Well, I will be unexpectedly out of town Monday through Wednesday, and I figured you'd like this early rather than late
The ToC for this story can be found
here . Thanks again for all the lovely comments thus far!
Good Samaritan (03/08)
For all the trouble it was getting him up the front landing, it was an even worse ordeal getting him up to the second floor where all the bedrooms were. On the way up the walk outside, I thought briefly of just letting him collapse onto the couch in the library on the first floor. And by the time I got him through the doorway and onto the fraying oriental welcome mat in my living room, I felt like I was trying to lug a very dead body instead of a live one. My shoulders were screaming for relief, and I think the circulation in my arm was all but depleted.
Claire and Annie stayed wisely back, looking silently on from their perches on the dining room chairs as we stumbled forward another step.
One glance across the room through the glass doors that opened onto the library, however, convinced me that a trip upstairs might actually be simpler. Claire and Annie had not cleaned up their toys -- the library was traditionally their special room to play in because it was so sunny, and save for the bookshelves around the rim and the sofa against the back wall, very open. I seldom asked them to pick up their things unless I knew we would be having company. Naturally, because of my dire need now for it to not be so, company was a very rare occasion, usually occurring around Christmas and Thanksgiving. Almost nine months ago now.
As it were, Barbie mansion and accessories nearly blocked off the entryway to the room, and I feared what lay further within. I doubted the sofa in there was even accessible. The girls had borrowed bed sheets a week ago, and I had not seen them returned, so there was a very good chance that the sofa had become a makeshift pillar for Fort Claire. Who knew? I hardly ever went in there.
"Stay with me, we're half-way there," I commanded, taking a baby step forward. "I think I'm going to collapse if you don't start helping at least a little."
All I got was a light groan in response. His ragged breaths scorched the air, and with my grip around his stomach I could feel him struggling for much-needed oxygen. But where he lacked in physical strength, he made up for amply in sheer power of will. My tone must have had some effect because, as I took yet another step forward, the weight on my shoulder lessened enough for me to stop wishing my arm would just fall off and be done with it, and he followed. Again, I felt a tugging sense of inadequacy at his sheer determination.
Progress was slow, but later rather than sooner, we made our way up my house's monstrous flight of stairs. Funny, they had never seemed that bad before. At least they hadn't been spiraled or switchbacks. That would have damn near killed me, I think. And possibly Superman along with me because I would have dropped him yet again. This was quite possibly the first time in my life I'd wished for an elevator to go up just one floor.
For one brief moment, I hesitated in the hallway, panting. Three choices lay before me, but only one even entered into consideration. I dragged myself and Superman past the door to the master bedroom and onward to my room. Briefly, I thought about the fact that the sheets in my room were dirty, but no amount of juggling was going to allow me to change them, and if I set him down in my reading chair, I had a feeling he wasn't going to be getting up again anytime soon. He would just have to live with my sheets as they were. It wasn't as if I was a slob or never showered.
Down he collapsed with a groan when I released him, like a puppet whose strings had been suddenly cut. The springs in the mattress creaked and he sank back into an oblivion of pillows. My mouth hung open for several moments, ready and able to explain the location of the bathroom, the towels, and anything else he might need, before I realized my audience was well and truly out, beyond all cares about where he was or any of the particulars.
I lifted his feet up off the floor and onto the bed. Then, I yanked his boots off, first the left and then the right, and placed them beside the bed. For all of two seconds I stared at his suit and cape and decided there was no way in any of the seven layers of Hell I was going to touch those, not even if he had been awake to give me permission.
I didn't know if they came off and had no desire to fumble around trying to find out. The cape was a little damp, but the suit itself had dried quickly and, his personal embarrassment aside, I doubted he would be at all appreciative if I tried to remove it. He seemed very big on personal space and dignity, both of which would be seriously robbed from him.
I blinked. It occurred to me that most of the world's female population, and quite possibly a chunk of the males, would be clawing and hissing to get into my current position.
God, what must it be like to be such a... well... a global sex symbol? Not that he ever used his image that way, but... I doubt he ever got much peace.
I swallowed and stopped that debate right there. I really did not want to know what he did in his spare time. Either he was wholesome enough that his public image matched the private one, in which case there wasn't much to be found out anyway, or he spent a lot of time... not... having peace. As many celebrities were wont to do. Which I did not want to think about. Really.
After a bit of hemming and hawing, wondering what to do next, I realized he was lying across the blankets and sheets -- I hadn't thought about pulling them back until now, when Superman was already acting as a man-sized paper-weight over the top of them. So, quickly, I went to grab a spare thermal blanket from the hall closet, taking only a moment to notice that there were no clean linens left.
Laundry. Had to do that.
When I returned, I draped the blanket across him, hoping that would be warm enough for him.
While he slept, I pulled some of my things out of my dresser and changed into a sweatshirt and flannel boxers, dreading what was to come. Explaining this entire situation to Claire and Annie was not something I looked forward to, not one bit. Hell, I hadn't yet come to grips with the situation myself. Not really.
Somehow, I managed to feed the girls, sleepwalking through the motions of fixing some sort of macaroni concoction. I suppose I should have broached the subject of Superman while we sat in subdued silence at the dining room table. But I was still coming to grips with the fact that the man was even in my house, and the meal had passed by, mechanical, and quickly. As soon as the last bit of pasta had been surrendered to a stomach, I sent them upstairs.
For a long time, I sat in the dining room. I listened to the racket upstairs as the girls shrieked and giggled. Several somethings were dropped. More giggles. And then I heard the thunder of tiny feet across the floor overtop of me.
I suppose I should have wondered what sort of mischief they were making.
Maybe I should have even worried that they would wake our houseguest up.
Houseguest.
Lord.
I shook my head and put the dishes away. Things began to blur a little after that.
Putting the girls down after all the excitement hardly even tried my limited patience, which probably meant I was in for an ambush. I walked into their bedroom, only to find them both under the covers with the lights out. I hadn't even had to tell them to get ready for bed. It'd simply been too easy. Their nightlight was giving off enough of a glow that I didn't bother to turn on their nightstand lamp as I sat down, tensed, and waiting.
It didn't take long.
"Daddy, why is Superman here?" Claire asked, not one to beat around the bush. Annie stayed quiet and watched from her side of the room. Apparently the older of the two had been appointed spokesperson.
I sighed as I pulled Claire's covers up over her chest. She clutched at the bedspread when I released it and pulled it up to her chin.
"Superman got hurt and didn't have anywhere else to go," I explained.
"But Superman can fly and move faster than a... um. A car!" Her arms trapped under the covers in a prison of her own designs, the bedspread leapt up and slowly resettled as she shot her hands up. She giggled.
I leaned forward and stared at her with a serious expression. "Well, sure, but even he gets tired sometimes. You can't move very quick when you're sick can you?" I countered.
She shook her head. "No."
"Well, see?"
She nodded, wide-eyed, as though she understood perfectly. I looked to Annie and found her making a similar gesture.
I sighed again. I knew that I was going to have a problem with this part. They were quiet now because they didn't understand what was going on. But that would wear off. And I knew from experience that telling little children to keep a secret was like trying to get them to eat vegetables. Children are extremely honest about the world around them, and it's hard to get them to go against that grain.
We had gotten them to use discretion in the past... I only hoped I could pull it off again.
"Claire, Annie..." I began. I sat back on the edge of the bed, staring over Claire like some sort of judge and executioner. "Daddy needs you to do a *huge* favor. Do you think you can do something really important for me?"
Claire's eyes went even wider if that were possible. "What?"
"Remember when Uncle Will gave you that beautiful glass ornament for Christmas last year to put on your bookshelf?"
She looked suspicious. "Yeah..."
"Remember how I made you swear to be careful with it and not to break it?"
"Daddy, I haven't touched it. I swear. Annie did it."
"Did not!" Annie interjected.
My line of thought was momentarily broken. Annie did it--what? My gaze flashed to the bookcase in question, and I noticed for the first time that the little glass swan Will had bought them was absent.
"When did *that* happen?" I snapped.
"I don't know." Claire sniffled woefully. "I wanted to get a book."
"Why didn't you ask--" Thankfully I'm not very articulate when I'm angry, and when I took a breath to compose my thoughts, I realized I was about to go into a long, red-faced litany about how they should never try to pick up broken glass on their own. How they should have come to get me the moment something had happened.
But the fact was that they hadn't, nobody had been injured, and it had apparently been a long time ago. At that precise moment of clarity, I found myself standing in the center of the room, arms flailing, and reminded myself why I had come up here in the first place. I choked off the growl that crouched deep in my throat.
"Never mind," I grunted.
They looked sufficiently chastised, anyway.
I made myself sit back down with some effort. And then I re-collected silently for a moment.
"Well," I said after a while, though it took some effort to conceal my chagrin at the irony, "This is even more important than that."
Annie gasped, and Claire's mouth formed a little 'o' of surprise. Though I couldn't really tell if it was because I had let them off the hook about the swan, or because they were well and truly amazed. Possibly, it was both.
I glanced back toward the entryway to the girls' room. Just down that hallway, the most powerful man in the world slept, unaware that his fate was being left in the hands of my first-grader and her preschooler accomplice in crime.
Then I looked back at them. They stared right back expectantly, though they were beginning to fidget in the long silence.
How to explain to them that if they opened their mouths about this, it might get Superman killed? Obviously, this was a closely guarded secret. And now it was in the hands of my children. And me.
God, it was in *my* hands.
"Most of the world doesn't know Superman can get tired like this," I tried to explain.
Annie's eyebrows raised. "Really?" she whispered. I guess she forgot Claire was the one who was supposed to be talking.
"Yes, really," I nodded, looking over to her. "They don't know he can get sick. And it is *extremely* important that you never talk about this to *anyone*."
"But--" Claire protested.
"Not even your friends at school can know. This has to be *our* special secret that he was here this weekend. Do you both understand me? Can you keep this a secret for Daddy?"
I prayed silently.
Annie was nodding, but I could see the wheels turning in Claire's head, and I knew this wasn't going to be at all easy. Her eyes squinted and her nose scrunched up as she thought deeply on the matter.
"What if... Ms. Steve asks me? Or... or the principal!" Claire's bedspread leapt up toward the ceiling again. I think she'd kicked it that time.
"Well," I said. "They shouldn't ask you, but if they do, you need to just say that nothing happened this weekend."
Annie interjected suddenly, "What about the police... Or Grandpa?"
I turned to look at her and shook my head. "Not even them."
"How come?" Claire asked suspiciously, forcing me to look back the other way. I felt strangely like a windshield wiper. I tried not to let my annoyance show. This was important, I told myself. Extremely important.
"Bad people could find out and use it against him."
And that was when it hit me. If anyone found out Superman was here, he might get associated with us. Press would be the least of our concerns. What if...
Lois Lane. Lois Lane was associated with him. And... Wasn't Lois Lane at death's door every other week? I remembered thinking several times as I sat over my weekly copy of the Daily Planet that half the time she was considered such a good journalist simply because she had had so many experiences with near-death that it was merely second nature to her to describe them to others.
My heart began to thud with fear, and I tried to calm myself. That was why I had to convince them, and I had to do it now. And I would do it any way I could, because I had to.
"How?" Annie asked. She just didn't understand. Neither of them did.
Claire's eyes glittered in the dim light.
What could I say that would possibly get them to realize? To understand?
The only example I could think of made me sick inside, but I sucked in a breath and forced myself to use it. I had to convince them.
"Well," I began, though my voice sounded strange and shaky, even to my own ears. "Remember when Mommy used to go out with wigs on?"
Claire nodded, though Annie appeared lost. "Yeah."
"It's kind of like that. If people had known she was sick, they might have treated her differently. And you know how she hated that."
Something was burning the backs of my eyes. I took another deep breath, though it shook and seemed to hang shakily in my chest. Claire's calculating gaze was all but gone behind a subdued mask. Her lips were set in a small, thin line, and she nodded.
But then she looked up, and her gaze made me want to lose what little composure I had left.
"Superman isn't going to die like Mommy, is he?"
I blinked.
I blinked again.
"No..." I said, but the word was so garbled across my thick tongue that I couldn't even tell if I had said it or moaned it. I cleared my throat.
"No, of course not. He's sick in a different way." The lump wouldn't go away, but I sounded much more understandable, at least to my own ears.
"How?" she pressed.
"Remember when you swallowed some of that bad stuff from under the sink and I had to take you to the emergency room?" I replied mechanically, trying not to succumb to my urge to look at the door. To flee.
I wasn't going to think about this now. And I certainly didn't want this responsibility. I began to count in my head. Recited my to-do list. Anything but think.
"Yeah," Claire said.
By the time I got to fourteen I was all right again.
"He got some bad stuff on him, and it made him sick," I said.
I saw from the looks in their eyes that we had finally arrived at an understanding. I could only pray that this agreement would remain that way, and not end up like William's glass swan.
Claire nodded and turned over onto her side. Her breaths were heavy and even very shortly after.
When I turned to Annie, however, I saw the light glinting off her pupils. I nodded mutely to her. We shared a moment of silence before I got up and headed toward the door.
"Daddy?" Annie called behind me, her voice small and pitiful.
I was preparing myself to explain why I couldn't read a bedtime story, when she surprised me. "You should tell him not to drink things under the sink," she said.
"I'll be sure and mention it to him," I said, a fake-plastered smile forced across my jaw. "And now, you need to get to sleep like your sister."
She nodded, and I glimpsed her rolling away from the glare of the nightlight as I gently closed their door.
It was only after I was in the hallway that I allowed myself a shuddering, noisy breath. I wiped at my face. Stubble pricked at my palms. A deep, cold exhaustion slipped under my skin. The sharp ache in my muscles returned with a vengeance.
What now?
I should have been relieved that the day was finally back under my control. That everything was finally over. But the calm only seemed to make it worse.
So, Jake, what did you do this weekend? Nothing much... Laundry. Cleaning. Watched the next episode of Lost. Saved Superman by making my dead wife into a simile...
The crushing feeling grew deeper as I looked forlornly at the door to the master bedroom. It was the only bedroom left in the house that didn't have people in it. The only place left for me to sleep.
I pushed open the door, which complied with a small moan of protest like a last, dying breath... A dim shaft of light from the hallway sliced the room in half. It was dark and the air smelled stale, unrecycled. As I stepped in and my foot crunched down into the plush, barely-trodden carpet, my chest tightened.
I never came in here. Never.
Maybe I could go sleep downstairs on a chair.
Bile stirred up in my throat, and I squeezed my eyes shut. I couldn't do this yet. Too soon. I couldn't. I couldn't do this now. Short breaths clogged in my throat.
My hand flashed back to the door handle, fishing for it in the soft dark. But I paused, hand outstretched.
It had been a very long time. A very, very long time since I had stepped foot in this room.
I *could* do this now, I told myself, though my sudden bout of courage felt false. My sight slowly unfuzzed as I became used to the dimness, and my breaths slowed to a fanciful calm, though panic still remained, lurking. I could feel it trembling underneath my skin, waiting to explode.
I could do this now, I told myself again. I could do this. I shut the door behind me and took a step further into the darkness.
Maybe I was imagining things, but I could almost smell the perfume she had been wearing the last night we had gone out for dinner. Rosy. Bittersweet. I remember it because she had asked me if I liked it. She had never asked me those things until the end. As if she had wanted every last moment to be perfect...
It was a silly notion, I know, to think I could still detect the scent. That moment hovering in my memory had been months before that last awful night, and years ago from now.
But it was comforting nonetheless. I breathed in the phantom scent again and closed my eyes. Imagining.
I shuffled blindly over to the bed and turned the lamp on. The room illuminated in a dim, haunting glow. Everything was as it had been left.
The room remained nearly untouched, even after all this time. Canyon-like vacuum tracks cut through the carpet, a remnant of the Thursday before last when the cleaning crew had been here. But the maids always did a careful job of not disturbing anything but what they needed to clean. And it showed.
I felt like I was walking into the past.
Shadows cast over the nightstand and the knickknacks on the dresser. Books that she had been reading but hadn't finished were still stacked beside the bed. A pair of her earrings lay at the foot of an alarm clock which had stopped long ago, the second and minute hands halting time just shy of eight. I stared at the forgotten jewelry. They were gold. Hooks. Dangly things. I still don't know what they were supposed to be, but I knew she had worn them more than any other pair. A photo of myself stared back at me from the other side of the table lamp, a smiling ghost of the past.
Stop chasing me around with that camera, I'd said. She'd laughed and then took the picture anyway.
With a mirthless grunt, I looked away. To the other side of the bed where I used to sleep. A copy of 'Living With Cancer' lay on its back, words offering up to the ceiling, open to page 47. Exactly where I had stopped reading it. That last night before she had to be taken to the hospital permanently...
My hand shook as I reached out to pick the book up. I held it in my palm cracked open along its spine. But I just couldn't seem to read it. I couldn't hold it still. Words blurred. The sour new-paper smell still drifted up from the pages, faint, but I think my eyes were tearing before I even noticed that.
I splayed my fingers over the page and smoothed the dog-eared edge I'd used to mark my place. I didn't need a bookmark anymore. I sucked in air and blinked, closing it after an eternal pause.
The action felt strangely final. Unforgiving.
But it couldn't really give me any useful information anymore, right? I placed it back on the nightstand and pulled the bedspread and sheets back toward me.
Still, the undercurrent of panic wouldn't leave me alone. It felt like I was breaching some sacred pact. Like I was trying to sleep in an altar that was not to be touched.
For a moment, I stared back at the discarded book. The dim light shined off the laminate cover. Like glass.
With a growl, I shoved the book violently to the floor where it landed with a hollow thud. There was no satisfaction for me at the sound of it.
I turned away from it, back toward the bed. Things got blurrier. I don't remember much. I remember the slow creak of the springs as I sank down onto the mattress. The way the room's soft glow sparked out as I flipped the lamp off. I remember smelling her on the pillows. Tossing and turning. I remember that, too.
Most of all, I remember finally giving up and sleeping on the floor.
*****
TBC...
(End Part 03/08)
