All Families Are Psychotic (8 page)

An hour of confusion and technicalities ensued.

'It was
my fault,'
Wade kept saying. 'I should have been watching more closely.'

'Wade,' Sarah shou ted at him, 'stop trying to cover for me. The fire was
my
fault.' When Ted got home from work, he was careful to get Sarah's story first.

'Dad, I was looking at your old technical journ als, from university when you were studying propul sion. I wanted to do something like that. It was a challenge.'

'You sent a fiery payload up into the sky during peak forest fire season just because I used to study it in college?'

'Yeah.'

Ted grabbed her. 'You are the greatest li tt le princess in the world ! ' He squeezed her and made her giggl e. 'Jan — what's for dinner tonigh t?'

'I was going to barbecue ... "

'Let's order in pizza for once. And Wade, why don ' t you choose what kind.' He tickled Sarah's feet. 'You're so lucky to have a big bro ther to help you on your projects, young lady.'

Wade returned to the hotel to check in Janet, but there was no vacancy. ' Mom, share the room here with me and Beth.'

'Dear, I don ' t want to be a pest.' Janet was lying on the bed, the curtains drawn.

' Mom, you've never been a pest. And it 's a good chance for the tw o of you to get to kno w each other.' 'I suppose I could.'

Wade sucked in some air: ' Mom, I saw the thalidomid e in the bathroom .' Janet looked up at him. 'Oh?'

'It 's OK. I kno w it 's for mou th ulcers.'

'It is.' Janet raised her body and craned her head towards Wade.

Wade sat down on a chair beside the minib ar. 'What I'm wondering is where does a person even
find

thalidomid e these days? Do scientists have garage sales? It 's — freakish — that anybody's even making the stuff any more. It 's creepy.'

'I get it from Brazil, through an underground netw ork. Usually it comes FedEx. Or sometimes through Mexico, but Mexico's a disaster, so Brazil's better. They use it down there for treating leprosy.'

'Leprosy? Seriously?'

'I kno w. The irony is too rich to ignor e. Now they're using thalidomid e to
prevent
people from losing limbs and digi ts.'

'Huh.' The room was quiet. 'What abou t Nickie, then?' 'Her being infected?' Janet asked.

'It sounds so bad when you say it like that. But yeah.' 'I have no idea what to say abou t it, Wade.'

He tossed a foil-wrapped complim entary sachet of decaf coffee grind s back and forth between his hands. 'So are you tw o friends now?'

'Friends? No. But I don ' t hate her any more. She's actually a very nice woman.' Janet slumped back onto the bed.

'You OK?'

'Yes, but I need some sleep. The sun here wipes me out. When is Beth returning ?' 'No idea. You rest. I'm going to look at the view.'

Wade took the phone out onto the balcony. He sucked in some air and made a call he'd hoped he wouldn ' t have to make. He dialed an old business acquaintance.

'This is Norm.'

'Norm — it 's Wade.'

'Wade Drummond ? Well,
well —
what's up, my man?'

'This and that. I'm a married guy now, Norm. Pretty soon I'll have a kid and a mini van and the whole works.'

'You — a family man?'

'Pffft —
all the snowmen in hell melt in a puff of steam.' 'Family's a good thing, Wade.'

'You should see my family. Every single one of us is psychotic.'

'All families are psychotic, Wade. Everybody has basically the same family — it 's just reconfigured sligh tly different from one to the next. Meet my in-laws one of these nigh ts. Where are you phoning from?'

'Orlando.'

'You're in Orlando? Oh, righ t — your sister's the astronaut. She's amazing.' They caugh t up for a few minu tes and then came an awkward manly silence. 'Norm. I need money.'

A pause. 'Well, don ' t we all.'

'I had to get a loan from Tony the Tiger in Carson City, for this fertili ty clinic that cost a bomb. My wife and me had to go to Europe for this new procedure. Fifty K.'

'Fifty K? What could cost fifty K?'

Might as well jump righ t in.
'Norm, I'm hiv. This place in Milan takes ejaculate and places it into a centrifuge and the ligh ter viral particles rise to the top, leaving what remains on the bott om clean.' Norm was silent. 'OK. Sure. I've heard lots of stories before. That's a pretty good one.'

'It 's not a story — it 's the truth.'

'But the poin t remains that you need dough .' 'Yeah.'

'You kno w how it works, Wade — the greater the risk, the greater the reward.' 'Like I don ' t kno w that.'

'How much you need?'

'The fifty K plus another fifty for Tony's interest.' 'That's some risk.'

'It 's what I need.'

There was a long silence on Norm 's end follo wed by 'You've actually phoned at a very oppor tune moment, my man. I could use a courier righ t abou t now.'

'Courier?' Wade knew that in the underground labor economy, this was the lowest, most dangerous job level. 'Why not.'

'Tell you what — I'm having a fling with Cheryl. She's in a Pocahon tas dance number on Main Street USA over in Disney World .'

'Cheryl?'

'Yes, li tt le Cheryl, and she's still young enough to like older men. Meet me outside the monor ail exit at Main Street USA -tomorro w morning , ten on the nose.'

'Disney World ? You?'

'Wade, Wade,
Wade —
nothing bad ever happens in Disney World . It 's the only safe place in this fucked- up state. I've had many a meeting there.'

They signed off. Wade stepped back into the room as Beth got in from shopping . After a nap they all ate a calm dinner in the hotel dining room, Janet's treat. Afterwards they went for a walk along International Boulevard, a frustrating experience for Wade, as everything, even the most casual trinket, was so expensive. They went back to the room to watch TV, and Wade once again took the phone out onto the balcony, and this time he rallied all of his nerve and all of his guil ty feelings abou t being a vagrant, useless son, and called his father down in Kissimmee.

'Yeah, hello?'

'Hey, Dad, it 's me, Wade.'

Ted's reply gave away nothing: 'Wade.'

'I didn ' t get much of a chance to talk with you today at Sarah's thing downstairs.' 'Buncha media clowns.'

'It was busy all righ t.'

'So you're out of jail,' said Ted. 'Good. You're too old for jail. Something kind of sad abou t a man being jailed after forty, like he's incapable of seeing the big picture.'

'You're looking good.'

'Well, it 's not like I deserve to. But Nix tells me I have fortunate bone structure. And I have regular bowel movements, and I have free use of the Y's tanning bed.'

'So, Dad — I heard through the grapevine that maybe you migh t need some money.' 'What grapevine? My grapevine's my own frigging business.'

'Just though t you migh t be interested in a scheme I've got to make some quick pocket change.' Ted went silent.

I notice he's not hanging up.

'Easy come, easy go,' said Ted. 'The house I can live withou t -the damn thing leaked. Nix can bring home the bacon until I locate a new gig, can' t you, Nix?' Nickie, doub tless, was rolling her eyes in the

background .

'Hey, Dad, why don ' t you come with us to Disney World tomorro w? We can have fun. I'll pay.' No
turning back now.

'Disney World ? Are you out of your mind?'

'Dad, you see, there's this guy — Norm . . .' Wade realized how bad that last sentence fragment sounded:

There's this guy, Norm . . .

'And?'

'He needs some help on a project . . .' 'And?'

'I was going to help him and I though t maybe you could, you kno w, help, too.' 'Doing what? And how much do I get?'

He sounds almost ruthless.
'For you? Ten K, and it 'll be nothing more than a quick day trip to somewhere nearby.'

A pause: 'OK.'

'What — you don ' t want to kno w the details?'

'I want the money. I'll leave the details to you.' There was a pause. 'It was very kind of you to think of me, Wade.'

The tw o men arranged a pickup time the next morning and hung up. Feeling like Santa Claus, Wade went inside the room where he, Beth and Janet fell asleep watching the History Channel. Around three, he

woke up and couldn ' t get back to sleep. He went out onto the balcony, swaddled in the bored, muggy remains of a Gulf wind. He looked up at the moon, either full or nearly full.
If human beings had never happened, that same moon would still have been in that very same position, and nothing about it would be different than it is now.
Wade tried to imagine Florid a before the advent of man, but couldn ' t. The landscape seemed too thoroughl y coloni zed -the trailers, factory outlets and cocktail shacks of the world below. He decided that if human beings took over the moon, they'd probably just turn it into Florid a. It was probably for the best it was so far away, unreachable.

Wade then though t abou t his mother, seemingl y ebbing away before his eyes — and yet she was also somehow younger than ever —
she knows about things now, stuff even I didn ' t know about until

recently: scary sex shit — she's opened up so many doors —
and again he felt one of the coun tless bol ts of shame he felt whenever he though t of his father's behavior, his own behavior, and what it had done to

his mother — his womanizing and stupidi ty.

At least tomorro w there would be money, and maybe
now
Wade could keep away those goons from Carson City, the ones parking outside his and Beth's condo flashing their high beams at one a.m. And maybe a bit left over to try some new anti-Hiv drug combin ations.
And the ten K for Dad? Peanuts. For once I can do him a sizeable favor.

Life was simple, really: a wife to care for and a baby on the way — a li tt le nest to pro tect, and this

enormou s world just waiting to pounce and shred the whole shebang. Wade though t abou t his blood

flowing through his veins — his legs and toes and fingertips and scalp — and he tried to keep totally still to see if he could feel the blood moving within him, but no go.
We're no more allowed to feel our blood than the rotation of the earth.
He though t abou t his aids. When he'd told Sarah, he'd said, 'It 's a time machine, baby sister.'

'Don' t be so flippant, Wade.'

'I'm not being flip, Sarah. The truth is the truth.' 'In what
way
is it the truth?'

'Like this: If it were a hundr ed years ago instead of righ t now, both of us would be dead. You from that burst appendix in grade three — or an infected cut.'

Sarah had said, 'Or they'd have dro wned me at bir th.'

'Blink, you're alive; blink , you're dead. Me? Hell, I'd be dead a hundr ed different ways by now. So I figure that this virus is merely resett ing the clocks to where they ough t to be reset. Senior citizens are

unnatural.'

'You honestly believe that?' 'I do.'

'Excuse me if I have troubl e agreeing with you.'

Wade had heard the hardness in Sarah's voice. She'd asked him, 'Are you able to get a job and work?' 'Sort of. I have this part-time job dealing cards in this shitty club off Fremon t Street. No booze, either — these livers are picky li tt le fuckers.'

' Medication?'

'Yeah, but let's leave it at that. I have to take a pill every time I blink . Pills are driving me mental.'

Out on the hotel balcony, fire ants had discovered Wade. He went inside. Beth was snoring . It was 4:00

a.m. and time for a 3TC capsule and a sip of pineapple juice.
" Where did the past six minu tes go? When

time is used up, does it go to some kind of place like a junkyard? Or down a river like the waters beneath Niagara Falls? Does time evaporate and turn into rain and start all over again?

Wade took his pill , sipped his juice and went to look out the windo w at the hotels and roads and cars covering Florid a.
Talk about a time machine.
Of all the states — even Nevada — yet again Florid a struck Wade as being the one most firmly locked in the primordi al past. The plants seemed cruder here, the

animals more cruel and the air more dank and bacterial. He felt as if the whole landscape were resigned to the fact that in a billion more years it 'd all probably be squished into petroleum.

Janet was sleeping on the rollaway couch, her breath sligh t, like a finger brushing against paper.

Wade opened the sliding doors onto the balcony, still hot, even at this hour, and li t a cigarette. If he couldn ' t drink , he'd smoke. Forget the fire ants.
Wade,
his doctor had told him,
your liver has the metabolizing capacity of a two-year-old girl 's. I don' t know when it was you had your last drink , but whenever it was, it was your last.

He turned around and looked into the bedroom . For no reason, the red message ligh t on the phone started blinking .
Huh?
He went inside, picked up the cordless phone and pushed the message butt on — Sarah:

'Wade, hi, it 's your baby sister. You won' t be awake -we're on these funny hours that have to do with orbi ting schedules. I'm on a break. Doesn' t that sound goo fy?
Hi, I'm an astronaut and I'm on a coffee break.
But it 's the truth, and today has been a long haul, so I gladly welcome some feet-up time. The Russians have tissue regeneration experiments on this fligh t, and I swear, their whole zero-G research progr am is being run by a McDonald's crew chief. Remember when the Soviets used to have their act

together? We should be so lucky again. How's Mom? How are
you?
Beth and I only had maybe seventeen seconds together. Bryan's girl friend is — oh, God — well, at least she has tw o X chromo somes. If you wake up early enough , give me a call. I'll be hitt ing the sack at 8:00 civilian time.'

She left a number, which Wade went onto the balcony and dialed. 'Baby sister?'

'Wade! Oh, this
is
yummy. What are you up to? What are you doing up at ... 4:25
in the morning ?'

'Way too much weird family juju. Can' t sleep. Sometimes I wish we were the way real estate salespeople look in those li tt le newspaper ads — with nice parted hair, optimistic att itudes and perfect li tt le lives — and that we'd all had our reptile cortexes surgically removed.'