Numb (12 page)

At the peak of the bridge, the Manhattan skyline reflected in the water below us like liquid fire, Mal clapped his hands and turned to face the group, a cold and shivering semicircle around him.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said. In the dark his eyes and teeth shone brightly. “We have gathered here to reclaim our lives, to make our hearts beat, to fill our lungs with air that hasn't been produced or purchased or packaged. Most of you know what this will entail.” He looked at me and a couple of the young women with the heavy eyeliner and chattering teeth. “A few of you don't.”

Those who knew laughed at those who didn't.

Redbach pulled back the blanket to reveal coils of rope. A lanky guy named Jerry joined him and the two of them unloaded rope and straps and hooks I thought might be mountain-climbing gear. It looked like the same equipment from the van, and I even thought I smelled a hint of burnt plastic.

Mal continued his sermon. “People are claiming unexplored spaces all the time. Think of the millions of people who've walked through Grand Central. Compare that with the few hundred who've walked on the roof of Grand Central. Compare that with the guys who walk high steel. They get to be first. They own that space.”

Mal removed his jacket. He stood in a T-shirt and jeans, and there were scars, burns up and down his arms.

“Some of you pay for the right to be here. Some of you don't. Some say that's not fair.” He stretched his arms over his head until a shoulder popped. “I say, I gotta eat too.” The girls laughed again, poked each other over how cute Mal was, with his broken tooth and burned hair. “If you don't like it, mug one of the guys who didn't pay. I'll let you work that out among yourselves.” He winked at the blonde who'd walked on his arm all the way up. He had picked his trophy. I wondered if Karen knew about this.

Jerry knelt before Mal and helped him with the straps. They fit tight around his ankles and were covered with rings and heavy ropes bound through metal clasps.
Jerry focused only on the gear. He'd heard the speech before—or not. He simply didn't need to. He obviously believed in Mal.

They tightened and retightened each buckle, pulled and yanked each strap again and again until they felt no slipping or give. They followed the loops of rope that led through and back again to a main coil at Redbach's feet. Redbach, meanwhile, played the other end around the walkway's metal handrail, tying a thick and complicated knot resembling a fist.

Redbach pulled wire cutters from his back pocket. With three quick snips he removed wire loops holding the chain-link fence to the handrail posts. The fence kept people from jumping off the bridge. He peeled a section three feet wide back like skin from an apple. As he did, he talked loudly, as if to himself.

“Remember that when you jump, arch like a diver, otherwise you tumble, and if you tumble there's a chance of pulling something. And breathe. But not too deep—”

“After all, it is the East River.” Jerry finished what must have been an old joke.

Mal nodded without looking at them, then stared out over the river. He nodded again, as if hearing a question no one else could hear. I gripped the handrail hard, whitening my knuckles. Again I felt like I was back at the lion's cage, but this time I was on the outside and Mal was on the inside. I suddenly realized that maybe that was why Mal had come to resent me—he'd grown tired
of the worry. Or maybe it was just exhaustion at all the eyes that followed me.

The women had clustered together. Only the tiniest sounds escaped us. A boot scraped on the walkway floor. The blonde sniffed.

Mal rubbed his hands together and dried his palms on his pants leg. Jerry and Redbach helped him climb over the handrail. His legs only spread a few inches due to the cords running between his boots. Redbach and Jerry lifted him carefully, set him in a sitting position on the handrail, and helped him swing his legs over so he faced the water. He sat between the sloping edges of the chain-link fencing. To his right Redbach slowly lowered the coils of what could only be a bungee cord over the handrail until the length of it dangled beneath Mal's feet.

As he sat on the rail, a picture of intense calm, his eyes on the city lights, I felt I had to say something. Only a faint crackling sound escaped my dry mouth. I coughed and tried again.

“What if something happens?”

Mal shook his head. “Well, something is going to happen.”

Redbach laughed.

I ignored him. “Is this safe?”

“Nothing is safe.” His hands were on the handrail, his knuckles as white as mine. “You should know that.”

“As long as we get you out of the river.”

He winked. “You will. But keep an eye out for cops. This is very illegal.”

His grin lit the crowd. This would kill him. I was certain. Behind his cavalier attitude had to be some realization of his stupidity, this breaking away from reality by leaping into a free fall over the river. I felt sick.

With a tap on Redbach's shoulder he let everyone know it was time. Redbach and Jerry each took a hand and lifted once again, helping Mal to his feet atop the rail. With one hand Mal steadied himself against the fence post. He lifted his other arm straight out in front of him.

The people on the bridge with us fanned out along the rail. The bridge was a rule, a commandment of force and gravity, that everyone had to obey in their transfer from one land to another. Silent, we haunted its steel girders, watched as one of us tried to break free of it. I felt the jagged lift in my legs that I'd had when I faced Caesar, as if being lifted from the inside. I vibrated with it, tensing against it and for it. Behind us the rumble of the next train built. Mal stood completely still for a minute. It took forever for the train to reach us. It crashed toward us, like a laboring spectator afraid to miss the main act. Its noise became deafening, nearly enough to make me look at it, and then Mal said something and smiled to himself. He leaped.

He disappeared into the darkness. I could no longer see him, could only watch the line move and begin to
tighten, and I thought that this was how he came in and out of my life: in bursts, at the most unexpected moments. I forced myself to exhale and felt myself lowering down off my toes.

The group remained silent. I'd expected cheers, but none came. Barely a sound could be heard. What little wind there had been died. I looked up at the great metal girder that rose above us and thought of the people who'd climbed it to build the bridge, of the few people to stand atop it. I thought that maybe if the bridge hadn't been needed they would have built it anyway, just to build it. Just because they could. Just for Mal. The ropes around the handrail were tight and creaking. Above the handrail hunkered the city, and beyond the city clung the starless night sky.

From below us came the distant echo of Mal's laugh. Redbach grabbed hold of the rope and Jerry and he each planted a foot against the handrail and began to pull Mal back up. As rope became available each of us took a place behind them, reaching forward to the next hold. The pullback pinned me between Jerry and the woman behind me, who in turn pinned another. Redbach chanted “pull” with each heavy tug, and then everyone would reach forward with one hand, careful not to let the rope slip forward again, to grab the next piece before bringing the second hand forward to meet the first. Bent forward like that, each of us resting against the back of the person in front, we waited for the next cry of “pull” to raise Mal another few feet. We all breathed together.

I don't know how long it took to bring him back to the bridge. All of our hands mixed and grabbed one another, and I lost track of my own, recognized them only by the webs of scars that ran along the edges of the fingers and up to my wrists. No thought, only pulling, the lifting of our friend, and I fell into the rhythm of the group effort gratefully.

At last Mal's hand rose to grasp the handrail. Jerry grabbed him and pulled him over, and both collapsed onto the walkway. Mal laughed. “Took you long enough.” He was soaked, having dipped into the river; water dripped from him as he leaned against the rail.

I reached down to help him stand but he remained seated and began to undo the buckles at his ankles. I asked if the line had been too long.

“No, just right. As I got close to the snap-back point I slowed enough to hit the water safely. I went completely under, then was pulled back out.” He grinned up at Redbach, who grabbed his shoulder and shook it.

Redbach said, “Told you we had the right length.”

Mal squinted at him. “I'll tell you something, though. That water burns your eyes. Pollution's a bitch.”

Mal worked himself out of the bungee harness and conversations picked up. Everyone had thoughts about what his jump meant. Opinions differed: some found it important as a cultural statement, others an entertaining diversion. The group mind fell away. We'd all begun to think again. I thought it was Mal just being Mal, true to his nature, putting himself where other people
wouldn't. He looked me in the eyes and laughed and said something blasted away the moment it left his mouth by the thundering roar of a police chopper. Helicopter spotlights beamed down at us and everyone scrambled like roaches.

Mal, Jerry, Redbach, and I ran to the Manhattan end of the bridge. Everyone else headed back toward Brooklyn. I looked over my shoulder and saw the light dance over the latticework like fingers on a body. The glare receded, following the others. The helicopter turned away, its thunderous beating of the air softened. We ran toward Manhattan, our breath heavy and our footsteps irregular and pattering as rain.

Jerry gasped and tried to speak. “As long as they don't have units waiting down here, we should be okay.”

To make sure we weren't being followed I looked over my shoulder again. I saw the chopper far away over the Brooklyn edge of the bridge and turned back, just in time to see the girder I was going to run into.

After the impact, I turned in a slow circle without light or sound. When I opened my eyes, Mal stood above me. He laughed.

“What's so funny?”

“You just asked me if the lion is okay.”

“I did?”

“Yep, but that's the wrong ending, my friend.” He helped me stand, and Jerry stuck a hand under my arm and we took off again. Everyone looked concerned. Everyone except Mal.

“Cops might be at the end of the bridge,” Mal said. “Can you run?”

“I think so,” I said. And we did. Blood kept spilling into my eye from a cut. My brief loss of consciousness had been restful. No pain, of course, just a sudden sleep. I had never done that before.

We arrived in Manhattan panicked and flying on foot, jumped over a wall onto a side street next to a weedy little park where junkies were shooting up, and then rushed into a subway station. We didn't see any police, but we weren't going to wait for them. I fell down the stairs and the others carried me part of the way, past the row of automated MetroCard vending machines. I could barely hold my head up. I must have hit it pretty hard.

“I think I'm hurt,” I said.

“You are losing blood.” Mal pressed a hand to my forehead.

“Christ,” Jerry said. “How can you stand? I think you've got a concussion.”

Mal smiled.

A train pulled into the station and as I staggered on board the conductor shut the doors on my foot, tripping me. The empty car smelled recently used.

Mal and Jerry helped me onto a bench and laid me down. Mal was still wet, and began to shake in the train's cooled air. Still, he took off his sweatshirt and put it under my head. “You don't know who we've got here, do you, Jerry?”

Jerry shook his head as he knelt beside me, examining
my forehead. He looked into my eyes and asked me to follow his finger. It passed back and forth in front of my face.

“We got a real live famous person here. You remember the guy who can't feel pain, the one everyone's gaga about?”

“No shit,” Jerry said. “It's a pleasure.” Using a penknife from his pocket, Jerry cut away the edge of his T-shirt and folded up the fabric. He pressed it against my forehead. The train seemed dim and I couldn't be sure I wasn't passing out. “We gotta get these cleaned,” he said. “I think you split your kitty.”

“My kitty?”

“Yeah. This nice cat scar you got up here.”

Redbach left from the subway to go to a drugstore for some bandages and alcohol. Mal and Jerry pulled me along Hudson Street and into Jerry's apartment building. His apartment had a long, narrow hallway at the end of which sat the bed in the main room. A heavy-hipped woman in a T-shirt and running shorts didn't look up from her magazine until she realized I was bleeding my way into her home, then she became all questions and concern, running around the room to get gauze and peroxide.

Jerry made me sit down. When I did, I saw the mirror beside the bed and my wounded reflection. My forehead was split open above my left eye, right across the Garfield scar. A two-inch gash and several smaller cuts covered what had been an eyebrow. Rust-colored dust
painted half my face. There were three evenly spaced bruises forming on either side of the cut—probably from bolts in the girder.

The woman stood over me, looking at the gash. “Hi, I'm Debbie. Jerry's wife.” She took away the shirt-bandage and began to clean the cut with water poured from a bottle. Bloody water washed off my forehead and onto the bed. I tried to warn them about stains but they wouldn't listen.

Jerry rummaged through the closet and brought out what he called his “stash,” a large duffel bag from which he pulled a hypodermic needle.

I couldn't imagine what narcotics they thought I needed. “I don't use anything. Besides, the pain isn't a problem.”

“No, but the rust is. This is a tetanus shot.”

“You keep that in your stash?'”

“You never know when you might happen upon a rusty nail, my friend.” He jabbed me in the arm while Debbie pulled and twisted my other appendages, looking for more injuries.