Part 23 (1/2)

Which in some lackluster fashi+on, I did until his father came to keep him for the weekend, while I disappeared into ot there, Dev was Superman, and I was a distinctly unwondrous Wonder Wo there, crying for estions I'd failed to take regularly was praying on my knees

Janice's voice comes back: You don't do it for God You don't do it for God

In the hospital, I have this urge to kneel, yet to do so in public-in front of , unsettled roommate-seems, well, obscene somehow

I tiptoe to the bathroom and bend onto the cold tiles Thanks, whoever the fuck you are Thanks, whoever the fuck you are, I say, for keepingthere Small and needy and inadequate Pathetic, even Like sos

Which is fairly accurate, after all, for the average inmate

If you're God, I say, you know I feel sht I want a drink

The silence fails to say anything back I glare at it It feels like judge; I start a ranting prayer inmy baby sick all the ti a baby like that, you fuck And et fro stir inin ely-the sweetness of my love for my daddy and my son It blesses , and I blurt out, Thanks for them

I feel the stillness aroundsafe at ho; and my husband, who row thin as I kneel there squinting my eyes shut For a nanosecond, I am lucent

Inside it: an idea, the thread of a different perspective than any I've ever had It's a thought so counterintuitive, so unlike how I think, it feels as if it originates from outside me The voice-the idea-comes in solid quiet in the midst of psychic chaos, and it says, If Dev hadn't been sick soIf Dev hadn't been sick so

Which is wholly true If Dev had been one of those blank-eyed, anesthetized little blobs who slept infancy away, I could've sotted up his early years Staying up with hiht were e kind of rescue

(Vis-a-vis God speaking toMoses booh, but reversals of attitude so contrary to hts-so solidly true-as to see and quiet View it as soe, if you like By checking in to the hospital, I've said in sohborhood-calf rope, referring to an ani so hard and begun to wait, so hope, to be shown) Then it hitsbefore a toilet The throne, as other drunks call it How s did I worshi+p at this altar, e above

And I start to laugh, kneeling there in a striped industrial robe-a barking laugh that devolves into a skittery le, so I have to cover one off

32

The Nervous Hospital What fresh hell is this?-Dorothy Parker After fourteen hours sacked out in the bin, I wake to find reen foarotesque ht into theiven ned up for

At the nurses' station, I'm handed a paper cup with another double dose of antidepressants to toss down

In the dayrooe wo both eyes The other's fortyish, with a flapper's curly bob and a small, muscular frame

I'm Tina, she says, manic-depressive

I'm Mary, I say, depressive-depressive

On TV, the correct door has been chosen by a woman who bounces up and down and claps at a new bedrooreen striped athletic jersey with the Italian flag on the sleeve She says to the other lady, Do you want to tell Mary your nairl voice She's white as parchment, with soft flesh that spills as if poured fros

On TV, a horn honks The audience sighs with disappointment

Tell her your bear's name, too, Tina prompts But Dimples just covers her face with the eyeless anie her, but she's no Dale Carnegie Multiple personality disorder Tina says, Do you work out?

This starts ular orks In my family, we claiht, I sob ets an earful, and since each shi+ft features a nurse ordained to hear me out-Mary, preeroup therapy Plus a shrink they assign me three tiether into a kind of steaDev by going inpatient And I sob about his dad, whose tenderness for me has perhaps been killed off by my small black heart And I wail in abject terror that-now I'm not only an alcoholic but also a lunatic-Warren will divorcekhaki shorts and a kind, owlish expression tohe wants to work on loving each other better, I blubber with hope at our prospects I swear forever to love him till death, and while there's still a blank between us, I mean it

(Here, Italk between us of the type I'd have insisted on if our roles were reversed) He and Dev come every afternoon to eat dinner with me in a private room I cry before they arrive, then hen they stride out

I cry for Mother to come She's about to head off on a spiritual retreat in Mexico counseling other alcoholics Ponder the likelihood of that one-Mother as sober guru Landing here is final proof I can't outrun her, but neither can I get her to spring into action for me Our phone call is brief

I'm in the hospital, I say I wanted to kill myself

That's terrible, honey Are you okay? Did you hurt yourself?

No, I was gonna use carbon

Why'd you pick that? She sounds curious, like soht a ball gown

You don't make a mess You leave a very livid corpse

That's just awful Does Warren have Dev?

Yeah I get to see him every afternoon Warren sees, but we've been living like strangers for so long

Y'all should work things out

I know, Mother, I know Since I was sixteen, you've wanted to pawn me off in matrimony to somebody

I just want you to be taken care of

This ht coht not have planned to cash in my chips

He's just so sith Dev