Philip Roth - Letting Go

None of this run-downness depressed Paul, however. He leaned closer to catch the soft, whispery words his uncle spoke, while overhead the El trains broke metallically through the cold steely air. He managed to hear “… oh … not … people … parents — yes?” Asher turned his head in the raised collar of his overcoat and peered questioningly at his nephew.

“I’m sorry,” Paul said. “I didn’t—”

“Not bad people, do you think?” Asher swung his head, freeing his nose of its burden.

“No. I know, Asher.”

“They have your interests in mind. That’s so, isn’t it?”

“ Their interests.” What with the noise overhead, Asher must not have understood what he’d been saying. “It would be in my interest to make me happy. It would be in my interest to give me a blessing.”

“They’d love to give you a blessing. They’re dying to give you a blessing,” said Asher, raising his ungloved hands from his pockets.

“Let them go ahead then,” Paul said.

Asher was peeling paint from under his nails. “They’d like to give me a blessing, they’d like to give everybody a blessing. How old are you, Paulie?”

“Twenty-one.”

Asher made a face, as though he’d eaten something unpalatable. “So what’s your hurry?”

“What hurry? Hurry for what?”

“You have a nice sweet life ahead of you, isn’t that a fact?”

Where was this conversation drifting? “But I’m in love,” said Paul, shrugging.

“Let’s get out from this noise, and talk,” Asher said, taking Paul by the elbow. As they crossed the street, he pulled his nephew close to him and with a sleepy closing of his swollen lids back of the tortured glasses, said, “I’m in love myself.”

“Yes?”

“Absolutely.”

“I didn’t know that,” Paul said, trying to remain composed.

“Sure. She comes to my studio every Wednesday afternoon. Today, this afternoon. It gets dark and she goes home. A girl twenty-five.” He spoke as if each fact had to be remembered from the dim past. Though he did not want to, Paul suspected his uncle of lying.

“Is she married?” Paul asked.

“I know her four years, and every Wednesday … the most valuable thing in my life … She’s married, sure. She has a baby.” Asher took a frayed billfold from his coat and handed Paul a picture of a little girl. “A darling,” Asher said.

“She’s very nice.”

“A darling child,” Asher said. He stuffed the billfold back inside his coat. “Look, Paulie, I’ve loved a lot of women. Six years I lived with a Chinese woman, for example. Many different types and personalities. I’ve screwed all kinds, every imaginable variety of cunt, I’ve had it. I’m no amateur at this business.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“What? What didn’t you know?”

“For instance, the Chinese.”

“Oh sure — well, I didn’t make a point of it with your mother. I think she has a prejudice against non-Occidentals.”

“That’s giving her a break, but that’s true.”

“Is she pregnant?” Asher suddenly asked. “This girl? I’m trying to get to your motivation.”

“Are we talking about me now?”

“About your girl friends,” Asher said. “What’s the story, Paulie?”

“My father told you she must be pregnant, is that it? Don’t you think that shows how he doesn’t begin to understand?”

“Don’t worry about his understanding. Of course he’s a dope. You didn’t knock her up?”

He felt moved to deny even sleeping with Libby; the conversation had turned in a way he could not have imagined. But he had reasons stronger than pride for not wanting Asher to confuse himself about his experience. He had not come out on a below-freezing day for bad advice. “She’s not intact, but she’s not pregnant either.”

“She’s not intact by you or before you?”

“By me.”

“Oh it clears up. And for that you’re throwing out all your opportunities? For that small puncture you’ll tie yourself down? How will you support this girl you ruined?”

“Asher, what are you talking about?”

“Money. Life.”

“You sound like my old man.”

“You haven’t got good ears — I’m at the other end of the globe. I understand she’s a little sickly.”

“She gets colds , Asher. They met her twice and both times she had colds. It’s winter. She’s human—”

“Even nose drops cost money,” Asher was explaining. “Kleenex can run you into a fortune, I mean paupers like you and me. You want to tie a stone around your neck?” Asher asked. “You’ll fall in love all your life, in and out all your life. You can even find a lady with a wooden leg, I don’t care. It isn’t the colds, Paulie, it’s the principle. You’re twenty-one, you drew a little blood from her, so you think there’s only one girl in the world for you. But you’ve got no obligations according to the date of entry, you understand me? If it wasn’t you, it would be another smart fellow. Don’t bind yourself round for having a little fun. Is it you who wants to marry or is it this girl?”

“We both want to. We arrived at the decision mutually.” He made no effort to hide his anger.

“Which more mutually than the other?”

“Mutually mutually!”

“And how old is she that she’s so in tune with you and life?”

“Nineteen.”

“Nineteen and a Catholic. Splendid.”

“Asher, I didn’t expect this from you.”

“So what am I supposed to do? Tell lies? You only take walks with right-minded people?”

“You can disagree, but why on this level?” Paul demanded.

“ What level? You tell me you like shikse pussy, you’re telling me something I don’t know? I’m you , Paulie, I’m you. Jewish girls devour you. Haven’t I seen my friends go under? The wives can’t walk upstairs. They need maids. They need vacations — once in August, then in January all over again. They’re sorry they laid anybody before they married you. They stop sanctioning looseness, bang, all of a sudden. One Friday you come in the door and they got the candles going, and then you’re really home. I’m not saying I blame you, Paul. I’m only trying to get to the bottom.”

“Getting to the bottom doesn’t mean digging into sewers. How can you talk like this? You don’t even know the girl. You never even saw her.”

“I never even saw that baby I carry a picture of either. But I know what a baby is, so I can appreciate this one. This girl’s got a background on her you don’t even begin to understand. She’s got a family that probably this minute is churning gall over you. True?”

“Like mine over her. Just as smart and sensible.”

“You think happiness comes out of gall? You think that’ll be nice, earning all those enemies? You think it’s enough to squirm around in bed with her, to wake up with her hand on your vitals? What do you think that solves, Paulie, after the wad is popped?”

“Christ, Asher, you’re a dunghole, a toilet!”

“We’re talking man to man, right? Don’t start crying. I’m not a charming man.”

“All right, Asher, man to man. If you’re a man, a human being, then why don’t you talk about love? I love Libby. I’m giving it to you straight now, though not so flowery as you. I love Libby. She’s alive, she’s sweet, she has deep and generous instincts. She has feelings. She, unlike you, is charming.”

“You like that?”

“Yes.”

“Charm is shit.”

“She’s a woman, Asher, listen to me! She behaves like a woman. I want to stick with her, to live with her.”

“Go ahead.”

“I am. I’m marrying her.”

“You’re a circular reasoner,” said Asher, “and I’m a cynic, but you’re worse. Marriage kills love. Do me a favor, look around at all the loving happy couples. You count them for me, all right? I’ll close my eyes, you tell me how many you come up with.” He took off his glasses, blew into them, then wiped away the steam on a piece of cloth he extracted from his coat pocket. His lower lids were jeweled with tears from the cold. Hooking the rims back over his elaborate ears, he said, “How many? Once you get past the Duke and Duchess of Windsor it’s slim pickings, no? Paulie, kiss the girl, caress her, stick it right up in her, but for Christ’s sake do me a favor and wait a year. You’re an artistic type, a serious observer of life, why kill your talent? You’ll sap yourself with worry, you’ll die of a hard-on in the streets. Other women will tantalize you some day and you and your conscience will wrestle till you choke. Artists and artistic types must go it alone. If a year elapses and the urge remains, then go ahead, hang yourself, there’s nothing anybody can do. Is a year too much to ask?”