John watched them embrace. Carolyn's arms were out stretched, wrapping around Holt's neck. Holt leaned down am gathered her close. They kissed each other on the cheeks several times, then once on the lips. They looked to him like mother and son. When Carolyn sat back she arranged her hair with both hands, still smiling at her husband.
"You look wonderful tonight, honey," he said.
"I feel like a million dollars. Oh, Janice!"
"Momma!" Valerie swept over and kissed her mother. "Two million at least, Mom. I love that new blouse."
Fargo had lined up behind Valerie, his posture and expression purely obligatory. With his back to Holt, he stared frankly at Valerie's butt as she bent over her mother, then looked at John When it was his turn he offered his hand and told Carolyn she lived in a family of skinflints, hiking up her looks to a cool billion.
"She's not being auctioned," said Valerie.
"I call them as I see them," said Fargo.
"Smack your way into the family," said Sexton.
"Patrick! My Patrick!"
Carolyn grabbed her wheels and thrust the chair forward nearly spilling off the first level of the patio before John caught one tire with his foot. He smiled down uneasily, then glanced a Holt. Holt nodded.
"Hello, Carolyn."
"I got your letter."
"That's good." He looked at Holt again, who held his stare then at Valerie, who looked away.
"Did you win last week?"
"No game, actually. Had the week off."
"It seems like ages since I've seen you. How long has it been, Pat?"
Sexton's jaw dropped.
John looked over to Holt, who interceded.
"You saw him last week, Honey."
"We went shopping, didn't we?"
"That was it," said Holt, a sudden exhaustion behind his voice. "Val, arrange your mum here. I'm going to make a fresh round of drinks. John, come with me."
Carolyn smiled at John as he walked past her. "He's calling you John, now?"
"Everybody is, Carolyn."
"Kiss your Mumsey?"
He leaned over and kissed her smartly on the cheek.
Holt took his arm as they headed inside to the bar. Holt motioned Joni to join the party on the patio. When she had gone, Holt said, "I'm sorry about this, but play along. By dinnertime she'll think you're Robert Goulet or Sandy Koufax, or a kid named Deke. It doesn't fucking matter what you do."
But after the dinner was over, Carolyn was still calling him Patrick, still bringing up an assortment of memories that, John gathered, were not altogether fabricated. She and Pat at the beach. She and Pat working on multiplication. She and Pat driving to Tijuana one day to see a bullfight, from which young Patrick had stormed out, sickened. He nodded along, a hollow smile plastered to his face, his own memories zig-zagging back and forth from Rebecca to Snakey to Valerie to Joshua Weinstein. With each sip of Scotch the fragments seemed to weld closer together, threatening to become one solid, unpassable gallstone of memory. He looked at Holt and Fargo, smile locked in place, wishing he could just stand up now, beat each to a bloody pulp and call in the cavalry. I didn't hire on to become a crazy lady's dead son, he thought. Poor girl.
"Excuse me," he said, then got up and went into the kitchen. He found a tall glass, pulled out the third drawer right of the fridge with his toe and peered down into it as he held the glass under the ice dispenser. On top of the neatly folded kitchen towels was a video cassette in a plastic case. He glanced outside. Only Valerie was looking in his direction, all other attention was drawn to Carolyn. With the glass still pressed to the noisy dispenser, John bent down, whisked the cassette into the pocket of his coat and stood again, nudging shut the drawer. Valerie h turned away. He filled the glass with water and carried it back outside.
After the dessert was served, Carolyn motioned Joni over, then whispered in her ear. Joni looked at her askance, but obeyed Carolyn's dismissing wave. The nurse went upstairs and returned with a cane.
The conversation ended and a silence crept over the dim table.
"I feel just great tonight," Carolyn announced. "Seeing Patrick makes me feel young again."
"Don't get carried away, hon," said Holt.
"A few small steps for womankind," said Carolyn.
"May I help?" he asked, pushing back his chair.
"You may stay right where you are. I'll walk these four steps to Patrick on my own. Patrick, rise."
"Mrs. Holt," said Fargo, "you haven't walked in months. Remember last time?"
"Put a lid on it, Lane," snapped Valerie.
Carolyn smiled. "Patrick, rise."
John stood.
Holt cast a warning glance at Joni, who nodded and moved up close to the wheelchair. The nurse removed the blanket from Carolyn's lap, locked each tire in place, then knelt down and Carolyn's apparently lifeless shoes on the pavers. Care scrunched forward on the seat, then set the four rubber-tip legs of the quad cane down on the patio in front of her. She cleared her throat. Valerie quietly moved behind her.
"Well, I'd say the old feet feel good, but they don't feel at all."
"Get your balance first, Mom."
"I've got that, Val. Ready… now… okay… forward ho."
Carolyn Holt's face went red. Her hands-on the cane handle -went white. Her entire body shivered and her dark eyes focused somewhere in space before her. She lifted up, perhaps inch, then settled back to her seat again with a sigh. She smiled to herself. She was breathing quickly.
"Nice try, Mom. Damn nice try."
"Whew! What was it that McMurphy said in Cuckoo's Nest? Warming up? Just warming up? Well, that's me."
Then she gathered herself to the end of the seat again and her eyes locked into space in front of her and her cheeks exploded with color and her hands whitened against the cane handle again and a hissing exhale escaped her mouth as her body lifted from the seat, then lifted more, and she froze there, bent forward like a swimmer prepared to start, all her weight resting on the four small cane feet that now wobbled greatly upon the patio. Her legs quaked. Her arms trembled. And slowly she unfurled herself, like the stem of a new flower. Her legs swayed, then steadied; her torso swayed, then steadied; her head swayed, then steadied as she lifted the ferocious concentration of her gaze from some private point in space to the speechless face of John Menden.
He was surprised how tall she was. And even with the sedentary months in bed weighing her down, he saw that her frame was once both strong and fine. Composed now, Carolyn looked at him and shook back her hair, as a model might before a stroll down the runway. She exhaled.
Her right foot moved up, forward, then down. An inch maybe, John thought. One whole inch.
Then her left.
Her eyes widened, never leaving John. And in spite of the intensity of her gaze and the rigid determination of her face, the corners of her mouth quivered upward-just slightly-in the most tenuous and fragile of grins.
John was moved by her courage even more than by her damage. Each confronted him from the single spirit of Carolyn Holt, the battling twins of her being. Each was so clear and strong, so contradictory and unmistakable. The courage fought the damage; the damage fought the courage. He had never seen these essential polarities of the living locked in such close contest. With his heart he willed her forward. With his feet he took two steps toward her, matching her own.
Then Carolyn focused her willpower again.
Foot up, out and down. Another inch.
Foot up, out and down. Another.
Four steps.
She smiled at him before collapsing, like a telescope, into herself. Valerie and Joni caught and straightened her, then eased her back into the chair. Through the sweat running down her face and her rapid breathing, her dark eyes still bore into John's.