Peter Orner - Last Car Over the Sagamore Bridge

“Puck’s always live. Puck’s only dead when it goes in the cage!”

And when they dragged him away by his pits and he was nearly unconscious, his blood across the gym floor, he kept sputtering that he didn’t need to go to the choke, that he was fine, absolutely fucking fine.

Salerno told us what happened after. He had contacts in the choke. They couldn’t save him, so they had him medivaced to Mass General. But that was only covering their asses. Denny Coughlin was brain dead before he rose up from Cedar Junction.

Gary died before the divorce was finalized, before he’d even moved out. Francine tried to be philosophical about it. Gary, had he been here to laugh, would have laughed. To him matters of life and death were laughable. He’d only fall apart when he couldn’t find his keys. And she did try to be — what? — light about the whole thing. An odd word, light, especially as it applied to her. Francine wasn’t light; she had no lightness about her. If you asked people, they might have said, Oh, no, not light, whatever you mean by this. Franny’s, you know, serious, lovely but serious. And yet today she feels oddly buoyant. Even the casket itself seems as if it’s bobbing in water. She loved him. Some people you come across in this world you end up loving. So many we don’t. So many we don’t even give a second thought. Why Gary? Nothing in particular doomed their marriage, and maybe this is why they decided to end it formally in the eyes of the State of Michigan before they had a true reason they could quantify in their heart of hearts. Heart of hearts. Her mother used to say that. What did it mean, the heart of a heart? What about the heart of a heart of a heart? Where does it stop? She stands before the casket and tries to weep. She’s finding it hard to stay focused. Affairs on both sides, but these were years ago, and, if anything, they’d strengthened their bond. For a while they were more interesting to each other. Once she’d run into him on the street downtown and he wasn’t wearing his wedding ring and she’d punched him in the face. Gary laughed, she laughed. To the end, he’d made her laugh. Francine wasn’t light, but Gary could make her laugh. This is more baffling than sad. I said I wanted to be alone, not alone alone. Gary? Just this past weekend he was packing boxes and asking politely if he should take or leave the ashtray they’d stolen from the hotel in Florence. Neither smoked anymore. What happened to smoking? She keeps trying to weep. She’s in the seat of honor, the seat closest to the body of the deceased. Deceased? What kind of word? Isn’t it redundant? Why not simply ceased? The casket is just far enough away so that she can’t reach out and touch it. She wishes she came from the sort of people who fling themselves on caskets. She saw that once, at the funeral of a Filipino coworker. Relatives clinging all over the casket like people on a raft. The lack of restraint was inspiring. But her own position now is somewhat awkward. Most of their friends know what’s been going on. Their kids too, of course. They’d taken it in stride. All in their twenties and thirties now, they’d been trained well by their parents never to pass judgment. Mom, Dad, do what you have to do. We totally get it. Anyway, who’s not divorced? People were groping for her now, tugging at her clothes, as if she were a talisman. “Oh, Franny, I’m so, so, so—” “Gary and I were supposed to play golf on Tuesday, a thing like this you can’t—” “The soul of kindness, you remember when he came over in his pajamas and talked Arthur off the roof?” “Anything at all, Fran, day or night, call me, will you? You won’t. Will you?”

And when it’s over she goes home, takes off her dress, and stands before the mirror. He’d been sleeping in one of the kid’s old rooms while he apartment hunted, a phrase he took literally. Gary was hunting down a house, a place to land. He said it was actually interesting, hilarious almost, how even familiar rooms, even architecture you know in the bones of your fingers, can one day simply deny you. Now I’m a guest, now I take up space. Oh, Gary, I just want to be alone, a little alone. Is this such a crime? I’m not blaming you, I’m merely remarking on the situation as a general matter, Fran. It’s not about you and me even, it’s simply bizarre to be looking for an apartment in a city I thought I knew but don’t really. I mean, going inside these buildings, walking up stairs, going through strange doors into rooms where other people I will never meet no longer live … She will have to get dressed again to go to his sister’s. Judy had been generous to host the after-funeral, given that it might be uncomfortable for the mourners to see his stuff already packed up like this. She puts on a dress. Hates it, tears it off. She remains in front of the mirror. Now she weeps, out-loud sobs that embarrass her even though it’s only her and the cat. Baldo. Baldo purring on the bed like nothing’s different. And Gary the only one who truly loves — loved — you. He was trying to find an apartment that accepted pets, which he said wasn’t so easy. When did everybody turn on pets? Renters don’t get companions? Only owners? How much damage can one old cat possibly do? A lot, she’d said. Don’t you remember what Baldo did to the suede couch? It was like Charles Manson came over. She looks at herself in the mirror. Not so terrible. Her arms need work, but not so bad. She will be wanted again. She begins to quake before the mirror. Will be wanted. Naked, Gary was always nervous. He’d always been self-conscious of what he considered his small penis. How did he know it was small? Did he go around comparing at the gym? He never went to the gym. She has to remember to cancel his membership. Charlene Gooch moved to New Hampshire to be closer to her grandkids, and they charged her credit card for three years before she noticed. Sex? Not unloving, hasty, and they liked it that way. They’d turn on the light again, begin reading where they’d left off, their bare arms touching. Okay for you? Mmmmmm. You? Mmmmm. My god, she thinks, horny? Now? This is ridiculous. All you were doing was moving out of the house.

He’d loaded his boxes, not in anger, in bemusement, holding items up, asking, Do you mind? This pillow with the elephant on it is definitely yours. And the furry slippers. The furry slippers are yours, Gary . He was magnanimous about the wedding gift crockery. He left her all the good saucepans. He packed only what he was going to need for a small one-bedroom. Still, she could sneak a few things back now, she supposed; by law it was all hers, again. The painting, for instance. He’d packed it with styrofoam peanuts. They’d had a friend once, an angry aspiring painter. The friend had painted what he called an abstract portrait of the two of them. To Fran and Gary it looked a mound, a blue mound. Still, they’d held on to it, hung it in a corner of the bedroom in case their friend became famous. He was certainly angry enough to be famous. What happened to Yari? People, they evaporate. She stands before the mirror. But somebody who was just here? How do you remember someone who was here a minute ago? Gary used to sit at the kitchen table and read her things out of the paper. The other day he said something about Egypt. Something about the Suez. How it all started with the Suez Canal. Canals, he said, usually cause more problems than they solve. Why do you think that is? She hadn’t answered, only took another sip of coffee and went out to the garage.

Jimmy Carter dead in the water, and the Democrats either can wait to be kicked like a sleeping dog or at least try to bite back. It’s 1979 and certain pipe dreams are still smoked. And Ted Kennedy shouts — call it the last gasp of the sixties— Mutiny! And Chicago mayor Jane Byrne, Mayor Bossy, Fighting Jane, backs him to the hilt. Byrne relishes any fight. She says she wants Carter’s sanctimonious presidential head on a platter for the good of Chicago, and as Chicago goes, so goes the country. Byrne hosts a whopping fundraiser for Kennedy in the ballroom at the Hyatt Regency. Giddy, rebellious Chicagoans gather to meet the Last Brother. Some people attend because they actually support him; other people want to see who is supporting him in order to decide if they support him. Since nobody can quite figure out who is who, it’s a confusing evening. Kennedy himself is present, and despite the fact that in an interview on CBS, he couldn’t for the life of him explain why he was running, Senator, could you tell the American people why you want to be President? Uh, uh, uh, uh, you see… the man is still a Kennedy. Ladies swoon as he works the room. When he reaches my mother, though, it’s the other way around. Like Roger Mudd on CBS News, she leaves Teddy Kennedy speechless.