Dead is Better (10 page)

Rose is subdued in his presence and holds her head low, her body taut, so close to me that if we were visible, we’d look a little like Ammit—one creature with a dog’s head and a big fat ass.

We trail Nilsson through the hospital like the dead skin a snake hasn’t finished shedding. If he senses our ominous, vengeful presence, he doesn’t let on.

Mr. Nilsson is a busy and important man. This morning he runs a meeting in a large conference room not far from his large office. His secretary—her name is Beverly—has placed a pen and a fresh pad of lined yellow paper opposite six of the seats, has set up a cardboard carton of Starbucks coffee, with paper cups, stirrers, sugar, and little containers of cream in the middle of the polished table. There is a paper plate holding some muffins and some protein bars.

Two men in suits enter, then a thirtyish brunette in scrubs, and two people wearing white coats over their clothes, their names embroidered on the chest pockets.

One of the men dressed in a suit wears an ID badge: “H. Michael Patterson, CMO.”

I drift close and read the woman’s pocket: “Dr. K. Justing, Cardiology,” then the man’s: “Dr. I. Miller, Emergency Medicine.”

Could this be the elusive Dr. Miller? Or should I say
my
Dr. Miller? A witness to my transit from this world into the other?

Mr. Nilsson’s voice is friendly. “Thanks for coming so early, everybody. Now that post-mortems are no longer routine, meetings like these are hard to fit into the hospital schedule.”

Nilsson nods to the woman in scrubs. “We might as well begin with the E.R.”

Dr. Miller opens her file, then begins to read, “On 8-27-13, the patient, age 26, was admitted to the ER and presented with syncope and numbness in his legs. He reported several previous transitory episodes of loss of consciousness during the previous weeks, but at the time of admission was uncommunicative and confused about the duration and times these episodes occurred.”

One of the suits, Patterson, nods.

“Patient reported dizziness, nausea, and abdominal discomfort prior to the episode. A preliminary examination could not exclude cardiogenic origin for the patient’s symptoms. Dr. Justing was called for a consult.”

Dr. Justing nods toward Dr. Miller. Mr. Nilsson smiles.

Dr. Justing opens her file, then speaks. “Because the patient presented with confusion and weakness, and with bradycardia in the SA node, I took the step of ordering a cardiac catheterization. The patient tolerated the procedure well. Unfortunately, while in recovery, the patient suffered a cerebral vascular accident that rendered him comatose. The patient expired ten days later.”

“Thank you very much, Dr. Justing,” Nilsson says, then turns to the second man wearing a suit.

“Mr. Carson, how do you gauge our vulnerability to lawsuit? And in the eventuality that the patient’s survivors sue, how large is our exposure to liability?”

“Was the patient able to sign a release before the procedure?” Patterson asks.

This guy is almost as smooth as Nilsson. “Yes. I’ve reviewed the case and don’t find openings for survivors who might choose to litigate.” Carson looks down again at his papers, “And I’ve done some research that I think will be good news: The patient—Mr. Brian K. Bingham—was, for the last 11 months, a resident at a halfway house in Skid Row where he had been a participant in a drug recovery program. To date, no family members have claimed his remains. He left foster care at age 18.”

“One who dies lusting for life in this world or for salvation in the next is not enlightened. In the Zen tradition, to die is nothing special.”

—Sushila Blackman

***

Brian the Missing, purple-haired and spider-tattooed, is now Brian the Dead.

Alas, poor Brian, who died alone like me, right here in Nilsson’s hospital. Does Rose feel how weird this is or sense my agitation?

I don’t know. Her whole being is fixed upon Nilsson. When he moves, she shrinks involuntarily. When he lifts a hand, she flinches.

Nilsson bares his teeth again to mimic a smile, but it’s not as wide as usual. “A sad and unfortunate case. Let’s hear from pathology.”

The woman in scrubs nods, “Toxicology panels revealed high levels of heroin and THC. My examination makes me believe that the patient smoked heroin 4-6 hours before he was admitted.”

This news causes the man in the suit to lean forward. “Is it possible the heroin caused the stroke?”

The pathologist glances at the other physicians, then nods. “It could. But there is no way, really, to be sure what caused the CVA—the catheterization or the patient’s drug use.”

“We are but dust and shadow.”

—Horace,
The Odes of Horace

***

Slate colored clouds hang low over the narrow beach that extends below the 101 freeway, just north of the Ventura County line. The tide advances in steel gray folds that rise and collapse against the dark, wet sand. Two joggers in the distance wear sweatshirts and long pants, so it must be cool.

I wonder if Rose’s paws ever touched sand, if she’s ever seen the ocean. She floats behind me, keeping her feet above the wet sand and herself far from the wave foam, as if to protect herself from the spray she can neither touch nor feel.

Rose and I are here for the Missing Brian’s funeral, if you can call this modest send-off that. We are here to say farewell and welcome to nowhere a man we never knew.

The blonde, barefoot with purple nail polish on her toes, wears black leggings and a pink hooded sweatshirt. She carries a white cardboard box carefully—as if it’s full of eggs or baby birds. With her is a woman who must be her mother—same body type but thicker—and her hair is brown. She holds a few purple flowers, chrysanthemums, I think, but dyed an impossible purple, the kind I used to see sometimes in the supermarket, and a helium balloon printed with the words, “I Love You.” The balloon bobs impatiently back and forth in the stiff breeze, as if it’s eager to be free.

A middle-aged man with short black hair walks behind the blonde. He wears jeans and a windbreaker. His fast pace through the sand and his large shoulders make me think that he’s a boxer.

The small group stops, and those wearing shoes remove them. The blonde hands the box to her mother, then bends down and rolls her leggings up above her knees. The blonde takes possession of the box again and walks slowly toward the sea.

She walks until the water is knee-deep. The others follow. Rose and I float above them with the balloon.

The blonde girl sighs, swallows and then speaks, tears streaming down her face, smearing her thick black eyeliner and dark mascara, “I love you, Brian,” she sobs. “I don’t know what happened to make you violate your ten months of sobriety. You must have had a good reason to do what you did. I’ll always love and trust you.”

A large wave threatens her balance and she hugs the box tightly. Her mother shivers and tightens her hold on the flowers and the balloon’s string. The water must be terribly cold.

The bald man pats the blonde’s shoulder. “During the time I knew Brian, I learned to appreciate and to respect him. He was one of the most successful and committed residents in our rehab program. His relapse will always be a mystery to me. The thing about Brian was he cared about other people, not just himself. I know he wanted to be a tattoo artist someday. I hope he can realize his dreams now that he’s in Heaven.”

Tattoo artist in heaven? Good fucking luck.

The mother nods and the girl opens the box, revealing a plastic bag inside. She lifts the bag, loosens the top, waits until a wave arrives, then pours its contents—Brian’s ashes—into the roiling sea. The breeze carries some of the gray, gritty dust away, but the rest sinks quickly under the swirling gray water and hissing foam.

The blonde’s body shudders with her sobs. Her mother gently hands her most of the purple flowers, then gives one to the man and keeps one for herself.

“God bless you, Brian,” the mother says, throwing the flower into the hungry waves.

“Goodbye, Brian,” the man with black hair says, and tosses his flower into the water.

The blonde holds her flowers for a moment, then lets them fall into the sea. She lifts the hand holding the helium balloon high, then opens her fist to release the string.

“Goodbye, Brian. Goodbye!”

The balloon zigzags upward, and then finds a current of air and rides it quickly out to sea. It’s as if the blonde, her mother, the man, Rose and I watch Brian, who’s now just a small dark shape, dissolve into the troubled sky.

“I never understood why when you died, you didn’t just vanish, everything should just keep going on the way it was only you just wouldn’t be there. I always thought I’d like my own tombstone to be blank. No epitaph, and no name. Well, actually, I’d like it to say ‘figment’.”

—Andy Warhol

***

We hang like broken light fixtures below one of the beige ceilings in the Memorial Medical Center, the place Mr. Nilsson spends his waking hours—even some weekends—except for trips to the gym, to Costco, to Starbucks, and to his house, which he visits overnights through very early in the mornings when sometimes he feeds and waters the dog and sometimes he doesn’t. Mr. Nilsson spends his life talking on the phone, reading printouts or typing numbers and then printing more long sheets of paper covered with more numbers.

He has meetings. With people from human resources, billing and collections, janitorial, parking. He speaks often about revenues and projections. If I weren’t dead already, I’d be dead of boredom. But Rose’s vigilance does not lessen. Her fear of Nilsson does not cease.

What have I learned?

Cruelty and pain are often hidden.

This is going to be a “great year” for “MMC”—Memorial Medical Center, A Medical Corporation—if a record number of sick and dying people can be considered “great.” It’s Nilsson’s job to see numbers—not people. And because numbers equal dollars, Nilsson is astoundingly, relentlessly cheap.

My thorough powerlessness—to free that dog—to expose Nilsson’s cruelty—to help Rose find peace—must be, I now believe, a punishment for something I did or failed to do in life.

Something bad, something really terrible, that I must fix, must pay for. But how?

“I told him I believed in hell, and that certain people, like me, had to live in hell before they died, to make up for missing out on it after death, since they didn’t believe in life after death, and what each person believed happened to him when he died.”

—Sylvia Plath,
The Bell Jar

***

All I know about atonement is here, at the San Fernando Valley Jewish Center, a Conservative Congregation, august location of my Bar Mitzvah and my shit brother Mark’s Bar Mitzvah and my cousin Sheila’s wedding.

Rose and I float inside the crowded synagogue, black polyester, embroidered and crocheted
kippot
like little flying saucers below us on the men’s heads,
tallitot
on their shoulders—hairspray and cashmere on the women. I didn’t bother to look for my shit brother Mark and his wife Helen among these living people—years ago he switched to a shul over the hill that is far more hip and much better for business than this one.

Rose and I have been here since last evening (your time), appearing just before sunset in time to see the ark opened, the torah removed, and to hear the hazzan sing the Kol Nidre:

Kol Nidre (All Vows)

Prohibitions, oaths, consecrations, vows that we may vow, swear, consecrate, or prohibit upon ourselves—from this Yom Kippur until the next Yom Kippur, may it come upon us for good—regarding them all, we regret them henceforth. They will all be permitted, abandoned, cancelled, null and void, without power and without standing. Our vows shall not be valid vows; our prohibitions shall not be valid prohibitions; and our oaths shall not be valid oaths.

It’s Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, time of ritual fasting and self-examination in preparation for the new lunar year that began last week on Rosh Hashanah, when God turned a new page in the Book of Life.

After the Kol Nidre is sung, all deals are off, and last year’s promises are no longer valid. Yom Kippur decides whose names will be inscribed in Life’s book and whose will not.

I know, of course, that my name will not appear. And being dead, I’ve got the fasting covered.

It’s the repentance, the expiation of my—failures? Sins?—I am seeking in this place.

I start with commandments honored and commandments broken:

I have not had strange gods before G-D. I’ve had, in fact, no gods at all. I do not believe in YOU. I do not believe in myself.

I did not make any graven image. Not even one.

I have often taken the Lord my G-D’s name in vain. But only metaphorically.

I failed to keep the Sabbath holy.

I did not always honor my father or my mother.

Nor they, me.

On the bright side, I did not, that I’m aware of, kill. Of course I wasn’t vegan, but does that count?

I did not steal except for an illegal video stream or two.

I did not commit adultery. Lately. And when I did it was not without provocation.

I didn’t bear false witness against my neighbor (except those times I lied to avoid jury duty).

I did not covet my neighbor’s house or fields, nor his male or female slaves, nor his ox or ass, or anything that belonged to him.

Well, maybe my neighbor’s ass.

On the bima the rabbi leads the congregation in prayer, then reads the Book of Jonah from the Torah. Even Jonah, it seems was not beyond God’s reach, was not too lost to find redemption.

I contemplate, once again, my many failures, my transgressions, my arrogance, my stupidity, my selfishness. It’s a shitload to revisit but I do, then add to the list of major fuck-ups the biggest and the most important—my failure to help Rose.