LORRIEMOORE

"People Like that are the Only People

Here: Canonical Babbling in Peed Oi
Moore, Lonie. Birds of America. Picador: New York, 1988.

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 Self-Help
Anagrams
~ I R D SO F
Like Life
!I Run the Frog Hospital? AMERICA

)e Forgotten Helper
 People Like That Are tk,Onfy People Here 2 I 3

Still, she phones the clinic at the children's hospital. "Blood in

the diaper," she says, and, sounding alarmed and perplexed, the
woman on the other end says, "Come in now."
Such pleasingly instant service! Just say "blood." Just say
"diaper." Look what you get!
PEOPLE LIKE T H A T ARE T H E In the examination room, pediatrician, nurse, head resi-
dent--all seem less alarmed and perplexed than simply pcr-
ONLY PEOPLE HERE: C A N O N I C A L plexed. At first, stupidly, the Mother is calmed by this. But
BABBLING I N P E E D O N K soon, besides peering and saying "Hmmmm," the pediatrician,
nurse, and head resident are all drawing their mouths in, bluish
. and tight-morning glories sensing noon. They fold their arms
across their white-coated chests, unfold them again and jot
'
things down. They order an ultrasound. Bladder and kidneys.
"Here's the card. Go downstairs; turn left."

In Radiology, the Baby stapds anxiously on the table, naked

A beginning, an end: there seems to be neither. The whole against the Mother as she holds him still against her legs and
thing is like a cloud that just lands and everywhere inside it is waist, the Radiologist's cold scanning disc moving about the
full of rain. A start: the Mother finds a blood clot in the Baby's Baby's back. The Baby whimpers, looks up at the Mother. kt's
diaper. What is the story? Who put this here? It is big and 1 get out of here, his eyes beg. Pick me up! The Radiologist stops,
bright, with a broken khaki-colored vein in it. Over the week- freezes one of the many swirls of oceanic gray, and clicks repeat-
end, the Baby had looked listless and spacey, clayey and grim. , edly, a single moment within the long, cavernous weather map
But today he looks fine--so what is this thing, startling against ' that is the Baby's insides.
the white diaper, like a tiny mouse heart packed in snow? "Are you finding something?" asks the Mother. Last year,
Perhaps it belongs to someone else. Perhaps it is something her uncle Larry had had a kidney removed for something that
menstrual, something belonginb to the Mother or to the Baby- e turned out to be benign. These imaging machines! They are
sitter, something the Baby has found in a wastebasket and for like dogs, or metal detectors: they find everything, but don't
his own demented baby reasons stowed away here. (Babies: know what they've found. T h a t Swhere the surgeons come in.
they're crazy! What can you do?) In her mind, the Mother takes ~ h e ~ ' like
r e the owners of the dogs. "Give me that," they say to
this away from his body and attaches it to someone else's. ' the dog. "What the heck is that?"

There. Doesn't that make more sense? "The surgeon will speak to you," says the Radiologist.
"Are you finding something?"
"The surgeon will speak to you," the Radiologist says
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 1 5

again. "There seems to be something there, but the surgeon "He's big on lights these days," explains the Mother.
will talk to you about it." "That's okay," says the Surgeon, nodding toward the light
"My uncle once had something on his kidney," says the switch. "Let him play with it." The Mother goes and stands
Mother. "So they removed the kidney and it turned out the by it, and the Baby begins turning the lights off and on, off
something was benign." and on.
The Radiologist smiles a broad, ominous smile. "That's "What we have here is a Wilms' tumor," says the Surgeon,
always the way it is," he says. "You don't know exactly what it suddenly plunged into darkness. He says "tumor" as if it were
is until it's in the bucket." the most normal thing in the world.
" 'In the bucket,' " the Mother repeats. "Wilms'?" repeats the Mother. The room is quickly on fire
The Radiologist's grin grows scarily wider-is that even again with light, then wiped dark again. Among the three of
possible? "That's doctor talk," he says. them here, there is a long silence, as if it were suddenly the
"It's very appealing," says the Mother. "It's a very appealing middle of the night. "Is that apostrophe s or s apostrophe?" the
way to talk." Swirls of bile and blood, mustard and maroon in a Mother says finally. She is a writer and a teacher. Spelling can be
pail, the colors of an African flag or some exuberant salad bar: in important-perhaps even at a time like this, though she has
the bucket-+he imagines it all. never before been at a time like this, so there are barbarisms she
"The Sugeon will see you soon," he says again. He tousles could easily commit and not know.
the Baby's ringletty hair. "Cute kid," he says. The lights come on: the world is doused and exposed.
"S apostrophe," says the Surgeon. "I think." The lights go
back out, but the Surgeon continues speaking in the dark. "A '

"Let's see now," says the Surgeon in one of his examining rooms. malignant tumor on the lefe kidney."
He has stepped in, then stepped out, then come back in again. Wait a minute. Hold on here. The Baby is only a baby, fed
He has crisp, frowning features, sharp bones, and a tennis-in- on organic applesauce and soy milk-a little prince!--and he
Bermuda tan. He crosses his blue-cottoned legs. He is wearing was standing so close to her during the ultrasound. How could
clogs. he have this terrible thing? It must have been her kidney. A
, The Mother knows her own face is a big white dumpling of fifiies kidney. A DDT kidney. The Mother clears her throat. "Is
worry. She is still wearing her long, dark parka, holding the it possible it was my kidney on the scan? I mean, I've never
Baby, who has pulled the hood up over her head because he heard of a baby with a tumor, and, frankly, I was standing very
always thinks 'it's h n n y to do that. Though on certain windy , close." She would make the blood hers, the tumor hers; it

mornings she would like to think she could look vaguely would all be some treacherous, farcical mistake.
romantic like this, like some French Lieutenant's Woman of the : "No, that's not possible," says the Surgeon. The light goes
Prairie, in all of her saner moments she knows she doesn't. Ever. f back on.
She knows she looks ridiculous-like one of those animals "It's not?" says the Mother. Wait until it's in the bucket, she
made out of twisted party balloons. She lowers the hood and hinks. Don't be so sure. Do we have to wait until it's in the bucket
slips one arm out of the sleeve. The Baby wants to get up and tofindout a mistake has been made?
play with the light switch. He fidgets, h s e s , and points. "We will start with a radical nephrectomy," says the Sur-
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A
People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 x 7 ,

geon, instantly thrown into darkness again. His voice comes three occasions used the formula bottles as flower vases. She
from nowhere and everywhere at once. "And then we'll begin
twice let the Baby's ears get fudgy with wax. A few afternoons
with chemotherapy after that. These tumors usually respond last month, at snacktime, she placed a bowl of Cheerbs on the
very well to chemo." floor for him to eat, like a dog. She let him play with the Dust-
"I've never heard of a baby having chemo," the Mother says.
buster. Just once, before he was born, she said, "Healthy? I just
Baby and Cbemo, she thinks: they should never even appear in
want the kid to be rich." A joke, for God's sake! After he was
the same sentence together, let alone the same life. In her other
born she announced that her life had become a daily sequence of
life, her life before this day, she had been a believer in alterna-
mind-wrecking chores, the same ones over arid over again, like
tive medicine. Chemotherapy? Unthinkable. Now, suddenly,
a novel by Mrs. Carnus. Another joke! These jokes will kill you!
alternative mediciniseems the wacko maiden aunt to the Nice
She had told toioften, and with too much enjoyment, t k story
Big Daddy of Conventional Treatment. How quickly the old
of how the Baby had said "Hi" to his high chair, waved at the
girl faints and gives way, .leaves one just standing there.
lake waves, shouted " ~ o o d ~ - ~ o o d ~ - in ~ owhat
o d ~seemed
" to
Chemo? Of course: chemo! Why by all means: chemo.
be a Russian accent, pointed at his eyes and said "Ice." And all
Absolutely! Chemo!
that nonsensical baby talk: wasn't it a stitch? "Canonical bab-
The Baby flicks the switch back on, and the walls reappear,
bling," the language experts called it. He recounted whole sto-
big wedges of light checkered with small framed watercolors of
ries in it-totally made up, she could tell. He embroidered; he
the local lake. The Mother has begun to cry: all of life has led
fished; he exaggerated. What a card! To friends, she spoke of his
her here, to this moment. After this, there is no more life.
eating habits (carrots yes, tuna no). She mentioned, too much,
There is something else, something stumbling and unlivable,
his sidesplitting giggle. Did she have to be so boring? Did she
something mechanical, something for robots, but not life. Life
have no consideration for others, for the intellectual demands
has been taken and broken, quickly, like a stick. The room goes
and courtesies of human society? Would she not even attempt
dark again, so'that the Mother can cry more freely. How can a
to be more interesting? It was a crime against the human mind
baby's body be stolen so fast? How much can one heaven-sent
not even to try.
and unsuspecting child endure? Why has he not been spared
Now her baby, for all these reasons-lack of motherly
this inconceivable fate?
gratitude, motherly judgment, motherly proportion-will be
Perhaps, she thinks, she is being punished: too many baby-
taken away.
sitters too early on. ("Come to Mommy! Come to Mommy-
The room is fluorescently ablaze again. The Mother digs
Baby-sitter!" she used to say. But it was a joke!) Her life,
around in her parka pocket and comes up with a 'Kleenex. It is
perhaps, bore too openly the marks and wigs of deepest drag.
old and thin, like a mashed flower saved from a dance; she dabs
Her unrnotherly thoughts had all been noted: the panicky hope i
5, it at her eyes and nose.
that his nap would last longer than it did; her occasional desire "The Baby won't suffer as much as you," says the Surgeon.
to kiss him passionately on the mouth (to make out with her And who can contradict? Not the Baby, who in his Slavic
baby!); her ongoing complaints about the very vocabulary of Betty Boop voice can say only mumJ&A,cbwe, ice, bye-byeJout-
motherhood, how it degraded the speaker ("Is this a poopie rid, boogie-boogie, goody-goody, eddy-eddy, and car. (Who is Eddy?
onesie! Yes, it's a very poopie onesie!"). She had, moreover, on They have no idea.) This will not suffice to express his mortal
k
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 I 9

suffering. Who can say what babies do with their agony and his mouth round and open like the sweetest of poppies. All the
shock? Not they themselves. (Baby talk: isn't it a stitch?) They lullabies in the world, all the melodies threaded through with
put it all no place anyone can really see. They are like a different maternal melancholy now become for her--abandoned as a
race, a different species: they seem not to experience pain the mother can be by working men and napping babies-the songs
way we do. Yeah, that's it: their nervous systems are not as h l l y of hard, hard grief. Sitting there, bowed and bobbing, the
formed, and they just h n ' t experiencepain the way we do. A tune to Mother feels the entirety of her love as worry and heartbreak. A
keep one humming through the war. "You'll get through it," quick and irrevocable alchemy: there is no longer one unwor-
the Surgeon says. ried scrap left for happiness. "If you go," she keens low into his
"How?" asks the Mother. "How does one get through it?" soapy neck, into the ranunculus coil of his ear, "we are going
"You just put your head down and go," says the Sur- with you. We are nothing without you. Without you, we are a
geon. He picks up his file folder. He is a skilled manual laborer. heap of rocks. We are gravel and mold. Without you, we are
The tricky emotional stuff is not to his liking. The babies. The two stumps, with nothing any longer in our hearts. Wherever
babies! What can be said to console the parents about the this takes you, we are following. We will be there. Don't be
babies? "I'll go phone the oncologist on duty to let him know," scared. We are going, too. That is that."
he says, and leaves the room.
"Come here, sweetie," the Mother says to the Baby, who has
toddled off toward a gum wrapper on the floor. "We've got to "Take Notes," says the Husband, after coming straight home
put your jacket on." She picks him up and he reaches for the from work, midafternoon, hearing the news, and saying all the
light switch again. Light, dark. Peekaboo: where's baby? words out loud-surgery, metastasis, dialysis, transplant-then
Where did baby go? collapsing in a chair in tears. "Take notes. We are going to need
the money."
"Good God," cries the Mother. Everything inside her sud-
At home, she leaves a message--"Urgent! Call me!"-for the denly begins to cower and shrink, a thinning of bones. Perhaps
Husband on his voice mail. Then she takes the Baby upstairs this is a soldier's readiness, but it has the w h 8 of death and
for his nap, rocks him in the rocker. The Baby waves good-bye defeat. It feels like a heart attack, a failure of will and courage, a
to his little bears, then looks toward the window and says, power failure: a failure of everything. Her face, when she
"Bye-bye, outside." He has, lately, the habit of waving good- glimpses it in a mirror, is cold and bloated with shock, her eyes
bye to everything, and now it seems as if he senses an imminent scarlet and shrunk. She has already scatted to wear sunglasses
departure, and it breaks her heatt to hear him. Bye-bye! She indoors, like a celebrity widow. From where will her own
sings low and monotonously, like a small appliance, which is strength come? Prom some philosophy? From some frigid little
how he likes it. He is drowsy, dozy, drifting off. He has grown philosophy? She is neither stalwart nor realistic and has trouble
so much in the last year, he hardly fits in her lap anymore; his with basic concepts, such as the one that says events move in
limbs dangle off like a pieta. His head rolls slightly inside the one direction only and do not jump up, turn around, and take
crook of her arm. She can feel him falling backward into sleep, themselves back.
 \< .. -.
B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 2 1

The Husband begins too many of his sentences with "What requests the Mother. And how do you want it? More charitable
if." He is trying to piece everything together like a train wreck. acts? A billion starting now. Charitable thoughts? Harder, but
He is trying to get the train to town. of course! Of course! I'll do the cooking, honey; I'll pay the
"We'll just take all the steps, move through all the stages. rent. Just tell me. Excuse me? Well, if not to you, to whom do I
We'll go where we have to go. We'll hunt; we'll find; we'll pay speak? Hello? To whom do I have to speak around here? A
what we have to pay. What if we can't pay?" higher-up? A superior? Wait? I can wait. I've got all day. I've
"Sounds like shopping." got .the whole damn day.
"I cannot believe this is happening to our little boy," he The Husband now lies next to her in bed, sighing. "Poor
says, and starts to sob again. "Why didn't it happen to one of little guy could s w i v e all this, only to be killed in a car crash
us? It's so unfair. Just last week, my doctor declared me in per- at the age of sixteen," he says.
fect health: the prostate of a twenty-year-old, the heart of a ten- The wife, bargaining, considers this. "We'll take the car
year-old, the brain of an' insect--or whatever it was he said. crash," she says.
What a nightmare this is." "What?"
What words can be uttered? You turn just slightly and "Let's Make a Deal! Sixteen Is a Full Life! We'll take the car
there it is: the death of your child. It is part symbol, part devil, crash. We'll take the car ctash, in front of which Catol Merrill is
and in your blind spot all along, until, if you are unlucky, it is now standing."
completely upon you. Then it is a fierce little country abduct- Now the Manager of Marshall Field's reappears. "To take
ing you; it holds you squarely inside itself like a cellar room- the surprises out is to take the life out of life," he says.
the best boundaries of you are the boundaries of it. Are there The phone rings. The Husbarid gets up and leaves the
windows? Sometimes aren't there windows? room.
"But I don't want these surprises," says the Mother. "Here!
You take these surprises!"
The Mother is not a shopper. She hates to shop, is generally bad "To know the narrative in advance is to turn yourself into a
at it, though she does like a good sale. She cannot stroll mean- machine," the Manager continues. "What makes humans
ingfully through anger, denial, grief, and acceptance. She goes human is precisely that they do not know the future. That is
straight to bargaining and stays there. How much? she calls out why they do the fateful and amusing things they do: who can
to the ceiling, to some makeshift construction of holinesi she say how anything will turn out? Therein lies the only hope for
has desperately, though not uncreatively, assembled in her redemption, discovety, and-let's be frank--fun, fun, fun!
mind and prayed to; a doubter, never before given to prayer, she There might be things people will get away with. And not just
must now reap what she has not sown; she must assemble from motel towels. There might be great illicit loves, enduring joy,
scratch an entire altar of worship and begging. She tries for faith-shaking accidents with farm machinery. But you have to
noble abstractions, nothing too anthropomorphic, just some not know in order to see what stories your life's efforts bring
Higher Morality, though if this particular Highness looks you. The mystery is all."
something like the manager at Marshall Field's, sucking a The Mother, though shy, has grown confrontational. "Is
Frango mint, so be it. Amen. Just tell me what you want, this the kind of bogus, random crap they teach at merchandis-
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 2 3

ing school? We would like fewer surprises, fewer efforts and "You're making me nervous."
mysteries, thank you. K through eight; can we just get K "Sweetie, darling, I'm not that good. I can't do this. I can
through eight?" It now seems like the luckiest, most beautiful, do-what can I do? I can do quasi-amusing phone dialogue. I
most musical phrase she's ever heard: K through eight. The can do succinct descriptions of weather. I can do screwball out-
very lilt. The very thought. ings with the family pet. Sometimes I can do those. Honey, I
The Manager continues, trying things out. "I mean, the only do what I can. I do the careful ironies of abydrertm. I do the
whole conception of 'the story,' of cause and effect, the whole marshy i&s upon which intimate life is built. But this? Our baby
idea that people have a clue as to how the world works is just a with cancer? I'm sorry. My stop was two stations back. This is
piece of laughable metaphysical colonialism perpetrated upon irony at its most gaudy and careless. This is a Hieronymus
the wild country of time." Bosch of hcts and figures and blood and graphs. This is a night-
Did they own a gun? The Mother begins looking through mare of narrative slop. This cannot be designed. This cannot
drawers. wen be noted in preparation for a design-"
The Husband comes back into the room and observes her. "We're going to need the money."
"Ha! The Great Havoc that is the Puzzle of all Life!" he says of "To say nothing of the moral boundaries of pecuniary rec-
the Marshall Field's management policy. He has just gotten off ompense in a situation such as this-"
a conference call with the insurance company and the hospital. "What if the other kidney goes? What if he needs a trans-
The surgery will be Friday. "It's all just some dirty capitalist's plant? Where are the moral boundaries there? What are we
idea of a philosophy." going to do, have bake sales?"
"Maybe it's just a fact of narrative and you really can't "We can sell the house. I hate this house. It makes me
politicize it," says the Mother. It is now only the two of them. crazy."
"Whose side are you on?" "And we'll live-where again?"
"I'm on the Baby's side." "The Ronald McDonald place. I hear it's nice. It's the least
"Are you taking notes for this?" McDonald's can do."
"No." "You have a keen sense of justice."
"You're not?" "I try. What can I say?" She pauses. "Is all this really hap-
"No. I can't. Not this! I write fiction. This isn't fiction." pening? I keep thinking that soon it will be over-the life
"Then write nonfiction. Do a piece of journalism. Get two expectancy of a cloud is supposed to be only twelve hours--and
'
dollars a word." then I realize something has occurred that can never ever be
"Then it has to be true and full of information. I'm not over."
trained. I'm not that skilled. Plus, I have a convenient personal The Husband buries his face in his hands: "Our poor baby.
principle about artists not abandoning art. One should never , How did this happen to him?" He looks over and stares at the
turn one's back on a vivid imagination. Even the whole memoir , bookcase that serves as the nightstand. "And do you think
thing annoys me." : even one of these baby books is any help?" He picks up the
"Well, make things up, but pretend they're real." : Leach, the Spock, the What to Expect. 'Where in the pages or
I','
qot that insured." i 4 - x of any of these does it say 'chemotherapy' or 'Hickman
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A
- People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 2 5

IVs up and down the single corridor of Peed Onk. Some of the
catheter' or 'renal sarcoma'? Where does it say 'carcinogenesis*?
lively ones, feeling good for a day, ride the lower bars of the IV
You know what these books are obsessed with? Holding a fuck-
while their large, cheerful mothers whiz them along the halls.
ing spoon." He begins hurling the books off the night table and
Wheee!
against the far wall.
"Hey," says' the Mother, trying to soothe. "Hey, hey, hey." 1
But compared to his stormy roar, her words are those of a
The Mother does not feel large and cheerful. In her mind, she is
backup singer-a Shondell, a P i p a doo-wop ditty. Books,
scathing, acid-tongued, wraith-thin, and chain-smoking out on
and now more books, continue to fly.
a fire escape somewhere. Beneath her lie the gentle undulations
of the Midwest, with all its aspirations to be-to be what? To
be Long Island. How it has succeeded! Strip mall upon strip
Take Notes.
mall. Lurid water, poisoned potatoes. The Mother drags deeply,
Is faintheurt~done word or two? Student prose has wrecked
blowing clouds of smoke out over the disfigured cornfields.
her spelling.
When a baby gets cancer, it seems stupid ever to have given up
It's one word. Two words-Faint Heurted-what would
smoking. When a baby gets cancer, you think, Whom are we
that be? The name of a drag queen.
kidding? Let's all light up. When a baby gets cancer, you think,
Who came up with this idea? What celestial abandon gave rise
to this? Pour me a drink, so I can refuse to toast.
Take Notes. In the end, you suffer alone. But at the beginning
The Mother does not know how to be one of these other
you suffer with a whole lot of others. When your child has can-
mothers, with their blond hair and sweatpants and sneakers and
cer, you are instantly whisked away to another planet: one of
determined pleasantness. She does not think that she can be
bald-headed little boys. Pediatric Oncology. Peed Onk. You
anything similar. She does not feel remotely like them. She
wash your hands for thirty seconds in antibacterial soap before
knows, for instance, too many people in GreenwichfVillage. She
you are allowed to enter through the swinging doors. You put
mail-orders oysters and tiramisu from a shop in SOHO. She is
paper slippers on your shoes. You keep your voice down. A
close friends with four actual homosexuals. Her husband is ask-
whole place has been designed and decorated for your night-
ing her to Take Notes.
mare. Here is where your nightmare will occur. We've got a
Where do these women get their sweatpants? She will find
room all ready for you. We have cots. We have refrigerators.
out.
"The children are almost entirely boys," says one of the nurses.
She will start, perhaps, with the costume and work from
"No one knows why. It's been documented, but a lot of people
there.
out there still don't realize it." The little boys are all from
She will live according to the bromides. Take one day at a
sweet-sounding places-janesville and Appleton-little heart-
time. Take a positive attitude. Take a hike! She wishes that
land towns with giant landfills, agricultural runoff, paper facto-
there were more interesting things that were useful and true,
ries, Joe McCarthy's grave (Alone, a site ofgreat toxicity, thinks
but it seems now that it's only the boring things that are useful
the Mother. The soil should be tested).
and true. One b y at a time. And at leust we have our heulth. How
All the bald little boys look like brothers. They wheel their
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 2 7

ordinary. How obvious. One day at a time. You need a brain for "Really," the Oncologist is saying, "of all the cancers he
that? could get, this is probably the best."
"We win," says the Mother.
"Best, I know, hardly seems the right word. Look, you two
While the Surgeon is fine-boned, regal, and laconic-they have probably need to get some rest. We'll see how the surgery and
correctly guessed his game to be doubles-there is a bit of the histology go. Then we'll start with chemo the week following.
mad, overcaffeinated scientist to the Oncologist. He speaks A little light chemo: vincristine and-"
quickly. He knows a lot of studies and numbers. He can do the "Vincristine?" interrupts the Mother. "Wine of Christ?"
math. Good! Someone should be able to do the math! "It's a fast "The names are strange, I know. The other one we use is
but wimpy tumor," he explains. "It typically metastasizes to actinomycin-D. Sometimes called 'dactinomycin.' People move
the lung." He rattles off some numbers, time frames, risk sta- the D around to the front."
tistics. Fast but wimpy: the Mother tries to imagine this com- "They move the D around to the front," repeats the Mother.
bination of traits, tries to think and think, and can only come "Yup!" the Oncologist says. "I don't know why-they just
up with Claudia Osk from the fourth grade, who blusiied and do!"
almost wept when called on in class, but in gym could outrun "Christ didn't survive his wine," says the Husband.
everyone in the quarter-mile fire-door-ro-fence. dash. The. "But of course he did," says the Oncologist, and nods
Mother thinks now of this tumor as Claudia Osk. They are toward the Baby, who has now found a cupboard full of hospital
going,toget ~ l a u d i Osk,
a make her sorry. All right! Claudia linens and bandages and is yanking them all out onto the floor.
Osk must die. Though it has never been mentioned before, it "I'll see you guys tomorrow, after the surgery." And with that,
now seems clear that Claudia Osk should have died long ago. the Oncologist leaves.
Who was she anyway? So conceited: not letting anyone beat her "Or, rather, Christ was his wine," mumbles the Husband.
in a race. Well, hey, hey, hey: don't look now, Claudia! Everything he knows about the New Testament, he has gleaned
The Husband nudges her. "Are you listening?" from the sound track of Godspell. ''His blood was the wine.
"The chances of this happening even just to one kidneywe What a great beverage idea."
one in fifieen thousand. Now given all these other factors, the "A little light chemo. Don't you like that one?" says the
chances on the second kidney are about one in eight." Mother. "Einekleine dactinomycin. I'd like to see Mozart write
"One in eight," says the Husband. "Not bad. As long as it's that one up for a big wad o' cash."
not one in fifieen thousand." "Come here, honey," the Husband says to the Baby, who has
The Mother studies the trees and fish along the ceiling's now pulled off both his shoes.
edge in the Save the Planet wallpaper border. Save the Planet. "It's bad enough when they refer to medical science as 'an
Yes! But the windows in this very building don't open and inexact science,' " says the Mother. "But when they start refer-
diesel fumes are leaking into the ventilating system, near ring to it as 'an art,' I get extremely nervous."
which, outside, a delivery truck is parked. The air is nauseous "Yeah. If we wanted art, Doc, we'd go to an art museum."
and stale. The Husband ~ i c k up s the Baby. "You're an artist," he says to
 - B I R D S O P A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 2 9

the Mother, with the taint of accusation in his voice. 'They "Oh my God," says the Mother. She comforts the Baby, who
probably think you find creativity reassuring." is also crying. She and Ned, the only dry-eyed people, look at
The Mother sighs. "I just find it inevitable. Let's go get each other. "I'm so sorry," she says to Ned and then to his
something to eat." And so they take the elevator to the cafete- mother. "I'm so stupid. I thought they were squabbling over a
ria, where there is a high chair, and where, not noticing, they toy."
all eat a lot of apples with the price tags still on them. "It does look like a toyBd'agrees Ned. He smiles. He is an
angel. All the little boys are angels. Total, sweet, bald little
angels, and now God is trying to get them back for himself.
~ecaus;his surgery is not until tomorrow, the Baby likes the Who are they, mere mortal women, in the face of this, this pow-
hospital. He likes the long corridors, down which he can run. erful and overwhelming and inscrutable thing, God's will?
He likes everything on wheels. The flower carts in the lobby! They are the mothers, that's,who. You can't have him! they
("Please keep your boy away from the flowers," says the vendor, shout every day. You dirty old man! Get out of here! Hands off!
"We'll buy the whole display," snaps the Mother, adding, 'I
I m so sorry," says the Mother again. "I didn't know."
1

"Actual children in a children's hospital-unbelievable, isn't Ned's mother smiles vaguely. "Of course you didn't know,"
it?") The Baby likes the other little boys. Places to go! People she says, and walks back to the Tiny Tim Lounge.
L
to see! Rooms to wander into! There is Intensive Care. There is
the Trauma Unit. The Baby smiles and waves. What a little
Cancer Personality! Bandaged citizens smile and wave back. In The Tiny Tim Lounge is a little sitting area at the end of the
Peed Onk, there are the bald little boys to play with. Joey, Eric, Peed Onk corridor. There are two small sofas, a table, a rocking
Tim, Mort, and Tod (Mort! Tod!). There is the four-year-old, chair, a television and a VCR. There are various videos: Speed,
Ned, holding his little deflated rubber ball, the one with the Dune, and Star Wars. On one of the lounge walls there is a gold
intriguing, curling hose. The Baby wants to play with it. "It's plaque with the singer Tiny Tim's name on it: his son was
mine. Leave it alone," says Ned. "Tell the Baby to leave it treated once at this hospital and so, five years ago, he donated
alone." money for this lounge. It is a cramped little lounge, which,
"Baby, you've got to share," says the Mother from a chair one suspects, would be larger if Tiny Tim's son had actually
some feet away. lived. Instead, he died here, at this hospital and now there is
Suddenly, from down near the Tiny Tim Lounge, comes this tiny room which is part gratitude, part generosity, part
Ned's mother, large and blond and sweatpanted. "Stop that! fkk-you.
Stop it!" she cries out, dashing toward the Baby and Ned and Sifting through the videocassettes, the Mother wonders
pushing the Baby away. "Don't touch that!" she barks at the what science fiction could begin to compete with the science
Baby, who is only a Baby and bursts into tears because he has fiction of cancer itself--a tumor with its differentiated muscle
never been yelled at like this before. and bone cells, a clump of wild nothing andits mad, ambitious
Ned's mom glares at everyone. "This is drawing fluid from desire to be something: something inside you, instead of you,
Neddy's liver!" She pats at the rubber thing and starts to cry a another organism, but with a monster's architecture, a demon's
' little. sabotage and chaos. Think of leukemia, a tumor diabolically
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Hen 2 3 1

taking l i q ~ dform, better to swim about incognito in the cookie. "Optimism," it says, "is what allows a teakettle to sing
blood. George Lucas, direct that! though up to its neck in hot water." Underneath, someone else
Sitting with the other parents in the Tiny Tim Lounge, the has taped a clipping from a summer horoscope. "Cancer rules!"
night before the surgety, having put the Baby to bed in his high it says. Who would tape this up? Somebody's twelve-year-old '
steel crib two rooms down, the Mother begins to hear the brother. One of the fathers-Joey's father-gets up and tears
stories: leukemia in kindergarten, sarcomas in Little League, them both off, makes a small wad in his fist.
neuroblastomas discovered at summer camp. "Eric slid into There is some rustling of magazine pages.
third base, but then the scrape didn't heal." The parents pat one The Mother clears her throat. "Tiny Tim forgot the wet
another's forearms and speak of other children's hospitals as if bar," she says.
they were resorts. "You were at St. Jude's last winter? So were Ned, who is still up, comes out of his room and down the
we. What did you think of it? We loved the staff." Jobs have corridor, whose lights dim at nine. Standibg next to her chair,
been quit, marriages hacked up, bank accounts ravaged; the he says to the Mother, "Where are you from? What is wrong
parents have seemingly endured the unendunble. They speak with your baby?"
not of theporsibility of comas brought on by the chemo, but of
the number of them. "He was in his first coma last July," says
Ned's mother. "It was a scary time, but we pulled through." In the tiny room that is theirs, she sleeps fitfully in her sweat-
Pulling through is what people do around here. There is a pants, occasionally leaping up to check on the Baby. This is
kind of bravery in.their lives that isn't bravery at all. It is auto- what the sweatpants are for: leaping. In case of fire. In case of
matic, unflinching, a mix of man and machine, consuming and anything. In case the difference between day and night starts to
unquestionable obligation meeting illness move for move in a dissolve, and there is no difference at all, so why pretend? In the
giant even-steven game of chess--an unending round of some- cot beside her, the Husband, who has taken a sleeping pill, is
thing that looks like shadowboxing, though between love and snoring loudly, his arms folded about his head in a kind of
death, which is the shadow? "Everyone admires us for our origami. How could either of them have stayed back at the
courage," says one man. "They have no i d b what they're talk- house, with its empty high chair and empty crib? Occasionally
ing about." the Baby wakes and cries out, and she bolts up, goes to him,
I could get out of here, thinks the Mother. I could just get rubs his back, rearranges the linens. The clock on the metal
on a bus and go, never come back. Change my name. A kind of dresser shows that it is five after three. Then twenty to five. And
witness relocation thing. then it is really morning, the beginning of this day, nephrec-
"Courage requires options," the man adds. tomy day. Will she be glad when it's over, or barely alive, or
The Baby might be better off. both? Each day this week has arrived huge, empty, and
"There are options," says a woman with a thick suede head- unknown, like a spaceship, and this one especially is lit a bright
band. "You could give up. You could fall apart." gray.
"No, you can't. Nobody does. I've never seen it," says the "He'll need to put this on," says John, one of the nurses,
man. "Well, not really fall apart." Then the lounge Mls quiet. bright and early, handing the Mother a thin greenish garment
Over the VCR someone has taped the fortune from a fortune with roses and teddy bears printed on it. A wave of nausea hits
 <
B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 3 3

her; this smock, she thinks, will soon be splattered with-with In their blue caps and scrubs, they look like a clutch of forget-
what? me-nots, and forget them, who could? The Baby, in his little
The ' ~ a isb awake
~ but drowsy. She lifts off his pajamas. teddy-bear smock, seems cold and scared. He reaches out and
"Don't forget, bubeleh," she whispers, undressing and dressing the Mother lifts him from the Husband's arms, rubs his back to
him. "We will be with you every moment, every step. When warm him.
you think you are asleep and floating off far away from every- "Well, it's time!" says the Surgeon, forcihg a smile.
body, Mommy will still be there." If she hasn't fled on a bus. "Shall we go?" says the Anesthesiologist.
"Mommy will take care of you. And Daddy, too." She hopes the What follows is a blur of obedience and bright lights. They
Baby does not detect her own fear and uncertainty, which she take an elevator down to a big concrete room, the anteroom, the
must hide from him, like a limp. He is hungry, not having been greenroom, the backstage of the operating room. Lining the
allowed to eat, and he is no longer amused by this new place, walls are long shelves full of blue surgical outfits. "Children
but worried about its hardships. Oh, my baby, she thinks. And often become afraid of the color blue," says one of the nurses.
the room starts to swim a little. The Husband comes in to take But of course. Of course! "Now, which one of you would like to
over. "Take a break," he says to her. "I'll walk him around for come into the operating room for the anesthesia?"
five minutes." "I will," says the Mother.
She leaves but doesn't know where to go. In the hallway, "Are you sure?" asks the Husband.
she is approached by a kind of social worker, a customer- "Yup." She kisses the Baby's hair. "Mr. Curlyhead," people
relations person, who had given them a video to watch about keep calling him here, and it seems both rude and nice. Women
the anesthesia: how the parent accompanies the child into the look admiringly at his long lashes and exclaim, "Always the
operating room, and how gently, nicely the drugs are adminis- boys! Always the boys!"
tered. Two surgical nurses put a blue smock and a blue cotton cap
"Did you watch 'the video?" on the Mother. The Baby finds this funny and keeps pulling at
"Yes," says the Mother. the cap. "This way," says another nurse, and the Mother fol-
"Wasn't it helpful?" lows. "Just put the Baby down on the table."
"I don't know," says the Mother. In the video, the mother holds the baby and fumes are gen-
I "Do you have any questions?" asks the video woman. "Do tly waved under the baby's nose until he falls asleep. Now, out
you have any questions?" asked of someone who has recently of view of camera or social worker, the Anesthesiologist is anx-
landed in this fearful, alien place seems to the Mother an absurd : ious to get this under way and not let too much gas leak out
and amazing little courtesy. The very specificity of a question into the room generally. The occupational hazard of this, his
would give a lie to the overwhelming strangeness of everything chosen profession, is gas exposure and nerve damage, and it has
around her. started to worry him. No doubt he frets about it to his wife
"Not right now," says the Mother. "Right now, I think I'm every night. Now he turns the gas on and quickly clamps the
just going to go to the bathroom." plastic mouthpiece over the baby's cheeks and lips.
When she returns to the Baby's room, everyone is there: the The Baby is startled. The Mother is startled. The Baby
surgeon, the anesthesiologist, all the nurses, the social worker. starts to scream and redden behind the plastic, but he cannot be
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 3 7

xeroxed list of patientsv names. "That's our little ,boy right How can it be described? HOW can any of it be described? The
there," says the Mother, seeing the Baby's name on the list and trip and the story of the trip are always two different things.
pointing at it. "Is there some word? Is everything okay?" The narrator is the one who has stayed home, but then, after-
"Yes," says the man. "Your boy is doing fine. They've just ward, presses her mouth upon the traveler's mouth, in order to
finished with the catheter, and they are moving on to the make the mouth work, to make the mouth say, say, say. One
kidney." cannot go to a place and speak of it; one cannot both see and say,
"But it's been two hours already! O h my God, did some- not really. One can go, and upon return'ing make a lot of hand
thing go wrong? What happened? What went wrong?" motions and indications with the arms. The mouth itself,
"Did something go wrong?" The Husband tugs at his working at the speed of light, at the eye's instructions, is neces-
collar. sarily struck still; so fast, so much to report, it hangs open and
"Not really. It just took longer than they expected. I'm told dumb as a gutted bell. All that unsayable life! That's where the
everything is fine. They wanted you to know." narrator comes in. The narrator comes with her kisses and
"Thank you," says the Husband. They turn and walk back mimicry and tidying up. The narrator comes and makes a slow,
toward where they were sitting. fake song of the mouth's eager devastation.
"I'm not going to make it." The Mother sighs, sinking into It is a horror and a miracle to see him. He is lying in his
a fake leather chair shaped somewhat like a baseball mitt. "But crib in his room, tubed up, splayed like a boy on a cross, his
before I go, I'm taking half this hospital out with me." arms stiffened into cardboard "no-no's" so that he cannot yank
"Do you want some coffee?" asks the Husband. out the tubes. There is the bladder catheter, the nasal-gastric
"I don't know," says the Mother. "No, I guess not. No. Do tube, and the Hickman, which, beneath the skin, is plugged
you?" into his jugular, then popped out his chest wall and capped
"Nah, I don't, either, I guess," he says. with a long plastic cap. There is a large bandage taped over his
"Would you like part of an orange?" abdomen. Groggy, on a morphine drip, still he is able to look at
"Oh, maybe, I guess, if you're having one." She takes an her when, maneuvering through all the vinyl wiring, she leans
orange from her purse and just sits there peeling its difficult to hold him, and when she does, he begins to cry,'but cry
skin, the flesh rupturing beneath her fingers, the juice trickling silently, without motion or noise. She has never seen a baby cry
down her hands, stinging the hangnails. She and t h e ~ u s b a n d without motion or noise. It is the crying of an old person:
chew and swallow, discreetly spit the seeds into Kleenex, and silent, beyond opinion, shattered. In someone so tiny, it is
read from photocopies of the latest medical research, which frightening and unnatural. She wants to pick up the Baby and
they begged from the intern. They read, and underline, and run-ut of there, out of there. She wants to whip out a gun:
sigh and close their eyes, and after some time, the surgery is No-no's, eh This whole thing is what I call a no-no. Don't you
over. A nurse from Peed Onk comes down to tell them. touch him! she wants to shout at the surgeons and the needle
"Your little boy's in recove6 right now. He's doing well. nurses. Not anymore! No more! No more! She would crawl up
You can see him in about fifteen minutes." and lie beside him in the crib if she could. But instead, because
of all his intricate wiring, she must lean and cuddle, sing to
him, songs ofperil and flight: "We gotta get out of this place, if
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Hers 2 3 9

it's the last thing we ever do. We gotta get out of this place . . . voice: an infuriating, pharmaceutical calm. It says, Everything
there's a better life for me and you." is normal here. Death is normal. Pain is normal. Nothing 'is
Very I 967. She was eleven then and impressionable. abnormal. So there is nothing to get excited about. "Well now,
The Baby looks at her, pleadingly, his arms splayed out in let's see." She holds up the plastic tube and tries to see inside it.
surrender. To where? Where is there to go? Take me! Take me! "Hmmm," she says. "I'll call the attending physician."
Because this is a research and teaching hospital, all the reg-
ular doctors are at home sleeping in theit Mission-style beds.
That night, postop night, the Mother and Husband lie afloat in Tonight, as is apparently the case every weekend night, the
the cot together. A fluorescent lamp near the crib is kept on in attending physician is a medical student. He looks fifteen, The
the dark. The Baby breathes evenly but thinly in his drugged authority he attempts to convey, he cannot remotely inhabit.
sleep. The morphine in its first flooding doses apparently makes He is not even in the same building with it. He shakes every-
him feel as if he were falling backward--or so the Mother has one%hands, then strokes his chin, a gesture no doubt gleaned
been told-and it causes the Baby to jerk; to catch himself over from some piece of dinner theater his parents took him to once.
and over, as if he were being dropped from a tree. "Is this right? As if there were an actual beard on that chin! As if beard
Isn't there something that should be done?" The nurses come in growth on that chin were even possible! Our Town! Kiss Me Kate!
hourly, different ones-the night shifts seem strangely short Barefoot in'the Park! He is attempting to convince, if not to
and fiequent. If the Baby stirs or frets, the nurses give him impress.
more morphine through the Hickman catheter, then leave to "We're in trouble," the Mother whispers to the Husband.
tend to other patients. The Mother rises to check on him in the She is tired, tired of young people grubbing for grades. "We've
low light. There is gurgling from the clear plastic suction tube got Dr. 'Kiss Me Kate,' here."
coming out of his mouth. Brownish clumps have collected in The Husband looks at her blankly, a mix of disorientation
the tube. What is going on? The Mother rings for the nurse. Is and divorce.
it R e d e or Sarah or Darcy? She's forgotten. The medical student holds the tubing in his hands. "I don't
"What, what is it?" murmurs the Husband, waking up. really see anything," he says.
"Something is wrong," says the Mother. "It looks like blood He flunks! "You don't?" The Mother shoves her way in,
in his N-G tube." holds the clear tubing in both hands. "That," she says. "Right
"What?" The Husband gets out of bed. He, too, is wearing here and here." Just this past semester, she said to one of her own
sweatpants. ! students, "If you don't see how this essay is better than that one,
The nurse-Valerie-pushes open the heavy door to the then I want you just to go out into the hallway and stand there
room and enters quietly. "Everything okay?" , until you do." Is it important to keep one's voice down? The
"ThereBssomething wrong here. The tube is sucking blood Baby stays asleep, He is drugged and dreaming, far away.
out of his stomach. It looks like it may have perforated his "Hmmm," says the medical student. "Perhaps there's a
stomach and that now he's bleeding internally. $k!" little irritation in the stomach."
Valerie is a saint, but her voice is the standard hospital saint "A little irritation?" The Mother grows furious: "This is
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like T h a t Are the Only People Here 2 4 2

blood. These are clumps and clots. This stupid thing is sucking "There is a particular thing I need from you," says the Sur-
the life right out of him!" Life! She is starting to cry. geon, turning and standing there very seriously.
They turn off the suction and bring in antacids, which they "Yes?" Her heart is pounding. She does not feel resilient
feed into the Baby through the tube. Then they turn the suc- enough for any more bad news.
tion on again. This time on low. "I need to ask a favor."
"Whar was it on before?" asks the Husband. "Certainly," she says, attempting very hard to summon the
"High," says Valerie. "Doctor's orders, though I don't know strength and courage for this occasion, whatever it is; her throat
why. I don't know why these doctors do a lot of the things has tightened to a fist.
they do." From inside his white coat, the surgeon removes a thin
"Maybe they're. . . not all that bright?" suggests the paperback book and thrusts it toward her. "Will you sign my
Mother. She is feeling relief and rage simultaneously: there is a copy of your novel?"
feeling of prayer and litigation in the air. Yet essentially, she is The Mother looks down and sees that it is indeed a copy of a
grateful. Isn't she? She thinks she is. And still, and still: look at novel she has written, one about teenaged girls.
all the things you have to do to protect a child, a hospital She looks up. A big, spirited grin is cutting across his face.
merely an intensification of life's cruel obstacle course. "I read this last summer," he says, "and I still remember parts of
it! Those girls got into such trouble!"
Of all the surreal moments of the last few days, this, she
'The Surgeon comes to visit on Saturday morning. He steps in thinks, might be the most so. ;
I
and nods at the Baby, who is awake but glazed from the mor- "Okay," she says, and the Surgeon merrily hands her a pen. ;
L

phine, his eyes two dark unseeing grapes. "The boy looks fine," "You can just write 'To Dr.- Oh, I don't need to tell you
the Surgeon announces. He peeks under the Baby's bandage. what to write."
"The stitches look good," he says. The Baby's abdomen is The Mother sits down on a bench and shakes ink into the
stitched all the way across like a baseball. "And the other kid- pen. A sigh of relief washes over and out of her. Oh, the plea-
ney, when we looked at it yesterday face-to-face, looked fine. sure of a sigh of relief, like the finest moments of love; has any-
We'll try to wean him off the morphine a little, and see how one properly sung the praises of sighs of relief? She opens the
he's doing on Monday." He clears his throat. "And now," he book to the title page. She breathes deeply. What is he doing
says, looking about the room at the nurses and medical stu- reading novels about teenaged girls, anyway? And why didn't
dents, "I would like to speak with the Mother, alone." he buy the hardcover? She inscribes something grateful and
The Mother's heart gives a jolt. "Me?" true, then hands the book back to him.
"Yes," he says, motioning, then turning. "Is he going to be okay?"
She gets up and steps out into the empty hallway with him, "The boy? The boy is going to be fine," he says, then taps
closing the door behind her. What can this be about? She hears her stiffly on the shoulder. "Now you take care. It's Saturday.
the Baby fretting a little in his crib. Her brain fills with pain Drink a little wine."
and alarm. Her voice comes out as a hoarse whisper. "Is there
something-"
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 4 3

Over the weekend, while the Baby sleeps, the Mother and Hus- way past the stuffed-animal limit. The Mother arranges, once
band sit together in the E n y Tim Lounge. The Husband is more, a plateful of Mint Milano cookies and cups of take-out
restless and makes cafeteria and sundry runs, running errands coffee for guests. All her nutso pals stop by-the two on
for everyone. In his absence, the other parents regale her further Prozac, the one obsessed with the word penis in the word happi-
with their sagas. Pediatric cancer and chemo stories: the chil- ness, the one who recently had her hair foiled green. "Your
dren's amputations, blood poisoning, teeth flaking like shale, friends put the de infin de si&le," says the husband. Overheard,
the learning delays and disabilities caused by chemo frying or recorded, all marital conversation sounds as if someone must
the young, budding brain. But strangely optimistic codas be joking, though usually no one is.
are tacked on-endings as stiff and loopy as carpenter's lace, She loves her friends, especially loves them forccoming,
crisp and empty as lettuce, reticulate as a net-h, words. since there are times they all fight and don't speak for weeks. Is
"After all that business with the tutor, he's better now, and this friendship?For now and here, it must do and is, and is, she
fitted with new incisors by my wife's cousin's husband, who swears it is. For one, they never offer impromptu spiritual lec-
did dental school in two and a half years, if you can believe that. tures about death, how it is part of life, its natural ebb and flow,
We hope for the best. We take things as they come. Life is how we all must accept that, or other such utterances that make
hard." her want to scratch out some eyes. Like true friends, they take
"Life's a big problem," agrees the Mother. Part of her wel- no hardy or elegant stance loosely choreographed from some
comes and invites all their tales. In the few long days since this broad perspective. They get right in there and mutter "Jesus
nightmare began, part of her has become addicted to disaster Christ!" and shake their heads. Plus, they are the only people
and war stories. She wants only to hear about the sadness and who not only will laugh at her stupid jokes but offer up stupid
emergencies of others. They are the only situations that can join ones of their own. What G% you get when you cross Tiny Tim with a
hands with her own; everything else bounces off her shiny pit bull? A child's illness is a strain on the mind. They know
shield of resentment and unsympathy. Nothing else can even how to laugh in a fluty, desperate way-unlike the people who
stay in her brain. Prom this, no doubt, the philistine world is are more her husband's friends and who seem just to deepen
made, or should one say recruited? Together, the parents hud- their sorrowful gazes, nodding their heads with Sympathy.
dle all day in the Tiny Tim Lounge-no need to watch Oprah. How exiling and estranging are everybody's Sympathetic
They leave Oprah in the dust. Oprah has nothing on them. Expressions! When anyone laughs, she thinks, Okay! Hooray: a
They chat matter-of-factly, then fkll silent and watch Dune or buddy. In disaster as in show business.
Star Wars, in which there are bright and shiny robots, whom Nurses come and go; their chirpy voices both startle and
the Mother now sees not as robots at all but as human beings soothe. Some of the other Peed Onk parents stick their heads in
who have had terrible things happen to them. to see how the Baby is and offer encouragement.
Green Hair scratches her head. "Everyone's so friendly here.
Is there someone in this place who isn't doing all this airy,
Some of their friends visit with stuffed animals and soft greet-
ings of "Looking good" fir the dozing baby, though the room is
 -
B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only People Here 2 4 5

"It's Modern Midd1e'~edicinemeets the Modern Middle young, full-haired husband who will never be so mania-
Family," says the Husband. "In the Modern Middle West." cally and debilitatingly obsessed with Joey's illness the way
Someone has brought in take-out lo mein, and they all eat Frank, her first husband, was. Heather comes to visit Joey, to
it out in the hall by the elevators. say hello and now good-bye, but she is not Joey's main man.
Frank is.
Frank is full of stories-about the doctors, about the food,
Parents are allowed use of the Courtesy Line. about the nurses, about Joey. Joey, affectless from his meds,
"You've got to have a second child," says a different friend sometimes leaves his room and comes out to watch TV in his
on the phone, a friend from out of town. "An heir and a spare. bathrobe. He is jaundiced and bald, and though he is nine, he
That's what we did. We had another child to ensure we looks no older than six. Frank has devoted the last four and a
wouldn't off ourselves if we lost our first." half years 'to saving Joey's life. When the cancer was first diag-
"Really?" nosed, the doctors gave Joey a 20 percent chance of living six
"I'm serious." more months. Now here it is, almost five years later, and Joey's
"A formal suicide? Wouldn't you just drink youtself into a still here. It is all due to Frank, who, early on, quit his job as
lifelong stupor and let it go at that?" vice president of a consulting firm in order to commit himself
-

"Nope. I knew how I would do it even. For a while, until totally to his son. He is proud of everything he's given up and
our second came along, I had it all planned." done, but he is tired. Part of him now really believes things are
"What did you plan?" coming to a close, that this is the end. He says this without
"I can't go into too much detail, because-Hi, honey!-the tears. There are no more tears.
kids are here now in the room. But I'll spell out the general "You have probably been through more than anyone else on
idea: R-O-P-E." this corridor," says the Mother.
"I could tell you stories," he says. There is a sour odor
between them, and she realizes that neither of them has bathed
Sunday evening, she goes and sinks down on the sofa in the for days.
Tiny Tim Lounge next to Frank, Joey's father. He is a short, "Tell me one. Tell me the worst one." She knows he hates
stocky man with the currentless, flatlined look behind the his ex-wife and hates her new husband even more.
eyes that all the parents eventually get here. He has shaved his "The worst? They're all the worst. Here's one: one morn-
head bald in solidarity with his son. His little boy has been ing, I went out for breakfast with my buddy-it was the only
battling cancer for five years. It is now in the liver, and the time I'd left Joey alone ever; lefi him for two hours is all--and
rumor around the corridor is that Joey has three weeks to live. when I came back, his N-G tube was full of blood. They had
She knows that Joey's mother, Heather, left Frank years ago, the suction on too high, and it was sucking the guts right out
two years into the cancer, and has remarried and had another of him."
child, a girl named Brittany. The Mother sees Heather here "Oh my God. That'just happened to us," said the Mother.
sometimes with her new life-the cute little girl and the new, "It did?"
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Are the Only Peopls Here 2 4 7

"Friday night." your boy is monitored with ultrasound instead. It's not all that
"You're kidding. They let that happen again? I gave them risky, given that the patient's watched closely, but here is the
such a chewing-out about that!" literature on it. There are forms to sign, if you decide to do
"I guess our luck is not so good. We get your very worst that. Read all this and we can discuss it further. You have to
story on the second night we're here." decide within four days."
"It's not a bad place, though." Lesions? Rests? They dry up and scatter like M&M$ on the
"It's not?" floor. All she hears is the p m about no chemo. Another sigh of
"Naw. I've seen worse. I've taken Joey everywhere." relief rises up in her and spills out. In a life where there is only
"He seems very strong." Truth is, at this point, Joey seems the bearable and the unbearable, a sigh of relief is an ecstasy.
like a zombie and frightens her. "No chemo?" says\the Husband. "Do you recommend
"Joey's a hcking genius. A biological genius. They'd given that?"
him six months, remember." The Oncologist shrugs. What casual gestures these doctors
The Mother nods. are permitted! "I know chemo. I like chemo," says the Oncolo-
"Six months is not very long," says Frank. "Six months is gist. "But this is for you to decide. It depends how you feel."
nothing. He was four and a half years old." The Husband leans forward. "Bht don't you think that now
All the words are like blows. She feels flooded with afGec- that we have the upper hand with this thing, we should keep
tion and mourning for this man. She looks away, out the win- going? Shouldn't we stomp on it, beat it, smash it to death
dow, out past the hospital parking lot, up toward the black with the chemo?"
marbled sky and the electric eyelash of the moon. "And now The Mother swats him angrily and hard. "Honey, you're
he's nine," she says. "You're his hero." delirious!" She whispers, but it comes out as a hiss. "This is our
"And he's mine," says Prank, though the fatigue in his voice lucky break!" Then she adds gently, "We don't want the Baby
seems to overwhelm him. "He'll be that forever. Excuse me," he to have chemo."
says, "I've got to go check. His breathing hasn't been good. The Husband turns back to the Oncologist. "What do you
Excuse me." think?"
"It could be," he says, shrugging. "It could be that this is
your lucky break. But you won't know for sure for five years."
"Good news and bad," says the Oncologist on Monday. He has The Husband turns back to the Mother. "Okay," he says.
knocked, entered the room, and now stands there. Their cots "Okay."
are unmade. One wastebasket is overflowing with' coffee cups.
"We've got the pathologist's report. The bad news is that the
kidney they removed had certain lesions, called 'rests,' which The Baby grows happier and strong. He begins to move and sit
are associated with a higher risk for disease in the other kidney. ' and eat. Wednesday morning, they are allowed to leave, and
The gdod news is that the tumor is stage one, regular cell struc- leave without chemo. The Oncologist looks a little nervous.
ture, and under five hundred grams, which qualifies you' for a >' "Are you nervous about this?" asks the Mother.
national experiment in which chemotherapy isn't done but "Of course I'm nervous." But he shrugs and doesn't look
 B I R D S O F A M E R I C A People Like That Arc the Only People Here 2 4 9

that nervous. "See you in six weeks for the ultrasound," he says, "It's a journey," he says. He chucks the Baby on the chin. "Good
waves and then leaves, looking at his big black shoes as he does. luck, little man."
The Baby smiles, even toddles around a little, the sun "Yes, thank you so much," says the Mother. "We hope
bursting through the clouds, an angel chorus crescendoing. things go well with Joey." She knows that Joey had a hard,
Nurses arrive. The Hickman is taken out of the Baby's neck and terrible night.
chest; antibiotic lotion is dispensed. The Mother packs up their Frank shrugs and steps back.. "Gotta
. go," he says. "Good-
bags. The Baby sucks on a bottle of juice and does not cry. bye!"
"No chemo?" says one of the nurses. "Not even a little "Bye;" she says, and then he i ~ ' ~ & nShe
e . bites the inside of
chemo?" her lip, a bit tearily, then bends down to pick up the diaper bag,
"We're doing watch and wait," says the Mother. which is now stuffed with little animals; helium balloons are
The other parents look envious but concerned. They have tied to its zipper. Shouldering the thing, the Mother feels she
never seen any child get out of there with his hair and white has just won a prize. All the parents have now vanished down
, blood cells intact.
the hall in the opposite direction. The Husband moves close.
"Will you be okay?" asks Ned's mother. With one arm, he takes the Baby from her; with the other, he
"The worry's going to kill us," says the Husband. rubs her back. He can see she is starting to get weepy.
"But if all we have to do is worry," chides the Mother, "Aren't these people nice? Don,? you feel better hearing
"every day for a hundred years, it'll be easy. It'll be nothing. 1'11 about their lives?" he asks.
take all the worry in the world, if it wards off the thing itself." : Why does he do this, form clubs all the time; why does
"That's right," says Ned's mother. "Compared to every- :
even this society of suffering soothe him? When it comes to
thing else, compared to all the actual events, the worry is ; death and dying, perhaps someone in this family ought to be
nothing." i more of a snob.
The Husband shakes his head. "I'm such an amateur," he "All these nice people with their brave stories," he contin-
moans. ; ues as they make their way toward the elevator bank, waving
"You're both doing admirably," says the other mother. :; good-bye to the nursing staff as they go, even the Baby waving
"Your baby's lucky, and I wish you all the best." i; shyly. Bye-bye! Bye-bye! "Don't you feel consoled, knowing
The Husband shakes her hand warmly. "Thank you," he i we're all in the same boat, that we're all in this together?"
says. "You've been wonderful."
; But who on earth would want to be in this boat? the
Another mother, the mother of Eric, comes up to them. : Mother thinks. This boat is a nightmare boat. Look where it
"It's all very hard," she says, her head cocked to one side. "But goes: to a silver-and-white room, where, just before your eye-
there's a lot of collateral beauty along the way." ' sight and hearing and your ability to touch or be touched dis-
Collateral beauty? Who is entitled to such a thing? A child
; appear entirely, you must watch yow child die.
is ill. No one is entitled to any collateral beauty! . Rope! Bring on the rope.
"Thank you," says the Husband. ' "Let's make our own way," says the Mother, "and not in this
Joey's father, Frank, comes up and embraces them both. 5 boat."
 B I R D S O F A M E R 1 C . A

Woman Overboard! She takes the Baby back from the Hus-
band, cups the Baby's cheek in her hand, kisses his brow and
then, quickly, his flowery mouth. The Baby's heart-she can
hear i t a r u m s with life. "For as long as I live," says the
Mother, pressing the elevator button-up or down, everyone in
the end has to leave this way-"I never want to see any of these TERRIFIC M O T H E R
people again."

There are the notes.

Now where is the money?

Although she had been around them her whole life, it was
when she reached thirty-five that holding babies seemed to
make her nervous-just at the beginning, a twinge of stage
fright swinging up from the gut. "Adrienne, would you like to
hold the baby? Would you mind?" Always these words from a
woman her age looking kind and beseeching-- former friend,
she was losing her friends to babble and beseech-nd Adri-
enne would force herself to breathe deep. Holding a baby was
no longer natural--she was no longer natural-but a test of
womanliness and earthly skills. She was being observed. People
looked to see how she would do it. She had entered a puritanical
decade, a demographic moment-whatever it was-when the
best compliment you could get was, "You would make a terrific
mother." The wolf whistle of the nineties.
So when she was at the Spearsons' Labor Day picnic, and
when Sally Spearson handed her the baby, Adrienne had bur-
bled at it as she would a pet, had jostled the child gently, made
clicking noises with her tongue, affectionately cooing, "Hello,