Leonard Michaels - The Collected Stories

“You got another story?”

“It’s the only story I know.”

“Tell me again,” said Isaac.

Before she finished they were inside an old brownstone, looking up a high, narrow stairway. She tugged at the umbrella, but Isaac only looked, as if they were stairs in a dream. To be looked at, nothing else. What can you do in a dream? She tugged. He fell against a wall. She went up alone and came down with, “Dr. Cracow says.” Isaac must walk up and lie facedown on the chiropractor table. Otherwise go away and shrivel. In a week his leg would be a raisin. He could look forward to carrying it in his armpit. Fagel screamed, Chaim punched. They walked up.

Cracow stood suddenly erect, as if, the instant before, he had touched his toes. His fingers were stiff, quivering like the prongs of a rake. He nodded to the table. Isaac dropped onto it as if into an abyss and Cracow pummeled him from neck to tail, humming: “Muss es sein. Es muss sein ,” then said, “Get up.” With dreamlike speed they were at the brink of the stairs. A thing whooshed by, cracked, clattered to the landing.“Get it,” said Cracow.

Isaac shook his head.

“Isaac, get it,” said Katya. Chaim said, “Get it.” Yankel said, “Get it, get it.”

The umbrella was a streak of wood and cloth in another world. Isaac shook his head at the possibility of getting it. Beyond that, not getting it. Shaking his head, he started down. Not with delicate caution, like a man just crippled, but mechanical exactitude, like a man long crippled. Even in the bones of former incarnations, crippled, resigned to a thousand strictures. Cracow hummed, Isaac descended. Every step an accident succeeding an accident in a realm where perfection was grotesque. Cracow said, “No pain?”

Isaac stopped, gazed out; then, carefully, into his own center. Pain? His whole being was a question. It trembled toward yes or no and, like music, yes, very slightly, yes, he felt himself lift and fly above the stairs. Then he settled like dust. Cracow’s voice shot through the air: “Six dollars, please.” Isaac turned to fly up to him. With four wings clapping he was struck by stairs, smacked by walls, stopped by the ultimate, unyielding floor. He lay on his back. His eyes fell shut. Thumps accumulated down the stairs. Katya screamed. Yankel shrugged, Chaim whispered, “Dead?” Fagel screamed, Cracow said, “Could be dead.” Chaim said, “Dead?” Fagel screamed, Katya screamed. “Dead? Dead?” said Yankel. Chaim said, “Not alive,” and Yankel said, “Dead.” Fagel screamed, screamed, screamed, screamed, screamed.

I YELLED; SHE RAN IN; I POINTED. “WHY IS IT GREEN?”She clapped her mouth; I shrieked, “Why is it green?” She answered … I shrieked, “Vatchinol infection!” She whispered … “Green medicine!” I wouldn’t let her mitigate; shoved her aside. “No mitigations!” She picked up a washcloth. I wouldn’t let her wash it. “No washing it!” I lunged into my clothes, laughed ironically, slammed out … Subway steps, downtown express, eighty miles an hour. Hot, cold, nauseated. Nevertheless, nevertheless, nevertheless. Not like the last time, fighting, fighting, collapse: leetlekissywissysuckyfucky. I checked my fly. Light tight. But I sensed the green, looked away. No one noticed. Good fly. Develop photos inside. A lady sucked her teeth. Suck. Suck. The man beside me did a crossword puzzle, picked his nose. Suck. Pick. Everyone busy. New Yorkers in the raging underground. Sensuous. Insular. Discreet. All buried in noise. I vomited. Quick. No one noticed. Used my shoe; slipped foot back in; looked up coolly at the ads: have a lot of fun; worry about communism; smoke; drink. They made a sense of community. Lot of fun all around. The lady sucked her teeth, the man did his puzzle, picked his nose. Train full of pleasure. Involvement. I liked the mood. I philosophized: What does this mean to ride downtown? eighty miles an hour? three o’clock in the morning? shoe full of vomit? I noticed a girl leaning against her date. A marine. She had frog eyes; motionless, dreaming of flies. Looked something like a moron. It all meant nothing. I had slammed, certain it meant something. I’d laughed ironically. She opened the door. I waited ironically for the elevator. I felt her stare, gray, foggy, rotten with guilt. She said, “Your face, Phillip.” I whirled. “Gimme carfare.” A flash of white ass, of blond. She vanished, returned, wrist-deep-crap clicking in her purse. She struggled, naked, shameless. I was cool. She pulled out a dollar. Green. I was sick, getting sicker. Rocking, banging, rocking, banging. But this was the last time. I sang it to the mambo of the wheels: “The last time, the last time. Chunga cha-chunga. Green green.” I’d soon have to walk. Deserted buildings, warehouses, alleys, cats, rats, drunks, unpredictable figments of the municipal dark. City at night, full of wonders, mysteries. Like a god. I could hardly wait to get home, lock the door, lie down, sleep. But I might run into neighborhood kids, get robbed, chopped up, set on fire, pissed on, stuck in a garbage can. That would mean the city hated me. I appreciated its hatred, shared it, wanted to fling out to the speeding tunnel. But I looked at the marine and his girl: both pale, tight in the face, yet healthy. I’d seen him before. On toilet walls. Her, too, waiting for him, cock and balls. It might have been us: Mr. and Miss Subway. No such luck. Cecily had a high I.Q., degree from Barnard. I giggled a lot. The moron leaned on the marine. I looked for a moral. They swayed against the rocking iron tumultuous rush as … they would sway against the buffets of life. I was envious; felt ashamed: my insularity, my self-pitying. I wanted to shove them off the train. I wanted to go back, pound on her door. She would open it. I’d giggle. But I knew the rules. It was her move. Love is not enough. Hell with her. Blond hair, gray eyes, white skin, green crotch. Every conceivable virtue. Happens to be festering in the vagina. Take good with bad. I giggled ironically. The man covered his puzzle. Inched away, erasing. Made me self-conscious, creepy feeling. I wanted to strangle him. I yelled, “No one can solve the puzzle!” He gave me a look as if that hadn’t occurred to him before. I shrugged. He changed his seat. I sprawled like a vulgar swine, yawned, scratched my ass, studied the marine and his girl, objects, paragons. My mother used to say, “Why don’t you be like Kenneth? … like Bernard? … like Schmuckhead? Why don’t you do the right thing, Phillip?” Why don’t I be like that marine? No sideburns to catch filth, unbalance his head. Just a haze of needles prickling at the top. And her hair: thick, red, bulging around her ears like meat. Such radical difference: Mr. Prickles and Miss Meat. What could their relationship consist in? “None of that rooting in my horn, Marie. Try it, I’ll kick your twat off.” She melts. He upchucks like a tilted jug. Take that, that. Spilling marines. Moral. But I was moral, too. I had slammed out. Exquisite dinner, wines, dessert in bed. Naked, satisfied, peeing hard into the roaring center and the whole toilet echoing to a tinkling consonant with the force that through the green fuse drives beyond right things, wrong things, and “CECILY,” I yelled, the train retching past Bloomingdale’s. She did it on purpose. The train stopped. A man entered carrying a newspaper. PLANE CRASH. Green crotch strikes again. I didn’t read another word. It all just came to me: fifteen hundred returning from a soccer game, team, coaches, cheering squad. Usual bunch. People shake their heads, tsk, tsk, but oneself isn’t dead. Ten cents to find out one isn’t dead. Cost me nothing, a glance, a second of subway lucubration. I was alive, aware of it, more than alive. I wanted to do kneebends, pushups, jog a couple of laps. Maybe the marine would join me. “Hey, schmuck, how about a little P.T. before the next stop?” He would really grin. So would his moron. But it was the next stop. Mine. I was up, striding out, step, splash, step, splash, hut-hut! I was alone. Now I could think. I shut my eyes, squeezed. I thought: Think! I couldn’t think. It proved I was social. No lonely thinker, no Thoreau, this Phillip. Which way to the pond? Let me see; I remember that pile of bird shit from yesterday. Take years just to get from shack to pond. “Simplify,” said Thoreau. Really see what life is about. Indeed, just come back, that’s all: here’s old Phillip, schmutz and fleas; no book; maybe a little map. “See, X is the shack. Dig? The circle is the pond.” What do you mean open the door, fall into the pond? I was nervous. I needed another voice. All right. “Say something.” What? “Say an important, sober, meaningful phrase.” I said, “Ludwig Wittgenstein,” snapped double, rolled, screeched, “What a dingleberry,” rolled into a phone booth. Numbers scratched into the walls. Names. Recommendations. The city was social; how could I ever live anywhere else? “Call Carla for a first-rate toe job.” I wiggled my toes. Seemed all right. I memorized her number, left the booth, ran. What I expected: deserted buildings, alleys, cats. My apartment. I had to phone someone. Green crotch was out. I grabbed the phone, dialed Henry. It was very late, but he was my friend. Marjorie answered: “Your name first, wise ass.”