Stephen Dixon - What Is All This? - Uncollected Stories

Of course you could try coaxing me to leave by pleading through the door. You could say “Would you do me this very one favor and leave?” Or “Would you please, without any more fuss, get your things together and leave?” Or “Listen, I’ve been reasonable and fair up till now, haven’t I, so what do you say you leave?” Or “Haven’t we had enough of this trying to wheedle and coddle you, so will you please just leave? Then will you just plain leave? Then will you just leave then, spelled 1-e-a-v-e, and please?”

But no matter how emotional and assertive you get through the door, I’m not going to leave. Even if you said in a much angrier voice “All right, that’s more than enough now, are you going to leave?” I wouldn’t leave. Or “Okay, do you hear what I say? — I want you to leave.” Or “Fun’s fun, but I’ve taken all I’m going to take from you, so leave. Now I’m more than asking you to leave. I’m more than even telling you to leave. I’m saying you have to leave. Once and for all now — you’ve got to leave. Now I don’t want to say this again — leave. This is the last time I’m telling you — leave. Did you hear me, I’m ordering you to leave. I said, I order you to leave. Now I want you to get out of there or I’ll really do something more than just order you to leave. Now get yourself straight the hell out of there, as you’re forcing me beyond the little self-control I’ve left to do something more than just order you to leave.”

But nothing you say or how or where you say it will force me to leave. Even if you screamed those threats from the street up to my window, I wouldn’t leave. I wouldn’t leave even if you got several people to yell from the street and outside my door that the only right thing for me to do is leave. That I’m spiting nobody but myself if I don’t leave. That I’m not doing it by the book or following any of the traditional or unspoken rules. That whatever little game I’m playing is up. That I should know by now that no place is anybody’s for keeps. That when you have to leave you have to leave and that’s all there is to it. But no matter how many of you yell from the street or through my door that I’m driving the lot of you beyond whatever self-control you have left to do something more than just order me to leave, I still won’t leave.

So go on and give the most rational arguments and doomful warnings imaginable, but you have to know by now they won’t make me leave. I’ve yakked about it through the door to you, yowled so loudly the whole block must have heard, sent my own telegrams and other dispatches and made calls why it’s impossible for me to leave. But you never seem to understand why I can’t leave. Or if you do understand, then you still can’t, or refuse to believe if you can, that nothing you or anyone else can say or do will ever get me to leave.

Of course you could do more than just yell from the street and behind my door that I’m forcing you to do something more than just order me to leave. You could tap on my door and ask to be let in so you can try and reason with me why it’s in my own interest to leave. Or even rap on my door and demand I let you in so you can reason and then insist, or just insist without giving any reasons, that I leave. Or you could bang on my door with another person, both of you asking and then demanding, or just demanding I leave. Or bang on the door while trying to force it open, so you could get in even if I tell you I don’t want you in, or barge in without first asking if I’ll let you in, and then demand I leave. Or bang on the door while someone else is kicking the door and two other persons are trying to pick the lock or force the door open and several other people are shouting behind the door and from the street and the roofs and windows of the buildings across the street that I leave. But the door’s quite strong and secure with several bolts, latches and locks, so no amount of picking, kicking and shoving’s going to force it open.

You could, of course, then pound on the walls of the two adjoining vacant apartments, while other people are banging and kicking my door and trying to force it open and shouting from all the other places I mentioned and throwing pebbles and bags of garbage at my window to get me to leave. Or you could climb up or down the building’s fire escape and yell from the landing outside my window that I leave. Or throw a rock through the window and shout through the broken pane while other people are shouting from the street and roofs and other windows and fire escapes and kicking and pounding on the adjoining walls and my ceiling and floor from the vacant apartments right above and below mine that I get straight the hell out of here. But listen to me. Even if you get all those people to do all that or they do it voluntarily and you also stick your hands past the broken panes and rattle the locked window gate while screaming bloody murder at me, I’m still not going to leave.

Of course your eviction methods might get more vicious and tactical than that. You might try driving me out with smoke-or stink-bombs or even some kind of narcotizing or tear gas. But I’m still quite the limber fellow, I want you to know, and prepared myself with a thick pair of fireplace gloves, so anything you toss in goes right back out the window at you. Or you might be able to bust open the door by snapping the latches and locks with a crowbar and then push aside my dresser and upturned bed and storm in. Or maybe you’ll just saunter in after you push everything aside and say “Picnic’s over, my friend, so do you leave peacefully or do we have to come up with some other way?” And once you again see your sweet talk doesn’t work: “We’ve had it up to here with you, do you understand? Now get your ass out of here this second or I’ll pull you out with my bare hands. Or knock you down and tie you up and, with a little help, carry you to the street. Or just drag you out by your hair, not caring a damn for the lumps you’ll take from the bumps along the way and down the stairs.”

But you’re not about to drag me anywhere while I’m chained to the radiator, and none of your bullying’s going to get me to say where I stashed the key. What you’ll then most likely do is try to rip the chain apart from the radiator. But this chain’s the strongest made these days, and try boffing me stiff so you can cut it with a hacksaw, and I’ll wrap it around your ankles and tug on it till you give up and wobble out on your knees. This is a small room, big enough for maybe two or three people and the radiator, toilet, dresser and my massive bed, and I’ve been here so long I know all the ins and outs of the place better than anyone, so don’t think you’re going to strong-arm me to leave.

You could then think the time was right for sound reason to work, and say “Why don’t you use your common sense already? With all the damage we’ve done to your window, door and walls, your room’s not worth living in anymore.” And when I remain silent: “What I’ll have to do, if you don’t unchain yourself or give me the key, is clean out your kitchenette, including the removal of your little fridge, sink and hot plate, and then stop all food deliveries from coming in and maybe even get your water and plumbing turned off.”

But what will you do when you find out I’m staying here no matter how poor and unsanitary the conditions are and that I prefer starving to death than leaving? Only thing I can see you doing after that is unbolting the radiator through the ceiling of the apartment below mine and dragging the radiator out with me still chained to it and swatting away at you from the other end.

Once you drag me out of the room, you and a few of your workmen could pick me up still chained and carry the radiator and me downstairs. Or if that’s too hard, lift the radiator over the windowsill, past the crowbarred window gate onto the fire escape and from there into a crane shovel, and with me, still attached, forced to follow, lower the radiator and me to the street.