Ghosts of Manhattan: A Novel(53)

“Jack, what are you doing?” It’s a stupid question. I know he’s not choosing to do anything right now. Something’s very wrong.

He lets out a muffled yell of pain and his knees buckle. His grip on my shirt pulls me down too, and I lower him on his back and I’m on top of him.

I look up and see a few dozen people standing around us, open-mouthed. “Call an ambulance!” I look back down and Jack is red-faced, eyes clenched closed and barely breathing. I’m not sure he’s breathing at all and it actually crosses my mind how much I don’t want to give him mouth-to-mouth. It might have to be me. We’re practically spooning and nobody else is within ten feet.

Jesus Christ, I don’t want to be here. “Does anyone know CPR?” I think it’s twenty chest compressions, then a breath. Or fifteen compressions. Maybe I’m supposed to tilt his neck to clear the airway. “Any of you idiots know CPR!”

“Nick, I called an ambulance.” It’s William.

“Good.” I look down at Jack. There’s shallow breathing. His eyes are watery and open in little slits. “Hang in there, buddy.”

He starts to speak. I can’t hear a voice. It’s more like he’s shaping his breath into words. He brings his right hand up to clench my shirt too and brings me closer. We’re nose to nose with about four inches to spare. His breath seems to be coming a little easier. I can tell he’s already had a few drinks.

“Nick. Tell my wife I love her very much. She knows.”

“What?” I have an image of standing over Jack in a casket holding hands with a woman I’ve never laid eyes on before, telling her how much Jack really loved her and how he spoke of her often.

“You’re right. Screw that. She’s a pain in my ass and she’s my ex-wife anyway.”

“What!” He’s clowning around with his last breath.

“Seriously, Nick.” He tightens his grip and brings me closer. We’re down to three inches from touching noses. He’s grimacing away the pain. “If I don’t make it, talk to my kids. Tell them something nice about me. You can do that.”

I think I can. I may have to get creative. “Sure, Jack. You’re going to be fine, though. Stop talking and try to breathe slowly.”

I’m pretty sure you give CPR only if the person isn’t breathing, so I think I’m in the clear for the moment. “Where’s the goddamn ambulance!”

“Two more minutes, Nick.” It’s William again.

“Hold on, Jack,” someone shouts from rows away, and this starts a ripple of encouraging words from dazed-sounding voices.

“Does he need some water?” William is trying to help again. He feels like he’s part of the rescue team.

“William, I don’t know what the hell he needs. Just clear a path for a stretcher.”

William goes about this, parting the ring of people and walking the shortest route to the elevators just as one opens and three paramedics come running out.

“Follow me,” William yells, feeling very involved now. They all run up, and I roll away from Jack and watch seated on the floor while they check Jack’s vitals and get ready to move him. They’re fast and decisive and relaxed. They’ve obviously seen a lot worse than this.

In a moment, Jack is up on the stretcher, wheeled to the elevator, and gone. I’m still sitting on the floor by my desk. Everyone is still standing around in a looser formation of the ring they had been in while Jack was on the floor. They’re shocked and everyone is talking in whispers.

Most of the people are like kids having watched their sports hero fall with a career-ending injury. I feel more like the player one locker down who’s been taking the same steroids for the last ten years.

I’m still sitting on the floor with my legs straight out. Ron walks over and offers a hand up. I take it without thinking or looking and he pulls me over and into my chair.

If I can’t find the fearlessness to make a change, maybe I can find the fear of not making a change.





19 | THE DIARY


January 27, 2006

I’M RATTLED BY JACK’S HEART ATTACK AND HAVE been leaving work early. Today I cut out for home instead of a bar and I notice Julia’s bag for the gym isn’t in the usual place by the door. I’m excited to be at home on a weekday afternoon, like a child skipping class and being in a place he shouldn’t be but no one knows. I go to the kitchen to fix a drink.

When problems at home get truly bad, a perspective takes over to remind a person that these are the most important problems to solve. I can’t get this off my mind, and if I can’t get it off my mind anyway, I may as well be at home. I told William I had a client lunch and left. Just by being at home, I feel I’m working on making things better.

I go in the living room and sit with my drink resting on the edge of the chair armrest and my fingers only loosely around the glass. I look at the remote control for the TV on the coffee table in front of me and decide to leave it there. Now I just want to sit.

I swirl my glass, trying to get the ice cubes to move in an orbit. I’m making an effort to think through issues but I can’t find the starting point for any one of them.

I finish the drink and wipe the sweat from the bottom of the glass onto my suit pants. I drank fast enough that there wasn’t much. Once I’ve had two or three, I can slow down my drinking, so I go back to the kitchen to fix another before changing out of my suit. I make it with more gin and less tonic this time, since the gin is already getting harder to taste.