She of High Mind (Redactor’s Addendum)

My, my. Just look at us go!

My word, my word. Such fun.

We’re having such fun, aren’t we, Herschel.

Aren’t we.

Why, with all the fun we’re having, well.

Well, one could be forgiven for thinking that—that it’s still the 15th of December! The Sunday of the second week!

One could be mistaken for thinking that that Sunday never ended, with the way you and I natter on.

We do natter on, don’t we, you and I, Herschel? We are so funny that way, you and I.

Like two peas in a pod, aren’t we. Chattering about this, chattering about that.

“They’re in their own little world,” people might say, affectionately, of us.

“Oh, don’t mind those Schoen kids,” people might well say. “They’re in their own little”

I wrote six thousand words, just about the little argument we had in the morning, that Sunday.

And I wrote close to eight thousand, about the little question-and-answer game we played, on the evening of the very same day.

And as for what happened in between? Your little trip up to the Financial District?

My, my. You really outdid yourself, there—didn’t you, Herschel?

You wrote so many words, in that long section from your papers, the one called “The Burden of Babylon.”

I don’t know how many words you wrote, in that section. I get dizzy even trying to think about the subject.

But however much you wrote—I’m sure it’s enough to tie the score, at least. And probably enough to roundly beat me, fair and square.

One could be forgiven for thinking that the third week of December never in fact arrived.

That we just, I don’t know, stayed up that Sunday night—and stayed up late, talking in whispers, trying not to wake Ma—and stayed up, and up, later and later, until at last we realized that there would be no sunrise.

No hurried Monday morning rush. No sheepish apology from Ma about the lack of a real breakfast, same as the last time, same as she always did.

(I don’t remember the last time we had anything worthy of being called a “real breakfast,” on a weekday morning. All I remember is the apologies, which were plenty real, and prepared with such care that one couldn’t help but admire them.)

(The apologies that she laid out just so, in front of us, with such care. The apologies, which had been primped and fretted over, much as our picture-perfect magazine-cover “real breakfast” might have been primped and fretted over, and laid out so perfectly on the table beneath the photogenic light of the Monday sunrise, in Ma’s magazine-cover fantasies.)

(It’s fine, Ma. It’s fine! I don’t need to have a breakfast at all, really. I’m not hungry, really, come to think of it.)

(It’s funny, I know, but I’m really not. Not hungry, I mean.)

(But the thing is that she wouldn’t let it be fine. It wasn’t really about us, anyway, we knew that. It was about her, and her wounded pride.)

One could be forgiven for thinking that we just floated up, up, all the way to the ceiling, and stuck there, and had such fun up there that there wouldn’t ever have to be a Monday, a 16th of December, a start to the third week.

It is all well and

It is all well and good, to

It is all well and good to look back over old things which were nice. It is all well and good to keep scrapbooks, and laugh fondly over old memories which were so funny at the time. And are so funny now, too, in another way, looking back.

It is all well and good to have a bit of fun. But one does have to take one’s medicine, too, and eat one’s vegetables.

One does have to come down from the ceiling sooner or later, and be serious, and face the facts.

It will only hurt a little bit, now. For just a moment, when the needle goes in. And then you’ll be all done, won’t you? All done, and as good as new.

Look, your sister did it, didn’t she? Look, look at her, look how she’s smiling. See?

Yes, I know the needle touched you. Yes, I know you don’t like that one bit. I know, okay?

There’s no need to bawl like that. You’re done, see? The scary bit, the bit where it hurts, is already over. And just look at you, now, all good as new!

And after all—it is not as though we could just hold up our twiglike little arms, you and me, and force the rushing tide to relent.

Just by ourselves, just with our four weak little arms, your two and my two.

It’s not as though we could hold back the wave of history, just you and I and our puny Schoen-kid arms, which had never benefitted from a “real breakfast,” anyone could tell that just by looking, no need for any shamefaced nattering from Ma to confirm the fact.

“No,” people might say of us. “There’s no way those Schoen kids could have done that.

“Ha, ha! Oh, the very idea, it tickles my sides,” they might say.

“I am going to need a moment,” they might even say. “Before I. Before . . . ha! My, my, my.

“I am going to need a moment to recover, before I can, ha! before I can, ha! ha! Oh my, oh my.

“What a thought, you know. What a thought. I’ve heard a lot of tall tales in my days on this earth, but my, that one does take the cake, now doesn’t it? That one really is something.

“But, to be serious, now,” they might say, with a wistful amusement. As if looking at an old scrapbook from a very long time ago, unable to recognize themselves in the infantile beings who can be seen cavorting through the successive images, or in the eerie, careless smiles that adorn those beings’ faces each frame and then again in the next, beneath the wind-whipped half-human hair.

“But, to be serious, now,” they might say, “I do think that the Schoen kids had it in them to . . . meet the wave with grace, when it came for them.

“I can see them, those two. I can just see them. Two peas in a pod. With smiles on both their faces, as they look up, together.

“As they look up together at the wave, as it comes. I can see them, smiling, without a care in the world. Can’t you?

“Can’t you just see it?

“The wet rush of the tide, the wild spraying water? And those two, those funny Schoen kids, just smiling as they get splashed? Just smiling on and on, as it comes, and rises way up high above their heads, and comes down again?”

 

 

It was around six P.M., on Monday, the 16th of December.

Let’s say that it was around six P.M. Good enough.

It might, in fact, have been a little earlier than that, or a little later. But not too much earlier, or later.

Certainly not as late as six-thirty, for instance.

Because, see, Ma usually got home around six-thirty P.M., on work days. Give or take.

So I wouldn’t have noticed anything out of the ordinary, if it had been as late as six-thirty P.M.

Where was I?

Yes, yes. It was around six P.M.

I was in bed, watching Vincent’s latest video essay. He had a new one out, as it happened, that day.

Nothing in it was new to me, oh no. He’d told me all about what was going to be in this new essay, earlier on, in the previous week.

Still, it was nice. Seeing the way that all those lofty ideas he’d talked about, on the phone, with such boyish excitement, had come to fruition in the real facts of the man, the room, the lamp, the camera.

Everything that could be seen was always so prettily arranged, in Vincent’s essays. Primped and fretted over, prepared just so. Despite the simplicity of the available materials—man, room, lamp, camera—he always managed to make something new out of them, in every essay he did.

Everyone noticed it, I should imagine. No one watching Vincent’s video essays could miss his natural talent for the medium, for getting dolled up and making yourself new—even if you’re only a man in a room, under the harsh light of one simple floor lamp, and offering yourself up once again to the merciless eye of the camera.

But even if they didn’t notice it? I did. I was there, every time, watching. To appreciate him, just in case no one else did.

It was around six P.M., give or take.

I lay on the bed, watching Vincent.

I barely heard his words. I didn’t need to; I had heard them all before.

I saw a man, in a room, under a lamp.

I saw the green-on-green wallpaper behind the man. I saw its green plaitings and greener fleurons, nested, nestling. I fell backward, smiling, into that lace fairyland.

I smiled my mindless smile, on and on, without any camera there to worry over it.

I saw the black rectangle of the bedroom door, behind the man. I saw the magnetic-tape shadows that kissed its edges, and the way they bloomed outward onto the wall.

He arranged it that way, you know. The door, and the shadows, there behind him in the frame, in every video essay. The way they felt so inviting, so welcoming, in spite of the harsh light and the pure darkness.

No, not “in spite of.” Because of. Because of the dolled-up light and the fetching darkness, which Vincent had prepared so thoroughly, so thoughtfully, with his steady and careful hands.

Oh, whatever am I doi

Miriam, Miriam. Now, now, now.

It was the funniest thing, you know. On Friday evening. It was just about the funniest thing you ever did

It was six P.M.

I suppose I was on the bed. I suppose Vincent’s latest essay was playing.

One can surmise all sorts of things, about what was probably true, at the time. It might be fun to try to count them, maybe.

There would no doubt have been cockroaches in the room with me, somewhere, crawling along the floor. There were always cockroaches, somewhere, in that room. Under the beds, somewhere, usually.

That’s one fact. The fact about the roaches, I mean, that they were probably there under the bed, under me. That’s one, and then another could be added, and the score would be up to two. And then I could go on trying to think of more facts, and counting them up, additionally, just like that.

It might be a nice bit of fun, just for a while, trying to count them up. Or maybe not. I don’t know.

I could say, maybe: Herschel was not in the room. That’s a fact, see? And so I get to write another tally mark down on my little scoreboard.

Herschel was out in the living room, where he’d been since he’d gotten home from school, a bit earlier. He was busy with his writing, I’d have to imagine.

I didn’t see Herschel writing, any more than I saw the roaches, rushing here and there across the shadows under my bed. But I’m sure that’s what he was doing, out there on the living room couch.

There are certain things one could rely on, in the Schoen household. The roaches skittering underfoot, and my brother’s pen skittering over the page.

And our own dear exhausted Ma, arriving home from work. At six-thirty, or a little later, even.

It was always at six-thirty, or a little later, that Ma got home. On Mondays, anyway. She’d started going to some sort of class, recently, after work, on some evenings, and that kept her out of the house much later, of course. But her class was only held on certain days, never on Monday.

I heard a noise. It rudely grabbed my attention, shoving aside the love of my life and the shadows he had prepared so carefully for me.

I heard the front door slam shut.

That’s what the noise was, I realized, after a moment. The door, slamming shut.

I heard Herschel say something, though I didn’t hear what.

His voice sounded as it usually did—when he was not off on one of his rants, I mean. It was placid, perfect, a flat lake which had not so much as stirred, even once, since the beginning of time.

A moment later, I heard Ma’s voice, out in the living room.

There was something wrong in Ma’s voice.

I don’t mean that she sounded irritable, or angry, or anything like that. Nothing would have been amiss, if she’d only sounded irritable or angry. I was used to that sort of thing; it was how she sounded more often than not, around the house, by then.

I only mean that I have spent all twenty-one years of my life under the same roof as that woman. I know what her voice sounds like.

And so, I knew there was something wrong with her voice, then.

That was why I got up off the bed, and went out into the living room, just then.

If it hadn’t been for that—for the thing that was wrong in Ma’s voice, the thing that I heard and couldn’t ignore, not after twenty-one years with that woman—why, well, in that case I might not have gone out into the living room at all.

In that case, I might well have stayed in the bedroom. Vincent’s latest essay was barely half over, after all.

And after it was over? Well, I might have found something else for myself to do, in there, under the covers, with no one but roaches to watch me.

Yes, yes, I know: if I had stayed in there the whole evening, it would have meant missing all of the evening’s scheduled television programs.

As you may have noticed, however, I am not a good person. I rarely do what has not already been made convenient, or made impossible to ignore. If my spoiled child’s heart had wished to stay in bed? Then I would have stayed in bed. For the whole evening, if I felt like it.

Isn’t it fun, thinking whimsically like this, about funny old might-have-beens that never were, and never in fact could have been? Sitting side by side, with the scrapbook in both our laps, laughing and laughing?

If we set our minds to it, we could spend all day like that, you and I could, probably.

 

 

“America,” Ma was saying, as I came out into the living room.

I couldn’t see her face. She had her back to me, and to Herschel.

She faced the wall, over by the front door, next to the telephone nook.

She seemed—for all the world—to be talking to that wall, rather than to either of her children.

“America,” she said. “Come to America! Come to America, they said.”

I suppose, thinking back, that you might have said Ma sounded angry, if you didn’t know better.

Angry, or I guess bitter might be a better word, really.

If you were not that woman’s daughter, you might have simply thought that what you heard was an angry voice, or a bitter one. Simply that, and nothing more. Plain as day, with nothing amiss.

But I knew better. All I heard was: wrong.

No other word could possibly fit, and no other word could possibly be needed.

“Come to America,” Ma said.

“Come to New York City,” she said, “where they’ve got that big lousy Statue of Liberty, and the whole works.

“Where they’ve got the big blood-suckers, bigger than anywhere. The ones that got to be so big and full and healthy, it’s a sight to see, you wouldn’t believe.

“Why, in America,” she said with a hollow laugh, “the blood-suckers eat so well, they might not be able to take even one more bite! They might be done with dinner!

“They might just give you a little taste of their leftovers.

“And why not? Who else’s gonna eat all that, huh? After all, it’d be a shame to go to all that trouble, bleeding the working class dry, and then let the blood go to waste!

“Who’s gonna clean up the table scraps, huh? After the blood-suckers, and their kids, have eaten their fill of all the good bits?

“Could be you, they said.

“Could well be you, Ruth Schoen.”

I took a few furtive steps away from the bedroom door, toward the center of the room.

“Ma?” I said.

“Ma? What’s wrong?”

She turned to me, and I saw her face. But there was nothing on it at all, or nothing that I could make sense of, anyway.

I saw only a flat, blank expanse, which technically contained eyes and a nose and a mouth, but which had been systematically stripped of all human meaning.

“Did something happen?” I said. “At work?”

My mother simply stared at me, wrongly. Without any sort of warmth, even the angry kind.

“How’s anyone supposed to,” she muttered.

I couldn’t see Herschel over the back of the couch, at the time, but I could hear the sound of him shifting his posture, there.

“How’s anyone supposed to raise her kids,” Ma said.

“Two kids,” she said. “Her two kids.

“Raise two kids—in America? In Brooklyn, New York, no less? It’s a joke. It’s a big lousy joke, that they all played on me.”

“Mother?” Herschel said.

Ma turned her head mechanically to the couch. She turned her meaningless eyes away from her daughter and toward her son, and stared at the son exactly as she had at the daughter, a moment earlier.

“I am very hungry,” Herschel said, “at present.

“Seeing as you are home unusually early,” he said, “might you prepare dinner unusually early, as well?

“It would make me glad, I think, to have dinner unusually early, tonight.

“My belly groans and begs, with increasing insistence, and soon enough I fear it may come between me and my papers, and impose an unwelcome delay upon the preparations which occupy me tonight, and which must be brought off just right, in every particular.”

Sometimes he was so perfectly oblivious that I half suspected he was doing it on purpose, to make us laugh.

Well, if he was, it worked. On Ma, anyway.

She laughed, wrongly, without any feeling at all.

“Oh, Herschel,” Ma said.

“Whatever will I do with you,” she said. “Two kids, and one of them’s got mental problems. In Brooklyn, New York.

“I should’ve done better by you, Herschel. All told, I should’ve. You’re my son, after all.

“I should’ve got a big dinner all ready for my son, tonight. A big dinner, with the whole works. Ready the moment I got in, for my son who’s got mental problems.

“It’s the least I could do, for my son who’s got mental problems, who’s having trouble at school. Who has to go see that bitch every day, now, that bitch Mrs. Rachel, every day, on account of all the trouble he’s having.

“If I can’t do that, for my son, what sort of mother am I, huh?

“Come on. Tell me. What sort of a mother am I. If I can’t do that, for my son.”

“Ma,” I said. “It’s all right.

“It’s fine,” I said. “We don’t have to have some fancy dinner, all right? We can just have a normal dinner, at the usual time.

“We’ll be fine,” I said. “Relax. I can tell that you . . . I can tell that you, I don’t know, that you had a tough day at work, or something, and it’s—”

“Oh you can say that again,” Ma said.

“You can say that again, ha, ha.

“Seeing as I got fired, and all.

“Seeing as I won’t be going to work any longer, at all, seems like.

“Hard day at work? Ha, ha.

“You know what they did today, Miriam? At work? At the wordmill? Huh?”

“No,” I said.

“They fired practically the whole place,” Ma said.

“Ninety percent of employees got their pink slips, today. What do you think of that, huh, Miriam?”

To my relief, she did not wait for me to respond before continuing on.

“A big old Christmas gift, from Herschel’s Santa Claus, maybe, I think,” Ma said.

“Give the workers something for the holiday, for once! A little something nice.

“Let them spend some time at home, with their families, for the holiday.”

“Wait,” I said.

“Ma, you got fired?

“And . . . ninety percent of everyone got fired?

“How are they . . . how are they even going to keep the place going, after that?”

Herschel stood up from the couch. I saw him glance my way, briefly.

He looked at me with pity, briefly, and with an exhaustion born of long-sustained patience finally giving way.

And then he turned towards the other side of the room, and towards Ma.

He approached her.

“Do not have fear,” he said to her. He was a perfectly still lake, which no mere tossed stone could ever disturb.

“If you suffer,” he said to her, “you suffer for nine days only, if not fewer.

“After that,” he said, “all your suffering will come to an end, a final end, and you will be glad again, and mirthful again.

“So long as I am permitted to undertake the necessary preparations, and provided that I bring things off just right, at that moment for which I am preparing.”

“Herschel,” Ma said.

“You do tire me out, sometimes,” she said. “You know that?”

As far as I could tell, Herschel made no response to this whatsoever.

“You’re a real handful, son,” Ma said. “You know that?

“Maybe you could pay your Ma back for it, for some of that trouble. For once.

“Say, Herschel. Since you’re so smart, what with that Raven test and all.

“Since you’re so smart, maybe you can tell me how we’re gonna pay the rent on this place, next month.

“Or get groceries, next month.

“Or anything.

“You’re so smart, huh, then how about you tell me how we’re gonna pay for any of it.

“Maybe you could do that. Just a little something, for your Ma, just once.”

I walked across the wide room, taking big brash steps, no longer caring to be quiet.

“Ma, there’s still hope,” I pleaded.

“There has to be hope, somehow,” I said. “There has to be a way. For us.”

The funny thing was that I really believed it, when I said it.

For some reason, I believed it. If you ever think I’m smart, like my brother, remind yourself of this, and come to your senses.

“Herschel can help you!” I said.

I was having what I thought was a bright idea, see.

Ma looked at me, blankly. If she had been angry, or confused, that might have been easier to take, but she wasn’t.

Just flat, blank, wrong.

“Herschel can help us!” I said. “He really can! Really!

“He made a friend, remember? At school?

“And his friend, Ma—his friend, it’s Frederick Eggert!

“The son of Damien Eggert himself—yes, the same Damien Eggert who owns and runs Eggert Capital, and Eggert Electronic, and—and, you know, all the rest of them, I can’t even keep track!

“Damien Eggert owns the wordmill, too, Ma!

“If Herschel could just, oh, I don’t know—talk to his friend, for you—put in a good word, you know, and put a human face on all the firings—maybe then—if his friend went to his father, and talked to him, and explained how things were—”

I stopped, as I finally noticed what was happening on Ma’s face.

 

 

“Eggert,” Ma said.

She looked back and forth, at me, at Herschel, at the both of us.

“My son,” she said, “is friends with Damien Eggert’s kid?”

The wrongness was still in her, pulsing. But now she was angry, finally, alongside that wrongness.

Even I could see that, finally.

Angry is an understatement. She looked betrayed, more like. She looked like she was about ready to disown the both of us, there and then, on the spot.

“Oh, I just knew something was wrong with you, Herschel,” she said.

She didn’t look at Herschel, or at me. She turned toward the inner side of the living room, the side with the doors that lead to the bedrooms and the bathroom and the kitchen.

She lifted up her head, and stood tall.

She walked, with an air of finality, toward the inner side of the room, toward the doors.

“I knew something was wrong with you,” she said, “from the moment you were born, Herschel.

“From before, even. The way you gave me trouble, even before you were born.

“You didn’t give me any trouble like that, now did you, huh, Miriam?

“I’d had you already, Miriam, so I knew what a kid’s supposed to be like. From the beginning on.

“It’s no picnic, make no mistake. It gives you trouble.

“But it’s not like . . . it’s not like he was. Not when it’s a real kid that you’ve got inside, instead of . . .

“Oh, I should have known. I should have known right away what it meant, that my son was giving me all that trouble, inside.

“I should have known he was a damned parasite! A blood-sucker!

“Sitting pretty in my belly, sucking my blood, thinking he was pulling a fast one on me!”

She walked through the door to the kitchen, and disappeared from view.

“Ma?” I said, limply.

A moment later, I heard her voice ring out from the kitchen. If she had heard me, she gave no indication. She carried on in the same way she had before.

In spite of her rage, or because of it, she spoke with pride, and with an odd and almost regal dignity.

“Should have known,” she said, “that I had a, what. Inside my belly. Instead of a real baby.

“A, a . . . a rentier! A parasite! Inside my belly!

“Who’d suck up all my blood, and demand more, and more—and never give anything to his Ma in return.

“Who wouldn’t even give his own Ma the table scraps that he refused to eat, because they weren’t good enough for him. Too coarse for his refined taste.

“I should have known that that thing in my belly was gonna grow up to be—to be a damn class traitor, that’s what! A parasite and a leech and an ally of capital!

“And sell me out! Sell out his own Ma! Give me all this trouble, and then sell out his own damn Ma, to his kind, in the end!

“Saying he’s got a friend, at last, even with his mental problems and all—oh, he’s got a friend, all right!

“He’s showing his true colors, with the friend that he’s got!

“So even his own damn Ma, who any old fool could pull a fast one on—who thought Brooklyn, New York was a place to raise two damn kids, with mental problems—

“—even his own damn Ma could see his true colors, now that he was showing them off so much!

“Showing them off with that pride of his!

“Like always, like he always did. Always thinking he was better than the rest of us.

“And I was everybody’s fool, and coddled him, and made him worse! Why, I didn’t even know why he thought he was better than the rest of us. I hadn’t even guessed.

“Oh, but now I know.

“Now I know my son’s true colors. No more hiding that from me, huh?”

Ma had returned from the kitchen, I saw.

She did not run across the living room floor, but only walked very quickly, in careful steps, with regal dignity.

She walked across the living room floor, towards the place where my brother was standing.

It was clear, now, why she had gone off to the kitchen, a minute ago.

She’d gone to look for our frying pan.

Which, for once, had been just in the place where she’d left it, the day before, in the kitchen.

I saw her approaching Herschel, now, with that frying pan in her hand.

I saw her stop, very close to Herschel, and then raise up her arm.

She loomed over my brother, holding the frying pan above her head, and above his.

And then she

 

 

Come on, now, Miriam.

If your brother can do it, so can you.

It will just be a little prick, see? Just a little hole in your arm, a teensy tiny one. Why, you’ll barely notice the needle, going in.

And it will be a magical hole, that one in your arm. If you can just allow the nice doctor to put the needle in, just this once, for just a moment.

Then you’ll be good as new.

Then all the lightness and all the joy in the whole wide world will flow in, through that one little hole, into your arm, into you.

 

 

I cringed.

I held my cowardly hands in front of my face.

I shut my eyes, and held my interlaced fingers tight over those eyes, as if expecting that my eyelids would somehow fail me, and I would need a second way of making myself see nothing at all.

“My son,” Ma said.

A horrible noise followed.

“My son,” she said again, and there was another horrible noise, just like the first.

The arm coming up, coming down. The heavy metal pan, lifted up, slammed down. The horrible sound that it made, when it struck Herschel’s—

Herschel’s what? His arm, his shoulder, his chest? His back? His buttocks? His head?

It was a heavy pan and Ma was a strong woman. If she hit my brother across the head with that thing then—then—

No, no, it was too horrible.

Too horrible to think, too horrible to see. I couldn’t. I can’t.

I heard the sound, over and over. I heard groans, and quick intakes of breath, and the hard sudden horrible sound of the blows as they came down, one and then the next.

I had to know where she was hitting him, on which part of his body, because if it was on his head, then—

I had to look. I couldn’t look.

I only had to do one simple thing. It would hurt, but only for a m

I only had to do the one simple thing that was asked of me, the only one that had ever been asked of me. I only had to bear witne

I had to look.

I didn’t look.

I heard Herschel cough.

“Don’t you try to run and hide from me, boy,” Ma said. “None of that, anymore, now, you hear me?”

I heard the sound of another blow, and a gasp, after it.

I had to look.

I couldn’t look, it was unbearable, but—but not looking was unbearable too, I couldn’t stand it anymore, I had to—had to—

I opened my eyes and created a very small window between two of my fingers, allowing myself a momentary glimpse of the room.

I saw Herschel standing with his back against the wall, next to the telephone nook. I could not see any blood on him, yet, or any other sign of damage.

That was good, I imagined. That was a good sign. Under the circumstances.

Although, I reflected, I did not really know anything about bodies or blunt objects, about blood, about bodily damage—except what I had been shown by the television, when such things were dramatized.

And it was not in order to tell us how to handle our own mothers, in our own living rooms, that these messages were broadcast to us. They were sent for a very different purpose, and from a different place, in which there were no mothers or living rooms at all.

I saw Ma, standing over my brother.

I saw the frying pan in her hand, moving, coming down again.

I shut my fingers, and my eyelids too.

“You must understand,” Herschel said.

I could hear that he was breathing heavily, and quickly. As a person would, under the circumstances.

If it was someone else, and not him, you might have said that he sounded afraid. As anyone would, no doubt, in his place.

But he was my brother, not anyone else.

“You must understand, Mother,” he said, “that I hold no malice toward you, for what you are doing, now.”

Ma grunted.

“It is of shadows, what you are doing now,” Herschel explained.

“It is of no consequence,” he said.

He began to speak again, but was cut off.

There was a loud noise, and then a long, awful silence.

I shut my eyes as tight as I could, and waited for that silence to stop.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Silence.

Breathe, Miriam—!

Silence, still.

“Ma,” I said.

“Ma, please,” I said.

I heard a string of wordless noises. From vocal cords, from bodies, from objects.

“Ma, you have to stop,” I said.

“You’re going to hurt him. And then—and then you’ll be sorry, but he’ll still be hurt—”

The voice that interrupted me, and contradicted me, was not my mother’s. It was her son’s.

Herschel addressed me from across the room. He did not use, with me, the placid tone he had used with Ma, just a moment earlier.

He sounded furious.

“Sister, do you really believe that I can be harmed?!

“By the brute action of one shadow upon another, depicted in shadow-play on the screen set out below Sheol?

“I had not thought you so far gone, Sister!”

He sounded furious—at me.

“Do I think . . . do I . . .” I stammered.

“Do I think you can be . . . harmed? Yes, Herschel!

“Yes, you can be fucking harmed, if someone fucking beats you with a piece of metal! And does it over and over, and doesn’t stop, I mean, I mean—

“I mean, Herschel, what the fuck are you even saying—”

“I won’t have that sort of language,” Ma said regally, “in my house, Miriam.”

“My daughter has such a tongue on her,” she said to herself.

“But at least she’s not a parasite, like my son is,” she said.

A parasite? I thought, but did not say. If HE is a parasite, then what on earth does that make me? He is still in school, at least, isn’t he?

“At least my daughter,” Ma said, “isn’t sick in the head, and all twisted up inside, like my son.”

Oh, I thought furiously, and you think THIS is going to help, is that it? You think he’ll be all well again, in the HEAD, after—

After—!

No, no, no, no!

I opened my eyes, not even in order to see what was in front of me, but as an act of simple defiance, as a bodily expression of my blind rage.

I didn’t think, before doing it. It was only half willed, almost reflexive.

I opened my eyes, and saw a room, and a mother, and a son.

And I saw, or thought I saw, a small splash of red, somewhere, newly added to the composition.

Which I decided I didn’t much like, and so I closed my eyes again, to make everything black again, to make that nasty splash go away. There! All gone.

“These events are of no significance,” Herschel said.

My eyes were closed, but I could hear in his voice how he had been battered, and how he held his head up still, in spite of it.

“Ma,” I said. “Stop. You’re going to hurt him.

“You’re going to give him bruises. You’re going to give him a concussion. You’re going to . . .”

You’re going to give him fucking brain damage, hitting him in the head with that thing, I thought, but did not say.

And won’t you be sorry, then, I thought. Won’t you be so, so very sorry indeed.

When he’s REALLY sick in the head, and it’s your fault, and he won’t get well again, ever, and—

“I’m giving him what he needs, Miriam,” Ma said.

“I do not have needs, Mother,” her son said, patiently, without malice. “I am—”

“Stop!” I screamed, at both of them.

I was very loud, but neither of them made any sign that they had noticed.

“Sister, you must understand,” Herschel said. Between each phrase and the next, I heard an audibly forceful intake of breath, or sometimes a cough.

“Once you . . . understand, Sister,” he said, haltingly, “you will be . . . glad, and . . . without fear.

“These events . . . are of no significance.

“My preparations . . . the last rite . . .

“It will . . . only be nine days more . . . really closer to eight, now . . . eight days, and then . . .

“You will have the Original Knowledge . . . again . . . and the Original Creation . . . and you will be glad, again, and . . .”

“That’s enough outta you,” Ma said.

The Original Creation, I thought. My brother’s little world, which exists nowhere except in his own head.

If she hits him on the head, I thought, and really hurts him, and his little world just—flickers out—and is gone, gone forever—

No, I couldn’t, I can’t.

He is already so strange, I thought. Twisted up, sick in the head, confused, lost, helpless. If he gets some sort of, I don’t know, brain injury, or something, on top of it—

What will he be like THEN?

“I need to,” Herschel said, “make you . . . understand.

“Sister . . . Mother . . .

“It is not . . . one of the necessary preparations . . . but . . . perhaps it is necessary, in another . . . way . . .”

“Enough,” Ma said.

“It is not . . . right, or fitting . . . for you to be so fearful, Mother . . . or you, Sister . . . at this, of . . . all times . . .

“I will . . . explain it all, to you . . . what has come to be, and how it came to be . . . and what will be, and . . . how it will come to pass . . .

“So that . . . you won’t have to fear . . . anymore . . .”

“Enough,” Ma growled, and struck him again.

That is, I think she struck him again, at this point.

I might be wrong. How would I know? I was not looking.

“I will . . .” Herschel said, “hasten the end . . . to all your fear, and your weariness, and . . . your despair . . .

“You will read my . . . words, and be . . . glad . . . even before Christmas . . .

“Even before Santa Claus arrives, in Brooklyn . . . New York . . .”

I had been crying for some time, I imagine, but only at this point did I notice my own crying.

My poor, helpless brother. My poor, pure, idiotic brother.

Even when his own mother is giving him a beating, and growling at him to shut up, he can’t stop running his foolish mouth.

His family is going to run out of money before the month is even over. And he believes it will be all right, because the month in question is December, and Santa Claus will come and make it right, on Christmas.

Oh, it was too much! It was unbearable!

No, what I mean to say is: I could not bear it.

It was too much for me.

There, that’s better.

“Ma, stop,” I said weakly, as I turned away.

“I was going to,” I heard Ma say, as I fled.

“I was already done, Miriam,” she said, in the voice she used with harmless, misbehaving children, when they were up to some piece of childish and harmless mischief, and only that, nothing more.

“He’s gotten what he needed,” she said.

“For the record,” she sighed, “I was done, Miriam.

“I was already done.”

 

 

I don’t want to give you the wrong impression, about Ma.

I am, though. I am giving you the wrong impression, and don’t know how to stop.

But I don’t want to.

I just wanted to say that, for the record.

She had never beaten Herschel before. Or me, for that matter.

I mean, sure, she had spanked us, when we were small. And she had slapped us, once or twice, when we were not so small. But only once or twice, and only with her hand, and she apologized immediately for it, at length.

She hadn’t talked like that before, either. Ever.

That’s part of what I meant, when I said she sounded wrong. That it wasn’t like her, the way she talked on Monday evening.

Not that she was a good mother, by any means, but.

I doubt she really meant half of the things she said, that evening.

Not that I would know. I tuned her out, a lot of the time.

And when I was listening, I didn’t always understand her, anymore. She was learning so many new things at those night classes she’d been going to, recently. About parasites, and class struggle, and the law of the value of commodities, and so on.

It was hard to follow, sometimes, even when I wasn’t tuning it out.

But the way she was that evening, it was different. It wasn’t like her. That’s not the way she was, not at all.

If I showed you a bit of what she was like, how she usually behaved, in our home, with us . . .

I wish I could. You’ll get the wrong impression, if I don’t.

I wish I could show you funny old photos, from the scrapbook. But this is not the place for them.

This is the Book of Miriam Schoen. Here I tell the story of my December. It is a strange story: nothing was its usual self, that month. Nothing, and no one.

You will have to take my word for that.

 

 

“I just,” I said, into the telephone handset.

“I can’t,” I said.

I sobbed.

“It’s just . . . it’s too much,” I said.

“I understand,” Vincent said, over the line.

“God, Miriam,” he said, “you’ve . . . you’ve been through so much. God. I’m so sorry.

“I’m here for you,” he said. “I know it’s not enough, I know I can’t fix it, but anything I can do, I will.

“If you just need to talk,” he said, “I can talk. If you need to talk all night, well, I’ve got all night.

“Or, if you need anything else—just say the word, okay?”

“Thank you,” I sniffled.

“I just can’t . . .” I said.

One could almost view it as a sort of game, having to find a place among the sobs and sniffles where one could insert a word, and then another word, and so on, until one had a sentence built up.

Someone might see it as a game, I guess, and have fun doing it. It’s possible to imagine. People find a lot of different things fun, it seems like.

“I just . . .” I said. “I just don’t think I can . . . be there for him, and protect him . . . not when . . .”

I trailed off.

I’m not even sure how I had meant to finish out the sentence, anyway, come to think of it.

“I don’t think anyone could,” Vincent said, “from the sound of it.”

“God,” he said, seeming to realize only after the fact what a devastating thing he had just said. “God, I’m so sorry, Miriam.”

He was trying very hard to reassure me. He was trying. He always tried so hard, at everything.

I loved him.

“I really should have asked you earlier,” Vincent said apologetically, “but is he . . . all right? Your brother?

“I mean, is he going to have to go to the hospital, or something? Because—”

“He seems,” I interrupted, only to pause a moment, trying to find a word that didn’t feel wrong.

“He seems . . . like himself,” I said.

I glanced behind me at the couch, where Herschel was sitting. He had a stack of paper in his lap, and a pen in his hand. Just like usual.

He was writing, just like usual.

Like it was just another evening, the same as all the others.

“That’s great to hear,” Vincent said.

“But,” he said, “I’m worried about you, Miriam.

“I mean, is there . . . is there anywhere you can go? In New York? If, you know . . . if you don’t feel safe, in that apartment, anymore?”

“It’s not me,” I said, “that I’m worried about.”

“Well,” Vincent countered, “I’m worried about you. Even if you aren’t, I am.

“And I’m not budging on that. You’re gonna have to deal with it. Sorry for the inconvenience, but you’re just gonna have to deal.”

He laughed, at his own joke, or half-joke, or whatever it was. His own feeble attempt to be funny, a little bit, maybe.

I loved him.

“There’s . . . nothing left for me, here,” I said.

I didn’t really mean this as an answer to his question, about whether I had anywhere else to go. Not exactly, anyway.

I’m not actually sure what I did mean, come to think of it.

“I wish I could just . . . see your face, again,” I said.

“I mean,” I said. “I see it on the screen, but . . . you know what I mean.”

“If you wanted to come out here, for a little while,” Vincent began.

My hands were shaking. It was a struggle to keep the telephone handset properly pressed to my ear, so that I could hear him.

“It’s just an idea,” Vincent said.

“If you wanted to come out here, just for a little while,” he said, “until this all blows over, or . . . well, just to give you a moment, you know, to breathe.”

I breathed. In, out.

“Vincent,” I said slowly, “I can’t do that. You know I can’t do that.

“Portland, Oregon,” I explained, “it’s . . . it’s all the way across the whole country. You know I can’t afford a plane ticket, a—”

“I can,” Vincent said, brightly.

“What?” I said.

“No you can’t,” I said flatly.

“A plane ticket out here?” Vincent said. “Oh, I can definitely afford that, if someone special to me needs it.

“I have some wealthy viewers,” he said. “You know that. And they can get . . . unusually generous . . . sometimes.

“On special occasions.

“If there’s, you know. If their money is going to an especially good cause.

“Why, I could get on the phone right now, I know just who to call, I’ve done it before! I know just what to say to them. I know they’ll be generous.

“This is a real exceptional situation, a meaningfully good cause. And these guys, I mean.

“I mean I’ve called them up just for frivolous things before and they’ve said yes. You remember the video I did, about the apex media form, you know, the one with all the special effects? That was how I—”

“I,” I said.

There was a pause.

“Thank you,” I breathed, marveling.

“I just . . .” I said, “I just want to see your face, again.”

And see your living room, I thought, but did not say. And touch that green-on-green wallpaper, and run my hands over the shadows around your bedroom door’s frame, and walk through that frame, and . . .

(And . . . )

(I brought my hand up to my forehead, and then brought it away. And held my arm out at its furthest extent, briefly, before bringing it down to my side, again.)

“I can wire you the money,” Vincent said. “I’ll do it right away! Right after you hang up the phone.

“You’ve had a hard day, Miriam. You need something to bring a smile to your face, tonight.”

“But you . . .” I said, newly confused. “You don’t have the money yet.”

“I do,” Vincent said. “Just about. I do have a bit of savings, stored away.

“I’ll wire you the money right away, and then I’ll call a few people up tomorrow morning, first thing, and they’ll be generous. And I’ll have my savings back again, just like that.”

“No, Vincent,” I said. “Just . . . just wait. Please, wait.

“Wait until you’ve called them,” I pleaded. “Until you have the money. Please. I can wait, if it’s just . . . if it’s just a day, Vincent, I can wait, please, it’s fine . . .”

The day had done enough damage already. Please, let it be over. Please don’t let my own misery bring harm to Vincent.

He had no part in it. Spare him, please.

“Sorry,” Vincent said, “I’m getting another call. I’m really sorry, Miriam.

“Do you want me to call you back, later, or . . .”

“No,” I said. My hand trembled, and the hairs on my arm were standing up.

Soon enough, I thought but did not say, there will be no need for calls any longer. Oh, yes! My love, my love!

“No, it’s fine,” I said.

“Okay,” Vincent said. “I’m going to go, now, all right, Miriam?

“It was good to talk to you.

“Be safe, please, all right?

“Be safe, for me.”

 

 

Later that night, I bought a plane ticket to Portland, Oregon.

Vincent had wired me the money for it immediately, just after the call. Just like he said.

Of course he had.

He tried so much, always, and cared so much, always.

In a way, you could almost say that he had forced my hand.

I did not have a bank account of my own, after all. And once the money was there, I wanted to make it go away again, as quickly as possible, before Ma could notice it.

I wanted to tell Ma that the plane ticket had already been bought, and couldn’t be returned.

I wanted to look my penny-pinching mother right in the eyes, and dare her to let that ticket go to waste, now that it’d already been bought, and couldn’t be returned.

I wouldn’t have to tell her that I’d bought the ticket. I could lie, and say that Vincent had bought it for me. That I’d tried to make him stop, but he wouldn’t. He’s just that way, see, Ma. Irrepressibly generous, unable to hold back his kindness and his love.

And Ma would be happy, wouldn’t she? One less mouth to feed.

At 12:35 P.M. on the 24th of December, I would be in an airport, for the first time in my life. And then in a plane, for the first time in my life.

And I would be taken up, up, into the sky—me, Miriam Schoen, way up in the sky, flying!

On the evening of the 24th of December, I would see Portland, Oregon, for the first time.

Vincent and I would be together, for the second time.

The second time, and the final time. Because we would not have to be apart, again, after that.

The money Vincent had sent me was enough for a plane ticket. But only the one plane ticket.

Only a one-way plane ticket.

But that was all right, I reflected.

That was fine.

That was perfect.