Elvissey (30 page)

The TVC played sans sound in our apartment when I came
home that evening; each window's curtains were drawn
against the dark without, all lights were switched on to
brighten the rooms within. `John?" I called out, expecting
an answer; hearing none. As each week passed he'd grown
more depressed, saying little, doing less; he'd not gotten out
of bed for several days, at least not while I was in the apartment, and all my attempts to comfort or concern futiled as
he walled me off along with all others. For the first time since
we returned I feared for what I might find, walking through
my home. Cat-treading into the kitchen, I glanced through
the door, turning my head away as quickly, praying to Godness I wouldn't spy him hanging there along with the garlic
strands, or resting floorways with weapon at hand, afloat in
his red sea.

`John?"

He wasn't there; all looked as per usual. Glasses filmed
with remnants of the liquids they'd held filled the sink, the
dishtowel was tossed on the table, an emptied icetray rested
atop the refrigerator. The silverware drawer was open; walking over, looking in, I saw that all the knives were missing.

"Are you here, John? John?"

Mayhap he was asleep, and hadn't heard my call. I
stepped into the short hall that ran between our bedroom
and the living quarters, hesitating for several moments
before crossing the bathroom's threshold. Reaching around
the doorframe, I switched on the light; sighed as I stared
inside and saw the shower door open, and visible emptiness
within. His bathrobe lay near the tub, where he'd dropped it.

"John," I said again, and moved toward the bedroom.
`John?" Our door was partly ajar; my hand trembled as I
brushed my fingers against the wood, pushing it open. I
could see my breath as I entered, and so found the wallswitch and lowered the AC. On our unmade bed's rumpled
sheets rested our wedding album, a heavy blue folder housing a player and all that we'd been, preserved on disk. The dressing table was undisturbed; there was nothing in our
closet that shouldn't have been there. Not even mice gave
life to our room. My knees shook so that I could no longer
stand; I sat on the bed, holding my head in my hands as I
allowed myself recovery time. Adrenaline charged my system, pounded my heart, throbbed my head. John's copy of
Knifelife lay open, facedown on the nightstand. Picking it up,
I saw marked pages revealing a section entitled "What is
Your Job?" Its opener read: You are the devil and you come to
do devil's work.

I stood up and moved across the room to shut the door
while I disrobed. As I started to close it I saw the kitchenknives embedded deeply in the wood, grouped at eyelevel in
a tight circle. I gathered he'd thrown them there while sitting, or lying on the bed. Looking beneath their lengths to
their wood-fixed target I gleaned what remained of the wedding picture he always kept with him. The door started to
open; I fell back onto the bed, trying to shout; found that I
couldn't speak, as if all my words were stolen from me.

"Iz-?" John asked as he walked in. I noticed a bloodspot
at the corner of his nose; his shirtcollar was torn. His hands
steamed in the room's cold air. "Iz, you're shivering. Are you
AO?" I backed away from him as he approached, and I
gripped my hands, trying to stop their shake. "What is it?
What's troubling?"

"Where've you been?"

"A walk," he said. "As ever, it uncertained what time you'd
home it. So I went walking. Nothing more."

"Why did you do that?" I asked, pointing toward the
crown of knives in our door. "That's us, John. On our wedding day. Why? Why?" He sat near me, clasping his smoking
hands before him in his lap.

"I mindlost, Iz," he said. "Forgive me. Something flared
and I seized. I jealoused. Once I started I tossed them all. I'll
repair-"

"Irreparable!" I shouted, beginning to cry. "That's us, John, that's us. Why? I came home, you'd left no note, I
didn't know-"

"Please, Iz, forgive-"

"You'd exed yourself, for all I knew. Then this is what's
found. This is what you think now? Is it-?"

"No..

"Then why?"

John stared at the knives in the door, blinking as if suddenly recalling that someone else had put them there. He
touched my shoulder with his hand; I pulled away. "I'll not
harm you, Iz."

"You harmed my picture-"

"Our picture," he said. "I jealoused. Forgive me. I miss
you so-

"I'm here every night," I said. "I want to be here. I did, at
least ..."

He stretched out on the bed, pressing his face into his
pillow as if he might suffocate himself with it; he evidenced
no sob, showed no rack, but I knew my husband's moods
and knew as well his hurt was true. All the same I froze,
unable to comfort, this time as never before fearful of the
manner in which he might choose to assuage his pain. A
metallic perfume clung to him, the scent of copper coins.
This was it, mayhap; still, however my emotions overwhelmed, my headache would not go away.

"I was unnerved, John. I expected you'd be here."

"I expected you wouldn't be," he said.

"Where were you?" I asked. "What did you do?"

"A walk, as told," he said, not turning to look at me.
"Rage overwhelmed, Iz. Something had to be done. It had
to be."

"What something?" He didn't answer. "I can't bear this,
John, it has to end-"

"Mutual," he said, and then silenced. I sat with him until
I was sure he was asleep, and of little harm to either of us;
then, rising, got up and walked into the living room and made myself a place on the couch. Unplugging the TVC to
assure that it wouldn't switch on by itself in the night, I lay
down, propping my head against the throws, hoping that
the throb would lessen enough that I too might sleep. I
drifted in and out of halfsleep, eventually settling; but each
time I remembered our picture nailed against the door I felt
a new knife slip into my head.

The next morning I had a dream as I awoke. No sooner had
I come to consciousness than most of its details raced from
my memory, but I recalled being in an elevator; my blond
hair lifted up from my neck as the car descended. E and John
attended me as the door slid open; they held my arms with
steaming hands, escorting me into a cavern. Metal filing
cabinets stood as stalagmites all around. My men turned
toward me and grinned; they'd lost their teeth. I noticed
they wore yellow lapel buttons imprinted with the letter D.
They lifted me off the floor of the cavern and threw me upward, high into its vault. As I descended I saw them waiting
below me; awakening, I opened my eyes, and saw nothing.

By one that afternoon I'd been treated and then bedded in
recovery at Montefiore. They'd anesthetized me during the
procedure; coming to, I saw my husband near. He'd brought
me to the hospital after hearing me scream for him that
morning.

"I'm unblinded-" I said; it hurt so much to hear myself
as it did to speak, and I quieted again. After a moment more
I'd adjusted to the lingering ache that rattled my head, and
spoke anew to John. "What happened to me?"

My husband appeared in angel's guise, whiteclad from
crown to toe; when he replied, the mask so filtered and
distanced his voice that it sounded as if it came from across
a seance table, and for an instant I wondered if I'd died. The
notion that heaven might resemble a hospital room seemed
only natural.

"You're viabled, Iz," he said, reaching through the noninfective shield overhanging my bed, sliding his arm into the
attached infold that he might stroke my hand with lastexed
fingers. "Thank Godness. They said you'd be able again,
after. I didn't believe. I thought you were leaving without me."

"What happened?"

"Calm yourself, Iz. Healing's ensuing. You'll be out by
nightfall, they say."

"What happened to my eyes?" I asked. "Why couldn't I
see?"

"Not your eyes," he said. "They attempted explanations.
Claimed the diagnostician wasn't programmed to spot what
showed. It's burned away now, you're treated-"

"My baby-?"

"No," he said, pulling his arm out of its enclosure, leaving
me untouched. "Your headache's source. Once they doped
you they scanned, and read a tumor. Behind the prefrontals,
pressing against the optic nerve. Now it's gone."

"I was cancered?"

"You were," he said. "No longer. Love, Iz. I love you-"

"Known," I said. "What caused it? They're telling?"

"They're investigating."

"We have to talk, John," I said, recalling the previous
night's events.

"We will. Meanwhile, I'll comfort. I'll nurse. Forgive me,
Iz."

There wasn't reason enough yet not to; the tent's translucence prevented me from seeing his eyes' light as he spoke.
"Forgiven. We still need to talk-"

"We will," he said. "We will, later. Rest, Iz. Rest."

Some time afterward I read of a child's brain tumor
which, when biopsied postmortem, was found to contain
within itself the seeds of seven tiny siblings who'd lost their
way in utero. Nothing in fetal art matched such a spectacular, if small-scaled, performance. That afternoon, long
before I heard of such findings, I insighted, and imagined
my own twin unisoned within me without my knowledge,
seeking solace in my head; I'd wondered why it had taken so
long to let me know it was there, and then I wondered how
its debut might have been assisted.

Several days later, once my outpatienting was done, I went
to see Judy. "They've not IDed the likely agent, or they're not
telling?" she asked; bells tinkled, counterpointing her
words.

"Either's likely," I said, touching my head, tracing my
scar, fingering my stubble. They'd shaved me to prevent
laserburn during the operation. Leverett had several wigs
forwarded to the hospital, blond mops of varying lengths; I
preferred my nubbiness, and so went naked, topside. "Mayhap I'm sideshowing paranoia-"

"Paranoia has its place," Judy said. "Here's what's found
thus far. The clinic's mum on Melaway. Your doctors are
even more evasive than mine. Montefiore claims the Brixton
studies are at present inaccessible. Alice won't rape their
network, or won't tell if she has. My labbies inhouse are
unfamilared with the candy he gave you direct, though they
estimate it no more than an accelerator. The problem, they
say, is that pinpointing the origin of tumors is like spotting the first cloud to rain in a hurricane. As ever, truth is lost
amid fact."

"As ever-"

"They were able to ID the pills he gave your husband,"
she said. "They contained an unpronounceable which, as
you hunched, nullified the regooding medication. That was
mixed with an amphetamine base. He was lightspeeding,
likely, throughout your trip."

"His behavior, then," I said. "Doesn't that explain his
actions? Is he to be held responsible-"

"That partially explains his actions," Judy said. "But it's
unquestioned to my mind that Leverett would have known.
I'm sure as well he was awared of what he gave you might do.
Astonishing that your husband could behave at all, as it
circumstances." She handed me a sheet of printout initialled with her chop. "Ergo, he's reinstated. This'll ease him
from your house with greater ease. If you'd told me Leverett
was serving as pharmacist to you earlier, this might have
been prevented."