Other Plans Page 8

  “He’d think I’d gone crazy,” he’d answered, imagining John’s face if, out of the blue, he kissed him. But now, lying in the dark, he wasn’t so sure. My father wasn’t affectionate, he thought, and I didn’t suffer feelings of rejection. I don’t think I did. People didn’t dwell on things like rejection when I was a boy. My father was reserved. There’s too damn much dissection today, too much pulling apart and examining of relationships. Even the word “relationship” had turned into a buzzword. Nothing is simple anymore. If it ever was. Take those fool how-to books. How To Make Love. How To Make Your Kid A Winner. How To Get Pregnant. It was ludicrous. Only this morning he’d read a story about a woman who was suing her lover because he refused to impregnate her. She agreed to drop the suit if he agreed to artificial insemination, using his sperm. If that didn’t say something about the world today, he didn’t know what did. Diamonds used to be a girl’s best friend. Now it appeared sperm was.

  Next to him, Ceil murmured in her sleep.

  “No,” she said, her voice gutteral, unfamiliar. “No, no.” He tugged at one corner of her pillow. She shifted position and breathed deeply once more. When they’d first married, he’d been frightened at the intensity of Ceil’s cries as she lay sleeping. When he spoke to her about them, seeking the cause, she’d said simply, “I have nightmares, Henry, I always have had. I can’t stop just because I married you,” and he’d said, “Why not? I’m here to watch over you. You don’t have to worry anymore.” She’d just given him a look. Her nightmares had continued and when he asked what they were about, although he knew she thought his questions unnecessary, she felt he was prying, she always said she couldn’t remember.

  “How about you?” she’d demanded. “How come you don’t ever tell me about your dreams?” Startled, he’d said, “I don’t ever dream,” which was true. And she’d said, “That’s because you have no conscience.” Maybe that was true. He didn’t think it was, but maybe she’d hit on something vital in his character.

  Just before he’d asked Ceil to marry him, he and his father had lunch together. It seemed a proper formality. That and asking Ceil’s father for her hand. He believed in going through the motions. His father had taken the news by saying, “It’s a tremendous responsibility, Henry. A wife and family. Hard work, too. A lot of forgiveness is involved. And pain, as well as joy. Families inflict wounds. A family is the most complex entity I know of. Very complex. Can’t even begin to tell you. It’s something you have to learn for yourself. If the family’s strong, there’s nothing stronger. I advise you to think long and hard before you settle into the role of a family man.” And he had. Two whole weeks he’d thought over what his father had said. In the end, Ceil’s golden arms, her walk, the way she held her head, had ensnared him. Theirs had been, still was, a splendid love affair. Those were the words he gave to it in the deep night. A splendid love affair. He would want as much for his children, for each of them to know a marriage like his and Ceil’s.

  Sleet and freezing rain slapped and tickled the windowpanes. Tomorrow would be a mess getting to the station. As he began the long slide into sleep, he thought with satisfaction that the back of February was almost broken. March heralded spring.

  9

  “How do you suppose they manage to make macaroni and cheese taste like live worms?” Keith poked a fork at him, just missing his nose. “It must be Gleason’s grandmother’s ancient recipe.”

  He chewed absentmindedly. “I read in the paper that people in some parts of the South eat dirt,” he said. “They dig it up and put it in paper bags and take it home. It isn’t just because they’re poor, they like the taste.”

  “Crazy.” Gloomily, Keith contemplated the ceiling of the dining hall, adorned with an intricate pattern of grease spots put there by expert practitioners of the ancient art of slinging butter pats. Margarine pats, to be exact.

  Outside, snow swirled, thick, wet flakes that hugged the ground and disappeared the second they hit. With any luck at all, the storm would continue through the day and night, and tomorrow the intrepid students would be free to wallow in the snow drifts, cut loose from school due to hazardous driving conditions.

  “When’re you going to Florida?” he asked, peeling an orange. He managed to do it so the skin fell away from the fruit in one unbroken arc. It was one of his talents.

  Keith’s jaws worked on the macaroni as if he’d landed a piece of underdone wild boar. He drank half a glass of milk without answering.

  “When’s the wedding?” he asked, thinking Keith hadn’t heard.

  When Keith finally looked at him, his eyes were hard and slick, without expression; a doll’s eyes, filled with the strange light that meant Keith had slid away from where he was to a place no one else could go.

  “It’s off.”

  “Oh.” He felt bad, he should’ve known better than to ask. Did that mean Keith wasn’t going to be best man? Or did it mean the wedding had been canceled?

  “My old man got the cold toe.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah.” Leisurely, Keith put both arms over his head and stretched. “He chickened out. Called the whole thing off.” Keith pronounced each word slowly, distinctly, clipping off the ends like a tailor biting off threads. “In other words, he couldn’t go through with it. He skipped town. Sent his intended a telegram saying he’d had a change of heart. Or maybe he told her he’d just discovered there was insanity in the family. Or that he had herpes. Or leprosy. My father has a vivid imagination. No telling what ruse he used to get out of it.

  “Or it’s possible,” Keith continued in a bitter voice, “he delivered the unkindest cut of all. Maybe he told her he was filing for bankruptcy. Nothing like bankruptcy to put the kibosh on love. He sent me a telegram, too. He always sends telegrams when he freaks out. He hasn’t got the guts to call. Said he was going to South America for a while. Probably going to dabble in real estate there. Or maybe life insurance. They must sell a lot of life insurance down there. All those terrorists, knocking people off like pigeons. Leave the wife and kiddies well-fixed when you’re blown away, amigo.” Keith bit off the end of his fingernail in one piece, like the orange skin, and spit it out on the floor.

  “You should’ve heard my mother,” he said. “She laughed like a hyena. She doesn’t want him, but she doesn’t want anyone else to have him. I think she feels better if she knows he’s not happy. She’s not happy, so she wants him to be miserable, too.” Keith threw out his hands, palms up. “Probably if she landed some rich dude, if she got married again or something, she wouldn’t give a shit about my father. She might even wish him well, who knows?”

  “Oh,” was all he could think of to say. He thought briefly of telling Keith about his upcoming date with Grace Lerner’s niece, just to lighten the atmosphere. And decided against it. Keith didn’t have a lot of dates, but when he did, they weren’t blind. Maybe that was because Keith’s mother didn’t have friends who had nieces.

  “I want you to tell me something off the top of your head.” Keith pushed away his plate and put his elbows on the table. “Which do you think would be easier, to commit murder or commit suicide?”

  “What kind of question is that?” he said, his voice rising. They stared at each other with a fierce intensity, as if a fight between them was imminent. “How do I know?” Several guys at the next table looked over at them curiously.

  “Just off the top of your head. Come on.” Keith leaned toward him, speaking softly now. “Don’t think about it. Give me your gut reaction. Which would be easier?”

  “Oh, that’s different. Which would be easier. Why didn’t you say so in the first place?” he asked sarcastically. “Well, that’s a cinch. Suicide. Because then you wouldn’t be around to suffer the consequences. You’re out of it. Man, are you ever out of it.” He treated it as a joke, although he knew Keith hadn’t meant it as such.

  “If you commit murder,” he said, “you probably never sleep very well ever again. Ever. That’s the way I figure it.�
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  Keith nodded, well pleased with this answer. “That’s an interesting reason for not committing murder.”

  There were times when he knew he bored Keith, but this wasn’t one of them.

  He elaborated. “You’d close your eyes,” and he closed his for maximum effect, “and you’d see the person you killed. Big eyes staring at you, always staring. And everywhere would be blood. Vats of blood. You have any idea how much blood the human body contains?”

  “Open your eyes,” Keith snapped.

  He opened them, not having realized they were still closed. He felt a sudden exhilaration. For once he, not Keith, was in control. “The human body has the most incredible amount of blood. Gallons, probably. I’ve forgotten how much.” He was improvising now, watching Keith’s face. “If you’re gonna kill somebody with a gun, aim for the stomach. A stomach wound is pretty nearly always fatal. Besides, the guy might be wearing one of those bulletproof vests.”

  That might make a good macabre routine. Guy in bulletproof vest, looks a little like Woody, wouldn’t hurt a flea, involved in shoot-out. Up and down fire escapes he goes, blind alleys, subway platforms, train thundering down the tracks. Don’t hesitate to borrow from Hitchcock or any of the other pros. Subway platforms were always ominous. Guys in black suits, black hats in pursuit of Woody-like hero. Who turns out to be an expert dodger of bullets, an expert ducker of flying lead. A wimpy Dick Tracy type, impervious to flying lead and fear. Nothing can touch him on account of his bulletproof vest, which his girl friend just gave him for his birthday. In that vest he’s Superman. Then, when it’s all over and the bad guys are oozing all over the pavement, the wimpy hero counts all the creeps he’s erased, scratches his chest triumphantly, and discovers he’s not wearing his vest after all. He left it home on the kitchen table. He faints. Fade out. Laughter.

  If only he had his pencil and paper handy. Some of his best ideas popped up when he least expected them.

  “Last night on TV I saw a picture of a cop who got his, even with one of those vests on,” Keith said in a challenging voice. “They’ve got a new kind of bullet designed to penetrate the bulletproof vest.”

  This was turning into some kind of a contest.

  “Yeah, well, maybe it was a second. Flawed. They save lives. Why do you think cops wear ’em? They’re very expensive. I’ve read plenty of stories telling about how some cop gets shot in the chest and if it wasn’t for that old vest, whammo.” He socked one fist into his hand to illustrate, but Keith, having had enough, made for the door, walking fast. Typical. Keith had posed the question: which would be easier, murder or suicide. Keith had a thing about stuff like that, especially suicide. Every time he heard about some kid knocking himself off, Keith would draw an X in the air and say, “Another one bites the dust.” Now he was suddenly losing interest.

  John took giant steps to catch up. Keith wasn’t getting off that easy.

  “There’s always a knife,” he said into Keith’s ear.

  Abruptly, Keith stopped, turned. They almost bumped heads. “Yeah,” Keith agreed, that peculiar light in his eyes, “if I was going to kill myself, I’d probably OD on pills, plus booze. That way you’re out of it. No pain, no nothing. The people who hang themselves really do me in. Or the ones who drive into a concrete abutment. Crazy.” He kneaded his forehead with two fingers. “You take a gun. Very impersonal. Never even get near the guy. But with a knife, you gotta be up close, right? You can feel the knife go in. Those Manson cats used knives. They got sexual kicks out of knifing those poor bastards. In and out, in and out.” Keith’s cheeks were crimson. “Even the pregnant one. They nailed her and the baby. In and out. There’s a sex thing you don’t get with a gun that a knife gives you. A gun, you aim it, boom, that’s it.”

  “Keith! Keith Madigan!” They both jumped. It was Mrs. Arthur. “Mr. Gleason would like to see you. In his office, please.”

  “God. What now.” Keith sloped off in the direction of Gleason’s office. And he stood alone in the deserted hall, goose bumps climbing up his arms, the back of his neck, thinking about a sexual thing with a knife. Yeah, he could see that. Come to think of it, he’d never heard of anyone committing suicide with a knife. Maybe it wasn’t possible. He drove his clenched fist against his heart, pretending it held a knife. It could be done. Wonder why nobody did it. Too messy, maybe. If suicides thought about mess. Probably by the time they got to the point of doing the job, mess was the thing furthest from their minds.

  His first year at St. Mark’s, the president of the senior class had killed himself. John had been too young to have known the guy, but everybody said he had everything going for him: good looks, a good mind, good athlete. What else was there? But in the middle of March, during a snowstorm, the kid climbed a water tower over a hundred feet high and jumped. He landed in the soft snow, which turned out to be not nearly soft enough. Everyone was shocked out of their skulls. They kept it as quiet as they could so little twerps like him and Keith wouldn’t wise up. Mrs. Arthur had worn dark glasses for days afterwards. Probably she had dished out the Last Duchess to that kid so many times that she’d pushed him over the edge. Even the city papers had sent reporters to town. Pictures of the school, the town, the guy’s house, were everywhere. His parents, poor bastards, were on television. At the funeral. They always get people when their defenses are down, when they don’t know what they’re doing. Psychiatrists were dragged in to give their opinions as to why he’d done it. The TV nightly

  “Did you ever suspect he’d do such a thing?”

  “Absolutely not. He was a fine boy, never in any trouble. They were a fine family, went to church every Sunday.” How to make the kid’s minister or priest or rabbi feel like a real winner, right?

  The kid had left a note that naturally was kept secret. And later, some columnist wrote a piece about teenage suicide, which was beginning to rival AIDS as the topic of the day. Among the salient facts he learned was that March was the favorite month for suicide and that more seventeen-year-old males committed suicide than any other age group. The senior class president was a seventeen-year-old male and he had jumped in March.

  Nobody knew what caused the kid to knock himself off and, as far as he knew, nobody ever found out. A memorial fund in the kid’s name was set up at the school, and for a while contributions poured in. Then the dead kid’s family moved away, leaving no forwarding address, and the donations stopped before there was enough money for a full scholarship.

  He’d wondered off and on about the suicide note. Not so much about what it said, although he was interested in that, but what the family did with it after they’d finished reading it. And after they’d finished crying, which he figured they’d eventually have to do, once they’d emptied the old tear ducts and tried to see out of their swollen eyes and read every word one more time until they knew them all by heart, what then did they do with the note? Tear it into a thousand pieces and flush it down the toilet? Or did they hide it somewhere, in a drawer or a trunk or even in a safety deposit box in a bank? Or did they maybe bury it in the back yard under the apple tree in a shoe box with 10D written on it, his size, and take out the box now and then to study the words further for clues? Did they take it from wherever they’d hidden it on the anniversary of the kid’s death every year and look it over and ask themselves for the zillionth time, Why? And did the words lose their power to hurt after a while? It might be better to burn a note like that, to destroy it rather than torture themselves with endless rereadings. But if they did that, there was always the added torture of thinking that if the suicide note had been studied carefully one more time, it might reveal the reasons the kid had for doing such a terrible thing. It might in some way absolve them of guilt.

  He shuddered and hugged himself, suddenly freezing, wishing he’d worn his heavy sweater. The hall was frigid. The school was cutting back, trying to conserve energy, they said. The heat was turned down as far as if would go without being shut off. Mrs. Arthur wore a sweater over her sweater
these days. And, when he thought no one was looking, old Gleason rubbed his pale hands together and tucked them up his sleeves for body warmth.

  “Healthy, that’s what this temperature is, healthy, my boy,” Gleason sang out when some novice complained of chilblains. “You’ll find you have far fewer colds this winter, Ferguson. Far fewer colds, my boy, because your system will be better able to handle the cold,” raising his voice over the sound of poor skinny blue little Ferguson coughing his brains out as his breath fogged the wintry air.

  10

  Grace Lerner’s niece met him at the door. Before he lowered his eyes, in the misplaced hope that this would make him less visible, he saw she had rosy cheeks, a broad face, and big boobs.

  “Come on in,” she told him, throwing wide the door. How’d she know he wasn’t the Boston Strangler? She didn’t exactly collar him, but she gave the impression she might. Silhouetted against the light he saw old Grace herself hovering in the background, making little mating noises as she sucked on a cheroot, expelling smoke madly behind her hand so as not to contaminate any nonsmokers in the crowd.

  He stared down at his sneakers and wondered if it was too late to run.

  “Come on in,” the niece said again. Put a menu in her hand and she’d be a natural for a hostess job at Hojo’s. I want my mother, said a small voice within him. If I get my hands on my mother, I’ll throttle her.

  “John!” Grace Lerner cried, striding toward him purposefully. Who else did she think he was. She touches me, he vowed, she lays a hand on me and it’s curtains. If ever his karate training was going to come in handy, this was the time. The three of them stood under the merciless glare of the overhead light. Without raising his head he knew that if someone were to run a muscle contest here, now, this minute, he’d lose, hands down. The thought depressed him immeasurably. He opened his mouth to say something disarming, something like “I just found out I have leprosy,” stealing Keith’s father’s line, but all that came out was a little squawk. Like a chicken before the farmer comes at it, ax in hand.