The Book of Living and Dying (22 page)

Michael ran to her, helped her to the bed. He laid her down, pulled the covers up and over her shoulders, tucking them in around her. “Rest.”

Sarah stared glumly out the window. In her hand she held a note from the school, on official letterhead, requesting an explanation for the days she had missed: seventeen and a half. She wondered briefly what constituted the half day as the letter dropped listlessly from her hand, tracing gentle arcs to the floor. She turned her attention back to the view in her window. The birds filled the tree branches—house sparrows—trilling courageously against the cold. Chirping. Twittering. These were not happy sounds. They made her think of spring, the urgent singing, heralding the beginning of another mating cycle. More birds fighting for the right to breed. More nests built. More eggs laid. More chicks to hatch and screech for food, only to be blown out of the trees at the faintest hint of wind, too young to fly. It happened every spring. The starlings were the worst, their numbers legion to beat the cruelty of nature’s odds. And so, come April, the sidewalks would be littered with fledglings, hop-hop-hopping innocently along, their parents calling out encouragement from the trees and telephone wires. Every moment outside would be spent herding the little birds off the road and onto the grass, only to hear their pitiful squawks as they eventually succumbed to neighbourhood cats. Later, out walking, she would find a half-feathered wing on the sidewalk, or a tiny leg, a tuft of down still attached at the top.

It was fitting, though, that so much death be associated with so much life. Some must go so that others may come—that’s what the little birds had taught her.

There was a problem with the intravenous. The veins, over months of abuse, had collapsed. Arms like deflated inner tubes. Patched and gaunt. The skin withered, wrinkled, like old plums. The nurses poked and poked, a macabre quilting bee, the needle stabbing through the skin and out the other side.

“What in God’s name is going on here?” the doctor demanded.

A call was put in to the expert. She arrived, neat and pressed as a cotton blouse from the cleaners, knelt beside the bed, her kit at her feet. She stroked the molested arm sorrowfully, tenderly as a flower petal. Inspected the punctures and bruises. Ran a finger down the dry riverbeds of empty veins. Her silver needle found the hidden spring on first attempt, the quick drip, drip, drip of intravenous solution, until the plastic wheel was rolled back along the tube to stay theflow.

A meeting was called. The staff depended upon meetings. It was determined that the hospital was no longer needed. Home care would ease the emotional burden, they said. And the burden on the taxpayer’s dollar. There was no real treatment required. Only maintenance. Morphine and saline. The sickness was too far gone for much else. But then the fever arrived almost as if to say, “See? Committees can’t predict everything.” The file was stamped “pending.”

It was in the shower that Sarah discovered the stain on her ankle. Lathering her leg with soap, she scrubbed at it with a sponge. But as the suds swirled down the drain, she could see that the mark was still there. A wine-red stain, like a butterfly. She couldn’t reconcile it being there, so she ignored it. Although later, as she dressed, she couldn’t help but glance down and acknowledge it, a dull red Rorschach blot.

As she stumbled toward sleep that night, the codeine pushing her down the hill toward unconsciousness, she met the woman’s cries pushing their way up. Sarah could see the girl, too, waiting for her in the shadows. With great effort she forced her mind to turn around, sent it scrabbling back up the hill again and into the light where the trap door waited for her.

She crawled out of bed and with much effort inched one of the boxes from the little closet in her room over the blue-and-green rug to secure the door.

Sarah clutched the sheets on the bed, eyes rolling.
Was she dreaming or awake?
She could not move, her body as heavy as wet concrete oozing into the mattress. Her tongue worked in the dry cave of her mouth, searching for the edges of words, twisting helplessly like a sticky red slug. With the force of great willpower, she inched her hand, painfully, deliberately, to the side of the bed, worked her fingers over the mattress and down to the cold metal frame to trace the letters engraved there:
T.G.H.
John appeared, hovering in the doorway. He glided into the room, opened
the codeine bottle and extracted three tablets, pushing them one after the other between her parched lips, then watched as she lay there, waiting, the bitter tablets dissolving slowly in her mouth.

There were five boxes over the trap door now. They made Sarah feel better about the nightly traffic in her room, even though the boxes hadn’t stopped anything. The footsteps, the voices whispering. Sometimes she would sit in the dark with the hope of catching them, bolting upright in bed, snapping the light on furiously. Or she would doze, eyes half open, hoping to trick them into showing themselves.

The girl was getting bolder too. In a voice distant and ethereal, she started calling Sarah’s name. Sarah struggled to move her feet, terrified should the girl lure her successfully to the tree—yet desperate to reach it all the same. And the tree itself had started changing, seeming to come to life through the girl, embodying her desire and intent. It transmogrified to deceive Sarah, the leaves shimmering gold, then silver, the bark glinting like cut glass, then milky and smooth as porcelain. Sarah tried to fool it, tried to break its hold on her by slashing the tree on her hip with a razor blade, the blood blossoming like strange red fruit from its inky green branches.

And then the phone, ringing. She thought not to pick it up, but for some reason couldn’t stop herself and did. She heard the ambient buzz in the background as she slowly lowered the handset to the cradle, a woman’s voice calling
out repeatedly over the wire.
“Hello? Hello?”
It was the girl. Sarah was sure of it.

When John appeared next, Sarah was shocked to discover him sitting in the middle of the bed holding her hand. She buried her face in her pillow until she was sure he was gone. When she finally raised her head, she was incensed to find her mother, dour, pitiful, sitting where John had been. She wanted to shout for her to leave, to get out of the room. But the codeine was in control, stealing the words like a soft-shoed thief from her mouth. Because it was all she could do, she turned her head from her mother in wordless protest, the way he had done.

Blankets moulded over the body, skin bleached white as sheets. Eyes closed. Mind reeling. Silence occupying the rightful place of voiced rage, the passive demonstration ultimately, disappointingly impotent.

Alone, Sarah forced herself to get out of bed. Teetering on unsure legs like a newborn calf, she worked her way to the door in stages: leaning on the side of the bed, clinging to the edge of the dresser, grappling for the door handle.

In the bathroom she grasped the rim of the sink, staring at the stranger facing her in the mirror. Sunken cheekbones, eyes ringed with fatigue. Hair dull and lifeless, coming away in her hands. Wiggling her fingers over the garbage can, she watched as the hair floated down, light as a prayer into the trash.

Coming off onto the pillow in a kind of nuclear-blast shadow of the head

The nightgown was stubborn, catching at her wrists and her chin. She caught her breath and tugged, dropping the gown to the floor. The lip of the tub cut into the back of her legs as she perched there, marvelling at the size of her kneecaps beneath the thin veil of skin. Leaning forward, she allowed herself to slide into the tub. She worked the taps, turning them by squeaking inches, the water trickling from the spout and eventually gushing into the bottom of the tub, swirling around her feet and buttocks. Engaging the shower lever, she wrapped her arms around her legs and let the water spray over her shoulders and back. She would go to see Michael, she thought. She would tell him about her knees.

The walk to Michael’s seemed to take forever. Her feet were leaden, her head dizzy and light as her mind ricocheted erratically, back and forth and sideways. The streets and houses, the trees and sidewalk, everything was slightly skewed. Resting on the bridge, she could see her secret spot down on the tracks. And there, beside the boxcar. Who was it? The old man from the cemetery.
Mr. Ellis from 317.
Their eyes met. Sarah pushed away from the wall, continued along the bridge. Feet moving step over step. Heavy as cannon-balls. At the grove of pine trees she stopped. Had to stop. Stooping over, hands braced on her thighs. She glanced over her shoulder, expecting the man to appear behind her.

But, no, she was alone. She straightened herself and began toiling across the stretch of ground to the parking
lot. A plaintive cry echoed across the stillness of the park.
The woman.
Sarah listened. It was a peacock, calling from inside its cage. Plumage painted and gleaming like a Japanese kimono, the peacock paraded regally along the length of fence. Sarah took a moment to admire it. It was the first time she’d seen one in the park. The bird cocked its luminous head and watched as Sarah made her way across the parking lot, calling woefully after her as she set out up the hill.

At his house, the windows were dark.

The curtains drawn, preventing the light from coming in

Clutching the ledge, she balanced tiptoe on the rock and peered through his bedroom window. When she couldn’t see him, she walked around to the front of the house and attempted the door. It was unlocked and slightly ajar. She pushed it lightly, the door creaking slowly open. “Michael?”

Mouth shaping words without meaning, the mechanical wails from some primitive place deep inside as the body began to expire

Stepping tentatively over the threshold, Sarah called out again. “Michael?” The door to his room was open. She took a few halting steps down the hall and stood in the doorway.

Where the nurses had nervously collected, while others trotted purposefully down the corridor

The room no longer neat but messy, as though he’d been looking for something in a hurry. Sarah sat down on the bed.
She was so tired. She needed to rest. She lowered herself slowly onto the comforter, the pillow cool against her cheek. Pulling her feet up, she curled into a little ball. She would stay like this for a while and wait.

The family gathering around the bed, weeping, confused faces searching for answers that were not there, labouring through the minutes, desperate for a peaceful resolution

But by morning when he had not arrived, she began to grow restless. She rose from the bed. The videos were in a heap on the floor. There was one beside the TV. A new one. An image of Michael and Donna flickered distantly through her mind.

The sudden kick of memory asserting itself, of life resisting surrender

Sarah turned on the TV, took the cassette from its case and pushed it into the VCR. The screen buzzed. The image grew clear. It was Sarah as a little girl, playing in her bikini in the plastic pool. She looked up at her brother and laughed, splashing him with water.

The intravenous dripping slower and slower

To one side, her mother, mouthing instructions from a patio chair, hair in curlers. Sarah watched with wonder as John jumped in and out of the pool, kicking water into the air. The scene faded and changed. It was Christmas.

The chance for miracles quickly unravelling

She was there, tearing open a package, pulling a doll from inside. She held it up to the camera, hugging it over and over with delight. John walked into the frame, cowboy hat tilted to one side. Lining himself up, he pulled a pistol from his holster and shot something off screen.

A thin trail of blood emerging from one nostril, eyelashes fluttering, chest heaving

The picture faded to black, then emerged again. It was her mother and father, young, smiling. They held a baby in their arms. They cooed and clucked over the infant, kissing its head and face with pride.

Arms enfolding, voices strained to the point of breaking, lips held closely to the ear, speaking through the moans

That she should find this filled her with awe and confusion. She watched the video for what seemed like hours, her face shining with tears as her life unfolded in front of her, through infancy to young adulthood, the shy joy of her first ballet recital to the anguish of skinned knees and broken hearts. She could not imagine how Michael had managed to create it.

An entire life playing out to its inevitable conclusion, the momentary glimmers of recognition, fingers working the air

As the last images faded and crackled from view, Sarah turned off the TV. The room was quiet and dark. Michael had not come home. She stared at the blank screen, knew that if she was going to understand any of it, she would have
to see the old woman again. Walking from the room, her heart resonated with the one truth that the video had imparted, the extraordinary message that Michael had so carefully pieced together in the hundreds of ordinary little scenes held there.

“I love you.”

The train trundled along the tracks. It swayed and rocked like a willow tree, urging her to sleep. Outside, the rain poured down, lashing against the windows and making it impossible to see. Inside, a few lone riders sat stiffly in their seats. Sarah recognized the old man’s hat, and the little boy from Michael’s videos, too. She slouched down to avoid eye contact when the old man turned to look at her. So she could stretch out her feet, she raised the armrest of the seat next to her, then covered her legs with her jacket and rested, the bundle of pictures clasped in her hand. The movement of the train lulled her, the whistle blowing mournfully in the distance, the engine hundreds of feet ahead down the tracks. The train was picking up speed as it left the city, careening through the night toward Salem. It wouldn’t be a long ride. Just enough to get some rest.

Sarah woke as the train slowed to a crawl and lurched to a stop at the station. There was the clamour and bang as the stairs unfolded to the platform. She sat up and looked around. The train was empty, save for herself. She wondered
briefly where the other people had gone. Her jacket dropped lifelessly to the floor as she got up and made her way along the aisle to the door. The door was open, the stairs waiting. She stepped carefully down, photos in one hand, holding the rail with the other for support. The rain had stopped; the station was deserted. She had to jump down from the last step, the conductor graciously assisting her. The train bucked forward, and the conductor disappeared inside the car as Sarah walked toward the stairs that led to the street. They were long and steep, switching back several flights; the rubber soles of her sneakers struck bluntly against the metal treads.