Bleeder (21 page)

I prepare my factor, wait, treat, and then curl onto my bed, holding my breath for the pain. I slip underneath the covers, let air into the sheets, and comfort my ankle atop a pillow, and then I don’t move. I try to make myself as still as the night and to sleep as best I can. Yet I stare around my moonlit room at the outdated posters and high school memorabilia pinned to the walls, and suddenly a morose lump clogs my throat. I feel I have not moved
on, but have returned again to senior year. I have gone out in the world and tried to make something of myself, and I have failed and have now returned.

I brace my ankle against the ice pack, shift, and sleep while the specters of the past hold court at my bedside.

Christmas Day, just as the winter sun fades from the cold sky, Dad lights a fire in our den, and I pull a rocking chair next to it and warm my feet on the hearth while I begin a new book. Dad sits beside me and watches the fire flame while upstairs I can hear Mom, Anne, and Louise trying on their new Christmas outfits and making gasps and exclamations of excitement.

“Now, Son,” Dad says to me. I mark my book with my thumb and look over to him. “I know you’re down in the mouth about having to come home and all, but I just thought you should know that your mother,” he says, taking a sip of his Maker’s Mark, “your mother is tickled pink about your being home. She’s been like a kid this Christmas, about to wet her pants she’s so happy . . . It’s been lonely here for her, I know, with me having to work in Goldsboro during the week, you off to school, and with Anne doing her thing up there at NC State. This house gets mighty quiet during the week with just your mom and Louise here. I know that. Hell, I think if she thought it would keep you here longer, she woulda bought the whole goddamn bookstore for you at Christmas.” He sips again. Ice clinks in his glass. “Now listen to me, Son,” he says. “I want you to do something for me. You think you can do that?”

I nod that I can.

Dad stands up and stokes the fire with the poker. Flames rise and a sudden whistle of gas pops from one of the logs and plumes out a blue-yellow dance of fire. “Goddamn it,” he yells suddenly as ash spews out onto the hearth. He jumps quickly, spills some of his drink. I jerk away my feet from the sparks.

“You okay?” he asks.

“Yeah. I’m fine. It’s nothing. Just startled me.” He rests the poker against the fireplace, settles back into his chair with his drink. “Now, Son. What I want you to do is to take one, two, maybe three days—hell, you might need a whole week—but what I want you to do, Son, is to think about what
you really wanna do. What is it you wanna do with your life? Now, I know you’ve been doing this teaching and that you’ve had your insurance and had a pretty good time living your life down there in Wilmington, but you know and I know that you can’t be doing that your whole life, now can you?”

“I don’t know. I guess not. I haven’t thought about it.”

“That’s my point.” Dad’s eyes grow large and aware. “Son, it’s time. Think about it. You can’t work like other people. You’re different. You need to find something that fits for you and all you’re up against. Your mom and I can’t be here forever for you to come home to, you know.”

I lean forward in my chair and I open my mouth to speak, but Dad quiets me.

“Tsst, tsst, tsst,” he says, stilling me with his upraised hand. “I don’t want you to answer me. Not today. I just wanted you to think about it. Can you do that? Your mom and I know that you’re too smart to keep killing yourself as a teacher’s assistant. That’s no life for you. Just think about it, okay. Promise me that.”

“Okay. I promise.”

“All right, then.” He swishes his ice, swallows diluted whiskey. “Now, I’ve gotta go and re-freshen this,” he says pointing to his glass. “Watch that fire for me while I’m gone.”

When he ascends the stairs, I return to my book. The fire crackles and warms the den and it burns heat until well past midnight when it eventually extinguishes into a warm orange glow. I hear the natural creak of a floorboard, but then nothing but palpable quiet. I close my book and in my new journal, I write:

Christmas 1995. Rain, no snow, but very cold. 12:45 in the a.m. I love that—“in the a.m.” Sounds like something Henry James might write. Has a nice ring to it. The house sleeps, the fire nearby dies out, I write. I am home.

Received several gifts today: books, clothes, strings for my guitar, a pocket watch, and this leather journal which has the inscription, “Thought you might have some time to write. Love, Mom and Dad.”

So I write tonight. Record, I suppose, the events of today.

In the morning the family opened presents. Anne loved the sweater I got her, Louise the Hulk video. Dad seemed mildly amused by his Nicorette gum, but asserted that he’d yet be ever faithful to his Marlboros, a habit which, I fear, shall buy his coffin for sure. I gave Mom some fancy coffee which she quickly brewed and we both savored.

Later, my aunts, uncles, and cousins arrived and we ate a late meal and dozed off the afternoon before they all left. Then Dad entertained me with a speech which encouraged me to consider my future. I guess all sons must get that kind of advice from their breadwinning fathers. It was the low point of the day.

Read a story by Chekhov, another by Cheever—it seems my parents must have shopped heavily in the bookstore’s “C” aisle—but was then consumed by Braudel’s
History of the Mediterranean
also given to me for Christmas. Braudel’s prose is good, clean, and vivid. His description of the Mediterranean Sea and the snow-capped Alps rising along the horizon momentarily transported me. Oh . . . to be there. Instead of here for as long as I fear I might be. I give it five months. Maybe six. At least until summer, I suppose. It all depends on how long it will take my part-time job—which I haven’t gotten yet—to pay down my debt. My debt—that’s another thing I should write down here sometime. How it happened. How it came to be so enormous. Perhaps I’ll save that for another winter day. As for Braudel’s history, I’m not far into yet, but am already enthralled and think it grand. It is a good day when you find something like that.

So, I suppose ole Mom and Dad were right—that I would have time to write in this journal. What else is there to do but write and think in a sleepy little town like this? But there is comfort and solace in this, in writing. It makes me feel better somehow. Perhaps I should stop then before I uncover something of a sadder, darker nature. Hmmm . . . Okay . . . Good-night.

ANKLES

F
EBRUARY 1996
. I
N THE HOSPITAL
X-
RAY ROOM, THE LANKY TECHNICIAN
asks me to turn my left ankle out for his photo. Tall and angular, his skin is blanched and in want of sunlight, and although his manner is courteous and professional, he is brisk and offers very little in the way of conversation as he twists me into position. He says nothing of my ankle’s size, but grabs and positions it at an unnatural angle.

“Okay. That’s good. Hold it. Hold it.”

He hurries off—a stick with fast legs—behind his protective shield and presses his button. Then he repeats the process for my other, less swollen ankle, but this time when he jerks me, I wince.

“I’m sorry, but the orthopedist asked that I get a good shot of your joint. It’s a difficult angle.” So, I endure. Grit my teeth and let out a slow rasp of air.

Once handed my X-ray charts, I return to the orthopedic clinic where I wait next to an elderly man, his leg plastered in a milky cast. We smile at one another, but say nothing, and he is soon called and crutches away in slow arthritic unhaste. Eventually I am taken back, and when the orthopedist shows, he shakes my hand. This orthopedist is new and young and tall and blessed with a thick turf of brown hair that is short and combed back in a wave. Additionally, he is talkative so that in the few minutes it takes
for him to enter the room, thumb through my folder, glance at my recent X-rays, scrub his hands, and then adjust his tie by securing it inside his shirt pocket—he relates his youthful career as a fledgling football tackle.

“I wasn’t any kind of star,” he offers with a humbling smile, “but it all led to what I was supposed to do. This.” He spreads open his arms in a gesture meant to encompass the room and designate it as his chosen profession, and it is then that I note his stocky build, something like a square with thick legs and arms.

He approaches, scrutinizes my ankle with a searching glance, and when he asks me to walk, I lower myself from the table and, shoeless, pad up and down the carpeted hallway as he studies my hobbled gait. We return to the room, and as he proceeds to further examine me, I catch the sporty lingo peppered in his dialogue, no doubt a result of his deep affinity for athletics. Stooping over to better see my ankle and rolling it around in his hand, the orthopedist jokingly tells me that it is like a warped football.

“You can play with it, but it’s not ideal. That ankle is choked with fluid. We’re going to need a game plan for it because if we don’t come up with something your touchdown days are going to be over. You’re walking by flexing what we call your lumbricals.” In explaining this, he adopts a more sophisticated, medical tone. “Lumbricals are the small muscles in your feet. You’ve got them in your hands, too, but at any rate, you’re not using those in your ankle. You’re bending more with your foot bones.” He turns my joint in my hands, causing me to jump from the pain. “Sorry about that.”

He rises and, pointing to the light-box where my X-rays are displayed, illuminates my ankle’s degeneration, the arthritis that has set in, and the bone spur that has developed, a condition that contributes to the sharp and shooting pain I’ve complained about. He goes on a bit more and then concludes with his game: surgery. “An operation would fuse the joint,” he says, “and would slow down your joint’s bleeding since it will remove the tissue from between it. Consequently, your swelling should be less and so should the pain.”

“Will I be able to walk?”

“Of course, you’ll be able to walk. It’ll take some time, and with a fused ankle you won’t ever be what I’d call ‘normal’ because, well, your ankle will
no longer bend, but you certainly could easily hold for the placekicker. I have no doubts about that.”

“Well, how long am I looking at being in the hospital?” I’m thinking about the operation on my right knee in 1980 and the eight weeks it took to recover and the other done in 1982 and the seven-week hospital stay required.

“Shouldn’t be too long. No more than a week. Like the time between one double-header Saturday and the next.”

“A week? Wow. I’m used to these things taking several weeks.”

“Yeah. Medicine’s come a long way.”

I agree on the surgery, and in late spring, I return for my presurgery evaluation. The orthopedist enters with printouts of my lab work. The blood drawn, the tests run, and my health translated into numbers, the orthopedist surveys the results that are unfolded in his lap like an unbound book. He rolls his chair next to me, grabs my ankle in his hand, feels around again, then backs away to reconsult my chart. He rubs his chin.

“I’m not sure you’re ready for surgery. We may have to take a rain date on this one. It’s a tough call.” He folds his hands in his lap. “We got your tests back, and your counts have dropped below a safe level for operating.” He looks up. “I always knew your HIV was a factor, but in a person with these counts, I think that the risk for infection is just too high. I think I’m going to bench you.” He breathes heavy. Pushes away. “If things improve,” he goes on, “we’ll run an audible, but for now it’s best to sit you on the sidelines and keep an eye on things.”

I squeeze my hands together. I lower my head, stare down at my softball ankle. “What am I supposed to do?”

“We’ll treat the pain and see how that goes. But don’t get too down about this little setback. On the bright side, I’ve been studying your X-rays and there’s a good possibility your ankles may fuse themselves. They definitely are closing that gap and drawing the bones together. I’ve seen it happen. Sometimes, if you leave it alone, the body takes care of itself.”

He stands, writes out a prescription for Vicodin, and then pumps my hand up and down in a vigorous shake. “It’s just not your day to be on the field.”

At home after I deliver the news, Mom quiets. “Well . . . I guess it just wasn’t meant to be,” she says.

She embraces me in a warm hug, and then we go inside and pour ourselves cups of coffee and sit at the kitchen table. We say little to one another but instead watch through the window as the spring sun descends into our backyard and beyond into the vacant barnlot and barren pasture. Mom spins her mug in her hands. Her wedding ring clinks against the porcelain handle as she drums her nervous fingers against the cup.

THE DEPRESSING EFFECT OF NUMBERS

J
ULY 1996
. H
OT
. V
ERY HOT
. T
HE SUN—A HAZY ORB OF MELTING HEAT
—parboils the trees and flowers. They weep. But I rest in the cool hospital room, tired and dozing while waiting for Dr. Trum. When he enters, he startles me. I brush my shirt and shorts flat, raise my arms in an exaggerated yawn, and position myself for the examination. Dr. Trum cleans his hands and asks me to remove my socks so that he can see my ankles, and like the orthopedist, he cups the rotund left one and passes a probing thumb across its swelling. He inquires about the pain medicine and, though I hurt and limp daily, I allow that the narcotic has aided some. My pain when I walk is now endurable.