Broken for You

BROKEN FOR YOU

Stephanie Kallos

Copyright © 2004 by Stephanie Kallos

A DF Books NERDs Release

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Published simultaneously in Canada Printed in the United States of America

Lyric permissions for
Broken for You
by Stephanie Kallos:

"The Nearness of You," words by Ned Washington, music by Hoagy Carmichael. Copyright © 1937, 1940 (Renewed 1964, 1967) by Famous Music Corporation, International Copyright Secured; All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission.

"Shall We Dance?" Copyright © 1951 by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, Copyright Renewed; Williamson Music owner of publication and allied rights throughout the World; International Copyright Secured; All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission.

"April in Paris," by Vernon Duke and E. Y. Harburg, Copyright © 1932 Kay Duke Music (ASCAP)/Universal Polygram International Publishing, Inc. All rights for the U.S. on behalf of Kay Duke Music (ASCAP) administered by BMG Songs, Inc. (ASCAP). Published by Glocca Morra Music (ASCAP), Administered by Next Decade Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission.

"Blues in the Night" by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer. Copyright © 1941 (Renewed) WB Music Corp. All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission. Warner Bros. Publications U.S. Inc., Miami, Flordia 33014.

FIRST EDITION

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kallos, Stephanie.

Broken for you / Stephanie Kallos.—1st ed.

p. cm. ISBN0-8021-1779-1

1. Landlord and tenant—Fiction. 2. Aged women—Fiction. I. Title. PS3611.A444B76 2004 8i3'6—dc22 2004040631

Grove Press

841 Broadway

New York, NY 10003

04 05 06 07 08 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For my children, Noah Gregory Johns and Samuel Liam Johns
They're so much more than objects. They're living things, crafted and used by people like us. They reach out to us and through them we forge a link with the past.

—Guendolen Plestcheeff, decorative arts collector (1892-1994)

. . .
He too\ Bread; and when He had given thanks, He brake it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, Take, eat, this is my Body, which is given for you.

—From the Prayer of Consecration, Holy Communion

BROKEN FOR YOU

Stephanie Kallos

Prologue

While the woman sleeps and dreams of all that breaks, come into this house of many rooms. Once your eyes adjust to the darkness, beginning to take in what is visible, y
ou may notice a silence that is
not quite silent. There is another language being spoken here, a tongue that emanates from white clay, fire, the oils of many skins, the fusion of rent spirits and matter. The woman hears this language always, even in her sleep, because she is guilty, and because those who speak to her are never silent. But for you, the innocent, there may only be a humming, a distant drone.

You might wander the rooms, wondering at its source. If you touch something, even lightly—that small figurine on her writing desk, say; the plump porcelain leprechaun from Belleek—you will perhaps become aware of a subtle change, a quickening that animates the molecules around you and sends them skittering across your skin. Pick up the figurine, trace its cool, silky contours with your
fingers
,
and this feeling intensifies. The distant drone becomes louder, less indistinct, giving you t
he vague im
pression of an evolving language, heard from far away. Something in your awareness might start to take shape, so
mething vaguely unsettling. Per
haps you shouldn't touch anything. You put the figurine down, possessed by the sudden certainty that you are being watched.

But no. Somewhere, the woman still sleeps—she is weeping now. There is only her and you, and whatever else this house contains. Moonlight, streetlights, headlights, starlights . . . All find a way inside and refract off thousands of glazed and polished surfaces. The light does not beautify what is already beautiful. It does not caress. No, it is sharp,
random, erratic. Everything looks panicked. In this shooting light, even the stolid, bulbous soup tureens seem fearful.

Leave now. Come back later, when the house is not bereft and its inhabitants are not desperate. There will be employment for you then. You'll feel more at home. Your hands will have a purpose, your relationship to these objects and their guardian will be clear and comfortable. Come back when you're ready. You'll find what you've been looking for.

PART ONE

One

Margaret

Wh
en Margaret Hughes found out she had a brain tumor, she stared at the black-and-white images illuminated on the screen behind her physician's desk—"slices," he called them. She was surprised to see that her brain looked like two halves of a desiccated walnut.

Her physician spoke of cisterns, vessels, ventricles, a star. Of cells that had forgotten how to die. It was so complicated, so difficult to understand, but in all fairness she had no one to blame but herself. She was the one who'd insisted on seeing the images, made him promise that he'd be straightforward, tell her the
names
of things, explain why she'd been experiencing these headaches, these slips of the tongue, errors in cognition, apparitions. The fact that he continually referred to the images as slices" only made matters worse; Margaret had already been so flustered before her appointment that she'd left home without finishing breakfast.

Dr. Leising pointed out the mass effect of the enhancing something-or-other as seen on Coronal Slice #16. Margaret's stomach rumbled.

I
can't believe it,
she thought.
I forgot to eat my jelly toast.

Her physician concluded his speech and asked Margaret how she wished to proceed, what interventional options she wanted to pursue, and was there anyone she'd like to call. "Stephen perhaps?" he suggested, rather too lightly. "Mightn't he want to know?"

Well, of
course
her ex-husband would want to know. Couples don't go through what she and Stephen had without forging some kind of enduring connection—even (although few people understood this) a complicated, battle-comrade kind of love.

But there was something irritating in Dr. Leising's tone—as if he didn't think she should hear his prognosis in the absence of a male shoulder to weep on. As if she couldn't handle things without the benefit of counsel by some father-by-proxy. Margaret had managed her own affairs nicely for most of her life. She wouldn't be railroad
ed, pitied, or bamboozled now.
I
might loo
k
li
k
e a nice, diffident old lady,
she thought,
but I'm not about to be treated li
ke
one.

She asked a few pointed questions. Dr. Leising gave answers which she considered unacceptable, evasive, patronizing, and then launched into yet another discussion of her "slices." Would it never end?

Margaret couldn't listen anymore, so she excused herself to the rest room, took the elevator down to the street, and walked until she came upon a cafe with the words "Desserts, Etcetera" painted on the windows. She deliberated. On the rare occasions when she had to leave the house, she made sure to have as little contact as possible with other people; on the other hand, she was so hungry that she felt nauseous. Peeking through the window, Margaret saw that the cafe was open but empty of customers. This was satisfactory, so she went in.

Inside was a display case filled with artfully presented pies, cakes, cookies, and an assortment of French pastries. Margaret whispered their names:
Genoise a I'orange. Mousse au chocolat. Creme Brulee. Roulade a la confiture.
She felt better already. Hanging over the counter was a menu written on a large chalkboard which included sandwiches and soups as well as desserts.

An anorexic-looking girl with short blue-black hair and black lipstick was talking into a telephone behind the counter. "I don't give a shit, Jimmy," she was saying, her voice tense and hissing, "You CANNOT use the juicer at three o'clock in the morning, I don't care HOW aggravated your 'vata' is!" Margaret waved to get the girl's attention. "Gotta go. Bye."

The girl hung up and loped to the counter. "Yes," she enunciated through clenched teeth. "What can I get for you?"

"It all looks so good," Margaret said. On closer inspection of the girl's face, Margaret was alarmed to see that she was wearing a gold ring
through her right nostril. She tried not to stare at it. "What is your soup of the day?"

"Split pea," the girl said, and sniffed.

God,
Margaret thought,
I
hope she doesn't have a cold.

"Well, in that case . . . I'll take a slice of raspberry cheesecake, a slice of pear ganache, the creme brulee, and the caramel flan."

"For here?"

"Yes, please."

Nose Ring began punching the buttons of a small calculator. Her fingernails were painted dark blue and sprinkled with glitter. They looked like miniature galaxies. "Do you want whipped cream on your flan?"

"Excuse me?" Margaret said. "Whipped what?"

"Cream. On the flan."

"No, thank you," Margaret said without thinking, but then, "I mean yes! Why not? Whipped cream!"

"Will that be all?"

"Tea, perhaps. Do you have peppermint tea?"

"Have a seat," Nose Ring said. "I'll bring it out when it's ready."

Margaret awaited her desserts. On the cafe walls there were several black-and-white photographs of empty buildings, streets, docks, parks. Margaret didn't much care for them. There were no people in the photographs, and something about the time of day the photographer chose or the angle at which he took the photos gave even the most benign landmarks—the Seattle-to-Bainbridge ferry, the pergola in Pioneer Square, the Smith Tower—a menacing, doomsday appearance. They made Seattle look like a ghost town, and they reminded Margaret of an old movie. . . . What was it? It took place in New York City; it was about the end of the world. . . . She had found the movie very disturbing, although she couldn't say why. She couldn't for the life of her remember the name of it.

"The World, the Flesh, and the Devil,
" said Nose Ring as she arrived at Margaret's table.

"What?"

"That old black-and-white movie about the end of the world. You
w
ere saying that you couldn't
remember the name of it."

“I was?”

"Uh-huh." Nose Ring began unloading dishes and tea things from a large tray. "Harry Belafonte, Inger Stevens, and Mel Ferrer.
The World, the Flesh, and the Devil.
"

"Oh. Yes."

"Unless you mean
On the Beach."

"I don't think so."

"Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, and Fred Astaire? Directed by Stanley Kramer."

"No ... I would've remembered Fred Astaire." "Or you could be thinking of
Fail Safe.
With Henry Fonda as the president."

"I think you were right the first time."

Nose Ring stood up straight and announced, "I'm a film student."

"I see." Margaret smiled and nodded. She made another effort not to look at Nose Ring's nose ring. "Well, that must be very interesting!"

Nose Ring sighed. "Do you have everything you need?"

"Yes! Thank you! It looks lovely."

Nose Ring resumed her place behind the counter.

Margaret took a small, yellowed photograph out of her wallet; it was a school picture of Daniel, taken when he was eight. She stared at it.

The whole thing was quite simple, really.

According to Robert Leising, MD, and the various other neurology, oncology, and so-on-colleagues with whom he had consulted, Margaret had a very common type of malignant brain tumor: an "astrocytoma." A slow-growing star. The traditional treatment was surgery followed by radiation.

"What's the prognosis?" she had asked.

"Well," and here Dr. Leising had pulled one of six sheets of film off the light board and scrutinized it, "your age is—?"

As if he doesn't know,
Margaret thought. "Seventy-five."

"Seventy-five." Dr. Leising nodded thoughtfully. He glanced at Margaret before resuming his study of the film. "Depending on the characteristics of the tumor—which we can't clearly define without getting in there and removing as much of it as possible—with treatment you have a chance of living as long as several years or as little as two." "How much of a chance?" Dr. Leising didn't look up. "Twenty-five percent."

"That's with treatment?"

"Yes."

"What happens if we don't do anything?"

"Excuse me?"

"I mean, if I only have a twenty-five percent chance of surviving this anyway, why don't we just leave it alone?"

"Maybe I haven't made myself clear, Margaret," Dr. Leising said, as if he were speaking to a nincompoop. That was when he resumed his discussion of Margaret's slices in a way that clearly constituted the American Medical Association's form of filibustering.

So, this was her choice: She could either undergo a
lot
of treatment and die, sooner or later, or she could undergo no treatment at all and die, sooner or later.

"Is something wrong?" Nose Ring had returned. "You haven't tried anything."

Margaret swallowed hard. Now that all of this lovely food was in front of her, she found that she wasn't hungry after all. She took a sip of tea, just to be polite.

"Is that your grandson?" Nose Ring asked, leaning closer. "Cute."

She's quite a young girl beneath all that makeup,
Margaret realized.
And much too thin.
"Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?"

Nose Ring shrugged. "What is
it?"

"Well, it's a rather trite question, I suppose, but if you found out that you had only a short while to live, maybe a year or two, how would you spend your time?"

The girl frowned. She picked absentmindedly at her fingernails, and showers of silver glitter flaked off and fell toward the floor. Margaret tried to follow the trajectory of the glitter, but it seemed to vanish into thin air.

"I suppose I'd think about whatever it is that scares me the most— relationshipwise, I mean—and then do it. Do the opposite of what I've always done."

Margaret studied Nose Ring. She'd always assumed that people who embraced dramatic vogues in fashion were actually compensating for an innate dullness of character or chronic insecurity. She'd expected someone who looked like Nose Ring to offer a superficial answer to her rather trite question: "Take up hang-gliding! Sail around the world! Race hot-air balloons!" Something along those lines.

“
It would be a last chance, wouldn't
it?"
the girl went on. "To break
all y
our old bad habits?" She caught herself worrying her hands and
prompt
ly stopped. "Well anyway, here's your bill. Pay whenever you're
read
y." She made her way back to the counter, looking pensive,
M
argaret contemplated her own habits. She stared at Daniel's photo, lad been at that age when most children are self-conscious in front of
a cam
era. But in this picture his expression was relaxed, serious, and sage.
Yo
u can see exactly what he's going to look like when he's twenty!"
Mar
garet remembered saying to Stephen all those years ago, when the age they'd ordere
d came home from school: one 8x10
, two 5x7s,
four,
and many, many billfolds.

But
Daniel would never be twenty. The 8x10 remained unframed. The
billfol
ds were never passed out to school friends and teachers. Margaret
wonde
red if Stephen still kept a photograph of their son in his wallet,
along
with pictures he surely carried of the children he had with his
second
wife. His living children.

“Jim
bo?" Nose Ring was on the telephone, speaking gently. "I'm sorry
I yell
ed before. . . . Yeah, I know.
...
I love you, too. You want me to
pick up
some Haagen-Dazs on the way home? . . . No, I'm not kidding."
Maybe
it was time for a change. A commuted sentence. Margaret had
di
fficulty knowing what was required. Daniel stared back at her,
without
forgiveness, but without condemnation, either, his eyes alight the detached, loving wisdom of a little monk. Margaret tucked the
photo
graph back into her pocketbook, sipped her tea, and waited until Ring hung up the telephone.

“E
xcuse me, dear," she called across the room. "Have you a pen I
can
borrow?"