The Grammarians by Cathleen Schine

Author:Cathleen Schine
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

TO DO´CTOR. v.a. [from the noun.] To physick; to cure; to treat with medicines. A low word.

—A Dictionary of the English Language by Samuel Johnson

Up the four flights of pea-green steps, unlock the four locks on the pea-green door, relock the four locks from the inside, turn on shower, wait for hot water. I am a human being, Michael said, to himself or aloud, who knew, who cared. I am Michael, Michael Blumenthal, I am a human being, I am Michael …

Daphne banged open the bathroom door and squeezed in. She kicked his hospital scrubs to a corner with distaste, then put her arms around him.

He pressed his face into her hair. You smell good. You are good. Did he say that or think that? Thirty-six hours on call. I am Michael. You’re up early.

“Yes, you are Michael.” She pulled the shower curtain back and gently helped him step into the tub. “Yes, I’m up early—because I’m still up,” she said. “Like you.”

When he got out of the shower she dried him with a large, thin towel. It had a faded picture of a blue and orange baseball on it. It said METS.

“Meet the Mets,” she sang softly. “Beat the Mets…”

She fell asleep as soon as they got into bed, but Michael was too tired to fall asleep. He listened to his Walkman. Laurie Anderson sang “O Superman,” a chant of profundity and nonsense that washed over him like the shower, such a nice, hot shower, such a nice girl who dried him with his favorite towel, soon it would be opening day.

“Hi, I’m not home right now,” Laurie Anderson said, “but if you want to leave a message, just start talking at the sound of the tone ha ha ha ha ha ha…” Michael had put this part of “O Superman” on their answering machine.

One night, when they got home from dinner, Daphne played back their messages and they heard, in her mother’s nervous voice, the next line of the song: “Hello? This is your mother. Are you there?”

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