Сэмуэль Шэм - Mount Misery

"Because I'm upset"

"But why are you calling meT She screamed and hung up.

"What the hell were you doing?" Berry asked.

"It's the only way to stop her."

"If you were in trouble, would you want to be treated like that?"

" 'Course not. I'd take responsibility for myself-I'm not a borderline. Day after day she's on me. It's good to get my anger out, okay?"

"You've been getting a lot of it out lately. It's like you're angry all the time."

"And you don't like it?"

"If we can talk about it, yeah. But we haven't been able to lately."

"/ can, why can't you?"

"Goddamnit, because you're so into yourself! It's getting hard to take!"

She sat naked on the edge of the bed, staring at me. I sat, braced, staring back, suddenly having that same incompetent feeling I'd had with Zoe and Christine. Berry, a BPO? With what? I used to think with ALOE-A Lot Of Empathy-but right now I wasn't so sure.

"Y'know," she was saying, "it'd make all the difference in the world if you'd just smile at me."

"I'm trying," I said, "I really am, but it's not happening."

" 'Kay. All I want, sweetie, is to be close to you. Feel you

with me."

"/ feel close. I'm just trying to focus more on myself."

"What?" she said, eyes widening. "You, more self-centered? Are you joking?"

"Heiler says it's healthy."

"Okay, okay," she said, trying to calm herself, her hands in front of her breasts moving back and forth, their palms pointing toward me. "I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Maybe there is something in SELF-psychology for you."

"But not for you? Is that what you're saying?"

"Not for us. God!" She gathered up her clothes. "I'm going home." I tried to stop her. "Fuck off," she said. As she turned she dropped a heavy necklace and a roll of panty hose. "I've tried hard enough to carry 'us' for one night. It's like moving heavy furniture. Without help."

I said I was sorry and tried to convince her to stay, but

she left.

The next morning she paged me, from the preschool. I was at the nursing station on Emerson, suturing up Thorny's face. The Lady Who Ate Metal Objects, now officially a Heiler BPO, had tried to get at Thorny's Rolex. A struggle had ensued. She'd coughed up a penknife and slashed him. Now, in the background, the kids were singing:

"It's cleanup time in the classroom,

It's time for girls and boys; To stop what they are doing,

And put away their toys."

"Last night," she was shouting, over this sugary off-key din, "makes me think that things are more screwed up than they seem."

"No, no," I shouted back, trying to get Thorny to hold still, "it makes me think that things seem more screwed up than they are."

"Everything I say, lately, you immediately say no to."

"No I don't."

"See?"

We fought. The kids sang. I said we'd talk more on the weekend. She said she was busy on the weekend. We said good-bye.

Busy? A hit of jealousy. I picked up the phone to call her back. But no, we'd just start arguing again. I put the receiver back down.

That Friday, I came home from Misery feeling bad about facing a weekend without her. I got the mail-including a conjunction-filled letter from my father that I devoured at once.

Hope you're back in your relaxed routine and know you will be the best resident in your class. Mom and I argue alot and it is normal for retired Jews. Had an 86 with two three-putt greens and my game now is all set…

Could this be BPO with HSD? High Speed Drill?

I was taking in the garbage cans for my senescent retired woman doctor landlady when an old dark blue car drove by, stopped, and backed up. A woman looked at me and called my name. She looked like Jill the mental health worker, but couldn't be because Jill had blond hair in braids down her back, and this woman had blond hair cut to a fuzz but for a cockscomb on top, a punk cut.

"It's me, Jill."

"Oh, hi." I crossed the street to her, noticing the rusted-out rear parts of her blue Buick. She was wearing a sleeveless tank top and shorts. An open can of Bud was sweating cold between her thighs. "What happened to your hair?"

"Cut it all off."

"Why?" I asked, smelling beer on her breath.

"Had to do something. I broke up with my boyfriend and

had to move out and I lost my job-my other job, not the one at the nuthouse-and I lost my horse because the boyfriend owned the horse and I've got no money, and yesterday I cut off all my hair."

"Looks great," I said, stunned by her good cheer in the face of these catastrophes. "Must be cooler, right?"

"And winter's coming-figure that one out. I'm getting just a little tired of these 'growth-promoting experiences,' know what I mean?"

"Yeah. But what are you doing here?" "I'm living with friends for a while, up the street. You?" "I rent the top floor. Up there. With the turret." She followed my gaze. "Bet it's nice up there." I felt the sweat bead on my forehead, and thinking maybe I shouldn't do this because of Berry, I said fuck that who knows what Berry's doing, and so I asked Jill if she'd like to have dinner sometime. By coincidence she was free that very night.

At seven I picked her up and we went to a fish restaurant nearby and ordered martinis. We talked hilariously about Misery being so weird and we maybe ate our fish. I invited her back to the top floor and then, showing her my loft when we got to the bedroom in the turret, as easily as a fish in water with another watery fish I kissed her and she me, opening her mouth, and then, lingering as if hi sad parting, all scented with cherry blossoms and suntan oil, she said, "Your lips are so softl" I started to caress her. She said, "Wait." "What?"

"It's gonna happen eventually," she said, pulling away and crossing her hands over her chest and grasping the bottom of her tank top, "So let's get it over with, okay?"

"O-foy!" I turned down the dimmer of the chandelier. She stood there in just her bra and jeans, the bands of pink satin alternating with bands of nothing, forming complex whorls on the roundnesses of her breasts like on seashells. I shivered. With straightforward innocence she stared at me and pursed her lips. I got aroused but somehow I didn't dare move because the moment was sacred in the way when you're drunk so many things seem sacred and you have a dim sense that the chandelier in your head is so dim that you might not recall much the next day. As if in prayer, she brought her hands together at her sternum, and like a curtain opening her breasts

fell away, jouncing a little, the bra hanging down lacily, as if it had disintegrated into pink ribbons. Her tan highlighted the white of her skin, and popping out on the white roundnesses, her nipples were, of all shades, lavender. She stretched, so tall that her fingertips wiggled the chandelier. I started toward her.

She said, "Wait a sec."

She brought her hands down to her jeans and undid the metal button and slowly unzipped the metal zipper and then carefully, so as not to disturb her panties, rolled back the denim edge and carefully pulled them down her thighs. Stepping out of her jeans, she turned to throw them on a chair, her thong bikini straining in and up against her buns. The chair tipped under the weight, then righted itself. Turning back, she peeled the bulging white lace triangle down, revealing her untanned pudenda frosted with a lace of light brown hair.

"Now," she said, smiling mischievously, "you."

Next thing I knew she was on top of me, but all at once I felt whirly from booze and thought of Berry and felt a killer guilt. Things stopped dead.

Into my head floated a phrase from my father's letter:

Hope you are being conscientious and know you will soon be on top…

Silence, a silence of Uh-oh.

"What's the matter?" she whispered. "Am I too wet?"