The Illumination_ A Novel - Kevin Brockmeier [0]
The View from the Seventh Layer
The Brief History of the Dead
The Truth About Celia
Things That Fall from the Sky
For Children
City of Names
Grooves: A Kind of Mystery
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2011 by Kevin Brockmeier
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Pantheon Books and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Portions of this work were previously published in the following: “Ryan Shifrin” in Tin House, “Jason Williford” in Unnatural State, and an excerpt from “Nina Poggione” (as “A Fable for the Living”) in Electric Literature.
Grateful acknowledgment is made to Hugh Blumenfeld for permission to reprint an excerpt from “The Strong in Spirit,” words and music by Hugh Blumenfeld, copyright © 1983 by Hugh Blumenfeld. Copyright renewed. All rights reserved. Recordings: The CooP: Fast Folk Musical Magazine (SE 201, Feb. 1983); The Strong In Spirit (Grace Avenue Records 1987, Prime-CD 1994). Reprinted by permission of Hugh Blumenfeld.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Brockmeier, Kevin.
The illumination / Kevin Brockmeier.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-307-37958-0
I. Title.
PS3602.R63145 2010 813′.6—dc22 2010020732
www.pantheonbooks.com
Jacket image © Illustration Works
Jacket design by Brian Barth
v3.1
Contents
Cover
Other Books by This Author
Title Page
Copyright
Carol Ann Page
Jason Williford
Chuck Carter
Ryan Shifrin
Nina Poggione
Morse Putnam Strawbridge
Acknowledgments
A Note About the Author
Carol Ann Page
The strong in spirit wear bright clothes of fire.
They dance and burn. The light is worth the pain.
The light is worth the pain.
The pain stops when the flame dies out.
—Hugh Blumenfeld
It was Friday evening, half an hour before the light struck, and she was attempting to open a package with a carving knife. The package was from her ex-husband, who had covered it in a thick layer of transparent tape, the kind fretted with hundreds of white threads, the latest step in his long campaign of bringing needless difficulty to her life. She was sawing along the lid when she came to a particularly stubborn cross-piece of tape and turned the box toward herself to improve her grip. Her hand slipped, and just that quickly the knife severed the tip of her thumb. The hospital was not busy, and when she walked in carrying a balled-up mass of wet paper towels, her blood wicking through the pink flowers, the clerk at the reception desk admitted her right away. The doctor who came to examine her said, “Let’s take a look at what we’ve got here,” then gingerly, with his narrow fingers, unwound the paper from around her thumb. “Okay, this is totally doable. I don’t mind telling you you had me worried with all that blood of yours, but this doesn’t look so bad. A few stitches, and we should have you fixed right up.” She had not quite broken through the nail, though, and when he rotated her hand to take a closer look, a quarter-inch of her thumb came tilting away like the hinged cap of a lighter. The doctor gave an appreciative whistle, then took the pieces of her thumb and coupled them back together. She watched, horrified, as he fastened them in place with a white tag of surgical tape. “Miss? Miss?” The room had begun to flutter. He took her face in his hands. “What’s your name? Can you tell me your name, Miss? I’m Dr. Alstadt. Can you tell me your name?” His hands were warm and soft, like the hands of a fourteen-year-old boy deciding whether or not to kiss her, something she remembered feeling once, a long time ago, and she gave him her name, which was Carol Ann, Carol Ann Page. “Okay, Carol Ann, what we’re going to do is bring in the replantation team.