Thirty-Seven Read online

  We reached a small outcropping of rocks. One climbed halfway up, then reached his hand back. I didn’t want to touch him but I put my arm out anyway. We climbed on top of a boulder. We stood there overlooking the house and the river, a view I knew he’d paid millions for.

  “Sit, sit,” One said.

  I sat. The granite dug into my skin through my jeans. One sat next to me. He didn’t say anything. Men never said anything in my presence; their silence was the sound of sins being committed.

  “I come out here to think,” One said.

  I nodded, waiting for him to continue. He didn’t, at least not for a long while. A woodpecker with a red back hammered its beak into a dead pine.

  “You have acted on the faith that our family here has something to offer you. Something you are not receiving at home. I’m sure you have questions; this is only natural. I will do everything in my power to answer your questions as Honestly as I can.”

  He looked at me. I pretended to be looking at the woodpecker, but was really just trying to avoid eye contact.

  “What are they sick with?”

  “We are sick with selfishness forced upon us by a society that cares nothing for a single one of us. However, if you are asking the cause of our portrayed physical symptoms, the answer is Cytoxan, a nitrogen mustard alkylating agent used to treat various forms of cancer, as well as select autoimmune diseases.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “A form of chemotherapy.”

  “Because they have cancer?”

  “Because sickness bears Honesty.”

  “So there’s…”

  “Physically speaking, no, there is nothing wrong with us. We are voluntarily undergoing chemotherapy. We are breaking down our physical, emotional, and spiritual selves in order to free ourselves from the shackles of everything we know. We are rebuilding ourselves among a loving family of our own choosing. We are trusting people who have experienced the same struggles. We are building Honesty. We are creating Truth.”

  I nodded. I had kind of quit listening. I needed to get away from this guy and from the rest of these freaks. I stretched my back, hoping it signified my intention to leave.

  “But what is it you really want to know?” One said. “What aren’t you asking?”

  I shook my head. I pretended to be struck with a thought. I said, “Can’t you die from this?”

  “That’s a risk we are all willing to take.”

  “Where did everyone come from?”

  “Families of origin do not matter.”

  “Oh.”

  “Take, for instance, your own. Your father, whom you were out fishing with the other month.”

  I could feel One’s stare.

  “I know he’s done things,” One said.

  I glanced to my left. One’s face was a carving etched in golden Basswood.

  “My father—we don’t talk about our previous selves here, except, of course, when we’re introducing a new family member to our way of life—was a sick man. Alcoholic. Abusive, in every way imaginable. We grew up dirt poor because he couldn’t keep a job. When I was eleven years old, I watched him strike my older sister with a wrench. She fell, hitting her temple on the corner of the table. She died three days later in the hospital.”4

  One paused. He took off his wool beanie. There wasn’t even the hint of stubble on his bald head.

  “So I know what it’s like to need to leave. I know what it feels like to have an ideal of family in your head juxtaposed to your actual family.”

  I was about to tell him that my father had never touched me. The words gurgled in my throat. I coughed.

  “I know what it’s like to keep secrets. I know what it’s like to feel responsible for hateful actions. It was my fault my sister died because I’d somehow made my father mad, he only touched me because I had been stupid to walk around the house in my underwear. This list is endless. All of it misguided attempts to gain control over the uncontrollable. All of it selfish. Counselors and shrinks will tell us the same thing. They’ll say it wasn’t our faults, our abusers were sick people, we are victims, which is true, but does us no good. Why? Because there is nothing more comfortable than the role of victim.”

  I nodded.

  “And once we really embrace that role, entrenching ourselves as hapless bystanders to others’ abuse, we will seek it out in every relationship we ever have. We will manifest this same dynamic. We will pass it to our children. We will bear victimization.”

  The sun had set but the sky was still light, or at least not dark.

  “What we are doing here is changing all of that. This isn’t bullshit psychotherapy or some crackpot religion, this is fundamentally changing the people we are. Scientifically, we are different people after chemotherapy. Emotionally different. Spiritually different. There is no way to be brought to the brink of death through the destruction of ourselves, only to be nursed back to health through a loving family of our own choosing, and not be a different person. A person who, above all else, leads with Honesty.”

  I was scared.

  I was scared because I didn’t want to experience pain and because these people were completely crazy and because I didn’t want to return home and because some of what he said made sense.

  “We are free to leave at any point. We are free to do whatever we want. But most of all, we are free of our pasts.”

  I was fifteen.

  I was fifteen and scared.

  I was fifteen and they called me Thirty-Seven.

  I was fifteen, unsure of anything, entitled to the notion of happiness and love, terrified I’d done something to elicit my father’s masturbation in my doorway, petrified I’d done something to force my birth parents to want no part of me.

  “This is the most heroic journey a person can ever take,” One said.

  “What?”

  “The journey from Self to Other.”

  I wasn’t sure what this meant but I nodded anyway.

  “Let’s try something,” One said. “We know you are scared about being here. We all were. That’s natural.”

  “Okay.”

  “We want to give you some reprieve from the pain you are in. Does that sound like something you would want?”

  “For sure.”

  “This is a single drop worth of easement compared to the ocean of tranquility you will eventually experience.”

  I looked up. One smiled. The sky was finally dark behind him; the edges of his face were sharp in contrast.

  “I need you to tell me three things. In telling me these three things, I need you to be as Honest as you possibly can. Try your best to leave your answers unfiltered. Reach as deep as your current self will allow for Truth.”

  “Okay.”

  One scooted toward me. Our legs touched. He leaned forward and down, pushing the side of his head near my face.

  “Speak directly into my ear.”

  I’d been right about One being some sick bastard and this cult being crazy. He was going to try to blow me. If I’d wanted that, I could have simply stayed home and dropped a hint.

  He asked me about my first love. I brought my lips near his ear. I told him. He asked me what my favorite memory was. I closed my eyes and tried to be Honest and I didn’t recoil when my lips grazed the soft blond hairs lining his ear. And then he asked me my biggest regret and my lips were pressed firmly to his ear, my tongue making contact with his cavern on certain stressed consonants, and something was happening, something I couldn’t explain, something inside of me, something with lightness, something with colors bursting across my closed eyelids, something with warmth and pleasure and being one hundred percent grounded in the moment—the slightly painful granite, the earthy tang of pine, the crispness of sudden shade—and I felt something wet against my lips and thought it was coming from One’s ear, but soon I realized it was mine—my tears, my tears as I told another man the three largest forces keeping me in everlasting servitude to a broken worldview of Self.

  On
e turned to me.

  He cried as well.

  He reached behind my head and pressed his forehead to mine. We kept our eyes open. My body was a thousand versions of post-coital humming. He didn’t have to tell me he was proud. That I’d done well, that on some fundamental level, he loved me. And likewise, I didn’t have to tell him I would stay, that I’d been searching for this my entire life. That I was ready to take this process to the next level, my fear of needles and sickness nothing in comparison to the intoxicating feelings of inclusion and vulnerability and love.

  3 Dr. Turner kept asking why I joined The Survivors until I told her about my father. Then she changed her question: “What catalyzing event occurred the night you ran away?”

  4 Dr. Turner snuck in Henry O’Connor’s Dr. Sick: The Survivors and The Day of Gifts, and allowed me to read it. She said it would help “dethrone” Dr. James Shepard once I learned the truth about his actual life. I read all five hundred pages in a day. I believed most of it. In the second chapter, after the sensationalized semifictional opening of how O’Connor envisioned the murders, it stated that James Shepard grew up as a single child on Fifth Avenue in New York City, his father a leading hedge fund manager at Goldman, his mother a socialite, a cousin through marriage to the Rockefellers.

  7. CYTOXAN

  We had to wait two weeks before we started our treatments. I protested and said I was ready and everyone shook their heads, told me this was a decision not to be taken lightly. They said it was wise to be around the suffering. They said it was important to read the literature of what Cytoxan could do. But they told me this in a kind way with brotherly and sisterly concern. I felt left out but not excluded.

  I read that Cytoxan could cause infertility. That it could lead to acute myeloid leukemia. Hemorrhagic cysts. Bladder cancer. I read about lowered white blood cell counts and infections that could take lives. Hair loss. Vomiting. Diarrhea. Fatigue.

  I helped as much as I could.

  I helped with the laundry. I helped with vacuuming. I helped scrubbing vomit-crusted buckets. I helped by being there and being healthy and having energy.

  I watched IV drips being administered. One had been a doctor, an oncologist in his previous life. That was how he knew what to do and that was how he had money for the amazing house and that was probably why he’d decided on chemo as a tool for bearing Honesty in the first place. He’d been around it; he’d administered IV bags full of poison to people who knew they were going to die. He’d seen the benefits of a complete stripping of Self.

  I gave a sponge bath to Five, a woman of thirty who made me think of alien abductions. She was attractive in a strange way or maybe it was just her voice, so soft, everything a whispered secret. We sat on the floor of the smallest bedroom. It was just her and I. She removed her clothes and I felt bashful and she told me not to be embarrassed. I apologized. She told me not to apologize. I ran a loofah over her shoulders. Her clavicles were entrenched foxholes. Her nipples hardened underneath my sponging. The only hair she had on her body was underneath her arms. She told me it was okay to look. I nodded. She told me it was okay to have feelings of lust; it was dishonest to pretend they weren’t there.

  I would go on walks in the afternoon. Sometimes I would go with the others. With them, I’d walk slowly. I’d offer my support over rocks. I’d tell them they were doing really well. When it was just me, I’d go quickly. I’d work up a sweat and sometimes I ran and I wasn’t sure why—I wasn’t a huge fan of any sort of physical activity—but it felt right. I’d work up a sweat, my pulse thundering in my ears, my legs going numb, and then I’d finally stop. I’d look out over the mountains that were now my home. I’d pretend I was suffering an attack of symptoms. I’d imagine myself sick. I’d envision myself getting better.

  My time with One became sacred. It was like he was everywhere at once. He seemed to understand exactly who needed him the most. I’d round the corner, and somebody I knew was close to giving up would be crying in his arms. Time after time, he sought out the ones in need. He had his fingers to the pulse of the entire family. And when my mind started to stray, thoughts about this being so crazy gaining momentum, he’d find me. He’d ask me to take a walk. We’d go to our boulder. I’d tell him my fears. We would put our foreheads together. He’d tell me I was doing well. That he was proud.

  Two weeks came and went and I was still there in the mountains of Marble. People smiled when I walked into rooms. I felt useful. I learned how to fold hospital corners. I knew Cytoxan was a carcinogen. I knew there was more than a slight chance of the drug causing my death. I’d held a knife above my wrist two weeks before, forty-nine to fifty-one percent suicide or running away. The hypothetical pain seemed like a treat; everything was theoretical. One asked if I’d made a decision. I told him I had.

  That night, the thirty-seven of us gathered around a fire. I knew how hard this was for certain people in the midst of agony, but they did it, not complaining, that pinch of a pain-racked smile. I was nervous, but more excited. People congratulated me. People rubbed my back. People kissed my cheek.

  One stood up. We all watched. The flames illuminated half of his face. He didn’t wear his beanie. Half of his head shone. He talked about this being the most special of nights. He said it was the most heroic action a young man could take. He said the universe bringing me to their door was proof that their way of life was gaining momentum. He looked at me. I had to fight back a smile. He said, “Thirty-Seven is poised for greatness. The capacity for Honesty in him is as immense as I’ve ever seen. Inversely, so too is his capacity for deceit. It is our job as his loving family of his own choosing to guide him in this transition. We must be diligent in feeding only his wolf of Honesty.”

  I nodded. One stared. I wondered if I was supposed to do something.

  Finally, One said, “Thirty Seven, I speak for all of us when I say that we love you more than we love ourselves.”

  People clapped.

  I smiled.

  He motioned for me to stand.

  I did. We stood next to the fire, encircled by thirty-five others. He took my head in his hand and pressed his forehead to mine and I loved the whites of his eyes. He said, “Are you ready to destroy yourself?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you ready to change the world?”

  “Yes.”

  He let go. I felt pressure against my back. Five stood there. Her eyebrow ridges were smooth. She walked in front of me. She unzipped my sweatshirt. She guided my arms out of the sleeves. She took the bottom of my T-shirt and pulled it upward. I felt like a little boy being undressed. I wasn’t sure what was happening. She undid my belt. She unzipped my fly. I thought of my father. She helped me out of my pants. She wrapped her fingers under the elastic of my boxers and I felt nervous and slightly excited and then I was naked and I was embarrassed because I had an erection but nobody laughed.

  She took hold of my left arm. She turned it so my wrist faced the sky. Her hands trembled against my skin. I knew she was tired and sick and maybe this wasn’t a good idea and I was so scared. One approached me with a needle. It was my turn to shake. He wiped the crook of my elbow with an alcohol swab. He didn’t wear gloves. I watched a needle go into my skin. He slipped a different device into my arm. He held a drip bag of some sort. Five took it, holding it above her shoulders. The tube was connected. Everyone stood and clapped and the fire crackled and I wasn’t cold anymore. I felt sickness enter my body. I still had an erection. Everyone was so happy for me. I was happy for me or maybe I was simply happy.

  8. SICK (I)

  The violence with which I vomited at three the next morning burst a blood vessel in my left eye. It was completely red, not a sliver of white. There was nothing inside of me; there was always more to come out. I cried. Somebody rubbed my back. My body expelled poison. Again and again and again. The reprieve between vomits was less than a minute long. The grape Pedialyte was the worst taste I’d ever ingested. My body forced the lining of my stomach out of my mo
uth. I cried even harder.

  9. OPTIONS

  I don’t worry about money. At least not really, not like the rest of the world. There are several reasons. First, I was given a “transition settlement” by the government. This was decided upon when I became anonymous in exchange for my testimony. It’s not much—food stamps, medical insurance, two years’ rent in Section 8 housing—but it provides the basics. I simply have to meet with a probation officer once a month, stay out of trouble, and remain anonymous in regards to The Survivors.

  The second reason I don’t worry about money is because I don’t want for much. Sure, I’m a human in the world and am slowly growing the material covets of the masses, but certain beliefs have attached themselves to my most primal strands of DNA. One always said money was not the root of people’s problems; it was the misguided belief system that happiness came through addition rather than subtraction.

  Thirdly, if I ever find myself in a desperate situation, or if I somehow experience a radical mental rearrangement, I could become a multimillionaire overnight. How? Break my anonymity. Agree to interviews. Sell my soul to one of the major studios. I don’t see this ever being a viable option, but it’s exactly that, an option.

  I once read something about options having a negative effect on people’s happiness. I believe this. It probably correlates with what One said about subtraction rather than addition. But the article also said something about not having options. If a person does not have a single option—this in itself is a falsity, because there are always options—then he experiences an even greater amount of unhappiness. I guess this makes sense too.

  Sometimes my life seems like nothing but options. I have nowhere to really be and no one to be accountable to. I could do anything. This thought often fills me with dread. Sometimes I long for structure. Sometimes I wish an underpaid guard would bang on my metal door and tell me to wake the fuck up. Sometimes I wish I knew the first half of my week would be occupied with vomiting and cramps so severe I prayed for death, then two days of fatigue, then two days of dread awaiting my next treatment.