Oonya Kempadoo - All Decent Animals

“Make a joyful noise,” someone says, keeping the beat. “Amen.”

“Sing a lovely praise.”

A church clap starts.

“Oh yes, Aye-men.”

“Hallelujah — make a joyful noise.”

“Aye-men.”

“That’s it. That is it! White. Plain and simple, black and white. Prints on T-shirts. Monday will be T-shirts and then — we can do this!” Slinger is blessed again, weaving and conjuring. His crew singing praise, clapping spiritual chorus.

No elaborate skirts and sewing. Just wraps of white cloth, however people want to tie it — on their heads, draped, swathed like the Holy Grail, sari, toga, sarong, kaftan, cloak — different weights of white with black strips for tying. Oh, why didn’t he think of it before? So simple. Happy. Rejoicing. Slinger rushes up to the old man and snatches him off the crates. “Thank you! Linton, you saved my life, thank you.”

“Yuh mean, is no wire-frame ass heads?”

Slinger hugs the man tight.

“We could put ‘Ketch the Spirit’ on de T-shirts,” comes from the brave heartened bunch.

“Or…”

Slinger holds up his very white palm. “That would be offending. The church will come down on us onetime boop, with a name like that. We must be careful with this one.”

“Is true,” they say, “that go be the problem right there.”

It sets everybody thinking hard, like Slinger, problem solving and arguing.

* * *

Fraser sits out by the pool at 3:00 a.m., swaddled in his bedsheet. He lies down on the bench and stares up at the single heaven. Stars are fantastic things. Even with the orange glow of the city they stand out from infinity, as only stars could. A particularly large one fixes its glory on Fraser. He knows when they were so big and non-twinkly, you could say it’s a planet. But no one is around, so Fraser prefers to think of it as a guiding star. Orion’s Belt and the incestuous cluster of sisters are pointing out themselves, waiting for him to name them too. Book knowledge — it gets in the way of his natural thinking, sometimes. Once his brain acknowledges the learning, though, he finds it hard to keep other names and things from surfacing. Zeus, Persephone, Cadmus, and Aphrodite, they stride this same heaven. Them and all the gods. His body, wrapped in white, feels like an offering. Sacrifice to the gods. Which gods?

Fraser tries to clear all thoughts but that in itself reminds him of TM techniques and Om. Suddenly he’s aware of his huge rib cage, and feet sticking up, bones resting on the wooden planks, lined up straight and bound in cotton. His own pyre. Like the one he saw at the Hindu funeral by the Caroni River, Trinidad’s own Ganges. He can feel the wood stacking around him, high, over him … until he has no glimpse of the stars or the night-river sky or the close hills. Only sucky, tugging, inky infinity and then … a crackling. Dry, greedy flames. Tinkling bones of pinewood. His bones. Crinkling them up, flaring on resin. And knots. Joints. The flames encase him, roaring a forest in his ears, all around, leaping into the air and licking at the magnificent heaven. A torch of amazing strength and power and fiery vitality — blazing away to kingdom come. Fire-shield armor gouging a path, a sword tip flying. Comet. Burning the sky. Burning out. Dark, lonely pain. Cold stars. Tinkling. He can see the pinpricks again. And feel his flesh caught in the stare of his guiding light, and the breath of the greedy hills waiting …

* * *

This is the day of the meeting. Ata and Pierre had agreed with Fraser that the caring business had to be taken in hand. Some sort of rules for respecting their home, and Fraser’s wishes and peace of mind, had to be set up. Everybody, close friends, parents, agreed but they found the word “meeting” offensive. Just the tone of Helen’s voice when she phoned her — the way she tasted the word — told Ata “too cold, too formal.” Ata is not looking forward to the afternoon meeting but Fraser was gaining vigor and sided with Pierre, insisting that it was the only way to sort things out. His strength had improved as her nerves began to tingle. A weakness is loading in Ata’s body. Electronic hourglass trickle while corrupt files multiply. She can feel the virus nestling in spaces she had kept clean and locked but she can’t stop it. Her whole body is unsafe and unpredictable, ticking. Maybe it’s hormones, lack of sleep, the evening glasses of wine she has with Pierre to help sleep? Toxins. In Dr. Turner’s private clinic, Ata had marveled at the woman’s strength — how she could treat patient after dying patient and keep losing them, yet remain so steadfast and bright.

* * *

Fraser had dragged his great feet from the cool car, up the few steps, to the baking porch and into the waiting room of the dialysis clinic. He pretended not to notice the heat. He and Ata said good morning and sat politely on the brown lino-and-steel chairs. The secretary, lost among filing cabinets behind the wooden half-wall, managed to find her way out and take Fraser’s name. There were only a few people waiting — four. Normal-looking people, waiting patiently. No one reading the curling diabetes magazines or doing anything, just watching each other’s hands and feet. Fraser crossed his ankles and clasped hands. Eventually, a man came out of the small corridor between what used to be bedrooms. The secretary looked up, nodded, and the lady with the umbrella went in. Dr. Turner came out, smiled at them abstractly, went back in, and the heat continued stacking under the peaked tin roof.

“It’s easy, easy. So simple, you wouldn’t believe how easy it could become. Just sit up there for me. One minute — just going to wash my hands.” Dr. Turner made two steps to the next room and Ata looked for somewhere to fit, out of the way. With the tiny room divided in two by a flimsy partition, the homemade doctor’s couch was only two feet from the cupboard-lined wall. More brown lino and sickly, meant-to-be-cheery yellow. Boxes were stacked up to the windowsill and a wire hanger hooked over the top of the partition. Bold sunlight pushed in, competing with the air-conditioning, winning gradually.

The doctor stepped back in briskly. “You want to lie down, Fraser? Yes, put your feet up.”

Fraser shook off his Birkenstocks and they thumped down, taking up all the space on the floor. He rocked back stiffly in his shell armor but he was shrinking daily within it.

“You have to eat to stop losing pounds. Lots of protein. I’m just going to take your pressure, okay?” Hands doing things all the time. She was turning easy in the little half’a room, moving packets, a bowl, scissors on the counter, gauze on the bed. She patted Fraser’s leg comfortably. “You like meat? Liver and beef, good things. This is okay. Let me just get a bag.” She dug behind the partition, half her body on Ata’s side of the room and the other still on Fraser’s side. She grabbed hold of a bag of clear fluid like it was any old thing, rested it on the bed against Fraser’s foot, and patted it. Fraser raised his head to look and flopped back down. His face glowed just before a dew of sweat appeared.

This was a lesson. Fraser needed to learn the procedure himself, but he just turned his face away and stared deadly at Ata. Her mixed feelings shone back at him. She couldn’t control it, her disappointment, judgment, and sympathy, close and overwhelming as the warmth in the room. He cut her slap of a look and turned away. Dr. Turner reminded him gently, after his minitantrum and sullen swipe at her, that he was lucky to have friends so close to him. Ata felt grateful but transparent. The warmth dampened Ata’s skin and slicked her armpits. She wondered if it wasn’t too warm for storing the precious solution.

Dr. Turner didn’t sweat a millidrop, while Fraser’s brow popped beads. He kept complaining, saying that even the usually cooling fluid wasn’t helping. Dr. Turner complimented him on his lovely feet. She was the coolest Queen of Saline and Ata couldn’t stop admiring her — her sure dry hands, the comfort with her full figure despite her unmatched clothes. Her face held saline secrets deep in understanding eyes and a tentative smile. The fluid is called dialysate, she explained. She should be worshipped more than God of Design. But no one knew about this quiet hero. Only families of the lives she had preserved a little longer, at a reduced cost whenever possible. Sometimes she had to send them on to gory hemodialysis at the hospital. Ata could not imagine how she could keep grace while having to refuse a patient treatment because they couldn’t afford it anymore. For years, this woman had dealt with her choice of speciality, saving dignity and souls instead of lives. If only everyone could find that grace when faced with sure death, or for a friend facing it. She looked at Dr. Turner closer.