The Cave Dwellers, Christina McDowell [ap literature book list .TXT] 📗

save you, I’ll give it to an ‘innocent’ man so that I feel I’ve contributed to the world. Stop acting like a fucking martyr when you only care about yourself. It’s sick.”

Bunny flings her arm up in the air, knocking over a paper cup on a metal hospital tray. “Oh, I’m sorry, are you talking to me or to yourself? And I’m not sick, you’re the one who’s lying in a fucking hospital bed!” Bunny tries to hold in tears.… “I can’t do this anymore, I don’t want to do this anymore.”

“Fine,” Billy says, his chin quivering, holding back tears.

Carol opens Billy’s door and enters holding a Styrofoam cup of coffee. There are dark semicircles under her eyes. “What’s going on in here?”

“Nothing. Bunny was just leaving,” Billy says, looking at Bunny.

Bunny wipes away a tear. “Hi, Mrs. Montgomery. I—I’m sorry, I have to go.… Lovely to see you.” Bunny brushes past her and out the door.

Carol walks toward the empty chair. “What just happened? I could hear yelling from down the hallway, William.”

“Nothing, Mom, it’s fine.”

“Everything is not fine. You have embarrassed this family and your girlfriend has gone storming out of the hospital. You better get your act together—for your father’s sake, for my sake. For this family. We are going through enough. How could you be so selfish, letting this happen?”

“It won’t happen again.”

“Well, if West Point finds out about this, we’re in big trouble. Big trouble.” Carol checks her watch. “I’m going to go see when we can get out of here, this is ridiculous. What are they giving you?” She walks over to the nightstand. “What is this, water? I’m going to go get the nurse.” Carol turns away and stands in the doorframe. She stops a nurse in the hallway: “Excuse me, we’re ready to leave now, please unhook my son. I have to be on the road in an hour.”

“Where you going?” Billy asks.

“To the farm.”

“Why? Is Dad going with you?”

“No. He’s requested to speak with you alone tonight. And I need fresh air—Excuse me!” She tries to flag down another nurse. “Oh, and I saw your tattoo. Say your prayers tonight that I haven’t told your father.”

Billy throws his head deeper into the pillow and closes his eyes, wishing that for once, his mother would protect him. Would find the courage to use her voice instead of hiding behind her husband’s.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Exhausted, Billy steps into the old rickety elevator. No one ever uses it except Bunny when she sneaks over in the night, but Billy feels compelled to get inside, in a masochistic sort of way, as if he might find her waiting there for him saying, Sorry, I didn’t mean it. He wonders if this time the elevator will get stuck, God’s way of punishing him, or maybe the cables will finally snap and he will plunge to his death. Instead, the elevator wobbles to a halt, releasing him into his childhood bedroom. Billy flips over a photograph sitting on his bedside table, of Bunny with her arm around his neck, kissing his cheek on the bleachers of the baseball field. Half of an Adderall pill crushed like children’s chalk is inside the bedside drawer; he presses his pointer finger on top of it so the chalky material sticks to it, then licks it, swallows the remainder without any water. This is what he thinks he needs to prepare him for the beating he’s about to take from his father.

The beeping sound of the intercom startles him: “William?”

“Uh, hi, Dad.”

“Come down to my office.”

“Yes, sir.”

General Montgomery’s office is covered in historical memorabilia, a wide range of social sectors: his great-grandfather wearing a newsboy cap, proudly holding a shovel in front of a coal mine as though becoming a crown prince. Wooden frames full of cursive and presidential stamps and coats of arms. Three-pronged candlesticks along the brick fireplace mantel, a ticking grandfather clock, and a photograph of the general holding Billy as a young baby in front of a new warplane, a grin on his face. A cross hangs above his desk where he spends the majority of his time when he’s not traveling. A random portrait of Queen Maria of England from 1634 hangs over the fireplace, which may or may not have been left by the home’s previous owner, an African diplomat. A wooden vintage airplane propeller given to the general as a gift upon his nomination from a friend at the Pentagon rests in the corner.

The general carries his glass of scotch from his desk to the Chesterfield sofa and takes a seat. A chair sits empty across from him.

A knock at the open door. “Dad?” Billy tiptoes in like he’s regressed to boyhood, afraid of his father’s rage.

“Sit down.” The general does not look up but gestures his glass in the direction of the leather chair opposite him, just far enough away to inhibit real intimacy but close enough to be within range of his intensity. The green Tiffany lamp on his desk provides the dim light, the wooden shutters on the bottom half of the windows closed for privacy.

“Yes, sir.” Billy takes a seat.

“Your grandfather loved this country,” the general says, somewhat nostalgic, which in the moment feels confusing for Billy as he so rarely sees it. “He survived a plane crash in the line of duty, and do you know what he got in return?”

“Uh…” Billy flounders for an answer because he knows he won’t win; he thinks it’s better to be silent than to be wrong.

“He got nothing. Do you know why?”

“Um—”

“Because the country, let alone the world, didn’t owe him shit. And not once—NOT ONCE—did he ever complain. That is the definition of a man of honor. A man who at any cost and without any promise puts his country first—that’s what I learned from him. That’s what I’ve always tried to do… at any cost.” The general takes another