William Vollmann - The Atlas

In the River City Deli he was always happy, no doubt because inexperience remained his friend. Sometimes Brandi the whore went by and he could run out and kiss her. He felt loved then. That was at night. Sometimes he'd sit drinking a beer in the middle of a rainy Sunday afternoon, the only customer there, and his knees didn't hurt anymore. At that time they had beers from all over the world. From the ceiling hung flags of all beer-drinking countries, and beer labels and plaques. There were over a hundred imported beers in the fridge, so they said, though he never counted them. Later they cut back to fifty and then the sandwiches got smaller and then they fired John and turned into a soup place and he stopped going. John was the one who used to make the giant sandwiches.

He'd known John for two years. He wrote him notes about the excellent and doubly large sandwiches he made and John put them up on the bulletin board. Then John would get in trouble for making the sandwiches too big, but John didn't care. John had been a student forever, making films. John turned up the radio as he chopped onions, sang I'm glad to be gay along with Dire Straits. He felt that he could count on John, that John understood his neediness. Sometimes when John was off, he went there and got drunk. Although he hardly knew John, he didn't want him to see that.

There had been an aquarium a few years before John, but the fish died one by one. Now there was a jukebox instead.

The girl who stood in for John that night was thin and blonde and homely. He was drunk and so he loved her through his heart's arch-windows of phallic narrowness. He knew what love was because he always felt it. It was simple loneliness.

If he had a gun right now he'd probably go kill himself, but he'd be calm and very very happy.

He decided that he would drink two more beers and then one beer and then he'd be ready to ask her to go out with him. Having never seen her before, he loved her so much. Love notched his soul like the close-packed circular indentations on the trunk of an imperial philodendron. He loved listening to the jukebox and being drunk all alone with no one to bother him, and her not being bothered yet by knowing that he loved her. He loved the nice quiet careful way that she made sandwiches.

Seven-o'-clock. He'd been here for four hours.

The 7-Up machine buzzed fretfully — no, it was singing! It was happy; it too wanted to express itself. .

A blonde in an army surplus outfit and a white headband came in and ordered a sandwich with melted cheese. He smiled at her. She smiled back. He was so happy that now he could die and no one would be bothered.

The thin girl came to take the empty beer bottles away. She smiled at him.

He loved to see her working so hard, cleaning the meat sheer. A few weeks ago, on a Saturday night, he'd been in here with his best friend, who'd now cut all ties. He'd talked about shooting his ex-wife, then himself, just for fun. He wondered if this waitress had been here then. He remembered a thin one, who'd been so patient behind the counter. He'd given her a ten-dollar tip, just for the hell of it. That had left him pond-bottom broke, but today was another payday.

The girl's hair seemed to be darkening so far away across the room, behind the counter. She was wrapping something in paper. The blonde with the white headband was still here, one booth away, staring out at cars and darkness. She looked at him; he looked at her, then down.

The refrigerators were making a steady loud noise. Sausages hung in the air. Finally nothing could be seen outside but the reflections of the cars. The waitress was clicking at something, moving food processor levers. How sweet she was! It would be impossible for any man she'd ever known to emulate his tenderness.

Do you want me to take this away? she said to him.

Maybe I'll just keep looking at it awhile, he said.

It was very black and pretty out the window at eight-o'-clock, just as it had been the previous night when he'd run past his ex-wife's house, running back along the dark street, running back from San Pablo where a man had chased him yelling that he was going to kill him; once he'd crossed Grove Street he slowed down, wondering if he'd see his ex-wife. He didn't want to see her, exactly, but he sort of hoped he would. He never did. If he had, his heart would've curdled so tight as to snap the scar tissues. Standing outside the house, he remembered the day that his best friend had told him that her friend Colleen had just moved in. He had never met Colleen. His best friend said that she was very pretty. He wondered what his ex-wife had told Colleen about him, and whether he could creep into Colleen's room and kiss her, to be unfaithful to his ex-wife. . But in fact he had slept with no one since his ex-wife.

Nine-o'-clock.

You want lots of lettuce? the thin girl was saying to a woman in blue. You got it.

He got up slowly. — Will you go out with me? he said to her. Please?

He was already looking at the floor so that he wouldn't have to see the disgusted pity rushing at him from the girl's face.

No, I don't think I could do that.

Please? he said, longing to kill himself.

I'm sorry.

He went out.

He always sat in one of those chairs whose cushion was the color kof canned tomato soup, in one of those chairs whose arms curved round to embrace your kidneys, at the table in the corner where the brick partition began. From this location (his loneliness reflected in the spoon) he could see one TV on a sports channel bright and silent, and the two fans spinning circles of shadows across the pennants that hung from the ceiling like sleeping bats. Above the brick partition reigned the paintings: the ocean scene, the phony horse, the discreedy blurred nude, the happy child — and beyond them lay a wall of lace locked in place by brass posts. Through this he could occasionally find flickers of action from the bar, but he preferred to gaze down the length of the brick partition, past cash register and coffee pot, where he could sometimes see the waitress who interested him. He did not love her; he did not know her name. But he was sorry whenever he didn't find her there. He had not yet learned when her shifts were because he did not come every day. Often enough she was there, blonde and Irish, rubbing her nose as she said something on the phone.

When she got the bone out of her throat and her ear out of her shoe, by then they'd hung up the telephone! a drunk was shouting.

On the television a man was in the driver's seat, closing the door of his car, and his arm was immense, bigger than his shoulder.

The door to the kitchen swung and glittered. He thought he saw his waitress's face through the diamond window.

She passed the small white table with two settings: two forks on the left, and a knife and spoon on the right, then salt, pepper and flowers, always wilting flowers. He had never sat there. It would have been too sad to sit alone.

Someday he would take this waitress out to dinner and they would eat at that table. She would get up and serve them both, or else no one would serve them and the food would come by itself, sliding like the black plastic tray on which she brought his change, Lincoln's wry face uppermost, his edges curling upward toward the distant fans.

So. You want to come with me? the blonde from Mannheim said in that calm slow voice.

Well, I don't know. Maybe. Can I kiss you?

She flinched. — Depends on where.

How long will I have with you?

Well, you know, we won't have all night, but I won't hurry you.