Out of the Blue (19 page)

“I can’t see,” I explained. I wondered what it was about Gus that made the panic retreat.

“Ever happen before?”

“No.”

“What can I do?”

“Tell me a story.” It just fell out of my mouth, I don’t know why.

I could hear him smile, just like Joe. “I was never much good at that,” he said. “There’s that one about the three pigs but I don’t remember the end.”

“Just talk about planes. Tell me about the plane you built with the boys.”

Gus covered my fingers with his other hand. I wanted to creep into that sheltered space.

“We chose her from a catalog,” Gus began. “Built her from a kit. It took us five years, but we had a lot of fun.”

“How old was Joe?”

“Must have been no more than eight when we started, and Frank in high school. The plans were pretty much a muddle, but Frank could always figure them out. And Joe, it’s all he ever wanted to do was work on that plane. Cut school half the time and caught hell from his mother.”

So he could be with his dad, I was thinking. I was starting to drift. I don’t know how much I missed but I remember hearing something about crashing the plane, which roused me enough to ask if anybody got hurt.

“Nah, it’s just the metal struts on the landing gear were too lightweight.”

“Gus, this means something, my going blind. About Joe and me.” I struggled as my brain was squeezed into a tiny black ball. But I clung to consciousness so I could stay with Gus.

I heard him say “Don’t go getting mystical on me,” and then I couldn’t fight it anymore. I slept. At one point, I think Celeste came into the room. There was muted conversation, but I was unable to snap out of my semi-conscious state. Through it all, Gus’s presence warded off the terror, suspending reality enough so that I could rest for the battle I knew was coming.

Joe and Gus sat beside me in the ambulance, and Steve rode up front with the driver. When we pulled away from the house with a lurch, I must have protested. It felt terrifyingly perilous, sliding along the road without my sight, as if it were my eyes that kept us on the road. Joe took one hand and Gus the other, what a comfort.

“I’m so lucky,” I said. They laughed just a little, identical sounds back in their throats that said
this woman is nuts.
Two peas in a pod.

When you can’t see, movement is a strange and frightening experience. It’s as if sight is the anchor and without it you’re cast adrift. Flying south, with Gus and Sam Barney at the controls, I felt the earth turning on its axis beneath me. There was no gravity. I wanted to be in a bed where I could grip the sides and hang on tight.

“Do you have any pain?” Joe asked above the howl of the engine.

I shook my head.

“Can I get you something? Is there any medication?”

“No. Thanks. I’m okay.” I just couldn’t see anymore, that was all. And I didn’t want to talk, couldn’t seem to talk. As if the power of speech were somehow connected to my optic nerve. Shutdown. Meltdown. Anna’s seen it all, said it all. It’s over.

At the hospital I think they must have given me a shot, because I barely remember any of it. I slept through strange dreams and when I woke up there was the familiar scent of fresh-baked bread.

“Hi, babe,” Ma said beside me. “What’s new?”

I opened my eyes slowly, hoping against hope, but all was dark. The tears came then. At least that part worked.

“Go ahead,” she said. “You’re entitled.”

There was a catch in her voice, but she started rummaging around beside the bed and it was business as usual. “Where the fuck do they hide the Kleenex in this place? It’s a hospital, for Christ’s sake. Okay, this’ll do.”

I heard her running water at the sink. After a moment, she came back and wiped my face with a warm washcloth. It felt good. I slipped into another doze. At some point there were footsteps that stopped in the doorway. There was a subtle rustle of fabric as Ma got up, and I wanted to say
don’t leave me.
But I couldn’t talk through my drowsiness and that resistance seemed tied to the blindness was there.

I heard a strangled cough, then Joe’s voice, soothing. “Norma. It’s all right. It’ll be all right…” And I faded again.

When I woke up the next time, I was still blind but had regained my mental clarity. The first thing I realized was that it was finished with Joe, once and for all. No more excursions into denial for either of us. Ironic that it took blindness to reveal the truth. I listened carefully for evidence of someone else in the room. Nothing.

“Hello?” I tried. It was difficult to push the word out. No one answered. As the reality of my isolation began to sink in, I started to panic. I may never see again, I thought. How could I live, how could I work, what would happen to me? I started searching for the buzzer to summon a nurse. I tried to get up but the rails of the bed were raised and I had an IV in my arm.

“Help me!” I yelled. “Help!”

Within seconds, I heard footsteps and that swooshing sound that only accompanies a starched uniform on the move.

“What is it, honey?” A sweet voice, a compassionate voice.

I wanted to tell her,
I’m scared. I’m so scared.
But the words wouldn’t come. She put her hand on my forehead.

“Do you want a pill to help you sleep? Dr. Klewanis ordered you a little something.”

Oblivion. Yes, that was just what I wanted. I nodded, and soon I was back in a place of faces and colors. I dreamed of the Prince and Cinderella from my favorite Walt Disney movie, waltzing together in the grand ballroom, only it was Joe and Lola. I was there, too, watching with the others, only the others were all me as well. I stood apart from the elegant pair, swaying with the music and believing with all my heart that this was exactly the way it was supposed to be.

I lay there like a hollow jar, the passive recipient of medication, food, the laying on of hands, some gentle, some not. Dr. Klewanis had the kind of clout to install me close to the nurse’s station. It was an advantage medically, but a little noisier. I heard him the first morning, inquiring in that mild midwestern style as to why my blood workup results had been misplaced.

“Any theories?” I heard him asking the nurse supervisor. “Nothing more stimulating first thing in the morning than hypotheticals. Better than caffeine. How about you just find them for me, nurse, and then we can have a chat about procedure. Nothing physically punitive. Psychological intimidation’s more up my alley.”

I heard the nurse’s murmured reply, respectful but not cowed. My neurologist rarely allowed the smile to slip off his face, and an undercurrent of humor ran deep with him. I suppose it kept him afloat when forced to confront the inevitable deterioration of so many of his patients. I heard his footsteps approaching my room and pictured his stocky form, white coat askew, looking more like a TV repairman than a world-class physician. Other footsteps clattered in his wake, the omnipresent students.

He stood at the foot of my bed, studying the chart, I presumed.

“’Morning, Bolles. Private plane, eh? Not too tacky. How’re you feeling?”

“Peachy.”

He spoke to his students, who were mouse-quiet. “Patient twenty-nine-year-old female Caucasian, diagnosed with relapsing-remitting MS approximately five years ago. This is her first episode of retrobulbar neuritis, resulting in total blindness. What’s in that IV, Johnson?”

“Corticosteroids?” answered a head cold.

“And?”

Much shuffling of feet.

“We’re playing hardball with Ms. Bolles here, people. What else?”

“A.C.T.H.?” A female voice. I tried to smile in gender support but it was too much effort.

“Hang out your shingle, Finnegan,” the doctor said. “In my opinion, the whammo jolt is the only way to go. Close monitoring and ease her off gently. I’m going to persuade Ms. Bolles here to indulge me when we get her out of here. The ABC’s. Benillo, what do I mean by that?”

“Avonex, Betaseron, or Copaxone?” I heard the tremor of anxiety in the voice, wondering if he got it right.

“Exactimento.” He came over and picked up my wrist. “Whadaya think, Bolles, you finally ready to play on my team?”

“The injections?” What an effort. It seemed like a hundred words.

“Bingo.”

“Mixing metaphors,” I said, and figured that was about it for talking.

“English teacher,” he explained to the troops.

I remembered the misery of the last attempt at drug therapy, the shakes, the aches, the joint pain. It doesn’t happen to everybody and sometimes it goes away after a while. One of those concoctions sent visions of nooses and razor blades dancing in my head like sugarplums. Odd that a drug can produce such a specific ideology—in my case, fantasies of suicide, and I wasn’t even all that depressed. But right now I was more interested in the short term.

“Get my sight back?” I asked.

“Hope so. How’s your speech?”

“You noticed.”

“That’s why they let me work here.” He bent over me and lifted my eyelids. I assumed he was shining his penlight in there.

“Words are lead,” I told him. “Not slurred.”

“A bit, actually,” he said. That was news. I had thought my enunciation was pretty clear. He stood up. “Ms. Bolles here is scheduled for an MRI later on.” A hand on my shoulder. “Okay, slugger. I’ll stop by tonight. Your ma can catch me about seven, and tell her I want some of that cranberry nut bread.” The sound of receding footsteps made me frantic.

Don’t go. Fix me. Heal me. Help me.

I didn’t say any of it. It was too hard to spit it out, and besides, what was the point?

Since I was unaware of the brightening and dimming of the sunlight outside my window, I became dependent upon certain events as markers in my day. The doctors’ morning rounds, the meals that I found difficult to choke down—though Grant later pointed out that I was not entirely at a disadvantage by being unable to see what I was eating. The pop-ins from Ma—brief, but several a day—the phone calls from Joe, who was undergoing a business crisis and was thankfully not in the city. I needed time to formulate the words to explain myself, an impossibility when my tongue had collapsed like an old rug onto the floor of my mouth. Joe didn’t press me over the phone. We just left it that I was medically unable to communicate.

But after a week of Dr. Klewanis’s radical treatment, my speech began to improve. Grant had been badgering me about visiting and it was getting difficult to put him off.

“Lookit, Annie,” he explained. “You’re blind as a bat. You won’t see the lugubrious pity on my face anyhow so why not let me come? I’ve got gossip.”

“You can tell me over the phone,” I said.

“Ah, but I won’t.”

“You bastard.”

“Four o’clock?”

“Oh, all right.”

It’s not easy to participate in a serious hug when you’re loaded down with IV tubes but somehow we managed. He smelled wonderful as always, the morning shave’s cologne faintly mingled with the merest hint of tobacco from an occasional furtive cigarette.

“What are you wearing?” I asked.

“What is this, an obscene phone call in person?”

“The gray herringbone, I bet.”

“Nope, brown and green plaid.” I felt him sit on the edge of the bed.

“With the tan slacks?”

“And the taupe tie with the creepy millipedes.”

“I love that tie.”

“Wore it just for you, darling. I brought you something.” I heard a paper bag rustle and was suddenly transported to our Mexican restaurant. Tacos! It was the first laugh I’d had in a while. I sat up in bed, presumably dribbling hot sauce all over my sheets, while he filled me in.

“Duncan Reese is out. Did you get your Duke of Windsor letter?”

I shook my head, too stymied by taco to speak.

“The board hinted around that he could keep his job if he acted
really
contrite and got rid of Jessica. Reese composed a very graceful response, basically telling them he would not renounce the woman he loved for Cameron’s throne or any other damn thing. Tell Norma to check the mail. You’ll like it.”

“Do you think Chubb joined forces with the head of the board?” I asked. “That woman whose husband left her.”

“Right on, Watson,” Grant said. “Jesus, if you could see what you’re doing to your bed. You look like a gunshot victim.”

“How will the school manage without him, Grant?”

“They’ve got an interim guy, a retired headmaster from Dalton. Life will go on.”

“Maybe, but it won’t be the same. Not to mention that I’ll probably lose my job.”

“Look, don’t get all in a twit. Can I find you something to calm you down? I think I’ve got a joint in a pocket someplace.”

I read in his voice that he was concealing news, but I simply wasn’t up to hearing it.

“How’s the boyfriend?” he asked. Leave it to Grant to raise the germane issues.

“Oh, well.”

“The fucker’s deserted you in your hour of need!”

“First of all, keep your voice down. Furthermore,
I’m
breaking it off, not Joe. He’s been perfect.”

He fell silent for a moment. “Okay,” he said finally. “I’m working on that.”

“I feel obliged to explain it to Joe before I explain it to you. But tell me about my kids.”

“They want to come see you. There’s a plot afoot.”

Total panic. “They can’t.”

“Why not?”

“They can’t see me like this.”

“Don’t be an asshole!” he boomed. “It’ll be good for them! A life lesson!”

“Shh, Grant. I don’t want to be a life lesson. I just want to be their teacher.”

“You look fine.”

“It’s unprofessional.”

“So I’ll go back and tell them they’re not welcome.”

“Do you know how hard it would be for me to see them without being able to see them?”

Another silence, not easy for Grant.

“But you can tell me about them,” I said. “How’s Rudy?”

“Nope.”

“Come on, Grant.”

“Not one word.”

“That’s blackmail.”

“So it is. You have taco shell in your hair, darling.” He reached to tidy me up. “Guess I’ll be shoving off now.”

“But what about Michelle, has she gained any weight? Did they hire a decent substitute for me this time?”

“Glad to note such a healthy interest,” Grant said. I could hear fabric on fabric as he slipped on his coat. I was getting pretty good at this.

“Don’t you dare leave me,” I said.

But he bent down and gave me a kiss. “Mm, you smell like a south of the border cocktail dip. See you, darling.”

“You rat. You king size rat. Thanks for stopping by.”

As usual, I couldn’t hear him grin. As he went out the door I called after him.

“Are you smiling? Grant Hurst, are you smiling?”

They stood whispering outside my door. Sukey was hectoring Eddie “Big Tits” Zimmer.

“Don’t you dare say anything about, you know.”

“I’m
not
, Sukey. Jeez, give me a little credit, will you?”

Then Rudy’s voice. “Are we going in or what?”

I had asked Ma to bring me some street clothes, and had my hair washed and blown dry. The nurses helped me get to the window chair. I was still attached to my IV, but I figured I didn’t look too frightening.

“Come in, people!” I called. Might as well get this over with. I was sweating with anxiety and supposed they all were, too. I cursed Grant for insisting on this extremely dumb idea.

They trailed in and I got an instant noseful of adolescents—acne medication, hair gel, and dirty feet. Somebody stumbled against the stool I used to climb into bed.

“Fuck!” Eddie said.

“Eddie, what’s your
function!”
Sukey said, and I heard a whack.

I wanted to cry with joy.

“Hi, guys,” I said. “So what’s going on?”

“It’s pretty lame without you, Ms. Bolles,” said the divine Will Simmons, alias Johnny Depp. Straight D average and destined for expulsion. We’d probably both be chucked out of Cameron at the same time.

“Who all’s here?”

Sukey piped up, “Rudy, Mark, Jennifer, me, and …” uttered scornfully, “… Eddie. Michelle’s sorry she couldn’t come. She’s doing a dance recital.”

“That’s terrific.”

Jennifer, Cameron’s most accomplished dancer, spoke up. “She’s gotten so good, Ms. Bolles. You should see—Oh. Sorry.”

“It’s okay, Jen. I’d like to see her perform. I hope that’ll happen someday soon.”

“When are you getting your sight back?” Mark asked.

I imagined Sukey’s eyes rolling.
Mark, you’re so inappropriate.