J. Donleavy - A Singular Man

"Don't go."

"Got to get back. Could only spare an hour anyway."

"Please."

"Why keep up a pretense. I'm going to try the wedlock. Hands in the soap suds, squeeze out the socks, wax the furniture. Gee I make a terrible liar. Only thing my hand will go into is a glove, holding a check book. The guy's a dynasty. If I want an ocean liner, I whistle. Those are the facts. I keep amassing them. End up with one gigantic fiction. It's in his grandfather's will that when we march down the aisle, we got to have the guy's ashes thrown over us. I don't want some dead guy's ashes on me."

"Miss Tomson, what will you do for love."

"That's nice, the way you said that."

"What will you."

"I don't know. What I always do, cry. I'll be crying and whistling. I'll make a stinking wife and I know it. I'm taking him for his money. I told him so. Sweet thing about him is he said he was marrying me for my brains. I thought that was so rich I accepted on the spot. After he'd been begging me for six months."

"You do have brains, Miss Tomson."

"Thanks."

"You have."

"A head full of pigeons. Sometimes I tie a message on one and send it out. Like the letters you get. Dear Sir, I'll casserole you. Hardboil your jewls and use them for billiards. See. The pigeons get out, just like that last remark. Gee I don't love this guy. What good is my body to him. Or what's more important, to me. When I worked for you, it was my first honest job. And what lousy pay. Sorry I said that. But boy it was low. Even so I used to go home happy at night. No kidding. Woke up laughing. Because I had you so scared."

"I wasn't."

"You were. You used to lurk behind your door for hours thinking up something to say to me, so it would look like you were running some big enterprise and your next move was going to have consequences everywhere. But I thought you were nice too. I really felt a few times, why don't I tell this guy the truth. But if you knew I was a big time celebrity, it would have made it awkward. Only my dog was shot that night I would have fainted seeing you at Jiffy's."

"I was there by accident/'

"Gee Smithy."

"What."

"I don't know. I think about you a lot. While the rest of us are skidding around, there you are in your own little world. It's so sweet. I got to go."

"Don't."

"Why do you look so funny at me, Smithy."

"I don't want to lose you."

"Smithy, gee, you've got moistening in the eyes."

"Yes."

"You're the most surprising guy."

"I feel I'm never going to be alone with you again."

"Sure you are. I mean I'll see you tonight, Smithy."

"In a room of crowded people."

"But we'll see each other. Let's not turn this into a funeral. Here's a hanky. You give me yours. Maybe I feel like a tear. This is just great. Sitting bawling into the sauerkraut."

"Sorry to behave like this, Miss Tomson."

"I like it. Feel free. Don't mind crying, it's the guys who pray. I don't like. Nice to see you break down."

"Thanks."

"Don't mention it."

"Kiss you on the nose, Miss Tomson."

"Sure. Anywhere you want."

"Covers a lot of ground."

"Good, I want it to. Why don't you buy horses, Smithy, and sport around the resorts. We might meet up. Spend an evening on a verandah watching the fireflies. Was my favorite as a kid. Wait for a shooting star, holding hands on a porch swing. Ask you to come back to my place now, but my fiancé is going to be there, the poor bastard, got in a rut inheriting millions. That makes you smile. That's better. Say you'll see me later. Come on."

"I'll see you later."

"That's it. Black tie, but you come as you like. Building opposite corner where we met tonight. I'm at the top, i A. Floors are numbered, the highest first."

"Let me get Herbert for you to take you back."

"No thanks, I'll catch a cab Smithy. No one's trying to rub me out."

Miss Tomson leaning across the table. Gathering her seal skin up round her black silk and kissing George Smith on the brow. Her tingling perfume. Ache to reach up and hold her breast. A last shred of feeling.

Goodbye.

ACROSS a black bridge, web of trestles over the river cold. Past the tops of warehouses and factories and down into dingy intersecting streets. Further to faintly lurking people along a rialto lined with stores blaring neon lighted bargains of socks, camping equipment, batteries and used parts of cars. Sad rows of houses east and west.

Herbert steering the dreadnaught limozine through the night, black cap on his black head. Dusty dark sky hanging over the upturned teeth of a cemetery. Sign of a can company rearing up, laying a carpet of orange light on the headstones. George Smith hands enlaced in lap. Lines darkening down the face. Leaving deep chasms of care.

One hour ago Miss Tomson left me. World gets gloom again. Red light stops the car. Old bearded gentleman crossing the street. Towards a glowing star over a temple entrance. If ever there was a place to hide. Out on these dismal flat lands. Feel all my blood is up for sale. Offered alive to medical science. Body steeped in bottles.

A highway lit with snakelike haunting lanterns. Blocks of buildings. Plastered box living rooms. Evening aprons and shirtsleeves. Where the men are sick and brides are brave returning from the honeymoons. While I was busy in another land. Poised with Shirl over a canapé. Instead of in these cardboard sprawls of charm and beauty. Where wives lean just gently over the coffee table. Taken from behind. Whisper what's your role in our relation.

Herbert raising his hand at a sign. Car pulling off the highway past a dark little park in a blanket of leaves. Under a bridge, the highway above streaming with the lights of cars. Herbert pointing. A forlorn brick apartment above a window display of medicines. Another window of a bar full of darkness with colored lights blinking far inside.

From the sidewalk Smith looks up. A few yellow lighted windows. Glass double doors into a dim tiled hall. Line of brass mail boxes on the wall. Running a gloved finger on the mottled metal. White square envelope sticking out. Between two names an engraved card from another world. C. C. B. Clementine, Apartment 6C.

Smith pressing the button for the bell. Waiting in the hollow emptiness. Door slamming inside. Sound of feet down the stairs. Someone talking to a child. Woman opening the door. Gasps, recovers and takes a little girl by the hand.

"You want in."

"Please."

"Sylvia hold the door for the man."

"Thank you."

Smith with barren steps climbing the stairs around empty landings to a brown metal door on the sixth floor. Knocking. Evening newspapers and empty milk bottles on mats by other doors. Roar of cars floating up from the highway down below. A dead squeak, the door opening a brief inch. Peer of a red eye. Part of a pink arm.

"My God, George. Come in. Thank heavens my message got through. Tell your Miss Martin I'm deeply and forever grateful. Welcome. Forgive me while I crawl Just this length of the hall And my attire. Only thing I have left is my hunting pink. My iron has burned holes in my airport uniform."

Smith walking slowly behind Bonniface crawling with an odd bark towards a sitting room. Through an open green curtain, a stove bubbling a pot of spaghetti.

"George I'm trying to teach Mr. Mystery to walk and bark again. I crawl to encourage him. Sit there, on the box. Which used to have oranges only I ate them all. Full of sunshine."

Bonniface pouring out a jar of wine. Handing it to Smith, who crossed his knees and tilted his head to listen.

"Smith it can't go on. Woeful things have befallen Mr. Mystery and me. We're nearly prisoners in here. We have spaghetti, we have each other. Woof woof."