THE PARALLEL PATHS OF YALE AND ARLO

2. On and On and On

An "Arlo" Story

by Brian Hughes

It’s a brisk and clear winter’s evening in New York City. Patients are being picked up and dropped off in wheel chairs outside New York Presbyterian Hospital. A man of slight build, unkempt black hair and bushy dark beard, sits on a bench just outside the main entrance – sobbing. This man of thirty years is Arlo. He rests his head in his two hands, and with elbows resting on his knees, lets the tears flow; with shoulders bouncing up and down, Arlo tries to catch his breath as passersby gawk; and just when Arlo thinks he has pushed out his last tear, more come – unexpectedly.
The scene keeps playing itself over and over again in his mind: how many times did his mother-in-law say it, with that winning smirk:
“It doesn’t matter … because if something happened to Noa, that would be the end of me Arlo. You wouldn’t have to worry about taking care of me. I’d swallow all the pills down right away.”
“Mom! Stop that! You’re nuts,” he remembers Noa saying, in what seems like a film of someone else’s life; because what is happening right now, this suffering, can’t really be happening.

***************************************************

Some of the best times he and Noa shared together were the glorious days of nothingness in their spacious one bedroom apartment. Arlo thrived on doing nothing; it was a trait he took advantage of and deplored in himself.
Waking up, they would stay in bed a little longer, dreaming about the children they hoped to have, volleying possible names back and forth:
“I’ve always loved ‘Hayden’ as a boy or girl name: What do you think of it?” Noa asks, as Arlo happily rubs a callous spot on the bottom of her foot – a spot that – when scratched – brings her enormous pleasure.
“I see Hayden as a girl’s name … it’s feminine. I just don’t see it as a boy’s name. ‘Hank’ – now that is a masculine name! That is one tough son-of-a-bitch.”
“Sounds like he spends his days hugging a beer in some dive bar. Awful. I should cut my hair: Is it getting too long?”
“No – it looks fabulous, what are you talking about?” Arlo says as her runs both his hands through.
“Shit – we have to pay bills tonight Sleepy.”
Noa called Arlo “Sleepy;” it was her nickname for him. Noa playfully envied Arlo’s ability to go to sleep at the drop of a dime – anytime, any place - while Noa fractured her sleep, mostly getting up to pee three or four times each morning.
Noa and Arlo are lying side by side, holding hands and staring at the ceiling as if it were a canvas in which they could paint their hopes. Arlo happily admits to himself that it feels good to finally feel like an adult when it came to his finances, his new friendships, his job, and especially his soul; it was a long time coming, and Arlo feels it’s finally okay to feel good about it – to bask in it’s well earned glory.
“You’ve done this for me, Noa. Since I have met you, I feel as if the shackles of bachelor-hood, of fear, have been blown right off. I look forward to fatherhood, to the challenges, and I look forward to sharing them with you.”
“Aw … Sleepy …”
Arlo feels child-like, hugging Noa a little further down, snuggled inside her, her arms around his shoulders. There is a security of content there he has never quite enjoyed nor known before.
“What are we going to do today?” Noa asks.
“You mean other than bills?”
“Well, yeah …”
“Absolutely nothing of consequence. We should just stay in, order in, the weather is shitty, watch a DVD, play backgammon, do some reading, catch up on some shit – you know, all of that: What about it? Does that sit well?”
“That sounds wonderful.”
There is a lot Arlo has to do. He desperately needs to catch up on some writing, clean up the bathroom, do the laundry; but after all the years of doing nothing and feeling guilty about it, there is very little guilt now, for in these moments in time, he is sharing the nothing with someone special.

*******************************************

Karen, Noa’s sister, is sitting at her mom’s hospital bedside, as Arlo enters the room. The onslaught of tears have washed the makeup from her wrinkled face. Both sets of eyes are red and swollen. Arlo stands against the wall, one sweatpant leg crossed in front of the other, staring at his mother-in-law, as she fights each breath. Neither acknowledges the other visually.
“Doesn’t she love me? Am I not worth living for?” Karen just stares hard at her mom, who has all sorts of tubes coming out of her. “She has grandchildren who want her in their lives and she goes and swallows these pills ; am I supposed to lose a sister and a mom?” Karen starts to sob, clutching to her damp handkerchief. Arlo embraces her around the shoulders. “What are we going to do without Noa? What are we going to do, Arlo? It’s so painful. I never imagined my baby sister would go before me - and with all my health issues. Why Noa? Why? Why? Why? Why?” Karen buries her face in Arlo’s tan corduroy jacket.
“I can’t think - my mind is just blank. I never realized life could be this sad. I don’t know what I’m going to do without Noa either,” Arlo says, unable to hold back his tears. “I waited so long to find her and she is gone like that. I don’t know what I’m going to do, I just don’t know what I am going to do,” Arlo says, energy fully depleted. Tank empty and gone, caressing Karen’s head.
“It’s not fair, I want her back. I want my sister back. It’s not fair…”
“It isn’t, I want her back to. It’s so painful.”
Arlo kneels down and embraces his sister-in-law, both breaking down, as machines click and beep and a game show host dole out the prizes on a small television hanging off the wall.

*********************************************

An 80s station is playing some classic tunes. Arlo sits on the floor in front of the couch – staring off – sobbing, sniffling, snot pouring forth. He wipes his face and nose on his t-shirt. He doesn’t give a rats’ ass about anything right now. Nothing gets in the way of the overwhelming numbness of loss: late bills can’t disturb it, his passion to finish his book is as helpful as used toilet paper; not even music, a faithful brother to Arlo in distressed times his whole life, can ease the ache that pains his heart.
The phone rings – threatening to wake him to his present reality – but he wants nothing of it, throwing a shoe and knocking it from the stand. Fuck the phone. Fuck everyone. Death to everyone! Arlo does not care anymore - for Noa is gone. He is having trouble remembering all the times they shared together, many joyous occasions; the specifics, the particulars, have faded, and this angers him – punching the rug with his fist.
“There will never, ever be anything like Noa Needleman. She will not grace this earth again and I can’t bare it. It was all so original. How her unique quirkiness brightened up the room. Man … so many people loved her. So many. All of them are in pain tonight, but not like my pain. It could never be like my pain."

**********************************************

Noa is sitting on the floor of their dining room, in her favorite pajamas, sorting through milk crates of presents from her “gift closet.”
“When are you going to stop buying presents for people? At some point, I think, you have to start giving them out,” Arlo says. “There is actual dust on them.”
“I know … I know … I have a problem,” Noa says with a smile, “whenever I see a cheapy gift that I know suits one of my friends, I have to pick it up for them.”
“Then you forget you have them!”
“I know! I’m such a spaz!”
“You’re my spaz, and I wouldn’t want you any other way,” Arlo says as he gets down on the floor and hugs her around, giving her a gentle kiss on the forehead.”
“Thank you Sleepy.”
“I can’t keep from kissing you, especially in those precious pajama’s of yours.”
“A elf came up to me today and said that you were going to rub my feet tonight; is that true?”
“That elf must be reading my mail.”
Noa gives a big, goofy smile – the one Arlo fell in love with at The Bowery Ballroom three years back.
“Yes of course I will rub your cute little feet, Arlo says”
Noa applauds rapidly and smiles.

****************************************************

Rabbi Ableman talks from his desk at The Little Israel Synagogue:
“The Jewish way of dealing with death is one part of a larger philosophy of life in which all persons are viewed with dignity and respect. Our people believe that, even after death, the body, which once held a holy human life, retains its sanctity. Our sages have compared the sacredness of the deceased to that of an impaired Torah scroll which, although no longer useable, retains its holiness. In Jewish tradition, therefore, the greatest consideration and respect are accorded the dead. Jewish funerals avoid ostentation; family and visitors reflect in dress and deportment the solemnity of the occasion; flowers and music are inappropriate; embalming and viewing are avoided; and interment takes place as soon as possible after death.”
“So what you are saying is that I can’t bury her with her favorite stuffed animal and with her favorite sweater, and her two favorite albums and..” Arlo begins to become fraught.
“Calm down, Arlo …” Karen says.
“Jewish law prescribes burial in plain white shrouds to demonstrate the equality of all.”
“Noa, as far as I’m concerned, was not equaled with anyone. She was completely and entirely individual, and the world will never see her like again!”
“We accept our equality and humility in the face of death. Thus, we avoid ostentation and adhere to the same simplicity and dignity for the rich and the poor, the influential and the powerless, the famous and the little known. We face death without masquerade son. The hallmark of our practice is dust to dust.”
“Please don’t make this more difficult than it is, Arlo,” Karen says.
“Then why don’t we cremate her.”
“Bite your tongue!” replies Karen.
“It is against Jewish custom to desecrate the body,” the Rabbi says. |
“But what if I have it in writing that she wants to be cremated?”
“She never said she wanted to be cremated! Stop this right now Arlo! We are having a traditional, Jewish burial and that is it.”
“When was the last time you were in a synagogue? Huh? In all the time I was married with Noa, the only time she went to temple was because of circumstances that were not her own. This whole thing is a sham. No one in your immediate family is religious.”
“Rabbi, would you please excuse us.”
“I hope you’re not planning on burying her on Long Island. I strictly forbid it! Noa despised Long Island.”
Karen and Arlo storm out onto the sidewalk.
“Why are you being a pain in the ass? Aren’t we suffering enough?”
“I don’t want to disrespect Noa. She wanted to be cremated …”
“It’s not happening Arlo – get it out of your mind.”
“I will find it, and if she has it in writing, you won’t have a leg to stand on. A leg to stand on!”
“Aren’t we in enough pain? Are you paying for all of this? Who is?”
“I have Noa’s bank account and I can pay for it all myself.”
“Arlo, be reasonable. Noa was bot mitzvah’d. She wanted to put your kids through Hebrew school. She has a strong Jewish side and it will not be denied.”
“I will find it in writing. I will find where she wrote it down. I will.”
“You’re a shit, you know that? A real shit.”
Karen briskly walks back into the synagogue.
“I can’t do this. I can’t make it. I can’t go on without Noa. I can’t. I don’t have the strength,” Arlo says as he crouches at curbside and begins crying.

******************************************

Arlo walks into their apartment and drops his bag. The welcoming lights of the apartment house across the way beckons him. He keeps the lights killed. Grabbing his binoculars out of the dresser drawer, he zeros in on some locals, carrying on with their lives. I doubt any of these people are suffering through the pain I am right now, while they read their books and do dishes and fumble through laundry bags. I could really use a pair of tits right now. I need a woman to come out of a bathroom completely naked, thinks Arlo as he passes from one window to the next with his voyeur glasses. I will stand here, I will wait, for I have nothing to do, and I have nowhere to go. I am here, with nothing to do, with nothing to love, with nothing to receive love. I am an empty, full-bodied vacuum waiting on you to show me your fucking goods. Come out now, out of your bathrooms, out of your bedrooms, and expose your flesh to me. The real me is the me standing before this window, clutching his cock, waiting for you to disrobe before my binocular eyes.
And then the voice on top of the voice says: how can you engage in this mindless, callous activity, when you have suffered an unspeakable loss? Have you no soul? Arlo drops the binoculars at his side and clutches his face with his hands; a guttural yell follows as he drops his body onto the couch.
The apartment, every corner, contains a memory, a story, every frame and hook: There is the framed Ketubah commemorating their blessed wedding, the tall cd tower from which they plucked the music that soundtracked their lives together; and the tiny, Fisher Price figures created to look exactly like Robert Smith and The Cure, along with the unstable banister that Arlo was just too lazy to fix. I don’t want anything to do with a funeral, with anything, with anything at all. I just want to go, leave – be where no one knows my pain, where I can perhaps start over. How can I start over? She has sustained me and now she is gone. What am I to do? What? Arlo clutches the throw pillow to his face, dampening it with his tears. I have to find where she wrote about being cremated. Yes. I have to do that, there is no time left.
Arlo begins with the small alcove that acted as her home office: spiral notebooks and folders containing receipts, bill stubs, newspaper clippings; Arlo looks through them all, flipping page after page, scanning – nothing. He lifts up pads, looking behind books, sifting through post it notes attached to the wall – nowhere. He turns, feels for his chin, and remembers the lock box she had. He is sure her wishes are stowed away in that little metal box, but where is it? Arlo looks under the bed first, knowing full well it would never be under there. He snatches the step stool and climbs up into the upper shelves of her clothes closet, pushing and parting t-shirts with his hands – scouring behind Noa’s fetish for shoe boots.
I don’t want to be near anyone I know; I know that is selfish, but my heart hurts so bad, that I just want to be in a room alone for as long as it takes – like a withdrawal. I keep playing in my head the moments when she knew she was going to die, that I couldn’t be there to protect her, to hold her, die for her, with her. I don’t know how I am going to deal with me being alive and Noa not being alive. I don’t believe I have the courage to kill myself – maybe. It’s so painful. I just feel as if I’ve been squeezed into this tiny cage of pain, unable to move my arms or legs. I don’t know what to do. I weep openly in public; it is uncontrollable.
And everything is happening so fast – so fucking fast! A few days ago we were talking about what we would name our children, and now I have no plans, no wife, no nothing at all. I wouldn’t wish this pain on anyone. I would rather slowly suffer on the electric chair than have to endure this.
Arlo pulls on the mattress and lets it slip to the carpet – nothing under there. Next the box spring, tearing into the fabric, he finds nothing inside, underneath or around it. He cries. He has destroyed the box spring. Now he has no bed. Great.
In the cupboards above the microwave, Arlo pulls down the can of peas, the boxes of pasta to get behind them, searching, the sauce shattering glass and red stuff on the linoleum: couscous thrown over his shoulder, and walnuts and vegetable oil. Nowhere in the cupboards does Arlo find a document stating Noa wanted to be cremated.
With a roar, and one arm, he lays to waste the dining room table, with its glass vase and dieing flowers, bills, dirty food plates and yellow stickies with important information scrawled all over. It’s over, nothing lasts, the fruit tree, the vase, Noa, nor the apartment. It all dies, it all suffers and hurts, and Arlo is going to have his physical say with whatever stands in his way.
Does it say anything about cremation on the orange plastic bottles in the medicine cabinet? No – well, trashed to the floor it goes. The toilet seat, the medicine cabinet, nor the mirror is spared Arlo’s brutality, as he smashes a bottle of perfume against it.
Taking a kitchen knife to the fluffy, forest-green couch, he searches the inner lining for his answer and comes up with nothing still.
And by the end of two hours, Arlo sits a defeated soul, bereft of Noa, yet left with all the materials of everyday life shattered and collapsed around him.

*********************************************************

Mourners pay their respect by sitting Shiva with Arlo and the rest of he and Noa’s immediate family. They all eat solemnly, mirrors covered up - while Arlo stares off on autopilot, thanking mindlessly those whom have paid their call. He has no desire to head back to work, to be a “sad story” amongst his co-workers, friends and acquaintances. All he wants is to just be a satellite gliding through vast space, not stopping anywhere – circling, drifting. That is his only desire right now.
Maybe I have to go against my core beliefs, he thinks, watching mourners mourn, but not really mourning; perhaps I have to start believing in heaven. Maybe, just maybe it is true. Maybe I’ll see her again there.


Arlo finds himself standing upon the broken steps that lead to the gymnasium of his old Catholic grammar school. A graveled parking lot stretches out behind him. Blue, red and green lights shoot through the crack in the large, metal gym doors, as pop music thumps beyond. Opening the doors, Arlo finds a school social in full swing: seventh and eight graders dancing about, drinking punch, playing practical jokes on one another, and standing mystified before the DJ. Arlo walks the perimeter of the gym, just like he did in the old days – forever a wallflower. It doesn’t shock him at all that he’s walked right into his past, with Ronald Jefferies hanging out with Billy Taben, and the ever popular Jamie Reynolds dancing with sweet Clara Delfinio; and the hall monitors, who were probably mostly dead by now, watching over everything. Miss Scoyak is there – the first teacher Arlo was ever hot for. And the look on Arlo’s face is one of marvel, as he crosses his arms and stands in the shadow, watching all his old classmates dancing with goofy determination. And little Arlo, chubby and self conscious, hangs with a few of his other nervous buddies, happy not to get involved, yet deeply yearning to be popular, to be dancing with the cute girls. Arlo can hardly look at his younger version without squirming. What a site? But on this night, little Arlo will get his chance to be popular for just a little while.
Noa – in her ever graceful, adult form, walks to the center of the dance floor, arms outstretched – beckoning the young tyke to step forward. Little Arlo suddenly has very little fear, as he slowly saunters toward her arms. It’s impossible for little Arlo to envision anyone prettier in the whole entire world. With just a few feet between them, little Arlo leaps forward and allows himself to be enveloped by her comforting arms. A peaceful smile arises on Noa’s face, trying to hold back tears as she smooths the younger Arlo’s hair.
“It seems we stood and talked like this once before,” cries little Arlo.
“It’s going to be okay … shhhhh … it’s going to be okay, Arlo,” Noa says, little Arlo sniffling and squeezing and crying little tears. “You’ll be okay. It’s going to be fine. Shhhh.”
Arlo’s fellow students spread out, grab each other’s hands, and circle the couple, caroling them to a Neil Young ballad.

Read part 1 (a "Yale" Story) - Designed To Die here