The Moon Above: Part 23

Chapters 45 and 46

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FORTY-FIVE

Years of Wine and Roses

A BODY in motion tends to remain in motion. I had learned that years ago in school and now I set about proving it with my own life. I had started going down and I kept going down. Paying the rent for my apartment was too difficult without a job and the thought of getting another job was unpleasant. I had spent so many years — most of my life — being in places where other people wanted me to be at the times they wanted me to be there, I simply lost interest in continuing that practice. So, I did not get another job and before long I could not pay for my apartment, and not long after that my landlord threw all my stuff into the parking lot.

I stuffed a few changes of clothing in a bag and left the rest of it there. My neighbor gave me a beer and said goodbye and waited until I was out of sight to start rooting around in my leftovers. I had come out of the war with nothing and I could live in peacetime with nothing. I drank the beer as I walked down the street with my bag and decided that I should have another beer. Later, I found a place to relieve my bowels and later still, a place to sleep. For the next several years, this was the cycle that defined my life. I boiled it down to the essence, and it was beautiful in its simplicity. All I needed was alcohol, a place to shit and a place to sleep.

Some days, I walked down by the river, taking care to avoid any of the nice neighborhoods that had sprung up there. Some days, I walked up the mountain, wondering if I might bump into one of the Germans who lived there. Some days, I wandered into the swamp that bordered Redstone Arsenal. The mosquitoes didn’t bite me. I was rejected by all life forms, including them.

One day I saw an alligator. I didn’t know there were any alligators this far north, but there it was, its colossal scaly back poking above the gummy water. Its kind had floated in the water like this back when the dinosaurs were fresh, and here it was now. I was wading in the water and I guess it could have attacked me, but I had no fear of it. The mosquitoes wouldn’t even bother to suck my blood, surely this lumbering beast would not bother with me. And it didn’t. It submerged as I approach and was gone, with barely a ripple marking where its bulk had been.

I came out of the woods one morning to find a car on fire on the side of the road. It was a fat old American car and there was no one around to watch it burn. Flames licked the sky, but it was a show that only I witnessed. The entire world was deathly still except for the crackling of the flames, and I was the only human being in that world. I watched the car endure its personal hell for a little while until even I got bored with it and moved on, and in all that time not another soul appeared anywhere on the horizon.

Sometimes I came across parcels of food, little sandwiches and apples and bottles of water, things like that, just abandoned by someone and left like manna. I felt like a child eating his lunch at school, but I ate them anyway.

There are things that you see and notice when you are by yourself, and I mean truly by yourself, that you do not see any other time. I have listed some of mine, but they were mild compared to what I heard about. Some of the other unglued men that lived in the area used to congregate now and then under the bridge that spanned the Tennessee River on the far eastern side of town. There were seven or eight of us and we huddled under our stinking blankets and talked. There was nothing much around here, just a gravel road that ran alongside the river. The Tennessee is pretty enough in places, but it was tired and brown here, as if its trip through town had worn it out. We would gather and tell our stories because no one else would believe us, and really, we didn’t even believe each other half the time.

One of the men, who called himself Ezekiel, said he had seen dozens of “little people.” We asked him if he meant midgets, and he said no.

“They are just about two feet tall,” he said, his eyes glowing at the memory. “I saw them in the Paint Rock Valley. They come out by the creek at night, when the moon is bright. And they dance. They have on tiny little clothes, little suits and dresses, and everything is leafy and green.”

I figured he had been staring at the side of a soup can too long one night, but he said he had seen them over and over. The rest of us just laughed, and he laughed too, but he was serious. He was as serious as I was when I told about the alligator, but I got the same response. They asked what I had been drinking because it must have been good stuff and proposed that we organize a hunting party. But I could tell, underneath the laughs, that some of them believed me, and some of them believed Ezekiel. To tell the truth, I believed Ezekiel.

One day I came across a broken mirror on the ground. I looked into it and saw my father. I saw my father as he looked right before he died. The man staring back at me from this shard of glass was gaunt, gray, dirty, tired. It was me, and I had become him. I had become him at his worst. The sight staggered me and I stepped back. When I did, the sun glanced off the mirror and caught me full in the eyes, blinding me. I sat down hard on the ground, having seen a ghost and been blinded by the vision. The mirror was outside an abandoned store and I leaned my back against the rusting metal wall and rubbed my eyes until I could see again.

I was not drinking as much as he did, I don’t think, but I drank whenever I could. I would say it helped the time pass, but the time passed with no help. The mornings faded into the afternoons faded into the evenings faded into the nights. It got hot, then cool, then cold, then warm, then hot again. The leaves appeared, turned green, turned yellow and red, turned brown and let go and crunched underfoot.

I stole to get by. I watched houses from the woods until I knew that their owners were gone and then I broke in and stole food and, when they had it, beer and liquor. It reminded me of when James, Toussaint and I staged our pointless little raids. Those flashes of memory were more painful than the shot of light from the mirror, more painful than stepping on a nail, more painful than anything else I experienced in those years. One night I was beaten and robbed of what little I had by some dirty young men; but the memories of James made that pain fade to nothingness.

The worst part of it all was the loneliness. I could tell my “friends” under the bridge about the odd things I had seen, but there were countless sights and thoughts that visited me, and I had no one to share them with. One evening in the Paint Rock Valley I watched a huge orange sun settle below the horizon, lighting the sky with orange and red loveliness that made my breath catch in my throat. I can understand why Ezekiel saw the little green people. Sometimes the world is far too beautiful to look upon by yourself. But I was done with the world, and the world was done with me.

FORTY-SIX

The Point of No Return

SOMETHING TUGGED AT MY FOOT. A rat? I kicked it away. It kept tugging. I crawled out of my unconsciousness and pulled the tattered blanket away from my face. I was hallucinating, early in the morning. I saw Virginia, standing over me with a look of pure disgust on her face.

“Get up. Your mother is sick. We’re going to Chicago.”

I must not have moved because, in short order, she kicked me.

“Get up.”

I got up. A couple of young men I did not know took me back to my old house and marched me into the bathroom. While they ran a hot tub of water, one of them motioned for me to get undressed. I handed him my clothing piece by piece, and there was quite a lot of it as it was September and getting cold. Because I didn’t have a closet in which to store things, I tended to wear whatever I had. He handed each piece out the door to Virginia. I never saw any of those clothes again.

When the tub was full and I was naked, the young men left. I stepped into the tub and almost cried out. I hadn’t felt water that hot in a long time. I stretched out and a wave of relaxation coursed through me, so strong it almost knocked me out right there. I had taken baths here and there, when I could, but this was the best bath in years.

I lay in the tub for what seemed like hours, until the water started to cool and turn a faint brown from the grime on my body. Then I washed and scrubbed and washed again. When I stood up, I felt human again. A razor and shaving cream were placed below the mirror atop the sink: very subtle. But I used them, and when I was done, I looked better. I looked like my old self again. My old self, but the thinner version; I looked like a much healthier version of the man who labored in the underground rocket plant.

I put on the robe and slippers that had been left beside the door and walked out. The young men were sitting at the table, and it was then I recognized them. They were from the church. They had been little the last time I saw them. They stood up and walked into the kitchen and returned with a plate full of ham and grits and green beans. I sat down at the table and ate hungrily, just above the level of an animal. They watched me with no expressions on their faces; no fear, no hatred, no disgust, nothing. When I was done, one of them brought me a slice of pumpkin pie and I gobbled it down in three bites. They took my plates away when I was finished.

“There are some pajamas over there,” one said, pointing to the couch. “That’s where you’ll sleep.”

The couch. My old couch. On closer examination, it wasn’t my old couch, it had been replaced with a newer one, but it was the same color and in the same place. I was back to sleeping on the couch, while Virginia was away in bed. I did not feel like I had made much progress, but I put on the pajamas and crawled onto the couch, covering up with the fresh blanket Virginia had placed there. I could see the young men in the kitchen, sitting in the darkness, watching. They were going to watch me all night. I thought that would bother me, but I closed my eyes and I was asleep.

I had a dream. In it, I walked across an endless field that was broken here and there by lovely little streams. The grass was fresh and bright green, free of brambles and bugs. The sky was a shining blue, as was the water. The streams were so narrow I could step over them easily. Golden fish swam in the water and showed no fear when I walked over them. Red birds flew in the sky, shining cardinals that called to each other in long, musical songs. And that was all that happened. I walkedand stepped over the water and the birds flew and sang and the fish swam. The scenery was slightly different as I moved but it never really changed, it stayed green and lush and water-fed. There was no one else around, no one to appreciate this beauty. A tall hill rose before me in the distance, capped with a white peak. No matter how long I walked it always stayed the same distance.

At first, I was disturbed by the lack of people and the unmoving mountain, but as my journey continued, I came to enjoy the rhythm of the trip and felt a kinship with the grass and the sky and the fish and the birds. I felt I was a part of everything, and my job was just to walk and see it all and if I never made it to the mountain that would be all right.

Despite all that walking, I awoke refreshed.

The young men were asleep in their chairs, the sunlight pushing their shadows against the kitchen wall. I went to the bathroom to pee and heard their chairs scraping on the floor after I shut the door; they probably heard the noise, woke up abruptly and wondered where I had wandered off to. They looked relieved when I came back. They made bacon and eggs for me while I got dressed, then watched me while I ate.

I felt like a prisoner, but the food was good.

Virginia did not appear until Rev. Scott showed up at the front door. She nodded to me and let her father in. The reverend had aged considerably. He still moved fairly rapidly, but was stoop shouldered, as if always on the verge of bending down to pick up a penny. I stood when he came in and stuck out my hand. He shook it with his own dry hand, then pulled me closer in a gentle hug.

“It’s been a long time, son,” he said softly.

Virginia walked out of the room.

“Yes, it has,” I said. Virginia returned.

“It’s time to go. We have a long trip ahead.”

We drove to the train station, Virginia and her father up front with one of the young men, the other two of us in the back seat with lots of room. Virginia did not want to sit with me and probably didn’t want her father to, either, although he kept tossing sad glances my way. The young men left us at the station. Apparently, I had passed some kind of test and been declared trustworthy, so I no longer needed guards.

We took our seats on the train. We had sleeping cars from Chattanooga to Chicago, but the trip from Huntsville to Chattanooga was not long so we just had regular seats.

“I brought you a magazine,” Virginia said, handing me an old issue of Popular Mechanics.

It had an article about the space program and how the Mercury and Apollo flights were progressing. I had no interest in reading it, but Virginia obviously did not want to talk so I ran my eyes over it to be polite. I had picked up newspapers and magazines and old books from time to time in recent years but had gradually fallen out of the habit of reading. I preferred to just sit still and listen to the world around me. I could hear the wheels clicking on the track and the wind pushing against the cars and occasional nearby traffic and Rev. Scott’s uneven breathing and Virginia’s silent disdain. I didn’t analyze or dwell on any of it, just let it wash over me.

You will notice that I have not mentioned having a drink, because they certainly did not give me one, and by the time we got to Chattanooga, my head was hurting and I was shaking, although I hid it as best I could by putting the magazine down and pretending to sleep, making sure to keep my hands folded tightly under my arms. When we changed trains, I had a sleeper car to myself, and once in it I doubled over and rocked and moaned to myself. I wondered if I could get to the bar car, but I didn’t have any money and Virginia wasn’t going to give me any. Maybe the porter would take pity on me and bring me something. After a while, I heard the door to my car swish open and I started to ask the porter for help, but I saw it wasn’t the porter. It was Rev. Scott.

“Son, you look bad,” he said, and sat down across from me.

“I feel bad.”

He fumbled in his pocket and then I felt something metallic and warm against my hand. He was handing me a small flask.

“Don’t tell Virginia about this,” he said. “I don’t want to argue with her. But I know a few more things about the world than she does, and I know how alcohol works. You need to get through this and, unfortunately, that means you need to drink.”

“Reverend,” I said, my voice a sly admonition.

“Son, if you’re a minister and you don’t know a few sinners, you’re not doing your job.”

We shared a belly laugh at that and I tossed back some of the liquor. It took a little while to hit but then, I have to admit, I felt better. I had liked to think I was not a drunk like my father but here was the proof. Ninety proof, at that, and once it coursed through my veins and got its hooks into me, goddamn it, I felt better.

“I don’t know what you’re used to drinking. This is vodka. It doesn’t smell as much as some of the others. I’ll give you some mints, too, so Virginia won’t notice.”

“She’s not going to get close enough to notice.”

“No, son, I don’t think she is.”

We rode on in silence for a bit and I drank a little more and felt a little better.

“It’s good to see you, Johnny,” Rev. Scott said after a while. “I’m glad you’re still around, but I don’t like what you’re doing to yourself.”

“Sometimes it’s not my favorite thing, either.”

“Why are you doing this, Johnny? Is it the war?”

“Isn’t that enough?”

“But — we won, Johnny! And you showed them what a Black man can do!”

I started to tell him. I really did. We had the time. It was a long ride. I could have told him about a hell he could only imagine, a hell that was right here on Earth. But I didn’t. And he wanted to know.

I took another sip, felt the burn, and even though I’ve never particularly liked gin, I felt better still. I looked him hard in the eye. His eyes were watery with age and had collected various spots and veins, but you could tell a spry mind still lived there.

“You don’t win wars, Reverend. You survive them.”

“I’ll have to take your word for that, Johnny. I don’t doubt it. You’re living proof, to me.”

I finished off the flask and handed it back. “At least I’m good for something. Any chance of a refill before too long?”

He didn’t laugh but tucked the flask away. I wonder what he did with it when he wasn’t loaning it to drunks.

“Maybe one more on the train. And I think there may be liquor in Chicago. But you can’t have too much. Just enough to get you through this.”

“Fair enough.”

“You should get help, Johnny. What’s happened between you and my daughter is none of my business, but I still feel like your father-in-law and I want you to pull yourself together. For my sake. For your own sake.”

“I know.”

“There’s that Alcoholics Anonymous. I’ve talked to people who work with them and it helps, it really does.”

“I’ve heard of them.”

He stopped talking and just looked at me sadly. I examined my shoes. There was no argument that could be made; he was right, of course. He was right and what remained was only the will I had to pull myself out of this dive, if it wasn’t too late already.

“Get some rest, Johnny. I’ll come check on you in a little while.”

“Yes, sir.”

“It is good to see you again.”

“You, too.”

I didn’t blink, afraid that a tear would run down my cheek, and I didn’t want him to see that. I didn’t blink until after he had left my car and closed the door. I should say that I spent the night thinking about my situation and resolving to do better, but actually I just fell asleep.

I didn’t see Virginia again until we arrived in Chicago, and I mostly saw the back of her head at first, even then. Rev. Scott hailed a cab and he and I got in the back seat. Rev. Scott put a cautioning hand on my shoulder as we entered the hospital.

“Your mother has cancer, and it’s made her demented. She may not know you.”

I felt ashamed that he knew this and I didn’t. I felt sad that it took me

a few moments to recognize the woman on the bed. She was knotted in the sheets like a trapped insect. She was bone-thin and wore a scarf on her hairless head. I recognized her by her eyes. Her eyes were the same.

“We’ll wait outside,” Rev. Scott said.

I pulled up a chair and sat beside my mother. A nurse came in to verify that I was family.

“He’s my husband,” my mother said, her voice thin and weak as a wisp of smoke. “He’s come to see me.”

The nurse gave me a look of severe disapproval and left.

“Oh, Carleton, you’ve come home,” she said. “I’m so happy.”

As I learned when I looked in mirrors now, I looked just like my father, for both good and bad.

“Yes, I’m here. And I will stay.”

“Yes, stay.”

She closed her eyes and clutched my hand in her wiry fingers. The bed next to hers was empty but there was a small vase with wilting flowers next to it. I got my little folding knife out and cut one for her, a pink daisy that was still in good shape. I had found the knife in the woods months or years ago and cleaned it up. It was very small and not sharp because I used it to open cans, and it left a ragged gash on the stem of the daisy, but it finally cut through and I was able to slide the flower through her hair and rest it on her ear. She opened her eyes.

“I’m so glad we’re back together. And how’s Johnny? Do you see Johnny?”

“I see him. He’s fine, he’s happy, he sends his love to you.”

“Oh, good.”

“He’s healthy and happy and married.”

“To that lovely girl, Virginia?”

“The very one.”

“And James? How’s our grandson?”

“He’s — he’s fine. Big and strong and healthy. He plays football.”

Her smile stretched wide across her face and seeing it was the only thing that enabled me to keep it together. We’re always taught that lying is bad, but sometimes it’s the best thing you can do. Sometimes it’s the only thing you can do.

“It’s so good to hear it. Everything is all right then, isn’t it, dear?”

“Everything is fine. We’re all together and we’re happy.”

“Then we’ve made it. We’ve made it.”

She opened her eyes again and met mine. “We’ve made it, haven’t we, honey?”

“Yes, dear. We’ve made it.”

She closed her eyes again, savoring the moment, and then drifted off to sleep, her fingers gradually growing slack in mine.

She didn’t recognize me at all the next morning and shouted for the nurse in fright when I came into the room. She died that afternoon. So, she knows more about life and death than I do.

I don’t really remember much of that day. I didn’t cry or make a scene, but I just drifted off. Mentally, I was back in the woods, alone. I remember being at the hotel and eating, waking up later still in my clothes, and Rev. Scott came to talk to me from time to time. I’m sure he brought me some alcohol, too, but I don’t remember it. I believe Virginia stuck her head in the door once in a while to check on me, but she didn’t talk to me except to hug me once and tell me how sorry she was. My memories of her on that day are mostly that of a shadow head framed in a doorway.

The funeral was two days later. Virginia and her father handled all the details, and thankfully, Mother and Father had worked out their burial arrangements long before, like proper adults. I didn’t have to do a thing. I felt like a child, and I guess I was behaving like one. Virginia didn’t know who to invite, and I didn’t either, so the funeral was as small as my father’s. A couple of her friends got wind of it and came to see me, and squeezed my arm afterwards. I don’t know when they had actually seen her last. One of them looked me in the eye and called me by my father’s name and said she hoped I’d be all right.

So now there was no one left, no one, at all. Katherine was in the wind and Mother and Father were in the ground. There was only me. This was a whole family, as happy and full of plans as any other, and now it was gone, worn down by war and time and bad luck and bad choices and weakness. It had crumbled like a statue and there was nothing left, nothing left but me, the feet of clay.

I listened to the preacher eulogize someone he had never met. He couldn’t know of Mother’s struggles, how she gained and eventually lost her husband, her brother, her daughter, her son, her grandson, her mind, her life. He couldn’t know that, but he tried. He read from some script and it fit her life well enough. All the rest was up to me. Nobody would remember my Mother but me. I didn’t go up to the casket and look at her that day. Rev. Scott assured me that she looked fine, she looked peaceful, but I knew she was gone from this earth and only lived now in my mind, a rickety place, at best.

At one point, the preacher looked at us and asked if anyone would like to say a few words. I thought I should but wondered if I was up for it; I wasn’t in the habit of speaking in complete sentences anymore.

Virginia just caught his eye and slowly shook her head no.

Some son I had turned out to be. Too destroyed to eulogize his own mother. While I stood there, clutching the back of the pew, feeling the shakes and the shame begin to come on, I decided that I would do my best to remember Mother. I would do my best to remember Father. I would do my best to remember Katherine, to remember James, to remember Uncle Abe, to remember Aunt Eveline, to remember Annamaria, to remember Marianne, to remember Julie, to remember Jean, to remember Pierre, to remember them all. They lived now only in my mind, and I would make that as good a place to live as I could. I would remove the cobwebs and pack the anger and fear into the attic so they would have room.

And then I thought I needed a drink. I wanted to head out to a bar after the funeral, any bar, anywhere, but I didn’t have any money. I would have begged on the street for a while to get some, but I think Rev. Scott could sense that temptation and kept himself close by. Virginia hovered, too, but she didn’t touch me and didn’t get too close, like a moth afraid of a flame. So, we headed back to Alabama. Rev. Scott appeared again in my berth and extended the flask. I drank it like a vampire on a neck and I felt better.

We got back to Alabama and Rev. Scott gave me a hug, dropping another flask in my pocket as he did so. Virginia stood before me then, as close as she had been in years. She looked me over and I guess I found some small amount of favor in her eyes.

“I’m so sorry, Johnny,” she said softly.

She gave me a hug that lasted just a little longer than it needed to. It felt good when I noticed that, and I thought about that for weeks and years to come.

“And, hey,” she said. “Did you hear? Men are on the moon. Right now, right up there.”

“What?”

I had missed that completely.

“They announced it on the train last night. You must have been asleep.”

I looked up into the sky, but it was daylight and there was no moon.

“So, they did it.”

All those rockets had finally worked. Those German bastards had put a man on the moon.

“Johnny — are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Just thinking.”

“Do you — can we take you somewhere? Do you need some money?”

“I’m fine.”

“All right. You take care of yourself. I know my father talked to you about pulling yourself together. You should.”

“I will.”

“Look me in the eye and say that.”

I looked her in the eye and said it. It was easy to say. I hoped I meant it. She didn’t look convinced.

“Take care, then, Johnny.”

“Goodbye.”

I waited until they were gone and then walked away from the train station, headed for town. I felt the weight of the flask in my pocket and it was comforting. I transferred some of the weight from the flask to my stomach and felt even more comforted. I repeated this a few times.

After a while, I noticed a lot of people were walking near me, and traffic was getting heavy. I looked around and people were flowing downtown. For a second, it reminded me of the march from Selma to Montgomery, but in this case, most of the people walking were white. I wanted to ask someone what was going on, but everyone seemed focused, and I had become pleasantly unfocused, so I just let myself get pulled along by the crowd. I could hear a loudspeaker in the distance now, and cheering. I got down to Main Street and saw that a small stage had been set up across from the First National Bank. Finally, the words blaring at me made sense, and I realized they were talking about the moon race. We had won it.

He had won it. There he was, on the stage, beaming at the crowd, hair slightly askew: Dr. Wernher von Braun. He was fatter than when I had seen him in the underground rocket plant. He shouted something into the microphone, and I could hear all of Germany behind him. I heard that voice and thought of the plant, and for a second, I was back in the crowd in the square, half alive, looking at the stage, wondering who was going to be hung. My vision narrowed to a black cone, and in the center was his Cheshire Cat face. I knew what I had to do. I had to kill him.

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