The Eden Express_ A Memoir of Insanity - Mark Vonnegut [107]
Her being young was the whole point. She was the hope, the future. If I could somehow get her to know all I knew about art, about life, about religion, about craziness, then maybe it wouldn’t be lost. Someone had tagged me, so I had to find someone else to tag with all this stuff as quick as I could. If they came to get us, the cops or someone, and destroy us as the carriers of some awful truth, surely they would spare the child. Who, even among the hardest-hearted cops, could resist that kid’s smile? Who would suspect that even most perverse Mark would stoop to hiding the goodies in a three-year-old girl?
Patience. Waiting for Easter was all right but maybe this bitch, whatever it was, would go on past Easter. I set my goals ahead a bit more, so as not to come up for air too quickly. I was waiting for Sarah to grow up, so we could live happily ever after as man and wife and have lots of nice kids and all: If I’m willing to sit here and wait for Sarah to grow up, you don’t have to run around like a chicken with its head cut off. Time to move to higher ground? Relax. As soon as Sarah is eighteen or so we’ll think about it.
She was such a bright, attractive kid, Joe and Mary must have been doing something right, but the way they treated Sarah was one of the things that hip folk put them down for. YOU DON’T HIT KIDS. Not that they really clobbered the kid, but she came in for some pretty healthy whacks now and then. I couldn’t help wincing when Sarah screamed and Joe hit and Sarah screamed louder and Joe hit harder and Sarah screamed like the end of the world and Joe hit harder.
I had never heard Sarah screaming so loud. I couldn’t stand it. My face must have been contorted in agony. I started crying. “It’s all right, Mark. Children recuperate quickly.” That was Mary.
“Oh, my God. What have they done to her?” More bloody murder, screaming, piercing. Maybe I was responsible. Was my condition contagious? Had I ordered the demon or whatever that was in me to take her over? Or maybe in one of my blanks I had told Joe and Mary that Sarah was somehow tainted and had recommended some sort of exorcism rite which they were putting her through.
The screaming subsided into pathetic sobs and then stopped altogether. I sank into utter despair, drifting nowhere, just the other side of consciousness. I felt Joe’s hand on my shoulder. I looked up with tears in my eyes. His face was very somber.
“Want half of my sandwich, Mark?” Oh, my God, how could they? How could he? Tears started pouring out of my eyes. “Here, Mark, help me eat this.”
“Shit. This has gone too far.” Joe had shown faith. I’m a bigger bastard than God. If only I had known, maybe I could have said something like, “Hold it, Joe, there’s some bologna caught in the brambles.”
“Here, Mark, eat this.” Joe was still holding the sandwich in front of me. His look was insistent. I took a bite. Gagging and choking, I couldn’t swallow. My mouth and throat just froze up solid. I couldn’t move a muscle. I couldn’t hear. I couldn’t see.
But I could still think and vow. Vow I did. “God, if that child doesn’t recover! I don’t know what’s wrong with her. I don’t know what Joe did to her. I don’t know what I passed on to her. But, God, if anything happens bad to that kid I am going to kick Your ass all over heaven. I’m not sure how, but I’m catching on to You little by little. You can put me through hell for as long as You like, shock treatment, padded cells, the works. But I’ll remember You, cocksucker. Kick my ass around all You like, but if You start fucking around with Sarah, and Joe and Mary, I’ll find a way to make You very sorry. Her mother said she’d recuperate quickly and You damn well better make her mother right.”
THE ARTS. “Mark, I’ve never read much.” Joe talking. It was part apology, part regret, part accusation. The talk got pretty heavy into literature now and then. I remember Kathy saying things like, “Don’t worry,