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WHAT THE OLDEST SON NEEDS
It was Tuesday night when Blake cut off his left hand. There was the expected 911 call, the ambulance, the hospital and surgery, the family being contacted and rushing in to find out why and how and where.
Blake's father said, deadpan, "Why in God's name would you do something so stupid?"
"It was an accident, Dad, really," Blake lied. He was 41, recently fired from his factory job, the seventh firing in the last 20 years. His marriage was floundering and he saw into the future the way people see underwater when they open their eyes. "But I'm glad you came." It shows you care, Blake thought. It shows I mean something.
"Blake, you're an idiot, you know that? When are you going to grow up?" Then, his father walked out of the hospital room, shaking his head. Blake thought he heard the word 'asshole.'
A month later, Blake accidentally sliced off his right leg with a table saw. There was no way to save it, to reattach it, so the doctors did what they could. He was in the hospital for two weeks and then sent home with crutches.
His father forced the psychologically testing. In fact, Blake was institutionalized for monitoring, extensive therapy, psychiatric treatment and counseling. They assumed there were other reasons for these so-called accidents, but nothing of consequence came out. After 30 days, Blake was released and given a visiting nurse three days a week. By then, his wife had moved out and filed for divorce. His one son, Roger, 19, had moved to New Orleans on a whim. On the phone, his father said, "So what next? Your dick? Your ear? Why not just kill yourself and get it over with?"
"Do you love me?" Blake asked quietly. He closed his eyes.
"Hell, I'm your father. I have to. But get your head on straight. There's nothing more I can do for you."
"Will you come and visit?"
"And do what?" His father's voice was rising, turning red. "Push you around in a wheelchair? Blake, you're damn nuts."
"Just come over and we can sit and talk, you know, watch a ballgame, drink some beer." Blake's heart was in his throat, lodged there so he couldn't breathe, and he coughed twice to send it back down.
"No. I don't have time right now. Your mother and I are going golfing. Something you can't do anymore." He hung up.
The next morning, Blake cut off his other leg. Then he cut off his head. It rolled around on the garage floor before coming to a stop on his left ear. Now, he'll have to love me, Blake thought. He'll hold me in his lap and we'll drive out into the country so we can see the fall trees turning yellow and orange and red. Blake waited for his father to come. He knew it would be soon. He smiled and sang a little song, looking sideways out the garage door, counting the vertical red bricks of his neighbor's house.
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