The estate is divided equally between Regina and me. She’s anxious to sell the house. She says we should capitalize on the hot real estate market. What she means is she’s afraid the ash from one of my cigarettes will ignite the carpet and burn her security to the ground. She’s not unsympathetic to my plight, but money is money and, as she points out, I need my share more than she needs hers. You need a change of scenery, she says, you need to get on with your life. She says she doesn’t think my antidepressants are working. I haven’t told her I’ve stopped filling my prescriptions, except for the anti-anxiety pills, of course, which I swallow religiously to put me to sleep, washed down with a six-pack and a couple of shots.
But I am getting on with it. Three days ago I dragged myself out of bed before noon and ran a razor over my face for the first time in weeks. My hangover tasted like spearmint mouthwash and my pants were spotted with coffee rings, but I looked respectable enough to the manager of the Charlotte outpost of the Barnes and Noble empire. He hired me on the spot, sales associate at minimum wage, and asked me to start the next morning. Startled, I backtracked and told him I wasn’t available for two weeks. I wouldn’t bet the ranch on me showing up.
My new landlord certainly didn’t seem to mind the Crown Royal blended on my breath. He was eager enough to take the check. In two or three days-or is it four or five?-I begin my new life as an inmate in one of his $600-a-month cells, complete with barred windows and chipped enamel sinks. I’m looking forward to meeting the other prisoners and spending time with their screaming babies and drunken spouses. We’ll all shout to be heard over the shrieking televisions. My sister offered to loan me the down payment to buy, but I’d rather serve my sentence at the Magnolia Towne Courte than in a luxury condominium with ceiling fans and hardwood floors and a wide balcony.
The contents of the Monument to Heat and Air are being put in storage. The move is scheduled. The movers are coming to pack everything into boxes and cartons and haul it off to a cinderblock storage compound near the airport. Regina says the charms of the listing-the crown moldings, actual plaster on the walls-will show better stripped to essentials and slapped with a fresh coat of paint. I’ve got my instructions to tag the few bits and pieces my prison cell can accommodate. She’s called and left several messages, not confident of my ability to accomplish even this one small duty. She’s right. I haven’t lifted a finger yet. The movers are coming…when? Tomorrow? I’m confused, uncertain when she left the message.
My mother’s bed, a dresser, an upholstered chair, and a television are all I need. I suppose I ought to poke around the kitchen and toss a coffeepot and bottle opener into a box. I need to pack my clothes. Everything else can collect dust in the storage compound.
It’s one o’clock. Not too late for an early start. I’ve had two cups of coffee and a half pack of cigarettes. Time to crack open a beer and get to work. The phone rings and I let it spill into the answering machine. It’s just my sister again, asking me to pick up, please. I ignore her and go to the front door to retrieve the morning paper. I keep forgetting to stop delivery. Need to put it on my to-do list. I skim the pages, looking for a headline about a body found in a city Dumpster, young white male, identity unknown, sandy hair, dressed in a nylon warm-up suit. Nothing. Somewhere out there, Douglas is still “working,” singing “I Love Rock ’N Roll,” dodging his angry supplier, finding refuge for the night.
Why didn’t you believe me when I told you I loved him, Matt? You told me you were concerned about my state of mind. You urged me to follow up with Dr. Brewer and gave me a prescription for Ativan. I promised I wouldn’t take them with alcohol. You gave me a number in Washington where you can be reached twenty-four/seven. Your messages are more and more frequent, pleading with me to call. Dr. Brewer has told you I didn’t show for the appointment. You’re threatening to call my sister if I don’t respond by ten o’clock. I’m not sure when you left that last message.
I should go upstairs and throw my underwear and socks and shirts in a suitcase. Maybe the movers will never come. Maybe they’ll come, but they’ll take pity on me and refuse to pack and haul, their consciences unwilling to let them throw me out on the street. I need a little nap. I can’t drag myself farther than the sofa. I close my eyes and my thoughts drift to a packed church, filled to capacity. I feel the heat of the bodies in the pews behind me. An ancient crone is pumping away and the organ is groaning. My sister sits beside me, whimpering and dabbing her eyes. Her husband puts his arm around her shoulder. Her sons stare at the casket resting before the altar. Dustin, her younger boy, tries to comfort his sister, sweet and awkward and self-conscious as he rises to the occasion. My heart is racing. All these people and the church feels empty, just me and the coffin.
Then a warm body slides into the pew. A small hand takes my larger one and gives it a soft kiss. My wife-no, my ex-wife, my friend-has taken pity and rescues me from my solitude. She stays with me through the interminable service and the long ride to the cemetery. She’s obviously pregnant and Sweeney the Son fetches a folding chair, setting it at the graveside. She ignores his kindness and stands by my side in the oppressive heat. She presses her left hand against my back to steady me. I feel her wedding band, not the one I slipped on her finger, through my damp jacket.
Later that night, I sit on the patio, drinking and smoking and counting the moths fluttering in the porch lights, while my sister and her husband, who’ve re-occupied the Monument to Heat and Air since my mother died, eat pizza and watch Die Hard with their kids. Little Dustin, looking younger than his years in his Tweety Bird nightshirt, comes seeking quieter companionship, an old board game under his arm.
“Sure, I’ll play with you,” I say, grateful for the company. “You can be Miss Scarlet if you want. I promise I won’t tell.”
I lie on my back, dozing, debating whether to pop another pill to put me under for the afternoon. I think that tarantula might be tearing my throat apart. I can’t swallow and drool is dribbling from my mouth. Perspiration drips from my eyebrows. I stumble to the kitchen but cold water from the faucet doesn’t soothe my burning eyes. I trip over my feet and fall face first into the sink, splitting my lip. My blood tastes like roast beef, rare. I wrestle with an ancient ice tray, spilling the cubes on the floor. I pick up the one closest to my foot and press it against my throbbing lip. I feel a long hair dangling on the tip of my tongue. I try to flick it away, but it has a will of its own, clinging to my bloody finger by its steel gray root.
I go upstairs, searching for an aspirin to dull the pain. My medicine cabinet’s empty except for my trusty Ativan, an exhausted tube of toothpaste, and a used Band-Aid. I’ll try my mother’s. Surely one lonely Bayer survived the wholesale disposal of her pharmacopoeia. The last of the prednisone, Compazine, and Lomotil has been flushed down the toilet. The septic tank’s probably developing muscles from all the steroids it’s swallowed. What’s left? Tweezers, cotton balls, and cuticle scissors. And one lonely hidden prescription bottle, dated over a year ago, when the word lymphoma was only a Latinate obscurity in the Family Medical Dictionary, when my mother’s sore throat meant nothing more than a bacterial infection brought on by the change of seasons. A simple cephalosporin, a ten-day regimen, Take Until Completed. My poor mother, usually so compliant, ignored the instructions on the label and stopped taking the pills when the pain subsided. Maybe it upset her tummy, maybe she felt like being defiant just once in her life. Six little striped capsules are left. Not too old, probably still effective. If one works, two will work even faster.