The Memory of Running (20 page)

I put people off. I must. When I got back home from the Denver hospital, I realized I had
nobody my own age in East Providence I was friendly with. I knew some people, sure, to nod
to if I saw them in Stop & Shop or the drugstore, but as people I could, say, call up at
night or go to a movie with . . . well, I wasnt connected in that way. Its a very New
Englandy thing, this being alone even though you dont want to be. It proves, I guess, that
youre above being lonely and can take or leave friendship. So, then, I was a loner who
wished not to be alone. Its something I have thought about and thought about, and I now
feel that at any given time there are a lot of lonely loners out there. We just dont
understand the process of making some friends. The complicated format of friendship. Its
not easy.

I was spending a lot of time at Bradley Hospital with Mom and Pop. Bethany was just not
making the kind of progress she used to make. She wasnt responding to anything, and for
the very first time, her voice made no bones about being in there. It was demanding and
loud and awful. It screamed at us when we were alone with Bethany. It called us horrible
names in that dry, cracking desert of a voice. But it was madness, and they knew madness
at Bradley, so the staff was understanding toward Bethany and comforting to us.

It still hurt, though. It still made us wince and hold ourselves up by thinking about
something else. Im sure, when she was truly hor- rible, Mom and Pop thought about all the
nice things our family was and what a sweet human being my sister was at the center, her
poor center. I thought about the certain roundness and neatness and push of Dr. Georgina
Glasss wonderful chest. I thought about how nice her hair fell and how blossoming her
smells, but mostly what turned me away from Bethanys vicious accusations and loud curses
were the doctors imagined breasts and hoped-for . . . well, nipples. Because I did notice
these things. It was, in a way, my awareness of the world,

my connection. And it wasnt lurid or creepy either. It was a notice and then a thought. A
sort of daydream with flesh. But what Im saying is, it wasnt a preoccupation. It was an
introduction to liking someone, say, in the way a girls eyes or skin or lips make you want
a date. Thats all. It was essentially healthy, this breast thing.

One afternoon that week, late afternoon after work, I met the folks at Bradley. After an
hour or so of Mr. Voice, I went into the hall for a smoke. Dr. Glass was at the nurses
station and waved.

Hi, Dr. Glass, I said as I walked over.

Hello, Mr. Ide. Our girl is being pretty tough, huh? I changed her medication, but short
of something thatll knock her out, it doesnt seem to be slowing her down.

She had on gray slacks and a light blue sweater. This time the pearls hung between her
mounds. I looked at my cigarette so I wouldnt stare at them.

How are your parents? Theyre, you know, used to it. How are you doing? Im used to it, too.
And the war and coming home and whatnot? Are you adjusting? It has always bothered people
that I didnt have to go through

some kind of adjustment. Actually, I was adjusting so many times from since I can
remember, five or so, that if I did have to adjust, I didnt notice it.

Yes, I said.

She said something to one of the nurses behind the desk. I put out my cigarette. Bethany
has an appointment on Thursday, Mr. Ide. And of course she wont be making it, but why dont
you come by yourself, same time, and maybe you can give me a better insight into your
sister.

She wrote something on a nurses chart, speaking to me casually but not looking up.

A little one-to-one, she said.

One-to-one, I thought. Oh, yes, Dr. Glass. Smithy Ide one-to- one with Georgina Glass.

Uhhh, I said thoughtfully. Okay.

The day and a half until Thursday dragged the bottom of the oily Providence River. It
trudged along like a grandfather. Thursday itself moved even slower, and the assembly line
went on forever. If there were arms and legs on the wrong sides of SEAL Sam, I was too
dis- tracted to notice. At four I punched out for my one-to-one.

Georgina met me at the door in jeans and a Brown University sweatshirt. Hi, cmon in.

I followed her into her office. She gestured to a blue-and-red wing chair opposite her
desk. Want some coffee or a soft drink?

No thanks.

She sat down at her desk. I saw your sister about ten this morn- ing. She wasnt growling
or anything like that.

Yeah, the last day its gone back in there. Who? It. The . . . you know . . . The voice?

Yup.

Ah. Georgina wrote something down. Did you kill anyone in Vietnam?

Huh? In the army. Did you have to kill anyone? No, I didnt kill anybody. I never even
discharged my weapon. But you got wounded. I got wounded all right, I said. I really got
wounded. I got the

Purple Heart. And now youre home. Living at home? Dr. Glass shifted in her

seat, and the Brown University crest fell slightly between the out- lined points. Did I
live at home?

Well . . . you know . . . Im helping my folks out with Bethany. Its just until Im sure
they can handle things. Im . . . you know . . . I got the Purple Heart and everything.

Dr. Glass smiled at me, and it was a very pretty and, I would say, girlish smile. But
maybe not. Its all right to live at home. I lived with my parents after medical school
until I got married.

I would want my daughter to live with me until she got married, too, I said, like someone
with his high-school diploma posted on his forehead.

And Bethany lives at home because . . . ?

Because of the voice. Its a different situation with Bethany. Shes beautiful, but theres
that voice, and it does things that mess her up. Its hard to explain. I like the way youve
done your hair.

My hair? Yeah. Its nice. Thats a ponytail kind of thing. Not really, its just longish in
the back. Longish. Thats what I meant. You think its an entirely different personality,
from the perspec-

tive of, say, a division of selves? That far? Uhh . . . its just, I dont know. I like it.
What? Your hair.

I was talking about Bethanys voice. Oh, of course. Well, yes, yes, a . . . of selves.
Youre very close to your sister, arent you, Mr. Ide? Yes, and its okay to call me Smithy.
Smithy. How close? Well, shes my big sister. Sometimes she gave me good advice

about stuff, and I was always helping find her, and shes got a wonder- ful beautiful
voicesinging voice I mean, not the bad voiceand we talk about stuff.

Dr. Glass wrote down some quick thoughts on a small pile of in-

dex cards she had stacked on her desk. She leaned back on her chair. Her breasts shifted
ever so slightly to the left. She didnt speak for a while, so I did.

Wed . . . you know . . . well, we were interested in Pops base- ballhe played with
Soconyand wed go and be together and talk and stuff.

A big cat curled up on a corner of her desk.

Thats Mitsi. Shes a good girl. Youre a good girl, arent you, Mitsi?

Mitsi yawned and closed her eyes. What about sex? Have much in the army? High school? Huh?
Intercourse. Well, I . . . I guess, for sure. I mean . . . Im sorry, I didnt mean to shoot
that question out of nowhere,

but Im curious, frankly, from all Ive observed of Bethany, to know the extent of your
relationship.

My blank face may have stayed blankIm not surebut the raw endings of my nerves twitched me
in that chair.

For example, Bethany at one point told me that you often showed her your penis as a boy.

My mouth was open, but the words were not there. I might have made a slight sound like a
cry a million miles away.

And that often you would touch her and finally you would have sex with her.

My upper palate had no moisture. My mouth was sand dry. My lips stuck together.

She . . . she . . . what? What?

I was absolutely at my Purple Heart point of tears, but my small brain warned me not to
let them out.

She said . . . I heard.

I stood on wobbly legs and walked behind my chair. Oh, Bethany, I thought. Did that
goddamn voice really make you believe that? Im Hook. Ill always be Hook.

Dr. Glass watched me calmly, but I felt a little touch of hostility. Maybe. Bethany told
meand I must say, in the kind of detail that might stretch a fictional accountthat your
fucking her became a daily routine. Almost a way of life.

To answer something that the minds picture of is so revolting, so past anything ugly I
ever imagined, seemed beyond me.

She told me she knew how wrong it was, but you were so insistent and then violent. Shes
showed me pictures. Pictures of her face all scratched and bruised. You just had her over
and over until her mind was broken, didnt you? Tell me. At least tell me the truth so we
can start healing that poor little girl. With those words Dr. Glass threw down four photos
that Bethany had kept from the four major acci- dents the voice had caused. The pharmacy,
the Red Bridge, the hip- pie commune, and the prom. I recognized each one. There were
three taken by the police and one by a plastic surgeon. I knew she saved them. I never
knew why. I looked at them and arranged them slowly, chronologically, on the desk. I was
crying now. I was crying for my sister. The events of each terrible day roared over me. Of
course, Dr. Glass took it all as the remorse of the pervert Smithy Ide.

Its all the proof I need to go to the police, Mr. Ide, and by God Im going to.

She pointed to the pharmacy photo.

Remember this one? You beat her over and over, until she finally gave in. She pointed to
the Red Bridge photo. The one used in the follow-up story by the Providence Journal. And
this one?

There was no mistaking Dr. Glasss vengeful anger now. How you threw her into your swimming
pool and wouldnt let her up to get to your mothers cabana. You just kicked and pushed
until she ac- quiesced. And this?

Dr. Georgina Glass slammed her fist down on the photo of the

prom, where we had found my sister mosquito bitten and scratched. I sobbed to think of
her, alone, in that swamp. My poor, poor sister. Look at what you did, Mr. Ide, when you
scratched her over and over while you kept her tied in the basement. What kind of a person
does such a thing to his own sister? Answer me, goddamn it.

For the first time, I looked up from the pictures and directly at Dr. Glass. She stepped
back from her desk.

People know Im here with you. Dont try anything. Ive got all the dates and the times. For
your own sake, come clean. You have to end this cycle. Youre as sick as your sister. You
have to act fast to re- activate your soul.

Her tone softened. Her fists unclenched. She took a deep breath.

Look, I know you must suffer horribly over your actions. Re- member last Thanksgiving?

Last Thanksgiving my lungs collapsed in Denver. Last Thanks- giving they stuck tubes in my
chest and inflated me like a cartoon character.

You told your folks you were going to go to the family lodge in Vail for a little
relaxation. You only did that because you knew that Bethany was already there.

Last Thanksgiving? I asked through my sniffles.

Dont play dumb. Its time to start healing yourself. Bethany. Look . . . I know how you
kept her a virtual prisoner in Vail and then Aspen, and I wont even get into the Paris
thing.

The Paris thing?

Okay, have it your way. Youre a terribly sick individual, Mr. Ide. Terribly sick. And like
most sick people, you have affected the well- being of everyone around you. And Im not
surprised your parents have failed to protect Bethany. Maybe they didnt know, maybe they
did, or maybe the rich just live differently than we do.

The rich?

Nevertheless Im going to the authorities with this. Bethany gave me permission.

Dr. Glass . . . Good-bye, Mr. Ide. I walked to the door of her office. My eyes ached and
threw short,

incredibly sharp stabs of pain back at my brain. I put my hand on the doorknob and talked
to the door.

We dont have a swimming pool, I mumbled. Did you say something? she said. I turned around.
Dr. Georgina Glass stood behind her desk with

her hands on her hips. Her feet were spread apart. I have seen pic- tures of matadors
standing next to dead bulls that did not give off anywhere near her sense of victory. I
said, we dont have a swim- ming pool.

Well, that

No pool. None, and we dont ski at all, let alone have a place in . . . where?

You dont have a place in Vail? No. Aspen? No, we dont. That . . . that first picture . . .
that one on the

left . . . your right . . . East Providence police took that at the drug- store she worked
at. The next one, the swimming pool one, is when she jumped off the Red Bridge.

She . . . jumped off the Red Bridge? Yes, she did. Dr. Glass narrowed her eyes and thought
hard. She didnt look

nice. She looked old, at least to me. If she lifted up her sweatshirt, I would have closed
my wet eyes before I would look at those previ- ously interesting breasts. I suppose you
have an explanation for last Thanksgiving.

No. I thought not. I asked the doctors why my lungs just collapsed in the army hos-

pital in Denver and why Thanksgiving Day they had to stick tubes in

my chest to pump me up, but they said that it just happened. They couldnt give me any
explanation. No.

Oh, she said.

I walked out of her office, and then I walked out the front door and down the steps. By
the time I turned onto the sidewalk, she was at the door.

Sorry, she called.

I finished reading Ringo in Colorado. I had now read two books by Harold Becker, the
author. Here is what he would say about Smithy Ide:

Page one. He sailed across the open plains like a jayhawk. Blown high and wide and away
from everyone. He felt that Kansas was the most beauti- ful of places, until he saw the
push of the Rockies outside of Goodland. But maybe this Smithy Ide was a plainsman. Maybe
that would be his legacy. A momentum of bike and body blown high and wide through the
history of jay- hawkers.

Thats the style. A little flowery, but this Becker guy could take a common person and
describe him like a knight, or a hero, even if the odds were stacked so high. Iggy, with
all the prejudice and stuff that went along with being black in 1878, never felt sorry for
himself at all. And Ringo, with one arm and one leg, sat taller in the saddle than anyone.
It just took him a lot longer to get up there. I didnt have anything to overcome, except
maybe my fat ass, which dropped off somewhere in Missourior, at least, part of it did.
Even the clothes that the doctor in Indiana had bought for me hung loose.

This OctoberI can say for certain because it was Octoberthe American plains swayed orange
and gold. The days were Rhode Is- land crisp, and the nights and early mornings were
freezing. I rode hard, one day even going three four-hour jaunts. Twelve hours. Blew a
tire outside of Oakley, Kansas. Fixed my tire at Rays Bike Shop, had a pile of fried
chicken, and then found a sweet, flat field about two hundred yards off the road to set up
my tent and even build a fire out of scrub wood.

In the morning, cows looked in my tent, and their heavy tails swished against the nylon
material. I lay wide awake in my warm sleeping bag, feeling particularly secure. I suppose
that comes from

the toasty bag in the middle of the freezing field. I ran my fingers along the sides of my
chest. I could feel my ribs. I mean, I knew they were therepeople have ribsbut I hadnt
felt my ribs under the layers of me for maybe twenty years. I felt the cavity the bottom
of my ribs formed around my stomach. Losing weight, I said out loud.

That afternoon in Keana, Kansas, a town that was a gas station, I weighed myself for a
nickel. Two hundred twenty-eight pounds. I stepped off the machine, put in another nickel,
and weighed myself again. Two hundred twenty-eight.

Possible? I stood on the machine, looking stupidly at the meter. That means . . . that
means Ive lost fifty-one pounds, I said,

again, out loud. Possible?

I made numbers in my head. Had I been gone thirty-three or thirty-four days? Fifty-one
pounds?

Norma?

Smithy. Hi. Hold on one second. I have to put my screen saver up on the computer.

Do what you have to. I can wait. I have a Mac. There. Macs are supposed to be good. Its
got a lot of capabilities. Do you have one? Oh, my God, this girl. There was a huge world
out there, and she

wasnt afraid of it one bit. Why?

People can have fun with them. I dont think I could learn how to use one. Theyre easy. Ill
teach. Im going to teach you, Smithy. Another

Smithy-Norma pause. A nice pause. A moment filled up and not at all uncomfortable.

Norma. I lost weight.

You dont have to lose weight, she said, as if she were defending my right to be a load. I
like you just the way you are.

Im in Kansas. Kansas is beautiful.

Oh, Smithy. Kansas. Youve taken your bike to Kansas. Im look- ing at my map. Kansas is
ridiculously big.

Big and flat.

I told her about the cows and the weather and the way I get al- most hypnotized by the
road after a while. She said, I love you, Smithy.

And for a second I saw Norma in Pops baseball hat, with a hot cocoa, and the Red Sox
filling up our porch. I think it was that spirit, and then the metal chair was just
nothing to her. I saw her in it outside the funeral home. I saw her tall and almost
angrily proud, and I missed her. I hadnt really seen her more than forty-five min- utes
total in thirty years, but I missed her so much my stomach ached.

I . . . I miss you, Norma. I really miss you.

Another good silence. Another wonderful, filled-up, forty-some years of silence.

Oh, Smithy . . .

More silence. More long Kansas wheat-and-cow pause. Sun- dipping pause.

Bye, Norma. Bye, Smithy. So much is Kansas, then. So much room and so many rolls of the

earth. That writer, that Harold Becker, would say in that Iggy way, in that one-arm,
one-leg Ringo way, hed say, Sometimes in the after- noon, when you squint the glare away,
you cant tell if that old girl Kansas is the sky or the sky is the earth. It turns you
around so.