This Side of Brightness (30 page)

He has even melted them into his feet, so that, at night, when he walks barefoot along the floor it looks as if these patterns are moving all over him. He tries to remember how many months it has been since Walker's death—and if it is three, he decides that it's four; and if it is five, he decides that it's six; and if it is September, an odd month, he decides that it has become October.

Outside, when he walks on sidewalks, he always makes sure that his feet don't touch the cracks. He counts as he walks; his footsteps end on even numbers. Occasionally he even retraces his steps just to get the number correct. Then he must go back and forth to make sure there is even pressure on his left and right foot. At the entrance to a grocery store, he steps up and steps down. The clerks watch him closely. After buying cigarettes, he says to them, “Thank you thank you.” He returns home to his paper clips. Continues to scrimshaw his torso.

Dancesca creates big dinners to punctuate the evening hush. He sits at the table and taps his forks against empty plates. Lenora asks him why he eats with two forks. He tells her that it's a special game and she too begins it, until her mother whispers in her ear.

Later his daughter says, “Daddy, are you crazy?”

“Go to the bedroom, girl, right now,” says Dancesca.

She looks at Clarence Nathan and says, “She just gets these notions.”

At work the foremen have noticed something curious: he must touch everything with both hands. On his thirty-first birthday, in 1986, he insists that he is thirty. They have heard about the cigarettes. It has become a ritual now. They fire him and, in the unemployment office, he fills out the forms twice.

At home, he turns off the television set. He needs to turn the knob with his left hand for balance. But the knob won't turn any more, so he switches the set on. Then turns it off again. Realizes that his right hand has been neglected. He reaches out for the knob once more. The screen flares to life.

On off on off on off.

On.

Off.

Until he can't remember which was first. Was it on? Was it off? He grabs at his hair. He lies on the floor, puts on his boots, laces them equally tight, and then smashes the television with both feet. The glass splays. He reaches inside the set and is delighted to count an even number of shattered pieces. Taping them back together, he smashes his feet through the glass once more.

Clarence Nathan sits on the floor, rocking back and forth, his head in his hands.

In the morning he must prepare two cups of coffee. Drink them alternately. Paste butter on four slices of bread. Make sure the strawberry jam has an even number of seeds.

There is a gentle throbbing in his brain if he doesn't portion himself out equally. Return and collection, return and collection.

In the room, there is something about the couch that makes him uncomfortable. He sees a ghost there and he avoids it.

“Now swear on it,” he says aloud to nobody.

“I swear.”

“Swear on your life that you ain't gonna give her another dime.”

“I swear on it.”

All repeated twice.

Once he dials Information and gets a number for a Nathan Walker in Manhattan; he hears a voice answer and he replaces the receiver without saying a word. Then he picks up the receiver with his left hand, dials, lays the phone down a second time. For a moment suicide scratches the side of his brain. He lets it rest there and gouge a ditch into his thoughts.

*   *   *

We had a nice apartment, see. On West End Avenue. Up on the fifth floor, except we didn't have a view or anything, but it was nice. I'd been making money on the 'scrapers. Back then an ironworker could make fifty grand a year. We had money in the bank. We were doing okay, even though the money's going down some. The union had good insurance.

Thirty-two or so.

Now? Thirty-six, I think. How old're you?

Take it easy, don't crash.

Anyways, I was staying in Lenora's room. It's with this yellow wallpaper and the aquarium and all, and she's getting older; she's got movie stars in there now, boys from school, singers too—Stevie Wonder, Kool & the Gang. She don't like being away from the aquarium, but the room is for me to get my head together; that's why I'm staying there. So she's sleeping with Dancesca. But Lenora, she comes in and visits all the time. I rig a blue light there above the aquarium and it goes shining down into the plastic, and she likes that. It was bright at the top and darker at the bottom, just like a real aquarium. Even ol' Faraday woulda liked that. Once we went together down to Penn Station, me and Lenora, and we got ourselves one of those photos in the photo booth with the swivel seat, four pictures of her and me, and they went on top of the aquarium. See, I still got one, see?

Yeah.

And, see, every day she brings in plates of food to me. Sandwiches and coffee and all. Milk in a nice little jug. Even the crusts cut off the sandwiches. And she's there, looking at me and asking me, Daddy, why can't you have any knives with your food? Daddy, how come Mommy says you can't have shoelaces?

Sometimes Dancesca comes in too, and she sits on the end of the bed and she cuts my hair and says to me, she says, It could happen to anybody. It weren't your fault. And she'd bring Lenora in to kiss me good night and all. She's the best child. I mean, she got that aquarium on her wall, right? And there's Walker, at the very top. I found the negative in the kitchen cupboard, went to the photo shop, made another copy, then another and another, until he was swimming all around me. I made I don't know how many copies. I suppose I shoulda gone to the nuthouse but I paid a couple of visits, outpatient. And they was telling me that I was fine, that I was just inventing this all for myself. They had all these speech people and psychologists and all saying how I'm very interesting, 'cause there's no chemical imbalance, when they give me drugs it just gets worse, so they don't give me drugs anymore, and Dancesca, she tells them she'll look after me. And she does. She looks after me real good. She makes sure I'm okay. And dinnertime, she lays out the table real nice with a cloth and she doesn't say a word even though I'm doing that switch with the fork still. And we're talking small talk and happy enough, I'm getting my head together. But I'm drinking some, getting the money from Dancesca's purse. Going up to the liquor store where they got it cheap. Sometimes a bottle a day.

Uh-huh.

She's cutting hair to make money, and Lenora's at school, and I'm home most of the time and we even bought a new TV after I smashed the first one.

I don't know, Angie. Maybe I was.

Shit, everyone's a bit crazy, ain't they?

What?

No.

Don't leave.

Stay here. The sun'll come up. Here, look, I got three pairs of socks. Put 'em on. Put 'em on your hands, I don't care. I don't care about nothing anymore. I never told nobody this story. Here. Put them on.

Why don't you want the blue ones?

Oh. Yeah. No problem. I forgot.

But they ain't washcloths.

Whatever.

Don't get frostbit.

Look, look how it is. Ain't it nice? Don't leave, Angie. Just sit here till the sun comes up, then we see it real nice.

Uh-huh.

Tide's out.

Yeah yeah yeah, cold sand, ain't that something?

Don't leave, Angie.

Elijah?

Elijah's got nothing but a fucked-up shoulder. He'll kill you anyway. You saw what he did to Castor. Just pull the goddamn blanket up and listen.

Angela. Listen. You gotta tell me something.

You gotta tell me that y'ain't gonna hate me.

Just tell me.

'Cause I don't want you to hate me.

Just tell me that, 'cause Dancesca she hates me, Lenora too. They went off, and I never even seen them since. So you just gotta tell me that you ain't gonna hate me.

*   *   *

At the Port Authority bus station he meets Dancesca and Lenora. They have spent two weeks in Chicago with relatives. The three of them take a taxi home together. He asks the driver to stop near a parking meter and he does his trick, but Dancesca doesn't watch; she keeps her head down as he moves from one parking meter to the other. He stretches his arms out, imploring her to watch, until Lenora rolls the window down and says, “Mommy wants you to get back in the car.”

*   *   *

It's been bad, see. I been going a little crazy. Lenora, she's been asking questions, like, Why you don't have a job anymore? And, Why does Mommy say you're sick? And, Why does Mommy want to go see her cousins in Chicago all the time? Little things like this. She's about nine or ten and she's looking up at me and asking me these questions. Sometimes, when I go to the bathroom or I'm watching TV or something, she'd go switching my photo around in her aquarium, so sometimes I'd be at the bottom where all the plankton was. That's making me feel bad, but I don't say anything, not a word. She's got these small eyes for a little girl, most kids got big eyes, but hers are small. And a scar on her ear where she fell off a tricycle. She's looking up at me. I know it sounds stupid, but it's the little things break your heart.

Yeah, I remember the story. You were in the backseat.

Now you see it, Angie. Well, almost. When the sun is up fully.

Yeah. I remember that too. Your old man.

That Cindy girl sure can dance.

But listen. I have to tell you this.

Listen.

See, a lot of the time we go down the park and it's all three of us, and if it's wet I slide down twice with the towel underneath my ass and if it's dry she climbs on up, but she's getting a little old for the slide, she don't like it too much, but she likes the swings, maybe they remind her of when times were all right with us, before I was so fucked up in the head. Maybe she's remembering that. Sometimes Dancesca and me sit on the benches and she says to me, You gotta pull yourself together. And I know that. I mean, it's not me that's doing this to me. It's just my head. It's just, you know, the playground—

The one on 97th there.

Yeah.

All right, already. Just take it easy, okay?

Put your head on my shoulder. There you go. That's nice. Don't that feel good?

I ain't whispering.

I ain't crying.

Angie.

I'm in the room, ya know? I been in the room a few days. Just laying there. Alone. And then I hear all these kids coming in and I say to myself, What the hell's that? I came outa the room and all these kids are there with nice clothes on and all. Lenora's friends. It got all silent when I came out. And there's this big cake on the table. Lenora, she comes up to me and says, It's my birthday, Daddy. And then I get that hollowness in my stomach like I told you about, and I says, Happy birthday, happy birthday. And I see this huge cake on the table. So I go into the kitchen and get some money out of Dancesca's purse, the last five dollars. We don't have a lot of money, even our savings gone down. I weren't working on the 'scrapers no more. Hid that money in my pocket. Went on outside and went to the supermarket where they got a cake shop. But when I came back it wasn't as big as the first cake. So I go to the kitchen drawer, and Dancesca she grabs me by the wrist and says, Put that knife back. I'm only gonna cut the cake, I says. And she says, It's Lenora's birthday, let Lenora cut the cake. And I says, Please, I just wanna arrange the pieces.

I don't know why. But Dancesca she gives me this smile like she understands and she kisses me on the cheek.

So I cut the cake and arrange all the pieces on two plates so that they're equal size. Put 'em on large white plates.

'Cause I like things equal.

Yeah.

And I think that mighta been one of the times I felt the very best, just sitting there in that room watching the kids eat that birthday cake, even though Lenora didn't have a chance to cut it and there was just one piece with all the birthday candles on it. And I was happy. Just sitting there, being a father. And after all them kids left, Dancesca she was cleaning up and she says to Lenora, Why don't you go down the park with your daddy?

Now, she's getting older, Lenora, but for some reason she still likes them swings. Getting taller and filling out and puberty coming along and all, but she loves them. She could go on them swings all day long. So we went down. It was summer. Garbage in the playground. Cherry blossoms out along the walkways topside. We're at the swing together. Her hair is done in braids. She swings happily and calls for a push. All I wants to do is give her a greater lift. I stand behind her. She just about fits on the small wooden swing, and her feet make these curves in the air. At first I'm just pushing the metal chains forward. She's laughing. It's not on purpose.

I swear it.

It's just that my hand—this hand—comes around the chain. I only brush her on the very edge, just a light finger touch, and she doesn't even notice and she's calling again for more height—she's wearing her birthday dress—and, shit, I don't mean to, I'm just pushing her, hands at her armpits, and Dancesca is coming along the pathway, carrying three cans of Coca-Cola, but I see her and my hands rest against the metal chains once more. But you see, I did it again.

And then I did it again. At the swings.

And then I did it one night in the bedroom and she was wearing a little nightdress and I says to Lenora, It's our little game, but it's just around her armpits, that's all it is, it's just that I'm stroking around her armpits.

No.

No fucking way.

No.

I ain't gonna tell you again.

It's not that.

I ain't crying.

It's just that I'm cold, that's all. Cold making my nose runny.

Listen up. Please.

This woman, see, she had made an appointment 'cause she said something was happening at school with Lenora. And I remember 'cause when she came in she looked at my hands and they was all scarred up and all. With cigarette burns and them paper clips. I went tucked my hands in under my ass and I was just sitting there waiting. I'm sitting at the table with Dancesca. The social worker, she came in and she seemed nice to Dancesca, but she wouldn't say nothing to me; she just said, If you'd give us a moment, please, Mister Walker.