Dancing with Gravity Read online

  “I have something.” Her inflection made her statement sound like a question. The others turned to her. She moved to the edge of her chair and leaned forward. Whiting was afraid she was going to stand. And then what would he do? He hated it when people stood over him, looking down on him as if he were a schoolboy. Instead, she addressed the group from her perch. “Oh St. Joseph, give me strength!” She covered her head with her hands, as if shielding herself from a blow, and then ran her fingers slowly through her coarse, dark hair. The intensity of her gesture alarmed him. “It’s Eddie!” Her exclamation made Whiting jump.

  “What happened?” The question came from Kathy, whose sixteen-year-old daughter had multiple sclerosis. Whiting wished that she had waited to let him ask the question. Carol burst into tears. She produced a wad of tissues from her jacket pocket and held them against her eyes. Her shoulders shook as muffled sobs leaked from her tissues. Whiting stole glances at the group. A few—the men—studied the floor as Carol cried. Most of the women watched Carol with expressions of concern.

  He shifted in his chair. He wanted her to get on with her story, but resisted the impulse to prompt her. I’ll allow her time to regain control, so long as it doesn’t make the others uncomfortable. He glanced over at Dennis, whose eight-year-old son had leukemia. Dennis had once told the group he cried every day for months after his child had been diagnosed. Whiting thought about the man’s devotion. The weeks of treatment. The sleepless nights as he kept vigil in his boy’s hospital room. Is that what it means to be a father? Is that kind of love innate? Can it be learned? He thought of his own father. I remember so little about him. Even his features. It was as though all that remained was an overexposed photograph taken at a distance—the person in the picture could have been anyone.

  Whiting roused himself from his thoughts and looked over at Marilynn, whose son had an inoperable brain tumor. Father Baricevic said she had not spoken during her first three meetings with the group, but instead wept to the point of hiccoughs and took tear-stained notes which she kept organized in a thick three-ring binder. Whiting studied her as she, in turn, watched the crying Carol. He considered the others in the circle. He thought about their grief—about their devotion to troubled, demanding families. They were a mystery.

  “I had to give Eddie a breathing treatment for his asthma.” Carol looked up from her tissues. Her eyes and nose were red. “I heard him coughing when he was playing with his race cars, and I knew that an attack might be coming on. But he didn’t want the treatment. So we had a big fuss over it.” She twisted the tissues mercilessly in her hands. “He was getting more and more upset, and that’s the worst thing that can happen. I was trying to calm him, and I promised I’d let him watch a movie if he’d just take the treatment.” Her voice broke. Whiting was afraid she was going to start crying again. She swallowed hard and continued.

  “So I get him all situated, and I see that it’s time for Benjamin’s insulin injection. But when I call Ben, he runs under the baby’s crib and he starts crying. Then the baby starts crying. And then Eddie pulls his mask off and he starts in. The boys were half fighting with one another and half crying, and the baby was making everything worse. So I told him, ‘Eddie, you have to take your breathing treatment, and no amount of crying is going to change that. In fact, if you cry, you might give yourself an asthma attack, and then we’ll end up in the emergency room, just like we did last Christmas.’ But he’s fighting and hitting me and the baby is calling me a mean pig—he’s just learning to talk so you can understand him—and I have to absolutely force Eddie to keep his mask on in the middle of all this. I was scared I would hurt him.” She stopped then and looked around at the other parents. Several of them nodded knowingly. Whiting studied their troubled faces. They seemed both old and wise.

  “Anyway, after the treatment was over, we were sitting at the kitchen table, just the two of us, our chairs facing. He wasn’t crying anymore, just whimpering, with his head down. Then he says to me, ‘You should have just let me die when I was in the hospital. You should have just let me stop breathing and be done with it.’ And I’m so upset, I say, ‘Eddie, that’s no way to talk.’” She looked up quickly. “He’s just five, you know—still a baby. But he just looks me right in the eye and says, ‘I don’t want to go on this way. I don’t want to live if this is the life I’ll have.’ And I just couldn’t think of anything to say. We were both so worn out from the struggle.” She fell silent. Grief contorted her face. “You just never know what they’re thinking, do you?” It was both an acknowledgment and a question. Whiting studied the floor. He thought about his mother, wondered if she felt the same devotion to him. Does she suffer secretly? Have I caused her sleepless nights? A painful tenderness welled up in him. His nose grew stuffy; he was afraid that he might cry as well.

  The air grew heavy in the silence that followed. Lost in his own thoughts, Whiting did not immediately grasp that Carol was waiting for his response. He glanced around the room. The parents waited. I must say something.

  He wanted to acknowledge the profundity of what she had said, but words failed him. A prayer? He knew the parents wanted him to respond, but his words were stillborn. Kathy leapt from her chair and rushed to Carol’s side. The two women embraced and began sobbing. Whiting took a deep breath and rose from his chair. He crossed to the two women, then placed one hand on Carol’s head, the other on Kathy’s.

  “Carol, the pain you have shared with us today—a mother’s suffering and devotion—are a testament to a mother’s love. And Kathy, in coming forward you demonstrated a heart brimming over with compassion. I pray that you—that all of us—will take comfort in these acts of love. And that Mary, our Blessed Mother, will lift up your hearts and lighten your burdens. Please, let us bow our heads as we recite the Hail Mary together. Hail Mary, full of grace ….” Tension drained from the room as the parents, heads bowed, all of them holding hands, recited the prayer.

  Carol regained her composure and Kathy returned to her seat. But Carol’s story—and the other parents’ reactions to it—dominated the session. One by one, as though offering invocations at the Mass, the other parents shared similar experiences of desperation. At last they were quiet, and it seemed that a palpable fatigue came over the group.

  Whiting suggested an early end to the session, which was readily accepted. The parents stood and held hands during the Our Father. A few hugged or shook hands as they took up their jackets and left the room. But Whiting lingered. What do I know of such suffering? How can I presume to comfort them? What have I ever given them, really? A few prayers? Vague generalities? It was Kathy who offered something real, something tangible. And yet, no one seemed disappointed in me. No one asked for more from me. He shook his head. And what could I possibly have offered if they had?

  As he left the room his thoughts turned to the circus. The suffering of these parents is as strange to me as the lives of the performers who live in caravans and trailers, moving from place to place, living intimately with danger. And yet, Sarah had said the circus was a happy place.

  After his meeting with the parents’ support group, Whiting was drained and wanted comfort. Lunch. He entered the cafeteria at the height of the midday rush and picked up his tray. He joined the hot entrée line but was frustrated to see that the baked macaroni—in his opinion, the best entrée offered—had run out. The line came to a standstill as a gloved worker waited, her spatula raised, for someone to replace the empty pan. He moved into a knot of employees at the salad bar, but saw that this line, too, had stalled as a thin woman in a dark suit languidly arranged every item she added to her plate. Hurrying over to an opening in the deli line, he settled on a tuna sandwich and chips. He didn’t particularly like his choice because the hospital’s tuna, usually salty and dark, wasn’t as good as his mother’s. But it was the best he could do. As he stood in the cashier’s line, he decided he was glad to have an entree that would not grow cold as he waited. The tuna had been a good decision after all.

/>   Tray in hand, Whiting scanned the tables of the packed cafeteria. Three women passed him on their way out, their lunches untouched. On particularly busy days, hospital staff sometimes found the cafeteria so jammed that they ate at their desks. Whiting considered returning to his office, but the idea of sharing his lunch and the office with Carla deterred him. He waded into the crowded room.

  Near the center of the dining hall, two silver-haired men wearing visitors’ passes were talking over their lunches. One of the men spoke with great animation and rested his hand on his companion’s arm as he spoke. The second man laughed so hard that he removed his glasses and wiped tears from his cheeks. Whiting could not take his eyes from them—he wanted their ease and warmth for himself. He slowed his pace, then stopped. The speaker was also laughing now, and struggled to continue talking. Whiting smiled broadly, as if he was part of their conversation. All at once, he, too, laughed out loud. Shocked by his own reaction, he scanned the room for witnesses. Two people rose in a far corner and he hurried over to their table. They had just taken up their trays when he took one of the vacant seats. He sat facing the wall.

  Whiting hunched over his sandwich and ate quickly. He was hungrier than he’d realized, and he wondered whether he should also have taken dessert. As he was trying to decide whether to get back in line or stop by the gift shop for a candy bar, someone touched him on the shoulder. He jumped and turned abruptly.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sneak up on you.” It was Sarah.

  “How’d the fishing trip go?”

  “I ended up sending one of the interns.” She sat down across from him with her tray. Still hungry, he was disappointed to see that she only had a salad and a can of Diet Coke. “Besides, I got pulled to escort a film crew through the O.R. today.”

  “So where are they now?”

  “Lunch break. Union rules.” She unwrapped her straw and took a long drink of soda. “You know, I thought surgeons were a nightmare, but this director makes our boys in cardiothoracic look sweet.”

  “Attitude?”

  “Worse. The guy’s got an eye patch. And ten dollars says there’s nothing wrong with that eye.” Whiting laughed. “I’m not kidding.” She took another sip of her soda. “So how’d the support group go?”

  Whiting frowned. “Tough. Those parents go through so much.” Sarah nodded. Someone or something across the cafeteria caught her attention. He shifted in his seat in hopes of bringing her attention back to him. “I was thinking about what you said earlier … about lunch.” I have to sound casual. “It seems like a good idea. Maybe we could go out to lunch sometime—away from here.”

  Sarah glanced up at him, then back across the cafeteria. “Sounds good.”

  “What about this week?” He struggled to push past his nervousness. “Say, Wednesday? Does that work for you?”

  “I’m in.”

  Now what? What am I supposed to say next? “Um, well, is there any place special you’d like?”

  “Looks like it’s time to go.” She took up her tray.

  “But you haven’t even eaten yet.” He didn’t want the moment to slip away.

  Sarah looked down at her salad and shrugged. “It’s my own fault. I stopped by my office for messages. I guess the time got away from me.” She had gone only a couple of feet when she turned back to him, “I’ll call you about Wednesday. You pick the place.”

  Whiting stared after her as she passed through the dining room. He could not conceal his smile as a short, overweight man dressed all in black and wearing an eye patch hurried out behind her.

  Although the original invitation for their lunch had come from Sarah, it was Whiting who took up the preparations with the energy and determination of a general waging a great campaign. He decided almost immediately that he would take her to a very nice restaurant even though his knowledge of such places, especially for lunch, was limited. After reading every restaurant entry in two issues of St. Louis Tourism, he settled on an Italian place downtown that was described as “a decades-old favorite of St. Louis’s business elite.” He closed his door so that Carla would not overhear when he phoned in the reservation.

  After making a dry run to the restaurant Tuesday after work, he had his car washed and vacuumed and then parked in the garage beneath his building in case of rain. He chose a cassette for the tape deck in his car—Pierre Fournier’s Bach Cello Suites—and fast-forwarded the tape so it would begin at his favorite selection. He polished his shoes and selected one of his newer coats and collars. As he laid out his clothes, Jerry’s comment about ‘special friendships’ came back to him and he stopped mid-gesture. What am I doing? Is this wrong? He picked up his collar and turned it over in his hand. No. This is an innocent friendship. I’m happy for the first time in a long time, and I won’t let Jerry ruin it. He put the question out of his mind.

  Whiting’s mouth was dry and he had difficulty making eye contact as he waited outside Sarah’s office. She wore fresh lipstick and a pink flowered dress that he had not seen before. Did she do these things for me?

  His pulse throbbed in his temple at the possibility.

  As they made their way to the parking lot, he checked the faces of people they passed in the hallway and reminded himself that they had no idea he and Sarah were going out to lunch. It was a secret that they shared, and he had to bite the inside of his lip to keep from grinning.

  Once outside, he unlocked his passenger door and held it open for her. In his nervousness and excitement, he forgot that his door was also unlocked, and locked it when he thought he was opening it. Sarah reached over and, in a gesture he saw as caring and intimate, unlocked the door from the inside.

  “So where are we going?” Unlike Whiting, she appeared relaxed.

  “A little place downtown. You said you like Italian, right?” He knew she liked Italian—at least she’d said so in the past.

  “I love it. But where downtown?”

  “I thought we’d go to Toscano’s.” He tried to sound off-handed about his choice.

  “You made a reservation?”

  He nodded. She looked both pleased and surprised.

  “What’s the occasion?”

  “Lunch with you of course.” He was thrilled his voice sounded so casual.

  She gave a delighted laugh. He could feel her watching him, but he pretended to concentrate on the drive. The restaurant was not far, so he took city streets, which he found more scenic than the highway. He lowered his window half way.

  “Too much air?”

  “Not at all.” She lowered hers as well.

  He started the cassette tape. Fournier’s cello music flowed from the speakers and provided a soundtrack for the scene: brilliant cumulus clouds against a deep blue sky, the bright green of spring-leafed trees, exuberant city gardens, and Sarah beside him. He glanced toward her. She laid her head back and looked out her window. He thought his heart might burst with happiness.

  Whiting left his car with the attendant and followed Sarah into the restaurant. The dining room was lush with a high, coffered ceiling. Wine colored drapes dressed the windows and pooled on the rug. Oil paintings offered muted landscapes at intervals along the mahogany paneled walls. Silver and crystal gleamed on the white linen tabletops.

  “It’s beautiful,” she whispered. Whiting rolled onto the balls of his feet.

  Sarah surprised him by ordering a glass of white wine. It had not occurred to him that they might drink at lunch, and he took a quick mental inventory of his afternoon calendar before agreeing to the same. When the wine was served, he took up his glass and leaned forward.

  “I’d like to propose a toast.” Sarah also raised her glass.

  “It’s spring; the day is beautiful.” He gestured to include the room. “This restaurant is beautiful … and so are you. Cheers.”

  Sarah reached forward and clicked her glass with his. She took a swallow of wine and smiled deeply, her eyes closed. She is enjoying herself.

  They gave great attention to the men
u, discussed their options, and changed their minds several times before ordering. He studied her with open admiration as she engaged the waiter to help her choose an entree. Whiting was sure that their server also found her charming and was overwhelmed with pride that she was with him.

  His steak was delicious and his pleasure in it only added to his intoxication with everything around him. Sarah cut a slice of her chicken spedini and placed it on his plate; he, in turn, shared his filet. They tasted one another’s salads and each ordered a second glass of wine. They ordered Italian coffees—laced with amaretto, brandy, whipped cream, and cinnamon—and shared a wedge of warm chocolate cake drizzled with caramel. After several bites, Sarah put down her fork.

  “So tell me, Sam, besides an affinity for expensive Italian restaurants, what other secrets have you been keeping from me?”

  “It’s good to know that I can surprise you.” He took another sip of coffee. The liquor had relaxed him considerably.

  “You’ve certainly done that.”

  He flushed with pleasure at her compliment. “Well this gives us a chance to talk. There’s a lot about you I don’t know.”

  “Perhaps there isn’t that much to me.”

  He shook his head. “I’m serious. After working with you these past weeks it occurs to me that I know so little about you or about what matters to you.”

  Sarah studied his eyes, then looked away. She ran her finger around the rim of her glass as she considered her reply.

  “What matters to me? Let’s see … well, I think it’s pretty obvious that the circus matters to me.”