John Irving - The Cider House Rules

The game was nearly over when they arrived, which relieved Homer Wells (who hated baseball). A worried fat boy was pitching; he took the longest time between pitches, as if he were waiting for it to grow so dark (or for the lights to fail so completely) that the batter could no longer see the ball at all.

'You know what I miss?' Wally asked Homer Wells.

'What's that?' said Homer, who dreaded the answer. Maybe walking, Homer thought-or maybe he's going to say, 'Loving my wife; that's what I miss.'

But Wally said, 'Flying. I really miss flying. I miss being up there.' Wally was not watching the ball game but looking above the tall field lights at some point high in the darkness. 'Above everything,' he said. 'That's how it was.'

'I never did it,' said Homer Wells.

'My God, that's true!' Wally said, genuinely shocked. 'That's right, you've never flown! My God, you'd love it. We've got to arrange that, somehow. And Angel would really find it exciting,' Wally added. 'It's the thing I miss most.'

When the game was over and they were driving home, Wally reached across to the gearshift and popped the Jeep into neutral. 'Cut the engine just a second,' he said to Homer. 'Let's just coast.' Homer turned off the key arid the Jeep ambled silently along. 'Cut the headlights, too,' Wally said. 'Just for a second.' And Homer Wells cut the lights. They could see the lights from the Ocean View house ahead of them, and both of them knew the road so well that they felt fairly secure just freewheeling in the darkness, but then the trees rose up and cut their view of the lighted house, and there was an unfamiliar {618} dip in the road. For just a moment they seemed to be completely lost, possibly plunging off the road into the dark trees, and Homer Wells turned the headlights back on.

'That was flying,' Wally said, when they pulled into the driveway-ahead of them, gleaming in the headlights, the wheelchair was parked in waiting. When Homer carried Wally from the Jeep to the wheelchair, Wally let both his arms lock around Homer's neck. 'Don't ever think I'm not grateful to you, for all you've done, old boy,' Wally told Homer, who put him very gently in the chair.

'Come on,' Homer said.

'No, I mean it. I know how much you've done for me, and I don't usually get the opportunity to say how grateful I really am,' Wally said. He kissed Homer smack between the eyes, then, and Homer straightened up, clearly embarrassed.

'You've certainly done everything for me, Wally,' Homer said, but Wally dismissed this with a wave; he was already wheeling himself toward the house.

'It's not the same, old boy,' Wally said, and Homer went to park the Jeep.

That night when Homer put Angel to bed, Angel said, 'You know, you really don't have to put me to bed anymore.'

'I don't do it because I have to,' Homer said. 'I like to.'

'You know what I think?' Angel said.

'What's that?' asked Homer, who dreaded the answer.

'I think you ought to try having a girlfriend,' Angel said cautiously. Homer laughed.

'Maybe when you try having one, I'll try one, too,' Homer said.

'Sure, we can double-date!' Angel said.

'I get the back seat,' Homer said.

'Sure, I'd rather get to drive, anyway,' Angel said.

'Not for long, you won't rather drive,' his father told him.{619}

'Sure!' Angel said, laughing. Then he asked his father: 'Was Debra Pettigrew big like Melony?'

'No!' Homer said. 'Well, she was on her way to being big, but she wasn't that big-not when I knew her.' 'There's no way Big Dot Taft's sister could have been small,' Angel said.

'Well, I never said she was small,' Homer said, and they both laughed. It was a lighthearted enough moment for Homer to lean over Angel and kiss the boy-smack between the eyes, where Wally had just kissed Homer. It was a good place to kiss Angel, in Homer's opinion, because he liked to smell his son's hair.

'Good night, I love you,' Homer said.

'I love you. Good night, Pop,' Angel said, but when Homer was almost out of the door, Angel asked him, 'What's the thing you love best?'

'You,' Homer told his son. 'I love you best.'

'Next to me,' said Angel Wells.

'Candy and Wally,' Homer said, making them as close to one word as his tongue could manage.

'Next to them,' Angel said.

'Well, Doctor Larch-and all of them, in Saint Cloud's, I guess,' said Homer Wells.

'And what's the best thing you ever did?' Angel asked his father.

'I got you,' Homer said softly.

'Next best,' Angel said

'Well, I guess it was meeting Candy and Wally,' Homer said.

'You mean, when you met them?' Angel asked.

'I guess so,' said Homer Wells.

'Next best,' Angel insisted.

'I saved a woman's life, once,' Homer said. Doctor Larch was away. The woman had convulsions.'

'You told me,' Angel said. Angel had never been especially interested that his father had become a highly qualified assistant to Dr. Larch; Homer had never told {620} him about the abortions. 'What else?' Angel asked his father.

Tell him now, thought Homer Wells, tell him all of it. But what he said to his son was, 'Nothing else, really. I'm no hero. I haven't done any best things, or even any one best thing.'

'That's okay, Pop,' Angel said cheerfully.

'Good night.' 'Good night,' said Homer Wells.

Downstairs, he couldn't tell if Wally and Candy had gone to bed, or if Wally was in bed alone; the bedroom door was closed, and there was no light coming from the crack under the door. But someone had left a light on in the kitchen, and the outdoor light on the post at the head of the driveway was still on. He went to the apple-mart office to read the mail; with the light on in the office, Candy would know where he was. And if she'd already gone to the cider house, he could walk there from the office; it would be smart, in that case, to leave the office light on and not turn it out until he came back from the cider house. That way, if Wally woke up and saw the light, he'd figure that Homer or Candy was still working in the office.

The package from St. Cloud's, arriving so exactly on the day of Melony's visit, startled Homer. He almost didn't want to open it. The old man has probably sent me enema bags! Homer Wells thought. He was shocked to see the black leather doctor's bag; the leather was scuffed and soft, and the brass clasp was so tarnished that its luster was as dull as the cinch buckle of an old saddle, but everything that was worn and used about the bag's appearance only made the gold initials that much brighter.

F.S.

Homer Wells opened the bag and sniffed deeply inside it; he was anticipating the hearty arid manly smell of old leather, but mixed with the leather smell were the feminine traces of ether's tangy perfume. That was when -in one whiff-Homer Wells detected something of {621} the identity that Dr. Larch had fashioned for Fuzzy Stone.

'Doctor Stone,' Homer said aloud, remembering when Larch had addressed him as if he were Fuzzy.

He didn't want to walk back to the house to put the doctor's bag away, but he didn't want to leave the bag in the office, either; when he came back to the office to turn out the light, he thought he might forget the bag. And the thing about a good doctor's bag is that it's comfortable to carry. That was why he took it with him to the cider house. The bag was empty, of course-which didn't feel quite right to Homer-so he picked some Gravensteins and a couple of early Macs on his way to the cider house and put the apples in the bag. Naturally, the apples rolled back and forth; that didn't feel quite authentic. 'Doctor Stone,' he mumbled once, his head nodding as he took high steps through the tall grass.

Candy had been waiting for him for a while, long enough so her nerves were shot. He thought that if it had happened the other way around-if she'd been the one to break things off-he would have been as upset as she was.