The house of God

The Follies had been a matinee, and I had to go directly from Molly to the E.W. for an eight?to?eight night shift. I tickled Toni and slobbered Sue until Molly awoke, and as she saw me leaving she said, "Oh Roy, wait, I forgot to give you your Christmas present," and she leaped up, hanging Toni lower than Sue, and bounced over to her dresser, and as I marveled at the genius of creation to make such a warm, pink-tittied, and soft?twatted thing as woman, she handed me a little box wrapped up in little?kid wrapping. I opened it, and there, to my astonishment, was a ties pin, in silver, which said:

***

***MVI***

***

"I got the letters and soldered them myself," said Molly. "You really are the ***MVI***, to me. You know, I think you're the smartest person I ever met; a genius. You must think I'm awfully dumb. I don't care, though, I just appreciate the time we're together."

The perfect gift. Strong feelings clashed in my head, from my grandfather asking me about another woman, to how much I did care about Molly, and I asked her, "Don't you think I'm a real bastard for having Berry and seeing you?"

"Nope. I really don't, Roy."

"It's incredible," I said. "you're so beautiful and so sexy and so much . . . fun and so free it's just hard to believe. I didn't know someone like you could really exist. I care about you a whole lot."

"Well, I kinda love you, Roy, even if you do see me as some dumb nurse and that's all."

"You're not some dumb nurse."

"Nope, I'm not. I'm just a fed?up Catholic who's had it up the kazootie with the nuns, and I'm making up for lost time. And now I'm go

"I'm not a bastard to you?"

"Oh, Roy boy, stop it. You and I are just going to have fun, OK?"

Well, sure it was OK, I guessed, and I gathered her up into my arms and kissed her and Toni and Sue and that hot moist and hairy thing whose name I hadn't caught who could squeeze Oscar as only twenty percent of vaginal vaults can, and she kissed me and we kissed everybody, and with warmth and kisses and the tiepin and everything getting aroused all over again and saying good?bye, it was a miracle that I and big Oscar could walk at all, much less walk out, into the slushstorm and down to the House of good old God.

And wasn't it on just such a night that my great-great?uncle Thaler, denied the chance to be a sculptor, had snuck into the barn, stolen the best horse, and ridden away, never to be seen or heard from again?

13

But that was it. That night shift was the fulcrum of my stay in the E.W. The fun was over. The abuse had begun.

It started when I walked through the waiting rooms and saw Abe rocking in his corner, alone, a pair of silk women's panties on his head. He was abusing those waiting, and they were begi

"Are you a Jew?"

"Yes, I am."

"You know the problem with you Jews is you're circumcised."

The nurses were upset at Abe's regression, and we were trying to convince Cohen to do something to prevent the inevitable, Abe's rehospitalization at the State F cility. Cohen seemed on edge. The policemen weren't expected until midnight. Flash had taken his vacation hitchhiking out to some godforsaken hole in the belly of the country to be ravaged by his retardate agrarian kin.

I went to see an abusive drunk who said, "I was by a pushcart in the garment district and I've got a problem with my legs."

"When were you hit?"

"Six years ago:"

"It's not an emergency. Come back to the clinic Monday."

He wouldn't leave, and I called Gath, and together we tried to convince him to leave, but instead he began to unwrap his right leg, saying, "Here, just look at this, eh?" As the yellow bloodstained rags began to unwind, my stomach turned, and Gath screamed, "DON'T TAKE THAT OFF!"

"Why not?" asked the drunk gleefully. "You're doctors. Look."

The pus?yellow rags slipped away, and we were faced with the most foul?smelling, ugly, oozing ulcers down to bone that either of us had ever seen. I felt sick. Gath went red and livid, sticking his face smack up against the drunk's and yelling, "YOU HAD TO DO THAT, DIDN'T YOU, YOU BASTARD!"

From there things went downhill. All joined in the chorale of abuse. Underdoses, overdoses, drunks, psychopaths, whores, V.D., and vagitch, providing me with the pleasure of sitting between the gynecology stirrups, looking down the diseased barrel of the Holiday world. My attempts at sleep were constantly interrupted. At three A.M. I saw a suburban housewife brought in by her husband.

"I can't stand up straight," she said, leaning.

"How long have you had this problem?" I asked, sleepy?eyed.

"Three months"

"Then why did you come in tonight?"

"It's worse tonight. See, I can stand like this," she said, leaning, "but I can't stand like this," she said, standing up straight.

"You are standing like that," I pointed out.

"I know, but I prefer to stand like this."

I TURFED her out and she abused me some, and left. At four?thirty I was awakened by a refrain of OIY OIY OIY and I knew that a medical admission had arrived. The nurse handed me the clipboard, saying, "Don't worry, it's hopeless: end?stage breast cancer, metastatic throughout pelvis, abdomen, and spine."

"It was awful. A scoliotic wreck of a woman, bent into an ungodly shape, demented from the spread of the cancer to her brain, fighting like an animal in pain against my doing anything for her. Two sisters hovered, demanding I do everything. The disease was disgusting and painful. These sisters were irritating in their absurd hope. This was no live thing, no hope. This was death. This was despair, that rare look into the mirror at first twinkle, at first graying, at gray. This was the bottomless panic at the lost smooth cheek of childhood, at no longer being young. I was angry at this woman because this, the begi

"Stand up, Roy," someone said harshly, shaking me "Roy?oy . . ."

It was Berry. All around me were well?dressed peon ple, standing up, and Berry said, "Come on, Roy, it's the Hallelujah Chorus, stand up."

I stood up where was I Symphony Hall. I was listening to that penultimate grenade, The Messiah, performed by the lonely and ratchet?voiced members of the Handel Society. Another matinee. As usual with any activity?outside the House of God, The Messiah had put me right to sleep. FOR THE LORD GOD OMNIPOTENT REIGNETH! HALLELUJAH! Sing it, boys. How could you know that He doesn't seem to reigneth much in the House of God E.W. AND HE SHALL REIGN FOREVER AND EVER. FOREVER! AND EVER! HALLELUJAH! HALLELUJAH! It wasn't a bad grenade, this Messiah, really. I looked around at the audience, stretching from the giant double organ onstage, back in row on row of creaky benches. Many gomers and gomeres, especially toward the front. Tufts of gray, hyperemic flesh over sallow cheek. GOMERES DON'T DIE! HALLELUJAH! HALLELUJAH! FOREVER! THEY LIVE FOREVER! The price of the seats had the rich gomers in front, the kids in the rear. Berry and I were halfway to being rich gomers.