Sacrament

'We're as much in the dark as Will is right now,' he went on. 'He may be in a completely closed down state as far as his consciousness is concerned. On the other hand he may be accessing memories at such a deep level we can't monitor the brain activity. I just don't know.'

'But he could still come out of it,' Adrianna said, looking down at Will.

'Oh certainly,' Koppelman said. 'At any time. But I can't offer you any guarantees. There are processes at work in his skull right now that frankly we don't understand.'

'Do you think it makes any difference if I'm here with him?'

'Were you and he very close?'

'You mean lovers? No. We worked together.'

Koppelman nibbled at his thumbnail. 'I've seen cases where the presence of somebody the patient knew at the bedside did seem to help things. But...'

... you don't think this is one of those.'

Koppelman looked concerned. 'You want my honest opinion?' he said, lowering his voice.

'Yes.'

'People have to get on with their lives. You've done more than a lot of people would, coming here, day in, day out. You don't live in the city, do you?'

'No. I live in San Francisco.'

'That's right. There was talk about moving Will back, wasn't there?'

'There are a lot of people dying in San Francisco.'

Koppelman looked grim. 'What can I tell you?' he said. 'You could be sitting here for another six months, another year, and he'd still be in a coma. That's a waste of your life. I know you want to do your best for him but ... you see what I'm saying?'

'Of course.'

'It's painful to hear, I know.'

'It makes sense,' she replied. 'It's just ... I can't quite face the idea of leaving him here.'

'He doesn't know, Adrianna.'

'Then why are you whispering?'

Caught in the act, Koppelman grinned sheepishly. 'I'm only saying the chances are, that wherever he is he doesn't care about the world out here.' He glanced back towards the bed. 'And you know what? Maybe he's happy.'

ii

Maybe he's happy. The words haunted Adrianna, reminding her of how often she and Will had talked - deeply, passionately - about the subject of happiness, and how much she now missed his conversation.

He was not, he had often said, designed for happiness. It was too much like contentment, and contentment was too much like sleep. He liked discomfort -sought it out, in fact (how often had she been stuck in some grim little hide, too hot or too cold, and looked over at him to see him grinning from ear to ear? Physical adversity had reminded him he was alive, and life, he'd told her oh so many times, was his obsession).

Not everybody had found evidence of that affirmation in his work. The critical response to both the books and exhibitions had often been antagonistic. Few reviewers had questioned Will's skills - he had the temperament, the vision and the technical grasp to be a great photographer. But why, they complained, did he have to be so relentlessly grim? Why did he have to seek out images that evoked despair and death when there was so much beauty in the natural world?

While we may admire Will Rabjohns' consistency of vision, the Time critic had written of 'Feeding the Fire', his accounts of the way humanity brutalizes and destroys natural phenomena become in turn brutal and destructive to those

very sensibilities it wishes to arouse to pity or action. The viewer gives up hope in the face of his reports. We watch the extinction with despairing hearts. Well, Mr Rabjohns, we have dutifully despaired. What now?

It was the same question Adrianna asked herself when Dr Koppelman went about his rounds. What now? She'd wept, she'd cursed, she'd even found enough of her much-despised Catholic training intact to pray, but none of it was going to open Will's eyes. And meanwhile, her life was ticking on.

This was not the only issue in play. She'd found a lover here in Winnipeg (an ambulance driver, of all things); a fellow called Neil, who was far from her ideal of manhood but who was plainly attracted to her. She owed him answers to the questions he asked her nightly: why couldn't they move in together; just try it out for a couple of months, see if it worked?

She sat down on the bed beside Will, took his hand in hers and told him what was going through her head.

'I know I'll be pulled in to this half-assed relationship with Neil if I hang around here, and he's probably more your type than he is mine. He's a bear, you know. He hasn't got a hairy back-'she added hurriedly -I know you hate hairy backs, but he's big - and a bit of a Junk in a sexy kind of way, but I can't live with him, Will. I can't. And I can't live here. I mean, I was staying for him and for you, and right now you're not taking any notice of me and he's taking too much notice, so it's a bad deal all around. Life's not a rehearsal, right? Isn't that one of Cornelius' pearls of wisdom? He's gone back to Baltimore, by the way. I don't hear from him, which is probably for the best because he always annoyed the fuck out of me. Anyhow, he had that line about life not being a rehearsal and he's right. If I hang around here I'm going to end up moving in with Neil and we're just going to get cosy when you're going to open your eyes - and Will, you are going to open your eyes -and you're going to say we gotta go to Antarctica. And Neil's going to say: no you're not. And I'm going to say: yes I am. And there'll be tears, and they won't be mine. I can't do that to him. He deserves better.

'So ... what am I saying? I'm saying I have to take Neil out for a beer and tell him it's not going to work, then I have to haul my ass back to San Francisco, and get my shit together, because baby thanks to you I have never been so untogether in my whole damn life.'

She dropped her voice to a whisper. 'You know why. It's not something we've talked about and if you had your eyes open right now I wouldn't be saying it because what's the use? But Wilclass="underline" I love you. I love you so much and most of the time it's okay, because we get to work together and I figure you love me back, in your way. Okay, it's not the way I'd really like it, if I had the choice, but I don't so I'll take whatever I can. And that's all you're getting. And if you can hear this, you should know

buddy, when you wake up I will deny every fucking word, okay? Every fucking word.' She got up from beside the bed, feeling tears close. 'Damn you, Will,' she said. 'All you have to do is open your eyes. It's not that difficult. There's so much to see, Will. It's icy fucking cold, but there's this great clean light on everything: you'd like it. Just. Open. Your. Eyes.' She watched and waited, as if by force of thought she could stir him. But there was no motion, except the mechanical rising and falling of his chest. 'Okay. I can take a hint. I'd better get going. I'll come visit you again before I go.' She leaned over him and lightly kissed him on the forehead. 'I tell you Will, wherever the hell you are, it's not as good as it is out here. Come back and see me, see the world, okay? We're missing you.'

CHAPTER II

The morning after the incident at the Courthouse Will woke in a wretched state: aching from head to foot. He tried to get out of bed, but his legs replayed their imbecilities of the night before and down he went, with such a shout (more of surprise than pain) that his mother came running, to find him sprawled on the floor, teeth chattering. He was duly diagnosed as having 'flu, and put back to bed, where he was plied with aspirin and scrambled eggs. Sleet had come in the night, and slapped against the window through most of the day. He wanted to be out in it. His fever would turn the icy downpour to steam, he thought, as soon as it fell on him. He'd walk back to the Courthouse like one of the children from the Bible who'd been burned in a furnace but had come out alive; steaming, he'd walk the muddy track, back to where Jacob and Rosa kept their strange counsel. Naked, he'd go, yes naked, through the hedgerow, scraped and nicked, until he got to the door, where Jacob would be waiting to teach him wisdom, and Rosa would be waiting to tell him what an extraordinary boy he was. Into the Courthouse he'd go, into the heart of their secret world, where everything was love and fire, fire and love. All this, if he could only get up and out of bed. But his body was cheating him. It was all he could do to get as far as the toilet, and even then he had to hold onto the sink with one hand and his penis - which looked very shrivelled and ashamed of itself right now - with the other, to be sure he wouldn't fall over, his head was spinning so much. Just after lunch the doctor came to see him. She was a softly-spoken woman with short, white hair, though she didn't look old enough to have white hair, and a gentle smile. She told him he'd get well as long as he didn't get out of bed and took the medicine she was going to prescribe, then reassured his mother that he'd be right as rain in a week or so. A week? Will thought. He couldn't wait a week to be back with Jacob and Rosa. As soon as the doctor and his mother had gone he got up and made his uncertain way to the window. The sleet was thickening into snow, and it was sticking a little on the tops of the hills. He watched his breath come and go on the cold glass, and determined that he would make himself strong, damn it, simply by telling himself to do so.