He escorts me home and seems unhappy when I take the spare key from under the fake rock to let myself in.
"Most people don"t use the spare key," he says.
I shrug and open the door. There is a note on the floor. "You suck, cheapskate. You need pay more."
I show the officer the white box installation of "My Life," I take him on a tour of the house, the upstairs bedroom, and explain why there are no bedside lamps. I point in the direction of George"s office, where there are lots of family photos, from when "times were better," whatever that means.
"Looks like you"re in the right place," the cop says as he"s leaving. "Stay safe."
It happens a little while later, when I"m brushing my teeth, a creeping sensation, like water is rushing in, like I"m going under. I brush, I rinse, I look at myself in the mirror. There is a pain in my head, in my eye, and as I"m looking, my face divides, half of it falls, as if about to cry. It just drops. I try to make a face, I grin, a sloppy half-smile. It"s as though I am mocking myself, as though I have been hit with novocaine. Using the b.u.t.t of my toothbrush, I poke at my face, almost stabbing, and feel nothing. As I am standing there, I realize I am sort of slouching, like a tipped marionette. I am using only one arm. I walk out of the room, stumble. There is the sensation of plastic wrapping around my head, not exactly pain but a kind of liquefaction, as though I am melting and trickling down my own neck. I"m watching as my face continues to fall; it goes entirely slack-I have aged a hundred years. I want to change my expression but can"t.
I a.s.sume it will pa.s.s. I a.s.sume I"ve got something in my eye, soap, and it will wash itself out. I come out of the bathroom and finish dressing-it seems to take hours. I"m exhausted. I don"t know whether to lie down or to keep moving. It occurs to me that I need help. The dog is looking at me strangely. "Did something happen?" I ask. "I can"t understand what I"m saying, can you?"
My right leg is like a rubber band, springing, firing unsteadily under me. I want to call my doctor, but besides the fact that I can"t remember his number, I can"t seem to work the phone. Fine, I think, I"ll drive myself to the hospital.
I make my way out of the house and into the car. I put the car into reverse, and then realize that I don"t have the key and the engine is not running. I take my foot off the brake and get out.
The car rolls down the driveway.
I vomit where I am standing.
The car rolls into the street and into the path of an oncoming car. An accident happens.
Somehow I am still standing in the driveway, next to the puddle of sick.
The cop who arrives is the same one who knows me from the park. "How can you be drinking so early?" he asks.
I can"t answer.
"He wasn"t in the car," the woman from next door says. "He was just standing there."
I try and say the word "hospital" but can"t; I try "ambulance," but it is long and soupy; finally, "MORON" comes spurting out, perfectly clear.
I make a gesture, the same gesture I would use in a restaurant when asking for the check, please. I make the sign of writing, and someone hands me paper and pen.
"Something is wrong," I write in large wobbly letters. The effort does me in, I am knocked to the ground, leveled. I hear someone say, "We can water you," and I wonder if I"ve turned into a plant.
Ambulance. Too loud. It is all too much, an a.s.sault, an insult. Too fast, too slow, nauseating, I have never felt so nauseated, and I wonder, have I been poisoned? Maybe that"s it, maybe it"s something about that spray, maybe it"s the box cave in the living room, maybe it"s off ga.s.sing toxic fumes, my previous life is rotting in those boxes and giving off toxic fumes. And as I"m thinking it, I"m worried there"s something about my logic that"s not right.
An interruption, a clot, a stroke, a little leak in the head. An X-ray, an MRI, some blood work, tissue plasminogen activator, arrhythmia, interventional radiology, cerebral angioplasty, carotid endarterectomy, stent.
I blame George: George and his desk, George and high-speed Internet. I am blaming what"s happening on everything from sitting at that desk for too many hours each day to the activities I"ve recently engaged in, both the physical exertion of suddenly having so much s.e.x, and also the tension, the trauma. I"m blaming it on George and George"s f.u.c.king medicine cabinet. As a "news" man, George believed he needed to know about everything. So his medicine cabinet was stocked with everything from v.i.a.g.r.a to Levitra, Cialis, Tadalis, Revatio, etc. The combination of his computer, his medicine cabinet, and the events of the last few weeks-namely, what happened to Jane-caused a kind of mania, a s.e.xual insanity that comes to an abrupt halt with me lying on a gurney in the ER.
Was this the big one or was this the small tremor, the warning? Does it get better-does the sensation of being in a dream underwater go away?
A nurse is standing over my gurney. "Mr. Silver. There"s a problem with your insurance. It appears you"ve been canceled. Do you have the actual insurance card?"
"Tessie." I try to explain that there is no one to feed and walk Tessie. No one pays attention, no one does anything until I pull out the IV line. "Someone needs to walk the G.o.dd.a.m.ned dog." They"re trying to get me to lie back down and asking if it"s a real dog and explaining that there is a volunteer pet-minder program.
"Call my lawyer," I say.
I am brought a phone.
I don"t know why Larry"s number is embossed like caller ID in front of my eyes-Train and Traub, 212-677-3575.
"Larry," I say. "Tell Claire that I am having a stroke." I say it, and I hear myself saying something that sounds like "Tell dare I"m outside having a smoke."
"What?" Larry says.
I try harder: "Can you please tell Claire that I am having a stroke?"
"Is this you?"
"Who else would it be?"
"Are you crank-calling me?"
"No," I say. I hear myself talking and it sounds like I"ve got rocks in my mouth.
"I can"t tell her," he says. "It"s manipulative. And, further, how do I know you"re really having a stroke and aren"t smashed?"
"I"m in the Emergency Room, Larry; they"re asking for my insurance card, and I keep saying, "Don"t worry, I have insurance.""
"You have no insurance," Larry says. "Claire dropped you. She asked me to drop you."
I throw up again, spreading sick over my gurney and across the EKG wires.
"Because you"re still legally married, you may have some recourse. You can fight it."
"I can"t fight anything-I can barely talk."
"Maybe they have a patient advocate at the hospital."
"Larry, can you please ask Claire to fax me a copy of the insurance card," I say, and the nurse takes the phone.
"Mr. Silver really shouldn"t get agitated-he"s had a cerebral incident. Agitation is definitely not a good thing."
Larry says something to the nurse and she hands me back the phone. "He wants a final word," she says.
"Fine," Larry says. "I"ll take care of it, I"ll fix this one. Consider it a favor, consider it the last favor I"ll do for you." Did Nixon have to deal with s.h.i.t like this, or did he hunker down with a bowl of SpaghettiOs?
I think of Nixon"s phlebitis; was the first attack in his left leg in 1965 during a trip to j.a.pan? I think of him during the autumn of 1974, just after his resignation, when again his left leg swelled and he also had a clot in his right lung. He had surgery in October, then a bleed, and remained hospitalized until mid-November, and when Judge John Sirica subpoenaed the former President, he was medically unable to testify.
As I lie waiting for my turn in the CAT scanner, which I"m thinking is like a cerebral lie-detector test, I am all the more sure there"s a link between Nixon"s clots and Watergate. And, not to put myself in the same league, but I"m sure the episode with George followed by Jane"s death has caused my brain to blow.
During the CAT scan to comfort myself I review Nixon"s enemies list.
Arnold M. Picker Alexander E. Barkan Ed Guthman Maxwell Dane Charles Dyson Howard Stein Allard Lowenstein Morton Halperin Leonard Woodc.o.c.k S. Sterling Munro Jr.
Bernard T. Feld Sidney Davidoff John Conyers Samuel M. Lambert Stewart Rawlings Mott Ronald Dellums Daniel Schorr S. Harrison Dogole Paul Newman Mary McGrory I am admitted to a semi-private room on a monitored floor. It occurs to me to call my "regular" doctor. Every word is a struggle. I do my best to explain my situation. The doctor"s office manager tells me it"s in G.o.d"s hands, and besides that, the doctor doesn"t practice outside of the city, and, more to the point, he"s on vacation. She asks if I would like to be transferred to Death Israel when the doctor is back.
"What is Death Israel?"
"The hospital where the doctor is affiliated," the office manager says.
"Sounds anti-Semitic," my roommate says, having heard it all.
"I hope I"ll be home before..." I say, my speech sounding slightly more coherent and familiar.
"If you change your mind, let us know," the office manager says.
"There"s nothing worse than actually needing a doctor," my roommate says.
"What are you in for?" I ask, though I think it comes out sounding more like "Why you here?"
"The show is over," he says. "Clock"s ticking down. Have you noticed I"m not moving? I"m stuck-all that"s still going is my brain, or what"s left of my brain. By the way, are you blurry or is it me?"
Before I can answer, the dog volunteer comes in. "I"m a Furry Friends Companion Consultant." She pulls up a chair and takes out an information packet and forms. "Do you have a cat or a dog?"
"Both."
"If a stranger opens the door, would they attack? Where is the food, and how much do they each get? Is the dog all right overnight-or do you need a nighttime companion? We have students who occasionally will do sleepovers."
"How long am I going to be here?" I ask.
"That"s a question for your doctor. Adoption is also an option in some cases."
"Someone would adopt me?"
"Someone might adopt the pets-if, say, you weren"t going to be going home...."
"Where would I go?"
"To a skilled nursing facility, for example, or onward...."
"Dead. She means dead," the guy in the next bed says. "They don"t like to come out and say it, but I can, because, as I mentioned, I"m heading there soon."
"You don"t seem so sick," I said to the guy. "You"re perfectly coherent."
I wipe drool from my own mouth.
"That"s what makes it so rough," the guy says. "Totally compos mentis, aware of everything, but that won"t last for long."
"Did you consider hospice?" the furry friend asks my roommate.
"What"s the difference-the art on the wall? They all smell like s.h.i.t." His hand comes up to his face. "Was that me or someone else?" he asks, and no one says anything. "My hand or yours?"
"It was yours," I say.
"Oh," he says.
"I don"t mean to interrupt," the furry volunteer says, "but you two will have all day and I"ve got things to do."
"All day, or not," the dying man says.
"About the pets-their names, ages? Do you have the house key with you?"
"Tessie is the dog, I don"t know how old, and m.u.f.fin is the cat. There"s a spare key under the fake rock on the left before the front door-a fake key and ten bucks."
The dying man hums to drown out the conversation. "Too much information," he says. "More than I should know."
"Like, what, you"re going to get out of bed and steal my house?"
"Can you take dictation?" the dying man asks.
"I can try." I push the call b.u.t.ton and ask for paper and pencil.
"It"ll be a while," the nurse says.
"I"ve got a dying man who wants to confess."
"We all have needs," she says.
I nap. In my sleep I hear gunshots. I wake up thinking my brother is trying to kill me.
"It"s not you," the guy in the bed next to me says. "It"s on TV. While you were sleeping, a cop came to see you. He said he"ll be back later."
I don"t say anything.
"Can I ask you a question? Are you the guy who killed his wife?"
"What makes you ask?"
"I overheard someone talking about a guy who killed his wife."
I shrug. "My wife is divorcing me. She canceled my health insurance."
Someone comes in and says, "Which one of you asked for a priest?"
"We asked for paper."
"Oh," the guy says. He goes out and comes back with a yellow legal pad and a pen.
"Where to begin?" the dying man says. "For certain, there are questions that will go unanswered. The difficulty is that there is not an answer for everything-some things cannot be known."
He begins to spin a story, a complicated narrative about a woman-how they came together and then apart.
His story is beautiful and eloquent, Salingeresque; they didn"t speak the same language, she wore a beautiful red scarf, and she got pregnant.