Jeremiah Healy - Right To Die

"You can go in now, John. But only a few minutes, all right?"

"Come get me if I overstay my welcome."

Wonsley went back to the chair.

I knocked, heard something, and went in.

They would have to invent a new kind of bleach to make the sheets whiter than his face.

Alec Bacall nodded to me, one fist compressing a little sponge ball. The arm had a clear plastic tube in it, some not-so-clear liquid pulsing downward and into him. I moved closer.

His eyes strained from the sockets, sunken and shriveled. The flesh sagged at his jawline, bruises of purple and blue providing the only color on the bed. I'd seen Bacall at his office in January, eight weeks before. Given the changes, it could have been eight years.

"Alec."

He nodded again. "I'd say sit, but Del probably told you not to stay that long."

"Just as well. I've been tossing down booze all day at a St. Pat's party."

The eyes went left-right-left. "God, I've lost track of that sort of thing. You and Nancy went to the parade?"

I told him about Inés.

"Good, good. She needs that, and more." Something moved inside Bacall, a brief spasm traversing his face as well as his body.

Then, "About Maisy?"

"She's back in San Diego. No notes since February. No progress, either, I'm afraid."

"What do you make of the notes starting and stopping like that?"

"I don't know, Alec. It must be that the guy knows her movements, including major events like arriving in and leaving Boston. It could be that she's carrying her trouble with her."

"I don't understand."

I explained my views on Tucker Hebert and Manolo.

Bacall lolled his head from side to side on the linen. "I don't know much about investigating people, but I think I do know something about judging them. It just can't be Manolo or Tuck, John."

"I don't see many other prospects right now."

"Will you stay with it?"

"As long as I'm needed. Or wanted."

"Thank you." Bacall's pupils wandered, and his eyes closed. I'd almost turned to go when the lids rose. "John?"

"Yes?"

"I said I was a good judge of people, but sometimes being too close blurs the vision. How do you think Del is doing?"

"He's still smiling."

A forced laugh. "Do you know, do you know what is really unfair about his generation?"

"No."

"The smiles. Or, more precisely, the teeth themselves. Like half the kids his age, Del's never had a cavity."

"You're kidding?"

"Not kidding. Never, not one. The fluoridation came a little late for you and me, but he's never even heard a dentist's drill up close."

"Doesn't seem fair."

"No." Bacall hesitated. "No, it doesn't seem fair at all." Another hesitation. "I'm feeling pretty sleepy, John." He released the ball, and it sought the depression his hip made in the bed. "See you soon, eh?"

I took his hand the way he offered it, like a black solidarity shake.

"Take care, Alec."

Closing the door behind me, I watched Wonsley get up. "Alec said he was getting sleepy."

"They keep him pretty well sedated. That's one of the problems, balancing all the different dosages."

"I have kind of a hard question."

Wonsley's tongue darted between his teeth and back again. "Ask it.”

"He looks so much worse than the last time I saw him. Should I be – "

"Trying to visit him more often?"

"That's not how I wanted to sound, but basically, yes, that's my question."

"Like I said, I think Alec will come around from this bout. But he's not responding well to the drugs, and if that doesn't – well, it's no secret from you what we'll do then."

I dropped my voice. "The hospital will go along with that?"

"The only way it can. The doctor will let me sign Alec out for a home visit while he's back on an upswing so we don't need all those tubes and shit. Then Alec and I will enjoy the upswing as long as it lasts. When it's downhill again, I'll do for him."

Without my saying anything, Wonsley continued. "I grew up in Chicago, John, South Side. My daddy, he'd take me to the lake, Lake Michigan. We'd go down to a la-de-dah yacht club like Columbia, by where Monroe hits Lakeshore, and we'd fish from the concrete walls. Back then it was lamprey time. Not much salmon, but plenty of perch and other runts for me. Man, that water was blue. Like a glacier melting into a stream, blue like it would hurt your eyes. You don't expect that.

"Well, after my daddy died, I tried going to the lake alone. I found out something real important. I could still fish, because he'd taught me how to do it right. It wasn't as much fun without him, but it was still good.

"I'm going to lose Alec, John. I know roughly when, and I'm going to see to it that I know exactly when. And after I lose him, life won't be so good for a while. But Alec's helped teach me how to live, and it'll get better. I can't stop AIDS from taking him, but I can stop it from taking me too."

Wonsley drew in a breath. "So, if you need anything else, you give us a call."

"I will. But if I don't, let me know when he's coming home the last time?"

The tongue darting again, Wonsley nodded quickly and entered Bacall's room.

FROM A TRAINING STANDPOINT, THE LAST HALF OF MARCH AND the first half of April were the worst. Wild changes in the weather. Teens one morning, forties the next. Blizzard snow to blinding sun. As the longer distances in Bo's program climbed past fourteen miles, I learned where the working water fountains were. The second floor of the Harvard Boathouse. The rest room of the MDC rink on Nonantum Road. I carried change in my pocket for sugar drinks at convenience stores in Newton and Watertown.

Medically, I stayed healthy, but my knees and hips began to hurt after ten miles each time. I started to wonder if legs were like tires, only so many miles in them before they blew. But hurting or not, I finished each run, gaining confidence that I could go as far as I had to, maybe even twenty-six miles.

The Andrus case, however, stayed dead while she completed her visitorship in San Diego. Juggling an arson investigation and a missing person matter, I couldn't understand it. Sending notes only sporadically might avoid diluting their effect, but there hadn't been any activity since the sniping incident in February. Granted, Andrus hadn't been back in Boston, either, but Hebert or Manolo, or whoever, must have had some kind of timetable, some overall strategy. I just wasn't seeing it.

"I've taken you about as far as I can, John."

I stopped stretching against a tree. The Wednesday before the marathon, I'd just finished a tapering run of six miles. The April sun was warm, so I was wearing only shorts and a long-sleeved T-shirt.

"Less than a week left, Bo."

Sitting on his bench, the man moved a shoulder inside the two sweaters he still wore. Tied around his waist were two other layers and the sport jacket, a green carnation from the holiday wilted in its lapel. "What I mean is, there's nothing left to tell you."

"How about hanging around anyway, see if I finish on Monday?"

"No need. I know you'll finish. Besides, the race herself is part of your life, John, not mine."

"I'd still like you to be there."

"No. No, I think maybe I'll go somewheres else. This climate, it doesn't have much of a springtime. Hell of a winter, but no spring."

He fingered the carnation. "I think I'd like to be someplace I'll see live flowers this side of June."

Bo stood, wiping his right hand elaborately on a sweater, then extending the hand to me. "Good luck, eh'?"

I took it. "Thank you, Coach."

He shook his hand loose from mine and pulled the Redskins cap down tighter with it. "Remember to do that last tune-up distance on Friday, now."

"I will."