The Mercy Journals Read Online Free

work to keep up because of my peg leg. I was looking at her face: crow’s feet on the outside corner of her eye, a brown eye with a shot of green; the redness of her lips, not particularly plump but not thin either, with perfect peaks where the trough under the nose makes a wave; her cheek the colour of milky tea—all of it imprinted on me right away. I wasn’t looking where I wasgoing and stepped onto a huge shelf of broken pavement that tilted upward.
    I fell back against the building to my right, face up to the sky, and slid to the ground. Although I was sitting I felt as though I was swimming through the city, but with no idea what was up or down. My endocrine system fired up, adrenalin poured from a gland near my recovered liver, my chest tightened, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up like mowed hay, and my testicles moved up and down like a pair of marmots.
    Since the die-off large shelves of concrete have broken from flooding and from fallen trees, and the sidewalks often look like a madman took a jackhammer to them. Normally I keep my eyes glued to the ground because if I step unknowingly on pavement that tilts, even as little as twenty degrees, I can be catapulted into a state of extreme vertigo. Then I have to crawl home dragging my prosthetic leg behind me and pressing my shoulder against the façades of buildings for orientation. At intersections I pray that a vehicle doesn’t hit me. If a passerby offers help, I ask only that they accompany me across the street without touching me because physical contact can trigger extreme nausea, which makes further movement impossible. The whole scene is hard on the dignity and on my knee. Usually by morning, after a hard-fought night’s sleep, the vertigo will have receded.
    You don’t ever want to meet a woman for the first time in a state like that. She must have continued a few steps, then turned around and come back. She crouched in front of meand I could feel the heat coming at me from her open jacket. I prayed she wouldn’t touch me.
    I’ll be fine in a while, I said. Please, for my sake, go where you were going. I’ll see you tomorrow. Same place.
    Other people came over and two men started to help me up, lifting me under the arms. Let me lean against the wall, I ordered. It will pass. It just takes time. I turned away from them, spread my arms out, and gripped the cement of the wall with my fingertips. I pressed my cheek against its cold stable surface, willing my nausea to pass, willing the world to stay still. My hands tingled. My chest felt too full. I focused on breathing, not deeply, but regularly, regular in, regular out. I waved them away but no one wanted to leave me alone.
    In the end I had to let them take me home. Two men put their necks under my arms and carried me, my head flopping left and right because I couldn’t keep track of which way was up. I told them where my key was, and they got me in bed and insisted on programming their numbers into my mobile. I asked them to get me a damp towel and a glass of water before they left.
    I heard the door to my apartment close. I lay the back of my hand across the bridge of my nose, breathed out, paused, then slowly let the air return. I opened and closed my hands to relieve the tingling. The nausea eased. Then I heard breathing.
    Who’s here? I called out, but I thought I knew. Someone came into the bedroom. I tried to open my eyes but everything was still spinning and lurching. I glimpsed Ruby’s hair, then had to shut my eyes again.
    Have we met before? she asked.
    No, I don’t believe we have.
    Who are you?
    As you see. A dizzy one-legged man.
    Why were you waiting for me?
    I saw you the other day.
    Hmm.
    My nineteen years of celibacy had been effortless and so complete that not even a kiss had brushed my lips.
    What do we do now, Allen Quincy?
    It would help if I could open my eyes without the room hurling itself into every dimension known to man. Could we start over tomorrow?
    I felt her