Apprehensions and Other Delusions (4 page)

RATS
didn’t
taste nearly as good as he hoped they would—even spiders were tastier. He managed to choke the third one down, pulling the tail out of his mouth as if it were an unpalatable length of spaghetti. He put this in the little plastic bag where he had already stowed the heads and skins and guts and paws of his other rodent-prey, then closed the bag with a knot. That done, he sat down and waited for the energy to rev through him as he knew it must. This time it hit him hard, making his veins fizz with the force of it. This was so much better than anything he’d gotten from bugs and lizards. He got up and paced around the basement, suddenly too full of vitality to be able to remain still. It was everything that he had hoped, and that thrilled him.

When the call came for dinner, he made his way up the stairs, the bag of innards and skin at his side. After his feast he was almost convinced he could levitate, so full of life was he. Everything in him was alive, from his hair to his toes. He felt like a hero in a comic book, or maybe an action hero. His step was light and he was smiling as he emerged from his haven. In the kitchen he looked about, smelling all the odors with an intensity that made him feel dizzy. The salty aroma of Hamburger Helper seemed overwhelming and yet unsatisfying—the beef was dead, robbing it of its savor. Since eating the rats he knew it was only living meat that would satisfy him.

“Henry! Wash your hands!” His mother’s voice—along with her choice of words, since she only called him Henry when she was stressed out—warned him that she had had a rough day at the clinic.

“Okay!” He stopped at the sink and rubbed his hands on the cake of glycerin soap in the dish over the faucet. It reeked of artificial flowers and he wrinkled his nose in disgust.

“And turn the heat down under the string beans!”

“Okay!” he answered; he rinsed his hands and dried them on a paper towel. He went to the stove and adjusted the gas flame under the saucepan.

“The table’s set,” his mother called as a kind of encouragement. “Your sister will be down in a minute. She’s changing.”

Henry made a face; just the idea of his sister made him want to puke, but he would not let any of it show. He licked his teeth, hoping no scraps of his meal would remain; he was not in the mood to answer questions about his basement activities. Let them think he was playing or studying or whatever they assumed he did down there.

“I could use some help with the salad.”

Salad! he thought contemptuously, but spoke meekly enough, “Sure, Mom.”

“There’s lettuce in the fridge. I’ll slice a couple tomatoes and if you’ll wash and tear up the lettuce, we can use the last of the buttermilk ranch, or the creamy Italian. You can choose the one you like best.” She had gone to the cupboard and taken down the bottle of vodka and was now pouring herself about three ounces into a small water-glass. “I need to relax tonight,” she said, by way of explanation. She drank about a third of the vodka without ice, which wasn’t like her.

“Something bad happen today, Mom?” Henry asked, knowing she wanted to talk. He retrieved the lettuce from the refrigerator and made sure it wasn’t too brown.

“Things are always happening at the clinic,” she said, and Henry realized whatever has taken place, it had been very bad. When she sounded like that, it meant something pretty awful.

“What about getting another job?” he suggested, knowing the answer.

“The only other jobs I could get pay less. Working with those patients—the mental ones, in the locked ward—I earn more, and we need the money.” She bit her lower lip then made herself smile. “I guess I’ll just have to make the best of it.”

“Well, it’s not fair,” he said as he thrust the lettuce under the faucet and turned on the cold water, pulling the head apart. Why, he wondered, was this called butter lettuce? It wasn’t anything like butter. He made a pile of the leaves and waited for his mother to say more. He began to pull the lettuce-leaves apart, remembering how sweet it had been to pull the rats to bits. He tried to imagine the soft green leaves were muscle and sinew and bone, but it didn’t work and he was left to try to remember how good it had felt to kill the rats.

“Did you have a good day at school?” His mother sounded slightly distracted, but he answered her anyway.

“I guess so. I got a ninety percent in geometry and Mister Dasher said my English paper was better than the last one.” He told her the good parts and left out the things Jack Parsons had called him in gym, and the bad grade he’d got in the American History quiz. There’d be time for that later. He looked around for the salad bowl and began to put the torn lettuce into it. In spite of the lowered heat, he could smell the green beans charring in the saucepan.

“Good for you,” she said, going to work on the tomatoes, taking the time to make the wedges all about the same size.

“So how was the clinic?” Henry asked, trying not to be too obvious about it.

“Trouble, a lot of trouble. Old Missus Chuiso got out of the day room and into the pharmacy and started taking everything she could get her hands on. They had to pump her stomach, and there were a lot of upset people on the locked ward. The violent ones needed extra medication.” She sighed. “Half of them aren’t really crazy, they’re senile, or they have brain damage, like Brian Bachman, who went over the handlebars of his motorcycle into a tree. He has seizures, bad ones, and he can’t stand up straight.” She had another drink, this one longer and deeper than the previous one. Henry knew it had been bad—she always mentioned Brian Bachman when it was bad. “I told Doctor Salazar that we ought to separate the crazy ones from the senile and damaged ones, but he says we don’t have the budget for it. It
would be better if we did something to make the place better for them.”

“But it’s county, Mom, and you say that’s like charity.” He scowled, thinking that it was stupid to argue with her when she was like this, but unable to stop. “The Thomas J. Doer Memorial Clinic is for people who can’t afford—”

“I know, I know,” said his mother, refilling her vodka glass. “But it’s not doing any good, and in some cases, like poor Missus Chuiso, we’re probably making things worse. Not that there is anything we can do for her.” She sighed as she drank again. “It’s so disheartening to try to deal with her. You should have seen her—well, maybe you shouldn’t—they had to put her in restraints because she kept fighting them, even though they were trying to save her. She’s miserable, and she’s all alone. She needs someone with her all the time, but we don’t have enough personnel to do that.”

“You do a great job, Mom; the best anyone could,” Henry told her as he took the buttermilk ranch dressing and held it out to her. “Do you want to toss it?”

“No; you do it.” She tossed the tomato wedges into the torn lettuce and went to wash her hands. “The Hamburger Helper is almost ready.”

“Great,” Henry said, though the thought of something so dead left him feeling queasy. He needed something with
life
in it.

“Just put it on the table. We can toss it before we serve it.” She was beginning to sound a little mellower, but not so much that Henry could refuse dinner with impunity. “I’ll find a bowl for the string beans.”

“Okay.” He took the salad into the small dining room—it was really more of an alcove off the living room—and put it on the small round table. He thought it was disgusting, and his feeling showed.

“Why are you making such a face?” his sister asked as she came in from her room. She was extravagantly made up, with two bright colors of eyeshadow above her black-lined eyes. Her cheeks, although they had no need of augmentation, glowed with blusher and her lips were painted a brilliant crimson.

“Because you look like a clown,” he answered, knowing it would silence her.

“Ha ha ha,” she said sarcastically. “I suppose you know what makes a girl look good?”

“I know what doesn’t,” Henry said pointedly. He started back toward the kitchen, not wanting to have another fight with his sister.

“How’s Mom?” his sister asked, suddenly subdued.

“Upset. Don’t make it worse, okay? She’ll just drink more if you do.” He has kept his voice down, but he had the uneasy feeling that he had been overheard.

“So you think I’m going to cause trouble?” she challenged.

“I hope not.” As he went back into the kitchen, he saw his mother top off her glass with more vodka. “Aw, Mom.”

“I won’t have any more after this glass,” she said, sounding resentful, which Henry knew meant she was getting drunk.

“Do you have to?”

“You bet I do,” she answered him sullenly. “If you knew what I go through.”

Henry had heard all her complaints before, but he held his tongue. “What about the string beans?”

“In the blue bowl,” she said, pointing in the general direction of the sink counter. “Put some butter on them before you take them to the table.”

Henry did as he was told. The exhilaration of the rats he had eaten was beginning to fade, the strength leached out of him by the deadly sorrow and anger that filled him and his mother. He watched the butter run over the string beans and tried to conjure up an appetite for the meal without success. He pointed to the skillet of Hamburger Helper, saying, “It’s starting to scorch.”

“I’ll take care of it.” She removed the skillet from its burner, muttering as she did, “If your father would pay his child support on time, we wouldn’t have to eat crap like this.”

“It’s okay,” said Henry, knowing it wasn’t.

The dining room light had only one bulb burning, but it was enough to illuminate the table. As his sister and mother took their seats, Henry did his best to look hungry. He sat down last of all. “Smells good, Mom,” he said with false enthusiasm.

“It smells burnt,” said his sister.

“Margaret Lynne,” their mother warned her.

“Well, it does,” said Margaret Lynne.

“I’ve had a hard day,” said their mother patiently. “Can we at least eat in peace?”

“Okay,” said Margaret Lynne in a tone that made it clear it wasn’t. “Sure. Anything you say.”

“Okay,” said their mother, and put some salad on her plate, then reached for the string beans. “I hope you’re not planning on going out tonight. It’s a school night, and you know you need to study more than you do.”

“Mo-ther,” said Margaret Lynne. “I’m only going for an hour or two. And it’s not like I’m doing anything wrong. I told Melanie that I’d help her with her geometry.”

“Dressed like that?” Their mother was not convinced. “If your father saw you like that, he’d—”

“Well, he can’t see me, can he?” Margaret Lynne asked defiantly. “He hasn’t seen me for five months now. He doesn’t give a shit about what I do!” She flung down her napkin as if it were a gauntlet.

“Margaret Lynne!” their mother exclaimed. “You will not use such language at the dinner table!”

“Why not?” Margaret Lynne flung back, her eyes beginning to fill with tears of rage. She pushed her chair back and rushed out of the dining room, heading for the door. “I’ll be back later!”

Their mother sat still for a long while, then drank the last of the vodka in her glass. “I don’t know what to do with that girl.”

Henry put his fork down. “Mom. I’m not very hungry.” He sounded apologetic, but he was secretly relieved: he didn’t have to invent a reason for not eating. “I’ll be down in the basement, if you need me.” He got up slowly, not wanting to seem too eager.

“Oh, no, Henry. You don’t have to run off.” She reached out and took his hand. “I want you to eat. You need to eat.”

“Maybe later,” he said as gently as he could.

“We can’t afford to waste food in this house,” said his mother, spooning some of the Hamburger Helper onto her plate. “Remember that, Henry.”

“I will, Mom,” he assured her. “I’ll nuke something a little later. Just put the leftovers in the fridge.”

“Okay,” she said, accepting defeat for the moment.

Henry smiled, knowing what good bait the Hamburger Helper could make. He went back into the kitchen, his plate in his hand, and put it on the edge of the sink for later. Then he headed down for the basement, planning to set some more traps.

* * *

Two weeks later, Henry caught a squirrel, and the charge he got out of eating it was way beyond what he had hoped for. It was much, much better than the rats had been! He thought it was delicious—and entirely superior to bugs and spiders. He relished every morsel of it, and vowed to catch more of them as soon as possible. But he also realized he had taken a terrible risk, hunkering down in the city park behind a thicket of rhododendron. Someone might have seen him, and that wouldn’t do at all. They’d probably make him stop eating the things that gave him life. No telling what Mom would think, working with the nuts at the clinic. She might even think he was a bit crazy himself. He had to be careful: he didn’t want to get caught. People wouldn’t understand, he knew that. So he hid a trap deep in a clump of hawthorn bushes in the Veterans’ Park, and hoped it would snare another squirrel for him; he’d check it on the way home from school.

Halfway home he came upon his sister and a group of her friends gathered around a four-year-old red Mustang convertible. Three senior boys lounged in the car, enjoying the obvious admiration Margaret Lynne was displaying as she leaned provocatively on the hood of the car, her boobs almost falling out of her skimpy tank-top.