The time traveler's wife (32 page)

"You haven't been paying attention. This
is a major Broadway production. We are just an excuse for my dad to entertain
lavishly and impress all his lawyer buddies. If we bowed out my parents would
have to hire actors to impersonate us."

"Let's go down to City Hall and get
married beforehand. Then if anything happens, at least we'll be married."

"Oh, but.. .1 wouldn't like that. It would
be lying.. .1 would feel weird. How about we do that after, if the real wedding
gets messed up?"

"Okay. Plan B." He holds out his
hand, and I shake it.

"So are you finding anything?"

"Well, ideally I would like a neuroleptic
called Risperdal, but it won't be marketed until 1994. The next best thing
would be Clozaril, and a possible third choice would be Haldol."

"They all sound like high-tech cough
medicine."

"They're antipsychotics."

"Seriously?"

"Yes."

"You're not psychotic."

Henry looks at me and makes a horrible face and
claws at the air like a silent movie werewolf. Then he says, quite seriously,
"On an EEG, I have the brain of a schizophrenic. More than one doctor has
insisted that this little time-travel delusion of mine is due to schizophrenia.
These drugs block dopamine receptors."

"Side effects?"

"Well.. .dystonia, akathisia,
pseudo-Parkinsonism. That is, involuntary muscle contractions, restlessness,
rocking, pacing, insomnia, immobility, lack of facial expression. And then
there's tardive dyskinsia, chronic uncontrollable facial muscles, and
agranulocytosis, the destruction of the body's ability to make white blood
cells. And then there's the loss of sexual function. And the fact that all the
drugs that are currently available are somewhat sedative."

"You're not seriously thinking of taking
any of these, are you?"

"Well, I've taken Haldol in the past. And
Thorazine."

"And..,?"

"Really horrible. I was totally zombified.
It felt like my brain was full of Elmer's Glue."

"Isn't there anything else?"

"Valium. Librium. Xanax."

"Mama takes those. Xanax and Valium."

"Yeah, that would make sense." He
makes a face and sets the Physicians' Desk Reference aside and says, "Move
over." We adjust our positions on the couch until we are lying side by
side. It's very cozy.

"Don't take anything."

"Why not?"

"You're not sick."

Henry laughs. "That's what I love you for:
your inability to perceive all my hideous flaws." He's unbuttoning my
shirt and I wrap my hand around his. He looks at me, waiting. I am a little
angry.

"I don't understand why you talk like
that. You're always saying horrible things about yourself. You aren't like
that. You're good."

Henry looks at my hand and disengages his, and
draws me closer. "I'm not good," he says softly, in my ear. "But
maybe I will be, hmmm?"

"You better be."

"I'm good to you." Too true.
"Clare?" "Hmmm?"

"Do you ever lie awake wondering if I'm
some kind of joke God is playing on you?"

"No. I lie awake worrying that you might
disappear and never come back. I lie awake brooding about some of the stuff I
sort of half know about in the future. But I have total faith in the idea that
we are supposed to be together."

"Total faith."

"Don't you?"

Henry kisses me. ' "Nor Time, nor Place,
nor Chance, nor Death can bow/my least desires unto the least remove.'"
"Come again?" "I don't mind if I do." "Braggart."

"Now who's saying horrible things about
me?"

Monday, September 6, 1993 (Henry is 30)

Henry: I'm sitting on the stoop of a dingy
white aluminum-sided house in Humboldt Park. It's Monday morning, around ten.
I'm waiting for Ben to get back from wherever he is. I don't like this
neighborhood very much; I feel kind of exposed sitting here at Ben's door, but
he's an extremely punctual guy, so I continue to wait with confidence. I watch
two young Hispanic women push baby strollers along the pitched and broken
sidewalk. As I meditate on the inequity of city services, I hear someone yell
"Library Boy!" in the distance. I look in the direction of the voice
and sure enough, it's Gomez. I groan inwardly; Gomez has an amazing talent for
running into me when I'm up to something particularly nefarious. I will have to
get rid of him before Ben shows up. Gomez comes sailing toward me happily. He's
wearing his lawyer outfit, and carrying his briefcase. I sigh.

" Qa va, comrade."

" Qa va. What are you doing here?"

Good question. "Waiting on a friend. What
time is it?"

"Quarter after ten. September
6,1993," he adds helpfully. "I know, Gomez. But thanks anyway. You
visiting a client?" "Yeah. Ten-year-old girl. Mom's boyfriend made
her drink Drano. I do get tired of humans." "Yeah. Too many maniacs,
not enough Michelangelos." "You had lunch? Or breakfast, I guess it
would be?" "Yeah. I kind of need to stay here, wait for my friend."

"I didn't know any of your friends lived
out this way. All the people I know over here are sadly in need of legal
counsel."

"Friend from library school." And
here he is. Ben drives up in his '62 silver Mercedes. The inside is a wreck,
but from the outside it's a sweet-looking car. Gomez whistles softly.

"Sorry I'm late," Ben says, hurrying
up the walk. "Housecall." Gomez looks at me inquisitively. I ignore
him. Ben looks at Gomez, and at me.

"Gomez, Ben. Ben, Gomez. So sorry you have
to leave, comrade."

"Actually, I've got a couple hours
free—"

Ben takes the situation in hand. "Gomez.
Great meeting you. Some other time, yes?" Ben is quite nearsighted, and he
peers kindly at Gomez through his thick glasses that magnify his eyes to twice
their normal size. Ben's jingling his keys in his hand. It's making me nervous.
We both stand quietly, waiting for Gomez to leave. "Okay. Yeah. Well,
bye," says Gomez.

"I'll call you this afternoon" I tell
him. He turns without looking at me and walks away. I feel bad, but there are
things I don't want Gomez to know, and this is one of them. Ben and I turn to
each other, share a look that acknowledges the fact that we know things about
each other that are problematic. He opens his front door. I have always itched
to try my hand at breaking into Ben's place, because he has a large number and
variety of locks and security devices. We enter the dark narrow hall. It always
smells like cabbage in here, even though I know for a fact that Ben never cooks
much in the way of food, let alone cabbage. We walk to the back stairway, up
and into another hallway, through one bedroom and into another, which Ben has
set up as a lab. He sets down his bag and hangs up his jacket. I half expect
him to put on some tennis shoes, a la Mr. Rogers, but instead he putters around
with his coffee maker. I sit down on a folding chair and wait for Ben to
finish. More than anyone else I know, Ben looks like a librarian. And I did in
fact meet him at Rosary, but he quit before finishing his MLS. He has gotten
thinner since I saw him last, and lost a little more hair. Ben has AIDS, and
every time I see him I pay attention, because I never know how it will go, with
him.

"You're looking good " I tell him.

"Massive doses of AZT. And vitamins, and
yoga, and visual imaging. Speaking of which. What can I do for you?"
"I'm getting married."

Ben is surprised, and then delighted.
"Congratulations. To whom?" "Clare. You met her. The girl with
very long red hair." "Oh—yes." Ben looks grave. "She
knows?"

"Yes."

"Well, great." He gives me a look
that says that this is all very nice, but what of it?

"So her parents have planned this huge
wedding, up in Michigan. Church, bridesmaids, rice, the whole nine yards. And a
lavish reception at the Yacht Club, afterward. White tie, no less."

Ben pours out coffee and hands me a mug with
Winnie the Pooh on it. I stir powdered creamer into it. It's cold up here, and
the coffee smells bitter but kind of good.

"I need to be there. I need to get through
about eight hours of huge, mind-boggling stress, without disappearing."

"Ah." Ben has a way of taking in a
problem, just accepting it, which I find very soothing. "I need something
that's going to K.O. every dopamine receptor I've got."

"Navane, Haldol, Thorazine, Serentil,
Mellaril, Stelazine... " Ben polishes his glasses on his sweater. He looks
like a large hairless mouse without them.

"I was hoping you could make this for
me." I fish around in my jeans for the paper, find it and hand it over.
Ben squints at it, reads.

"3-[2-[4-96-fluoro-l,2-benizisoxazol-3-yl)...colloidal
silicon dioxide, hydroxypropyl methylcellulose.. .propylene glycol—" He
looks up at me, bewildered. "What is this?"

"It's a new antipsychotic called
risperidone, marketed as Risperdal. It will be commercially available in 1998,
but I would like to try it now. It belongs to a new class of drugs called
benzisoxazole derivatives."

"Where did you get this?"

"PDR. The 2000 edition."

"Who makes it?"

"Janssen."

"Henry, you know you don't tolerate
antipsycotics very well. Unless this works in some radically different
way?"

"They don't know how it works. 'Selective
monoaminergic antagonist with high affinity for serotonin type 2, dopamine type
2, blah blah blah."

"Well, same old same old. What makes you
think this is going to be any better than Haldol?" I smile patiently.
"It's an educated guess. I don't know for sure. Can you make that?"
Ben hesitates. "I can, yes"

"How soon? It takes a while to build up in
the system." "I'll let you know. When's the wedding?"
"October 23 "

"Mmm. What's the dosage?"

"Start with 1 milligram and build from
there."

Ben stands up, stretches. In the dim light of
this cold room he seems old, jaundiced, paper-skinned. Part of Ben likes the
challenge (hey, let's replicate this avant-garde drug that nobody's even
invented yet) and part of him doesn't like the risk. "Henry, you don't
even know for sure that dopamine's your problem."

"You've seen the scans."

"Yeah, yeah. Why not just live with it?
The cure might be worse than the problem."

"Ben. What if I snapped my fingers right
now—" I stand up, lean close to him, snap my fingers: "and right now
you suddenly found yourself standing in Allen's bedroom, in 1986—"

"—I'd kill the fucker."

"But you can't, because you didn't."
Ben closes his eyes, shakes his head. "And you can't change anything: he
will still get sick, you will still get sick, und so wiete. What if you had to
watch him die over and over?" Ben sits in the folding chair. He's not
looking at me. "That's what it's like, Ben. I mean, yeah, sometimes it's fun.
But mostly it's getting lost and stealing and trying to just
     
"

"Cope." Ben sighs. "God, I don't
know why I put up with you."

"Novelty? My boyish good looks?"

"Dream on. Hey, am I invited to this
wedding?"

I am startled. It never occurred to me that Ben
would want to come. "Yeah! Really? You would come?"

"Beats funerals."

"Great! My side of the church is filling
up rapidly. You'll be my eighth guest." Ben laughs. "Invite all your
ex-girlfriends. That'll swell the ranks." "I'd never survive it. Most
of them want my head on a stick."

"Mmm ." Ben gets up and rummages in
one of his desk drawers. He pulls out an empty pill bottle and opens another
drawer, takes out a huge bottle of capsules, opens it and places three pills in
the small bottle. He tosses it to me.

"What is it?" I ask, opening the
bottle and shaking a pill onto my palm.

"It's an endorphin stabilizer combined
with an antidepressant. It's— hey, don't—" I have popped the pill into my
mouth and swallowed. "It's morphine-based." Ben sighs. "You have
the most casually arrogant attitude toward drugs."

"I like opiates."

"I bet. Don't think I'm going to let you
have a ton of those, either. Let me know if you think that would do the job for
the wedding. In case this other thing doesn't pan out. They last about four
hours, so you would need two." Ben nods at the two remaining pills.
"Don't gobble those up just for fun, okay?"

"Scout's honor."

Ben snorts. I pay him for the pills and leave.
As I walk downstairs I feel the rush grab me and I stop at the bottom of the
stairs to luxuriate in it. It's been a while. Whatever Ben has mixed in here,
it's fantastic. It's like an orgasm times ten plus cocaine, and it seems to be
getting stronger. As I walk out the front door I practically trip over Gomez.
He's been waiting for me.