Wetlands (7 page)

In good times and in bad. It’s certainly bad times when one person no longer loves the other. To stay only as long as there is love is not good enough if you have children.

Mom comes too late. She’s still not there at six. Dad leaves. Failed once again. They repel each other like two negative poles of magnets I’m trying to push together.

My goal is that they see each other and, years after separating, fall head over heels in love again. And get back together. Highly unlikely. But anything’s possible. At least that’s what I maintain. Though I’m not really so sure.

A lot of time elapses between dad’s departure and mom’s arrival. I speak even less with mom than I did with dad. She thinks I’m upset because she’s late. The perpetually guilty conscience of a working mother. She doesn’t know what I know. That she just missed her future husband. I don’t let on. She can go ahead and try to convince herself that my bad manners have to do with my pain.

Her visit was a lot
shorter than dad’s. Your own fault, Helen.

They both plan to come back tomorrow. So I’ll try again. The longer I stay in the hospital, the more chances I’ll have to bring them together. At home I’m either at my mom’s, where dad will never go, or at my dad’s, where my mom will never go.

So it would be better not to have a bowel movement. For my own recovery, of course, the opposite is true—better to have a bowel movement soon, if the doctors are to be believed. I can secretly have a bowel movement and not tell anyone. That way I’ll be able to stay in the hospital longer without having to worry about my bum.

That’s what I’ll do. Also, maybe by injuring myself again I can force another operation. Then I’d have many more days to work toward my goal.

Maybe something will occur to me. Definitely. I certainly have enough time here in my boring, atheist room to think up all sorts of possibilities. My parents were each here for only a short time. I’m not talking enough to people. I always realize I’m not when I fall into a state of brooding
and start to have bad breath. When I don’t talk for a long time—don’t open my mouth and give it a chance to air out—the leftover bits of food and the warm saliva in my closed mouth begin to ferment. At night your mouth is the perfect, body-temperature petri dish—bacteria multiplies and the food between your teeth decays. That’s what’s starting to happen to me now. I need to talk to someone. I push the buzzer. Robin comes in. I have to think of a reason why I pushed the call button. Ah—a question.

“When am I getting the device from the anesthesiologist so I can self-administer pain medicine?”

“He was supposed to have been here a long time ago.”

“Good. So anytime, then. Otherwise I would ask for tablets now, as the pain is starting up again.”

That’s a lie. But it makes my use of the call button more believable. He reaches for the door handle.

“Are you okay, Robin?”

Typical of you, Helen. He’s a nurse. Yet I think I have to look after him and make sure he has a nice shift.

“Yes, I’m doing fine. I’ve been thinking a lot about your wound and about how cool you are about it. I even talked about it with a buddy. Don’t worry—nobody from here at the hospital. He thinks you’re an exhibitionist or whatever you call it.”

“Show-off is what I always say. And it’s true. Is that bad?”

“No, I wish more girls were that way. Like the girls I meet at clubs.”

To keep the conversation going and maybe also a little to try to turn Robin on and get him into me, I tell him about my nights out.

“Do you know what I always do when I go to the disco?”

I do a cool thing when I’m meeting a boy and want to fuck him. To prove that I’m the one who initiated the fuck that night. To show that what happens later on is no coincidence. A night like that always starts out a little uncertain. You know how it is. Do you both want the same thing? Will you manage to have sex at the end of the night? Or was the date all for nothing? To make totally clear what I wanted from the get-go, I cut a big hole in my underwear so you can see the hair and the lips. Basically, the whole peach should peek out. Obviously I wear a skirt. I start to make out with him and we grab at each other. After he’s stroked my breasts for long enough, at some point his finger wanders down to my thigh. He thinks he has to painstakingly work his way into my underwear and is worrying whether I want to go that far. You’re not going to discuss that kind of thing when you haven’t known each other long. Then, with no warning, his finger comes into direct contact with my dripping wet pussy.

Boys all react the same way to this gift. The finger has a heart attack and pauses for a second. Then there’s more
feeling around because he can’t believe what his finger has found. They always think, She’s not wearing underwear. Once they realize—like they’re playing a sensory perception game—that there’s a hole in the underwear, it becomes clear that I got ready for this and tinkered with them hours prior. This always causes a broad, dirty grin to spread across the face of my prospective partner. That is, my prospective fuck partner.

I break out into a bit of a sweat just telling the story. What would possess me to do this? I think I just got a rush from his compliment. Always have to dial it up a notch, eh, Helen?

Robin stands there with his mouth slightly ajar. My story has achieved its desired effect. I can see his cock bulging in his white scrubs. While I’ve been telling him the story, the call buzzer’s been going nonstop out in the hallway. Other patients who want something from Robin. But not the same thing I want.

“Okay, see you later,” he says, and leaves.

I’ve unsettled him. It’s like a sport. In any room I have to be the most uninhibited of all those present. This time I’ve won. But this was an easy opponent; it wasn’t even a real contest. More like a blowout.

I’m already curious what the effect will be, whether he’ll still be able to look me in the eyes. I put myself in strange situations. Is it possible that anyone who works in a
hospital—whether they’re old or young, good-looking or ugly—seems sexually attractive just because there’s nobody else around?

I exhale through my nose to settle my breathing. Better already. I don’t have to muster the strength to get up and go brush my teeth. Just push the call button and tell filthy stories and I’ll get plenty of fresh air in my mouth. In the old days children who said bad words would have their mouths washed out with soap. Did people really do that, or only threaten to do it? I’ll have to try it out. I’ll say a bad word and then wash my mouth out with soap. Something else to add to my mental scrapbook. I’ve already sprayed myself with pepper spray—also just because I wanted to know what it felt like. The brand I used was called Knockout but I know now there’s no truth to the name. I didn’t pass out. My eyes just started to tear up really bad and I couldn’t get them to stop. You cough a lot, and spit runs out of your mouth like a waterfall. The stuff really agitates your mucous membranes. I’m bored here. I can tell from the thoughts in my head. I’m trying to entertain myself with my own old stories. I’m trying to divert attention from how lonely I feel. It’s not working. Being alone scares me. Must be one of the afflictions of being a child of divorce.

I’ll go to bed with any idiot just so I don’t have to be in bed alone or spend a whole night sleeping alone. Anybody is better than nobody.

My parents didn’t anticipate that when they split up. Adults don’t think about the wide-ranging consequences of a breakup.

I sink my head deep into my pillow and look up at the ceiling. The TV hangs there. That’s it. I’ll play my old guessthat-voice game. I pull the remote out of the drawer and turn on the TV. Using the brightness button, I keep pushing “minus” until the picture goes dark. Then I turn up the sound and start changing channels. The idea is to pick out the voice of someone speaking. Obviously it only works with familiar people. I came up with this game because I liked to watch TV to stave off loneliness but I started to get annoyed at the shows. It had to do with one thing above all else. When people on TV have sex with each other and the woman stands up afterward, she always covers her breasts with a sheet. I just can’t stand that. They’ve just stuck parts of themselves inside each another and now she’s hiding her tits. Not from him, but from me. How am I supposed to get into what’s happening on the screen when they keep reminding me that I’m watching? If the man stands up, they only show him from behind. So aggravating. That’s how they lost me as a TV viewer. Only unknown actresses show their tits on TV. When somebody is running around with no top on, you can be sure she’s unknown. The stars never show anything. That’s the way acting is these days. Now I only listen to the TV—for my guessing game. I used to be
better at it. When I was young and watched a lot of TV I recognized voices much better.

I stare at the black screen and try to concentrate on the voices. No idea whose they are. I turn off the TV again. I don’t feel like playing. It’s more fun to play against someone. I’ll ask Robin when he has time. Which is never.

What else can you play here in this room? Something occurs to me.

I push my head back, getting the pillow under my neck, so I can look above and behind me. I haven’t looked there yet. That’s where the pale light is coming from. On the wall is a row of long fluorescent tubes. A wooden cover hangs in front of them to keep them from being blinding. I look at the grain of the wood and all I can see are pussies. Whenever I see the grain of boards lined up next to one another, I see pussies of all shapes and sizes. Like on the door to my room at home. It’s covered with that thin wood laminate that’s made in mirror-image panels. It reminds me of something from art class when I was younger. You put a blotch of watercolor and water in the middle of a piece of paper, fold it in half, press it together, then open it up again, and your pussy portrait’s done. I try to conjure something else in the grain of the fluorescent light cover. Doesn’t work. Just pussies. I ring the call button. What could I want now? Think of something fast.

A knock and the door opens. A female nurse walks in. Actually she opened the door first and then knocked. I’m
so generous to this oafish nurse that I switch the order of the two activities in my head so she comes across as more courteous. Robin must have sent her. I’ve got him too flustered for now. I’ll have to work on that. This nurse is named Margarete. Says so on the badge on her chest. I looked at her breasts first and then her face. I do that often. But I’m fascinated by her face. She’s unbelievably well-kept. That’s what people say: a well-kept woman.

As if being “well-kept” represents something of great value. At school we call kids who look like that “doctors’ daughters” no matter what their fathers do. I don’t know how they do it, but they always look better washed than the rest of us. Everything is clean and carefully styled. Every little body part has been treated with some beauty product.

What these women don’t know: the more effort they put into these little details, the more uptight they seem. Their bearing is stiff and unsexy because they’re worried about messing up all their work.

Well-kept women get their hair, nails, lips, feet, faces, skin, and hands done. Colored, lengthened, painted, peeled, plucked, shaved, and lotioned.

They sit around stiffly—like works of art—because they know how much work has gone into everything and they want it to last as long as possible.

Those type of women would never let themselves get all messy fucking.

Everything that’s sexy—mussed hair, straps that fall off the shoulder, a sweaty glow on the face—is a bit askew, yes, but touchable.

Margarete looks at me questioningly. I’m supposed to tell her what the story is.

“I need a trash can for my dirty bandages. If I leave them on the nightstand it won’t smell too good in here.”

Very convincing, Helen. Well done.

She’s sympathetic to my put-on wish for additional hygiene in the hospital room, says “of course,” and walks out.

I hear noise outside. Something’s happening. Probably nothing exciting. The usual hospital things. I bet it has to do with distributing dinner. Here in the hospital you’re subject to a strict schedule that must have been designed by a lunatic. Starting at six in the morning the nurses bounce loudly around the hallways. They come in with coffee, they want to clean the room or clean me. You’re trapped in a beehive full of worker bees, all flying around and tending to something. Very loudly most of the time. All sick people really want to do is sleep, and that’s the one thing they won’t let you do here. If after a bad night—and every night is bad in a hospital—I want to catch up on sleep, there are at least eight people conspiring against my doing this. Nobody who works in the hospital pays attention to whether someone is sleeping when they enter the room. They all just yell “Morning” and loudly do whatever it is they have to do. They could
just drop the “Morning” and quietly and considerately take care of their duties in the room. They have something against sleep here. I heard once that you’re not supposed to let people with depression sleep too much because it intensifies the depression. But this isn’t a nuthouse. I sometimes think they use the constant interruptions to make sure the patients are still alive. As soon as one nods off, he has to be saved from certain death: “Morning!”

People come in and out. Each one expects me to be understanding. But that should go both ways. That’s how the world works.

The nurse comes back in with a little chrome trash can and sets it on the nightstand. She pushes down on the plastic pedal with her hand and the top flies open. I put in the used bandages from between my ass cheeks. The way Margarete uses the pedal is typical of a well-kept woman. She pays close attention to her nails. She touches everything only with her fingertips. Odd phenomenon. Sure, if your nails have just been painted, you’re careful not to touch things until they dry. But some women act the same way even when their nails are dry. It makes them look squeamish. As if they’re disgusted by everything around them.

“Thanks a lot. When it comes to hygiene, I’m quite particular,” I say with a broad smile.

She nods knowingly—though she doesn’t know a thing. She thinks I want to keep things neat here, that the smell
bothers me, or that I’m ashamed of the bandages I magically pull out of my behind. In reality, what I’m quite particular about when it comes to hygiene is that I don’t give a shit about it, and I despise germaphobes like Margarete.

What’s up with me? Why am I so worked up about her? She’s hasn’t done anything to me.

I’m putting one over on her with my trash can request, not the other way around. When I instantly despise someone for no comprehensible reason, when I want to punch them or at the very least insult them in the harshest terms, it usually means my period is on the way. Just to top it all off.

Margarete says, “Have fun with your trash can.”

Yeah. Thanks a lot. You’re a barrel of laughs.