Girlfriend in a coma (16 page)

Wendy is concerned about swamping Karen with too much information or too much novelty. As a doctor, she can limit certain things. Richard has been coming in with the annual volumes of the World Book Encyclopedia and teaching Karen about the new years leading up to 1997. He is already at 1989: the fall of the Berlin Wall, the AIDS quilt - Karen must be so amazed at this. And then there's crack. Cloning. Life on Mars. Velcro. Charles and Diana. MAC cosmetics. Imagine learning so much stuff at once.

Karen and Pam have spent some hours sifting through style magazines together; Wendy beamed with pleasure at the sight - so much like the old days. Good gossipy jags: "Oh, and Karen, food is amazing these days. It suddenly got good around 1988," Pam says, making Karen eager to try all the new food trends - Tex-Mex, Cajun, Vietnamese, Thai, Nouvelle, Japanese, Fusion, and California cuisine - "sushi, gourmet pizzas, tofu hot dogs, fajitas, flavored ice teas, and fat-free
everything.
"

Lingering in the back of Wendy's mind, though, is the phenomenon of Hamilton and Pam having stereo heroin nightmares. The nurse showed Wendy the tape of stereo dreaming as well as parallel stalagmite brain readouts. So now Wendy has two medical mysteries on her hands at the same time. Best to keep the video hush. Pam and Hamilton are unaware it even exists. Best to scoot Karen home immediately - away from public intrusion.

Megan enjoys visiting her mother at the hospital, where she helps her flex her arms and legs and fingers. She has never been able to help others, and the sensation is as though she had opened her bedroomdoor and found an enormous new house on the other side full of beautiful objects and rooms to explore.

Megan is relieved that Karen has a good sense of humor and, though older, is technically the same age. "Megan, tell me, all the young girls I see on TV these days dress kind of, um . . . "
"Slutty?"
"Your word, not mine."
"It's Lois's word." Megan giggles. "Lois is from another era where girls had to be doormats. Nowadays we dress for strength. Didn't you?"
Karen ponders her adolescence: "No. I think we felt equal to guys but never more forceful than them."
"I guess that's a switch. Soon we'll have you going to the gym."
"I think I'm a bit far gone for that."
"Crap
Mom."
Megan loves saying Mom with extra vim, as each mention is a small stab at Lois.
Yes, Karen is happy to see that Megan is rebellious - and that she talks back to Lois. Karen had never dared. Megan is also
angry
- at Richard and at her parents and at the world. And Karen is angry with Richard for being so shiftless in helping raise Megan. That's something to be dealt with in the future. Karen is mad and lost and found and bewildered. The new world lies before her eyes like an opened chest of treasure, a flock of birds over Africa, a thousand TVs all playing at once.

Wendy thinks about Karen. Unsurprisingly she is front-page news the world over; a medical oddity, a feature-section story, tabloid grist. Yet the only photo the media have is Karen's old graduation photo. The media have been unable to snap a new picture of Karen; such a photo has become the golden fleece of journalism. There have been attempts to bribe relatives - Wendy herself was approached by a French photographer, Linus by the Germans. Such
cheek.
And to think that Karen never wanted to be photographed even at the best of times - it would be too cruel to exhibit her in such a frail, emaciated state.Friends and family want to protect Karen and her innocence from the modern world, the changes that have occurred since her sleep began. Her innocence is the benchmark of their jadedness and corruption. The world is hard now. The world doesn't like simplicity or relaxation.

The world also wants photos of Megan - the girl who met her dead mother. Dozens of photos of Megan abound, courtesy of her schoolmates. She is the "Lost Child," the "Child of Corpse Born."

In particular, the U.S. news networks have been fearsome in demanding interviews at top
dollar and wide exposure. "Maybe in the future, Richard, but not now." What Karen
doesn't
tell Richard is that she feels the onset of some previously withheld news on the brink of
making itself clear. From where? What? A message from the other side - from the place she
went to for all those years. She needs to wait for the right moment to use it correctly.
18
EXTREME
BODY
FAILURE

Less than two weeks after awakening, Karen is taken home to Rabbit Lane. She has gained two more pounds; Lois changes her diapers and inspects her waste as though Karen were a Chinese Empress, reading meaning into her waste's patterns like tea leaves on a cup's bottom. "Mom, do that somewhere else,
pleeeze."

"Dr. Menger says you can start on solids next week."
"Gee."
"No need to be sarcastic, young lady."
Once home, Karen is both relieved and annoyed by the absent signs of time's passage, by

the same owls, furniture, knickknacks and carpets that adorn the house. Only Megan's room, Once Karen's, gives evidence of time's march: posters of strange young pop stars engineered to disturb parents, unfamiliar and annoyingly provocative

141
garments strewn hither and yon and a plaque on the door made in wood shop: MEGAN'S
SPACE.

Richard spends an inordinate amount of time in Karen's new room, which was previously George's never-used den. At night he sleeps on the floor beside Karen's bed, and sometimes on the bed with Karen. Thus the geography of their lives has become the same as when they were teenagers. The two of them quickly develop baby talk words between themselves and when they aren't together they begin to experience a sweet ache. Their conversation devolves into a secret patois and the two are wonderfully aware that they are in love.

"I look like a telethon child," she tells Richard. "My body may be interesting to others as a science project but that's all. I'm not sexy."
"Well
I'm
head over heels for
you,"
says Richard.
"Toot toot, Beb," Karen says.
"Ick,"
says Megan, overhearing them speak, beginning to feel pangs of jealousy. Megan is allowed to be helpful, and enjoys being so, but between Lois and Richard, she feels the way she imagines a Best Supporting Actress must feel when she loses her Oscar. Megan and Karen have many chats, but they aren't as deep or intimate as her chats with Richard. Karen saves all her intimacy for Richard. How can she jimmy her way inside Karen's heart? Fashion? How pathetic. Dyeing Karen's hair was fun, and the new hairdo is at least serviceable. But that was just a few hours. She must try harder. Food?
Lois
has taken complete charge of both Karen's nutrition and her hospital functions. Lois is blissed out. Even a few days earlier, when a coyote from the canyon made off with the bison friche, Lois took the event with almost cheerful equanimity. "Nature's way.
Sigh.
Here, Karen freshly squeezed orange juice - no pips, either."
Karen jokes with Richard that her bedroom is a jail cell with Lois as warden. "It's her dream situation, Richard. I'm her dietary lab rat. No chance of escape." She bites her knuckles. "There must be something karma-ish about this. I might as well be a newborn."
"We'll break you out of here soon enough."
"As if."

"Don't be so negative."Richard is happier than he's ever been, juggling Karen and his TV work. Hamilton and Pam are happy enough, too, juggling work with Narcotics Anonymous meetings and clinic visits. They live in a bedroom cocoon of un-rewound VCR tapes, rancid yogurt containers, empty prescription bottles, color-coded vitamin jars, half-eaten meals, lipsticked napkins, stained blankets, and half-read magazines and books. Wendy oversees their recovery.

Richard, looking at all of their lives from a distance, sees the recurring pattern here, the one mentioned on a
rainy
poker night months ago - a pattern in which the five of his friends seem destined always to return to their quiet little neighborhood. Karen notices this, too. What she
doesn't
tell Richard, though, is that in a strange way her old friends aren't really adults - they
look
like adults but inside they're not really. They're stunted; lacking something. And they all seem to be working too hard. The whole
world
seems to be working too hard. Karen seems to remember leisure and free time as being important aspects of life, but these qualities seem utterly absent from the world she now sees in both real life and on TV. Work work work work work work work.

Look at this! Look at this'.
People are always showing Karen new electronic doodads. They talk about their machines as though they possess a charmed religious quality - as if these machines are supposed to compensate for their owner's inner failings. Granted, these new things are wonders - e-mail, faxes, and cordless phones - but then still . . .
big deal.

"Hamilton, but what about
you
- are you new and improved and faster and better, too? I mean, as a result of your fax machine?"
"It's swim or drown, Kare. You'll get used to them."
"Oh,
will I?"
"It's not up for debate. We lost. Machines won."

After life has calmed down somewhat - after the initial flushes of wonder have pulsed and gone, Richard waits until he and Karen have the house alone - a cold gray overcast afternoon day hinting at snow but unwilling to deliver."Karen," he gently asks, "do you remember the letter you gave me?"
"Letter?"
"Yeah. The envelope. That night up Grouse. I was supposed to give it to you the next day

unless something happened - which it obviously did."
"Yeah." She mulls this over. "I remember. You never mentioned it. I thought you'd left it
unopened, that it was forgotten."
Richard pulls Karen's letter from its envelope where it has lived for nearly two decades,
removed every so often for confirmation of its existence. "Here." He hands it to Karen.

December
15 ... 6
Days to Hawaii!!!

Note: Call Pammie about beads for corn-rowing hair. Also, arrange streaking. Hi Beb. Karen here.
If you're reading this you're either a) the World's Biggest Sleazebag and I hate you

for peeking at this or b) there's been some very bad news and it's a day later. 1 hope that neither of these is true!!

Why am I writing this? I'm asking myself that. I feel like I'm buying insurance before getting on a plane.
I've been having these visions this week. I may even have told you about them. Whatever. Normally my dreams are no wilder than, say, riding horses or swimming or arguing with Mom (and I win!!) but these new things I saw - they're not dreams.
On
TV
when somebody sees the bank robber's face they get shot or taken hostage, right? I have this feeling I'm going to be taken hostage - I saw more than I was supposed to have seen. I don't know how it's going to happen. These voices - they're arguing
one even sounds like Jared
and these voices are
arguing while. I get to see bits of (this sounds so bad) the
Future!!

It's dark there - in the Future, I mean. It's not a good place.Everybody looks so old and the neighborhood looks like shit (pardon my French!!)

I'm writing this note because I'm scared. It's corny. I'm stupid. I feel like sleeping for a thousand years - that way I'll never have to be around for this weird new future.
Tell Mom and Dad that I'll miss them. And say good-bye to the gang. Also Richard, could I ask you a favor? Could you wait for me? I'll be back from wherever it is I'm going. I don't know when, but I
will.
/
don't think my heart is clean, but neither is it soiled. I can't remember the last time I even lied. I'm off to Christmas shop at Park Royal with Wendy and Pammie. Tonight I'm skiing with
you.
I'll rip this up tomorrow when you return it to me UNOPENED. God's looking.
xox Karen

Solid evidence confirms her fears. "I wrote this. Yes. Didn't I?"
"Okay..."
"And what I say in it is real. It exists. Yes." There's a defiant note to her voice. "I don't doubt you, Karen, not at all." Silence falls between them. Karen fidgets with a Tetris

game Megan gave her to help improve her dexterity. Richard looks at her averted eyes. He asks quietly, "What is it - who are they
them
- whoever?"
"I'd rather not if that's okay. My ankles hurt."
"You
know
who they are?"
She looks up: "I do; I don't. I tried to run away and I got caught. They're not going to let me get away again."
"What do you mean, 'get away'? And who's
they?"
Karen wishes she could be more forthcoming. At that moment Megan bounds into the room, bumping into a chair as she does so.
"Ouch.
Hi kids. Ready for some stretching, Mom?"

Karen is all too glad to have her talk with Richard end. "Sure.Let's go." Richard's stomach flutters; he feels like he's being shipped off to war.

Mom. Lois.
Owls - nothing has changed. Or maybe not. Lois seems slightly hardened, probably the result

of Megan's shenanigans. Lois isn't quite as vain as she once was. The outfits are there but gone is the constant preening. George - Dad - comes home early from the shop. He sits beside Karen's bed, dewy-eyed.

Karen likes 1997 people because they're never boring - all these new words they have - the backlogs of gossip, of current events, and of history.
"What was it
like?"
George and everybody else keeps asking, "What's it
like
to wake up?"
Like?
Like nothing. Honestly. Like she woke up and it was seventeen years later - and her body was gone.
But her answers are consistently lame to deflect them away from darker ideas that are returning to her memory. Her day-to-day memory is fine. Some people from UBC gave her some psychological memory tests. Her memory is as good as the day she passed out. She even remembers the page number of her last algebra assignment. But the darkness? It's taking its time.
She knows people are expecting more from her. A certain nobility is demanded - extreme wisdom through extreme suffering. People tread lightly around her.
"I'm not made of uncooked spaghetti, everyone. Jesus - come a little bit closer, okay? I promise I won't splinter."