Borrowed Horses (29 page)

Near the end of the shift, Dr. Rivers slipped in. His eyes were sunken, the circles underneath an unnatural purple. Wraithlike, he moved as if he’d had to will each step forward. His twenty-four-hour ER shift should have been over hours ago, but I knew why he stayed, and I knew it wouldn’t be compensated.

“We just lost the boy,” he said.

I sank onto my small stool and looked at him, standing there in his limp coat. It looked as if even his clothing were exhausted from the effort to save that child. “There was never much hope, I guess.”

Dr. Rivers looked at the ceiling, struggling with all the emotions he barred while working with the child as they now surged in. “I thought maybe if we could ever get him stabilized, we could airlift him to Spokane.”

Though it was time to leave, the dim light of this room seemed more appropriate for this conversation than the stark white light outside. “And the mother?”

“She’ll be in surgery at Sacred Heart within the hour. No guarantees, but she has a decent chance.”

“The others?”

“We set the father’s wrists and gave him a sedative. The little girl will be just fine once the swelling in her neck recedes. They’re waiting for their ride downstairs now. The father,” Dr. Rivers paused and cleared his throat, “the father thanked me for all I’d done.” His voice broke in spite of himself, and a tear slid from his eye. He brushed it away with the sleeve of the white coat he’d pulled on over the scrubs.

“You did all that you could—more than most doctors could.” The words were stupid and mechanical; I had no real comfort to offer. He was exhausted. “You should go home and get some sleep.”

“The rest cure,” Dr. Rivers snorted a sarcastic, mirthless laugh.

“You know as well as I do that there is no real help for this.”

“That’s honest, if nothing else.”

He looked like a haunted man. I understood. The weight of the boy still hung in my shoulder joints, the sadness of losing him making the bones heavy. His small, shattered face was in front of me again, the thin blood tears.

Dr. Rivers lifted his hand toward me, paused, then ran the back of his hand down my cheek. There was no mistaking that gesture: its tenderness, its hope. I knew the loneliness that generated it. You can’t watch a person die and not want someone to cling to. I swallowed and turned my face away, just enough to slip from his caress.

“A bit of a cold fish, aren’t you, Joannie?” Dr. Rivers dropped his hand. “I’m sorry. That was inappropriate. I don’t know what I was thinking coming here.”

You weren’t thinking anything; you were feeling
. I could have said something to comfort him. Perhaps I was a cold fish.

He was no better, no less awkward, at love than I. He, too, had forgotten how to reach out. His house was lavish but empty. I, at least, had Timothy. “It’s been a long day all around,” I said. “I’m sorry.” I hoped he heard the finality in those words that I intended.

“It was wrong for me to come in here. Please forget all about it.”

“It’s forgotten.”

It wasn’t the answer he was hoping for. He reeled from me as if I’d slapped him.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “That’s not what I meant,” but he was already gone.

I looked at my watch, 4:15. I should have been on the way to the barn by now.

Cheryl’s chuckle slowed me. She’d stayed past quitting time, gossiping with Glennis, the night receptionist, just to have this opportunity. “I see I shouldn’t have worried about Dr. Rivers not getting a chance to stop by. Room One’s turning into our own little tunnel of love.”

I stared at her, unbelieving. I was used to trying to read through her innuendos, but she’d laid all her cards on the table. “Dr. Rivers just came up to let me know about the patients we treated earlier. The boy died. He was six. His mother was just airlifted to Spokane, and we don’t know if she’ll make it either. There’s a little girl downstairs with her father whose lives have just been blown apart. He’s going to have to raise her by himself for a while, which will be tricky since both his wrists are broken. Does that satisfy you?”

The smile had dropped from Cheryl’s face. Her mouth worked, but no words were coming out. Glennis, sitting next to her, looked wide-eyed from Cheryl to me. Cheryl said, “No need to get snippy, Joannie. It was just a little playful teasing to pass the time.”

She is expecting an apology now
, I thought. That would be the kind thing to do. They say that kind words cost nothing, but I’d never bought that. To be kind to Cheryl would have exacted a great cost, the words coming at an expense I was not willing to spare. Instead I leaned in so that not even Glennis would overhear. “Do me a favor and go fuck yourself,” I whispered, then turned and left: cold fish indeed, swimming away.

V

Finding the Distance

Stasis in darkness
,

Then the substanceless blue

Pour of tor and distances
.

—Sylvia Plath, “Ariel”

But please, just let this long light be garlanded by birds

and the garrulous, sloe-eyed toad
.

Let the mare scratch her ear all the way down the length of me
.

Let her breathe where the lick of memory wants
.

—Robert Wrigley, “Clemency”

Dream Girl

T
he blood was the boy’s blood. I did not go home and change the bandage. Instead, I pulled on riding gloves, letting the tender deerskin press the stained tape to my skin. It seemed the least I could do.

Every toss of Zephyr’s head sent a searing reminder through my cut finger that the world was a different place than it had been this morning: One of its small ones was gone, and my time, like everyone’s, was limited. I took Zephyr into the hills, neglecting again to ask Eddie’s permission. We jumped banks; we galloped. She’d started to know me, and I was more subtle with my aids. We were coming to terms, defining boundaries, learning how to stay out of one another’s way. It was a crisp day. Twilight was already well advanced. We kept it short and raced dusk home.

Back in the barn, Dawn had arrived to clean stalls. “Damn,” she said. “You know I hate to admit it, but Zephyr’s actually starting to look like a half-decent horse. Her hip bones don’t look like they’re going to poke straight through her skin anymore.”

I patted Zephyr on the shoulder. “Good grain and good work.”

“I still say she’s a waste of pasture space. Hounds could get some good eating off her now, though, if Connie’d take my advice and send her for dog food.”

Zephyr yanked the lead across my lacerated finger. The pain brought me back to myself and to what I had to do; I had a life to get on with. The time had come to confront all the disasters I’d tried to avoid with lies and sidestepping. I said, “Been a while since we all went to dinner. What do you say to getting everyone together again at El Mercado’s? Maybe Friday night?”

“Suits me down to the ground.” Dawn paused pre-toss, holding a shovel-full of piss-sodden chips forward as if offering them to me. “You asked Jenny?”

“Not yet.”

She pitched the shovel-full into the barrow. “I’ve got to call her tonight about getting together for a trail ride. I’ll tell her.”

Zephyr faked a spook as Dawn lifted the wheelbarrow to push it outside, bringing the lead rope once more against my finger. I jerked her back, popping the halter on her nose to stop her nonsense. “You’ve never been afraid of anything in your life,” I said to her. Dust rose under her shuffling hooves, and the warmth of blood oozed afresh under the bandage.
It’s time to grab a hold
, I thought,
even when it hurts
. The clock was always ticking. I stroked Zephyr’s nose, and she stood, nostrils flaring.

“Waste of pasture space,” Dawn called again.

Timothy was on his bike outside my apartment when I arrived home. “Thought I’d missed you,” he said. “You hungry?”

“Starved.”

“You look it; your face is so pale.” He walked me up, carrying his backpack of groceries. “It’s kind of giving me
déjà vu
.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. To back when I first met you. I had the strangest dream.” He paused a moment, his hair flopped down over his eyes to hide his thoughts.

“Was I in lace or leather?”

His faced broke into a smile. “Not quite. Nothing so expected, actually.”

I unlocked the door, listening, not daring to interrupt.

“I half don’t want to tell you,” he said. “It’s all so hokey.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“Fine,” he said. “But don’t take it as some Indian vision thing. I don’t believe in that stuff, and I never had a dream like this in my life.”

“Other people dream too, you know. Indians don’t have a corner on the market.”

“O.K.—but don’t forget that.” He took a deep breath, glanced up to read my expression, and continued. “It started with just me: I was out in a freshly plowed field at night. The moon started getting brighter and brighter, and I had to walk north. For some reason, I knew that, like it was my mission or something, but the moon was so bright, I couldn’t see the stars. I was looking hard at the sky, trying to figure out where Polaris would be, when a cold nose nudged my hand. This huge black dog was standing next to me. If you believe in omens, a black dog should be one, right? Isn’t that out of mythology or something? But this one just seemed big and goofy—you know, one of those big dopey dogs that smile all the time. I kneeled and started to pet him. Then the moon went out, and there were no stars, only darkness, and the sound of horse hooves.”

I liked the way he told a story. Together, we pulled bread and cold cuts from his bag.

“I stared into the darkness and began to see, though there was no light. A big grey horse and rider were galloping right at me. I don’t know why I didn’t move. The dog was so big and smiley and unconcerned, it seemed like everything was just O.K., but all of a sudden, I realized the horse was going to run me down. I started to move, and that’s when I saw it wasn’t a normal horse at all, but one made of bone and fire. It balked when it saw me, throwing the rider into the dirt. ‘Catch my horse,’ the fallen rider said, but I couldn’t catch it. It was a wild thing. The rider started laughing, and I looked back. It was you, laughing at me because I couldn’t catch your horse. You whistled, and the horse ran right to you where you sat. You handed me its reins to hold, and I helped you stand.” He paused and looked at me, a bottle of Shiraz in hand. “Corkscrew?”

“Second drawer on the right.”

“Your foot was hurt, and I offered to give you a leg up, but you said you didn’t need my help. You just reached out and grabbed a rib of the bone horse and swung yourself up onto the saddle, laughing again. The moon came back on when you mounted, like you’d thrown the switch. ‘Hand me my whip,’ you said, and I cut a switch from a tree branch and handed it to you. The horse tried to move away, but you held it. I looked into its eye, and it was full of flame. Without making a sound, that flame spoke to me, like Moses and the burning bush or something.”

Timothy looked at me, like he was unsure if he should keep talking, then he smiled at himself. He poured liberal glasses while I sliced the crusty bread, careful of my cut.

“‘Mine,’ the flame repeated, low and steady. ‘Mine, mine, mine.’ The word sounded like a bell tolling—you know, how the toll seems to hang in the air long after the bell is struck. I looked up at you to see if you heard. The smile on your face was all mischievous. A coyote howled at the new-lit moon. ‘Guy likes you,’ you said, nodding at the black dog. He licked my fingers, and I stroked his big, soft, dopey head. ‘Ride with me,’ you said, but when I approached, the horse bolted, and it was just me, the dog, and the echo of your laugh as you rode away.”

I was spellbound.

“See what I mean?” he said. “A stupid dream, but it’s kind of stuck with me ever since.” Timothy sliced tomatoes, and I tried to laugh off the strange sense of premonition. What stunned me was how thoroughly he knew me right from the start. I was exactly the person he just described—someone not to get mixed up with, someone who would leave him and ride on alone. I didn’t want to be that person. Not to him.

Timothy smiled and handed me a glass of wine. “I didn’t even know your name yet, but I was already dreaming about you. Weird, huh?”

The day had been full; its edges pressed on me. I said, “A boy died in the ER today.”

Timothy had been about to take a bite, but he stopped and laid the sandwich down. “Are you O.K.?”

There was no way to begin to answer that question. “Death makes you think.” I held the glass of wine in my hand, its glass resting against the bandage. “Mostly, I’ve been thinking about how we’re always dying. Did you know your skeleton is always breaking down and being rebuilt? No matter how old you are, there’s no part of your skeleton that’s more than ten years old. Whether you’re fifteen or eighty, your skeleton is the same age. Our skin’s always sloughing off and re-growing. Maybe that happens with our minds, too. We’re always dying. I think of who I was in high school and who I am now, and the person I was then is dead.” I saw myself dressed in a stiff black skirt at the side of Mouse’s coffin. It was the last time I could remember wearing a skirt. “I don’t think there’s a single molecule of myself left from then, except maybe the blueprints that give me shape. Like how, once we stop growing, our bones stay the same length even after they’ve been rebuilt over and over.” I spread mayonnaise and layered cold cuts to feed the body I both loved and couldn’t trust. “I’ve been thinking how we’re always dying, only some people don’t get as long to die as others.”