The Bradbury Report (39 page)

“I do,” I said.

“We'll want to watch you for a few days. Then, if you seem stable.”

“All right,” I said. “Put me on the list.”

 

I waited for Anna's second visit—the second for which I was conscious—to tell her what the cardiologist had said. Alan had again decided to remain in the waiting room.

“Candy striper?”

“No,” Anna said. “There's an old woman at the desk. She gave Alan a lollipop. They've got the television on. He's okay.” She put a small duffle bag on the bed, at the foot. “I brought you some stuff. Pajamas and toilet articles. Magazines. Candy. Slippers.”

“You brought candy?”

“I didn't know,” she said, and sat down beside the bed. “I just threw in some things.”

“Thanks.”

“And I brought you your glasses.” She took them out of her purse
and put them on the bedside table. “He wants to see you, Ray. Don't think he doesn't.”

“I don't think anything. I want to see him, too.”

“Maybe tomorrow.”

“When he's ready,” I said. “Did the doctor talk to you?”

“I'm your wife.”

“Right,” I said. “Hold it. Let me raise my head up.”

“Shall I get the nurse?”

“I can do it.” I fumbled through the tangle by my left hand and, by touch, located the appropriate device. “There,” I said. “What did he tell you?

“What did he tell
you
?” Anna said.

“All sorts of cheery things. My heart is shot. That's the delicate way he put it. I need a transplant. Without it, I won't live more than a couple of months.”

“I am
so
sorry, Ray.” She touched the back of my right hand, careful not to disturb the intravenous drip. “
Three
months he told me.”

“At the outside. What did you think of him?”

“The doctor?”

“Arrogant jerk,” I said.

Anna smiled. “You have trouble with men.”

I thought about this. “Maybe I do.”

“Have you always?”

“Maybe I have,” I said. “Was Alan around when he spoke with you?”

“On the margins. I don't know what he heard.”

A nurse I did not recognize came into the room. She spoke to Anna. “Mrs. Grey, your son is asking for you.”

“Is he all right?” I said.

“Appears to be,” the nurse said. “He asked me to get his mother. I told him it was okay if he came in, but he didn't want to.”

“I'd better go,” Anna said.

“Will you be back?” I said.

“Yes. Let me just see what he needs.”

Anna was back within minutes.

“He wanted to tell me a joke,” she said.

“A joke?”

“His first one,” she said.

“Momentous,” I said.

“It is,” she said. “Something about two men and a duck. I didn't follow it. He thinks it's very funny. Requires quacking.”

“Did he make it up?”

“I have no idea where he got it.”

“How long do we have?”

“A few minutes,” she said. “He's nervous, Ray. He told me the joke. Then he asked me how you looked.”

“How do I look?”

“You look terrible.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him you looked good. Like yourself.”

“Half the truth.”

Anna unzipped the duffle bag and began unpacking it.

“What are you doing?” I said.

“I'm putting your stuff away. So you'll have it.”

“Stop,” I said. “Sit here.”

“I don't want to,” she said. “I don't want to sit.”

“Please.”

She stopped unpacking, but did not sit. “What will you do, Ray?”

“About what?”

“About the transplant?”

“Are
you
asking me this question?”

“Yes,” she said.

“You can't want me to do it.”

“I don't know what I want,” she said. She took a deep breath, then spoke, flatly, ticking off her wants as if she were ordering a meal. “I don't want to lose you. I know that. I want to keep the three of us together. I want to see my children again. My grandchildren.”

“There's no way all of that can happen,” I said. “You can't have all these things.”

“I can't have any.” This, too, said matter-of-factly.

“You'll see your children again.”

“You think so?”

“That would be too great a price to pay.”

“I was willing to pay it,” she said.

I didn't know how to respond.

“Just consider it,” she said.

“You can't mean this, Anna.”

“I do.”

“You can't. I can't take a heart. How could I do that?”

“You could. They've got plenty of hearts. They wouldn't have to kill a clone.”

“You don't know that. You, of all people, don't need me to say this. However it goes, the heart would come from a clone.”

“Someone else's.” She was angry. “I don't care, Ray. I swear to you I don't.”

“You
do
care. Of course you do.”

She was quiet.

“That's not the whole of it, anyway,” I said. “The truth is, Anna, three months sounds like just about enough.”

I could see this hurt her, and I was sorry.

“What do we tell him?” she said on her way out. “I'm not sure he can handle any more hard news.”

 

When Anna next visited me Alan came with her into the room. They showed up first thing in the morning. Though it was warm out, Alan was wearing his Winnipeg Jets jersey. He was nervous. He stood by the door and did whatever he could to avoid looking at me.

“I'm glad to see you,” I said to him. I
was
glad. “You look sharp. I like your jersey.”

“Don't say jersey,” he said. “Say sweater.”

If Alan was a citizen of any country, it was Canada.

“I like your sweater. So, are you coming in?”

“I am coming in,” he said. “You got it for me. Do you remember that?”

“I do remember. That was a good night.”

“How are you feeling?” Anna said.

“Good. Raring to go.”

“What did you say?” Alan was in the room now, standing beside Anna, though still not quite looking at me.

“I'm eager to go.”

Alan stated the obvious. “You are not feeling good. You are not raring.”

“No,” I said. “I'm not exactly raring. I'm tired. But I want to go home.” To Anna: “Maybe tomorrow.”

“Good,” she said. “We'll be ready.”

“Anna says you will be all right,” Alan said. “They will give you a new heart, and then you will be all right.”

“I hope that's true,” I said.

“It's true,” Anna said to Alan. Then, to me: “Of course it's true.”

There was a TV bracketed to the wall opposite the bed. Alan looked up at it. “The TV's not on,” he said.

“Turn it on if you want to,” I said.

“I don't want to,” he said. “I don't want to watch it.”

“There's some Jell-O here I didn't eat. Would you like that?”

“No,” he said. “What is Jell-O?”

I was unable to lift my hands, one still attached to an intravenous drip, the other to a monitor. I moved my head in the direction of the bedside table. “It's that green stuff on the tray.”

“I don't want Jell-O,” Alan said. “It looks like goo.”

Anna laughed.

“It's good,” I said. “You'd like it. It feels slippery and cool going down.”

“Why didn't you eat it?” Alan said.

I had no answer.

“I don't want it,” he said.

“One thing you can do for me,” I said to Anna.

“Okay, but just one thing.”

“I'd like to meet with a lawyer before I leave here.”

“What for?” she said.

(I was reluctant to speak of this in front of Alan. I had it in mind
to make my will. I'd decided to leave my estate—Sara's money, the house, the car—to Anna. Sara's brother and sister had been well provided for; Anna and Sara had been, when I met them, the closest of friends; if it hadn't been for me, their friendship might have been lifelong. If, as now looked unlikely, Anna were to predecease me, the estate would go to Anna's children, to be split three ways among them. Anna was able to find a lawyer who would come to the hospital. He drew up a simple will according to my instructions. He mailed a copy, which I will soon give to Anna, to the 14th Street address in Calgary, and kept a copy for his files.)

“There are some things I need to settle,” I said.

Anna shook her head. “I don't want your money, Ray.”

“Don't worry,” I said.

Then Alan spoke to me. “Will they take my heart, Ray?”

“No,” I said emphatically. “They will not take your heart.”

“You are free now,” Anna said. “No one will take your heart. No one will take any part of you.”

“I am still a clone,” he said.

“Yes,” she said. “But you are safe with me. We are safe together.”

Again, to me: “Whose heart will they take?”

“I don't know that,” I said.

They stayed a while longer. No more was said on the matter of Alan's heart. Or mine. Then we said good-bye. Alan was somber. I tried to be as chipper as I could.

 

It was four more days until they discharged me. Anna had arranged to have a hospital bed delivered and set up in the bedroom I'd shared with Alan before I went down. Going forward I would share the room with Anna—Alan moving to the other bedroom—who now became my nurse, so that she would be near if, in the night, I needed her. Alan helped me from the car into the apartment. He was uneasy touching me, as if he was afraid I might shatter. I got into bed, and I have hardly left it these three months.

That first morning back, after breakfast, I asked Anna to get out the boot socks.

“What are boot socks?” Alan said.

“Wait,” I said.

“Are they for me?” Alan said.

“Hang on. Will you get the socks, Anna?”

She took the socks out of the dresser drawer. “Now what?”

“I want you to empty them.”

“Boot socks.” Alan said. “What's in them?”

“Money,” I said.

“Is it money for me?” he said.

“Some of it.”

“What are you doing, Ray?” Anna said.

“I know what I'm doing.”

She emptied the socks onto her bed. There were six stacks of bills, each stack held together by a thick rubber band.

“I don't want the boot socks,” Alan said.

“Fine,” I said.

“I would like the money.”

“I know,” I said. Then, to Anna: “Will you take five thousand dollars and put it in one of the socks?”

“Five thousand?”

“Yes.”

“You're a sweet man,” she said. “But this is crazy.”

“We both know I'm not sweet,” I said. “And this makes perfect sense.”

Anna counted out the bills and put them in a sock.

“Can I have the sock, please?” I said.

Anna handed the sock to me.

“Come here,” I said to Alan.

“All right,” he said. He came closer.

I handed him the sock. “This money is for you.” I said. “You can spend it however you like, so long as Anna says it's okay. Do you understand?”

He took the money out of the sock and held it in his hand. “This money is for me?”

“Yes.”

“I can spend this money?”

“Yes. So long as Anna says it's okay.”

“If she says it's okay, I can spend it?”

“Yes,” I said.

Alan looked at Anna. “No girl,” he said.

“No girl,” she said.

“There is one thing,” I said, “I want you to buy right away. Today.”

“You want me to buy it today?”

“Yes. I want you and Anna to go out today and buy a computer.”

“I want to buy a computer,” he said. “I told you that. Do you remember?” He said this without any enthusiasm, and with more than a hint of recrimination. As if to say my offer was not so much too little as it was too late.

“I do. I want you to buy a computer. Anna will help you pick it out. It will be your computer. But I will use it for a little while.”

“It will be my computer, but you will use it?”

“Yes,” I said. “For just a little while. Then it will be yours.”

“It will be my computer?”

“In a little while,” I said.

“Y
ou're going to write the report,“ Anna said.

“I was thinking I would,” I said. “If I can remember how to write.”

“Good, Ray. That's good.”

“I've got nothing better to do.”

“No. You want to write it.”

“I suppose I do. I'm not sure why.”

When Anna had satisfied herself I was comfortable and safe in my bed, that I would stay put, she and Alan went out and bought a computer. They picked one Alan liked the look of—they paid for it with Alan's money—and Anna set it up.

(I
am
comfortable. As comfortable waiting for my heart to quit in a rented hospital bed in a crap shack in Calgary as I have been anywhere else in Canada. As I have been anywhere else. From my mother I know the Germans have a word,
heimweh
, for the kind of homesick-ness you feel, even when you are at home. Everywhere you go you find what you find everywhere you go. After Sara died, I have been, without respite, homesick, with no notable increase in the feeling since we washed up here. Moribund heart or no.)