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about getting my way?"
"What animal are you this instant? Say it now."

 

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"I'm . . . a Budweiser Clydesdale. I've got big white shaggy feet."
"Where are you?"
Harry let the images flood his brain. "I'm pulling a wagon full of beer through a cobblestone street. Part of a team."
"Now you're going up a steep hill."
"My feet make a lot of noise. My big chest is pulling the wagon up."
"Feel your body," Dr. Toland ordered.
Harry became aware of his tight stomach muscles, his hands curled into fists, his forehead furrowed with effort.
"Hold that tension for a moment," Toland said. "Now the day's work is done. You're in a pasture, lying down with the other horses. Night is falling."
Harry felt his body begin to go limp. He sank deeper into the leather couch. His legs relaxed until his feet formed a V.
"Now you see your mother and brother, wife and children. All the members of your family are slowly walking into the pasture."
Harry could see them clearly. First was Bella, and holding her arm, Mel. They were dressed up like royalty, but they looked sad. "They're all crying," Harry told the doctor. He felt tension return to his body as his relatives filled the pasture, which had sand traps and rolling hills like a golf course. He watched the horde of people arrive until the pasture was tweeded with color like a football stadium on TV. And then his time was up.
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Harry and Mel were having lunch at Duke Zeibert's, a restaurant where people went to be seen and where the owner, Duke, circulated among the tables. Normally, Harry brought in deli and ate it one-handed as he presided over the office hustle-bustle. He liked to eat fast. He looked at the menu. What could he order that would take a long time? Something leafy. Maybe something with bones, tiny bones.
The waiter appeared. Mel ordered a soufflé. Harry ordered smoked whitefish with cucumbers and sour cream.
"I've been thinking we ought to talk to Mama together," Harry said.
"Hmmm," Mel said.

 

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Unlike the rest of the family, Mel talked little. Harry figured this was the result of being in the War, of having seen things that words could not change. The Goldring Boys , that's how they were known. But the two of them were so different. Mel vacationed at a hacienda in Mexico; Harry went to Miami where his overeating was practically deemed a mitzvah. Mel had a future as an alcoholic. Harry imagined himself keeling over on the golf course. Heart. The big heart would just stop.
''You'd think an eighty-two-year-old woman would be starved for company," Mel finally said.
Harry tried to picture Bella in the retirement home, but her figure kept looming out of focus, an expression of terror on her face. "The only people she ever wanted around was the family."
Mel set his fork down. "Suppose I call her? Make it real casual?" He signaled the waiter to bring a phone.
"You're going to tell her on the phone?"
"Mama, how are you feeling?" Mel began. A long silence followed during which, Harry knew, Bella was reporting on the condition of her bowels. "Listen," Mel said. "I want to tell you a secret." Harry perked up. "Your apartment building is going for condominiums. So Harry and I have found you a new place." Long silence. "It's big, sure. Roomy. Harry will take you to see it''he looked over at Harry for a date"next Thursday morning."
Harry couldn't believe it. Snap. Just like that. He had more trouble tying his shoes.
Mel was purring into the phone again. "Oh, Mama, I love you, too." He hung up. "At least she's agreed to look at the place."
"What if she doesn't like it?"
"I'm not a magician."
"Think about it," Harry countered. They both reached for the check.
Moments later, Harry handed his ticket to the valet and watched him sprint into the parking lot. When was the last time Bella had told him she loved him? His car squealed to a halt in front of him. The day of the Japanese surrender. They were listening to the radiohe and Velvel and Bella and Florence. "My