American Music - Jane Mendelsohn [24]
He answered all of their questions and sat down. When he said fatal, his voice had faltered in a way that only his wife noticed. As he walked back to his seat, he made sure not to catch her eye.
The seven-man board deliberated for less than an hour. When they returned with a verdict Captain Michaels’s wife was still sitting in the heat. The perspiration bloomed in large spots across the back of her dress. The head of the board gave the verdict. The verdict was guilty of conduct unbecoming an officer. The sentence was dismissal from the army. Captain Michaels was also convicted of a lesser charge of failing to shave, thereby presenting an undisciplined appearance. When the decision was read Captain Michaels showed no sign of emotion. According to the newspaper accounts, his pregnant wife who sat behind him in the courtroom showed signs of strain.
2005
The cake was vanilla with chocolate icing. Honor had stayed up late baking it. She used a mix from the health food store but still it took her a long time. She double-checked every instruction and ingredient. She made the icing.
She carried it on a plate and covered it with tinfoil. She leaned it against her body when she pushed open the door. He wasn’t there yet and she set it out on the table. She put a candle next to it. She took off her coat and left the room to wash her hands. When she came back he was there, early, sitting in his wheelchair.
What is this? he said.
A cake, she said.
What for?
I heard it was your birthday.
He closed his eyes and rolled his head and his hair moved and he made a disgusted gesture with his mouth.
So this is a party? he said.
Not exactly. Not a party. I just thought it would be nice to celebrate.
She tilted her head. She bit her lip. She felt afraid of him for the first time.
You and your pity.
It’s not pity. Look, if you don’t want the cake we don’t have to have it.
She walked over to take the cake away and he slammed it off the table with the back of his hand. The plate broke.
See that? he said. That’s you, he said. You think you’re so good but you’re just using me to feel good. You and these goddamned stories. What do they have to do with me anyway? You’re just some crazy lady with a fucked-up need to mess around in my head. You can just forget about it. I don’t need this kind of help.
Okay, she said. She was looking at the cake on his arm. It was like pieces of flesh stuck all over.
So we understand each other? he said. This is all over, right? Because I don’t know what it is you’ve been doing to me but I’m better off without it.
I wish you’d give it another try, she said. She was scared of him now but so scared that she felt she could say anything.
He pushed over the whole table. It dropped on its side like a fallen horse. They both looked at it for a long time.
I’m sorry about the cake, she said.
His eyes looked hurt like a boy’s. They squinted up at her with a blue fire.
It’s not the cake, he said. It’s you.
PART TWO
Come sail your ships around me
And burn your bridges down.
We make a little history, baby,
Every time you come around.
—NICK CAVE, “The Ship Song”
CHAPTER SEVEN
They lived happily ever after. Anna gave birth to a baby girl at the tender age of seventeen and it was the beginning of a great love story. She had never known such joy. The round head burst forth from her like a marvelous idea. Her body shook with the revelation of new life. Her family, however, did not share the same attitude, and so the baby was taken from her and given to a respectable and grateful couple who were waiting anxiously outside the delivery room. It seemed that everything was right again with the world, except to Anna. Her father and mother handed the child over with a mixture of pride and revulsion. Pride and revulsion were popular sentiments in the late twentieth century. Ronald