Noah Hawley - Before the Fall

Scott turns down the volume. The boy stirs but does not wake. In sleep he is not yet an orphan. In sleep his parents are still alive, his sister. They kiss him on the cheeks and tickle his ribs. In sleep it is last week and he is running through the sand, holding a squirmy green crab by the claw. He is drinking orange soda through a straw and eating curly fries, his brown hair bleached by the sun, freckles splashed across his face. And when he wakes up there will be that moment when all the dreams are real, when the love he carries up with him is enough to keep the truth at bay, but then the moment will end. The boy will see Scott’s face, or a nurse will come in, and just like that he will be an orphan again. This time forever.

Scott turns and looks out the window. They are meant to be discharged today, Scott and the boy, expelled from the looped loudspeaker of hospital life, BP checked every half hour, temperature taken, meals delivered. The boy’s aunt and uncle arrived last night, red-eyed and somber. The aunt is Maggie’s younger sister, Eleanor. She sleeps now in a hard-backed chair beside the boy’s bed. Eleanor is in her early thirties and pretty, a massage therapist from Croton-on-Hudson, Westchester. Her husband, the boy’s uncle, is a writer, squirrelly about eye contact, the kind of knucklehead who grows a beard in summer. Scott doesn’t have a good feeling about him.

It has been thirty-two hours since the crash, a heartbeat and a lifetime. Scott has yet to bathe, his skin still salty from the sea. His left arm is in a sling. He has no ID, no pants. And yet, despite this, his idea is still to head into the city later as planned. There are meetings on the books. Career connections to be made. Scott’s friend Magnus has offered to drive out to Montauk and get him. Lying there, Scott thinks it will be good to see him, a friendly face. They are not close really, he and Magnus, nothing like brothers, more like drinking buddies, but Magnus is both unflappable and relentlessly positive, which is why Scott thought to call him last night. It was essential that he avoid talking to anyone who might cry. Keep things casual. That was his goal. In fact, after he’d finished telling Magnus — who didn’t own a TV — what had happened, Magnus said weird , and then suggested they should grab a beer.

Looking over, Scott sees that the boy is awake now, staring at him unblinking.

“Hey, buddy,” says Scott quietly, so as not to wake the aunt. “You sleep okay?”

The boy nods.

“Want me to put on some cartoons?”

Another nod. Scott finds the remote, turns channels until he finds something animated.

“Sponge Bob?” Scott asks.

The boy nods again. He hasn’t spoken a word since yesterday afternoon. In the first few hours after they reached shore it was possible to get a few words out of him, how he was feeling, if he needed anything. But then, like a wound swelling shut, he stopped speaking. And now he is mute.

Scott spies a box of powdery rubber exam gloves on the table. As the boy watches, he pulls one out.

“Uh-oh,” he says, then quietly fakes the big buildup to a sneeze. With the achoo he hangs the glove from his left nostril. The boy smiles.

The aunt wakes, stretches. She is a beautiful woman with a blunt bang haircut, like a person who makes up for driving an expensive car by never washing it. Scott watches her face as she regains full consciousness, as she realizes where she is and what has happened. For a moment he sees her threaten to collapse under the weight of it, but then she sees the boy and forces a smile.

“Hey,” she says, smoothing the hair back from his face.

She looks up at the TV, and then at Scott.

“Morning,” he says.

She brushes her own hair off her face, checks to make sure her clothes are on properly.

“Sorry,” she says. “I guess I fell asleep.”

It doesn’t feel like a comment that deserves a response, so Scott just nods. Eleanor looks around.

“Have you seen…Doug? My husband?”

“I think he went to get some coffee,” Scott tells her.

“Good,” she says, looking relieved. “That’s good.”

“You two been married a long time?” Scott asks her.

“No. Just, uh, seventy-one days.”

“But who’s counting,” says Scott.

Eleanor flushes.

“He’s a sweet guy,” she says. “I think he’s just a little overwhelmed right now.”

Scott glances at the boy, who has stopped watching the TV and is studying Scott and his aunt. The idea that Doug is overwhelmed given what they’ve been through is mystifying.

“Did the boy’s father have any family?” Scott asks. “Your brother-in-law?”

“David?” she says. “No. I mean, his parents are dead, and he’s, I mean I guess he was an only child.”

“What about your parents?”

“My, uh, mom is still around. She lives in Portland. I think she’s flying in today.”

Scott nods.

“And you guys live in Woodstock?”

“Croton,” she says. “It’s about forty minutes outside the city.”

Scott thinks about this, a small house in a wooded glen, easy chairs on a porch. It could be good for the boy. Then again, it could be disastrous, the isolation of the woods, the glowering drunken writer, like Jack Nicholson in the winter mountains.

“Has he ever been there?” Scott asks, nodding toward the boy.

She purses her lips.

“I’m sorry,” she says, “but why are you asking me all these questions?”

“Well,” says Scott, “I guess I’m just curious as to what’s going to happen to him now. I’m invested, you could say.”

Eleanor nods. She looks scared, not of Scott, but of life, what her life is about to become.

“We’ll be fine,” she says, rubbing the boy’s head. “Right?”

He doesn’t answer, his eyes focused on Scott. There is a challenge in them, a plea. Scott blinks first, then turns and looks out the window. Doug comes in. He’s holding a cup of coffee and wearing a misbuttoned cardigan over a checked lumberjack shirt. Seeing him, Eleanor looks relieved.

“Is that for me?” she asks, pointing.

For a moment Doug looks confused, then he realizes she means the coffee.

“Uh, sure,” he says, and hands it to her. Scott can tell from the way she holds it that the cup is almost empty. He sees her face get sad. Doug comes around the boy’s bed and stands near his wife. Scott can smell alcohol on his clothes.

“How’s the patient?” Doug asks.

“He’s good,” says Eleanor. “Got some sleep.”

Studying Doug’s back, Scott wonders how much money the boy stands to inherit from his parents. Five million? Fifty? His father ran a TV empire and flew in private planes. There will be riches, real estate. Sniffling, Doug hikes up his pants with both hands. He pulls a small toy car from his pocket. It still has the price tag on it.

“Here you go, slugger,” he says. “Got this for you.”

There are a lot of sharks in the sea , thinks Scott, watching the boy take the car.

Dr. Glabman enters, eyeglasses perched on top of his head. He has a bright-yellow banana sticking out of his lab coat pocket.

“Ready to go home?” he asks.

They get dressed. The hospital gives Scott a pair of blue surgical scrubs to wear. He puts them on one-handed, wincing as the nurse maneuvers his fragile left arm into the sleeve. When he comes out of the bathroom the boy is already dressed and sitting in a wheelchair.

“I’m giving you the name of a child psychiatrist,” the doctor tells Eleanor, out of earshot of the boy. “He specializes in post-traumatic cases.”

“We actually don’t live in the city,” says Doug.

Eleanor shushes him with a look.

“Of course,” she says, taking the business card from the doctor. “I’ll call this afternoon.”