David Gates - Jernigan

“Well,” I said, “since I’ve been sent to the showers anyway …”

“Do you love me?” she said. “Oh God, you should never ask that. Withdraw the question. Sorry.”

“Slow down,” I said.

“No. I really don’t want to hear it right now. Even if you do.”

“Suit yourself,” I said. I knew how to get around this one. Easy: be oh so winning. “But can we still have that shower?”

“Yes,” she said. “That we can do.”

Afterwards, in bed, she said, “So this is really true?”

“As a ploy to get my ashes hauled,” I said, “it’s a bit elaborate, no?”

“Are you really freaked?” she said, grabbing a pillow off the floor and tucking it behind her so she could sit up. “I sometimes can’t tell with you.” Apparently we were now to have a conversation about it.

“Heavens to Betsy no,” I said. “I’m sure the bank will be understanding about it when I stop sending my mortgage payments. Power company? Pretty loose guys over there. Supermarket—”

She put a hand over my mouth. “Hush,” she said. “Why don’t you sell that awful house and move in here? You live here anyway. What’d you pay for it?”

“Fifty-seven. That was, like, ten years ago.”

“Ten years,” she said, and scrunched her eyes to figure. “So you put it up for probably one seventy-five, one eighty, you pay the bank what you — how much do you owe them?”

“I don’t know. A lot. Probably forty-five. We didn’t put all that much down.”

“Okay, so say forty-five. Even less commission you’ve got well over a hundred thousand dollars just sitting there.”

“Right. Which the minute I touch I then lose half of in taxes.”

“So you find some tax-free thing to put it in, and you don’t touch it for a while. Keep a little back for yourself, don’t get another job, so you can income-average your next year’s taxes.… You’ll be fine. Hustle together a little money when you need it, you know, odd jobs, this and that.”

“Fine until I get sick,” I said. “Or Danny. What am I doing about health insurance and shit like that? I mean, what if somebody has to have root canal?”

“Well Peter, you can’t just live your life in a cringe, waiting for stuff to happen. I really believe that’s a way of inviting stuff to happen. You could be living here for practically nothing—”

“I.e., on whatever money your ex-husband sends you.”

“So?” she said. “What? It’s good enough to slum around in, but you wouldn’t lower yourself to live here?”

“Christ, give me a break,” I said. “I got fired from my job, what, three hours ago? I mean, that’s enough to absorb. Would you be ready to change your life just like that?”

“You betcha,” she said. “If it needed changing as much as yours does. Sweetie.” She got out of bed and walked naked to the door. “I have to go pee,” she said. “When I get back, you tell me what you want to do.”

I lay there and tried to figure out what I ought to think. I thought I probably ought to think I was being pressured by a crazy woman. If she kept after me about it, then I would know she was evil and meant me harm, wasn’t that right? And then I would know not to do anything she said.

When she came back she had the robe on again.

“Okay,” I said. “Now what is this?”

She got under the covers, robe still on, and stared at the hula girl. “I’m sorry,” she said. “That was meant to be just sort of an exercise that I thought might help you. I guess it was stupid to use shock therapy on somebody who’s shocked already. What I mean is, you’re welcome to come live here, Peter. You and Danny. You know that already. I think it could be a nice life. And it could be really good for Danny to have a woman around. And Clarissa to have a man. Or if you want, you could look for another job and we can just keep on the way we’ve been doing. Or you’re at liberty to change that part of it too. I mean that’s pretty much giving you, I don’t know, whatever you want.”

This didn’t sound like someone who meant me harm. Though actually what could be more hostile than giving you whatever you wanted? Thinking about the Twilight Zone thing where the guy says he’s going nuts in heaven and won’t they please send him to the Other Place and this guy tells him this is the Other Place, nya-ha-ha-ha-hab.

She looked at me. “I just think you could have a more satisfying life for yourself, Peter,” she said. “You were talking the other night about how you used to want to write poetry. You know, you could do it.”

“Madre de dios,” I said. (The other night we’d gotten popped on that moonshine again and I’d been telling high school stories.) “I was talking about when I was fourteen years old , for Christ’s sake. Every kid in my little clique wanted to be a poet. Like with a beard , you know? Because we thought Allen Ginsberg was this great romantic figure. I mean, this was just after I wanted to be Roger Maris , okay?”

“Sounds like I hit a nerve,” she said.

“You didn’t hit a fucking nerve,” I said. “I would just like to be spared the final degradation, you know? Being a fuckup and a burnout I can deal with. Being a fuckup and a burnout who’s starting to write poetry at forty years old, or learning to play the fucking saxophone , no.”

“You know,” she said, “it actually sounds like I’m picking up fear of failure? I think that’s so cute.”

“You’re a twisted fuck,” I said.

“Isn’t that the way you like ’em?” she said. “You’re only thirty-nine, by the way, unless you’ve been lying about your age.”

I did the bang-zoom gesture. Channel II had The Honeymooners just before Star Trek , which was just before The Twilight Zone .

“I’m serious,” she said. “Really, no wonder you like demeaning jobs, Peter. You ever thought about being a desk clerk? There’s that nice Holiday Inn that overlooks the whole Meadowlands. Would that be depressing enough?”

“Martha dear,” I said, and put a finger to my lips. “We’ve made our point?”

She tapped her forehead and nodded, then crossed her hands over her chest mummy-style and lay rigid, staring at the ceiling.

“Oh for Christ’s sake,” I said.

“Shhh,” she went.

“Okay, fine,” I said. “Listen, I’m going out for a walk.” Knowing I was just being a huffy asshole. Since she was acting out of love, apparently.

4

Against that cobalt-blue sky, the leaves looked morbidly colorful: the hectic yellow, orange and red stages of a wasting disease. You were supposed to think they were beautiful. I hadn’t even noticed them this morning while walking to the car, or driving under the arching trees all the way out to Hamilton Avenue. Oh, completely my own fault: simply having a job needn’t numb you. Obvious example: Wallace Stevens. Any deadass drudge can feel even worse about himself by thinking about Wallace Stevens.

At least this much was clear: to move into Martha’s house with no job and no other place to go was to lose power, imaginary hundred thousand dollars or no imaginary hundred thousand dollars.

If even that much was clear. I mean, if at some point you wanted a job, then fine, go get a job, right?

Though like what? And how would you explain when they asked you what you’d been doing for the last year or whatever?

Which in turn was a whole other question: what would you do with yourself all day long?