2008

YouCan’t Pronounce It

Some descents thrill more than others. Landingat Charles de Gaulle is not thrilling, as it’s one of those major metropolitan airports tucked away from the city in a waythat prevents worthwhile aerial views. In Cairo, depending on your point of origin, if you sit on the lucky side of the plane you might see thepyramids at Giza brushing up against desert on one side andhigh-rises on the other, as if the pyramids were digitallysuperimposed instead of the oldest structures there. Arriving at LAX, if you’re traveling west, from New York, say, you might have to wrapyour head around snow-capped mountain ranges, smog-blanketed valleys, and the glinting Pacific before touching down. When the pilotannounced their descent into Charles de Gaulle, Desiree looked out the window, expecting to see what? The Eiffel Tower, maybe. She saw nothing so spectacular. Deep browns and greens, the blank gray of cement apartment buildings.

They had taken a red-eye from Los Angeles. The cabin was quiet, and most shades were drawn. Nolan slumped a row ahead. His arm had drooped over the aisle-seat armrest for most of the ride, liver-spotted knuckles grazing the tube of light on the floor. Desiree had hardly slept, and when she did she felt guilty, jolting upright and peeking between the seats to check on him.

Now, at landing, her grandfather coughed. An uncomfortable cough, because it made others uncomfortable, reminded them of mortality. Anyone within earshot felt culpable. Should they pat him on the back? Call for help? Offer water? A wheezing, hacking, full-bodied affair that prompted a biological anxiety, like riding an elevator with a very pregnant woman. An awareness that something, some type of above-and-beyond compassion or physical contact might be required of a stranger toward another stranger. He brought his handkerchief to his mouth, and Desiree watched it come away dry. She decided to break an unspoken rule about how he liked to be treated in public: she handed him her half-full water bottle. He put the bottle in an unsteady grip, fingers curled tight around the cap, and drank with unsteady hands.

‘I missed the little breakfast?’

He lifted the inflight menu up to his face. Still mostly smooth, save for the hairs that sprouted from the flesh-colored mole on his right cheek. His nose, beakish, kissed the cardstock.

‘Like half an hour ago.’

‘Mm. Shoulda woke me up.’

A week of firsts: first trip with just her and Nolan, first time sitting in business class, with its obscene amount of space for each seat, seats that reclined flat into little cots, and attendants plying her with food throughout. By the time she’d relented and booked their tickets, it was either business or a later flight, and Nolan wouldn’t hear about any more delays, so here they were, on his dime. Her first time, and she was the only brown face on this side of the curtain. She suspected others thought her to be some sort of nurse escorting Nolan, who appeared to be an elderly white man. She was sort of a nurse, kind of. In any case, there were free cocktails, as many as she wanted, and a comforter softer than the one she used at home.

Every morning, beginning two years ago, she’d rub alcohol on his lower abdomen, secure a piece of butter-colored flesh between her forefinger and thumb, and try to be quick and neat with the needle. It marked the beginning of a new kind of intimacy for the two of them. When his weight dropped, she moved to the flap of his withered biceps, where the blue veins showed through, and finally to the underside of his thigh, where the skin was pale and pliant as biscuit dough. Six months ago, as she helped him put on his socks, she saw a black patch of skin just beneath his heel. No bigger than a kumquat. She reached for it, palm upward, and Nolan jerked his foot away, curled his long toes into something like a fist. His eyes were vacant, but his mouth trembled. Desiree, who had not cried in at least five years, sat back on the floor and wept.

Prior to him needing help with insulin injections, they had lived together like a couple who’d long ago stopped touching each other but had never bothered to separate. They said good morning and good night when the occasion arose, sometimes ate meals in the same room, and discussed unavoidable household matters, such as needed repairs. Nolan would not admit he needed help. He treated Desiree’s return home like an imposition, refusing to hire someone to clear a space for her among the old tennis rackets, pool noodles, and a Ping-Pong table in the back house. She spent the first month back home covered in cobwebs and dust from making space for herself. Three years later and he was still acting surprised and a bit shy to see her at the breakfast table in the morning, as if he anticipated her leaving any day, as if he hadn’t come to depend on her for meals packed away from the restaurant where she worked, as if he even kept a datebook anymore and could keep track of his own doctor’s appointments.

Another airport observation: if the surrounding city has a decent black population, then a good number of them will be working at the airport. A dark-skinned, long-limbed young man whose nametag read