Swimming (7 page)

Thee Thou Thine

Dot and Roxanne are playing Ping-Pong; Dot’s losing because she keeps stopping to pull up her jeans. The sky’s shining a flat, even light over the yard, the wind blowing invisibly into the trees. I like this weather; sitting under the sun when the wind stops, I get as hot as I do in the summer. I’m reclining in a lawn chair, holding a red and white plastic bag of malted milk balls, eating them one by one. Bron’s reclining next to me, quietly watching Dot let herself lose. She’s cold, is wearing her orange parka, a heavy wool cap, a scarf, and a blanket.

Wanna malted?
I hold the open bag out to her without turning. Roxanne is playing viciously, slicing her paddle down hard at an angle, the white ball reacting in a spastic, impossible flight you’d have to be inhuman to follow.

She pushes it away.
Dead people don’t eat malted milk balls
.

I don’t want to, but I look anyway. She’s looking at me already.

What?

Dead people don’t eat malted milk balls
.

This is new. I have to be careful.
You’re not dead
.

Actually, darling …

There is no medical doctor in the world who would agree with you
, I say carefully.

Like I give a shit who agrees with me
.

Bron is expert at saying things no one can respond to; it’s part of the debate technique that won her many matches across the state of Kansas. I think hard, but my brain lets me down; all I feel inside is a white electric blank and, stuck in my gob, sliding slowly down my throat like a hunk of clay, a malted milk ball. My lousy year is lengthening into two, school’s just started again, the Cocoplat has a boyfriend who leans his body into hers when the nuns have their backs turned. Her world is spiraling away from mine at warp speed, and my body is still refusing to accept the natural curse that unites all women, even nuns. I check every day, am still girl. Worry gnaws at my innards.

Well … no one would agree to … that
, I say, trying to swallow the sugary lump of cement, fail, hacking up shards that scratch my throat on their way up and out.

Look at them
, she says, pointing to Dot and Roxy with a hand composed of toothpicks and glue. Dot’s face is sweating flame with effort. Roxanne’s lips are a cool blue, her eyes filled with a relentless killer instinct she will one day turn on herself.
That’s alive. Now look at me
.

I won’t.

Look at me
.

I won’t.

I’m going to pull you by your hair, Philomena Grace. I swear to fucking God. Look at me
.

I hate it when she uses my full name, but obey anyway. Her sweater is swallowing her neck, her scarf is swallowing her head, her pants are swallowing her legs, her shoes are wondrously normal.

Good-bye table good-bye mush good-bye old lady who says hush
, she says.

She’s been seeing southeastern Glenwood’s most popular psychologist, Benny Chap, who has an office above Fanny Farmer.
You should explain this stuff to Benny Chap
, I say, hacking up some more malted milk shards.

Benny Chap would freak
, she says, shading her eyes from a shaft of sun.

He would not
, I say carefully.

She gives me a look.
You don’t know him. I do know him. I dream I’m as thin as a sheet of paper
.

She
is
as thin as a sheet of paper, but I don’t mention it.
Tell Benny Chap. He should definitely know about this paper … situation
.

I want to … but his head is so big compared to the rest of him …
She sighs, stretches two broomsticks out in front of her, crossing them at the ankle.

What’s his head …
tell
Benny Chap about the paper thing, Bron. I’m no good to talk to; you’ve said so a million times yourself
.

Have you taken a good look at his skin?
She picks up a dry leaf and crushes it.

What?
I watch it fall through her fingers and onto the ground.

Have you or have you not taken a good look at his skin?
She picks up another dry leaf and crushes it.

No. I have not
. I watch it fall through her fingers and join the other one lying on the ground.

She rolls her eyes, flipping them back toward mine, leans in close.
Adolescent inflammatory acne … He’s scarred for life and it’s iffy waters for me, sis. Hit or miss. Sixty-forty. Come or go. Win or lose. Sad. That kind of thing. Mother sits in the waiting room reading
Woman’s World …
Oh how did it go, baby, she says, like I’ve been to the dentist. Yesterday I said: Fuck off, bay-bee, that’s how it went. And she didn’t say one word. And do you know why, Philomena dear? Other than the obvious reasons, of course
. The tonal component of her debater’s voice is starting to shift, her face moving in too close. I start looking around for June. I indicate with my eyes that I do not know why Mom is suddenly accepting the F word. Then I sigh. Then I shrug. Then I concentrate all my energy into pulling June from wherever she is to here, where she isn’t.

Because
she knows I’m dead, stupid
. Who gives a flying fart about a dead man’s vocabulary? A dead man can say whatever he wants to whomever he wants. Carte blanche, if you will. But it’s a sad, useless freedom
.

She looks at me, the debater in her singing in triumph.

My mind is having difficulty churning out some sentences that don’t have a
dead
in them.

She says:
Duhhhh
and laughs, suddenly light, putting one of her birdy fingers into the bag and pulling out a malted milk ball.

Dr. Bob’s calculating my life exactly like he calculates how much fuel it will take to get to Florida. Old Chapologist knows. I saw him know it just like he knows no more hair will grow no matter how nice he is to his head … And, Dad, the poor dear … I’m not so sure about you, though. Does she or doesn’t she? Suspense, suspense
. She slips the malted milk ball into her mouth.
These taste like Styrofoam covered in wax
.

She has no eyelashes, which makes her eyes seem eggy.

I try to pull Dot and Roxy over with my stare; there’s a little me inside each eyeball, jumping and waving like people at the scene of a bad accident. But their game is turning ugly. Dot’s pants have fallen to reveal a skinny ass sitting in a pair of skinny underwear; Roxanne’s hair is dripping with mean sweat. My mind turns to song under duress:
You’ve got to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative…
. Song takes over, blending in with parts of Coach Stan’s speeches. I’m the worst debater in the family next to Dot, who’s erasing herself with goodness.

Malted milk balls are good
, I say.
Just suck off the chocolate, then let that center thing melt
.

Look at me
, she says.

I try.

Both your goddamn eyes, fucker. Look at what I’ve become. I listen to people talk about life and I have nothing to say. Looking at me makes people sick. Their eyes play Ping-Pong with everything in the room except me. Ping ping ping ping
PONG
ping ping ping
PONG
. You know what’s making them so uncomfortable? My eventual demise, darling. They feel bad about it, but the snow must continue to fall. My sun went out and they felt it. And it is rather sad as I haven’t done anything yet. Do you understand? Practically nothing
.

June has recently shown her how to tie a scarf so that it falls flat and smooth around her head. The one today is pale blue with big tan roses.

Don’t you ever wonder if your brain’s making this all up?
I say, defying direct orders.

Making what all up? Making what all up?
She’s so mad she’s spitting.
You? This wonderful chair? These ugly shoes? Malted fucking milk balls? That stupid cloud? Just what am I making up?

All that stuff you’re so sure’s going to happen
, I say carefully.
Like why should your brain know more than anyone else’s brain? I don’t think it works that way
, I say carefully.
And the future is … the future is a … vast …

My brain, wonder woman, knows what it knows
. She’s not mad anymore, just annoyed.
And I know what I know, asshole, and I’m fucking sick to death of people pretending they don’t know it too. You can lie to yourself, but don’t lie to me
.

I get red in the face. It’s genetic; Leonard gets red in the face too. Every time I visualize Bron getting well, the same image drifts to the surface of my mind: her in a box in a sparkly sweater with gray makeup on her face. Super dead.

Don’t sweat it, wampum woman
, she says and laughs.

I find June sitting in a field of white tube socks in front of the TV. She’s matching them with one eye while the other scans the screen. I interrupt.
Bron thinks she’s dead
.

She looks up.
Did she use the word dead?

Like a thousand times…. She said that everyone knew it, but that no one would say
.

Leonard calls an emergency meeting while June whisks Bron to the library. Mom is standing behind her chair, leaning on it with both elbows. Leonard says:
Sit
. She says:
Thank you, no
. He sighs, tapping the table with a rolled-up newspaper,
tap tap tap tap
. Dot has changed into a dress, brushed her teeth, and wound her hair into two strict braids that sprout from her ears. I smell mint as she breathes my way. Roxanne is slouchy. I am slouchy with her.

This is going to be the difficult part of the healing process. Dr. Bob says she’ll get worse before she’ll get better. We mustn’t be worried. And we certainly mustn’t be worried in front of her. She’s very sensitive …
He looks at us, changes his mind, looks down at the table.
As you know
.

Mom says:
It’s poison, it’s poison, it’s poison … they’re pumping my baby full of more and more poison
. She leaves the room, has a thumping nervous breakdown up the stairs. Leonard continues to tap the table with the newspaper. He looks at us,
tap tap tap
, speaks softly:
That is exactly what I’d like to avoid
.

Without Gravity

Stan works his whistle. I follow sound, enjoying the ancient technique of destroying all human thought, plugging my ears with water, the pressure creating a pleasant vibratory hum. But sometimes Bron defies the ancient technique of destroying all human thought, walks across my darkened lids, and starts making noise. I stretch one arm up from its socket, stretch one arm out into air, slicing as deep as I can, pulling with all my force. Stan’s voice is chanting now:
Moooovvvve it moooovvvve it moooovvvve it
. I follow the thin black line until it stops in a cross that indicates imminent wall. But sometimes the ancient technique of destroying all human thought relaxes me into nothingness and I forget about the imminent wall until I hit it.

Hey
. She’s standing over my bed wearing my striped knit cap and an Irish sweater.
I’m not responding. That’s the news. I’m steadfast in my resistance. Can you believe it? Another minuscule mystery in a vast sea of … are you listening to me?

It’s between very early in the morning and horribly late at night. The moon is low, spilling a yellow-gray light through a vertical shaft of open curtain. She’d been lying in bed all day thinking with her eyes shut. Now she’s awake, standing like a ghost in the middle of the room.

I’m half-asleep.
Yes, yeah, I am, and quit always asking me that; my ears work
.

She’s energized by the moon.
Well, quit always not looking at me when I’m talking to you. It aggravates me when I can’t tell what you’re thinking
.

My eyes are adjusting to her form.
Like you can tell what I’m thinking
.

She’s whacking a leather belt against a skinny thigh.
I can even tell what you’re not thinking
.

I look at the belt.
What am I not thinking now then?

She throws the belt on the floor, turns back to her bed, lies down on her side with her face to the wall, not bothering to reply.

There are pictures of her winning state debater three years in a row. She’s standing in front of the Gold Cup; first in braids and triple-striped pants, then in a high ponytail with a red ribbon, smiling with big lips and no visible teeth, then in her navy suit, her long blond hair pulled up into a knot and stabbed with two chopsticks. Her Uganda triumph. She must have been talking when they snapped the last picture; you can see her molars, followed by a dark tunnel of throat.

When is all this going to stop?
I ask my mother the next day.

She’s writing out checks with a frown on her face.
Soon
.

I watch her hand slash out signature.
You said that before
.

She looks up.
Soon; I said soon. Go do something
.

I run water, brush my teeth, fill up the sink, stick my face in with both eyes open. Afterward, my eyes are cooler, my breath is minty, my hair unattractive, my vision impaired.

Manny moves his bed from the armchair in the kitchen to the foot of Bron’s bed. When she’s home, he follows her. When she’s at her appointments, he lies waiting for her, head on the ground, ears alert. When she becomes difficult to approach, he lies down with her and doesn’t make a sound, sometimes for hours. We watch him walk into the kitchen, eat, stretch, lap up some water, look up at us, smile, shake his head, nod, then go back to lie with Bronwyn, who’s thinking with her eyes shut.

June says:
That dog is the truest dog I’ll ever know
.

When I ask Bron what she did all day, she says:
I was thinking with my eyes shut
. Every day the same thing:
You can talk to me; I’m not asleep. I’m just thinking with my eyes shut
. But sometimes she is asleep and I’m talking to Manny, who looks back without blinking, his pond eyes shining from the inside out.

Manny has difficulty finding solutions to practical problems and does not recognize people he knows by heart if they have something on their heads. I tried to cure him by putting a hat on in front of him, but the minute it was on my head he no longer recognized me and started barking and snarling and backing away, foaming in fear even as I dog-talked in my familiar dog-talking voice:
It’s me, my man; it’s just me, me, me
. His fear can be measured in degrees; he runs away from anyone in a fedora, cowboy hat, baseball cap, straw hat, helmet. He barks and snarls at berets, wool caps, large sunglasses. He will accept scarves and, later, Leonard’s scary beard, but we have to lock him in the basement for Halloween.

I walk into the room and Manny reacts, stirring Bron.
He’s just protecting me; he knows. Death is animal
, she says without opening her eyes. I hate it when she does things like this, leaving me with nothing to say back, nothing that won’t sit in the air like a piece-of-shit lie. I just stand in the doorway, my backpack on my shoulder, my hair melting onto my face, hungry, my wool cap in my hands.

I have the dreaded Atrocious—a pesky traditional nun—for homeroom, which means I have to make sure my socks are even, my shirt tucked in, my tie flat, my ears clean, my hair neat, my prayers said, my homework complete. This morning I watched her remove eyeliner from Tanya Slaughter’s eyelids with her own spit. But spring is coming, so I think of summer. I make a li
st: fins, Carmex, maxi pads, Mountain Dew, sports bra, flip-flops
. I bury my face in Manny’s neck. He stinks like shrimp.

I create a simple routine I follow like a map. I ride my bike to school, then listen without saying much for six hours. Kids animate the halls with urgent discussion between classes; drama reaches its peak during lunch. I observe, do not partake. Bron’s ex-friends’ little sisters and brothers avoid me. Their faces deflate if I catch them smiling. After school, June picks me up, throws me a sack with two apples, a chocolate crunch protein bar, a slice of corn bread dripping with honey, and says:
Eat
. I get to the Quack, jumping out of the car fast with a
Thanks
she doesn’t wait around to hear. The air is good; college kids are walking around with backpacks on. I put my backpack on too, blending in, making my way to the locker room, which smells like bleach, rubber-soled shoe, talc, shampoo, burning hair, dried blood, bananas. Stan is standing on deck, a baseball hat on his head, a sheen of sweat lighting his face. He’s all business, grinds his voice down, shouting:
Come on come on come on come on let’s go let’s go let’s go let’s go
. I swim myself into a trance, make fun of anyone more than five pounds overweight in the locker room, then Lilly and I wait for Mrs. Cocoplat, whom she refers to as
Aleta
.

When Bron’s in the hospital, Mrs. Cocoplat drops me off at Glen-wood Memorial on her way home. I drink a Gatorade and talk about school. When Lilly and I were organizing vaginal areas into subgroups, she placed Aleta’s in Category Four:
Rip Van Winkle
. Mrs. Cocoplat lets me out in front of the automatic doors. The hospital reception lady looks up from her magazine and waves. The elevator is as large as a horse’s stall. Nurses nod. I nod back. They’ve sedated her. Mom is somewhere else demanding answers. There is a chair next to the bed. I sit on it and stare at things. Her slippers, pink velour with Vichy checkered bows, brand-new with plastic grip bottoms. I’d been jealous of them, wanted the same, now do not. Her cello is lying in its case in the corner, her music stand folded up beside it. Her backpack remains zipped. I unzip it, rummage, find
Seventeen: The Beauty Issue, Time
magazine for debate, a lifetime reading list the Superior Sister Fergus handed out at the end of World Ethics.

Her eyes open for a second, focus.
I know exactly what you’re doing
, she says. Her eyes close, but now she’s smiling like a creepy cat. My heart sinks. It’s dark already, the darkness humming with the sound of clinking needles on metal trays, water running, people complaining in murmurs and bursts. Someone’s TV says:
I can name that tune in four notes, Bob
.

The nuns say that church bells are the voice of man calling for the voice of God. God is called
thoing thoing thoing thoing
. The voice of God is occupied, but the occasional ambulance answers with a shriek. I stand by the window, watching what’s left of the sun sink in the sky. I try to swallow out hospital taste, my tongue sitting in the middle of my mouth, dry and useless, as Bron dozes. I jump every time I hear a siren.

Something freak you out at the pool?
I’ve woken her up.

No, no, I’m good
, I lie.

You look like crap
, she says, acknowledging the lie.

Thanks
. I’d cut some bangs to look different and am living to regret it.

I’m just saying … Mom says you’re racing like crazy now
. Eyes close.

Yeah, yeah
. I wish Mom would shut up.

She drifts in and out, jerking awake again if I make big noise.

Quit fucking jumping around!
I command myself internally. I concentrate hard on the eventual siren, imagine it tearing through the air, but the harder I try to remain calm, the more intense the startle. This is an early warning sign of a weak constitution, but I don’t know anything about early warning signs or weak constitutions; all I know is I can’t get my heart to stop thumping, which makes me so antsy I have to leave the room. I breathe better wandering the corridors, slipping past the nurses chatting behind their oval domes, candy stripers pushing half-full carts. I lose track of time; an hour gets confused with fifteen minutes and sometimes, when I get back, she’s wide awake with a dinner tray she doesn’t pay attention to sitting in front of her and it’s already time to go.

Where in the hell have you been? Mom’s been looking for you everywhere
. She’s too tired to enjoy the drama.

Just looking around. You want something for tomorrow?

Bring the checker set, will you? Maybe Battleship … we haven’t played that in a while
.

When Mom appears, she won’t look at me. We ride the elevator down four floors in a crackling, electric silence. She lets it out when we’re in the car. I’m not exactly frightened, but I’m not comfortable, hanging on tight to the strap above the door as she pushes down hard on the gas.

You’d think that you’d spend some time with your poor sister who … who … who’s just waiting to have a little taste of the world outside and what do you do?
Wander the halls
for over an hour
.

People are starting to honk.
She was asleep
.

She looks at me with narrow red eyes.
She slips in and out
.

I am bitten by the pointy teeth of shame.
Her eyes were closed. Okay? It got … I got antsy
.

Her face collapses and she starts clutching at the wheel, speeding an inch away from parked cars.
Tough titty for you. Antsy. Antsy. Antsy. Antsy. Antsy. Antsy. She gets antsy. She got antsy. Tough titty. Do you hear me?
She leans over, fangs my arm, and the car jerks to the side. When I pull my arm away, she slaps the side of my head and the car jerks to the side again.

They join forces. Leonard points to a chair and has me sit down, his arm around Mom’s sad waist, listing hospital rules that involve consistent sitting, homework completing, magazine reviewing, water from the bathroom getting. He raises his voice, grows stern, chopping the palm of one open hand with the other:
No out the door going. No hall lurking. No disappearing
.

I sit in her room consistently. I go into her bathroom and look at myself in the mirror to see if the hospital has done something to my face. Nothing major, but my lips look blue. I sit on the toilet and stare at the gray and black diamonds that repeat themselves on the floor—
gray, black, gray, black, gray, black—
until Tanya Slaughter appears in my mind. She’s sitting on her ten-speed staring me down with narrow navy eyes. Kelly Hill and her probably no longer bald vagina are standing behind her, smiling a small smile that does not reach her eyes. The Cocoplat is standing behind me, hands on her hips, but she’s shaking inside; like all mostly nonviolent people, she is hating the idea of being hit. I try to make peace by being universal.

I spread my arms, encompassing their bikes, Holy Name, the sky, the world.
Listen, Tanya, there’s no reason … for … you to get so upset over … these little …

Tanya Slaughter looks at me with
I don’t give a shit
eyes, gets off her bike.
I heard
, she says.

I’m stumped. I can’t think of anything we’ve done to Tanya recently except for the
PIZZA FACE
we’d written on her locker when she’d had that bad breakout. But that was months ago.

I take a quick look at the Cocoplat; she’s puzzled too but playing it cool.
What’s up, Tanya?

Tanya isn’t going for it.
You know what …

She’s a short, burly Catholic with bandy legs and a lovely, sour face. I don’t know what’s going on but we’re probably going to get punched. This must be the Cocoplat’s doing, but I can’t look at her in case I laugh. Slaughter pushes me out of the way, grabs the Cocoplat by the throat and squeezes, giving her time to turn red and squirm. She rips Lilly’s white blouse in half with one of her meathook hands, revealing a thick white bra with extra-sturdy straps.

I know what’s what and who’s who, cunt chip
, she says, spitting in rage. Kelly Hill flips me the bird, two hairsprayed wings sprouting from either side of her head, and I watch them ride away into two specks of metal that disappear into the sun.

Lilly is holding her neck, where four welts are forming, her eyes welling. She tucks what’s left of her shirt back into her skirt, buttoning up her sweater. She’s always been good at controlling her voice.
What in the hell was that about?