Death Rhythm (12 page)

Amazing how time changes people, Mae thought as she set the table in the dining room, her face blank with the memory. She set the table for Andy and herself, laying out two blue plates, silverware, and water glasses.

It was the day Mae heard about Hector’s stroke that she heard the awful racket coming from the basement. God-awful racket, like a baby screaming. Screaming murder. Only it wasn't a baby, of course. It was Holden.

She went down into the basement, saw an orange flash streak across the floor, heard the storm door slam shut (goddamn kids, she'd thought, goddamn awful sick kids) then was down on her hands and knees pulling off her sweatshirt, draping it over Holden. She retched from the smell of burning fur, heard the flesh sizzle as she smothered him, patted him with her sweatshirt. It took most of her strength to keep from vomiting. Goddamn sick kids.

She quickly called the fire department in case anything else was on fire, but the target had been Holden. Just poor old Holden. Who would do such a thing? She turned the names of a dozen kids over in her mind, the hell-raisers of Ellingston, but she couldn't think of a reason any of these kids would want to hurt her cat. Just leave it to cruelty. Hell-raising. Mae had experienced enough of that when she was a kid. More than enough, she thought. Plenty.

But now she wondered again when Natalie had come back.

It would explain a lot, she thought. Natalie coming back would explain a lot.

FOURTEEN

I can’t do this. I shouldn’t do this, Andy thought. He had been so close to going home, so close to leaving, taking a bus, hitchhiking if he had to, but now here he was in a cemetery with someone he had only met the day before.

His heart raced and the wind sounded like cries of pain, biting through his clothes. So many times in the last fifteen minutes he had been on the verge of saying no, saying he couldn’t do this, it wasn’t right, he had to go.

I can’t do this, I can’t.

He felt like he was balancing on one foot at the edge of a cliff. One foot and all he had to do was lean back and let himself fall to the safety of the solid rock behind him.

I can’t do this.

Just fall back, break away from the pull of the dark unknown before him.

I can’t...

But instead of falling back, he leapt forward into Natalie’s embrace. Her lips closed in hungry upon him. Her arms wrapped tightly around his waist, and she pulled him down onto an old tombstone embedded in the earth, the surface cold and hard. Their breath escaped in a frantic mist, each molecule freezing at the moment of release.

The moment of release.

Off in the distance.

His eyes blurred from the cold. His tear ducts worked frantically to keep his eyes moist and warm.

The ground underneath his back.

So cold and hard.

Natalie's breath intermixed with Andy's, each frozen molecule of air intermingling, rising in the air, dancing in the air to the back-beat of their pulses.

He tried to see Natalie's expression through the tears in his eyes, but he could only see the shape of her body, a dark silhouette behind a veil of her frozen breath. Her form moved slowly up and down, up and down, on top in a steady rhythm, a gentle, slow, steady rhythm that pressed his bare buttocks into the cold, hard stone.

Andy felt the pulse inside of her against his groin, her blood shooting against the walls of her inner flesh, beating out a rhythm on him, taking him up, pumping, up, up, up inside of her.

The moment of release, the molecules escaped and mingled and froze together.

And he heard the buzzing. Deep inside his brain, deep inside Natalie, the buzzing of a hundred flies, his mother's coagulated whispers, just out of reach, droning like a jet engine, against the beat of their hearts and the pumping motion of Natalie on top. Her red hair backlit, forever backlit, by the moon, looking down and laughing.

The moon laughed as Natalie took him up into her, took his soul to the drone of a thousand flies, buzzing around in Andy's head, in the shed, just out of reach, the moment of release.

Somewhere it intermingled. It intermingled, like their bodies, their souls. Like Andy being sucked up into Natalie. It intermingled. His aunt, his mother, Cathy, everybody, everything blurred into one, as the moment of release rocked his bare buttocks against the cold stone, wracked his skull, ground it into the hard headstone.

The moment of release, and everything calmed.

Andy walked shivering through the doorway into Mae's house, into darkness. For a moment, he felt as if he was melting as the house's warmth enveloped his body. It felt good.

Turning on the hall light, he let his eyes grow accustomed to the semi-brightness of the low wattage bulb. He hung up Mae's jacket, brushing off the dirt and dead grass. He brushed off the seat of his pants.

Their parting had been awkward. After they stood up in the chill of the cemetery, Natalie was crying.

“What’s wrong?” Andy asked.

“Nothing.”

Andy tried to hug her, but she backed away. “No,” she said.

“Come on, what’s the matter?”

Natalie shrugged. She wiped the tears from her eyes. Shook her head. Turned and abruptly left, taking the trail that led to her house. Andy stood for a moment, wondering whether or not he should follow, but decided it was best to leave her alone. He fumbled his way back to Mae’s house, branches and twigs grabbing desperately at him.

A plate had been left on the dining room table. On it was a slab of cold roast beef, cold potatoes, cold cooked carrots. A glass of warm milk accompanied it. Andy sat down.

Mae's footsteps creaked upstairs. Andy listened as she crawled into bed, the bedsprings groaning under her weight. Then silence.

His crotch ached.

He sat and stared at the food on his plate.

He picked up a fork and poked at the meat, then sat back, soaking up the silence. The wind was still. No cars drove by, no birds chirped. There was only his quiet breathing.

As Andy listened to himself inhale and exhale, a feeling of guilt crept over him. Slowly at first, as he was sorry that Mae had taken the time to fix dinner for him, and he had missed it. He didn't want Mae to think he was taking advantage of her hospitality, taking it for granted.

Maybe he had been.

Probably seemed that way. He promised himself that he'd apologize to her first thing in the morning. Apologize and thank her for trusting him, a stranger, to sleep in her house.

Maybe there was something in what Mae said about being family after all. He hadn't known Mae at all before arriving here, but there was something about her - something about her that he warmed up to, that made him warm up to her. Maybe this thing about family ties went deeper than he thought. As he sat there at the dining room table and reflected on the few conversations he'd had with Mae, he realized it hadn't felt like a stranger had been talking to him. It felt like he was listening to someone he'd been listening to for years. Someone familiar. Maybe it was in her face, the bone structure, the way it resembled his mother's.

No, it was more than that. It was deeper. She was family. And for the first time in his life he felt that undercurrent, that bonding of kinship, of blood, like an umbilical cord passing between them.

FIFTEEN

Dad, oh Dad, Natalie thought, her inner thighs sore all the way up inside her. It had been two years since she last had intercourse. Two years since a man had been inside of her.

She helped Hector out of his wheelchair and onto the toilet. He was heavy, dead weight. As he sat still, Natalie began to undress him.

"Where's Em?" Hector asked.

"C'mon, Dad, you're gonna have to help."

"I said, where's Em?"

"She's not here."

With a grunt, Hector reached out for the aluminum handicap bar Natalie had installed, and held himself an inch above the toilet. Natalie slid off his boxer shorts.

"Let's get you in the tub." Natalie struggled to ease Hector into the bath. A great deal of effort was needed to keep him from slipping on the slick porcelain and banging his head on the faucet. Natalie cursed herself for forgetting the textured adhesive strips for the floor and sides of the tub last time she was in town.

"She was supposed to be here for supper, but she's not here.”

"I know, Dad." Natalie squirted shampoo onto the horseshoe of Hector's pepper gray hair. She massaged it in, taking her time, knowing Hector liked this. She ran her fingers soothingly over his bald spot.

"She was supposed to be here for supper. Where is she?"

"I don't know, Dad." She worked up a lather on his back, then scooped up water in a plastic pail and poured it over him. She handed him a bar of soap.

"You do the rest," she said.

Hector sat still, resting his back against the end of the tub. "Emma? That you?"

"No, Dad. It's Natalie. Nat. Your daughter."

The soap slipped out of his hands. Natalie fished in the water for it, trying not to get her blouse wet, grabbed hold, and placed it back in Hector's hand.

"C'mon. Gotta get cleaned up."

Hector slowly rubbed the bar across his thighs. He struggled to reach his calves.

"Don't worry about that. I'll get 'em when you're finished with the rest of it."

"I'm not a goddamn baby," Hector said. He scrubbed his chest, the soap producing a dull lather on his graying chest hair. He scrubbed without enthusiasm, without vigor, as if in a stupor.

"C'mon," Natalie said. "You're almost done."

He finished, scrubbing the gray mound of hair between his legs. "Emma was supposed to be here for supper."

"I know." Natalie took the bar of soap from him and washed his calves and feet, being careful of the corns and the sores on his ankles and toes.

"Oww. Goddamn it, watch my toes!"

"I'm trying, Dad."

Natalie toweled Hector dry and returned him to his wheelchair in a fresh t-shirt and boxer shorts.

"Feel better?"

"Goddamn it, where's Em? Where is she off to now?" Hector shifted in his chair. "She said she'd be back by supper and it's been past supper for a long time."

Natalie sighed. She thought she'd never be able to get used to this. She had hoped and hoped it was only temporary, prayed it was just a short-term side effect of the stroke, but two months had passed and it wasn't getting any better.

"Em?" Hector called. "Em? Get in here! Where are ya, Em?" He held onto the wheels, making it almost impossible for Natalie to roll him down the hallway to his room.

"Em's not here. Let go of the wheels. It's bed time."

"You don't tell
me
when it's bed time. I tell you. Who the hell are you anyways? Goddamn nurse? Who told you to come to my house, anyways?"

"It's me, Dad. Natalie."

"Let go of my goddamn chair!"

"It's time for bed now. You have to get to sleep."

"Says who?"

"Says me. Now let go of the wheels."

"Where's Em? Em! Em? Where's my goddamn wife?"

"She's not here, Dad."

"Where is she?"

"She died thirty-six years ago."

He didn't seem to hear. "Goddamn it, where is she?" His face grew red. He put more pressure on the wheels.

"Let go of the wheels, Dad. I'm Natalie. Your daughter. Mom's dead, okay? Thirty-six years ago. Can't you remember?"

"Em, come here! Some goddamn crazy woman's kidnapped me. Em?"

"She's dead, Dad."

"Em?"

"Let go of the wheels."

"Emma?"

"She's dead, Dad." Natalie knew it was best to be patient. It was hard, of course. Sometimes she wanted to shout at him, to yell,
She’s dead, Dad, goddammit!
But she knew it was best to stay calm, be patient.

"She's dead, Dad." Her voice gentle. Relaxed.

Hector's arms went limp, and his head sank to his chest. It had come back to him. For a brief moment, the present had come back. Natalie rolled him to his room. She gave him a pill. This one was for his blood pressure. She gave him a second one. This one to control his mood swings.

"That Mae still alive?" he asked. There was sweat on his forehead, but the color in his cheeks had faded. "She still around?"

"Yes, Dad. She's right next door. She's doing fine."

"Goddamn bitch killed my wife."

Natalie didn't say anything. She wiped the sweat off of Hector's forehead.

"That goddamn bitch killed my wife, I said!"

"Settle down."

"What the hell do you mean, settle down? That fucking bitch killed my wife.
She killed my wife, goddammit!
Why the hell should I settle down?"

“It's your pills talking.”

“My pills aren't doing shit! If it wasn't for these goddamn pills, I would've been over there a long time ago, and, and - " Hector held the sides of his wheelchair as Natalie tried hoisting him into his bed.

"Let go, Dad."

"And where's her bitch sister? Where is she?"

"Let go, Dad."

"What was her name? They got no right being alive, those two. Where is she? Where's her sister?"

"I don't know, Dad. Let go."

His grip loosened. He flexed his hands. His head lolled slowly from side to side. He closed his eyes. "Where's Emma?"

"Emma's dead," Natalie whispered as she pulled the covers from the bed and tucked them around his chest. She placed the nurse's buzzer next to his hand.

"I love you," she said as he drifted off to sleep.

Of course, there were times when Natalie thought Hector belonged in a nursing home. Times when he'd scratch at her and strike at her while she tried to bathe and dress him. Times when he wouldn't eat, when he wouldn't take his pills. But there was all that time he had spent taking care of
her
, all that time he had spent raising her. All alone. She owed him for that, didn't she? She owed him.

And it wasn't like she had never been away from home. Hell, she was thirty-eight years old. She'd seen plenty of the world. Plenty. And taking care of Dad wasn't much different than a full-time job at the hospital. Just that now she was on call twenty-four hours a day. Longer breaks, usually, though no real vacation time. But what she got out of it, what she gained from it, was knowing that she was helping her dad, helping him through his suffering, his turmoil. Because hadn't he brought her into this world? Hadn't he done it despite all the pain and grief suffered from the loss of Emma, his beautiful wife Emma? Natalie's mother? The mother she never knew.