In Case of Fire

Marina Antropow Cramer

“These candies are so good.” The woman reaches past Vera’s elbow to take several tins off the supermarket shelf.

“Are they?” Vera glances at the stranger, middle-aged like herself, dressed, like her in black pants, a white shirt, and a sweater, pale blue to Vera’s vibrant purple.

“Oh, yes.” She places the tins in her basket and reaches for two more. “They really taste like fruit. I like to bring a box when I visit old people.”

Vera studies the tins, the miniature fruits in sharp relief against a black matte ground, the boxes flat and round, made to fit easily in a woman’s purse. Or nightstand, she thinks, picking fruit pastilles for Solange and lemon drops for herself. Solange will like these.

Solange is not old, but her shopping days are surely over. Vera does not know what drew her – tall, bookish, reclusive – to the petite blonde with sparkling gray eyes who swore like a truck driver and knew how to use her shapely body to advantage; the first of their tight friendship circle to drink beer and smoke and ride in cars with boys.

It seems ironic that Solange would be the first to be struck down, as if her brash laugh and filthy mouth, her undeniable vitality, should have been shield enough against the cancer ravaging her lungs. She should have been invincible, sailing through life on sheer audacity. When the relentless coughing turned to pneumonia, sending Solange into the hospital, the tumor was revealed.

“Big as a grapefruit,” Solange told her friend, unblinking, her tone flat. “I’m fucked.”

Vera has been away, enjoying the solitude of her annual writer’s retreat. The futility of this habit is not lost on her; she has little hope of breaking into print at her age. But she relishes the company of other hopeful authors, the evenings talking writing over wine, sharing occasional successes with barely veiled masochistic envy. In her ten-day absence, Solange was discharged from the hospital and transferred to a nursing home. The tumor is deemed inoperable and further treatment is not recommended.

The television quiz show is blasting from 433. Vera enters the room and stops; the clever remark she was poised to deliver falls away. Solange sits on the edge of the hospital bed; her pale thin legs dangle, child-like, over the side. The privacy curtain is drawn almost completely around the bed, leaving an opening a foot or so wide so she can see – and be seen – out the door. Solange looks shrunken, her arms withered, her hair roots nearly translucent against angry pink bare spots dotting her scalp.

“What’s this?” Vera exclaims, her voice loud to conceal the shock at her friend’s changed appearance. “Are you waiting for the doctor?”

Solange stares at her. “It’s like being underwater. I feel like a goddam goldfish in a scummy bowl,” she says in a hoarse whisper. “I’ve been sitting here since breakfast.”

“But why? It’s nearly noon!” Vera looks around the room. The woman in the other bed, barely visible under a hand-crocheted afghan, has her back to the blaring television set, where a dejected contestant has just lost all her winnings on a double or nothing dare.

“It’s her TV,” Solange says, lifting dull gray eyes to Vera’s flushed face. “I guess I’m not supposed to watch it. Not that I would,” she adds, “If I had a choice.”

“That’s stupid,” Vera claims bluntly. “Then why don’t they put it next to her bed, instead of on the dresser, where you can’t help but see it?’

“I don’t know, Vera. Please don’t say anything about it.” Solange looks sad. “I don’t know if that poor woman is even aware of it. She never makes a sound. They come and wash her, and sometimes they feed her a little, but that’s about it. Her daughter came yesterday, brought some more pictures.” She gestures at the wall, bare on her side but hung with cheerful children’s drawings above the other bed.

“So they don’t have you like this all the time? Behind the curtain?” Vera feels the anger subside, replaced by a glimmer of compassion for the dying stranger, touched by the tokens of tenderness surrounding her immobile form.

“No, not all the time. Maybe they were going to bathe me and forgot. It happens.”

 “What did you have for breakfast?” Vera asks, to break the mood.

“Oatmeal or some such slop. Cardboard toast. Shitty decaf coffee.”

“Here, or in the dining room?”

“Here.” Solange winces. “I can’t take the dining room. All those sick people. Their hands shake so bad they can’t even hold a spoon. I know the poor bastards can’t help it, but I just can’t stand it.” Her fingers fidget with the hem of her hospital gown, crumpling then smoothing the cloth. “What I wouldn’t give for a soft-boiled egg. Fresh hot toast, a cup of good strong tea.”

“Don’t hold your breath,” Vera’s mouth twitches in a sardonic half-smile. “I doubt their kitchen has even seen a real egg. How’d you end up in this place, anyway?” She feels a twinge of guilt for having been away, for giving her friend’s predicament no more than a passing thought while she pursued the hedonistic illusion of literary accomplishment.

“Champagne taste, Medicaid budget,” Solange replies. “The hospital gave up on me, and I’m too sick to go home. I had a choice of two facilities. Eeny meeny. Here I am, sponging off your tax nickel.”

“Sweetie, you’ve paid for it many times over. They owe you better than this.”

“Oh, hell, Vera, what’s the point? I’ll be dead in a month.” Solange pulls the beige cotton blanket over her bare knees. “I just wish it didn’t smell like day-old puke covered with Lysol.”

“Listen,” Vera says, groping for a less sensitive subject. “Where are your clothes? Don’t you feel like getting dressed? That sexy gown just doesn’t do it for you.”

“You think nobody wants to see these droopy boobs and skinny ass?” Solange deadpans. “Look in the wardrobe.” The wardrobe yields hot pink sweatpants, a bright floral print shirt, a black sweater. “No underwear? These drawers are empty.”

“Welcome to the Depends generation. I’ve joined the ranks of the adult diapered.” Solange says, not without a hint of caustic pride. “And my bra got lost in the laundry, so I’ll have to hang loose.”

“OK, here goes.” Vera unties the hospital gown closures and holds the shirt for her friend like an old-time gentleman helping his evening date into her wrap. “You lost some weight, huh? Getting your girlish figure back,” she jokes to mask her horror at the washboard back, the ripples of pallid skin around Solange’s waist.

“You know it, honey. If I wasn’t sitting down, these pants would fall off. Thanks,” she nods to the uniformed attendant setting down the lunch tray.

Vera lifts the domed metal cover. “Pasta,” she proclaims. “Shells.”

“Oh, joy. I swear it’s a government conspiracy to rid society of poor, sick people. Death by pasta.” She glares at the two large shells, their edges curled from excessive microwaving, oozing cheese into a pool of watery red sauce. “And this,” she snorts. She picks up a packet of dressing intended for the slice of pink tomato resting on a lettuce leaf. “As if there’s anything remotely French about it. And Jell-o? Yes, Jell-o.”

Vera covers the offending food. “What do you want? I’ll go get it for you.”

“Nothing. I’d just as soon skip it.” Solange sulks. “What’s it like out?”

“Nice.” Vera brightens. “Let’s go look at the tulips. I’ll get a wheelchair.”

They wait for the elevator for what seems like much longer than the elapsed five minutes. “Hey, check it out.” Solange points to the wall between immobile sliding doors. “How’s that for comfort.” The sign, printed on a yellowing card, reads:

IN CASE OF FIRE USE STA RS

DO NOT USE ELEVATORS

The space where the missing “I” had been gleams white between block vinyl letters.

“Must be somebody’s idea of a joke,” Vera guesses.

“Huh. I wonder if it’s happy staff or captive inmates,” Solange replies grimly. “Abandon all hope, blah, blah, blah. What are the chances, you think, of anyone carrying us gimps and lepers out of a flaming building? Maybe stars are a better bet.”

They ride down in uneasy silence. “Don’t forget to sign me out,” Solange says. “I’m government property.”

The grounds consist of a grassy area at the side of the building, bordered by a few budding azalea shrubs. The tulips – pink, yellow, white – grow in a raised bed near two plastic benches. A small picnic table stands on a bed of gravel in the shade of a lone maple.

Solange raises her face to the sky and closes her eyes. “Sun feels good, huh?” Vera says.

“Like a lover’s caress,” her friend agrees, opening one eye. “Almost.” Her skin looks papery in the bright light, like fine muslin draped over a barely concealed skull. How tenuous, Vera thinks, our hold on life. How fragile the vessel.

“Hey, Sol. Let’s split this joint.”

“Hell, yeah,” Solange breathes. “Where can we go?”

“My place. I’ll make you that soft-boiled egg.”

They drive without speaking for a while, Solange cradled deep into the seat, her slippered feet barely touching the floor, her head turned to the side window.

“Fuckin’ flowers,” she says as if to herself. “I never saw them much before. Pretty.”

“You never were a nature lover.”

“Still, I never cared. If they weren’t long-stemmed roses from the man of the moment, I had no reason to notice them.” When Solange suffers a spasm of raspy coughing, Vera remembers the candies.

“Oh, hey, I brought you some fruit drops,” she says, eyeing her friend uneasily. “They’re here in my bag.”

“Thanks.” Solange seems to shrink even further into her seat, her breathing ragged. “I may be beyond fruit drops. But thanks.”

Vera’s two-story starter home cannot be entered, front or back, without negotiating porch steps. Rather than risk a fall from Vera’s uncertain grasp, they decide it’s best for Solange to stay in the yard.

“This is the part that sucks the most,” Solange says. “Three weeks ago I could walk. Screw the dignity, I just hate being helpless. I get drugs for the pain, but nothing to bring back a little strength.”

“Must be hell,” Vera can think of no words of comfort that aren’t anemic or trite. “What kind of tea you want? Earl Grey, Jasmine, English Breakfast?”

“You got Russian Black? Yeah. Make it strong, sister, with lemon. No sugar.”

Vera has pulled the car as far up the driveway as it will go. She half drags, half carries her friend the short distance to the lawn chair. Solange makes an effort to move her feet in a heroic semblance of walking. The yard is small but private. “Look up,” Vera says. “The cherry’s in bloom.” She raises her head to admire the masses of white blossoms swaying high overhead against deep green foliage and too-blue sky.

Solange, settled into the chair, glances at Vera with profound indifference, her mouth drawn down in pain, exhaustion dulling her eyes. “Right,” Vera says. “I’ll boil you that egg.”

In the kitchen, she moves with grace and culinary confidence. She assembles the tray with an eye for aesthetic detail while the egg boils and the teapot warms. Within minutes it’s ready, the brown egg smooth and hot in its ceramic egg cup, the toast edges perfectly crisped, the cutlery nestled in the folds of a linen napkin. Wild strawberry jam glows like rubies in a glass dish. Vera places the salt shaker on the tray, backs out the door and takes the steps down into the yard where Solange sits, eyes closed, legs straight out in front of her on the webbed chair.

“I’m not sleeping,” Solange assures her. “Just zoning.” She reaches for a slice of toast before Vera has settled the tray across her lap. “Do you know how much I love this? Hot toast with the butter not yet melted, is there anything better?” She bites into the bread, talks while chewing. “You can keep your fancy dishes. All I want is a piece of decent goddam toast.”

The egg is cooked perfectly. The firm opaque white reveals a warm but still liquid yolk that trembles like leaf-dappled sunshine on the spoon in Solange’s hand. She eats slowly, dipping slivers of toast into egg, adds the occasional dash of salt, slurps mahogany tea lightened with thin lemon slices. Is this it? Vera thinks, her own cup balanced on the arm of her upright lawn chair. Is this what it comes down to, all the struggles and aspirations, all the desire, heartbreak, frustration, accomplishment, the busyness of life lived at a frantic pitch of boredom and fury, violence and joy? An egg, a cup of tea, the perfect slice of toast.

“You want more?” she asks when Solange scrapes the last shred of egg white out of the shell.

Solange licks a bit of jam off her finger. “No. It was divine.”

“Want some music? I could bring the radio,” Vera offers, suddenly shy, as if Solange’s suffering has extended her friend’s horizons, placed her on a higher plane of existence where things are simple and sublime, a blurry outline of peripheral concerns around a crystalline center of pain. It is an alien place, a place she cannot go.

“No. There’s nothing I want ̶ ” Solange leans forward, unable to continue, her chest wracked with a fit of phlegmatic coughing that gradually subsides into a throaty rumble. The episode leaves her gasping for breath. “You got a blanket, maybe? For my legs?” she whispers.

Vera takes away the tray. When she comes back, Solange’s head is resting against the back of the chair, her chin turned to one shoulder. A faint blush spreads across her prematurely aged cheeks. She stirs when Vera tucks the blanket around her. “You’re a fuckin’ angel,” she murmurs.

Vera goes into the house. She drops the crumbs and eggshells into the composting bucket, waters the ivy with the last of the cooled tea, runs hot water over the dishes, and weeps.

***