Let me now what you think.
------
OLD HUNDRED
He
said: “And the angel told me that this window from our world to his only opens
once every hundred years, and he comes each time and waits for another hero to
come through.”
His
daughter snorted and rolled her eyes. “But
he got you instead.”
“He
got me. I was eight years old. I asked him how long I could stay. Because it was wonderful, you see. He was wonderful. He said, ‘You can stay in this world for as
long as your heart is true.’ As long as
my heart was true.”
“I
guess that left you out.”
“Ah,
well. I stayed, and became one of them,
one of the great clan. Oh, I could tell
you many things about that year, Fran.
So many. But it ended so quickly,
because I grew homesick. And frightened. They needed hero. And when I realized that wasn’t me, I just… fell. And landed back out there, in the sand, in
front of the stone, with the tide in and the surf around my knees. It was still summer, still 1955, even though
a whole year had passed on the other side.
And I was late for dinner.” He
laughed at that, which got him coughing again.
She had to hold a tissue to his mouth so he could spit, then pull him up
straight again in his float-chair. Even
with the leaps science had taken in the last few years, one hundred-and-eight
years old was not pretty.
They
looked at each other, each one scanning the other’s face for some clue where to
take this strange discussion. Fran found
she was pissed. That didn’t surprise
her; it was standard with her father.
“You
are so full of shit,” she complained. “You
call me down here from D.C., and give me this fantastic crap. It’s 2055.
And I’m sixty-five years old. Do
you think I’m an idiot?
”
She
winced, expecting him to jump on such an easy line. Ten years ago he would have, but now he just
looked at her. There were tears in his
eyes, and his face was strained, his shoulders and neck rigid. She glanced down at his hands, bony white and
gripping the arms of his float-chair fiercely.
Her scalp prickled suddenly, and a shiver ran from her head all the way to
her toes in a sudden rush.
“You’re
serious. You really believe this.”
The
relief in him was almost heartbreaking. “Yes!”
he said. “Yes! Look outside.
Look at what I’ve done. Would I
do all that as a some joke? Just to pull
your leg?” She turned her head and did
indeed look out through the great picture window, down the lawn to the dunes,
to the cranes, trucks, men and machinery, and beyond them to the dike that now
held back the water and reclaimed a stretch of beach lost to climate change
twenty years before. A stretch of beach
leading up to a great, black, jagged rock.
And on top of that, a tall, grey, granite stone, glittering in the late
afternoon sun.
The
dike was new. It stretched the length of
two soccer fields from one arm of the small bay to the other: an enormous, ugly
ribbon of concrete, like an old-style roadway stood on its side. How much had all that cost? How much had all that cost! Shit!
He
saw her face close down in disbelief, anger and worry. “I’m not senile, Fran,“ he said. “And I’m not crazy.”
She
wanted to scream. She did scream. “What do you mean, you’re not crazy,
Dad? Look at what you’ve done! Look at what you’ve spent! Is there anything left? Who the hell let you do this? What lunatic contractor hired on to change
the goddamn coastline!” She couldn’t
stand sitting there any longer, and started pacing back and forth as stunned
questions just vomited forth. Oh yes, vomited. She knew that was the right word even as she
kept on yelling and pacing and pointing and panting for breath. Sixty-plus years of this man, and his
crap. How had her mother ever stood it? How had any of them ever stood it?
But
he just sat there looking at her, like she was his last chance on earth. No arguing, no arrogance, nothing. She found she was weeping, and that she was
sitting across from him again.
“I
need you, Frannie.”
God,
and she needed deodorant. Amazing how
menopause could survive the implacable march of medicine. She stank.
“You
need me,” she said, her voice shaky, her whole body almost limp now. “That is the definition on irony.
“You
need me,” she repeated, when he didn’t rise to the bait. “What happened to your nurse, what’s her
name?”
“She
quit yesterday. Couldn’t stand me anymore. Packed her things. Left.
I called you.”
“Well
someone had to change your diaper, I guess.
Wasn’t that a treat. Hey, Fran,
it’s an emergency down here at the beach house.
I’ve shit my pants and no one’s here to clean me up.” She closed her eyes on him and tried to let
her mind go dead. But she felt the anger
starting up again, and had to swallow hard against the taste of bile. She took a deep breath. Let it out.
Took another. “How much money?” she
said.
“There’s
still money left, if that’s what you mean.
Building the dike took a lot. But
I have a lot.”
“Not
what I meant, Daddy,” she almost sneered at him, knowing that the anger was
turning her mean. “I mean, how much is it
worth to you?”
Their
eyes met, and she looked away first, blushing from her neck to her ears.
“It’s
good to see still you have some capacity for shame,” he said. Hah! she thought. Look who’s calling the kettle black.
He
used his chin to point to his desk. “Over
there, you’ll see I’ve gotten it all written out properly. Amazing what virtual lawyers can do these
days.” The old bastard knew her, didn’t he.
Knew what she’d want to go along with his delusion. And what did she care anyway? Let him have his pathetic fantasy, if she got
something out of it. She felt every wall
there’d ever been between them go up, enormous, black slabs of history and
bitterness, as she walked over to the deck and picked up his last will and
testament and a power of attorney over all his earthly affairs.
The
sun was falling to the horizon when they reached the black rocky outcrop and the
standing stone on its crest. He’d had a
ramp built from the base of the dune, across the sand and up the side of the
rock. But there was no way he’d have been
able to navigate to it without help. He
hadn’t had a chance to get one of the new lift-chairs that could be controlled
through a brain-link. She couldn’t
believe it. All this effort, all this
money, and it hadn’t even occurred to him. He’d needed her. Well, someone.
Gulls
wheeled overhead as the sky blushed rose and orange. She was glad she was standing behind him, and
unable to see the weird patterns he’d insisted she draw across his face with
lipstick. “Next best thing,” he had said. Though in comparison to what, she didn’t think
she wanted to know.
“Hold
my hand, Frannie,” her father said. She
let him grab on to her.
“I’m
going to sell the damn house,” she said.
“I
won’t need it.”
“Hey!”
came a voice from the sand below, startling Fran and almost causing her father
to jump out of the chair. She twisted
around and saw a small boy looking up at them.
He started climbing up the side of the ramp, calling out, “What are you
doing? What’s up there?”
“Who
is it,” her father asked, in a sudden panic.
“Who is it?”
“It’s
just the boy from next door,” Fran answered, remembering seeing him playing
around among the litter of the construction when she’d arrived that morning.
“He
can’t be here,” the old man said. “You can’t come up here!” he shouted, waving
his arms wildly as the boy stepped up next to them. “Go away! It’s not for you!”
The
boy squeezed around the chair and stepped toward the standing stone as the
blazing sun kissed its very top. A
shimmering started all around them, as though waves of heat were suddenly
baking off from every surface. And
something opened in the sky.
“Take
me!” screamed the old man. “Take
me! I’m ready now! I won’t fail you!”
The
boy said, “It’s beautiful!”
The
old man screamed again, and again, weeping and begging and cursing.
Fran
laughed on the edge of madness and said, “I guess the house will sell for more
than I thought.”
