat, until she suddenly became self-conscious. She was being watched.

It was Doc. She wondered how long he'd been staring at her like that and why it didn't make her more uncomfortable than it did. She shifted her left hand from Teresa's shoulder to her waist, and the older woman surrendered and allowed her to lead. Marge and Dallas were the next to hit the floor and it was immediately obvious to everyone present that the pair had danced together before. Maria collected old Santo from the domino table and dragged him into the fray, and as they danced, one anticipating the other's every nuanced maneuver, the question of why they had stayed together for all those years, cuttings and beatings notwithstanding, was answered in two turns around the floor. Doc was still transfixed, unable to take his eyes off Graciela, so Manny finally gave up and shoved his hand to the middle of the table.

"Well, fuck it, Doc. If nobody wants to play, then I'm gonna dance!"

The big man lumbered across the floor, catching Teresa in mid-spin and excusing himself to Graciela, who smiled and acquiesced, giving her partner a barely perceptible push into Manny's arms. Their first few steps were tentative until Teresa overcame an understandable fear of being crushed and her genuine surprise at how smoothly Manny moved once they got going. Graciela watched them for a moment before retreating in a series of fluid, sliding motions, still in time with the music, and pivoting on her toe like a music-box ballerina to face Doc and then curtsying expectantly. When Doc remained in his chair, suddenly unable to look her in the eye, she hid her disappointment behind an understanding smile and sat down at the table.

"Merry Christmas, Doc," Graciela intoned perfectly.

"And merry Christmas to you, child."

That's right, Doc reminded himself. She was only a child.

Doc and Graciela watched the others dance until all of Teresa's quarters were spent. After the presents were opened—dime-store purchases mostly: chocolate-covered cherries, cheap cologne, and the like—there was more dancing and drinking and grazing on tamales and beans.

The party broke up about eleven. Dallas and Marge finished off the eggnog and steadied each other for the short stumble home. The Mexican women freshened up in the ladies' room, covered their heads with lace mantillas, and then, accompanied by Santo, headed downtown in Teresa's car to midnight Mass at San Fernando Cathedral. Doc, who had seen enough of church recently to last him awhile, politely declined and offered to lock up the beer joint on his way out. Manny stayed behind to keep Doc company.

Once the women were gone, the spirit of the occasion evaporated instantly. The joint was suddenly dark and dirty and quiet. Too quiet.

"Game of bones?" Doc offered, mainly to hear the reassuring sound of his own voice.

Manny grunted agreement and shoved the tiles around in circles, drowning the oppressive silence in the satisfying scrape of Bakelite across the metal tabletop.

It was amazing, Doc mused to himself, how addictive fellowship was. Most of his life he had functioned as a standalone entity, interacting with others only out of need and self-interest. Now he had to admit, at least to himself, that he was becoming accustomed to company and that Graciela's absence in particular was excruciating. How long had it been since she had been out of his sight for more than a few minutes? Weeks? No. Months! But this was ridiculous. She'd only just left, and she'd be back directly.

Manny won the first game and then, snorting, shoved back from the table.

"I got to take a piss but you need to get your head in the game, Doc, or I'm goin' home."

As soon as the men's room door closed behind Manny, Doc, no stranger to the joint, was aware of a cacophony of rattling and humming that he had never noticed before. The worn-out compressor in the beer box. The neon buzzing in the window. A barely perceptible whisper, dry and brittle like a last breath.

"
You got to help me, Doc! I'm tellin' you, I'm in a bad way!
"

Doc ignored the voice. He never answered Hank when he was reasonably sober and anybody else could hear. Instead, he noisily shuffled and reshuffled the dominoes until Manny returned to the table.

The two played for the better part of an hour, speaking only when they added up their scores. Doc was less distracted and played marginally better than before, going domino a time or two, but Manny knew something was wrong.

"You okay, Doc? If you need a little somethin', I got a bag or two left."

It was only then that Doc realized that he hadn't had a shot since his wake-up, and that had been over twelve hours ago. Doc took a quick inventory. Head hurt. Legs ached. Nose was running. Yep, he was sick.

"Well, now that you bring it up, I don't feel all that great, but I reckon I've almost made it through the day already. Maybe it can wait until morning."

Manny whistled. "You're really pulling up, ain't you, Doc?"

Doc ignored the observation. "Hey, Manny, tell me something. The other day, when we were riding back from the west side? You mean what you said? You really believe you're going to hell when you die?"

The big Mexican shrugged.

"You reckon it's going to be like Dante?"

"Like who?"

Doc shook off the familiar sting of guilt he felt whenever he caught himself talking over Manny's head. Truth be told, Manny, despite his lack of education, was one of the smartest people Doc had ever met.

"Dante Alighieri," Doc explained, "an Italian poet. Hell,
the
Italian poet when all's said and done. He was the first to describe heaven and hell in a language other than Latin. Everything that ordinary folks know about eternal damnation comes from him. You know. Lakes of fire. Lost souls tortured by demons and writhing in eternal agony."