War by Candlelight: Stories

a strong dead man

Rafael’s father started to die in March. By summer, it was nearly complete. It came upon him all at once, a summer storm brewed from a cloudless sky, and rendered him — in quick and cold fashion — a ghost, a negative image, weak and formless, a fourth cup from a single bag of tea. Rafael watched in muted horror as a succession of strokes reduced his father ever further. Nearly dust by the end. He learned that life makes us older frantically, that time does not always pass in an even cadence, but sometimes all at once: that we can age — months, years, decades — in a single day, even a single hour.

For Rafael, that hour came on a Sunday in June, the day of his father’s third stroke, just at the end of the school year. He was sixteen. Outside, music swept off Dykman Avenue. A throaty bass from each passing car drifted into his family’s third-floor apartment. Aunts and uncles and cousins had arrived, making all the sounds of grieving: whimpering, crying, whispering, laughing so as not to cry. The curtains were pulled, but through the thin fabric Rafael could make out the brick wall just beyond the window. There was another apartment, another life just beyond that. The room where he sat was dark and hot. Suitcases lay open. The last stroke had come that morning as they were planning to travel home to Santo Domingo. Rafael felt the skin of his thighs sticking to the plastic covers of the sofa cushions. In the next room, his mother slept at the foot of her bed, an unthinking, drugged sleep. His aunts spoke about him and his father as if Rafael could not hear.

“Poor thing. They took him away almost dead. He couldn’t recognize his own wife.”

“Did the boy see it?”

“He was here the whole time. He hasn’t said a word since.”

He hadn’t. Rafael had begun to understand that life bends you, forms you, creates the spaces you fill without hope or interest in the particulars of your plans. He had none. His mother got a sleeping pill after she cried and cried, her eyes and face nearly bursting with red, all tears and sweat, but Rafael was quiet and said nothing and so he got nothing and was not spoken to. This is it, he thought. Life is bending me. His aunt Aida paced nervously in the small room. “Dios mío, it’s hot,” she said. He didn’t answer. She pulled back the curtain, but no light came in.

Whispers. A door. His cousin had come. From the hallway, a voice.

“What happened?” Mario called. The heels of his dress shoes rapped against the wooden floor.

Aida, his mother, hugged her son tightly and told him, “A stroke, papito. They took your uncle to the hospital…” She couldn’t finish. Her breath seemed to run out on her and she was left only with sobs. Mario consoled his mother while she cried. Rafael could tell that Mario’s eyes hadn’t yet adjusted to the peculiar twilight of the apartment; his cousin squinted behind metal frames. I’m here, Rafael thought, on the couch. Can you see me?

From the kitchen, another aunt appeared with a plate of white rice and habichuelas. “Eat, Mario,” she said. Steam rose from the warm plate, but Mario shook his head. Aida pulled away, wiped her eyes with a pink paper napkin.

“And Rafael?” Mario asked. His voice was concerned, but calm. “How is he?” He turned to face his cousin, looking blankly at the wall beyond the window. “Are you all right?”

Rafael shrugged. Mario’s question was warbled and scratchy, like a voice from behind glass. Mario turned back to his mother. “I’ll take him. He should get out of the house. I’ll talk to him.” Aida sighed. The room was full of silences. Mario motioned to Rafael, and he rose quietly. They walked down the long hallway, closing the door softly behind them.

They wandered west on Dykman to the river, to the park where Rafael had seen his only dead body. This was years before, seventh grade, twelve years old and loud, in a pack of friends six deep. They had stared off the pier at 208th Street, three in the afternoon, three-thirty, the bridge to the south, an escape, to the north, the river, green and wide and beautiful. They had gazed across the Hudson, at the wooded bluffs of Jersey, spotted with white mansions peering out among the trees. “Damn, who lives there?” Patrick Ewing, they decided, or someone else rich and famous and young.

Amir saw it first, drifting against the rocks beneath the pier. “Oh shit! Look at that shit!” he yelled. They got down on their knees to see. Rafael, Jaime, Carl, Javier, Eric, and Amir. None would admit they were afraid. Carl lived in Grant down on 125th, but he went to school up in Dykman because his mother worked at the hospital. “He looks like a Spanish nigga,” Carl said.

The body’s skin was brown, a shade or two lighter than the river itself.

The body wore only a pair of black shorts.

The body’s back was rippled with muscles. Rafael thought to himself, That’s a strong dead man, and the idea made him laugh, so he said it aloud. “That’s a strong dead man.”

“Well, somebody must’ve been stronger.”

Amir was the funny one. They laughed, and Rafael felt good. He was new to the school and made friends only by accident: on the walk home, by lockers that faced each other, at desks that sat side by side. Friends had never been easy.

“He’s got a damn plastic bag stuck on his foot.”

“That’s fucked up.”

“That shit ain’t right.”

They stayed at the pier, talking, until the conversation moved away from the body, and soon they were all seated, their legs dangling off the edge. They remembered him only when the Circle Line passed, gliding down the river, a boat full of tourists waving and taking pictures. “You think they can see him?” Rafael asked. His first instinct was to run.

“Naw, they’re too far. There’s no way,” Amir said.

Then Javier waved back because Javier was like that and Carl and Amir laughed at him and called him a pussy. “With my arm, I could hit that boat, no doubt,” Carl bragged, and Rafael smiled, though he didn’t believe him. Beneath them, the body came and went against the shore. They glared at the Circle Line and none of them knew why they hated that boat so much.

Mario and Rafael didn’t stop at the pier. Instead, they found a place to sit at the fields, letting their eyes wander as the games unfolded before them. The day was bright and clear, the park brimming. A man carried a wooden board pegged with colorful balloons. A Chinese couple laid out bootleg videos on a blanket spread on the grass. So many bikes whizzed by that the ground itself seemed to move — a giant conveyer belt this island — and the only ones still were Mario and Rafael. They sat in the sun between fields, where they could watch two games at once. Mario had bought them both sodas, and the games slid by as they sipped from straws, their plastic bottles pimpled with condensation. Rafael was glad to be outdoors.

He could tell how tired his cousin was. His slacks and dress shoes looked out of place, he had unbuttoned and untucked his shirt. Mario’s hair was black and unruly and should have been cut weeks ago. Everyone was always saying that he put in too many hours — he’d come from work that very day. But to Rafael it seemed exciting to have tasks to complete and people who depended on you. Mario had gone to college and worked in a bank now, something with computers. He called them systems. He was ten years older than Rafael.

For a long while they said nothing and were comfortable, the bright day being so far and so different from where they had come. Then, slowly, they were talking, Rafael surprised that they could speak of something else. They wagered as to who would get on base. Mario had the science. “You size up the hitter,” he said, “by taking in the complete picture. Don’t be fooled by his physique.”

“The whole package?”

“Fat don’t mean he can’t run and skinny don’t mean he can’t hit. Look for confidence. The way he carries himself, even between pitches.”

They eyed a hitter as he came to the plate. His uniform hung off him, a little too big, enough to highlight the thin arms and puny legs that carried him. He was fidgety, adjusting and readjusting his cap. The pitcher waited. “He’s gonna strike out,” Rafael said. “He’s nervous.”

The batter kicked his left cleat up against the barrel of the bat; a tiny cloud of dust materialized and then vanished. Mario nodded.

The first pitch came in high, but he chased it, nearly falling over in the process. There were some snickers from the opposing team. The hitter took his time, a few mock swings, before getting back to the plate. He looked lost already. The next pitch sailed by him, a called strike. 0–2. Mario nudged his cousin. “Good call. He’s done.” Rafael smiled. The hitter called time and, taking off his cap, looked sheepishly toward the dugout. Half his guys were already getting their gloves on. None of them would meet his gaze. The pitcher smelled blood. The hitter stepped back in, got in his stance. The pitch was a good one, but the swing was all wrong, defensive, tenuous. He popped the ball high toward first. He didn’t even run.

“Damn. Good call,” Mario repeated.

They watched a few more, and some surprised them. A little rail of a man slapped a double, driving in a run. An overmatched pitcher got a slugger to ground out. Before long, Rafael found himself rooting for the batter, even though he had been a pitcher in Little League. He saw no contradiction in switching allegiances when the teams switched sides. Rafael loved the way a pitcher’s face dropped at the crack of the bat or the way he followed the ball’s long flight into left field with a look of resignation. “Do it!” Rafael shouted. “Run, run!” he yelled. “Beat the throw! Slide!”

After a while the sun got too strong, and they walked past the soccer game to the next set of diamonds where there was shade. It seemed like the whole world was in the park, everyone pitting themselves and their skills against each other. Rafael was not an athlete, hadn’t thrived in competition. His Little League glove now collected dust in a corner of the room he shared with his sister. It came back to him, though, the smell of it, the slant of the shadows on the field, the simple rules he had once played by. He never hated his opponents, could never convince himself he did, and had wondered on the mound, holding the ball in his sweaty palm, if the batters hated him. Rafael rattled easily, took each hit personally. A fielding error turned his stomach to knots — are they sabotaging me? my own teammates? — and by the eighth grade he had lost interest in playing. He threw weakly, or thought he did, but missed that feeling of pure joy when, after throwing hard and fast for hours and hours, his arm became jelly, throbbing and nearly glowing. There was something wonderful there: every tendon stretched, a vague tingling. Is that what it feels like, Rafael thought, what my father felt? After the first stroke in March, Rafael had sat with him, watched his father and the confused way in which he observed his own limbs. “I’ll be okay,” his father had said, but he had no movement in his left side. His eyes darted from his son to his own useless arm and back again. “What’s going to happen?” Rafael had asked.

“I’m getting better. This is just a small thing,” his father said. He forced a smile, and Rafael believed him.

Mario and Rafael hung on the fence by the northernmost field and watched a pitcher bully his way through a couple of innings. He threw like a monster, strictly heat. Fastballs from an abbreviated windup, tight with scarcely a kick of the leg. Boom against the catcher’s leather. Hitter after hitter watched pitches go by, the ball slapped solidly against the mitt. His teammates cheered him on. Nobody could get around on his fastball, and the smugness of him was too much. He was killing them. He wore a little mustache that he stroked between pitches, and smiled cruelly when a ball went foul, as if he was surprised the batter had even made contact. Rafael bristled at his arrogance. He wanted to see him hit, could imagine it: a drive up the middle, driven hard to the thighs, to the stomach, to the chest. Why not?

Mario liked him. “This kid can throw,” he said.

“He’s a dick.”

“He’s good, Rafael. That’s it.”

Rafael was aware that they had been at the park and out of the house for over an hour now and had not shared a single word about why they were there. It was better this way. He felt no particular need to speak of it, to speak of his father. It was happening. He was at the hospital, or perhaps they had brought him home by now. Or perhaps he would never leave the hospital alive. He thought of his mother, asleep, calm for the first time in weeks.

She had no interest in ever waking up.

“I could tell you a story, Rafa, but I’m not sure you’d even believe me,” Mario said, breaking the silence. He took off his dress shirt, draping it over his head. “It’s too bizarre, almost unbelievable.” Rafael didn’t answer him, but only looked on. Mario sighed.

“Whatever…I was ten. We lived on 181st. I liked to ride my bike all over the place, I mean all over. Down to 116th, to Riverside, all around Dykman. Me and some kids rode all the way to Yankee Stadium a couple of times. I mean, we just loved to go places, see things. My moms couldn’t really keep an eye on me, she was working and all, so I was sort of left to mind myself. I did all right, not great but all right. We were good kids. Then one day, I’m out and I’m alone and I’m riding by myself, and I swear to God, I’m there just cruising down the sidewalk, and there’s a shot, and before I have time to look up — you won’t believe this — this body has landed on me. Fell from the second floor, third floor — what do I know? A man. Straight knocked me off my bike. I swear to God! A fucking body. Straight knocked me over. I didn’t even look at him. I didn’t even breathe. I got back on my bike and rode and rode and rode, don’t know how I got home, but I did. Then I put that bike away and started playing video games, kid. Full-time. I mean, I got fat. You couldn’t get me out of the house, I was so fucking scared. I mean months. I watched TV and played video games and never got on that bike again.”

Mario sighed, laughing, shaking his head. Rafael just stared. It was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard. “You ever told anybody?” he asked.

“Naw. Not my moms, not a soul. No one would have believed me. I don’t know why I just told you…,” Mario stammered, “but I did. And you can do what you want with it. Fuck it, forget it.”

Rafael shook his head. “Can’t forget that, cousin.”

He thought of the body he had seen, not even a hundred yards from where they sat. Rafael had never told anyone either. He thought of the plastic bag clinging to the man’s foot and was suddenly ashamed. His mind curved down a spiral of dark thoughts, but he turned away, stopping that chain of memories cold. Instead, he smacked Mario playfully. “You look like a fucking habibi with that shirt on your head!” Mario laughed his big laugh and Rafael smiled, eyes closed against the sun.

All dead men don’t fall from the sky. They don’t all float down the Hudson and come to rest against smooth moss-covered rocks at the water’s edge. Some of them are your fathers, your uncles. Some of them lose the battle slowly. Some die hating the world. Rafael wondered what his father was thinking or if he was at all anymore. Beyond the trees, there was shimmer: a glaze of hazy sunlight hung over the water.

They sat in silence a while, submerged in the sounds of the park. The game ended and another began. It was a joke, all of it. Nameless, faceless dead. Bodies raining down on city sidewalks, throwing children off bicycles. They’d been gone for hours now. The breeze picked up plastic bags and candy wrappers and carried them off to the river. From there they would ride to the ocean. It was time to head back. There were still hours of light left, but in Rafael’s apartment it would be dusk. In Rafael’s apartment they would be waiting for news and his mother would still be asleep. He would come home and they would tell him nothing. And this would go on for two more days before they would tell him the only thing he didn’t want to hear. Rafael saw his father then, extinguished, his skin sallow and ashen, his arms at his side. They buried him. A week later, the family was home again, under an empty Caribbean sun, receiving condolences from people with faces and names Rafael didn’t recognize. The Spanish they spoke slipped off their tongues too fast, and he couldn’t be sure of what he heard and what he misunderstood. It was like a dream. On the tenth day, his mother’s sleeping pills ran out and he fell asleep to the muffled sound of her sobbing. He thought of his father. Every minute of every hour, he thought of his father, and of Mario and the park. He thought of the water lapping over the dead man’s body, and the plastic bag around his foot. He thought of bodies falling from the skies. He wished he had been there to see the body fall. He wished he could have been there to catch him. To hold him up. To look him in the face and say, “Live! Live! Live!