“I don’t believe you. . Who de hell is dis?. . Okay. No, tomorrow I go to New York. Next week I come. Tell me your address. Okay. Six o’clock next Wednesday. Okay.”
CUT to Milo walking down the dimly lit hallway of a shabby rooming house. The odor of poverty fairly leaps at us from the screen: a gut-rippling mixture of urine, beer and cabbage. So thick is the layer of filth on the walls and floor that Milo’s hand hesitates before touching the door knocker. The door opens a crack; a bleary eye peers out; a chain is removed; Milo steps into the room.
Smaller than he, the man reeks of whisky, decayed teeth and ancient sweat. His apartment seems to have seen neither daylight nor a duster in decades. . Thank God for images, Astuto; thank God we don’t need to cast about for words to describe the place. The stench and strangeness are so overpowering that Milo has to consciously will his body to stay nailed to the spot.
“Sit down,” the old man says. “Make yourself at home.”
Milo lowers himself into a faux-leather armchair whose springs whine in protest at his weight.
“So explain to me what you’re talking about.”
“It’s true. I swear it’s true. Cross my heart and hope to die, I’m your da.”
“My fader’s dead.”
“No,” says Declan, ridiculously flexing his biceps. “Look: There is still a bit of life left in these old bones! If I was dead I’d know about it, seems to me!”
“Who de fuck are you?”
“I’m not kiddin’, I’m your da. Look! I’ve got your birth certificate and all.”
Hobbling over to a chest of drawers, Declan pulls out a sheet of paper and waves it under Milo’s nose, then points triumphantly at words on the paper: “See? See?”
But whether because of the dim light in the room or the hubbub in his brain, Milo can decipher nothing; all he sees is the black line of dirt under the old man’s fingernail.
“Noirlac, Milo. Son of Noirlac, Declan and Johnson, Awinita. I’m Noirlac, Declan. I’m your da, see? Neil’s son, seventh of thirteen, right smack in the middle! Didn’t Neil ever tell you about me?”
Milo is thunderstruck.
“I’m the one who named you Milo! I chose your name, I did! In March ‘51, Miles Davis’s Birdland songs were on the radio all the time and I was crazy about them. So I called you Milo, which is Irish for Myles. Given that we’re Irish.”
Silence. Then: “How did you find me?”
“Saw in the newspaper you were livin’ in Montreal again. Called up information on the off chance.”
“In de newspaper?”
“Yeah, look. .”
Declan opens a folder containing a sprawl of newspaper clippings. Torn from the culture section of a recent Gazette, the one on the top includes a photo of Milo and Paul grinning from ear to ear, their arms around each other’s waist. Local Screenwriter Swings Contract with Major U.S. Producer, the headline reads.
“So?”
“So! You’re doin’ good, eh? You’re doin’ fine. Glad to know it, Milo.”
“So?”
“So I thought. . you know. . Me being your very own da and all, and you havin’ come up in the world, so to speak. . doin’ even better than your own da. .”
“I don’t believe it. . Is dat why you got in touch wit me?”
“Well, I admit I thought you might see clear to givin’ your old man a hand. Makin’ him a loan, like.”
Silence. Declan offers Milo a glass of whisky. Getting no response, he sits down and takes a swig directly from the bottle.
“I told your ma I’d maybe ask you for a little help, and she said it was a good idea.”
An electroshock.
“My moder’s alive?”
“Sure. . Why should everybody be dead? We ain’t even old yet. We keep in touch. When you were born, I promised her I’d take care of you and I did.”
“You took care of me? I’m tirty years old, I meet you for de first time in my life, and you sit dere and look me in de eye and say you took care of me?”
“Yeah, you know. . I stayed in touch with the agency. . I always kept track of the foster homes they put you in. . And if I heard your foster parents were beatin’ you too bad, I made sure they moved you somewhere else. . None of that for me! Strangers, hitting my own son! No, sirree! I kept my promise to your mom. .”
“My Indian name.”
“Yeah, Nita gave you a Cree name, too. That’s right.”
“What was it?”
“Huh. . it’s been ages. . Got it written down somewhere. Prob’ly find it in that chest of drawers, if you wanna take a look. Or you can call her up and ask her for yourself. She’s back on the res now, up north. Happy to give you her number, if you can afford long distance calls. I sure as hell can’t!”
“I don’t believe you.”
“She wrote to me last week. Go see for yourself, if you don’t believe me. Letter’s right there in the bedroom.”
Milo rises. As he crosses toward the bedroom in slow motion, Awinita’s voice moves into our ears in crescendo: What ya doin’ in de dark, little one? Come wit me! Come wit your mom!. . Fear noting, son. The sacred is neider above nor below you. . Don worry ‘bout God or de Devil. . Everyting you do is a prayer. . Your Cree name means resistance. You gonna have to resist, little one. You gonna need to be strong. . What ya doin’ in de dark, little one?
In the bedroom: subjective camera, swinging down in a capoeira ginga from ceiling (cracks and cobwebs) to floor (overflowing ashtrays, discarded clothing stiff with filth). The bed hasn’t been made in ages. An upended orange crate serves as a bedside table. On the crate: an envelope.
Milo crosses the room (lightfooted, Indian, his mother’s son). Picks up the envelope. Camera close-up on the clumsy, childish handwriting. Declan’s name and address. . Montreal spelled Muntreal. . Her hand traced these words a mere few days ago. . he’s virtually touching his mother. . Gently, he turns the envelope over. Withdraws the single sheet it contains. Unfolds it. Starts to read. Again we hear Awinita’s voice. . but strange and low and echo-filled, as if from far away.
Hi Mister Clening — Fluid
glad to hear you found your son
Milo refolds the sheet of paper. Slides it back into the envelope. Sets the envelope on the orange crate. Crosses to the door. Turns off the light. Leaves the room. Leaves the building.
IT’S OKAY, ASTUTO. There would have been no point in your actually, physically traveling to an isolated Cree reserve way the hell up north in Waswanipi and meeting Awinita. She was pushing fifty by then, and probably alcoholic and obese. . What would you have said to each other? I mean. . your mother had been talking to you your whole life long. She couldn’t ever leave you.
• • • • •
Neil, 1927
SEVERAL YEARS HAVE passed. We come upon Neil at age thirty-five, sitting at his desk in his new den on the second floor, reading glasses perched on his nose, his red beard now streaked with gray. The bookshelves on the walls around him are empty; at their foot, bearing shipping stickers from Ireland, several crates of books have been opened but not as yet unpacked. Distracted by family noises from downstairs, he is trying desperately to concentrate but getting nowhere.
CUT to the dinner table, later that evening. Present are Marie-Jeanne, hugely pregnant, Neil, hugely despondent, and half a dozen snotty, squirmy little children, up to and including a thin, dark-haired six-year-old girl whose already-bossy attitude designates her as Marie-Thérèse.