Michael Cunningham: Specimen Days

At home, he fixed what supper he could for himself and his father. There were bits, still, from what had been brought for after the burial. A scrap of fatty ham, a jelly, the last of the bread. He laid it before his father, who blinked, said, “Thank you,” and ate. Between mouthfuls, he breathed from the machine.

Lucas’s mother was still in bed. How would they manage about food if she didn’t rise soon?

As his father ate and breathed, Lucas went to his parents’ bedroom. Softly, uncertainly, he pushed open the door. The bedroom was dark, full of its varnish and wool. Over the bed the crucifix hung, black in the sable air.

He said, “Mother?”

He heard the bedclothes stirring. He heard the whisper of her breath.

She said, “Who’s there?”

“It’s only me,” he answered. “Only Lucas.”

“Lucas. M’love.”

His heart shivered. It seemed for a moment that he could abide with his mother in the sweet, warm darkness. He could stay here with her and tell her the book.

“Did I wake you?” he asked. “I’m ever awake. Come.”

He sat on the edge of the mattress. He could see the sprawl of her hair on the pillow. He could see her nose and chin, the dark places where her eyes were. He touched her face. It was hot and powdery, dry as chalk.

“Are you thirsty, are you hungry?” he asked. “Can I bring you something?”

She said, “What’s happened to ye? How have they darkened ye so?”

“I’ve been to work, Mother. It’s only dust.”

“Where’s Lucas, then?”

“I’m here, Mother.”

“Of course you are. I’m not quite right, am I?”

“Let me bring you some water.”

“The hens need looking after. Have ye seen to the hens?”

“The hens, Mother?”

“Yes, child. It’s gone late, hasn’t it? I think it’s very late indeed.”

“We haven’t any hens.”

“We haven’t?”

“No.”

“Forgive me. We did have hens.”

“Don’t worry, Mother.”

“Oh, it’s fine to say don’t worry, with the hens gone and the potatoes, too.”

Lucas stroked her hair. He said, “Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touch’d from.”

“That’s right, m’dear.”

Lucas sat quietly with her, stroking her hair. She had been nervous and quick, prone to argument, easily angered and slow to laugh. (Only Simon could make her laugh.) She’d been vanishing gradually for a year or longer, always more eager to be done with her work and off to bed, but still herself, still dutiful and fitfully affectionate, still alert to slights and hidden insults. Now that Simon was dead she’d turned into this, a face on a pillow, asking after hens.

He said, “Should I bring you the music box?”

“That’d be nice.”

He went to the parlor and returned with the box. He held it up for her to see.

“Ah, yes,” she said. Did she know that the box had ruined them? She never spoke of it. She seemed to love the music box as dearly as she would have if it had caused no damage at all.

Lucas turned the crank. Within the confines of the box, the brass spool revolved under the tiny hammers. It played “Forget Not the Field” in its little way, bright metallic notes that spangled in the close air of the bedroom. Lucas sang along with the tune.

His mother put a hand over his. “That’s enough,” she said.

“It’s only the first verse.”

“It’s enough, Lucas. Take it away.”

He did as she asked. He returned the music box to its place on the parlor table, where it continued playing “Forget Not the Field.” Once wound, it would not stop except by its own accord.

His father had moved from his place at the table to his chair by the window. He nodded gravely, as if agreeing with something the music said.

“Do you like the music?” Lucas asked him.

“Can’t be stopped,” his father said in his new voice, which was all but indistinguishable from his breathing, as if his machine’s bellows were whispering language as they blew.

“It’ll stop soon.”

“That’s good.”

Lucas said, “Good night, Father,” because he could not think of anything else to say.

His father nodded. Could he get himself to bed? Lucas thought he could. He hoped so.

He went to his own room, his and Simon’s. Emily’s window was lit. She was faithfully eating her candy, just as Lucas faithfully read his book.

He undressed. He did not remove the locket. If he removed the locket, if he ever removed the locket, it would no longer be something Catherine had put on him. It would become something he put upon himself.

Carefully, he found the locket’s catch and opened it. Here was the black curl of Simon’s hair, tied with a piece of purple thread. Here, under the curl, was Simon’s face, obscured by the hair. Lucas knew the picture: Simon two years ago, frowning for the photographer, his eyes narrow and his jaw set. Simon’s face in the locket was pale brown, like turned cream. His eyes (one was partially visible through the strands of hair) were black. It was like seeing Simon in his casket, which no one had been allowed to do. What the machine had done had rendered him too extraordinary. Now, in the quiet of the room, the Simon who was with them still met the Simon who was in the locket, and here he was, doubled; here was the smell and heft of him; here his habit, on the drinking nights, of slapping Lucas playfully. Lucas closed the locket. It made a small metallic snap.

He got into bed, on his own side. He read the evening’s passage.

When he had finished it he put out the lamp. He could feel Simon in the locket and Simon in the box in the earth, so changed that the lid had been nailed shut. Lucas determined never to open the locket again. He would wear it always but keep it forever sealed.

He slept, and woke again. He rose to dress for work and get breakfast for his father, feeling the locket’s unfamiliar weight on his neck, the circle of it bouncing gently on his breastbone. Here was the memento of Simon’s ongoing death for him to wear close to his heart, because Catherine had put it on him.

He gave his father the last of the jelly for breakfast. There was no food after that.

As his father ate, Lucas paused beside the door to his parents’ bedroom. He heard no sound from within. What would happen if his mother never came out again? He got the music box from the table and crept into the room with it, as quietly as he could. His mother was a shape, snoring softly. He set the music box on the table at her bedside. She might want to listen to it when she awoke. If she didn’t want to listen to it, she’d still know Lucas had thought of her by putting it there.

Jack wasn’t there to greet him when he arrived at the works. Lucas paused at the entrance, among the others, but didn’t linger. Jack would most likely be waiting for him at the machine, to tell him he had done well yesterday, to encourage him about today. He passed through the vestibule, with its caged men scowling at their papers. He passed through the cooking room and went to his machine. Tom and Will and Dan all said good-morning to him, as if he had been there a long time, which pleased him. But there was no Jack Walsh.