Dave Eggers - Heroes of the Frontier

It was hard to see Ana, though, because she existed as a blur. She did not stop moving, even while eating. She’d been born four months premature, had entered the world weighing just over three pounds, was beset by a series of gothic afflictions — sleep apnea (being the occasional twenty-second delay between breaths), necrotizing enterocolitis (intestinal problem causing swollen belly and diarrhea), a bout with sepsis, then a blood infection, a half-dozen other full attacks on a creature the size of a shoe. But she got stronger daily, was a beast now, still underweight, still having something in the eyes that said Holy hell what happened? But aha! I’m here! You couldn’t kill me! but somehow her head had grown huge and heavy, and every day she seemed possessed by the need to prove she belonged here and would use her days fully, recklessly. She woke up ecstatic and went to bed reluctantly. In between she took five steps for everyone else’s one, sang loudly songs she created and which made no sense, and also attempted at every opportunity to cause herself harm. From a distance she resembled a perpetually drunk adult — bumping into things, yelling randomly, making up words. She could not be trusted in parking lots, near electrical outlets, near stoves or glass or metal or stairs, cliffs, bodies of water, vehicles of any kind, or pets. At the moment she was swaying back and forth like a buoy, doing a sitting dance to music only she could hear. In her left hand was a piece of toast, and surrounding her mouth like a messy new galaxy was syrup, eggs, grains of sugar and a film of milk. Now she stopped moving, and took in her surroundings in a rare moment of what could be construed as contemplation.

“Do they speak English here?” she asked.

“Yes,” Paul said to Ana, then gently said, “We’re still in America.” And then he patted her arm. The boy was freakish in his devotion to her. When Ana was one, two, three, Paul insisted on helping put her to bed, and every night created some new song for her to lull her to sleep. “Ana is sleepy now, Ana is sleepy, all the Anas in the world are so sleepy now, they hold hands and drop away…” He was a startling lyricist, really, at four, five, six, and Ana would lie there staring at him, her eyes unblinking, sucking on her bottle, listening to every word. And his artwork! It showed a different level of devotion: he signed everything he created Paul and Ana .

They ate their breakfast, Josie sitting across from her children, staring at the heartless landscape of blue sky and white mountains, and remembered Carl once saying, joking but not joking, that their children had their genders confused. Paul was exquisitely sensitive, thoughtful, maternal. He didn’t wear girls’ clothes but he did play with dolls. Ana liked motorcycles and Darth Vader and had hit her giant head on so many things, falling, ramming, that her skull was wildly misshapen and lucky to be covered with her riot of red curls. Paul listened, cared more for people than objects, and was wounded deeply by the thought of any suffering endured by any living soul. On the other hand, Ana really did not care.

Then there was the matter of honor. Though his father was an invertebrate, Paul was already a great man, a tiny Lincoln. A few months ago, for his after-dinner treat, he chose a tiny packet of peanut M&Ms from the candy left over from Halloween (Josie kept it in the cabinet over the fridge). There were six M&Ms inside the packet, and Josie said he could have four. Josie took Ana to bed, while Paul ate his treat in the kitchen so Ana wouldn’t see or want some of her own. The next morning on the counter, Josie found the packet with the two extras in it. Paul was so honest that he wouldn’t sneak the last two and eat them — something Ana, or Carl, or even Josie, would likely do without a second thought.

Finished with most of her food, Ana left the booth and ran to a gumball machine, which she yanked on hard enough to bring it down — it would have gone down if it weren’t bolted to the floor. Josie could not remember Ana ever seeing a gumball machine before, so how was it that she knew exactly how to harm one? And what had she imagined would be the results of her efforts — broken machine, a floor of glass and gum, punishment inevitable? What was the appeal? The only explanation was that she was receiving instructions from extraplanetary overlords. That, and Ana’s tendency, once a week, to look at Josie with otherworldly eyes, old eyes, knowing eyes — it was unsettling. Paul was always Paul, self-contained, earth-bound, but Ana, sometimes, would stop being a child and look at Josie, her mother, as if to say, For a second let’s stop pretending.

“Can you get her and bring her back?” Josie asked Paul.

Paul slid out of the booth and went after her. Seeing him coming, Ana grinned and ran toward the bathrooms. In seconds there was a loud crash, an odd delay, then Ana’s wail overtook the diner.

Josie rushed to the bathroom and found Ana inside, on her knees, holding her chin, screaming.

“She was standing on the toilet and fell,” Paul said.

Paul always knew. He knew everything — every event, every truth involving Ana. He was her personal coach, her historian, assistant, caretaker, governness, guardian and best friend.

“I’ll get a first-aid kit,” Paul said. Josie knew her son, only eight, could do this. He could find a waitress, ask for the first-aid kit, bring it back. He could answer the phone, could run into the grocery store to buy milk, could go to the end of the street to pick up the mail. He was so calm and reasonable and composed that Josie considered him, most of the time, her peer in parenting and also, possibly, some shrunken reincarnation of Josie’s own pre-breakdown mother.

Josie lifted Ana to the bathroom sink, looked under her chin and found a tiny red line. “It’s just a scratch. There isn’t really any blood. I don’t think we need a first-aid kit.” She held Ana close, feeling her rabbit heart thrumming as she heaved and choked on tears.

Then Paul, who had returned with the kit, gave Josie an urgent look, a clenching of his teeth, meant to convey that he knew there was no blood, but that Ana would not stop crying until some remedy was placed on her chin.

“There’s got to be a good band-aid here,” Paul said, and at this, Ana’s eyes opened and followed his quick long-fingered hands as he opened compartments. Finally he arrived at the right one. “Found some,” he said, and held up a clump of simple, if oversized, bandages. While Ana watched, no longer crying — in fact rapt, holding her breath — he pored through the band-aids like a normal boy would do with Magic cards, baseball cards. “I think this one,” he said, and took a small one from its wrapping. “Maybe we should put some cream on first. What do you think?”

Josie was about to answer but realized Paul was talking to Ana, not to her. Ana nodded gravely to him and insisted that he, not Josie, put on the cream. In seconds he had some kind of lotion in his hands, and was rubbing it between his palms.

“Let’s make it warm first,” he said. After it was whatever temperature he deemed right, he applied it to her chin with the utmost delicacy, and Ana’s eyes registered a pleasure so great they had to close. After the cream was spread evenly, he blew on it, “so it dries quicker,” he told Ana, ignoring Josie utterly, and then carefully attached the band-aid to her chin, pressing it lightly on both adhesive ends. Then he stepped back and assessed his work. He was satisfied, and now Ana was calm enough to speak.

She asked for a meal.

“You want a meal?” Josie asked. “You haven’t finished your breakfast.”

“No!” Ana roared. “I want a meal .”

“A meal?” Josie was lost.