Literary Giants 29 - Toni Morrison
Kylen slammed into her room, ripping off clothing as she crossed to the bathroom. The only answer was hot water. She wasn't used to fighting with people she cared so deeply for and was upset by the incident itself, let alone the content. The bitter exchange had left her feeling dirty. She set the shower for the hottest temperature she could stand and the strongest massage. She gave a quick shake to the bottles of perfumed soap and shampoo that Eithne had given her.
"I hope there is enough," she thought. Tears of frustration stung her cheeks as she climbed into the steam.
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Downstairs in the parlor, Amy was absolutely glued to her chair, flabbergasted. Steinbeck seemed relieved and a bit amused. "That was one pissed off little cheerleader," he said to himself. McQueen was still standing at the foot of the stairs - looking at the spot where Kylen had stood, but focusing on something within himself. Dale approached McQueen and calmly picked up the shoe. "I particularly liked the bit about the nasty burning little red eyes," he chuckled. "She certainly can turn a phrase, our little Kylen," Dale said, leaving no doubt that the exchange had been overheard in its entirety.
McQueen spun around to face the doctor. "How much longer?" he demanded. "How much longer do I have to stay here? Sitting around your house doing nothing. I've got to get out of here. I have to do something. I've got to get back."
Dale turned the shoe over in his hand. "Shoe therapy. Now, why didn't I think of that?" He paused briefly and then steered McQueen back into the library.
"To answer your question," Dale replied. "First of the year. The end is in sight, Ty, but let me give you some advice. Calm down and then go upstairs and grovel. She is a woman, and groveling usually helps," he chuckled to himself. "If you don't make your manners with her tonight, she's likely to put the other shoe up your butt tomorrow."
"Apologize?" McQueen was indignant. "Me? She was a little harridan."
"Not very pretty but effective," Dale remarked. He paused before continuing in a different tone. "Ty, she admires and respects you. Don't look at me like that. You know I'm right. Other than the odd joke and occasional gentle teasing - and I stress gentle - when has she ever shown you disrespect? I don't know how she behaves privately, but publicly she has always paid you your due. Even with Amy and me she will only call you Colonel or Sir. Ty, she brought you news. Kylen wants you to be proud of her. She wanted your approval. Calling someone a little puke isn't exactly the best way to do that."
"She comes here to get away from the circus at her house. She comes here for herself. So she can feel better. I do not exist to make her feel better." McQueen muttered with an intensity that mildly surprised Steinbeck.
"Of course she comes here because you make her feel better. I like to think that I make her feel better. That Amy does, too. But you can't pretend that she is a little bloodsucker either. You can't tell me that she doesn't lighten your spirits. That your days, hell, all of our days, are just a little more interesting when she does visit. Tell me that she never plans things to distract you, or that she never makes you laugh. That she never pays attention to your feelings or what you have to say. Even if she is sometimes trying, tell me that you don't enjoy her company. You can't. Give me a break. Kylen knows who you are. Fair trade is no robbery, Ty."
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Kylen was washing her hair, letting the water rinse away the anxiety. "Damn it, I bitch to him about his anger and I can't control my own." The fight had made her aware that she had been training her own rage. A Doberman to his gorilla, true, but she had been keeping it hidden.
"Black thoughts grow best in the dark," she quoted her favorite colonel. "I've been stuffing things away in a dark place deep inside myself." Kylen had been trying to follow McQueen's advice; not to worry about things over which she had no control, but she was finding it difficult. "I wonder how well he really does it? Can he control his thoughts as well as he does his dreams?"
Survivor's guilt was a well- known and documented psychological reality, but there was a world of difference between reading an article and living with shadows. Being free was one thing - claiming ownership of that freed self was another. When Kylen looked into the mirror she often didn't recognize the woman who was now living behind her eyes. And worse yet was the knowledge that often the people with whom she shared her life, her history and her love didn't recognize that woman either. Her family wrapped themselves around her. Interested, open but never pressing, they had all taken the lessons of the "decompression" seminars to heart. The family tried to let her find her own way. They ignored her foul language as best they could. (That had been a big change she hadn't even realized until four letter words started falling off of her tongue in the middle of her father's living room.) She could see compassion in their eyes and could feel their love and patience. Sometimes it made her feel like they were sapping her strength rather than assisting, and it made her want to scream. They had thought her dead - 'anything dead coming back to life hurts.'
The counselors had been right about other behaviors as well. Most of the time things went pretty well. She still had trouble sleeping and actually felt the most comfortable, the most truly at home, in the middle of the night when she was the only one up and around. Alone, but with people around her. There, but not there. Kylen found herself weighing people and judging them. The ups and downs of the everyday life that most people lived, the life she had dreamed of every night in the mines, often seemed trivial. Too many silly, worthless things that people worried about and on which they wasted their time and energy. Often even her family all appeared weak to her - untempered and untried. Her father, her brothers and her sisters still too often treated her with kid gloves and Kylen felt that she could easily break any one of them with the sheer force of her will if she so desired. They made her impatient. Sometimes she wondered how they could breathe.
Kylen found that she now often preferred the company of people that she had only just met, people who knew her since the disaster on Tellus. Steinbeck's house had, until this evening, been a release. Everyone here just took her as she was today. No one had looked for subtle differences in her reactions or had held her up to an imaginary line on the wall. Until this evening.
Kylen was forced to realize something uncomfortable. What had bothered her the most hadn't been McQueen's temper. She had seen it before. His isolation did seem extreme which deeply worried but did not surprise her. But what had upset Kylen - had caused her to lash out - was the fact that for the first time McQueen had treated her as he treated everyone else. She had observed that he could attack people and ideas effortlessly, quietly, dismissively. She knew that he had a streak of ruthlessness if pushed. McQueen had put up 'Do Not Disturb' signs but had never slammed the door in her face. He had warned her to back off; setting out clear boundaries that she had respected. But she had never before felt the actual fusillade of his brusque dismissal and aloof appraisal. He had never aimed his guns at her. Kylen had gotten used to the pride of place. She had come to think of it as her own little Door: No number but her tiny name instead. Her trust was shaken and it hurt and frightened her to be shut out of his circle.
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Civilians!" Ty used the term like a curse.
Dale responded: "I suppose we civilians are from a different reality, but the fact remains that, you are immensely important to her. You are her link to both worlds. The one world she had before Tellus and the one she lives in now. She is devoted to you. Kylen wants you strong and clear. She wants you to be your best, not just because she feels safe with you, but for you - all by yourself - just you - because you have great worth. But I will tell you this, T.C. McQueen: She does want something from you. She wants you to think of her as valuable.... And since it is 'Samuel Clemens Night' - who, until this evening, I never thought of as confrontational - at least not in this sense," he gestured with the shoe. "Remember: 'Keep away from people who belittle your ambitions.'" He gave McQueen a moment to think it over. "Nathan isn't here but you are. You really don't know how significant you are to her, do you?"
"Of course she has value. I wouldn't be pissed off if she didn't have value," McQueen protested, choosing to ignore Steinbeck's question.
"So tell her. Look, Tyrus, I know that you've been dealing with your self-image, but you may also have to deal with your image of the future. And I don't just mean in the war."
"What are you talking about?"
"Face it, no matter how you may have pictured your death, you just may not go out in a blaze of glory - and you will never be one to just fade away. You will die one day. But it just may be that you will die old, in your own bed, hopefully surrounded by people who care about you." McQueen just snorted his doubt at that statement.
Amy had entered with a brandy, which she handed to her cousin, Dale. "Why wouldn't we be there?" she asked McQueen. "Besides, after tonight, Kylen will be there just to make sure that you really are dead." The snide remark actually eased McQueen's hostility. Amy spoke again.
"Ty, I know that you love her." Amy held up her hand to cut short any protest. "Make that: I know the manner in which you love her. If you want to dance at her wedding ... if you one day hope to be called 'Uncle T.C.' and to get silly drawings from her children to hang in your quarters.... You should take his advice. Listen to Dale. Kylen will forgive you almost anything, I think, but don't be fooled, she doesn't come here to baby-sit your attitude."
Dale gave McQueen a moment to think it over then added: "Grief can take care of itself, but to get the full value of a joy you must have somebody to divide it with."
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Kylen was washing her hair for the second time and trying to analyze the confrontation. She came to the conclusion that she had wanted McQueen to do something that now, upon reflection, she didn't think that he was able to do: Kylen had wanted him to let go of his rage. She believed McQueen implicitly, and he had once told her that a good commander does not give orders that are impossible to follow. Now Kylen was no longer sure if letting go of his anger was a good thing for him to do - a safe thing. In her estimation, he was a keenly balanced individual. Kylen had heard somewhere that to be normal meant the ability to work and to love. McQueen was normal and he had paid dearly to be that way. Not that it meant he had a particularly well balanced personality. She considered several things as she turned the water temperature up even higher as if the hot water drumming on her back would clarify her thoughts.
"McQueen is an angry man and has lots of reasons to be such. He is driven and single-minded. He is accomplished and successful and, most importantly, he has built himself from the ground up. People ask for and respect his opinion. Hell, wasn't that what I wanted? His good opinion? McQueen has tested and polished himself - found the mix that fuels his successes. No, expecting him to give up that spike of anger is like expecting a thoroughbred not to be hot-blooded and fractious. Take it away and the balance could be thrown off. For a man in his line of work that could be dangerous. Maybe fatal." McQueen didn't have to just stand balanced on the edge of a cliff - he had to walk over it on a tightrope and he carried the weight of others on his shoulders while he did it. If fortune would smile, someday he could relax - but today wasn't the day. His life and that of others could depend on his sense of self - his sense of balance. For now, changes had to be made in very small increments.
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Amy and Dale led Ty into the parlor where they sat while they all composed their thoughts and emotions. They could all hear that Kylen had retreated into the shower. No one could really think of anything to say, so they sat for quite a while in silence. Finally they heard the water stop and Kylen's footsteps could be heard coming from the floor above. The sound seemed to provide a release for the trio.
Dale looked at Amy. "What family doesn't have its little problems?"
"What?" she asked, tired. She really hadn't heard him and didn't really care. "Oh, Dale, I'm tired. I don't know what you mean and I'm going up to my room." She gave Ty a pat on the back, kissed Dale on the cheek goodnight and started up the stairs. Dale followed her and gave her the answer. "It's from 'The Lion in Winter.' Don't worry, Kylen will know."
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Kylen had put on her pajamas and was brushing her teeth. Since her first night at The Barn she had left her toothbrush and a few toiletries in the little bathroom attached to what Dale had assured her was "her" room. She had staked her claim on this little corner of the universe. "Someday. Someday, maybe even tomorrow, I'll have to take this with me when I go." The thought of not leaving something of herself behind in this house, with these people, made her very sad. "Dale is probably going to take the news of my decision to work for the Corps about as well as McQueen, and Amy flat out hates the Big Green."
Kylen sat on her bed and pulled out her journal, which she had started to keep at the suggestion of Doctor Feller. In reality it was also a scrapbook of sorts. Kylen had filled it with articles, news stories and pictures, as well as the writing of the ups and downs of her readjustment. She was amused to see that she had unconsciously divided the journal into sections. There was a special place for her family and a section filled with items about the disastrous Tellus mission. There was now a divider for Maine and life at The Barn, and a section for Nathan, which was also filling with things about the 58th.
"When she finds out I'm compartmentalizing, Feller will probably schedule a half a dozen more intensive sessions. If he was in a better mood, McQueen would probably get a good chuckle over the fact that I'm dividing my life into compartments," she thought. Colonel McQueen was the only person who inhabited more than one section of her journal.
Kylen looked at a picture of Nathan. It was a formal portrait of him in his dress blues wearing the Montgomery Star. He was a recruitment officer's dream.
Kylen's study of the Marine Corps had revealed a strange dichotomy. A number of individual Marines seemed to have difficulty accepting the cultural differences between their lives and the lives of the civilian population. When she had been at Marine Headquarters, she had overheard a couple of Marine enlisted men use the word "Nasty" when talking about the civilians they had to shepherd around. It had struck her as odd, this friction between the military and "The World" that so many of the men longed for. Kylen had finally asked the corporal who had been assigned to take her to see the Marine Corps Memorial at Arlington.
The young man had apologized that she had heard the remark, but she noted he didn't apologize for the remark itself.
"It is a difficult thing to explain, Ma'am. I suppose that many men and women in the services find that there is a lack of discipline in the general population. And on a personal note, Ma'am, I don't believe that I have heard anyone outside of the Corps - other than my father and my minister - use the term 'integrity.' The Marine Corps just lives by a different code."
Kylen turned a few pages and found the most recent news article about Colonel McQueen. Another formal portrait of an officer in the dress uniform. But there was a difference in this photograph.
McQueen's devotion to the Marine Corps was unquestionable. It was a perfect example of the Square Peg. But for the first time Kylen saw that there was a possibility that there was an unacknowledged element inside that commitment. Kylen wondered if it was discomfort with the civilian world, fear of the lack of rules - the existence of riots, ghettos and the ever present IVA.
The InVitro units had been disbanded by law. An InVitro joined the military now only by free will. She was not so naive as to believe that there weren't two standards of behavior - one for Naturals and one for InVitros - but the framework within the military was firm, the expectations clearly laid out. There was only so much a bigot could get away with. It had to be better than in 'The World,' as Marines called civilian life. It certainly had to be better for McQueen with every rank he had achieved especially now as a Full Bird Colonel. Begrudgingly or not, every Marine had to give him the respect of his rank and achievement. McQueen would never be treated with the same respect and civility in the private sector.
Kylen compared the photographs of Nathan and McQueen. Nathan looked like the man you would want to have defending your freedom. 'Character, leadership, duty, integrity.' He filled the uniform the way you hoped it would be filled. It added an air of maturity and competence. Kylen smiled and stroked the face in the photograph with her finger.
The portrait of McQueen was subtly different. In his case the uniform did not add to the man: The man added to the uniform. Kylen was familiar with Door Number Two - McQueen in command mode. She had seen him in uniform, but not like this. This image was a door to a part of the man that she didn't know. It was not a picture of the man she considered her one of her closest friends. It was almost a photograph of a stranger - someone who she could only vaguely imagine. McQueen looked not only like an officer and a gentleman. Not only warrior - but High Priest. The dress blue tunic was his sacred vestment, his ephod. Kylen wouldn't have been in the least surprised to see the Ark of the Covenant behind him.
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McQueen had heard Dale and Amy close their doors, had listened as they both padded around their rooms getting ready for bed. When all was silent in the house, McQueen finished his drink in solitude and then he too started up the stairs.
End Chapter Twenty-nine
