The Sea-Wave (7 page)

I
love books but I was once murdered by books just about.

I call the white bookcase in my room The Leaning Tower. It's where I keep English Literature, including all my Dickens. I have everything by Dickens except
Chuzzlewit
, which I threw out the window.

At first the white bookcase didn't lean, but as I added more books it started leaning. I tried putting the heavier books on the bottom shelf but over time, I just needed the space. I don't do paperbacks, I kept putting hardcovers higher and higher. That made the tilting worse but after reaching the one o'clock position the bookcase basically stabilized. So I stopped thinking about it.

Then one day I was in my room reading, and a book fell over my shoulder, onto my lap, then a hundred more. Then the top shelf of the bookcase stabbed me in the back of the neck. My angry head now occupied the top shelf space, like a bust of Beethoven. I realized I was the vertical part of an acute triangle, and in acute pain. Also, if I pressed forward on my directional pad, all that would happen would be that my head would keep bending back, the top of the bookcase would scrape up my forehead and possibly my head would snap off. So I decided to just wait there till my mom found me. Which wasn't too long because of the loud sound of all the books falling.

My mom helped me put the books back on the shelves. The way we arranged them the bookcase didn't tilt as bad; it hasn't fallen since. I still have a mark like a birthmark on my neck.

The first book that fell on my lap was
Martin Chuzzlewit
. That's partially why I threw it out the window.

W
hen my anxiety gets the better of me it's like my nerve cells are doing hard arithmetic. I think of them holding pencils and checking the clock. I can't wring my hands, I wring the inside of my stomach like it's a hateful dog. Or I try my breathing. I learned these breathing tips on TV, though they don't generally work. I basically just have to wait. It's like, if a prince spills hot soup on you, you have to just grin till your skin stops burning.

It's hell.

M
y parents went to church before I was born. They got married in a church.

If a ninety-pound kid can kill god, god can't be up to much.

I'm the kid with the slingshot.

I
get angry. When I get angry I can't control my anger. It won't burn out. I don't know if that means there's something wrong with me or it's just because of my life, I have a lot of compressed rage. My throat feels like fire climbing a ladder. I suffer. I can't go for a run, I can't make it go away.

I hate my anger. But I just can't
do
anything.

Will you help me please because I'm stuck?

I
t was storming and we were going really fast downhill. There was a river at the bottom of the hill and some trees. I was soaked. My glasses were soaked; I could barely see.

I wondered how the old man could run so fast. Then I heard something that was like far-away screaming. Oh god, I thought. It's happening. I've gotten away. I'm rocketing down a steep hill, into deep water. My nightmare.

My teeth were rattling, so I pressed them hard together. I squeezed my armrests. That was the wrong thing to do. I should've tried to fall off my chair as soon as possible, and let it drown. But I was scared of falling off, I was going so fast. The rain made it confusing.

I hit something, the wheelchair hit something. The chair stayed still but I went flying. I'm not a god type but I remember thinking god don't let me fall in the river and drown.

Then I fell in the river.

Water flowed into me like I was the Titanic. I choked. I just about blacked out, but then I was in pain because someone grabbed me by the hair and pulled me up out of the water.

The old man was crying. He hugged me but didn't say anything and put me back in my chair. Then he pushed me back up the hill. The whole time he pushed me, he was crying. Eventually he stopped crying. It stopped raining, too.

I just about died.

T
here was in one corner of the floor, a hole. The
sewer
. Though it soured what little there was of air, from such a place came something . . . wonderful.

Singing.
The brothers, singing. In some hidden chamber. It seemed . . . there were not even words to their hymn, but emotion, only. As if they fingered the strings . . . of emotion. And whichever they touched, touched
me
.

I could only listen. The singing. It was a very great wave. Taking . . . me. A sea-star, on the dark waters. Its mystery. Though sorrowful, so wonderful. In tone so beautiful. They must have been singing, the men, in some cavern of stone. Echoing, as several thousand men. Down corridors. In dark corners. From pipework emerging. As a tone, from an organ.

It was . . . holy. Their sorrow. It was in itself religion. Their
emotion
. It could have been my own . . . emotion. Then. Listening. Bowing over, the hole.

My tears fell into the very sound of singing.

D
on't talk to me. Because you never really talk to me. You talk over me, around me, down to me, through me, but never
to
me. Your words go through me, like x-rays, without sticking to me, because they were never meant for me, but for the people standing next to me. The pharmacist and his wife are really keen to see what doting parents are like in the face of adversity, and I'm so glad you have the extra time to show them. To demonstrate. You have hardly any time for me, but you at least have time for somebody. And that just makes me so happy.

I am
so
happy.

Just don't ever talk to me again.

M
y parents took me to Dr. Fritz, a prosthetist. He went on about devices, what great, great devices they had these days, and wouldn't I be so much happier and more complete if I owned one or more of these devices? He faced me and his words hit me in the face, but his eyes were always stuck on my parents. He talked in a fake-ly gentle way about his devices, rubbing his hands along them like he was selling reams of the finest silk, only it was Arm Buddies or the Motorized Claw. He did these demonstrations where he'd first try to pick up a glass of water, pretending I guess he was a typical spastic kid,
without
the aid of a device, and, of course, knocking it onto the floor. Then he'd strap on an Arm Buddy and lift and drink the whole glass down, not spilling a drop. And I'd be sitting there grinding my teeth in silence. One of my other doctors told my parents that teeth-grinding was a sign of a vitamin deficiency. They gave me magnesium powder, though it didn't work. That should've been their first clue.

In the end my parents broke down and ordered a pair of Arm Buddies
plus
a Motorized Claw Petite, which is the smaller model. It was maybe two months before they were ready because they had to be custom-moulded. The day the call came, my parents were so nervous, it made me nervous. Dr. Fritz strapped on the left Arm Buddy, then the right one. He attached the Motorized Claw Petite to the extension port on the Arm Buddy on my right arm, which he decided was my dominant arm. Then he wheeled me in front of the mirror and waved my parents over.

I looked at myself in the mirror. My parents . . . They looked like raisins, or dried up and defeated. Which is basically how I felt. Dr. Fritz asked me to go ahead and try picking up a stuffed rabbit, which I could keep, and as I closed the claw around its head I remember thinking: I am the claw game.

I actually cried that day. There was a bit of moisture. I didn't think I could ever really cry.

After a month or two, I gave up on my devices. Because I can grip things fine myself, I've improved, just squeezing thick things is difficult. I can hold a pen or a pencil fine. I don't think I'll ever make orange juice.

My devices helped a little with certain things. They weren't worth it. It's not worth feeling like you take batteries, even if life is 10% easier. Because I'd rather it was tough. I'd rather it was just so horribly tough, and I was just a little less pathetic.

I guess it's my dream.