Geoff Nicholson - Street Sleeper

‘Well, sort of.’

Ishmael nodded. He had a feeling for these things.

‘Actually,’ she said, ‘I’m doing research for my first novel.’

They passed a road sign that said Shoeburyness was twenty-four miles away.

‘My parents want me to go back to Oxford and finish my degree. I want to be free.’

This was what Ishmael had journeyed so far to hear.

♦

Karl and Cindy spend the summer making love, reading Joyce aloud and touring in Karl’s Beetle convertible. He has the car resprayed in red metalflake with some very tasteful black pinstriping. He has to take out another student loan to pay for it all but he considers it worthwhile. He has fitted a zoom tube, a set of moon discs, and a pair of baby turbo mirrors. They drive out to the edge of the desert, read Pomes Penyeach , and fuck naked amid the scrub and sand.

♦

Marilyn, it appeared, was working on a novel about a girl who is studying Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Oxford University, but really the girl wants to write a novel. However, she feels she has no experience of life so she takes to the road, hitches, screws around, gets drunk, gets molested, gets tattooed, gets chased around the country by her parents, and meets lots of fascinating and colourful characters, including the man of her dreams. They buy some land, become self-sufficient, she writes a bestseller, and they have half a dozen gifted children.

Ishmael thought it sounded like a good read.

‘And am I one of the fascinating and colourful characters?’ he asked.

‘I’ll say.’

‘Where’s your tattoo?’

‘I’ll show you when we get to a motel.’

‘Motel?’

‘Yes, I thought we should go to a motel and have raunchy sex in the middle of the afternoon.’ Ishmael narrowly kept control of the wheel.

♦

But graduation is coming, job recruitment threatens, and student love often dies in a last minute dash for good grades. Karl and Cindy see less of each other in these crucial weeks though that is his decision not hers. Karl completes his paper on the ‘difficulty’ of Joyce’s parody in Ulysses and this absorbs him to such an extent that he can’t even find time to replace the dying starter motor in his car. And Cindy, loving Karl more than ever, feels lonely, resentful, and resigns herself to a so-so degree in Communications.

Then Karl gets the news that he has won the Xavier Clinton Harley scholarship in James Joyce studies and the chance to visit the University of Texas and spend six months with Joyce manuscripts.

‘It’s too good an offer to turn down,’ he tells Cindy. ‘And after all, six months is no time at all. We’ll write. I’ll call you. Nothing need have changed when I get back.’

Cindy wonders whether he is trying to deceive her or himself.

‘Yes,’ she says. ‘Everything will be fine when you get back. I’ll make sure of that.’

♦

The A13 is not a Mecca for cheap, sordid motels. In fact, the only one Ishmael knew was just outside Cambridge. It was a long drive but they were free spirits with all the time in the world. What’s a couple of hours and a few gallons of petrol when you have all eternity in front of you?

And of course they had so much to discuss. Ishmael had never met a student of philosophy before. Mostly she talked and he listened. There were more things in her philosophy than Ishmael had ever dreamed of. They chatted about Spinoza, Russell, Kant and Bergson. They chewed the fat over Existentialism, Egoism and Platonism. Marilyn tried him out with a few old chestnuts like the self and others, appearance and reality, free will and predestination. It was heady stuff.

‘Imagine an island,’ she said.

‘I might have heard this one before.’

‘The inhabitants are all female and are either virgins or nymphomaniacs. The virgins always lie. The nymphomaniacs always tell the truth. Now, if you met an inhabitant from the island, what question would you ask her in order to determine whether she was a virgin or a nymphomaniac?’

‘I give up,’ Ishmael said.

‘You wouldn’t need to ask any questions,’ Marilyn said. ‘You can always spot a nymphomaniac. It’s something about the eyes.’

She explained this was her little joke. Ishmael was finding this whole philosophy business a lot more tricky than he had imagined. He was more at home with a few simple concepts.

‘But philosophy is not about a few simple concepts,’ Marilyn said.

‘Oh come on,’ said Ishmael, ‘it is to me. I may not know much about metaphysics but I know what I like. A tank full of petrol, a head full of relevation, that’s my philosophy and I’m sticking to it.’

‘You know,’ Marilyn said, ‘this attitude you have towards cars is really profoundly working class, if you don’t mind my saying so.’

Ishmael did mind. That hurt. The Zen motorist likes to think of himself as classless. He would have to think that one through.

♦

Six months is plenty of time for some scars to heal, not enough for others. Cindy is determined to remain one of Karl’s passions.

The months pass. Joycean letters cross the States, and finally Cindy gets a letter that says Karl will be home ‘at the end of the month’. Cindy is hurt by the lack of precision, and Karl’s letter says that he will have one or two things to sort out before he sees her, things like getting the Bug out of storage, seeing what needs doing to it.

Karl does indeed come home at the end of the month but it is well into the next month before he makes contact with Cindy. He is warm on the phone and says he’ll be round at about six, they’ll go for a drive.

‘How’s the Bug?’ Cindy asks.

‘Bugs don’t change much,’ he says and chuckles.

♦

Ishmael discovered that it is a legal requirement to give your name and address when registering at a motel. He wrote ‘Ishmael, c⁄o The Road’, but that didn’t go down too well. In the end he wrote ‘Mr and Mrs Smith’. It was just like the movies.

Another requirement, at least in this case, was payment in advance. The receptionist looked at Ishmael and Marilyn, looked at the car, and then insisted.

Their only luggage was Marilyn’s shoulder-bag, and a large brown paper bag containing Ishmael’s leather suit. He never knew when it might come in handy. When they got to their room Marilyn took a bottle of champagne and a side of smoked salmon out of her bag. They sat on the edge of the bed and drank from the bottle.

‘This is good champagne,’ Ishmael said, though he wasn’t sure it was.

‘I only shoplift the best,’ Marilyn replied.

They took off their clothes and got into bed.

To cut a long story short, Marilyn’s tattoo was on her buttock and it was of a snake. They made love. Ishmael offered the opinion that it was transcendent though he didn’t have much to compare it with, only Debby and a girl called Eunice whom he’d met very briefly at a party.

‘What’s your favourite position?’ he asked.

‘Foetal,’ Marilyn replied.

She explained that was another joke. Ishmael suddenly thought he should have brought his vibrator and attachments in from the car.

♦

At five o’clock Karl rings the bell to Cindy’s apartment. She isn’t ready for him but his earliness seems like a good sign. She quickly puts on old jeans and a sweatshirt and runs down to the front door of the apartment building to greet him on the doorstep. They kiss. It is passionate enough.

‘Come in,’ she says.

‘Nah,’ says Karl. ‘Let’s go for a drive.’

‘Where’s the car?’ she asks, looking up and down the street.

‘There.’

♦

Marilyn got out of bed to have a shower. Ishmael was dozing and thinking higher thoughts when he heard the gentle crunch of metal from outside. He got up and looked out of the window. Someone had run their car into a bollard in the car-park. It was a Rolls-Royce. It was Marilyn’s parents’ car. Enlightenment was clearly visible in front of Reception. Mother and father got out. They looked at the damaged rear wing, shouted at each other accusingly and strode into the lobby of the motel.