And Then the Gray Heaven Read online

  I liked working at the shop. It was the airbrushing golden days and people would come in six or ten at a time to get dolphins jumping over their names. Couples got matching v-necks with a burst of hearts or shells or music notes limply dangling from sunset clouds. I called bullshit on every v-neck couple. I called bullshit on romance and beach condos and Florida itself, for its promise to people who came from somewhere else that life was just one cool ad for fresh-squeezed orange juice. I called bullshit on Florida for people who lived in Florida and got heat-stroke and sea lice and picked oranges for fifteen cents an hour.

  I got on perfectly with FM, except for her awful boyfriend. Ben had guns and dogs, and when I got home from school he’d be waiting with the butt of his gun up against the sliding door. He’d tap on the glass: one tap for come on in but go straight to your room. Two taps for don’t you dare and go play somewhere else. There was a lot of don’t you dare in that house then. There was also a lot of what is wrong with you and stupid kid bitch. He actually said that, kid bitch. My friends thought it was hilarious, but then again what did they know. One day we’d all grow up and just be regular bitches.

  FM seemed happy enough with Ben, but I don’t have a single good memory of us all together. He was one of those people who kept rage at a simmer at all times so that it was ready. He was a record-breaking bastard who made me sleep in a tent down the beach on weekends because he wanted FM all to himself, and he said why shouldn’t they get to have a life together just because I showed up. He never tried anything with me but sometimes I’d wake up with him sitting in the corner of my room just watching.

  Ben left FM when I was halfway through high school. I was getting ready to go to junior prom with my gym teacher Mr. Garrison, and we were trying to figure out how he could drop me off then circle the block and come in after as a chaperone. We heard FM and Ben start to wind it up in the kitchen. They fought all the time, but he had never been so pitchy loud. When we heard FM scream and a crash of pots and pans, Mr. Garrison flew out of my room and told Ben that he was going to call the police. Ben told him that he would call the police right back, and Mr. Garrison said nothing and kind of disappeared inside himself. Ben went into the bedroom and packed his hunting bag, and then he took his guns and his dogs and the whole change jar from the top of the fridge, which must have had a hundred and fifty dollars in it by then, and that was that. FM didn’t do anything to stop him. She just walked out of the bathroom long enough to watch him near-shatter the sliding door, and then she went and took a bath. Mr. Garrison must have had a dark revelation in that moment because he left the house saying that he loved me but what we were doing was wrong and he was sorry to me and to Jesus. He was my ride to prom, so I took off my dress and watched TV until FM told me to go to bed.

  Things got grim at the airbrush shop pretty soon after that, by which I mean, FM started stealing money from the register to go day-drinking in Boca—and I had to pretend I knew how to airbrush shirts and hats while she was gone.

  The only thing I could freehand was a dragon because the body could be like a hose or a snake body and the face was whatever. It’s a mythological creature: there is no wrong way to fake a dragon. Eventually people wearing bad dragon clothes ran into other people wearing bad dragon clothes on the beach, and they came into the shop and demanded to see my manager. I was in a tight spot. So naturally, that was the moment. That was B’s cue. Wherever they were, they came through.

  They were nineteen and tall, and when they walked through the shop doors in clean white tennis shorts and a baseball cap, they killed me dead. They walked in like they had something important to say, like they were sent by the president to tell us all who we were all going to be now that the world had ended. I shut up and the people yelling at me shut up, and we all looked at B and waited. I think B paused a minute just to make sure we were listening. They pulled their cap off and swept their dark curls back and let them bounce up in slow motion; and as for me, I watched with my mouth hanging open because I had never seen a creature feel so easy.

  Are these people harassing you? they said to me, like we were friends, like we were already in on it together.

  I said No, but someone else was saying No at the same time as me, and louder.

  No, a woman in a dragon tank top said, she doesn’t even know what she’s doing.

  I remember B laughing then. You paid for that? they said, pointing at the dragon.

  I blushed violently.

  We all paid, said a guy in a dragon trucker hat, and we want our money back or we want something different.

  No problem, said B.

  They moved through the crowd, or I should say, the crowd parted majestically around them. When they got to the counter, they leaned over the glass to place a manicured hand over mine.

  Mind if I come back there? they said to me.

  I don’t know, I said. What are you going to do? It was a stupid thing to say.

  I’m going to save your ass, they said.

  B had a talent for making the room disappear so it was just us. The spell is so powerful. Now B is gone and still it is just us in every room.

  4

  I broke the dishwasher and the dishwasher man came back.

  I thought we went over this, he said.

  I over-detergented, I said. Also I think I overloaded it.

  He laughed. What has this poor dishwasher ever done to you?

  I don’t know, I said. Too much water, too many drowned men.

  He looked at me and then the counter. What?

  Raymond Chandler, I told him.

  Surfer? he said, his eyes still on the counter.

  No, I said, well maybe.

  I’m going to show you one more time. He reached down and unscrewed the cap of the detergent compartment with great gentleness.

  No thanks, I said. You can leave now.

  Okay, he said, scratching his leg, whatever you want.

  It’s still under warranty, right? I said. In case I need you to come back?

  Three days ago B stopped breathing on their own. I knew this not because they let me in to see them hold them whisper to them kiss their face, but because I watched them roll machines in and out all day. Two days ago: scarier machines. The kind of machines that surround people and then swallow people whole, and then the machines replace all the people parts and then people are just dead or machines or both. Also, I am not an idiot. The more the nurses had to tell me nothing, the more their faces screamed into my face, and I knew. I could see it in the nurses’ eyes, their twitchy little frowns. Knuckles, twisting a shirt hem ghosted white. The dust bowl of their knowing.

  I stopped the tears but there was something else in me that wouldn’t be stopped. It didn’t live in my throat, or any other part I knew how to close off. You always hear people talk about how somebody can just snap. People can be fine, and then just: that’s it, they snapped. But for me, it felt more like a spring—something with infinite give but only in one direction. That direction was toward B, for B; B, who was disappearing faster than I could get to them now and faster than hospital security could get to me.

  In my memory, if I really search, I can find the moment when I actually slipped into B’s room and froze, saw them or what was left of them stone-still, tentacled, and humming brightly. The electricity in the room. B’s body left there by another time and about to return. Voices from the hall pitched over one another like a dissonant chord. I know that I blocked the door, but I don’t know how, or what came next. Fortunately for me, this is the part that the police recorded for the official statement. So along with this howling hole of a memory, I get to have a notarized copy of what I said happened in that room when they came for me just a few minutes later. My words.

  Thing is, in our darkest moments, everything we say is a lie. It’s not malicious. We just can’t show up for our own version of the events.

  Officer on Duty: Did you enter the patient’s room?

  Jules Baffa: Yes.

  OD: Had you
been warned by hospital personnel that you were not permitted access?

  JB: Yes.

  OD: Who did you speak to before attempting to enter?

  JB: Hospital personnel.

  OD: Which personnel?

  JB: Gr—::crying:: How long is this going to take? I really can’t be doing this right now. I have to be in there. Do you understand? They’re almost gone! W—::crying:: I’ve been here for a week.

  OD: Ms. Baffa, please state for the record which hospital personnel informed you that you were not permitted access to the patient’s room.

  JB: Just about everyone, I mean. No one really talked to me much except for Lina—Lina Boorstin. I have her card here. She’s the administrator they sent down to speak with me on the intake floor. She was nice, but she couldn’t help me. The second day I was here they made me talk to Security—big guy—very hostile. Completely unsympathetic. Phobic, if you really want to—::muffled sounds::

  OD: Ms. Baffa, I will remind you that we do not need to know the actions of the staff for this statement. Only that Security informed you that you were barred from the patient’s room. Also, his name if you can recall.

  JB: Yeah well he di—::crying:: Didn’t tell me his name while he was threatening to physically remove me, if you can imagine. Also, the social worker down there—Brandon. I see him over there now. Am I going to have to talk to him again?

  OD: Who else?

  JB: There were nurses that I saw many times over the last few days on this floor. But we didn’t really talk much, just enough for them to refer me back to Lina. I think one of them—a night nurse. I think her name is Carol. She sat with me. There’s also an orderly I’ve talked to who’s tall and has big glasses, kind of scowly, and unexpectedly kind. He always asks me how I’m doing. I don’t know—how is this helping?

  OD: Carol? Carol who?

  JB: I don’t know. Really? Why? I don’t know. I do know B’s doctor’s name. Dr. Prasad. He won’t talk to me though. Not once. I’ve tried to catch him going by a few times. I’ve called his office.

  OD: B—B-------Khong is the patient?

  JB: Yes. Un—::crying:: B is their preferred name for the record, yes. What else do you need to know?

  OD: What happened after you entered the patient’s room?

  JB: ::no response::

  OD: Ms. Baffa. What happened after you entered the patient’s room?

  I don’t know what got into me or for how long, but it was all muscle. I looked at the door to B’s room, now from the other side for the first time in a week of no sleep, no relief, no acknowledgement from anyone that this was my person and I was theirs; what happened was I ripped an entire dresser from the wall and launched it into the door. I heard screams from somewhere else. Looking at B, I couldn’t go over to their bed at first. I just looked. I squinted. They hurt my eyes. That body, which was and was not B.

  OD: What happened once you were inside the room? Did you or did you not disconnect the dresser from the wall and move it across the room to barricade yourself?

  JB: I guess I did.

  OD: You did or you did not?

  JB: I did.

  OD: Maybe you can help me out. What we can’t figure is how were you able to move such a large object in such a short amount of time.

  JB: What? I don’t know. Grief is a strong drug.

  OD: Are you implying that you were on drugs?

  JB: No, how did you—how—are you just going to—are you going to charge me with something or what? What else do you need to know? If you’re kicking me out, please just get it over with. This is too much.

  OD: Miss—you need to cooperate with us and we’re going to try to get through this as quickly as possible. I have a few more questions. We’re almost finished here and then the Head of Security will meet with you to go over what will happen if you’re found on the property or if you enter any of St. Agatha’s facilities again.

  JB: Fine.

  OD: OK. So then what happened once you had sealed the door closed?

  JB: What are you asking me?

  OD: What actions did you take in the patient’s room?

  JB: Wait—are you—is B’s family pressing charges?

  OD: I am not at liberty to—

  JB: What do they think happened? What’s going on here?

  OD: Miss—please answer the question.

  JB: Wh—::crying:: What does a person do when the person they love is dying in front of them? What is the punishment for holding their hand?

  OD: Miss, you need to calm down and answer the question. Did you administer any kind of substance to the patient? Did you touch or alter the patient or the medical equipment in any way?

  JB: Well, what if I took their hand or read to them? What if I sat next to them? What if I held them—what then?

  OD: Are you saying that you tampered with the patient?

  JB: What? I don’t understand. How many people’s husbands or wives do you ask about tampering when they are visiting somebody? I know I went in without permission but—what is the real point of this interrogation? At the bottom you want to know what I’m doing here? What is the point of me? What is the point of us, of our relationship? How does it work? Who do I think I am? What do I deserve for loving B? What should I get for being alive? ::muffled crying::

  OD: All I know is that I’m about to take you in for resisting, so you better come up with an answer for what you did in that room.

  JB: Honestly, I don’t know.

  There was gauze around B’s head, and their face was pulled into a grimace—like they were concentrating. They wore a single bone earring that had been nearly ripped out of their ear by the force of the fall or something since the fall, which I hoped and knew they did not feel. Some strange solace in this, knowing there were no more small pains for B. No paper cuts, no scrapes, no minor injuries that always hurt more than they should. Just quiet. Rest. There was a single dot of blood on their neck behind their ear. I licked my finger and wiped it away. All around their head, a prism of clichés. Prayers like throwing stars. No god drama here, just the wash of empty light that comes for us on the fifth floor of anywhere. I pressed my lips to their earlobe and I did the only thing I could do. I sang their song. Slowly. Quietly. A grunge dirge. I sang:

  I like all the different people

  I like sticky everywhere

  Look around—you bet I’ll be there

  Hot metal in the sun

  Sooey and saints at the fair

  Saints alive you’re saying—walk in square

  The hid are out—out for the year

  It’s a lot of face

  A lot of crank air

  Eroding round here

  Summer’s ready, summer is ready when you are

  Summer is ready when you are.

  Summer is ready when you are.

  5

  Montage. In the report it says that when hospital staff and security were able to get past the barricade, they found me lying on the floor next to B’s bed. I was unresponsive. That’s how they know I’m a monster.

  A quiz:

  Q: What kind of horrible creature breaks into a hospital room and blocks the door to quietly lie on the floor.

  A: The creature who has been erased.

  6

  I drag myself home in the brash orange light and try to disappear facefirst into the futon in B’s studio. It is so quiet I can hear my jeans rub against the cushion. I need the sound now: confirmation that I am here, material, real. Futon is real. Futon is all I’ve got. Futon is a whole medium-firm galaxy. I move the muscles in my legs back and forth less and less until I cricket to sleep.

  In the dream I help B dream. At first I hardly move. I do not know how fragile this place is, and I worry my breath will bother the air. But I hear enormous shallow breaths: steady pulls that catch every so often. This room is B, and B has four walls. One wall is a window through which I can see people passing. Occasionally they peer in with interest, pause, tilt their heads as if they are consid
ering me, and then they continue on. I notice one immaculate glass of water on the floor next to me. It is a significant glass of water. I try not to knock it over. Light movements. The small dance. Balletic. I get the hang of breathing in time with B. When I inhale and B inhales, the room slows to linger in its present atmosphere, images, dew. I exhale and flicker through dreams at shutterspeed. I pivot like idea. I learn to move an arm and give B a dream of horses that I blow away with the next breath. I descend into a valley. A development collects, houses on three walls. Then a dead end with an old brown rusting refrigerator in an open field. The door has been ripped off. Drop my arms and asphalt curls up from the mud like ribbon. Cross my legs and half-turn to make a sinkhole. I crack my fingers and reeds spring from the rim. I shiver the crater into a broken molar. I downshift, clench my fists, and the molar is a wraparound porch that collapses into the center. Little licks of flame over the broken wood: crackling sound which might as well be rain, and I look up to beg rain on in. Thread spooling. A green storm collects: undereyelid green. Lakewater. These are the right colors, I think. I want B to dream of their life well. Their scenery. Our swamp home. On the window wall, a face presses to the glass followed by the pad of an index finger—a thunderous pulse. The finger pulls away, taps again, and the sound breaks around me and through me. Thunder finds its way into my knees, elbows, hips, shoulders, and every part of me falls in different directions.

  Hands and knees in the low light. Out of the corners of my eyes I search frantically for the glass of water. It is still upright. Completely perfect. I bend to peer closer, and I see a very small tide coming in. The water rolls itself to one side wave by wave. I wait and watch, feel all the space where I used to want things. I feel my spaces empty of longing. The water in the glass displaces itself sideways, a tidal sip forming near the brim. I place my lips there and draw in the cool water just enough to see the bottom of the glass clear. I see bubbles at the bottom. They have formed themselves into a lacework. Just then the room of B goes dark. I know it’s over. But one last thing: in the dark, I feel the walls for a switch. I run my hands over the walls until I forget what I am looking for. Switchless, every smooth place I touch is a possible home.