used to say. He’d been a little frightened at first, but once the pain let up he didn’t care one way or the other. He wondered if that was how Creaky’d felt. Or Helen. He just didn’t want to die in Texas, that was all. He just wanted to go home.
He passed out again, and when he woke up in the Rio Grande Regional Hospital in McAllen, what he thought he remembered was the Russian lifting up his shoulders so that Norma Jean could slip her trunk underneath him and pick him up and lay him down gently in the bed of the pickup.
He tried to explain to the doctor the next morning: about trying to swim against the current in the Rio Grande, about straining to turn the valve that opened clockwise instead of counterclockwise, about the chicken vindaloo he’d eaten for lunch at the Taj Mahal, about the sensation of being shot in the chest, about the importance of the wedding … But the doctor wasn’t listening.
“You’re lucky to be alive,” he said. “You’re lucky we’ve got one of the first CCUs in Texas.”
“What’s a CCU?”
“Coronary care unit.”
“What’s the diagnosis?” Rudy asked.
“Myocardial infarction.”
“Why can’t you just say ‘heart attack?”
“Because your heart didn’t ‘attack’ you,” the doctor said. “I’m going to give you a prescription for an oral arrhythmic and nitroglycerin tablets.”
“What’s ‘infarction’?”
“It’s a blockage. Your hearts not getting enough blood. If you exert yourself too much, or get too worked up, especially after a heavy meal, then boom, you’ll find yourself lying on the ground again. Your blood pressure will shoot way, way up and you’ll develop diastolic hypertension.”
“Avocados are supposed to reduce the risk of heart attacks,” Rudy said. “Cancer too, and diabetes.”
The doctor looked at him over the top of his glasses. “You need to watch your diet,” he said. “No smoking. No alcohol. No rich foods — and that includes avocados. You don’t want to clog up those arteries: no bacon, no sausage, no eggs, no butter,
no cream, no driving for at least a month. The main thing is to keep calm. No emotional excitement. No conjugal relations.”
“No conjugal relations?” Rudy said. “I’m not married.”
“You’re wearing a ring.”
“I
was
married.”
“You know what I mean,” he said.
“What about the nitrogen fertilizer?” Rudy asked. “Could that have something to do with it? We got a couple of sacks of nitrogen fertilizer in the barn left over from last winter.”
The doctor shook his head while he wrote something on his clipboard. “You’re barking up the wrong tree,” he said.
Rudy didn’t say anything. He didn’t
like
hospitals — who does? — but he’d never really
minded
them. He’d had his tonsils out, and he’d been hospitalized once for pneumonia. He’d neverparticularly minded the dentist either. You went with your mother; you looked at a magazine. And whatever was wrong was taken care of. He hadn’t even minded the shots, not the way his daughters had. In his arm or in his butt, it didn’t matter. The doctor’s office in St. Joe had been right in the doctors house, and on their way home Rudy and his mother would stop at the drugstore in Stevensville to pick up a prescription and Rudy would order a cherry phosphate. His mother would have something too. It was hard to remember. He did remember spinning round on a stool. But then when Helen got sick … it was different.
In and out of the Passavant Pavilion at Northwestern Memorial Hospital on Huron Street, right on the Gold Coast. Dr. Arnold in his office saying there was nothing more they could do. Helen had smoked for years, but it wasn’t lung cancer that killed her. It was leukemia — attacking her lymph nodes, liver, spleen. She took a kind of perverse pleasure in that. At least they
— Rudy and the girls — couldn’t say “we told you so.”
“And if I don’t?” Rudy asked the doctor — back in
He passed out again, and when he woke up in the Rio Grande Regional Hospital in McAllen, what he thought he remembered was the Russian lifting up his shoulders so that Norma Jean could slip her trunk underneath him and pick him up and lay him down gently in the bed of the pickup.
He tried to explain to the doctor the next morning: about trying to swim against the current in the Rio Grande, about straining to turn the valve that opened clockwise instead of counterclockwise, about the chicken vindaloo he’d eaten for lunch at the Taj Mahal, about the sensation of being shot in the chest, about the importance of the wedding … But the doctor wasn’t listening.
“You’re lucky to be alive,” he said. “You’re lucky we’ve got one of the first CCUs in Texas.”
“What’s a CCU?”
“Coronary care unit.”
“What’s the diagnosis?” Rudy asked.
“Myocardial infarction.”
“Why can’t you just say ‘heart attack?”
“Because your heart didn’t ‘attack’ you,” the doctor said. “I’m going to give you a prescription for an oral arrhythmic and nitroglycerin tablets.”
“What’s ‘infarction’?”
“It’s a blockage. Your hearts not getting enough blood. If you exert yourself too much, or get too worked up, especially after a heavy meal, then boom, you’ll find yourself lying on the ground again. Your blood pressure will shoot way, way up and you’ll develop diastolic hypertension.”
“Avocados are supposed to reduce the risk of heart attacks,” Rudy said. “Cancer too, and diabetes.”
The doctor looked at him over the top of his glasses. “You need to watch your diet,” he said. “No smoking. No alcohol. No rich foods — and that includes avocados. You don’t want to clog up those arteries: no bacon, no sausage, no eggs, no butter,
no cream, no driving for at least a month. The main thing is to keep calm. No emotional excitement. No conjugal relations.”
“No conjugal relations?” Rudy said. “I’m not married.”
“You’re wearing a ring.”
“I
was
married.”
“You know what I mean,” he said.
“What about the nitrogen fertilizer?” Rudy asked. “Could that have something to do with it? We got a couple of sacks of nitrogen fertilizer in the barn left over from last winter.”
The doctor shook his head while he wrote something on his clipboard. “You’re barking up the wrong tree,” he said.
Rudy didn’t say anything. He didn’t
like
hospitals — who does? — but he’d never really
minded
them. He’d had his tonsils out, and he’d been hospitalized once for pneumonia. He’d neverparticularly minded the dentist either. You went with your mother; you looked at a magazine. And whatever was wrong was taken care of. He hadn’t even minded the shots, not the way his daughters had. In his arm or in his butt, it didn’t matter. The doctor’s office in St. Joe had been right in the doctors house, and on their way home Rudy and his mother would stop at the drugstore in Stevensville to pick up a prescription and Rudy would order a cherry phosphate. His mother would have something too. It was hard to remember. He did remember spinning round on a stool. But then when Helen got sick … it was different.
In and out of the Passavant Pavilion at Northwestern Memorial Hospital on Huron Street, right on the Gold Coast. Dr. Arnold in his office saying there was nothing more they could do. Helen had smoked for years, but it wasn’t lung cancer that killed her. It was leukemia — attacking her lymph nodes, liver, spleen. She took a kind of perverse pleasure in that. At least they
— Rudy and the girls — couldn’t say “we told you so.”
“And if I don’t?” Rudy asked the doctor — back in
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