Will Baer - Hell's Half Acre

I find Molly in her bedroom, reading. She has changed into black leather pants and an impossibly small, transparent T-shirt that says pornstar across the tits. I stare at her.

What? she says.

I don’t like those pants. You look like Jude.

Why don’t you suck my dick?

That’s nice. Now you sound like her.

I’m sorry, she says. I’m just trying to get a handle on my character. I don’t want her to be too passive.

Uh-huh.

What do you think? she says.

About what?

My character, she says. Do you think she’s tough enough?

I close my eyes. Do I think Molly is tough enough? No, not really. Molly is too neurotic and fragile. Molly is sweet but there’s something ghostly about her and you get the feeling she’s not gonna make it.

Molly stares at me.

I’m sorry, I say. This thing with the kid is making me…uneasy.

Did you see him?

Yes.

How is he?

He’s a nice kid. His name is Sam.

Is he okay, though?

He’s scared. What the hell do you think?

Molly hesitates. I think he would break my heart.

There is an incessant grinding noise coming from down the hall and suddenly I don’t want to talk about the kid anymore. I have a powerful urge to rip off my own head. Or Molly’s head. The grinding noise is slowly but surely eating into my spine. I have a beauty of a headache, a whopper. I push through the silver wings to the bathroom and commence to root around in Molly’s medicine cabinet for pills. The grinding noise is louder in the bathroom. It’s coming through the pipes, it’s echoing. I want a muscle relaxer, something in the narcotic family. I want a big glass of whiskey but I don’t care to wander around the house anymore so I eat a Valium and two aspirins and chase them with a chewable vitamin C.

What the fuck is that noise? I say.

What noise?

That grinding noise down the hall.

Oh, she says. Huck and Jeremy are constructing something in the dining room. We’re shooting the dinner party scene in a few hours.

Fabulous. I sit in the green chair and close my eyes. Then open them. What dinner party scene?

Molly frowns. I think it’s one of the new scenes John added to the script.

Brief, awkward silence. What color would they be? says Molly.

I hold my head. What color would what be? I say.

Those Nazi lampshades. Do you think they would be pink or yellow?

What?

You know. The Nazis made lampshades from the skin of death camp victims, supposedly.

I stare at her, helpless. What the fuck are you talking about?

It’s a line from a Sylvia Plath poem.

Okay.

Do you like poetry? she says.

No. I don’t like poetry.

Why not?

I don’t know. Because I’m empty inside. Because I have a headache.

But you’re such a good kisser.

Have you been talking to Jude?

No, she says. Why?

Because Jude has a funny theory about murderers and poets being the best kissers and now I wonder if you and she are only pretending to dislike each other.

Molly stares at me. Are you a murderer?

I have never kissed you, I say.

Anyway, she says. Pink or yellow?

I don’t understand this conversation.

Molly rolls over and stares at me. I’m reading lines from the script. You and I have a scene later where we discuss Sylvia Plath.

Oh, I say. Of course.

Molly smiles at me and she looks so sweet and normal I feel insane. I cover my eyes with my hands. I try to crush my eyes into my skull.

Are you okay? she says.

No, I don’t think so.

Molly sighs. I think John just wants us to go mad and kill each other.

Long beat.

He’s succeeding, I say. And those lampshades would definitely be yellow.

The grinding noise stops, mercifully. Then immediately resumes. I light a cigarette and notice that my hands are twitching.

I don’t know, says Molly. I think they would be pink.

Molly, I say. I have to get out of the house.

The grinding?

The grinding.

Let’s go somewhere, she says.

Do you want to go shopping with me?

Where? she says.

I explain that I want to get the boy some action figures, that if he has his own little army of five-inch superheroes to wreak imaginary mayhem with, maybe he won’t be lonely. Molly kisses me, a quick darting kiss on the mouth and I remember something my redneck baseball coach once told me, perverse but true. Be kind to dogs and children, he said. Women love that shit.

And so we take the motorcycle across town to a Toys-R-Us.

It’s an American afternoon, by god.

The parking lot is a shiny wasteland of family cars and minivans and I wish the sun were not so bright. I wish the sun would fuck off for a while. The statistics claim that people in the Northwest kill themselves at a much higher rate than those in any other region, presumably because of the endless rainfall. But it seems to me that the opposite should be true, that the unfortunate souls who are confronted day after day by the glaring sun would be the ones most likely to reach for the sleeping pills. The sun is neither flattering nor sympathetic. The average American is afflicted with some combination of bad skin and bad hair, bad posture and bad shoes. Bad habits and bad genes and bad taste and bad fucking luck and the sun seeks out such flaws with the cool, detached efficiency of a sniper.

Just ramble down to the beach on Labor Day weekend. Take a good look around.

Once inside the store, I relax a bit. There is music in the air-the theme song from the recent Winnie-the-Pooh movie featuring Tigger, a happy wacky little tune about the semi-charmed life that is just perfect for bouncing and therefore perfect for Tigger. But the lyrics are not so cheerful, however. I may be ignorant about contemporary poetry, but it seems to me that the song is about the perilous highs and lows of being a crystal meth addict. And this puts a smile on my face. I turn to Molly and she too is smiling. It is one of those goofy moments that needs no words and I feel like my head will soon be in a box.

I take Molly’s hand and we literally scamper through the place. Down the gloomy aisle of stuffed animals waiting to be loved and past the freakishly pink Barbie aisle, then past the brightly colored plastic swing sets and sandboxes shaped like turtles and bumble bees. Past the gleaming rows of bicycles and tricycles and red wagons and midget electric cars. Turn a corner and come upon the action figure aisle. I stop and suck in my breath with reverence. This is a kid’s promised land.

Molly laughs at the expression on my face.

I reach for a shopping cart and start loading up on little role models. Explaining to Molly as I go that Batman is indispensable. The Dark Knight, baby. Spider-Man is a nerd and talks a lot of trash but he has the coolest powers. Wolverine is your ultimate psycho and what kid doesn’t want adamantine claws. The Silver Surfer is the mad philosopher, the cursed poet, Hamlet on a magic surfboard. And then there’s Ghost Rider. Obscure as hell but I was always partial to him because he has a flaming skull and he’s not always a nice guy. Ghost Rider is sometimes a bad guy, and this is an important lesson for a kid to learn. I pass over Superman because he was such a bore. He was like the president of the student council. And he hung out with Aquaman, over there in the Justice League. Now there was a worthless ninny if ever there was one. Aquaman talked to the fishes. He was handy during an oil spill or a tropical storm, maybe. But if somebody was robbing a bank, where the fuck was Aquaman?

Women, says Molly. What about some women?

Of course. I immediately reach for Catwoman.

Catwoman? says Molly. The femme fatale from hell?

Or heaven, I say. It’s just a matter of perspective.