And without looking at me, looking back and forth between his sketch and the new dancer, Denny says, "Then, dude, you got that cancer a long time ago."
Even if my mom died, I'm not sure if I'd want to go back and get readmitted before my credits start to expire. As it is, I already know way more than I'm comfortable with.
After you find out all the things that can go wrong, your life becomes less about living and more about waiting. For cancer. For dementia. Every look in a mirror, you scan for the red rash that means shingles. See also: Ringworm.
See also: Scabies
See also: Lyme disease, meningitis, rheumatic fever, syphilis.
The next patient who presents herself is another blonde, thin, maybe a little too thin. A spinal tumor probably. If she has a headache, a low fever, a sore throat, she has polio.
"Go like this," Denny yells up to her, and he covers his eyeglasses with his open hands.
The patient does this.
"Beautiful," Denny says, sketching a study fast. "How about if you open your mouth a little."
And she does.
"Dude," he says. "Workshop models are never this hot."
All I can see is she's not a very good dancer and, for sure, this lack of coordination means amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
See also: Lou Gehrig's disease.
See also: Total paralysis. See also: Difficulty breathing. See also: Cramps, tiredness, crying.
See also: Death.
With the edge of his hand, Denny smears the cork lines to add shadow and depth. It's the woman onstage with her hands over her eyes, her mouth slightly open, and Denny picks at it fast, his eyes going back to the woman for details, her belly button, the curve of her hipbones. My only gripe is the way Denny draws women is not the way they look for real. In Denny's version, the cheesy thighs on some woman will look rock-solid. The bagged-out eyes on some other woman will become clear and toned underneath.
"You got any cash left over, dude?" Denny says. "I don't want her to move on just yet."
But I'm broke, and the girl moves on to the next guy down along the stage.
"Let's see, Picasso," I tell him.
And Denny scratches under his eye and leaves a big smudge of soot. Then he tips the legal pad enough for me to see a naked woman with her hands over her eyes, sleek and tensing every muscle tight, none of her looks trashed by gravity or ultraviolet light or poor nutrition. She's smooth but soft. Flexed but relaxed. She's a total physical impossibility.
"Dude," I say, "you made her look too young."
The next patient is Cherry Daiquiri again, coming back around, not smiling this time, sucking hard on the inside of one cheek and asking me, "This mole I have? You sure it's cancer? I mean, I don't know, but how scared should I be ... ?"
Without looking at her, I hold up one finger. This is international sign language for Please wait. The doctor will see you shortly.
"No way are her ankles that thin," I tell Denny. "And her ass is way bigger than you have there."
I lean over to see what Denny's doing, then look down the stage to the last patient.
"You need to make her knees lumpier," I say.
The downstage dancer gives me a filthy look.
Denny just keeps sketching. He makes her eyes huge. He fixes her split ends. He gets everything all wrong.
"Dude," I say. "You know, you're not a very good artist."
I say, "For serious, dude, I don't see that at all."
Denny says, "Before you go trash the whole world, you need to be calling your sponsor, bad." He says, "And in case you still give a shit, your mom said you need to read what's in her dictionary."
To Cherry crouching there in front of us, I say, "If you're really serious about saving your life, I'm going to have to talk to you someplace private."
"No, not dictionary," Denny says, "it's diary. In case you ever wonder where you really come from, it's all in her diary."
And Cherry dangles one leg over the edge and starts climbing down off the stage.
I ask him, what's in my mom's diary?
And drawing his little pictures, seeing the impossible, Denny says, "Yeah, diary. Not dictionary, dude. The stuff about your real dad is in her diary."
Chapter 17
AT ST. ANTHONY'S, THE FRONT DESK GIRL yawns behind her hand, and when I ask if maybe she wants to go get a cup of coffee, then she looks at me sideways and says, "Not with you."
And really, I'm not hitting on her. I'll watch her desk long enough for her to go get some coffee. This isn't a come-on.
Really.
I say, "Your eyes look tired."
All she does all day is sign a few people in and out. She watches the video monitor that shows the insides of St. Anthony's, each corridor, the dayroom, the dining room, the garden, the screen switching from one to the next every ten seconds. The screen grainy, black-and-white. On the monitor, the dining room shows for ten seconds, empty with all the chairs upside down on each table, their chrome legs in the air. A long corridor appears for the next ten seconds with somebody heaped on a bench against one wall.
Then for the next ten furry black-and-white seconds, there's Paige Marshall pushing my mom in a wheelchair down some other long corridor.
The front desk girl says, "I'll only be gone a minute."
Next to the video monitor is an old speaker. Covered in nubby sofa mohair is this old radio kind of speaker with a dial switch surrounded by numbers. Each number is some room in St. Anthony's. On the desk is a microphone you can use to make announcements. By turning the dial switch to a number, you can listen in on any room in the building.
And for just a moment, my mom's voice comes from the speaker, saying, "I've defined myself, all my life, by what I was against..."
The girl switches the intercom dial to nine, and now you can hear Spanish radio and the clatter of metal pans back in the kitchen, back where the coffee is.
I tell the girl, "Take your time." And, "I'm not the monster you maybe heard from some of the bitter, angry types around here."
Even with me being so nice, she puts her purse in her desk and locks it. She says, "This won't take me more than a couple minutes. Okay?"
Okay.
Then she's gone through the security doors, and I'm sitting behind her desk. Watching the monitor: the dayroom, the garden, some corridor, each for ten seconds. Watching for Paige Marshall. With one hand, I'm dial-switching from number to number, listening in each room for Dr. Marshall. For my mom. In black-and-white, almost live.
Paige Marshall with all her skin.
Another question from the sex addict checklist:
Do you cut the inside out of your pants pockets so you can masturbate in public?
In the dayroom is some grayhead, facedown in a puzzle.
In the speaker there's just static. White noise.
Ten seconds later, in the crafts room is a table of old women. Women I confessed to, for wrecking their cars, for wrecking their lives. Taking the blame.
I turn up the volume and put my ear against the cloth of the speaker. Not knowing which number means which room, I dial-switch through the numbers and listen.
My other hand I slip into what used to be my britches pocket.
Going number to number, somebody's sobbing on number three. Wherever that is. Somebody's swearing on five. Praying on eight. Wherever that is. The kitchen again on nine, the Spanish music.
The monitor shows the library, another corridor, then it shows me, a grainy black- and-white me, crouched behind the front desk, peering into the monitor. Me with one hand crabbed around the intercom control dial. My other blurry hand is jammed to the elbow inside my britches. Watching. A camera on the lobby ceiling watching me.
Me watching for Paige Marshall.
Listening. For where to find her.
"Stalking" isn't the right word, but it's the first word that comes to mind.
The monitor shows me one old woman after another. Then for ten seconds, there's Paige pushing my mom in a wheelchair down another corridor. Dr. Paige Marshall. And I dial around until I hear my mom's voice.