Chapter 17
"Finding a Happy Medium"
THE REMAINDER OF THE TIME MOSCHA AND ALFONZO WERE ON THE ISLAND, MOSCHA HUNG OUT WITH ME AT THE CABIN. HIS DAD AND HOOLEY DROPPED HIM OFF IN THE MORNINGS AND I WOULD MAKE BREAKFAST FOR US. FONZE AND HOOLEY WOULD THEN DRIVE OFF TO TEND TO CLIENTS OF HOOLEY'S, AND WORK AFTERNOONS AT THE HOLETOWN CLINIC. I WANTED TO ACCOMPANY THEM SO BADLY I COULD TASTE IT. I COULD HAVE TAUGHT MOSCHA SOME THINGS ABOUT MEDICINE THAT HE'D NEVER LEARN ANYWHERE ELSE, BUT I COULD NOT DO IT FROM A WHEELCHAIR, SO I NEVER MENTIONED IT.
SOMETIMES MY PAIN RAMPED UP AND IT WAS MOSCHA WHO DID THE COOKING, WHICH USUALLY CONSISTED OF HONEY NUT CHEERIOS AND MILK, OR SCRAMBLED EGGS AND TOAST. I DIDN'T TEASE HIM ABOUT HIS LACK OF CULINARY SKILLS, BUT ATE WHAT WAS PLACED BEFORE ME. SOMETIMES HE ADDED CHEESE AND TOBASCO TO THE EGGS AND EVEN GOT IT RIGHT.
DURING THOSE WEEKS I ROLLED AROUND IN THE WHEELCHAIR BECAUSE I COULD NOT BEAR WEIGHT ON MY FOOT, AND BECAUSE MY SCREWED-UP SHOULDER SQUEAKED LIKE A RUSTY GATE EVERY TIME I MOVED MY ARM. IN THE BATH IT WAS DIFFICULT TO GET AROUND EXCEPT WHEN I FINALLY FIGURED OUT A WAY TO LEAN ON THINGS AND GRASP THINGS WITH MY LEFT HAND AND PULL MYSELF ALONG THE SHOWER ROD.
I COULDN'T DO LEG EXERCISES BECAUSE OF THE ADDED INSTABILITY OF MY ANKLE, SO THE ADVANCE OF THE CONTRACTURE BEGAN AGAIN. THERE WAS NOTHING I COULD DO ABOUT IT EXCEPT WAIT FOR THE INJURIES TO HEAL. TO SAY I WAS FRUSTRATED WAS PUTTING IT MILDLY.
THE THING THAT BOTHERED ME MOST ABOUT THE WHOLE BUSINESS, I THINK, WAS THE CONTINUOUS PRAISE I RECEIVED FROM MY NEIGHBORS WHO BEGAN TO STOP BY TO TELL ME WHAT A HERO I WAS, AND HOW GRATEFUL THEY WERE. I FELT LOUSY TAKING THE CREDIT FOR THAT, BUT WHEN I TRIED TO TELL THEM IT WAS NOTHING MORE THAN A LUCKY COINCIDENCE … THEY SAID I WAS JUST BEING MODEST.
*WHO? ME?"
Fortunately, Moss was an easy kid to be around. He took up the slack when he saw me feeling sorry for myself. He demanded nothing of me and he was always there if I needed him for something. When I cooked, he would happily do the cleanup. When he cooked, he did the cleanup anyway, and rubbed it my face that he did the same thing for his grandfather sometimes. I gave him the 'Gregory House' face, but he just laughed at me until I laughed back. We never argued, just teased the hell out of one another.
We played that old radio until it seemed the roof would fly off beneath the thunder of the sound vibrations. Fonz and Hooley came back one evening to find Moss pushing me in the wheelchair, circling and circling the room. We were caterwauling full-volume to: "I've Been Working on the Railroad". Neither of us had done a lick of cleanup and the cabin looked like lightning struck it. As it turned out, I'd been cramping up all day and Moss was trying to distract me with old tunes that everybody knows, and careening me around and around as fast as he could. We might both have capsized and broken our fool necks. But we didn't. We were laughing too hard.
There was one time when he offered to work on my foot in the same manner he'd used on the plane. I didn't refuse, and I'm sure the dexterity of his small, strong hands did more for the healing process than anything I might have done on my own. It made my foot and ankle ache like hell for a while afterward, but the ache was temporary and it almost made up for the lack of leg exercises.
When I asked about his growth status, he told me he had added about a half-inch to his height since we'd first met. He said he'd also talked his dad into backing off on the idea of having him treated by a specialist after he mentioned the conversation the two of us had on the way to San Juan. Fonze was, of course, surprised to learn that his son didn't mind being the little guy. The subject had simply never come up between them before, so it turned out that Fonze had actually deferred to his son's wishes.
Moss and I even high-fived on it.
Man! What I wouldn't have given to have had a dad like that … one who actually listened to what I said once in a while.
On rainy afternoons we would go out on the porch; me in the wheelchair in shorts and tee shirt and bare feet. Moscha in jeans and sneakers and a baggy sweatshirt. He would sit in the old rattan chair with his knees pulled up inside the shirt, his arms around his knees, looking like a turtle sitting there. We drank hot tea laced with mint. Plain. No sugar. Moss's idea.
I thought: *ugh!* … until I actually tasted the stuff. Now I even make it for myself once in a while. He asked me a lot of medical questions, which I was happy to answer and even expand upon. He enjoyed the gross, bloody stuff of thoracic surgery and funny stories of clinic patients' stupidity.
He laughed his head off when I told him about a delirious patient who led a cadre of highly paid doctors, including myself, running all over the hospital looking for him. When we found the guy, he'd been hiding under his bed all along with the top sheet pulled down like a curtain, almost in plain sight. I had forgotten the extent to which boys Moss' age loved the gross stuff. Zombies … walking dead … roadkill … bloody murder … yucky crap. Actually, I could relate. I was sometimes seduced by that dreck as well.
Since I was wearing cutoffs, and my scar and the healing wound were both clearly visible, I let him indulge his curiosity: look at it, study it, touch it. My easy consent alarmed me, and I wondered why I would even allow this. He was surprisingly gentle and extremely careful not to hurt me.
Containing my tension, I decided to tell him the short version of what happened to me. A few times during the telling, I saw his eyes mist up. I have no explanation why I gave this child permission to lay his hand on the one area of my anatomy that I always guarded so jealously, and with the utmost privacy. I wondered if this was what Kyle Calloway was going to be like as I became better acquainted with him. Or was something finally opening up inside the shuttered world of Gregory House? (I hoped, both.) My body was jumpy and unyielding, but still I allowed him to explore as he pondered the life-changing experience I was struggling to tell him about.
Moscha was intense and compassionate, and when he fully comprehended the reason I had become a cripple, he placed his hand over as much of the scar as he could reach, and I watched him, not speaking. Not daring to; not wanting to impart any kind of influence on his thinking.
"When I become a doctor," he said, finally, "I will be able to repair terrible things like this ..."
I nodded shortly. "I believe you."
When I was finished, we sat silent for a long time, lost in our own thoughts and sipping at our tea, now quite cold.
After that, we talked about cars and baseball and NFL and basketball and Monster Trucks … and girls.
Well … of course girls! We're guys!
I asked him if he had a girlfriend …
I asked him that same question three days in a row. Evidently the topic of 'sexy-girlie-stuff': (his own words), was a subject with which adults must use restraint when seeking such information from a teen-age boy. For the first two times I mentioned it, he hid his face behind crossed arms and clammed up until I laughingly changed the subject.
But the third time, a ripple of exasperated giggles finally indicated a breakthrough. I apologized for my bluntness, but then urged him again. "Well … do you?"
I laughed out loud when he finally sighed and said: "You aren't gonna let this alone, are you?"
When I told him "no", he said: "I have two girlfriends, but they don't know about each other. Don't tell my dad. He'd have kittens. Satisfied?" And that was that. I decided if the subject came up again, it had to be his idea. I put my fingers to my lips and zipped my mouth shut. He grinned.
As time went on, I regaled him with war stories and overblown tales of growing up a "Marine Corps Brat", having to pull up stakes again and again when my jet-pilot father got transferred from one base to another all over the world.
His one observation of my vagabond life told me he had intelligence and foresight far beyond his tender years. "Didn't it make you sad when you had to leave your friends over and over again? It happened to me once … when we moved to New York City …"
He was right. It had happened to me so many times that I turned into a loner who no longer even tried to make friends. I was forever the outsider. I kept to myself and learned to play guitar and piano and took up studying medical books.
He told me that was the saddest thing he'd ever heard, and he wished he could hear me play sometime.
Moscha understood. He hated that he and his dad had had to hide in New York under an alias in order to protect themselves from persecution by drug dealers and thugs. He also understood how I must feel about the same type of awkward circumstances in my own situation, since I'd introduced myself on the plane as 'Greg'.
It hadn't taken his father long to figure out who 'Greg' was … for real …
"I hope you trust us to keep your secret," Moscha said. "Dad and I know what it's like, hiding in plain sight and never knowing when the wrong person might see us and recognize us. It still scares me sometimes. Does it do that to you?"
Actually, I hadn't thought of it in those terms before. I was just trying to hold off the inevitable, and I told him so. "I think you and your dad are in a lot less danger now that those idiots are in jail where they belong."
"Yeah," he said, "but there's still the trial." He watched me closely, waiting for a reaction. I paused a moment.
"To answer your question … now that I think about it … I guess I'm a little scared. But unlike you or your dad, I did some bad things back in the states; things I regret. I hurt people I cared for, all because I was angry with them … and one of these days I'll have to atone for it. Right now, I'm hiding here because I haven't figured out how to be honest and tell them how sorry I am. I don't want them to think I'm begging for sympathy because of my leg … or that I'm playing the 'cripple card' the way I used to …"
I took a deep breath and grew suddenly quiet as I realized that I had just spoken a truth that I had not visited for a long time.
I felt a small, warm hand on my arm, and when I looked across, Moscha's large eyes were boring into my own. "Kyle Calloway … you can tell those people what you just told me. Straight out. You should also tell Gregory House … because I think he'd like to know …
"I like you, Greg … a lot. You're a good guy. So is Kyle, and I like hanging around with both of you and talking about whatever comes up. It's fun. I hope when I grow up, I can take the stuff I learned from my dad and mix it up with the stuff I learned from you. It would be cool to do that someday."
*What the hell do I say after he says that?*
Discretion being the better part of valor, I said nothing. I felt my ears growing hot.
And I heard him smiling.
Two weeks later, Moss announced quietly that he and his dad had to leave. They would fly back to Jamaica and stop to visit at his grandparents' place. After that, Dr. Alfonzo Rodriguez must return to work at Sloan-Kettering, and life would return to whatever-the-hell 'normal' was. Like mine, their futures were shrouded in mystery. But they were done hiding.
By that time, I'd finally left the wheelchair and took to the poor, dilapidated arm canes once again. I was wobbly and weak in my shoulder, and a little dizzy. Moscha did not miss the opportunity to laugh at me and accuse me of looking like a drunken gorilla. (Like he'd ever seen a drunken gorilla, but I got the picture …)
Our parting, two days later, was solemn, because I knew that very soon I must head off in the same direction. None of us were sure if we'd ever meet again.
I nodded to Hooley and shook hands with Fonze with a grin on my face. I admired the man, and I felt a bit envious of the warm relationship he had with his son. I also admired the son for the obvious respect he held for his father. The two, I thought, were a prime example of a kid and a Dad who'd got it right.
It was difficult to see them go. The back of my throat was dry and achy as we all gathered on the cabin's porch saying our awkward goodbyes. I reminded myself that a year ago, I would have avoided this type of communal huddle like the plague. I wasn't sure how to take my leave of Moscha. He stood next to this father in a stiff and formal pose. Finally he nodded, posture guarded, fists clenched tight.
"Is that all I get? Really?" I tilted my head and frowned at him, playing the Cripple Card beautifully.
That did it. He broke away from Fonzie's side and hurried across to me as his dad and his uncle stood and watched with knowing expressions. Moss wrapped both arms around my back, hugging so hard it whooshed my breath. Gone was the gentleness left over from my long stint in the wheelchair. This kid meant business. I hugged back, and we lingered just long enough so it wouldn't become embarrassing before we broke away and he returned to his dad's side.
We heard the Piper zoom in from overhead, splash down and taxi to the beach. And the sound of the engine winding down. But Packy did not shut it off, and we knew the time had come …
He sauntered over and walked up to the porch. He looked me over quickly and nodded. He shook hands with Hooley and Fonzie and Moscha.
Fonze hesitated briefly, and then reached for his brother-in-law. They hugged the way guys do: a quick touch of arms-on-shoulders and then back off. Hooley's hug with Moss lasted a little longer. Hooley pointed to his colorful hat and winked at his nephew. "The hat survives!"
"I can see that," Moss responded with a grin. "Probably saved Kyle some embarrassment …"
*Smart kid!*
I remembered back to the first days I'd spent on the island: "My nephew has knitted this wonderful hat for me …"
*HAH!*
Fonzie reminded Hooley and me that he would call when the drug trial came up. He then turned to me and said: "I don't know if your testimony will be needed or not, but if so, I'll let you know in plenty of time so you can make arrangements to be there."
*Well hell! Who wouldn't want to hear the story of that heroic, well-aimed crutch … ?*
I nodded. "Understood." But I knew I wouldn't be around when that time came … if it ever did.
I watched as they walked down the beach, Hooley and Fonzie and Packy toting their luggage like they were being exiled to Elba …
Moscha looked back once and waved.
"Smooth sailin'!" I shouted, for wont of anything better.
"Keep the shiny side up!" He yelled back.
They walked to the waiting plane … out of my life … probably forever.
The Piper hit the sky like the eagle she was, and disappeared toward the horizon.
It was time to break out the Vodka and the cigars.
Probably more than one …
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