Salvation City Part 4

"At first I thought I was imagining it, but Shireen" (her friend who also happened to be a dermatologist) "confirmed it. There's an epidemic of hair loss among women of all ages. No one knows exactly why, but it must be something in the environment-they think maybe plastics."

Another time, his mother had brought up something else she'd noticed.

"When I started middle school, I remember there were just one or two really busty girls, and it was such such a big deal. Now it's the flat-chested girl who's the exception. And look at Krystal" (the ten-year-old next door). "She's got more cleavage than I do." a big deal. Now it's the flat-chested girl who's the exception. And look at Krystal" (the ten-year-old next door). "She's got more cleavage than I do."

In this case, too, the cause was thought to be contaminants in plastics.

Cole hadn't noticed women losing their hair until his mother had said something. As for early breasting, he had noticed a lot-you couldn't help noticing Krystal-but he hadn't realized this was something new. Some of the girls in his cla.s.s were so big he had trouble believing they weren't in pain. And how could you not feel bad for them? Never to be able to sleep on your stomach-because of growths growths on your on your chest chest? It wasn't exactly vomitous-after all, ginormous b.r.e.a.s.t.s were a big part of what made a lot of apocalyptic girls apocalyptic-but it was close.

His father said, "When it's warm out and the girls come to cla.s.s half naked, it looks like something out of a men's mag. I know it wasn't that good when I was in school." He roared with laughter when Cole's mother said, "I guess that's how women will look in the future: humongous b.o.o.bs and no hair."

And instantly they sprang to mind: a race of supergirls . . . bald, blimp-breasted, disc-eyed . . . with long muscular legs that they could turn into laser swords . . . supernaturally smart, although, because of some genetic defect, unable to read the alphabet . . . The Dyslexichicks, who communicated not with words but through a kind of music, like birds . . . engaged in never-ending battle with the evil Stubs, a race of short, bushy-haired bookworms a race of supergirls . . . bald, blimp-breasted, disc-eyed . . . with long muscular legs that they could turn into laser swords . . . supernaturally smart, although, because of some genetic defect, unable to read the alphabet . . . The Dyslexichicks, who communicated not with words but through a kind of music, like birds . . . engaged in never-ending battle with the evil Stubs, a race of short, bushy-haired bookworms (Cole envisioned something like troll dolls) (Cole envisioned something like troll dolls) who wished to rid the world of all music, even the music of birds . . . who wished to rid the world of all music, even the music of birds . . .

His parents had stood by him, but still it was awful.

All he'd wanted was to show his friend Kendall, who could draw almost anything himself.

"What ya got there, boys?"

Mr. Gert. Short, bushy-haired, evil Mr. Gert.

"Mind if I have a look-see, too?" Like he was really giving them a choice.

Actually, the whole business had died pretty quickly. In confrontations like this his mother was a champ at getting the opposition to back down-not to mention expert at mimicking Gert's sibilant voice: "Sssorry, but I know p.o.r.nography when I sssee it."

But in private his parents were less blase. They were completely on his side, of course, and they thought Gert should be sssued. But they admitted that they also found Cole's drawings disturbing. The s.e.xy girls, okay, that was a normal obsession for a boy his age. But evil bookworms evil bookworms? Here was something they needed to talk about.

They didn't say anything else about the comic book, and though Kendall had delivered his praise like a blessing-"You got the gift, dude. Use it wisely"-Cole tore up the panels he'd drawn so far. He refused to discuss the subject with his parents, until finally they dropped it. But of course every math cla.s.s he still had to face Mr. Gert, who treated him like a budding perv.

Proving there really was no pleasure grown-ups couldn't spoil if they put their minds to it.

But what was wrong wrong with him? With his dad so sick and his mom trying so hard to be brave-couldn't he at least have some nicer thoughts about them? with him? With his dad so sick and his mom trying so hard to be brave-couldn't he at least have some nicer thoughts about them?

In fact, this sounded just like his mother, who not long before had complained: "It's like you get colder all the time."

That was him. He was like a gla.s.s slowly being filled with ice water.

His mother also accused him of being ashamed of his own emotions.

Back when they were still in Chicago, his cla.s.s had started doing something called mindfulness training. Fifteen minutes, three times a week. It was supposed to help improve everyone's ADD. Dimmed lights, chimes, something called elevator breathing. Close your eyes, drain your head, focus on your breath rising and falling. Lame. Cole breathed normally and let his mind wander. Which was how he found himself back in the summer when he was nine and his parents had gone away for two weeks without him. A friend of theirs had been getting married somewhere in Ireland, and after the wedding they wanted to visit Aunt Addy in Germany. Meanwhile, Cole would go to sleepaway camp, where he'd been wanting to go anyway, having heard from other kids that camp was awesome.

A perfect plan, but they were all anxious about it. After all, they'd never spent more than a night apart before, and Europe was so far away . . . Cole would always remember their good-byes, the three of them on the verge of tears and at the same time laughing and teasing one another for being such big sillies.

And it wasn't that he'd had a bad time. Camp was was awesome. The counselors were much better than teachers at breaking up cliques and keeping bullies in line, and in two weeks he'd gone from being a spastic swimmer to an almost smooth one. awesome. The counselors were much better than teachers at breaking up cliques and keeping bullies in line, and in two weeks he'd gone from being a spastic swimmer to an almost smooth one.

It wasn't exactly that he was homesick, either. But never having been away from his parents before, he was unprepared for what it would mean to miss them. Even before the end of the first week, he was spending at least part of each day in agony. He kept it secret, of course; he didn't want to look like a baby, and homesick kids were often teased or avoided.

It was worse at night, when, lying on his cot in the pitch dark with nothing to distract him, his longing bloomed into a kind of insanity. For the first time in his life he had trouble sleeping. He could not shake the fear that something would stop his parents from coming home. Things happened, didn't they? Planes got hijacked. Buildings caught fire . . .

He dreamed that they had returned and had brought a strange boy with them. An ordinary-looking innocent-seeming little boy who wanted to be Cole's friend. But in the dark world of the dream, Cole knew without a doubt that the boy's appearance spelled his own doom. But you asked asked for a brother, his parents kept saying. Perplexed; annoyed. for a brother, his parents kept saying. Perplexed; annoyed.

And then, at last, their ecstatic reunion, it, too, like something out of a dream-but how could something that makes you so happy also make you feel like you were being beat up?

This was love, but it was also terror, and Cole didn't know what to make of it.

And now, he did not like to remember that time. Because even though it was about something happy, something good, it had become only painful to remember. And that particular day in school it had been too much to bear. Had it happened in the middle of a lesson, he would have had some major explaining to do. But mindfulness training was known to make some kids emo, and Cole's excuse, that he absolutely had to get to the bathroom, no time to raise his hand, was accepted without comment.

And it wasn't the teacher but Cole himself who sternly warned: Don't you ever let that happen again. Don't you ever let that happen again.

His mother was right. He was ashamed. He was totally ashamed even to have such feelings, let alone have them found out.

Later, when he was in the hospital, a volunteer grief counselor would come to see him. She took him out to the courtyard, where roses the size of melons were in bloom.

"What I'd like you to do for me," she said, "is to think back to a time when you and your mom and dad were all very happy, and describe that time for me." The woman's name was Eden. She was not a comforting sight. She had hooded eyes and deep dark lines running down her cheeks as if she had wept acid. They sat on a bench near a small fountain whose gurgle sounded like birdsong. There was real birdsong, too, and it almost hurt his ears, it was so shrill and excited. The day was cloudy. He had not been outdoors in weeks and he was sharply aware of the light and the air, almost as if he were experiencing them for the first time. Though he was well covered up, he felt naked. The least breeze made him shiver. The smell of the roses was strong, almost sickening, like the perfume of old ladies.

He didn't want to talk about the happy time, and so he invented something, some story that he then forgot almost immediately. But he would remember later how he'd gone on and on, dragging the fake story out, and how Eden had listened, watching him curiously, not interrupting until he finally stopped talking. Then she made no comment except to thank him for sharing. He had no idea if she knew that he'd lied. But it seemed to him that as she listened her mouth had tensed and something like dislike had crept into her face.

COUGH, COUGH, COUGH, COUGH, COUGH.

It followed you everywhere, like footsteps. But then came worse.

It was as if behind the bedroom door Cole's father had split into several different people who could be heard at different times chattering, arguing, laughing, and once even singing with one another. Cole listened, his blood running cold.

"Get out, get out, you spider c.u.n.t! I'll kill you, Serena!"

Cole nearly collided with his mother as they both ran out into the hall. There was no color in her face. "Dad doesn't know what he's saying." But he kept saying it, over and over.

Once, he found her slumped on the landing with her legs tucked under her and her hands over her ears. Behind the door his father was calling, "Mom! Mom!"

Fever dream, his mother explained. "He's back in his childhood."

Yes. But why did he sound so scared?

Middle of the night. Cole woke to hear his parents talking. To his surprise, the noise (why were they being so loud?) came not from their room down the hall but from downstairs.

So his father's fever must have broken. He was probably in the kitchen, getting something to eat. He'd be starving, of course; he'd eaten hardly anything this past week. Cole wanted to see him! He wanted to go down and join his parents-but not if they were fighting. Wait-how could they already be fighting? And where did his father get the strength to raise his voice? Had his mother picked now of all times to announce that she was leaving? This, Cole could not believe. The only explanation was that Cole was still asleep; he was dreaming . . .

Morning. He found his mother in the kitchen, alone. She was sitting at the table, her laptop open in front of her. Instead of her bathrobe she was wearing her winter coat. His father wasn't there. He wasn't upstairs in bed, either. The door to his room had been wide open when Cole pa.s.sed on his way down.

Before he could form the question, his mother spoke. "I'm sorry," was all she said.

Cole's head started jerking helplessly from side to side, as if someone were taking swings at him. The pounding in his ears was so fierce it felt like a sudden loss of hearing.

"But I heard him last night-"

"Don't shout," she whispered. She stood up and embraced him. They staggered together, gripping each other for support, a macabre little waltz. She let go of him then and coaxed him down onto a chair, saying, "Sit, sit, sit." They were both crying.

She went to the fridge and took out a bottle of water. She took a gla.s.s from the cupboard and filled it with water and carried it to the table and set it in front of him. Every movement careful and slow, as if even the least gave her pain.

Cole stared at the water as if he had no idea what it was.

She gripped the edge of the table with both hands. "I have to lie down before I pa.s.s out." Her voice was a croak; her eyes looked as if someone had tried to scratch them out. "I've been up all night."

He wanted to help her. He picked up the gla.s.s and tried to give it to her but she waved it away.

She didn't want to climb the stairs. Without taking off her coat she stretched out on the living room couch, resting her heels on one of the arms so that her feet were higher than her head. Cole knelt on the floor beside her. He sucked in his lips to stop them from trembling.

It wasn't his father he'd heard, she said. His father had been unconscious.

"He needed to get to a hospital, but I knew I'd never get an ambulance to come here." She had run out into the street and started knocking on doors. Two houses down lived a retired widower-the owner of the chocolate Lab that sometimes roamed the neighborhood-who'd agreed to come back with her.

"I wanted him to help me carry Dad to the car. He tried talking me out of it. He said the hospital wouldn't be able to do anything. But I wouldn't listen. I hung on to his arm, I begged him until he gave in."

"Why didn't you wake me me, Mom?"

"Oh, sweetie, I don't know." She looked at him imploringly. "I wasn't sure, I didn't think it would help if you-yes, maybe I should have woken you. Can you understand why I didn't think so at the time?"

Cole nodded, but inside he was screaming. He remembered waking up to the noise and how he'd decided against going downstairs. Mistake! Mistake!

The man wouldn't go with her to the hospital, she said. Suddenly she began to sob. "Why did we come here? We never should have come!" She sat up and gazed around the room with a look of terror. "We never should have come!" She was sobbing so hard Cole could barely make out the words.

He said nothing. He felt utterly helpless, under a spell, without the power even to put his arms around her. How would they live? How would they live without his father?

His mother had let herself fall back. She was still sobbing, but quietly, and Cole let her be. Minutes pa.s.sed-he had no idea how many-and he saw her fall asleep, or pa.s.s out. A river of fear ran through him. He didn't want to be alone.

"Mom!"

Her eyes flew open. For an instant she looked blind.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I can't stay awake anymore."

Cole thought again of that old movie, the one where falling asleep meant worse than death. The one whose hero had the same name as his father.

"Let me sleep just a little," she slurred, eyes closing again.

He was alone.

He got up and drifted back into the kitchen. He took a sip of water from the gla.s.s sitting on the table and poured the rest down the sink. How clean the kitchen was, all neat and shiny. The whole house was like that. It was one of his mother's ways of dealing with stress. If my hands are busy I'm not wringing them, she said. At other times, the house was a mess.

He sat down at her laptop and tapped the touchpad.

Addy, the worst has happened. Miles had a heart attack and died last night. I've been trying to call you but can never get through. I'm writing now mostly just for something to do until Cole wakes up. I don't know how I'm going to tell him. I swore to him Miles was going to get over the flu, and technically he didn't die of the flu, though I was told the attack was probably triggered by inflammation caused by the virus. I had to ask a stranger to help me get Miles to the hospital. He kept telling me it wouldn't do any good and I knew he was right, but if Miles was past saving I was determined at least to get his body out of the house. I didn't want to be like all those poor people forced to live with their dead or secretly dump them somewhere. What will happen to his body now I don't know, I suppose it will be burned, or buried in some ma.s.s grave. My G.o.d, I can't believe I just wrote that. I feel like a big part of me still hasn't taken it in.I'm not sure how much Miles understood what was happening, either. His last lucid moment was around noon two days ago, when for a little while he was able to breathe a bit more freely and he could talk. And he looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, We blew it, baby. I still don't know what he meant. I thought he might have been talking about us separating, but it's possible he was talking about the flu and how we'd blown our chance to get away. He may not have realized there was nowhere to go. But these were his last words to me, and I will never get over that. I can't bear to think of him dying under the weight of such a heavy regret. And it was the first time he called me baby in such a long time.But I can't let myself think like this right now or I'll go mad. I've got to think about Cole. And now that I've been to the hospital and seen with my own eyes what it's like, I couldn't live with myself if I didn't try to do something. I've made up my mind to volunteer at the clinic they've set up at the college, at least for a few hours a day. It will mean leaving Cole home by himself but I think he'll understand. Besides, if I'm around him all the time it just gets on his nerves. Poor Cole. When I think of all the trouble we've been having with him, how badly he's doing in school and how cold and sullen he's gotten with me, and now he's even smoking on the sly-how small all these problems seem now. Can you imagine losing Mom or Dad when we were that age, and without even being able to say good-bye?

Cole stopped scrolling and went upstairs to get his cigarettes.

It was chilly outside but he didn't put on a jacket. He paced back and forth on the porch, shivering, as he smoked a Marlboro down to the b.u.t.t-first time he'd ever smoked a whole cigarette all at once. Cough, cough, cough. Cough, cough, cough. It stung his lungs and made him so woozy he had to sit down. He was afraid he might throw up. It stung his lungs and made him so woozy he had to sit down. He was afraid he might throw up.

The sky was the solid blue of any fine Midwestern winter day. Across the street, on the graveled drive, the calico sat cleaning itself just as if the end of the world were not taking place.

She should have woken him. It was all wrong. She was always wrong! She was always wrong! He felt the heat expanding in his chest, the heat of his rage, but at the same time he was ashamed, for to be so angry at his mother now was all wrong, too. He felt the heat expanding in his chest, the heat of his rage, but at the same time he was ashamed, for to be so angry at his mother now was all wrong, too.

He stared up the street, toward the house of the man who'd been in their house last night, an old geezer Cole had only glimpsed once or twice. Lumber jacket, ear-flap hat. One of the last people to touch his father. Cole beamed his anger there. That man should have stayed with his mother. That man should have done more to help them!

Cole was freezing now, his teeth actually chattering so that he bit his tongue. He went back inside.

A whole Marlboro turned out to be way strong-almost strong enough to knock you out.

He weaved up the stairs, but instead of going to his own room he found himself walking into his parents' room and diving into their rumpled bed. Immediately, his father's smell engulfed him. He pulled the covers over his shivering body, he pulled them up over his head, he burrowed his face in the pillow, inhaling the smell of his father.

The bed went slowly round and round, borne on a lazy tornado.

His mother was lying. His father was gone-hadn't she wanted to be rid of him?-but he wasn't dead. It was part of her plan. Maybe his father was in on it, too. They had plotted together to pretend pretend he was dead . . . he was dead . . .

Later Cole would call this the sickest and craziest thought he'd ever had.

His parents had talked to him about death. They had talked about it at length after his grandparents died. What had they said? That it was irrational for a person to be afraid of death because if you were dead you didn't know you were dead, and how could you be afraid of something you didn't know. But also that it was perfectly natural to be afraid. Even people who got to live a long time weren't happy to die, they said. Death was always tragic, they said. But the worst tragedy was to have your life cut short. To die young.

When he thought about it, though, Cole didn't believe it would be such a bad thing to die. Even before the pandemic began, he'd caught himself thinking this. It was another one of his secrets (he knew his life would become unbearable if his parents ever found out). He imagined the actual moment of dying as something like sinking into Lake Michigan: deeper and deeper, colder and colder, darker and darker. He imagined it was something like being frozen stiff. And then you'd be dead but you wouldn't know you were dead, so you couldn't feel bad. You couldn't feel anything. You'd be free. Never to have to worry again about how people were looking at you, or talking about you. Never to have to pretend how awesome it was to be alive, how lucky to be a kid, enjoying every minute of your precious kid time.

A few weeks earlier, someone in Chicago had called to tell them Cole's old cla.s.smate Ruthie Lind had died. It wasn't that Cole hadn't felt sad for Ruthie; he'd felt very sad, even if he hadn't cried. But he'd felt something else as well. A funny, nagging, must-keep-secret feeling. And already many times since hearing the news he'd caught himself thinking, She got out. She got out.

But his parents believed life was too short no matter when you died. They hated growing older, and once, when they heard Cole tell someone his grandmother had died because she was old, they had rushed to correct him. Sixty wasn't old, they explained, it was middle-aged. And to die die at sixty was to die at sixty was to die young young.

His father was forty-nine.

His father had wanted to live forever. That was why he ran every morning.

Cole wanted to know, though he knew no one could ever tell him, if somehow, at the moment you died, you understood what was happening to you. He tried to imagine then how his father might have felt, and he could not imagine this except as something extremely frightening and painful. He could not believe that, in his father's last seconds, there had been any thought of rest or quiet or sleep or peace. What he imagined his father seeing and smelling and hearing was a saber-toothed tiger pouncing to tear him apart.

The year before, his father had had some kind of symptom, some stomach pain, and he'd gone to the doctor, who ordered some tests, one of which came back "iffy." The doctor had ordered more tests, and it was while they were waiting for the results that Cole had seen what a hard time his father was having. Though his father had gone about his business as usual, it was clear in everything he did, including repeating the same joke-at which his mother always laughed dutifully, though each time with a little more strain: "Who has time to die?" The day the doctor called with good news his father said he felt ten years younger. "And you look it, too!" said his mother, dabbing at tears of relief.

From time to time Cole had sat in on a cla.s.s that his father was teaching. In fact, the last time he'd done this had been just three weeks ago. He had sat in on one of his father's lectures. It was a happy memory. His father complained endlessly about teaching, but that day he was clearly enjoying himself, and Cole had been particularly impressed with how he held the attention of those fifty or so students, even getting a couple of good laughs out of them. Anyone would have thought he and Abe Lincoln were bros. Cole remembered how bitter his father had been about not getting tenure. "If it was up to the kids, it'd be a different story. Just read their evaluations." The students loved him, his father insisted, and whenever he said this Cole would wonder how those students would feel if they knew what awful things Professor Vining said about them and how much he made fun of them, sometimes reading from their papers to his mother, the two of them roaring with laughter.

When the lecture was over, several students crowded around his father while Cole waited, staring at one girl with multicolored hair and glossy red-black lips and jeans so low-slung he could actually see some hair. She waited till the others were gone before approaching his father, and Cole had watched as she flirted with his father and his father flirted back.