The Bradbury Report (46 page)

“Who would I leave it to?”

“No. I should have said that before. I didn't want to think of you dying.”

“You don't have to think of it,” I said.

“I've come untied, Ray. And I'm afraid.”

“Me, too,” I said, which wasn't the truth.

“Oh,” she said. “What about the pill?”

“Do you want it?”

“I don't,” she said.

“Leave it then.”

She stood up. “I never had a chance, did I?”

“That's not how I'd put it,” I said. “I'd say you lucked out. You deserved better, and you got it. You've lived an enviable life, Anna.”

“I have,” she said. She smiled. “I want more of it.”

“Good. Good. Then go.”

“I will go,” she said. She moved towards the door. “I seem to lose you again and again. I'm happy to see I was right about you all along. You aren't such a shit.”

“So
you
say,” I said.

 

I will finish, then take the pill.

 

Sara and I had agreed that last Christmas not to buy each other gifts—the baby would be our gift to one another—but neither of us had any intention of abiding by the agreement. When I came down the stairs on Christmas morning, I saw, resting on the mantle, propped against the wall, a large, ornately framed Audubon print of a bald eagle. (She must have gotten up in the middle of the night to put it there.) My present for Sara was wrapped and underneath the tree, where I'd placed it the night before, after Sara had gone to bed. Christmas Eve afternoon—the last minute—I'd driven to Hanover. In a fancy shop there I'd bought her a pale green linen sundress. I liked her in that shade of green, and I liked to look at her in sundresses, to see her arms and neck and shoulders and legs exposed. And I wanted to remind her that she would once again be elegant and lissome, to remind her, in the teeth of winter, that spring would come again.

 

I have lived more than a year with Anna and the clone. I have lived. I have done that which was asked of me. I had forgotten who I once was, who once I might have become. I have been made to remember.

 

This is my report.

M
y debts are many and large.

I am most grateful to Ann Patty, the book's first editor, and to Doug Stewart, my agent. Without these two wizards, there would be no book. I am grateful to my sons, Benjamin and Michael Polansky. It was in discussion with them this book was conceived and elaborated. And to Richard Florest, the book's second editor, who rescued it. Thanks to Judy Hottensen, Kristin Powers, and Katie Finch at Weinstein Books, and to Jamie Byng and Francis Bickmore at Canongate. I thank my longtime friend, Flip Brophy, of Sterling Lord Literistic, and Marcy Posner and Seth Fishman, of that same agency. Thanks to my brother, the composer Larry Polansky, for setting the standard high. To Alvin Handelman, my kinsman and colleague, for his support and advice, and to David Delvoye for reading a manuscript version. Substantial parts of this book were written at Melvyn's Cafe in Alnwick, Northumberland, and at the Copper Rock in Appleton, Wisconsin, and I am grateful to the proprietors and staff of these establishments for their patience and hospitality.

For some of what I know and say about human cloning, I am indebted to Leon Kass's fine essay, “The Wisdom of Repugnance: Why We Should Ban the Cloning of Humans.” What I know and say about heart transplants, I owe to Jean-Luc Nancy's essay,
“L'Intrus”
(English
translation by Susan Hanson). The description of how it feels to suffer cardiac arrest, I owe to Michael Wanchena. For my thinking on the subject of self-love, I am indebted to Harry G. Frankfurt's
The Reasons of Love
.

My apologies to Ray Bradbury; my intention was only to honor him. My apologies to Dr. Anna Lewis, whose friendship I have not forgotten. My apologies to Penelope Fitzgerald, from whom I stole a lovely metaphor.

Finally, I am grateful, for her faith and encouragement, to my wife, Julie Filapek, who gave me back my life and, as well, a daughter, the remarkable Sylvia, thief of hearts.

Copyright © 2009 Steven Polansky

 

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of the Publisher.

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eISBN : 978-1-602-86131-2