Partita for continuo (first published in The Mayo Review)

I.

At a time when mouths were for putting gum in and sticking tongues out, you laughed like a real grown up and kissed me full on the mouth. Meanwhile, our peers thought themselves big with their games. I hated kids when you and I were children; now that we are old and falling apart, children are life to me. My friends and co-workers I abhor.

I thought about this while one of those painful, spring showers fell, the world divided in half between rain that washes and wastes and the sun that melts and molests. Walking in the storm, a young girl ran across my path and nearly knocked the bag of groceries out of my hands. She stopped suddenly and mumbled a frightened apology. I told her to be careful, but I grinned because she meant no harm. She skipped away, under my false harshness, and I thought about you and felt so sad that I ate my supper without television or music.

Now I feel a little better. At least enough to listen to Beethoven, which makes me think of you in a different way. Sad still, but the room is no longer silent.

II.

You used to say that the walls whispered. I'd lay next to you and humor you by cocking an ear toward whichever wall you indicated might be speaking. Finally I'd say, "It's mice" or "Perhaps I should call an exterminator."

"Don't be an idiot," you'd say, slapping my thigh. "Mice don't talk. Pay attention." To this I'd sigh and feign interest. Soon I'd be asleep and have you punching my side.

"Was I snoring?"

"Yes," you'd answer angrily. Then: "Turn on the stereo so I can sleep." I'd oblige with an ignored grumble. It took some time for me to get used to sleeping with music, but before long, even I could not get drowsy without it. As a boy I slept accompanied by my father's bass throat sounding in the room next to mine; as a man I slept to your violins and the tinkling rivers of piano sonatas.

III.

Have you been crying? When I come to visit, you are like a mannequin: neither hot with anger or passion nor cold with bitterness and pain. You sit in the crazy garden like a statue of flesh, nodding to my words as if to the evening news or a Strauss waltz. I know it's the drugs, but your frowns and faint smiles pin me to this wooden bench.

When I leave, I start the car and the radio comes on playing something you would smile at and I want to turn the crooked thing off but I can't and I curse it until the second or third light. By then, I'm calm enough to hate myself for not knowing anymore about your cries of pain and terror. Sometimes I can't get home without having to pull over and bang the heel of my hand against the steering wheel and my agonized forehead.

Once, after such a trip, I even kicked in one of the speakers of our bedroom stereo. I stood there panting and looking at the crushed mass of wood and wires. Soon I began to laugh loudly with the noise of freedom. Then I fell in a heap upon our floor and wept. Insanity conquered me and I began to hold the mangled speaker to my chest, crying "Oh Marge, forgive me. Please don't be angry with me." I was nuts then, my dear, and I drove to a place called The Audio Doctor and begged a man in a stupid white uniform to fix the thing. He took it behind a curtain and brought out something resembling a screen. He said only a wire or two was damaged and easily repaired and that the screen would make it look as good as new. I paid him thirty dollars for the job and he watched me exit the building clutching the speaker like a mother eagle guards her brood.

IV.

Today I decided to come get you. I watched more children playing at the park and that same little girl sat in a swing, ignoring the others. She leaned back and made circles in the sand with her toe. I thought that she might walk like an angel, quietly and quickly, the clouds of a suffering sky the only obstacle in her path. Your great face was so present then to me that I began to talk to you, picking up a lost conversation from our elementary days:

"Don't you like to swing?"

"Yes, sometimes. Today I don't want to."

"Then why don't you do what you want?"

"I am. I'm sitting in the swing, watching you and the other kids. I'm through with playing."

"Through?"

"Yes. I can't anymore, because I grew up."

"You look like a kid to me."

"You don't have to be big to grow up. My daddy came one night and shook me. He said I was ready to be grown up and then he loved me so much that I don't like little kid things anymore."

I nodded and the little girl was gone and I remembered that I wanted to take you away from your father and bring you the happiness that you gave in condescending to speak to me. I went home and began to prepare our bedroom so that two could occupy it.

Then consciousness came and I was aware of my limitations. "I did not violate you," I said aloud. "I took nothing from you and did nothing to harm you but give you a quiet home where you could hear my snoring and listen to the ripple of oboes and flutes in your sleep." You can't know, Marge, how angry I have been that God made me a failure, in that I cannot take care of you. The Margaret that I loved is dead. The Margaret that lives is dead too, but if I took the ghost back it would breathe fire and trample me underfoot. I cannot live with you; it is all I can bear to recollect your eyes like a wounded cherubim.

V.

Tomorrow I will come and wish you a Happy Birthday. I wonder if you will recognize me. The nurse says "Here is your husband," over and over, but you make no sign. Are you still angry at me? If we cannot reconcile, then why do I come? You know I had to bring you to Red Oaks; you even blessed the day, saying that peace might come at last. I listen to your silence, begging to hold the hands you rub together.

You will reply that you have no husband, no father, no soul. I'll say to myself that you are crazy, but to you I'll reply "Now don't talk that way, Marge." You will look out across the lawn and see the multitudes who have been forgotten, the masses who are never visited, even on birthdays. You'll see those who spend Christmases with a nice meal and singing, but no family, and you will look at me and hate me more than I can take.

But I'll stay until the nurse forces me from the room.