Bruce Wagner - Still Holding

Morning Tide

KIT WAS PROPPED in bed while Alf, who had already swallowed a Klonopin and a few extrastrength vikes, ate cold pasta and watched a Jackass DVD on the plasma. He kept an eye on his friend and gently shook him whenever he nodded off.

“They said you shouldn’t sleep.”

“That’s only for the first few hours.”

“How’s your head?”

“It’s better. Much better. So chill.”

• • •

8:00 A.M. AND ALF awakens to a Vicodin hangover.

He lays on the living room couch. Outside, preanarchy of bird chirps. For a half second, looks around in where-am-I? mode.

Hungry. Stink breath. Bladder three-quarters full.

Should have closed curtains — intolerably bright.

Mr. Raffles is on the patio, splayed indifferently upon flagstone, wide, soft belly slowly rising, falling under cold spotlight of sun.

Hears a frightful noise: garbled, prolonged scream. What what what —is it even a scream? Leaps to feet. Enters bath, shocked at what he sees:

Kit vomiting — a broken, blasted hydrant — onto walls and mirrors. Both eyes monster swollen. Stops. Retches. Convulses while still standing. Hunches. Straightens. Vomits again as if overtaken by spirits. Alf tackles him — what else to do? — slaughterhouse wrestling ring, infernal tag team. Tries holding him down — holds him — what else to do? — meaninglessly, irrelevantly, crazily — to stop time in throes of gale-force throw up while Mr. Raffles canters in, slip-sliding, paws in muck, yelp-yawn groaning. Kit bellows to sky, inciting Alf to yell himself — pure Dumb & Dumber shtick — cradles him, helplessly, hopeless, Kit blind, desperately clutching hem of Alf’s wifebeater in grand mal pietà, the Great Dane twitchy, and basso barking. Now Kit impossibly manages to look— really look —straight into Alf’s eyes, in the panic room: locked gazes, primordial silence, close fetid stink, drowned shouts in flooded engine rooms, paws and kneecaps slipping, ducking, and feinting, dog near to retching itself, forgotten grotto’s dank, drippy bacterial stench, Kit gone finally limp, Alf’s continuous scream solo now while he lurches with brotherly burden, crablike to phone, any phone, deadweight of fallen People’s Choice tucked hard to rib cage bosom as would sibling sailor’s washed-up warrior body be, figures in a majestic tempera, ruined ship loitering offshore, charred and luminous — sudden skeletal descent, descant, plainsong to ocean floor, grateful aquamarine entombment silent everlasting.

“I CANNOT BELIEVE they discharged him,” said the lawyer.

Counsel, agent, managers, and publicist converged on Cedars (Alf too — he hadn’t left since the early A.M. return) while friend and client underwent emergency surgery to relieve pressure in his skull.

The surrealistic events had left the whole team powerless, breathless, and aghast.

Marooned.

“He signed a release?” asked the agent.

“Yeah,” said Alf, boyishly vacant. The handsome, uncombed head hung low. Semidirty fingernails scratched reflexively at grizzled jaw. “He was pretty adamant about it. There was no way he was going to check himself in. He seemed OK — while they had him here. And he was OK at home. I mean, last night.”

“He was not OK!” shouted the lawyer.

“Whatever,” said Alf, shocky and depressed. Not up for chastisement. The agent shot the lawyer dead eyes, on the kid’s behalf. “All I’m saying is, he was totally lucid. He was worried about Viv finding out before he got a chance to call.” He huffed and snorted, congested by mucus and inchoate tears. “I tried to tell him that going home was a shitty idea — that he should just stay overnight and be observed.” He cleared his throat. “He said that his mom died here—”

“That’s true,” said the agent, grateful to be able to glom on to some other tragic factoid, one at least that had resolution. “That’s absolutely right.” She began a series of short, nervously rhythmical nods, telegraphing historical longevity and the pedigree of her special relationship with the concussed superstar, a tenured, privileged intimacy with his life that naturally included an acquaintance with R.J., and charnel knowledge of that awful, protracted womb cancer. “That is completely correct. It was horrible for him. Horrible for him. Horrible.”

“—that’s why he wanted to go home. Hey,” said Alf, resigned. “I can’t go up against Kit. Never could. He’s like a big brother.”

“I don’t give a shit what he signed,” said the attorney, mostly to himself. Alf should have called someone right when it happened, but he was a dumbo — an actor. Not the target. Counsel’s wrath became focused: rustle of lawsuits, hubbub of press conferences, briefs to be filed. “It is completely negligent, completely irresponsible. This is a major fucking personage here! Would they have let Spielberg discharge himself against medical judgment? Just stroll on out with a buddy? What on God’s earth were they thinking?”

“It’s just so insane,” said one of the traumatized managers, staring into space. “It’s just… so wrong . Everything is wrong. ”

“I’ll tell you one thing,” said the lawyer, in high dudgeon. “When I am through, Kit Lightfoot is going to own this fucking hospital and the ground it sits on.”

“Did someone finally call Viv?” asked the other manager.

Alf nodded, snapping gum long bled of flavor. “A few hours ago, after we got here. She’s on her way back.”

“That couldn’t have been an easy call to make,” said the agent. She touched Alf’s arm as a mother would.

“I hope you didn’t tell her right before she went on Letterman,” said the publicist.

“He said a few hours ago, ” said a manager, testily. “Jesus!”

“After,” said Alf, by rote.

“My poor attempt at black humor,” said the publicist, contritely.

“She’s flying back with Sherry on the Paramount jet,” said Alf.

“What are we doing about crowd control?” said the lawyer to the publicist. “It’s Day of the Locust out there.”

Just then, Darren Aronofsky was led in by a hospital guard.

“What’s happening?” he asked.

“He’s still in surgery,” said the agent.

“Jesus.” He turned to Alf. “Was it a fight?”

“No. This guy just… blindsided him. He was hassling us before at the bar. He was pissed because Kit wouldn’t sign his girlfriend’s left tit or whatever.”

“Jesus. Jesus.” Darren shook his head, sucking in air. “Are you OK?”

“Under the circumstances,” nodded Alf. “Yeah. I’m cool.”

“Where’s Viv?” said Darren, turning to the others.

“On her way back from New York,” said the publicist.

“Have they said anything?” asked Darren. “I mean, the doctors?”

The agent began to cry. A manager put his arm around her.

“Oh my God,” she said. “What if he’s really, really hurt and can’t get better? This is so horrible! The world is such a horrible place!”

“There’s a lot of people who love him, Kiki,” said the other manager, forlornly. “A lot of people who care.”

The comanager said hollowly, “We’ll see him through.”

“He’s a stubborn motherfucker,” said Alf, cocking his head — smiling, as they say, through the tears.

“That’s for damn sure,” said Darren. “He’s a survivor.”

“Plus it’d kill him not to do your movie,” said Alf, wryly.