The Age Read online

  Dr. Woo coughs. You both understand. This is not a good situation.

  Why not? The girl is confused.

  Dr. Woo opens his mouth to speak, but Dr. Patak cuts in, her voice curt and stringent. With the levels of radiation poisoning we’ve seen, it’s almost guaranteed this fetus is or will be severely damaged. There’s no way to predict the extent of abnormality or deformity. And I don’t just mean appearance. Radiation exposure is synonymous with undeveloped or missing vital organs. Essentially, an organism incompatible with life. Even if you don’t miscarry, and the fetus is delivered alive, both of which are highly unlikely, we have no facilities to treat or help this baby in any way, and it will most likely die soon after birth.

  Dr. Patak’s stare is impatient. Also, the risk to you is too high. A natural birth will be full of complications. A Caesarean would be out of the question.

  The girl shrugs. People have babies all the time, she says.

  Not under these circumstances, they don’t. Dr. Patak’s disdain echoes in the room.

  Dr. Woo clears his throat. Given the circumstances. We feel the safest thing. Is to terminate the pregnancy.

  No! The girl covers her stomach with her arms.

  This early. The procedure would be simple. Not without risk. But lower risk, anyway. Than the pregnancy itself.

  The girl shakes her head.

  Look, you have to be reasonable. This is no time for selfishness.

  The boy sees that in their previous lives, Dr. Patak and the girl might have been friends, the girl offering advice on how to meet men, how to style her hair, how to balance career and social life.

  The girl stands. I’m not doing that. You can’t make me do that.

  Dr. Woo looks to Dr. Joan. She shrugs.

  Maybe you could both. Wait outside.

  The boy leads the girl out of the dining room and into the hallway. They sit side by side on folding chairs. Dr. Woo closes the door behind them.

  Dr. Patak’s voice is muffled. This is unbelievable.

  Dr. Joan sounds as if she’s smiling. She knows what she wants.

  Maybe. With a little more information, offers Dr. Woo.

  I don’t think she’s going to budge.

  There is another option. Dr. Patak’s voice is quiet. We have sedatives.

  Oh. I don’t know. Drastic. Very drastic.

  It’s for her own good. The girl has no idea what she’s gotten herself into. For the good of the community.

  It would be hard. To justify. That sort of action. Where would we. Draw the line?

  I don’t think anyone else is stupid enough to let this happen.

  The boy flinches and turns to the girl. She is gazing up at the hallway light, a chandelier dripping glass teardrops. If she is listening, she gives no indication.

  Dr. Joan clears her throat. Regardless of what you think of these people, Dr. Patak, they are not animals, and we are not in the business of population control.

  Maybe we should be.

  Let us. Have a vote. Whether to terminate.

  Dr. Joan votes, no.

  Dr. Patak votes, yes.

  I’m going to have to. Vote. No.

  A hand smacks the table, a chair scrapes the floor. Dr. Joan appears in the hallway. We’ll just hope for the best, shall we? I’ll come around and check on you in a couple of weeks.

  The girl stands and takes the boy’s hand, leads him out of the house. His feet trip down the stairs. Pebbles crunch beneath his shoes as he walks the beach. His legs move separate from him, urged forward by the girl’s momentum. In front of him, the girl turns, her body bobs, lightened by a sureness he cannot grasp.

  THE LIT EDGE OF GERRY’S JOINT crawls toward her fingers. Through her window, she watches her mom bend to unlock the car door, arm piled with files, her purse and lab coat, a paper bag lunch. Gerry crouches as the car backs out, comes to a full stop on the street, then advances with tempered speed. Whitewashed nine to five, a walking coma. Gerry returns to the game of solitaire laid out on her bed, an attempt to keep her mind still. The high rolls over her tongue but does little to soothe the constant sputter of thoughts. She swipes away the lines of cards, gathers them up in her hand, shuffles them, sprays them into the air.

  She arrives to find Megan’s front door wide open, sunlight scalding rectangles into the old furniture. In the middle of the carpet, two grey leather suitcases, propped at attention, buckles cinched tight. She waits by the door.

  Ian strides through from the kitchen, leather jacket tied around his waist. “We’re ready.” He hefts the suitcases without looking at her. “She needs a hand with Clem.”

  Clem shuffles through first, loose black coat over his suit, tweed fedora on his head, the band decorated with a small red feather. Megan follows, arm through his elbow, face grey and puffy, her colour worked away. Gerry loops her arm through Clem’s other elbow, guides him across the living room and onto the porch. They take the stairs slowly, Clem pauses on each step to admire the view. He grins, face pushed up to the sun.

  Ian holds open the car’s back door, nods to Gerry. “You sit with him.”

  In the car, Clem adopts a formal posture, elbow on the armrest, back straight, chin up as he surveys the passing streets. Now and then he points a crooked finger and says, “That’s the place.” Gerry cranes her neck but can’t make out anything other than a gas station, a playground, an empty lot strewn with garbage.

  The care home is a low brick building with a dark canopied entrance, Cherrywood Manor in raised red letters above the automatic doors. As Ian parks, Gerry watches the scatter of patients out front. Wheelchairs turned away from one another, prawnlike bodies smoke, tow oxygen tanks, slouch beside metal racks decorated with fluid bags.

  Sun flares in her eyes as she helps Megan hoist Clem out of the car. His arms tremble, his feet skate the pavement. Ian marches ahead with the bags.

  They sit across from one another in the tiled foyer. An antiseptic sting rises from the floor as they wait for the admitting physician. Ian holds Megan’s shoulders, ducks his head to check her face. Beside Gerry, Clem hums. The easiness of his mood relieves her. His eyes blink, shiny and alert, his hands still, at rest in his lap.

  The doctor arrives clipboard in hand, a tall, older man with brown skin and white hair, and an accent that reminds her of Fantasy Island. Megan stands and the doctor holds up his palm. “Just your father.” The doctor lifts Clem to his feet, leads him to a room with an examination table, and closes the door.

  Megan leans her face into Ian’s shoulder, wipes at her eyes. Ian kisses the top of her head. Gerry looks away to give them privacy, then stands, wanders to pass the time. On the other side of the nurses’ station, a carpeted expanse of living space, recliners set in rows like a geriatric movie theatre, TVs strung from the ceiling. Beyond the carpet, more tile, metal stanchions and glass cases of food, a small cafeteria.

  Tucked into the recliners, fat bodies, shrunken bodies, bodies slumped into painful contortions. The men doze or sit motionless, entranced by the screens above. The women fiddle with things, rings on their fingers, the gauge of an oxygen tank, the purse wedged in at their side, some work feverishly with yarn and sticks. One TV screen offers a game show, another an old movie with cowboys, another has Merv Griffin interviewing a woman in a gold lamé dress. The sound for each channel warbles low, blends with the others into a foreign tongue. She knows this will upset Clem.

  In the waiting area, she imagines leaving her own father here, a crumpled, frail package in a wheelchair. Over and over, she replays the panicked workings of his face as she wheels him in, locks him into place, and backs away slowly. She tries to think the same of Henry but can’t bring herself to punish him, even in her mind.

  The doctor steps from the examining room. He gestures to the nurses’ station and two nurses round the corner, approach the door to help Clem as he walks. They lead him away from the intake area, toward a white hallway lined with doors.

  “Wait.” Megan stands and jogs towar
d them. She clutches Clem, her body curled over his. His bewildered face peers over her shoulder. His hands dangle loose behind her back. She lets him go, and the nurses move in to guide him away.

  The doctor offers Megan a tissue. “Your father is non-responsive.”

  She nods, wipes her nose. “He was in prison.”

  “He’s malnourished and dehydrated.” The doctor scribbles on the clipboard. His rigid stance, the way he holds his pen, fingers straight, the angle of his chin, all of it poised in judgment. Gerry hears it in his accent, how he sees them, punks loitering in his waiting area.

  “I take good care of him.”

  The doctor lifts a brown bottle from the pocket of his white coat. “Where are you getting this?”

  “That’s his medicine.”

  He turns the bottle back and forth. “There’s no doctor’s name on the prescription label.”

  “It’s from a doctor.”

  “I’ll need his name.” He puts his pen to the clipboard.

  “He’s a friend of my father’s.”

  “I still need his name.”

  “This is his medicine.” Megan voice rises, carries down the tile hall. Gerry looks to Ian. He sits with his elbows on his knees, stares at his hands.

  “This is a controlled prescription narcotic. Your father has developed a severe chemical dependency. He needs to be weaned off it.”

  Gerry forces authority into her voice. “That’s his medicine, I’ve seen him take it.” The doctor glances over Megan’s shoulder, winces in irritation.

  Ian glares at Gerry, whispers, “Shut. Up.”

  Megan nods. “I just want you to know, this might not be permanent.”

  The doctor records another sentence, punctuates it with a tap. “Do you know what kind of place this is? It isn’t a hotel. I’m admitting your father today because I have serious concerns about his health and the level of care he’s been receiving. If, in the future, you decide to take him home, you will have to undergo a government-approved home-study before we agree to his release.”

  “Why? You can’t do that.” Megan grabs the doctor’s sleeve. “That’s not what he wants. I’ll take him home right now.”

  Ian is beside her, loosening her grip on the doctor, pulling her away. “It’s okay,” he says to Megan. Then, to the doctor, “She’s just upset.”

  “I understand,” the doctor says. “It’s very upsetting.” He says it to the air, and Gerry feels a rush inside her, sand through her ribs, the quickness of things that can be done but not undone.

  Megan sobs into Ian’s chest.

  The nurse behind the counter gives Gerry a sympathetic smile. Gerry looks away, refuses her fake pity. On his way down the hall, the doctor stops beside Gerry, hands the brown bottle to the nurse. “Get rid of this.”

  The nurse tucks the bottle behind her file tray, shuffles charts, watches as Ian manoeuvres Megan through the glass doors, the two of them swallowed by daylight.

  Gerry slips back into the common room. She wastes a few minutes, wandering amongst the chairs. The alert ones stare, eyes like stones, mouths tight, dry latches, vigilant for any bad business. The lost ones shiver as she passes close, mouths agape like landed fish, eyes cloudy and frightened. She strolls back to the nurses’ station, brushes her hand over the counter. The nurse looks up from her charts.

  Gerry sinks her face into a grimace. “I think some guy threw up in his chair.”

  With an exhausted sigh, the nurse hoists herself, pushes her pencil behind her ear, rounds the corner into the living area. Gerry’s hand dips behind the file tray, lifts the medicine bottle, slips it into her pocket.

  In the parking lot, Ian flicks a cigarette butt in the air. “What took you so long?”

  Ian trails Megan into the bedroom, closes the door. Gerry settles herself in Clem’s chair, tries not to listen to Megan’s crying, Ian’s low, even voice. The front door hangs open, as if awaiting Clem’s return. Instead, the whir of lawn mowers and a warm spring wind curl into the room.

  Clem’s smell rises from his chair, stale saltwater aftershave and peppery old man. The upholstered arms rest hard and flat under Gerry’s elbows, two mangy patches where the heels of Clem’s hands rubbed, the TV remote positioned for his fingers. She presses the remote and bright, unconcerned faces rise on the grey screen. Her hand pushes down into her pocket, traces the bottle on its side, small raised dots around its curved bottom edge, a fine lip where the label lifts away, scratches her skin.

  Perhaps she could take Megan’s place, care for Clem herself. With the house so close to her school, she could prepare his meals, finish her homework at the kitchen table while he watched TV. But when she thinks of the razor on the bathtub, how she would have to undress him, touch his body with a washcloth, how he yelled or cried for no reason, she knows the best she can hope for is visiting hours, kneeling beside his chair, sneaking a splash of medicine into a coffee mug and tipping it to his lips. For an instant, the image in her mind is confused, and it is her father sitting in the recliner, his young hand steadying the cup, his grateful smile. Outside, another mower grumbles to life. The perfume of fresh-cut grass trails in on the breeze and she is lolling behind her father. A flat summer sun raises dribbles of sweat around her hairline. Leather straps of sandals scrape the swollen edges of her feet. Her father walks ahead, hands in his pockets, long strides that carry him away. When she whimpers and scuffs her steps, he stops, pats his trousered thigh, a signal for her to hurry and catch up. At the summit of their walk, the smoky dome of the conservatory. She begs to go inside, but her father shakes his head, leads them to a low stone wall and a line of what look like parking meters. He jingles the change in his pocket, feeds a coin into the meter, and hoists her, his foot on the small metal platform, his knee her seat. The machine, cold against her face, revives her from sulky exhaustion. As she blinks against the eyepiece, a soft click sounds and a city reveals itself: a dark gutter of freight trains, behind them, brick warehouses, a thin stand of office buildings, farther back, the inlet, dotted with ships, all of it wavy with heat. Her father’s arm snugs her waist, and she grips it like a guardrail, leans forward with the tilt of the machine to see the tops of trees, a field of rooftops, birds swooping below. She leans back and the mountains appear, steep and white-tipped. The sky unfurls around them, patterns of clouds close enough to touch. The click sounds again and two black discs close over her eyes. Her father’s grip loosens.

  The tears begin as he sets her down, the bottoms of her sandals dragging on the pavement. She waits for him to gather her up again, gangly as she is, as her mother still did, until their bodies sealed together. A breeze shimmers the treetops in front of them, the air around her sags. Tomorrow, her father will return to his job in California. As he stands there, waiting for her to collect herself, he lights a cigarette. He blows an exasperated breath that makes her cry harder. She hiccups into her elbow, unable to form words for her weariness, embarrassed by the babyishness of her reaction, the failure of its effect. She tries to explain herself, but what comes out burbles with incoherence, slimy nonsense scraped over tears. And though after his cigarette, he offers his hand, and they walk down through the park side by side under the shade of trees, and her father nods as she chatters desperately about school and friends and songs she’s heard on the radio, she knows, from the looseness of his hand, the gentleness in his voice, the effort he puts into smiling, that he is already farther away than any machine can see.

  The bedroom door opens. Gerry swipes at her eyes.

  Ian appears, stripped to his jeans, his feet bare, his skin flushed pink, as if he’s been dipped in hot water. He leans his forearm on the wall. “What’s up with you?”

  “Is she okay?”

  “Yeah, she’s fine.” He brings his hand to his face. She notices the powder just as he rubs it away, a fine sprinkle of talc near his nostrils. Ian snorts deep, clears his throat. “That was rough today. Thanks for your help.”

  “What about tomorrow?”
r />   “Tomorrow is tomorrow.” Megan’s voice rises behind him. He steps to the side, looks over his shoulder. Megan sways in the hallway, naked from the waist up, her eyes and nose ringed red. She blinks, sniffles into her hand. Her pupils like crystals, lit and glinting.

  Her breasts are perfect, pale saucers against her chest, nipples spongy, wide and pink. Megan opens her arms to display them. Heat rushes to Gerry’s face and she lowers her gaze as Megan crosses one leg over the other, reaches out to Ian to balance herself, then pushes off toward the bathroom. “Tomorrow,” she says. “We all meet at the meeting place, at the meeting time.” The bathroom door snaps shut.

  “We’re not going to practise today? What about Andri, isn’t he coming?”

  Ian grins. “I thought you said you were ready, hotshot.” He surrenders to a spurt of frantic blinking.

  Gerry envies him the escape, the buffer from thought. “What are you guys on? Do you have any more?”

  Ian knocks on the wall as if knocking on a door. “You go home.” He points at her. “Do something normal for a change.”

  THE PHONE RINGS AS SHE DIGS in her pocket for the house key, then stops as she wheels her bike through the door. It starts again before she has her shoes off.

  “You’re back.” Henry huffs through the receiver, breathless.

  She leans against the counter, cranes her neck to check for shadows of workmen through the back windows, but sees none. “I do have a life, you know.”

  “No, no.” The sound is choppy, broken by rustling and thumping, as if he is moving heavy bags of groceries. “It’s just. I’m going on a trip. I wanted to let you know.”

  “Where?”

  A tinny metal crinkling. “Let’s just say, out of town. I’ll be gone for a while.”

  His generalities make her nervous. “Are you in trouble? Should I call Larry Walsh?”