Robert Coover - Pinocchio in Venice

"But some things I never forgot, prof. You really helped me, you know, you changed my life!" She reached into her mouth, pulled out a long glistening ribbon of gum like a frog's tongue, rolled it up, and, turning back to the altarpieces, stuffed it back in her cheeks again. "I can see now, for example, how all these — schloopp! — paintings are really like moving pictures. Nothing stands still, so art, to be truthful, has got to move, too, right? It's why you said you — yoomm! sploop! SPAP! — always loved the movies. And theater — "

"No, I never…"

"I mean, 'images of eternity,' 'shadows of the divine perfection,' all that's just — ffplOP! — bullpoop, isn't it, Professor Pinenut? Like you always said!"

"I–I don't think you were, eh, listening very carefully…"

"And I can see now what you meant about churches being nothing more than fancy repertory theaters — I mean, just look around! — it's a place where you just expect something wild to happen — !"

"I said nothing of the kind — !" he rasped faintly, coughing and snorting. He felt infuriated by these stupid travesties of his deepest convictions, but at some remove, far behind his sinuses, which had filled up painfully, making his head bob heavily on his feeble neck.

"All the bejeweled props and snazzy sets, the stage doors and costumes and all the music and magical stuff — I mean, what actor wouldn't go apeshit for the priest's gig, it's a real headliner, isn't it, it's got everything but dancing girls! And what with the whole amazing tonk dolled up in all colors of the rainbow, these glitzy dollar signs all over the joint, kissing putti in the front row, and those big chromos up there like crazy movie posters — what's a masterpiece but just a high-class ad, a billboard for the bigots, like you always said, right, prof?"

"Oh, please — !" he squawked, racked by a rattling cough.

"Jeepers, professor! Are you okay?" She slid in beside him then, took his hand. "Hey, you're looking like a whoopee cushion that's lost its whoopee! What's happened to all your fancy threads?!"

"I–I have suffered a — wheeze! — great misfortune… Now, please, Miss, go — "

"And you're so cold! Here, tuck your hands in here and get them warm!"

"What are you doing — ?!" he yelped. "I — rurff! hawff! — I don't — ! Kaff! I never — !" But she had grabbed them both, stuffed them inside her sweater, it was already done. One of his hands was still clutched around an ear. He hopes she didn't notice. If it were still on his head, it would be burning with shame. In fact it feels a bit warm under his fingers right now. If that's his ear. Not much flesh left on his fingertips, can't be sure of anything any more. Not much in his head either, his faculties hardening, his memory turning to dust: who was this student? All the dense airless lecture halls of his endlessly protracted career have blurred into one, his innumerable pupils into a vast shapeless, faceless mass. Waiting outside his office door. Waiting to have their little strings pulled. Day after day. That was life, what he knew of it. Closed now, that door. Forever. He nestles his nose deeper into the soft fleece, wondering, vaguely, if he might have missed something… Well, and even if he did, what did it matter? I casi sono tanti…

"You know that Mary up there hanging out over the skewered saint, the one on the cloud holding up her little puppet," she says suddenly, so startling him that he sets everything jiggling around beneath his nose. "Hey! Be nice now, professor," she murmurs admonishingly through the scarf tied round his pate, and gives him a playful little smack on his behind. Which, to his joy, he feels. "Well, you used to show us a lot of pictures like that in class. And what I noticed is that the Virgin is always sad." She hugs him closer. He is still, in his mind, protesting, but his body has completely surrendered. And the therapy is working: there is feeling now, quite wondrously, even to the tips of his toes. "I know what that's supposed to mean, that she has that faraway look because she foresees her little boy's tragic future, and that spoils the fun, but I think that's just dumb guys talking. What I see in that look is a disappointed mother." Even the tickle in his throat and the wheezing convulsions of his chest have faded away. He feels so grateful he wants to kiss something. "It's like, I don't know, it's like having a perfect son is not enough…" She sighs, and her breasts lift and fall around his nose like animated powder puffs. "Is that what you think?"

"Yes," he lies. He is too happy to argue. The gratitude wells up behind his eyes like the onset of a delicious sneeze. Before his eye, the open one, the tender blue hummock swells invitingly. Che bella! He lifts a finger under the sweater to touch the pointy part. "Exactly…!"

"Is — is something the matter, professor?" she asks in alarm.

"What — ?!" he cries in panic, jerking his finger back and rearing his head up. It takes him a moment to remember where he is. "The matter — ?!"

"Your nose! It seems to be — !"

"Ah, it's — it's a cold!" he mutters confusedly, his eyes watering. He turns his head away in embarrassment, pulls his hands back, hides his nose in his sleeve. "I'm sorry! Nasty thing, don't want you to catch it…"

She seems to be giggling behind him, but he can't be certain, and he's too ashamed to look. He ducks his head. What was he thinking — exposing himself — in his condition — and if she saw the rest — ! He is wheezing again, his chest racked anew by a fit of coughing. "You sure you don't want to come home with me?" she asks, rising from the pew, her jaws snapping at the gum once more. "I could put an extra blanket on — "

"No! A friend! I have to wait!" he gasps between the painful spasms, keeping his offending part tucked between his knees.

"Well, can't blame a girl for — fllupp! POP! — trying. It was terrif seeing you again, prof. You're really something else!" And — "Peace!" — she is gone.

"Wait — !" he whispers and, twisting round, catches just a glimpse of her tightly denimed posteriors disappearing provocatively out the door. "B-Bluebell — ? Miss — ?!" Too late. He has lost her, lost her forever! Of course, he cautions himself, turning back, shriveling once more into his terrible debilities, it's no catastrophe, insolent uncouth creature that she is, frivolous and disrespectful, no, good riddance, his final hours can be better spent without suffering yet another gum-popping American barbarian, her cockiness exceeded only by her ignorance, though she is not completely stupid, it must be said, brash, garrulous, but also fresh and winsome in her boorish way, blasphemous to be sure, impudent, a shamelessly wanton creature no doubt, but warm-hearted (he knows, he has been there), generous, compassionate, and willing to learn, yes, he could teach her, he has already changed her life, has he not, she said so, the soil is prepared, as it were, it's never too late — and think of it! a hot bath! What does he want to do, go back to that stinking boat yard? He finds he has already staggered to his feet. In the painting behind the altar, if his beclouded eyes do not deceive him, the Virgin Mary has opened her bodice to give baby Jesus and all the cherubs and angels crowding round a suck and is peering down now past her hiked skirts at Saint Sebastian, struggling in agony against his bonds beneath her but his eyes to heaven. And then (is something dripping on his face — ?! what is she doing — ?!) the holy martyr's nose begins to grow! Straight up! Oh my God! Even before the arrow in the saint's groin starts to twang obscenely, the old professor is out of his pew and scrambling stiff-kneed up the aisle. "Miss — !" he croaks. "WAIT FOR ME — !"