Pressure Drop (6 page)

The nurse rolled in a table of instruments. “Betadine, please,” said Dr. Crossman.

The nurse opened a bottle of brown liquid. Dr. Crossman dipped a gauze swab into it, leaned forward and dabbed inside Nina. He didn't have a light touch, but he didn't hurt her. Perhaps she couldn't have felt it if he had: she was trying to shut off all physical sensation. She thought of the long freckled fingers under the translucent plastic, and of frogs and baloney.

“We're ready, Sal,” said Dr. Crossman.

The nurse attached a clear plastic tube to the syringe and handed it to him. He glanced at the printout. “VT-three-h?” he said.

Sal read the label on the empty test tube. “Check,” she said.

Dr. Crossman bent forward again, a speculum in one hand, the syringe and plastic tube in the other. Nina glimpsed the white fluid; then all the tools were out of sight, hidden by the raised hem of the paper dress.

“Wait!” she wanted to call out, but didn't. She felt the plastic tube slip into her antiseptic insides; felt the hairs on Dr. Crossman's bare forearm brush against her thigh, once, twice, high, higher; felt the pressure of his gloved hand as he slowly squeezed the syringe. It seemed to remain in her for a long time. She thought about having an abortion.

Dr. Crossman withdrew the syringe. His bare forearm brushed her again. Dr. Crossman's eyes moved up to Nina's face. “Stay like that for a few minutes,” he told her. His red mustache twitched, as though it were itchy but he didn't want to scratch it with his hands in their present state. He left the room.

Sal looked down at her. “Not so bad, huh?”

“No.”

“Good,” said Sal. She wheeled the instruments away. “Back in a jiff.” The door closed. Nina wondered if she would ever have an orgasm again.

Soon the door opened. “Oh, you didn't have to stay like that,” said Sal. “Not in the stirrups. He meant on your back, that's all.”

Nina felt herself blushing. “Can I get up now?”

“Sure. I'll take you down to the business office.”

Nina put on her clothes, leaving the paper dress hanging on a stirrup. Sal left her in the business office on the ground floor. “Keep your fingers crossed,” she said.

Nina was handed a bill for five hundred dollars. “What if it hasn't worked?” she asked.

“Didn't you read the financial contract?” the clerk replied.

“I don't remember,” Nina said, making no attempt to soften her tone.

The clerk blinked. “You return at no additional cost,” he said. He blinked again. “Paragraph thirteen D.”

Nina wrote a check for five hundred dollars. “I guess I didn't get a laureate,” she said, remembering the two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar-premium.

“I wouldn't know about that,” he said, taking the check. “Can I just see your driver's license?”

Nina went home with VT-3(h) inside her and her mind still not made up. She had a long shower, as hot as she could stand.

Thirty-five days later, Dr. Berry said: “Congratulations.” Nina must have replied something, but she wasn't conscious of what.

She walked out of Dr. Berry's office into driving freezing rain. It was the most miserable day of the year. But the sun was shining on Nina and it was eighty degrees. None of the pained-looking sufferers on the street seemed to notice; nor did they have any idea of the secret she bore. It was the happiest moment of her life.

Not long after, soaked to the skin, Nina found herself entering the antique shop halfway between her apartment and the office. The man at the desk looked up from
Vogue
. “And how may I help you?” he asked.

“I'd like to buy Achilles.”

“Achilles?”

“The rocking horse. With the red saddle.”

“Oh dear,” said the man. “It was sold yesterday, I'm afraid. But here's an adorable nineteenth-century doll from Bavaria.”

6

The last day of July turned out to be a bad one for N. H. Matthias. It began badly because he had to wear his necktie. It was his only necktie, the necktie he always wore when neckties had to be worn. Matthias had paid $3.95 for it at a Woolworth's in Raleigh, North Carolina, in 1972. His necktie was maroon with a pattern of abstract figures that might have been green sunbursts; its width had been in and out of style several times. Now it seemed to be on the way out again. Matthias told himself that he hated wearing neckties only because they were uncomfortable, especially in Miami on the last day of July, when the temperature stood at ninety and the humidity was a little higher. But there was a lot more to it than that.

Ties mean business: all the men and most of the women working in the Carib-American Bank on Biscayne Boulevard were wearing them, including the tellers, the loan officers, the vice-presidents of this and that, and Dicky Dumaurier. Dicky sat behind a little plastic sign that said, MR.
DICKY DUMAURIER
,
ASSISTANT MGR
. Matthias had been dealing with him for more than ten years. It was a sporadic relationship, conducted mostly on the phone and through the mail, but they called each other by their first names and had even had drinks together once. Matthias, to appear businesslike, had worn his tie on that occasion too. Mr. Dicky Dumaurier had downed three planter's punches, two mai tais and a blue margarita; at one point, they had watched a bored-looking naked woman dance with a bored-looking naked snake; soon after, Matthias had helped Dicky into a taxi. This friendly shared history must not have made it easy for Dicky to say no to Matthias. But he wasn't an Assistant Mgr. for nothing, and rose to the challenge.

“I'm really sorry, Nate,” he said. Dicky had a prominent Adam's apple; it throbbed in silent counterpoint to his words. “Really and truly very sorry. And I mean that. I want you to know I mean it. In this business, as in any business—you're in business, so you know what I'm talking about—we sometimes say things we don't really mean. This isn't one of those times. Please believe me. But …” Dicky sighed, a rich, breathy sigh that conveyed hopelessness, disillusion, surrender. “But, but, but. It can't be done.”

Matthias should have walked out at that moment; the idea occurred to him. Instead he ignored the message of the sigh, and said: “Does that mean you can't do it, or you won't?”

“It means it can't be done. Not by Carib-American, or any other reputable institution.”

Get up, Matthias thought. Go. But he said: “On what grounds?”

“Nate, let me be candid.” Dicky straightened his tie—fabric: silk; width: au courant; color: yellow, with pink and lavender diagonals. It could have been the tie of a regiment that had won its stripes at the Battle of Capri, or someplace like that. “I've always been candid with you, Nate, and I don't want anything to change that, now or in the future.”

Matthias thought: Future? He said: “Heaven forbid.”

“Nate. Please. I'm trying to be candid. Let me tell you about this guy we had in here last week, a small businessman with six kids and a wife dying of cancer. I'm not making this up. We'd done business with him for twenty years and his father before him and his grandfather before that, and we still had to pull the plug.”

Matthias waited for him to continue. When he didn't he said: “What's the moral of the story?”

“The hard decisions are hard, Nate. You wouldn't want to be in my shoes.”

Matthias tried to see through the smoked lenses of Dicky Dumaurier's glasses to the eyes behind. Dicky looked down at the papers on his desk, shifted them around. “It's black and white, Nate. Even if we forget for a moment about the judgment—”

“I plan to appeal.”

“—we've still got the two mortgages and a cumulative nut of thirteen-five a month. You can't go on like that—you haven't got the capacity. You've been sinking deeper for years. So how can we talk about another note? You don't meet the guidelines.”

Because, Matthias thought, without the money, there would be no appeal. No appeal, no more Zombie Bay. But that wasn't banker talk, so he said: “Bookings are picking up.”

Dicky searched through the papers. “I've seen your projections for the winter. I've worked the numbers. Believe me, I've worked them. I was up till after ‘Nightline' working them. It's just not in the cards, Nate. I really hope things turn around. Believe me when I say we'd hate to have to foreclose.”

“Foreclose?”

“Don't get me wrong, Nate. Your place is … charming. Although it's unfortunate you're not a tad closer to the beaten path. It wouldn't be of much use to us at all.”

“My condolences.”

“Huh?” said Dicky. He licked his lips. “It would be a headache, in fact. Despite all its many, many good qualities. For us, you see. But, my goodness, I don't have to tell you about the trials and tribulations of doing business in the islands, do I? The point is, I'm pulling for you, Nate, honestly. We all are, here at Carib-American.”

Matthias put his hands on Dicky's desk and leaned across it, feeling his suit jacket straining at his back and shoulders. He was aware of his size, his strength, his deep tan—acquired not because he wanted to be unfashionably dark or die of melanoma, but because he worked outdoors in a hot country—and of the Carib-American Bank, with its deathly green computer screens, its telephones that made electronic noises instead of ringing like bells, its cold air. He might as well have had a bone through his nose. “I'm glad you're pulling for me, Dicky, really and truly glad. But if I don't get the money, I can't pay the lawyer. And if I can't pay the lawyer, I lose this case by default.”

Dicky shrank back in his padded chair. He bit his lips, first the top, then the bottom; he pursed them; he sighed again. “But we'll still be protected, Nate, no matter what happens. Don't you see?”

Matthias rose. He kept his fists by his sides. “Don't call me Nate,” he said, and walked out of Dicky Dumaurier's office.

“But I've always called you Na—that,” said Dicky, somewhere behind him. “What should I call you?”

Friends called him Matt, but why pass that on to Dicky? Matthias strode through the gleaming lobby of the bank. He wanted to do something violent. But he was forty-four years old and a responsible citizen of two countries. So he just ripped off his necktie. He considered flinging it across the lobby, but ties don't fling very well. He jammed it in his pocket instead.

Matthias walked out of the bank and into white glare. A taxi materialized, like a special effect in a film about commuters in deep space. Matthias raised his hand, feeling the sweat already dampening his armpit. The taxi stopped. Matthias got in, spoke the address he wanted to the back of the driver's head. The head nodded. The car began to move. Matthias looked out the window, saw nothing. After several blocks he realized that the driver hadn't understood him and tried again in Spanish.

“
Perdón
,” said the driver, making a violent U-turn. He glanced at Matthias in the mirror. Matthias had seen that glance before; now the driver would either leave it alone or pursue him along a line of inquiry that Matthias had gotten used to. The driver glanced at him again, cleared his throat. “
Usted no me parece cubano, señor
,” he said.

“
No soy
,” Matthias answered.

“
Anglo?”

“
Sí
.”

“
Pero usted habla español muy bien
.”

“
No es tan raro
.”

“
Pero habla como un cubano
.”

Matthias grunted. The driver swung into the passing lane and stepped on the gas. Traffic was heavy, but that didn't keep his eyes from shifting to the mirror from time to time.

“
Eran uno de sus padres cubanos, señor?”

“
No
.”

The driver nodded. He had a thin neck with two prominent tendons. The tendons lengthened and shortened as he nodded, then came to rest, giving Matthias the impression that the driver's head might be fastened insecurely to his shoulders. This image, and the driver's questions about his past, brought back another image, recalled from long ago: an image he hadn't wanted to see again.

The taxi had almost reached the Grove when the driver said, “
Perdón, señor, pero ha usted vivido alla?”

“
Adónde?”

“
Cuba, señor
.”

“
Sí
.”

“
Antes de Castro?”

“
No
.”

The taxi stopped in front of Café Martinique. Matthias paid the driver. The driver opened his mouth as if to try one more time, but all he said was, “
Gracias
.”

Matthias went into the restaurant. It was packed with the lunchtime crowd, but Matthias spotted Marilyn the moment he walked through the door. She sat at a pink-covered table by the water, stretching her lips taut while she applied lipstick of the same shade. Drawing nearer, Matthias saw that Marilyn was outdoing Dorian Gray, not just retaining her beauty, but growing better looking with time. Her cheekbones seemed more prominent, the blond highlights in her hair blonder, her smooth skin smoother, her white teeth whiter. She looked like the figurative million dollars; she was probably wearing twenty thousand real ones in clothes and jewelry, although Matthias didn't have enough experience to know for sure. That was one of the lesser reasons for the break-up of their marriage.

Danny was sitting beside her, wearing orange-tinted sunglasses and catapulting snowpeas with his spoon. It was a trick Matthias had taught him long ago, in a moment of bad parenting: a good trick, and cute at the time, when Danny was four. But now he was almost fifteen.

They both saw Matthias coming at the same moment, and looked up with expressions on their faces that weren't easy to read. “Hi, Danny,” said Matthias, sitting opposite them. “Hello, Marilyn.”