Leonard Michaels - The Collected Stories

Breakfast with Henry near campus. A strange woman joined us at the table. She smoked my cigarettes and took my change for her coffee. In her purse she had a fold of bills compressed by a hair clip. “My tuition fee,” she said. Henry smiled and carried on as if she weren’t there. He refused to be inhibited in our conversation. He said one of his colleagues felt happy when he turned fifty because he no longer desired the pretty coeds. He would concentrate on biochemistry, get a lot of work done, not waste time fucking his brains out. Henry laughed. He didn’t believe in this lust for biochemistry. The woman, pretending to study for a German class, looked up from her grammar and said, “I will learn every word.”

It was cold, windy, beginning to rain. Deborah was afraid she wouldn’t find a taxi. She’d have to walk for blocks in the rain. She didn’t want to go, but her psychotherapist wasn’t charging her anything. A few months back, she told him she couldn’t afford to continue. He lowered the rate to half. Even that became too much for her, so he lowered it to nothing. She stood, collected her things, and pulled on her coat like a kid taking orders from her mother, then fussed with her purse, her scarf, trying to be efficient but making dozens of extra little moves, rebuttoning, untying and retying her scarf, and then reopening her purse to be sure there was enough money for a taxi if she could find one. She wanted to stay, talk some more, but couldn’t not go to her psychotherapist. She felt he really needed her.

Sonny says, “The woman can’t understand any experience not her own. She’s Irish.” She didn’t mean because she’s Irish. She meant thin, practical, cold. She meant not like herself, dark and warm. She meant blond. In effect, the way people talk is what they mean. It is precise and clear — more than mathematics, legal language, or philosophy — and it is not only what they mean, but also all they mean. That’s what it means to mean. Everything else is alienation, except poetry.

Sonny has green eyes. I can’t not see them.

Sonny’s teeth are crooked. I can’t not desire to lick them.

I think of Sonny’s terrible flaws. I love her flaws.

I’m so furious at Sonny I almost hate her.

I told Sonny I love her. She said,“I’m a sucker for love.”

Sonny strides toward me across the room holding something behind her back. Her face is expressionless. Then she raises her hand above her head and I see she is holding her high-heeled shoe. She brings it down, trying to spike the top of my head, but I grab her wrist, wrench her about, shove her away. She falls into the chair and sits as she fell, arms limp, legs sprawled apart. I go to her, drop to my knees, and hug her about the waist. She says, “Intimacy brings out the worst in us,” and then whispers,“I want to pull your whole head into my cunt.”

We made love all afternoon. Sonny said, “Was it good?” My speech was slurred: “Never in my life …” She said, “I should be compensated.”

Sonny reads in the paper about a child who was sexually assaulted and murdered. She says quietly, as if to herself, “What are we going to do about sex?”

We made love all afternoon. Sonny asked, “Was it good?” I said, “Never in my life,” etc. The irrelevance of words, the happiness of being free of all such clothing. I lie on my back. Dumb. Savoring dumbness. My mother said she found my father on his back on the bedroom floor, staring up at her with a dumb little smile on his face, as if it weren’t bad being dead. He’d gone like himself, a sweet gentleman with fine nervous hands, not wanting her to feel distressed. It’s a mystery how one learns to speak, the great achievement of a life. But when the soul speaks — alas — it is no longer the soul that speaks.

There used to be a desert here. Now there are banks, office buildings, shopping malls, and wide roads striking in all directions, rolling with cars — going away, going away — pressed by unresisting emptiness. Nothing says stay. Nothing speaks to you, except the statue of John Wayne. I waited in front of the terminal building, studying him. (Sonny was late.) Nine feet tall, cast in brownish metal, he wears a cowboy outfit — wide-brimmed hat, gun belt, boots, spurs. The big body, a smidgeon too big for the head, goes lumbering toward the traffic. Beneath his hat is the familiar sunlight-cutting squint and tight dry scowl. He sees no traffic, no concrete or asphalt. He sees the California desert of long ago, the desert of his mind. No woman was ever late for “Duke.”

The afternoon sky was purest blue, without birds or clouds. It was perfect until planes appeared, flickering specks. I’d hear their engines as they descended. It seemed I’d heard dozens of them. I stopped looking at my watch, stopped waiting for her.

Light sank into bluer and bluer blue. Air moved in swift, thin currents, like ghostly fibers drawn across my cheeks. John Wayne’s metal face had an underwater glare; eel-like menace. Cars pulled up. Travelers hurried to night flights. She’d been happy to hear from me. “Are you in town?” she cried. Her enthusiasm must have leaked away when she hung up the phone. Maybe she’d checked the mirror and seen something to discourage her; or she’d had an accident driving to the airport. I wasn’t thinking about her when the apparition appeared. “I’ve been looking at you,” it said, “standing right here looking at you.” Sonny’s hair, freshly washed and brushed, released airy strands of light. She shook her head, as if to deny what she couldn’t help believing.

“You’re very late,” I said.

“You can beat me.”

“My plane leaves soon.”

“Miss your plane.”

I already knew I would.

“I didn’t come straight from my office,” she said. “I had to go home first, shower and dress. Look, I’m here. Aren’t you a little happy to see me?” She took my arm, squeezing it as she pressed against my side, saying, “I’m hungry,” walking me away toward her car.

We ate in a restaurant near the ocean, then went to a bar. An old black man, wearing glasses, played sentimental songs on the piano.

Sonny said, her hand stroking mine, “Nothing is going to happen. I don’t care how sad you look.”

“I missed you.”

“We never got along.” She took a cigarette from my pack and shoved the matchbook toward me.

“I think about you every day.”

“What do you think?”

“What do you suppose?”

“Nothing is going to happen. Tell me what you think.”

“Making love to you.”

“Tell me what you do to me.”

“It’s hard to say.”

“Say it.”

Strolling in the balmy night, we stopped and kissed, holding each other long after the urge subsided. The ocean raved in darkness.

“Don’t feel me,” she said.

“You feel good.”

“Men don’t turn anymore. I go by and that’s all.”

“Does it matter?”

“They used to say, ‘Wow.’ ‘Mamma mia.’ Of course it matters. It’s a way of being.”

“It’s savage.”

“Nothing else is real.”

I heard the dull repeated crash along the beach. I smelled the ocean salt on Sonny’s skin.

She stood at the bathroom mirror, making up her face. Tiny jars of cosmetics clanked against the sink, like stray notes of a wind chime. I sat on the edge of the tub.

“I hadn’t planned to stay,” I said.

She didn’t answer at first. She unbuttoned her dress, letting the top fall about her hips, not to be soiled by makeup. She wore no bra. Leaning close to the mirror, she did her eyes, restoring shadows with brush and fingertip. I watched her rebuilding her look, perfecting it. She drew back, studying her work as she said,“I don’t know why you phoned. Anyhow, I don’t care.”