babbling and kept pushing Ray’s arms down onto his stomach and telling him to hold things together, but Ray didn’t want to feel the ragged edges of himself under his hands, he wanted to feel the wind cooling his hot, wet arms and watch the lights. Manny was telling him a story about Scott coming to his house, but he was busy in his head and couldn’t follow things. There was so much to say and no point in saying it. No one to hear. Manny knew all about it, knew all his secrets.
At the hospital Manny went in shouting and they got him onto a gurney and people with serious expressions gathered around him and he caught Manny’s eyes and tried to wave him off and however it happened Manny was gone and Ray could relax, fi nally, and let go. It was bright and there were people everywhere, and he was tired but didn’t sleep. There were people he knew, he thought. There were bikers with long hair and their hands on fire, Rick Staley looking apologetic, shaking his head like don’t blame me, man. Danny Mullen with his one hand and Danny’s mom with a bandage on her throat, and they all looked very concerned. There were other people that he felt he should know, guys from prison and cops, and it made him feel guilty that he couldn’t remember their names. And there was the girl from the picture, in her cap and gown, only it wasn’t the girl from the dealer house, it wasn’t a stranger from Bristol. It was another girl, one he did know. A girl he had loved. Who loved him.
“HE’S DYING?” an older guy’s voice, clipped and precise. A cop. They all sounded military nowadays.
“Yeah, Gene.” A young woman. A doctor, a low voice in case Ray was listening.
“Does he know it?”
“That I can’t tell you. He’s lost a lot of blood? He’s got major organs compromised?” Her voice making questions out of statements. Meaning she didn’t really know what to tell the cop.
“If he knows he’s dying he can give us the name and we can use it in court.”
“I don’t know his mental state.”
“Can I talk to him?” There was an insistent beeping and electronic whirring noises, nurses conferring and someone being sent for an X-ray cart.
“You can try.”
“Raymond?”
“Yeah.” His own voice, strange and hoarse.
“Raymond, do you understand you’re dying?” The older guy, the cop, his voice raised over the murmur of patients and nurses and machines hissing. Someone was talking loudly into a phone, spelling Ray’s name.
“I got shot at.”
“Did he get shot?”
“No, he was stabbed, according to that kid who dumped him here. Erin, were there gunshot wounds?” There was a sound of paper flipping, a metal clipboard clattering on a desk.
“No, Doctor. Just the penetrating stab wounds, abdomen, left thigh, medial, right arm, left arm. We have… heroin on a tox screen. Cocaine. Methamphetamine. Blood alcohol, negative.”
“Christ.”
“No GSW.”
The raised voice again. “Raymond, you were stabbed, do you remember?”
“Shermie’s out.” He was trying to help, but he couldn’t see anything under the bright lights. He wanted to shield his eyes but couldn’t lift his arms.
“Shermie?”
“Shermie, he’s out! Tell Theresa. I call her Mom.”
“Raymond, did Shermie stab you?” Quieter, “Do we know who he’s talking about? Do we have known associates?”
Another voice, deeper, another cop. More paper flipping. “I don’t have a Theresa. Mother’s name is… Caroline. According to the fax we got from Lower Makefield. Father’s name Bartram.”
“Tell her to get Shermie.”
“What did Shermie do, Raymond?”
“He was biting.”
“He bit you?”
“No, he’s too old.” There was a long pause, paper rustling, machines going, and the lights so bright it was like a humming in his head. Near his ear a nurse complained that the veins were all blown.
“Doc?”
“He’s going. It’s just… random connections, synapses firing. His blood pressure’s down. The surgeon’s on his way, but…”
“Shit.”
There was a beeping, loud and close. A woman said, “Oh, there we go.”
“Yeah, this is going nowhere. Who’s on call for anesthesia?”
“Raymond, can you hear me?”
“What’s her name? That girl. Look in the car. I knew her name. Marletta.”
“He’s out.”
“That’s V-fib.”
“Yeah, he’s…”
“Lidocaine? Ringer’s lactate?”
“Is anesthesia here?”
“There he goes.”
“Doc?”
“Start compressions.”
“Doc?”
“Sorry, Dectective. He’s going. He’s got too many holes.”
“So that’s that?”
“That’s it.”
He pulled off County Line Road in Perry March’s Lincoln, the lot packed, cars pulled up on the lawns of houses for graduation. He remembered how hot it was and the radio full of Nirvana because of Kurt Cobain.
Through his open windows he could hear a voice through a loudspeaker and distant cheering, and already people were leaving,moving in small knots clustered around beaming kids in black and white caps and gowns. And he did feel something, a pang in his chest seeing kids he knew, their arms around each other or being squeezed by parents and grandparents.
He drove slowly, looking at faces, a tall girl he’d had a crush on in junior high whose name he couldn’t remember now; a kid he’d had English with who’d always said “president” during roll call. Then there she was coming across the lot from the gym, her gown lifted and showing jeans on her short, muscular legs as she ran toward the street and her cap under her arm. A smile stretched to the point of breaking, waving over her shoulder at friends, hitting the curb and juking right to run alongside his car. He slowed and she yanked the car door open and they were gone down Centennial Road like a bank heist.
She looked at him a long time without saying anything, and he’d steal glances at her until she smiled and hit his arm.
He said, “Put the cap on, I need the whole effect.”
She did, and moved over to the door to pose, her hand under her cheek. He shook his head.
“So, how was graduation?”
“Fun. How was Juvie?”
“Oh, you know. There was one boy who I liked, but I couldn’t tell if he liked me back.”
“Jesus, Ray,” but smiling when she shook her head. “ You kill me.”
“I could always make you laugh.”
“Really, how was it?”
“Oh, it was fine. I cleared some brush, cleaned up some litter off
611.” She made a move toward him, bringing in her hand like shewas socking him in the jaw, touched his cheek instead.
“I couldn’t sleep, thinking about you in there.”
“Mars, it was fine, really. There are always some retards, but I just give them the eyes and they keep moving.”
