was becoming dangerous, and my father’s death meant I had no money to stay in school—and then, in August, Ranko broke it to me that he was being mobilized. I hadn’t even known it was a possibility.
“I cried for two days straight, and I decided I’d go. I had a hell of a time getting out, what with everyone booking passage at once. I went back to Philadelphia, where my mother was, and I taught drawing classes to some insufferable children.”
“But you came back,” Roman said. “All the other pieces, they’re later, right?”
“Yes,” she agreed, and then she launched into a deep, wet cough that rocked her whole body. Debra shot out of her chair and vanished into the kitchen, and Yale stood, not knowing what to do. He’d become used to the PCP cough, a dry bark he’d heard on the streets and in the bars, a cough that made him think of a more medieval type of plague. He remembered Jonathan Bird, Nico’s old roommate, saying, “I just wish that with all this hacking I could cough something up.” Whereas Nora sounded like she was drowning. Debra was back with a paper towel and another glass of water.
Yale stepped into the dining room, signaled for Roman to join. They could give Nora space, at least.
Roman whispered: “He died in the war, right? Ranko Novak?”
Yale shrugged. “I mean, I don’t feel like this story has a happy ending.”
“It’s so beautiful,” Roman said. “Doomed love.”
Yale laughed. “Is it?” And then he couldn’t stop laughing. Which was terrible, because Nora was still coughing and Roman looked hurt. But the moony expression on Roman’s face, his voice, had hit the darkest spot of Yale’s humor. How beautiful, the doomed love! How gorgeous and ambient, the ways we abandon each other! The lovely wars we die in, the poetry of disease! He wanted to be able to call Terrence up, to say, “You were like Romeo and Juliet! Romeo and Juliet die puking their guts out. Tristan and Iseult at ninety pounds with no hair. It’s beautiful, Terrence. It’s beautiful!”
Roman said, “Are you okay?”
Nora’s cough was finally dying down.
“Maybe we should leave,” Roman said.
And then Debra was in the doorway, suggesting the same thing. “This is way more than I should have let her do,” she said. “What about tomorrow?”
It sounded lovely: the guarantee of another night up here, away from the city, away from everyone he knew. If only he could stretch it into a week, and then a month. No posters up here urging him to get tested. He could stay in Nora’s house, send Debra off to live her life.
* * *
—
In the car, Yale said, “If she dies in her sleep tonight, just shoot me, okay?”
“Now that you said it, she won’t.”
The seats were frozen, and the steering wheel sent waves of cold through Yale’s gloves. “I’m not sure I have that kind of power over the universe.”
Roman said, “When you think a specific bad thing is going to happen, it never does. I don’t mean like if you think it looks like rain it won’t rain, but like if you think your plane will crash, it won’t.”
Yale shook his head. “I want to live in your world. Doom is beautiful, and you can control your fate.” Although probably it was a belief system Roman desperately needed. Why mess him up? Yale couldn’t tell him anything the world wouldn’t eventually teach him on its own.
They stopped for a late lunch at the same place they’d eaten the night before, and Yale had the same batter-fried fish plus a couple of beers.
When they walked back into the bed and breakfast, Mrs. Cherry ran toward them, flapping her hands. “Oh it’s terrible, isn’t it? Now, your rooms have NBC and CBS, but ABC doesn’t come in too clearly. PBS you’ll get, too, I think, but you never know if they’ll show the news. I’d try CBS, myself.”
Yale was opening his mouth to ask what she meant, to say they hadn’t been near a TV all day, but Roman was already asking what channel CBS was and nodding in agreement as Mrs. Cherry said again how terrible it was. She didn’t seem that upset, though—it couldn’t have been the end of the world. “Now let me ask you,” she said, “do you fellows drink wine? A young couple checked out this morning, and they left a full bottle right on the floor. Hold on and I’ll grab it.”