Tim O’Brien - Northern Lights

In a moment of openness, he told Grace about the sac of black bile he carried around in his belly.

‘You mean pus ?’

‘Black bile. It’s hard to explain. It could be responsible for all this.’

‘You’re sweet,’ she said.

‘Thanks.’

‘I won’t tell the relatives.’

‘Thank God.’

‘But I want ice cream. Otherwise I’ll squeal. I’ll tell them all that you’re loony and carry around black bile in your gut. Maybe the black bile causes your pot.’

‘What?’ He stiffened. ‘I’m exercising. I’m looking pretty good. Look here, don’t you think so?’

‘Yes,’ she smiled.

‘Really.’

‘Tarzan. You’ll look like Tarzan someday, just keep it up.’

‘Seriously. Don’t I look skinny?’

‘Black bile,’ she whispered. ‘Pus gut.’

‘Okay for you.’

‘I won’t tell the relatives if you take me in and buy me some ice cream. Is it a deal? Pus gut.’ She kissed him.

‘You’re a sleeper.’

‘That’s another good idea,’ she whispered. ‘Smothered by ol’ pus gut.’

They drove in and ate ice cream in Wolff’s drugstore. It was Friday night. Wolff was doing a good business. The stores were open along Mainstreet and the August shoppers were out.

Grace held his hand and they walked up the street, the streetlamps were on, Grace looked in the windows. She liked clothes. She tried on capes and sweaters in the J. C. Penney store. Perry stood with arms folded and watched the high-school girls.

She showed him a garment. ‘Do you like it?’

‘I guess. What the hell is it?’

‘A smock.’ Her lower lip dropped.

‘I don’t know. Try it on.’

‘If you don’t like it …’

‘I don’t care, try it on. I’ll tell you then.’

It was tight on her. She was heavy in the chest. She stood before the mirrors, turning. The fabric was filled with printed apples. She put it back on the rack.

Outside, squat women stood with baskets on their arms.

Up and down Mainstreet, boys were driving their fathers’ cars, an elbow out the window, radios on, sniffing the Friday night air. The high-school girls roamed the streets in tight frantic bands, heads together. Perry watched them. Their tiny asses and spangled jeans.

The movie was letting out.

Harvey and Addie were crossing the street. They looked good. Harvey was talking and they were together and holding hands and Addie’s black hair bounced on her back. They both walked fast, taking long steps, and they crossed the street and Addie waved. Perry watched them come up.

‘We’re going swimming,’ Addie said. ‘It was an awful movie so now we’re going swimming.’

Grace smiled.

‘What do you think?’

‘You both ought to come,’ Harvey said loudly. ‘I can vouch that Paul is one great swimmer. He can be lifeguard. You both have to come.’

Addie pried Grace’s hand off Perry’s arm. ‘We’ll go out to the lake. I know the perfect spot. It’ll be a perfect night.’

Grace stuck to her smile.

‘We were just in town for ice cream and shopping.’

‘A night swim,’ said Addie.

‘That’s all right.’

‘Okay then,’ she grinned. ‘Poop on you. Too bad for you.’

Perry looked at her sandals.

‘Have a good swim.’

‘Crumb,’ Addie smirked.

On the drive home, Grace sat apart.

‘You didn’t want to go did you?’

‘Doesn’t matter.’

Her lower lip stuck out. ‘You could have gone if you wanted to. I didn’t know.’

He shrugged. ‘Doesn’t matter.’

‘Well, you could have gone.’

‘But not you.’

‘Well.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Well. They were together and everything.’

‘True.’

Grace sat still and he drove the car up the tar road.

‘Addie’s awfully pretty, isn’t she?’

‘Not all that pretty.’ He had to watch the road.

‘You could have gone. I just don’t enjoy that kind of thing, that’s all.’

‘What do you enjoy?’

She was quiet. ‘Are you mad?’

‘No, just forget it.’

‘Black bile? she whispered.

‘I guess that’s it.’

‘Old pus gut.’

‘You put the finger on it.’ He glanced over at her. ‘Forget it. I didn’t want to go.’

‘Really?’

‘Nope.’

He noticed, cleaning a walleye, that the fish’s eyes were attached to the brain by a braided grey cord with hard little knots scattered along its length.

He noticed that Grace bathed and dried her hair and combed it and went to bed with a book and read until he joined her.

He continued his inspections, seeking the bottom of things. He noticed that Harvey sometimes drank beer for breakfast and hid the bottles in the trash.

He noticed that three families had moved away from Sawmill Landing over the past year and that no one had come to replace them.

The insights had to be separated from apparitions. Often he saw the old half-memories, patches of colour, gleamings, and the illusions dissolved on a closer look. Once Grace appeared to resemble his mother, whom he knew only by photographs. But when he examined the pictures and puzzled over the problem, the differences jumped out, the mirrors reflected back and forth over time in a dazzling series of contradictions.

‘The trees will be turning,’ he observed.

‘Look closer,’ Addie said. ‘They are changing.’

‘Not much. In a week you’ll see something.’

‘I already see it. Look close.’

‘Where the devil is Harvey?’

‘He’ll be along. Don’t be silly, stop worrying about it.’

‘I just asked where he was.’

‘He’ll be along soon. Do you see what I was saying about the leaves?’

‘Yes, I see. I saw it before.’

She was tall. He was glad they were lying on the beach. Long brown muscles ran up her thighs. The calves were long and all bone.

The trees above them were elm and sweet maple. Across the lake it was all pine.

‘Are you taking Grace on a vacation this winter?’

‘I guess so. I don’t know. She’s been talking about Iowa. I guess she wants to go down.’

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