Maggie always slept wearing socks. She hated cold feet. Without them she put her feet on my back or stomach, depending on which side I happened to be sleeping at the moment. Blue licked her feet, rubbed his cold nose against her fingers, sniffed her hair, and lay down at the foot of her bed.
Maggie looked as though she were sleeping. Her expression didn't mirror the doctor's dooming comments about “permanent damage.” About “never waking.” We were now through the 50 percent range and well into the 25 percent chance of recovery. A few days ago, he shook his head and said, “Dylan, I'm just being honest. Prepare yourself.”
But she didn't look like what her chart said she was. She looked like my wife on Saturday morning. She looked like she was about to wake up and float with me downriver. I walked into the room, picked up her chart out of the sleeve on the end of her bed, read the doctor's illegible comments, opened the window, pitched it as far as I could, and watched it flail into the reflection pond three floors below. They don't bar the windows on the rooms of vegetables. Not much danger of their jumping out.
I kissed her forehead. She was warm. She smelled like Maggie. I whispered, “Hey, Maggs, it's me,” and sat down. She didn't move. I didn't expect her to. It's just that every time in our life that I whispered, “Hey, Maggs,” kissed her forehead, and put her coffee on the table next to the bed, she woke up, turned on her side, put her head in my lap, took a deep breath, and said, “What do you want to do today?”
Maggie was a pretty intense sleeper. Sometimes I'd get up in the middle of the night, and her hand would be sitting upright on her forehead as though she were thinking or had forgotten something. Whatever she was thinking about, whatever she had forgotten, it had wrinkled the skin between her eyes above her nose. I'd lean over, pull her hand down to her side, kiss her gently, and place my hand on her forehead. She'd relax. The skin would ease, go soft, and the wrinkle would disappear. When I didn't wake up, and she spent most of the night in that tense wrinkle, she'd wake and her neck would be screaming with pain. I knew it was only evidence of her depth. Maggie is a simple complexity. A paradox. Meaning between extremes.
I put my head down next to Maggie's and breathed. It was the first time in our married life that she let me share the same pillow. I wanted to smell her. Hear her breathe. Listen to her feet shuffle under the sheets. I wanted to be with my wife.
I'm not talking about the sexual thing. God knows I could. I'm a man. This is my wife. I love her. But after the delivery, the hemorrhage, the blood, and what the doctors had to do, even if she woke right this minute, it would be months before that was physically an option. And then there's the emotional aspect. Maggie's strong, but not that strong.
No, I'm talking about that sweet thing that happens when you open your eyes and realize in the dim daybreak of dawn that your wife has nudged her head next to yours and that you're now breathing air she breathed. That sweet thing that happens when you realize this and then close your eyes and feel that soft rush of her breath tickle your eyelashes. The sweet thing that happens when, after feeling that soft rush, you doze, each breathing parts of the other's air.
About dark, long after my stomach started growling, Amanda walked in the door, pulling a cart.
Blue looked up from the floor and perked his ears.
“Hello, Professor. Hello, Miss Maggie. Hello, Blue.” She stopped next to me, grabbed my left arm, and started pulling back the sleeve of my T-shirt. I winced and jerked it back, but Amanda would have none of that. “Professor, if you don't give me that arm, I'm calling in the doctor, a couple of really big nurses, and your deputy friend. So we can either do this the easy way, or we can do it your way.”
I extended my arm.
My T-shirt was stuck to my flesh. Small circles of pus and serum seeped through the fibers of my shirt. Amanda took my wrist in her hand and started methodically cutting and peeling the shirt away. After about the third pull, I realized how much it hurt. My arm was raw meat.
While I winced, Amanda spoke to Maggie. “Now, Miss Maggie, don't worry. I'm taking good care of this arm until you get to where you can. At least when he's in this hospital. I can't speak for him outside of here, but in this hospital, I'll take good care of him. We need to get his arm healed up. From what I can tell, he's not real good at taking care of himself.” Amanda looked at me. “He keeps picking at this thing like he's trying to get rid of something.” She turned to Maggie again. “So it would help us all out if you'd just go ahead and wake up before this arm gets to where he can't use it anymore.”
She finished bandaging my arm, held out her hand, and said, “Swallow this.”
Shortly thereafter, I dozed off. About two in the morning, Amos tapped me on the shoulder and said, “D.S., let's go get some coffee.”
Blue licked my ankle as I wiped my eyes and cleared the drool from my chin. I was groggy, but whatever Amanda had given me had worked. I kissed Maggs and put my hand on her forehead.
“See you tomorrow. Thanks for letting me share your pillow. I promise, if you wake up, you'll never have to do it again.”
Amos and I walked out of the hospital and crossed the street to the all-night diner. It used to be a Waffle House that had long since gone out of business. Now the sign above the door read “Al's Diner, Open 24 Hours.” I've never been there when Al wasn't working the grill. When that guy slept, I'll never know.
Amos and I sat down and ordered coffee, and I placed three orders for scrambled eggs.
“How is she?”
“Same.”
“What's this business with your arm?”
“Huh?”
“I said, why do you keep doing whatever you're doing to your arm?”
“Oh. I just goofed it up working in the pasture.”
“That's not what your nurse said.”
“Yeah? What does she know? She wasn't there.”
“She says that every time she sees you it's worse, and now you're trying to cover it up. That's why she's bandaged it like that. So you can't make it any worse.”
“Amos, it's three in the morning. Can we talk about something else?”
“How's class?” he said without a break.
I looked up. “Shouldn't you be home sleeping or working or something?”
“I am working.”
“My tax dollars are paying you for this time?”
“How's class?”
“You don't quit, do you?”
“Not when it comes to you.” Amos smiled, his white teeth shining in the dim light of the diner.
I rubbed my eyes. “It's probably a good thing too.”
“Have you figured it out yet?”
“Figured out what?”
“Amanda.”
“Amos, would you quit talking in code? It's about three hours past my ability to translate.”
“Have you figured out Amanda Lovett?”
“What's there to figure? I've got an attractive, kind, pregnant preacher's daughter sitting in the front row of my class, and she also happens to be my wife's nurse. Yes, I've got that figured pretty well.”
“Yeah, but have you figured how that attractive, kind, sweet, unmarried daughter-of-a-preacher got pregnant in the first place?”
“No. I haven't spent much time on that.”
“You probably thought she was just another statistic.”
I rubbed my eyes and stared out the diner window. “Amos, please come to a point. Just about any point will do.”
“Six months ago, Amanda Lovett was kidnapped, driven seven miles from town, and tied to a tree deep in the Salkehatchie. She was then raped by at least two men, maybe more. Six days later, they dumped her on her daddy's lawn. You need me to draw you a picture?”
That was picture enough. “No, I got it.”
“That girl, the same girl that bandages your arm, brushes your wife's hair, leaves a towel for Blue, and brings you orange juice in the morning, was beat up and left for dead. She was also impregnated.” Amos sat back. “This is a small town, and word travels fast, but you Styleses have a tendency to keep to yourselves. Always have. Now . . . ” Amos pointed his toothpick at me. “You want the answer to your next question?”
“Yes.”
“Well.” He tongued the toothpick to the other side of his mouth. “I could tell you, but you need to hear it from her. Ask her sometime. ”
“Amos, did you bring me to this one-tooth establishment to tell me this?”
“Yup.”
“Why?”
“'Cause you need to hear that there are folks in this world who got lives just as bad as yours. Life ain't fair, and welcome to earth.”
“Thanks. I feel much better just knowing that.”
I paid for the coffee and eggs, and Blue and I left Amos talking with Al. When I cranked my truck, Garth was singing a duet with Martina, but I turned it off and rode home in silence, except for the rhythmic sound of a nail in my tire hitting the blacktop.
F
RIDAY NIGHT WAS THE BIGGEST GAME OF THE
year, according to Marvin. This was “The Rivalry.” Every school has a nemesis, and Digs's was South Carolina Junior College.
Blue and I walked up to the fence next to the track and stood parallel with the goal line. The bleachers were filled with kids, and because dogs make some folks nervous, I put a leash on Blue. He looked at me as if I had lost my mind.
“Sorry, pal. It's just for an hour or so.”
I leaned against the fence and looked up at the clock. It was the third quarter, and Digs was beating SCJC by a touchdown, 27-20. From what I had heard in the classroom, Digs had speed and a decent quarterback, SCJC had a running back named Thumper, and both teams had defense.
The Digger defense was on the field, and Russell was lined up on the far side as defensive tackle. SCJC snapped the ball, and the quarterback rolled leftâto Russell's side of the field. Russell ran over the offensive tackle and sacked the quarterback for what would have been a twelve-yard loss had the quarterback not fumbled the ball.
Players scrambled everywhere trying to pick up the pigskin. The stands erupted again in a wave of arms and a roar of penny-filled milk jugs. Out of the heap, Marvin came up with the ball and began running down my side of the field. His arms and feet were a blur. When he passed me, his face was a picture of gums, teeth, and unadulterated joy. He crossed the goal line twelve yards ahead of the nearest player, spiked the ball, and did some dance I had never before seen. Then Russell picked him up and they, and the rest of the defense, paraded to the bench. Score: 33-20.
I was saying something to myself about fast feet when I heard, “Hey there, Professor.”
I didn't need to look. The seductive voice gave her away. I turned and said, “What? No sunglasses tonight?”
Koy reached up and pulled her sunglasses down from their perch atop her head. “How's that?” she said.
“Much better. I almost didn't recognize you.”
Digs kicked off and tackled SCJC on about the twenty-two.
“So, what are you doing here?” Koy asked.
“Watching a football game,” I said, pointing to the field.
“Don't most people do that from the stands?”
“Yeah, but I thought it might be too much for Blue. You knowâall the noise.”
“Oh,” she said with a skeptical expression. She knelt down and rubbed Blue's head. “What's your story, Professor?”
“What do you mean, what's my story?” I asked.
“I mean, what's your story? Why's a good-looking, upstanding guy like you teaching a loser class like ours?”
“You think you guys are losers?”
“Come on, Professor. We're all adults here.”
“Well, I used to teach some, had a break in my farming, and this class came along. I saw it, applied, and they accepted me.”
“That ain't the way I heard it.”
“It ain't?”
“No, it is not,” she said in her best imitation of me. “Way I heard it was that you was found 'bout half dead in a cornfield by your buddy, the deputy, who I saw somewhere here tonight.” She tilted her head, looking out over the field, and put her finger to her lips. “You know, he carries a big gun, and he ain't too bad-looking. Anyway, your wife knew you could teach, and he knew you can't farm. So the two of them signed you up and stuck you in this class with the rest of us losers.”
I nodded. “All right, now that you know most of my story, what's yours?”
Koy picked her glasses off her nose and tucked them back on top of her head. “Professor, I'm just playing with you. You look like a sore thumb out here. You're about the only white person in this smelly armpit.” She waved her hands across the crowd. “I thought maybe you could use some friendly conversation.”
“Is that what this is?” I said, smiling.
“Oh, you ought to hear me when I'm unfriendly.” Her right hand played with her earring.
“I'll pass. I like the friendly.”
“Good.” She moved up, rubbing shoulders with me, and rested her chin on her hands over the fence. “So what's the deal? Why are you here?”
“I like football. I wanted to see if Russell and Marvin are really as good as Marvin keeps telling me they are.”
“Believe me, they're better. Up there, in that box”âshe pointed to the press box above the standsâ“are about sixteen scouts. The guys on the roof above them are the reporters who call the game. They kicked them out of the press box to make room for all the scouts.”
I scanned the rooftops and wondered about Russell and Marvin's futures. Three years from now their lives, and lifestyles, would be very different. I turned back to Koy. “My story is simple, Koy. My wife and I moved back here after graduate school. I couldn't get hired as a teacher, so I leaned on what I knewâfarming. But, as you so aptly stated, I'm not much of a farmer. Not yet, anyway. So, for a lot of reasons, my wife, with a little help from my friend Amos, signed me up to teach this class. And here I am.”