The Lonely Polygamist Part 35

Having already taken a step back, Trish asked what she should do.

"Oh, just work around it, dear, it won't last forever and it ain't gonna bite."

She gave it a wide berth anyway, doing her best to focus on the other extremities. But during the entire process it did not show any intention of retreating, even after she had finished the bath and ma.s.saged the straining joints and limbs, which felt held together by wires ratcheted tight, and had settled down in the bedside chair to read out loud from a battered hospital copy of Harrowing Tales of the High Seas Harrowing Tales of the High Seas. The following afternoon, before she had the diaper off there was already a definite bulging under way, and when Nurse Pickless arrived to get a look at things, she said, "I've worked three twelve-hour shifts around this youngster and he's never once once given me a salute like that. Maybe you oughta take it as a compliment." given me a salute like that. Maybe you oughta take it as a compliment."

Trish blushed and Nurse Pickless flashed a quick sideways grin. "Dear, if it'll make you more comfortable I'll show you an old nurse's trick. Sometimes we have to resort to certain measures for a catheter insertion or what have you."

She tossed the diaper into the rolling hamper and then sized up the erection. It was about the length and width of a man's thumb, uniformly white with a tinge of pink at the head (unlike the variegated and strangely hued adult p.e.n.i.ses Trish had laid eyes on) and canted slightly toward the southeast. Nurse Pickless c.o.c.ked her middle finger against her thumb, said, "Sometimes you've just got to show it who's boss," and gave the p.e.n.i.s a quick little thump.

Trish startled and the nurse waved her hand. "No need to worry, he can't feel a thing. We're just trying to discourage it a little. Case you're wondering, this'll also work on your husband when he gets too enthusiastic."

They both kept an eye on the erection for any signs of discouragement, but it was holding firm.

"My husband," Trish said, not caring to hide the resentment in her voice, "hasn't been this enthusiastic for a very long time."

The old nurse put her hand on Trish's shoulder. "Take it from someone who knows, dear, there'll come a time when you'll thank the good Lord for small favors." She was already preparing to give the erection another finger-flick, saying, "Just a t.i.tch harder should do the trick," when Trish stopped her: "It doesn't bother me, really, please, I'll be fine."

"Sure?"

"Certain."

"Just one more pop and it'll be down for the count, I promise you."

"No, please. Really. Thank you so much."

"It's only the body, remember," said Nurse Pickless, already heading out the door to continue her rounds. "It comes and it goes. Nothing to be afraid of."

For a time, Trish did nothing but study Rusty's face, or the part of it, at least, that was not covered with bandages: the freckled nose and fuzzy round ears, the single exposed eye that occasionally opened, seeming to focus on something for a moment before swiveling back under its half-drawn lid. All of which, according to the doctors, could sense nothing, were shut down or short-circuited by the boy's irredeemably damaged brain. As she often had in the past two weeks, to keep herself from crying or otherwise falling into hysterics, she bent down and gave him a light kiss on both smooth cheeks and, imagining he could hear her, told him that she loved him, and always would.

She stood up, gasping a little at the way the bones of her chest ached. She decided Nurse Pickless had a point: What was was there to be afraid of? Why should the body be discouraged-Rusty's or hers or anyone else's? She dipped her washcloth in the basin and gave his chest some brisk business with it, moving to his stomach and then his groin, putting a thorough, workmanlike polish on the stiff p.e.n.i.s as if it were the hood ornament of an expensive car. Just as she was about to move on to the thighs she sensed a deep rippling under the skin and Rusty's hips twitched once, twice, and with only that much warning he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed a thin, glistening string across the inside of his leg. Trish made a surprised noise in her throat-something like a laugh-but after the merest pause went right on soaping and rinsing as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred, feeling with some pride the tension go out of boy's legs like the air from a tire, the bones loosening, the muscles going soft, the whole body, with a single grateful exhale, pooling like spilled water in the hollows of the bed. there to be afraid of? Why should the body be discouraged-Rusty's or hers or anyone else's? She dipped her washcloth in the basin and gave his chest some brisk business with it, moving to his stomach and then his groin, putting a thorough, workmanlike polish on the stiff p.e.n.i.s as if it were the hood ornament of an expensive car. Just as she was about to move on to the thighs she sensed a deep rippling under the skin and Rusty's hips twitched once, twice, and with only that much warning he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed a thin, glistening string across the inside of his leg. Trish made a surprised noise in her throat-something like a laugh-but after the merest pause went right on soaping and rinsing as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred, feeling with some pride the tension go out of boy's legs like the air from a tire, the bones loosening, the muscles going soft, the whole body, with a single grateful exhale, pooling like spilled water in the hollows of the bed.

DON'T LOOK BACK A few days later, she was sitting with Rose in the same hospital room in the late morning sunshine. There had been a lull at Big House, and as had become her custom lately she had driven over to keep Rose company for an hour or two. Sometimes they did nothing but read or do crossword puzzles, but mostly they talked. In the two years since they had become sister-wives they had not talked half as much as they had in the past weeks; with all the recent upheavals they had been released, somehow, to speak about their pasts, their doubts, pretty much anything at all-what did they have to lose? This morning they were discussing the possibility of Golden's taking another wife, which in different times had never been a topic for open discussion, especially in a public place such as this. Last night he had gathered his current wives around the dining room table to get their approval on the blueprints of the new addition: three new bathrooms, a small kitchen, a large recreation room, and seven new bedrooms, three in the bas.e.m.e.nt, four on the second floor. He explained the room configurations and sleeping arrangements, but by the time he was finished it was clear he had left two bedrooms unaccounted for, an oversight Nola immediately pointed out.

"This one," Golden said, resting his fingertip on the smallest bedroom, a tiny ten-by-eleven tucked between a linen closet and Bathroom #3, "this one's for me, I guess. You know, to have my own place once in a while. Or we could use it for something else, if you don't think..."

He searched his wives' faces for approval. No one, of course, had ever heard of a plural husband having his own bedroom-in theory it was ludicrous, almost sacrilegious; in a house full of clamoring children and demanding wives, how could a G.o.dly husband justifiably keep anything-even a night here or there-to himself? But this was a new time; the old rules didn't apply. The wives looked at each other and seemed to agree: Why not? Why not?

"And this one?" Beverly said, pointing to the last bedroom, the tone in her voice suggesting she already knew the answer, that she herself had scripted it.

Golden said, "This one is for, you know, future possibilities."

It wasn't hard for the other wives to guess the room's purpose: in the next few months they would almost certainly be welcoming a new sister-wife to the family. Golden had already been under heavy pressure from Uncle Chick to take a fifth wife, and now that his recent indiscretions had become common knowledge, the pressure had only increased; if he wanted to maintain his standing in the church, prove his faithfulness and good intentions, he would be bringing another wife into the fold as quickly as possible. The only question now was who the lucky lady might be.

The obvious answer was Maureen Sinkfoyle, mostly because she had been available the longest, and because Beverly favored her. Though something had clearly happened to Beverly around the time of Rusty's accident, and there were still days when she walked with a slight slump to her shoulders and a pallor to her skin, sometimes retreating to her bedroom to cough herself hoa.r.s.e, she seemed to be regaining her old form. She had roused herself to begin taking on more responsibilities and dictating tasks, and lately had started to engage in milder sorts of Beverly-style maneuvering: agitating on behalf of her children for better sleeping arrangements, making sure each design element of the new addition met her approval. Until now, she and Nola had been coexisting in Big House under a stay of remarkable calm, but any fool could see that trouble was on its way.

Maureen Sinkfoyle was not the only candidate in the running. There was the recently widowed LaDonna Ence and the twenty-year-old, scared-of-her-own-shadow Tanya Belieu, who Nola and Rose favored. And now, rather amazingly, a dark horse seemed to have entered the race: the beautifully named Huila, of all people. Not long ago Golden had asked permission from his wives to pay her a visit; she had taken out a restraining order on her husband and was living temporarily in one of the rentals in Mexican Town. He promised there would be no funny business-he was long past that-he simply felt responsible for her plight and wanted only to make sure she was safe. Though Nola made a few comments under her breath and Beverly was clearly less than enthusiastic about it, they all relented. It seemed harmless, but Nola was convinced something was afoot. There'd been a rumor that Uncle Chick had gone out to Mexican Town to see Huila as well, which meant he might be testing her interest in joining the church. This kind of missionary work was an Uncle Chick specialty-bringing in the wayward and lost, extending the hand of fellowship to the last person anyone would expect. It was how Golden's father had come into the church, and by extension Golden and Beverly as well.

"Do you think it's possible?" Trish asked Rose. They had been chatting aimlessly for a half hour, Rose in the easy chair next to Rusty's bed, skimming the final chapter of A Gentleman in My Bedroom A Gentleman in My Bedroom, and Trish making a sorry attempt at knitting some wool booties for Rusty's cold feet.

Rose shrugged. "Could be. Crazier things have happened."

"I can't see it, not if Beverly has a say."

"Beverly's not really in charge anymore, is she?"

"Then who is?"

Rose glanced up from her book, blinking. "I don't have any idea."

Here was the thing: though Golden was giving it all he had, n.o.body was really in charge. They were all in separate holding patterns, looking for guidance, waiting for the haze to clear.

For a while they said nothing. A cart with a squeaky wheel pa.s.sed in the hall and Rusty's heart monitor beeped with its stubborn regularity.

"If you had the chance," Trish said, trying her best to affect an idle tone, "do you think you could just pick up and go away somewhere new, leave everything behind?" She glanced up to see if Rose had heard her, but Rose murmured something and kept her gaze on the pages of her book.

Until she'd asked it, Trish hadn't realized how much she needed to air this question, to let it out into the open, even if n.o.body would hear it. "I mean, if you had somebody to go with, to be with, do you think you could just leave?"

Rose looked up at her then; obviously, she had had been listening. Her eyes shone and her lips parted slightly to show her teeth. "Do it, Trish. You might never get another chance." been listening. Her eyes shone and her lips parted slightly to show her teeth. "Do it, Trish. You might never get another chance."

"No, see..." Trish shook her head and tried to go back to her knitting, which now seemed like nothing more than a big mess of knots. "I'm just asking hypothetically-"

"Go," Rose said. Her eyes were as sharp and clear as Trish had ever seen them, her voice an urgent whisper. "Don't even think about it. Go, Trish. Go and don't look back."

40.

THE BOY AT THE WINDOW

THE BOY WAITS AT THE WINDOW. IT IS WIDE, UNCURTAINED, A SINGLE pane of dusty gla.s.s that looks over a parking lot filled with cars. But when the boy's good eye swivels spastically toward the block of light, a parking lot is not what he sees. On the other side of the gla.s.s are small still lifes and huge panoramas, all of them strangely familiar: alleyways and backyards and prehistoric swamps full of long-necked dinosaurs, the contents of a kitchen junk drawer, a wave taking shape on the horizon, a steaming garbage dump, the remains of a rabbit flattened in the middle of the road, a barbed-wire fence made soft with a fur of snow, the bleak red surface of Mars. Every time it has been something different, but lately, as he emerges from the grainy drift of unconsciousness, he is confronted with the same heavenly tableau: clouds stacked into towering ramparts packed with teeming ma.s.ses of bodies, each one vaguely outlined and imbued with light, clamoring in voices the boy can barely hear, millions of them, billions, rank after rank of nameless souls, terrifying in their numbers, the great family of the dead. pane of dusty gla.s.s that looks over a parking lot filled with cars. But when the boy's good eye swivels spastically toward the block of light, a parking lot is not what he sees. On the other side of the gla.s.s are small still lifes and huge panoramas, all of them strangely familiar: alleyways and backyards and prehistoric swamps full of long-necked dinosaurs, the contents of a kitchen junk drawer, a wave taking shape on the horizon, a steaming garbage dump, the remains of a rabbit flattened in the middle of the road, a barbed-wire fence made soft with a fur of snow, the bleak red surface of Mars. Every time it has been something different, but lately, as he emerges from the grainy drift of unconsciousness, he is confronted with the same heavenly tableau: clouds stacked into towering ramparts packed with teeming ma.s.ses of bodies, each one vaguely outlined and imbued with light, clamoring in voices the boy can barely hear, millions of them, billions, rank after rank of nameless souls, terrifying in their numbers, the great family of the dead.

The boy closes his eye and sinks back into himself, but there's no escaping it: the dead are everywhere, and they are waiting for him.

But he's not ready to go, not yet, especially now that he has everything he ever wanted: his own room, his own bed with sheets clean and crisp, his mother all to himself. His mother, who dotes on him, who sings to him while she swabs out his ears and brushes what's left of his hair, who reads to him every day from Johnny Tremain Johnny Tremain or or I Was There at the Alamo I Was There at the Alamo, who has come back to him, as he always knew she would. The details of his old life are sifting away like the finest powder, but he hasn't yet forgotten how hard he planned and worked, how he suffered for this reward.

When his father comes to visit, he is quiet, but the boy can sense him there, a presence at the foot of the bed. He can hear the breath whistling through his nostrils, can smell the minty bite of his mouth-wash. Unlike the other visitors, his father doesn't speak, doesn't nervously chatter or coo over the boy, or stroke his arms. He stands at the foot of the bed or sits in the easy chair next to it, doing nothing, saying nothing, so quietly that the boy becomes charged with the silence as if it were an electrical current, his body poised and straining for some word or touch. And then one morning the boy wakes and his father is there, quiet as always, the light in the room gray and somber and cool. For a long time there is nothing but the wet sound of breathing, the creaking of work boots, and then the boy feels his father's rough palm settle gently on his neck. He says the boy's name, Rusty Rusty, and it is the first time in the boy's fractured memory that his father has ever spoken it without at least a tinge of anger or bewilderment or exasperation, and if the boy could have he would have asked only one question: Was that so hard? Was that really so hard? Was that so hard? Was that really so hard?

Most of the boy's other visitors, he can take or leave them. Sometimes he listens to what they have to say, sometimes prefers to tune them out and float through the warm and sparkling waters of his mind. So many people come, schoolmates and relatives and church members, most of them strangers. At first, when his siblings came, they were brought in bunches, which was a mistake: b.u.t.tons were pushed, tubes yanked, dials turned, a stethoscope went missing, and the nurses threatened to ban all family visits until the children learned some manners. The mothers decided that each of the older children would be given five minutes alone with the boy, and though a few might have acted inappropriately (one brother pinched the boy's arm just to make absolutely sure he wasn't faking, and one sister threw herself weeping across the boy's body as if she were Mary Magdalene and he the crucified Lord), most did exactly what was expected of them, which was to tell the boy they were praying for him, they were so very sorry for how they'd treated him, ignored him, ditched and mocked and teased him, how sorry they were for ganging up on him and hurting his feelings. They told him what a good person he was, what a wonderful brother. Like a thirsty sponge the boy absorbed every word, and if he could have he would have told them how wrong they were. He had been Wrong his whole life and he wanted them to know how Wrong they were, too, because he was not a good person or a wonderful brother, he was Wrong, he was the Bad Brother, he was Ree-Pul-Seevo!, the Weirdo and the Pervert. And who were they? They were liars and a-holes, all of them, to be treating him like this now, what a gyp, what a gyp to be saying such things now, to be touching him with such kindness and care.

But they have kept coming, saying nice things and praying over him and bringing him cards which they tape to the walls. Every day his mothers sit with him, ma.s.sage his limbs and wash and powder his skin. And of course there is the special mother, his secret crush, the one who smells like oranges and glows with a warm light. Somehow he has forgotten her name-like so many other details it has been lost to the gaping creva.s.ses in his head, but it doesn't matter, she comes to visit every day. The moment she steps into the room he can sense her presence, can smell the citrusy conditioner she uses in her hair, which brings him back into his body so completely he feels the full pain of his broken head and shattered hand, the burns on his face and arms, the corporal poisons of anger and stifled l.u.s.t seeping from his glands. When she is there next to him, when she rests her hand on his, his whole body aches with something like knowledge for all he has lost, the chances he will never have, to return such a touch, to fall off a horse or eat Chinese food or shoot a crossbow (which has always been one of his most dear wishes), to receive a letter in the mail, to be kissed with longing or punched in the jaw. And though none of this comes to him as conscious thought he brims with the injustice of it, with every unmet need and carefully savored resentment and thwarted desire, every dirty thought and dearest wish, the whole of his childish optimism and loneliness boiling to the surface until he is a straining vessel, ready to burst.

One night she puts her hands on him, as if she knows this, as if she alone can understand. She touches him just the right way, coaxing him along until the pressure is released with a rush of such pleasure and hurt that everything goes white and for a moment it all pours out of him, his past and future, his very soul, and still he comes back, not yet ready to go, and as he sinks into the dark, mica-specked depths of himself he calls out to her, Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you.

Yes, they keep coming, his sisters and brothers and mothers, the nurses who call him Hon Hon and and Baby Doll Baby Doll, who rub lotion into his sweet-smelling feet. They keep coming, the church members and neighbor ladies who bring fresh-cut flowers from their gardens, the elders who anoint his ruined head with holy oil and sanctify him with their healing power; his seventh-grade cla.s.s, which tromps into his room single file, sings one rousing chorus of "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow," and hangs a crooked banner above the window:

GETWELLSOONRUSTY!!! WELOVEYOU!!!

Is it any wonder the boy slowly loses all trace of himself, gradually becomes the person he never, in his most ardent imaginings, hoped he could be: a good boy, a special child, a beloved brother and son.

On a perfect late spring morning in May the boy suffers a ma.s.sive stroke, which cleaves him neatly down the middle. During the following week, unbeknownst to the doctors, undetected by their machines, he suffers a series of smaller strokes, each further dividing him from himself until he is little more than a scattering of thoughts and impressions held together by filaments of will. He seems to have lost access to his own body, which lies twisted and strange on the bed, bathed in the copper light of late afternoon, but still he is unwilling to let go, he wants to stay just a little while longer, to smell the flowers and read the handmade cards, to look out the bright window where the dead, in their billions, wait for him, to watch his visitors come and go, sometimes laughing, sometimes crying and shaking their heads and whispering sweet, doubtful things only he can hear.

It is a warm day, the sky empty, the heat rippling over the surface of the parking lot like water. The boy waits at the window. He won't be waiting long.

41.

THE MIDDLE PAIN

AT NIGHT, AFTER HER SHIFT AT THE HOSPITAL, SHE WOULD DRIVE home, the stars aligning haphazardly in the eastern sky, the shadows of dusk soaking into the fields and foothills. She often sat for long stretches in her idling car in Big House's driveway, considering the prospect of another night with the ill.u.s.trious Cooter in the sw.a.n.ky confines of the utility closet. Because there were no longer enough parking spots to accommodate Golden's work vehicles and the wives' cars, and because all rules of order and common sense seemed to have been suspended until further notice, she had taken to parking in the middle of the lawn. home, the stars aligning haphazardly in the eastern sky, the shadows of dusk soaking into the fields and foothills. She often sat for long stretches in her idling car in Big House's driveway, considering the prospect of another night with the ill.u.s.trious Cooter in the sw.a.n.ky confines of the utility closet. Because there were no longer enough parking spots to accommodate Golden's work vehicles and the wives' cars, and because all rules of order and common sense seemed to have been suspended until further notice, she had taken to parking in the middle of the lawn.

Her mornings and afternoons were filled with a noisy amplitude, with the piping clamor of children calling her name, demanding her presence. But nights were a different story. Nights were a long slog of the mind, her thoughts sliding past one another but never catching, the gears of her brain stripped smooth. Sometimes she would reach that point in the early morning when all the birds of the world went quiet, that perfect half hour when even the most psychotic starlings slept, and the silence would reach such a pitch she would find herself singing half-forgotten Beach Boys lyrics to ward it off.

And it wasn't helping at all that her body was sending her messages-the pangs in her uterus, the swelling of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s-trying to convince her, dumb beast that it was, that it had the power to conceive a bit of joy amid so much uncertainty and grief, that anything was possible. At times it was hard not to feel like the b.u.t.t of a cosmic joke, lying alone in her dark little cave, wide awake, the owner of a body so hopeful and full of yearning, while not thirty feet away slept her strapping husband, sad and impotent as an old shoe.

Every night she would venture into the dusky atmosphere of the dining room and stare into his sleeping face, searching for some change, a glimmer in which she could read a future for herself, but all she could see there were crosshatchings of exhaustion and bewilderment, a trace of pain around the eyes. Each evening he arrived home well after dinnertime, beleaguered and spent, and, after a quick meal, family prayer, and a good-night kiss for each child and wife, dived headfirst into the Barge's questionable comforts. Besides the new mantle of authority he seemed to be fitfully trying on for size, the only real change in him was in his att.i.tude toward the children; he had always been sweet with them, mild and forgiving, but now his tenderness had a custodial quality to it. He no longer tried to hide or to escape them, to find a quiet corner where, his back to the wall, he could ward them off with his rolls of blueprints or the phone receiver pressed to his ear. During those first days at Big House, she came upon him more than once holding one of the younger ones, Jame-o or Sariah or Pet, clutching them with such an intensity he seemed to be trying to beam a promise or a prayer of forgiveness into their damp foreheads.

Each night, after making a circuit of the house, and checking in on Faye, who had taken to the new family situation with an enthusiasm rivaled only by that of the Three Stooges, Trish would retire to the utility closet. Each night by the blue glow of the water heater's pilot light she would reread June's letter, and then spend much of the early morning hours trying to chase down the possibilities it set loose in her head.

And then one late Friday she dozed off only to be wakened by the sharp, needling pain of ovulation-the charmingly named Mittelschmerz Mittelschmerz, the middle pain. This time it lasted only an hour or so and ended with that almost pleasurable sensation, deep in her abdomen, of a nickel dropping through a slot. Afterward, she would try to remember what was going through her head as she pulled on her tennis shoes, walked past Golden's sleeping form to the front door, where she took her keys off the hook. But there was nothing there, as far as she could tell, except a buzzing mental static. She emerged into a crisp, late spring night and settled into the driver's seat of the Rabbit without a thought in her head.

Only when she turned onto Water Socket Road did she realize where she was headed. She drove fast with her window open, the turbulence tangling her hair, and when she got to the mailbox with the name HAYMAKER HAYMAKER painted on the side, she pulled onto the rough two-track without touching the brakes. She b.u.mped over potholes and clattering tablets of sandstone, letting the car roll to a stop as she crested the shallow rise. Down below it was dark except for a single lit window at the back of the first Quonset hut. And there it was: June's Ford parked in the night shadows out front. She let out a hard, shuddering breath. painted on the side, she pulled onto the rough two-track without touching the brakes. She b.u.mped over potholes and clattering tablets of sandstone, letting the car roll to a stop as she crested the shallow rise. Down below it was dark except for a single lit window at the back of the first Quonset hut. And there it was: June's Ford parked in the night shadows out front. She let out a hard, shuddering breath.

But she did not go down. She stayed in her seat, listening to the lowing of a train pa.s.sing somewhere to the south. She got out and paced around the car under an impossible net of stars, seized by a black flash of confusion. What was she about to do? Where was Faye? With a burst of relief she realized she had forgotten something. She got back in the car.

The hospital parking lot was nearly empty. She walked down the long corridors, past the darkened rooms and the abandoned nurses' station. Nola had the eight-to-twelve shift tonight, and Trish found her in the soft easy chair next to Rusty's bed, head thrown back and snoring in rhythm like a well-oiled machine. Trish woke her, told her as long as she couldn't sleep she might as well take the rest of Nola's shift, and Nola wandered off, stretching, smacking her lips, saying, "Thanks, Trishy dear, you're a doll."

Earlier today, Rusty had spent most of Trish's shift down in Radiology getting a few more X-rays at Rose's request, in hopes the doctors would find a miracle: the metal fragments in his brain suddenly accessible and therefore removable or, better yet, disappeared altogether, spirited away by the hand of G.o.d. The family had been fasting and praying for such an outcome, gathering each night to say a special prayer on Rusty's behalf, and Rose in particular seemed convinced that faith, exercised with staunch vigilance, could bring back her son.

And so today Trish had not given Rusty his bath, which was why she was here now. His body was slowly transforming itself into an expression of the trauma visited upon his brain; head craned to the left and into his shoulder, his neck held rigid, his knees drawing up under the sheets, his left hand clenched and beginning to curl inward at the wrist, as if his body were trying to fold itself around the last mote of life at its center. Even the simple task of taking off the gown had become difficult-the joints stiff, the tendons like sun-hardened leather-but once she had removed the diaper and quickly swabbed the genitals, bringing the straining body to a quick, shuddering release, she felt it relax, the flesh softening, the neck going slack, the head easing into the pillow.

She'd always rushed through bath duty in the perfunctory manner she'd learned from the nurses, but here, now, in the deep hush of night, with no one to see or to judge, she took her time. First the feet, cold and bone-white and decidedly feminine-the nails carefully tended, she knew, by the boy's mother-and then on to the calves and thighs, the full hips and soft belly, the chest with its nipples so faint and vestigial they were hardly there at all, and then the smooth arms, limp and wet in her hands. Except for a scattering of freckles and the few faint curling hairs on the groin and in the armpits it was still very much the body of a child, pale and sweet and untouched by time.

With great care she soaped and rinsed the pleats of his neck, the shallow sockets behind the ears, and for a moment, in that dim room, she could not help but see the face of her own son in the features of this boy, in the cupped chin with its off-center dimple, in the low cheekbones and full, fleshy lips, each a shared inheritance from their father. Bending close, anointing every crease and crevice of that face with the tip of her damp cloth, she felt the entirety of her loss as both love and emptiness-for her, two strands of the same cord-a deep, pained mourning for this child, for the children she had lost, for the children she might never have.

In a daze, and feeling suddenly exhausted, she climbed onto the bed, breathing in the soapy scent of the boy's neck, pulling him close, feeling the heat and weight of him against her chest, and as she dozed off she thought she could sense him lifting, releasing, taking her with him into some bright place-heaven, she hoped-where the souls of children pulsed like sparks, lighting up the dark.

She was awakened by a noise in the hall-a nurse making her rounds, or maybe Beverly come to start her shift-but she did not move. She stared at the cracks in the plaster ceiling, feeling the knowledge rise in her, stirred by this breathing child in her arms, that despite everything that had been taken from her, despite all she had lost and could never have back, this emptiness inside her could be filled again.

She took the long way back, slowing as she pa.s.sed the little cemetery on the ridge where Jack was buried. Though she did not stop-visiting a cemetery in the dead of night struck even her as a bit morbid and inappropriate-in her mind she called out to him and to her other two lost ones, told them no matter what happened she would not abandon them, they would always be loved, they could never be replaced.

When she pulled up in front of June's the place was dark. She got out of the car, looked up for a second at the deep sky layered thick with stars and galaxies, tasted the dust of the road on her tongue. Before she could knock, the porch light came on. And there was June, one hand on the doork.n.o.b, the other holding his gla.s.ses, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, freshly shaven, as if he had been waiting for her all along. The look of open expectation on his face nearly broke her heart.

"I can't go with you," she told him. "But I'd like to stay the night if you'd let me." Something flared in his eyes and went out. He nodded, letting out a single, sharp breath, and opened the door wide.

After that night, she returned four times over the course of the next ten days. Each time he begged her to come with him, showed her maps of the places they might go: Mexico, British Columbia, California, anywhere she wanted. She listened, dreamed a little along with him, but made no commitments. At every visit she noticed more material and equipment missing, compressors and arc welders sold at auction, piles of lumber and rebar hauled off their piers. The house grew progressively emptier and more cave-like until it contained nothing but a bed, a refrigerator and a small chair and card table in the front room. The last time she went, a warm breezy night at the beginning of June, the place was abandoned, the Quonset huts dismantled and gone, nothing but two concrete pads and a few sc.r.a.ps sifted over with red dust, the desert already come to reclaim its own.

42.

A FUNERAL

THOUGH RUSTY MCCREADY RICHARDS WAS n.o.bODY SPECIAL, JUST a kid, his funeral drew the largest congregation the Living Church of G.o.d had ever seen. Not only had the strange story of his accident, his miraculous five weeks of survival, and eventual death been featured in the a kid, his funeral drew the largest congregation the Living Church of G.o.d had ever seen. Not only had the strange story of his accident, his miraculous five weeks of survival, and eventual death been featured in the Dixie Weekly Dixie Weekly, but the superintendent of schools had decreed that any student who attended the funeral would be given an excused absence for the day. It was standing room only, then, the mult.i.tudes spilling out well into the cinder parking lot.

After the service, Golden stepped out of the church and was immediately pulled into the gears of the crowd, the mourners and well-wishers and malingerers, eventually finding himself spit out on the other side. He scooted past a local family he vaguely knew, gave quick handshakes, fended off hugs and, desperate for a few moments alone, ducked into the driver's side of the hea.r.s.e, pulling the door shut behind him.

The pallbearers had already placed the casket in the back, and the red velvet curtains were drawn, lending the car's interior a warm Martian glow. Golden held on to the steering wheel for a while, then gave it a single desultory shake. He had promised himself he wouldn't cry; for the past month he'd been swallowing tears and now seemed to have a permanent ache in the hinge of his jaw. He had managed to hold himself together for most of the service, even while around him his wives and children sniffled and wept. It was when Uncle Chick gave the final prayer and closed the lid of the casket that he lost himself, just for a moment, and let out a short, breathless shout through his teeth.

Be strong, he told himself one more time. You've got to be strong You've got to be strong.

He remembered the mess he had been at Glory's funeral more than three years ago, so much weeping and carrying on, as if he alone had lost something. He had insisted on making the drive from the church to the cemetery by himself, just the two of them, and it seemed to him now that all his mistakes as a husband and father could be summed up in that single gesture.

He rolled down the window and called out to Em, who was being consoled by a clutch of girls doing an admirable job of pretending to be distraught. Em, radiant in a dark navy dress, her hair done up in a duenna's bun, came right away. She bent down a little so she could look in his eyes, and when she put her hand on his neck and said, "Daddy," in a soft voice, he had to turn away and clench his jaw to hold back a sob.

He swallowed, nodding to buy a little time. Then told her to gather up the children, that they would all be riding to the cemetery together.

"All of us?" she said, and he said, "Everyone."

It was five and a half miles from the church to the cemetery. The procession moved slowly, never more than ten miles an hour, with the sheriff and his new deputy taking the lead, lights flashing feebly in the summer sun. Traffic was stopped at the county cutoff, and all along the way cars and pickups and flatbeds with heeler dogs in the back pulled over and waited for the procession, more than a quarter mile long, to pa.s.s. Housewives and their youngsters stepped out onto porches, men paused in their work, calling to each other to shut down their machines. A crew of Mexican laborers cutting the first alfalfa of the season gathered in a ragged line, the field green and brilliant beneath them, each one removing his hat to make the sign of the cross.

If any of those people noticed the long Cadillac hea.r.s.e was packed floor to ceiling with a seething ma.s.s of bodies, feet jutting up at odd angles, arms and faces and whole torsos hanging out the windows, they had the good decency not to gawk or point. The first mile or so was the worst. The kids were heaped all over each other, having dog-piled into the car as if they were going for a joyride. To accommodate the casket, Golden had had to remove the three homemade bench seats, so only the front and rear seats remained, upon which fourteen of them, including Golden with Pet on his lap doing much of the steering, were now haphazardly stacked, while the back bay was crammed full with the other thirteen, including Rusty in his casket. Even before they pulled out of the parking lot the wailing and carping had started. Ferris hollered at no one in particular, Alvin claimed in a m.u.f.fled voice he was being asphyxiated by someone's b.u.t.t, and Darling, because she had lost her shoe, wept louder and longer than she had during the funeral service. Smuggled in from Nola's station wagon by Clifton and lost somewhere deep within the pile, Cooter howled and whined as if he were being boiled in a pot.