Siri Hustvedt - The Enchantment of Lily Dahl

Martin always wanted the same breakfast — poached eggs on toast — but unlike Lily’s other early customers, he had never been happy with silence. It wasn’t enough to say to him, “The usual?” and let him nod. He wanted an exchange, so instead of Martin stammering out an order and getting flustered, he tapped out a little rhythm on the tabletop with his fingers, rat-tat-a-tat-tat, and Lily answered him with two raps of her own, tat-tat. The tapping had started soon after Lily began working in the cafe and had made them friends again, after a fashion. No one else was in on it. Those beats were a little language all their own, and Martin seemed so happy to order his breakfast in code, it made Lily happy, too.

That morning they went through the routine again. Martin rapped the table.

Lily slapped her index finger twice against the edge of the table and said, “You’ve got it, Cobweb.”

Martin had landed the tiny part of Cobweb in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Lily thought it would be friendly to acknowledge it, although she wondered if Mrs. Wright hadn’t taken charity a little too far by casting Martin in any role, no matter how small. She hadn’t rehearsed with Martin yet. So far practice had been limited to the actors with big parts, but it was hard to imagine Martin as any kind of actor, much less a fairy.

When she gave Vince Martin’s order in the kitchen, the fat man leaned across the stove and said, “Where’s the funeral? It’s so quiet in there, you’d think I was cooking for a bunch of stiffs.”

Lily grinned and shook her head. “You say that every morning, Vince. It gets noisier in an hour. You know that.”

“This is one dead little burg, baby doll. It’s big-time excitement around here when one of them old Lutherans lets out a fart.”

Lily smiled at Vince. He was in a good mood this morning, and she felt grateful. “Go back to Philadelphia then, why don’t you, if it’s so perfect there,” Lily said and picked up the plate of French toast for Mike Fox. “Must be great, people shooting each other in the streets, muggers, pickpockets. I read the papers, Vince. Sounds like paradise.” Lily backed through the swinging doors.

Vince pointed his spatula at her. “At least people talk to you before they shoot you!”

With Mike’s plate in her hands, Lily paused behind the counter. She could feel Martin watching her and glanced over at him for an instant. His sober face was measuring hers. Maybe he does have a thing for me, she thought, and laid Mike’s plate on the counter beside the six cigarettes that he had already lined up in front of him on the Formica surface.

“You’re food’s here when you’re ready, Mike,” she said.

He looked up at her and pushed a strand of long blond hair behind his ear, before he stuck a fresh cigarette between his teeth. Lily watched him light it. Six days a week for a year, she had watched Mike go through the same ritual. The job called for a whole pack of Kents, and when he was finished, Lily would find a row of twenty cigarettes on the counter, each one smoked just a hair shorter than the one before it. Looking at Mike, she felt sure that he was counting his puffs, but she knew he couldn’t be dragging too hard on it either or the butt would burn too fast. Mike lowered the cigarette to the black ashtray and began to snuff it with a gentle turning motion of his wrist and fingers. The first time Mike had left that perfect slant of Kents on the counter, Lily had been scared to throw them away. But Bert had said, “He doesn’t care about it once it’s done. Just sweep the masterpiece into the garbage. He’ll make another one tomorrow.”

Lily walked back to the kitchen to pick up Martin’s food, and Vince started in right where he left off. “And because there’s no talking in this goddamned place, there’s no real sex. Ever think of that, doll? Look at the women in this town, hardly a single one with a speck of ‘cha-cha.’ In the winter they’re all covered up with those god-awful down parkas and in the summer they wear dresses that look like bags. Lipstick’s a sin. Jewelry’s a sin.” The man’s face was red. He had big jowls that shook when he moved his head.

Lily grabbed Martin’s plate. “There’s plenty of sex in this town, Vince. Don’t be a dummy.”

“Yeah, but it’s not fun sex. There’s a big difference.”

Lily groaned. “Come on.”

“You haven’t been around, baby. I’m telling you.” He held his arms out at his sides and wiggled his enormous hips back and forth. “Sex is shmooze in a dusky bar with a jazz band and a girl who looks like she likes it. Oh, honey, the nights I spend dreamin’ about Sandra Martinez,” the man groaned.

“What you don’t know, Mr. City Man,” Lily said, “is that a cornfield can be just as sexy as a jazz club. You just haven’t been around.” Lily rolled her shoulder at him.

Vince opened his mouth and pretended to be shocked. “Why, Lily Dahl,” he said. “You little devil.”

“Don’t ever tell me I haven’t got cha-cha,” Lily said on her way out, and she heard Vince muttering something under his breath.

The rain had stopped and Division Street looked brighter. When she put down the plate in front of Martin, he looked up at her with his serious face and his wide eyes, and she remembered how light his irises were — pale blue — a color that made her feel she could look right through them. As she left the table she felt a vague spasm in her abdomen, heard the screen door open and, turning toward the sound, saw the Bodler boys shuffle into the cafe. She sighed, but not loudly enough for them to hear it, and watched them walk toward the booth in the back just outside the bathroom with the sign Vince had put up that said “EITHER/OR.” If only they weren’t so dirty, Lily thought, as she looked down at the trail of mud on the floor behind the two men. If only it was just their boots that were dirty, and not their arms and legs and heads and butts and every square inch of their whole selves. Lily stopped in front of the Bodlers’ table and took out her order pad. She looked from Filthy Frank to Dirty Dick and back to Filthy Frank. The old coots were just as grimy as ever, only moister. She could see drip lines on their cheeks where they’d been rained on. Lily tapped her toe and waited. Frank would order. He always did. Dick never said a word. The Bodler boys were identical twins who over many years had turned out different. Nobody had the slightest difficulty telling them apart. Dick’s body echoed Frank’s but didn’t repeat it. Punier, balder, blanker, Dick had become a diluted copy of his brother.

Everything they touched turned black. Lily looked down at Frank’s hands. She could already see smudges forming on the white table.

“Well, what’ll it be?” she said.

Neither man moved or even blinked.

She leaned closer to Frank and raised her eyebrows. He smelled like clay.

The man opened his mouth, showing brown teeth interrupted by several holes. Then came the guttural rumble: “Two eggs, scrambled, bacon, toast, coffee.”

“Coming up.” Lily turned away and looked over Martin’s head into the street. The weather was clearing steadily. Martin was reading now. He usually brought a book with him and read for a while before leaving. As far as Lily could tell, Martin read everything. He seemed to like history books, especially books on World War II, but he also liked novels — cheap ones and highbrow ones — and science fiction books and how-to books. She remembered him reading Anna Karenina in the cafe for several weeks, and when he finished with that he had started in on a book called A Hundred Ways to Make Money in the Country. Still, Lily figured all that reading had to do some good. He’s probably pretty smart, she thought, and then on her way to the kitchen she considered the fact that Martin had turned twenty-one and was most likely a virgin. She liked this thought, liked the idea of innocence in a young man. At the same time, she felt sorry for him.