Last Bender

9.3

I awoke early the next morning and had coffee alone by the open window. A fresh breeze blew in; the room was bright with early sun. I became absorbed in a book, emerged from the trance long enough to shower and dress and then returned to the chair for another hour. It was heating up. I had to move onto the bed to be in the shade. Still Roy had not called. The plan was for him to call to say what time he would pick me up for the ride out to our father’s.

My father lived with his second wife, Elaine, a former secretary. She was in her late thirties and came with a ten-year-old son named Barry. I would have rather broiled to death in the apartment than go out there to sip gin and tonics on the patio watching Barry attempt to do back flips and cannon balls, while his mother and my father applaud. Every summer we did this.

At noon I got Roy on the phone. At a quarter-to-one I entered his apartment. Dawn was sitting across the arms of a chair in a bra and underwear. The air was so cold you could see your breath. They were watching Apocalypse Now on the biggest TV I had ever seen. The pixels were so spread out the image was fuzzy. Roy was half asleep on a futon, an Indian blanket pulled up to his chin.

“I love this part,” Dawn said. “You know where they surf? I wish I could do that. Have you ever seen a wave like that, what they surf on?”

“The beginning of Hawaii 5-O,” I said.

“That’s stupid Alex. I don’t mean TV.”

“Then no, never, no.”

She tapped her cigarette in a sandbag ashtray and stared at the explosions on the TV. Without turning her head she said, “Roy, will you get up? Your brother’s here.” Then to me, “He don’t listen to me. I told him this morning, 8 o’clock when he walked in, ‘don’t even bother going to sleep, you have to be there in two hours.’ But he took a Quaalude.” She shook her head slowly back and forth.

Roy groaned. “Fuuuuuck. Let’s go.” He put on his sunglasses and stood staggering to his feet. His face looked like someone had knifed it on with silly putty.

“Go take a shower,” Dawn said. “You stink bad.”

I took him by the arm and led him willingly away into the black marble bathroom with stainless steel fixtures. He wiggled out of his clothes and stood trembling in his skin, which was colorless except for flushes of pink and blue. His ribs stood out. I turned the shower on, a steady jet of gentle water gushed through a huge showerhead. Most places you get the throbbing needles of water, a sputtering low use head. I closed the shower doors and watched him soap up. He was like a flame behind the textured glass, running with suds and water. His face was an oblong hole. He got out and dried off and weaved into the closet to dress. “Oh my god, fuck,” he said, putting on his shoes. He made some guttural sounds, cursed again and followed me into the living room. He was dressed in a blue Italian suit with narrow lapels, and dark sunglasses. Dawn had on dark glasses too, and a black dress, pearls and no stockings.

“You better let him drive your car, Roy.”

“Fuck you. Let’s go.”

We took a cab to the lot, found the car and Dawn got in back. I stood at the passenger side, facing Roy and the Hudson over the canvas roof of the car. I said, “Give me the keys, Roy.” Traffic crashed across metal plates. A tugboat pulled a rusty barge down the river. I watched myself in Roy’s sunglasses. In the bathroom he tried to hide behind his hands. “You can’t drive this thing.” He cleared his throat and lit a cigarette. I squinted. “Dawn said you took a Quaalude.”

“You ever take one?”

“No, never. No.”

“They’re nothing. They help you sleep.”

“You’re too fucked up to drive.”

“Am I? Cause I don’t see how you could know that. You don’t get high yourself. That’s a major strike against you, but you’re my brother, so out of love I make allowances. But I question your judgment.”

“You, you, you put on that Marcello Mastroianni suit and think it’s like a magic vest or something.” The roof was blazing hot. Tar and auto fumes scented the air. There were periodic eruptions of jackhammers demolishing concrete. My head started to ache. I held my hand out for the keys.

“Look, it’s like this,” he said. “A ‘lude lasts for all of four hours. I took it at 8. It’s 1:30. You see? I’m down from that and up from this.” He stuck a hitter to his nose and sniffed. “Now let’s cut the crap. Get in.”

We were very late. Our father would be pacing about wondering where we were, if we were all right. He was always late himself but got worried and angry if anyone kept him waiting. Roy would stand out there till sunset before he’d hand over the keys. Dawn was rapping at the glass and cursing at us. I gave up. Roy got in and started the car. I opened the door and sat down on the black upholstery. It made my back feel like pizza burn. They were both smoking. I rolled down the window. Roy yelled, “It’s too fucking hot for that. Put on the AC.” He slammed in a tape, Diamond Dogs. We headed north to the Henry Hudson, then up through Westchester to the Tappan Zee. Roy drove with the seat back as far as it would go, a cigarette dangling from his lips. Bowie sang, “When it’s good it’s really good and when it’s bad I go to pieces.”

“Can we listen to something else?” Dawn asked.

“I don’t think so. We’re practically there.” We got off the highway and squealed along a two-lane road.

“I can’t listen to this all the time. It’s like ten times a day now. I have a tape–”

“You don’t think it’s like this now? Just wait. Cause what you don’t see now you will live to see. See, I got it all worked out here with this music. Bowie’s just reporting on what’s out there. Sometimes there are things out there you don’t hear about here. The news doesn’t come. But I’ll tell you what. We’ll take a vote. That’s what we’ll do. How do you vote, Alex, in the matter of Dawn v. Roy?”

“Do you think we’ll have to watch him swim again?” I asked. “Or is he too old for that?”

“Too old,” Roy said.

“Back home, everyone could swim. It wasn’t nothing you would brag about.”

“The vote then. How do you vote Alex.”

“This tape,” Dawn said. “It’s my friend. Put it on next. And I don’t think he wants to vote. And please, turn it off before it goes rat rat rat rat rat. It gives me the creeps.”

“Bruh. Bruh Bruh Bruh Bruh Bruh,” he said.

“No, it’s rat.”

“Bruh, like in brother, big brother.”

“My god, you talk so much. If you’re so smart, how come I never see you read a book?”

“I read ‘em in spurts. Jail’s a good place for reading books. And a ship at sea. Men on submarines read a lot, and in the Antarctic. But the place I’ve read the most has been in decompression chambers, after working in a diving bell. You’re breathing helium. And there’s just nothing else you can do for weeks at a time. All you have to look forward to is a really deep dive, a dark and endless dive along a chain lit up only by your headlamp, disappearing deeper and deeper. Down there, at those pressures, only certain kinds of things can live. The seabed is a barren place they say, but I doubt it. There ain’t a barren place on this earth. I sometimes thought I could stay down there forever. It was so perfect. It scared the fucking shit out of me how perfect it was.”