William Gaddis - J R

— Even dry cleaning can’t give you a fresh start Jack that suit is really the most appall…

— I mean be the dry cleaner Amy… he was back to turning pages, — watch you teach sometimes problem your kiddies think grownups do what they always wanted to do when they grew up, God damned Protestant ethic can’t escape it have to redeem it, have a kid right from the start wants to be a dry cleaner when he grows up how’s that… They heaved into another platform where the train gasped, failed to a stop. — He grows up gets married has kids want to make monogram…

— I have no idea what you’re talking about honestly Jack if you can’t simply…

— Try again then look, Protestant ethic have to justify your own existence be a Chinaman like Lin Yutang and make a million dollars, problem now’s to justify the Protestant ethic grow up want to be a dry clean…

She cleared her throat without turning from the dirty pane. — What did you want to be when you grew up.

— A little boy.

— I said when you grew up!

— Can’t remember Amy, told you once I never really expected to… and the pages started again, — find something else here maybe… pounding them down in rumpled creases against his leg extended in the aisle where his foot kicked a passing trouserleg black serge all the way up to the round collar, easing into the empty seat ahead. — Well Christ.

— Jack get your feet in, people can’t…

— New shoes like them?

— Yes but get them out of the aisle people can’t…

— Can’t be alone like a God damned lunchroom, sit down at the empty counter he comes in sits right down beside you, twenty empty God damned stook comes in sits on the stool right beside you… A train passed from the other direction with an enveloping shock and was gone, and the door up ahead banged half opened, half closed to the sway of the car past billboards, finished apartments Now Renting, diaper service trucks marshaled against the day to come. — Might start a diaper…

— Jack if you say another…

— Whole life waiting for this chance favors the prepared mind Pasteur says spend all my God damned time preparing never quite ready when the…

— And if you can’t simply sit up I think I’d…

— Get a black suit and just freeload, problem it’s too God damned late now even to be any of the things I never wanted to be. He swayed forward, caught the seat ahead as she stood. — Redeem the Protestant epic have a kid wants to be a dry cleaner instant he’s conceived, little conditioning Stella both think dry cleaning next time we climb in concentrate on dry cleaning feel it slip in dry cleaning dry cleaning what… She’d already got one knee past him, squeezed the other past his rising knotted up now against the seat ahead where he unfurled the paper full fanning the wisps trailing over the round collar there, folding the pages back and battering them flat without a look across the aisle to where her profile rose beside her in that dirty pane, eyes fixed ahead where slow as though endemic there tears welled, that nearest the glass seized a course down and dropped and she snapped her bag open, pulled dark glasses from the handkerchief tangle and put them on, reflecting the train’s shuddering stops and starts as the aisle generated shopping bags, umbrellas, newspapers neatly creased pausing occasionally at the welter gone silent across the way until, beyond it through the dirty pane, buildings aswarm with fire escapes rose from sight as they dropped in a culvert, dropped back as they rose, the tunnel enclosed them like a blow and she waited, joined the end of the line shuffling toward the door, through it, and then a minute later back, pulling the newspapers aside.

— Jack? Wake up…

— Wide awake who won.

— Get up, you can’t stay on the train.

— Amy?

— You can’t stay on the train, get up.

— No came in to take you to dinner… the papers went to the floor in a heap, — French restaurant said I’d take you to dinner never showed up…

— You’re not taking me anywhere Jack but you’ve got to get off the train. Where are you going.

— Take you to dinner little French…

— And you can’t wander around like this with all that money, here come this way…

— I see crowds of people walking round in a ring thank you? See dear Smyrna merchant Mister Eugenides pockets full of currants how’s that.

— Please…

— What? He had her arm, a half step behind. — Used to know every word…

— Jack I’m, I’m going out this way and I simply can’t…

— Raining?

— It’s drizzling yes what are you going to do!

— We won’t worry what to do, won’t have to catch any trains and we won’t go home when it…

— Jack please be quiet, you can’t wander around in this with that throat don’t you know someone you, do you want to go to a hotel?

— Think they’ll let us in without luggage?

— Jack don’t you know someone in town? Here’s a cab I can drop you wherever you…

— Can’t Amy. Can’t drive and I won’t ride.

— Well you can’t just stand out here in the rain either.

— Can’t drive and I…

— You’re not going to drive just get in!

— Window side see the natural… and they were swept past Girl-O-Rama Live plus Stagette Loops with a jolt that heaped him in the corner.

— Driver? she leaned forward to the glass, — one ten east…

— All go to the movies how’s that.

— Now, she finished and sat back — you must know someone in town where you can…

— Know Mister Eigen probably hates me though.

— Hates you don’t be silly where does he live.

— Opened that suitcase make him hate anybody.

— No but you must have friends where you…

— No friends Amy just you, sorry that your foot?

And she drew them close, sitting away from him to look out the window until they stopped, released by a doorman in gaping livery. — All right Jack can you, here take my arm and please…

— We’re here? Thought we’re going to a hotel have room service.

— Well we’re not and please try to behave.

He had her arm half a step behind into the elevator, half one ahead out and his weight against it pushed the door open at her turn of the key, into the foyer bright at her touch on the switch. — This my room?

— No come along, please…

— Nice little room put up print curtains get a hot plate…

— Jack! Now please…!

— Sorry… he came on toward the white expanse of sofa, — looks like Bloomingdale’s furniture department nobody live here?

— It’s just a, a place… She dropped her bag on the sofa and sat on its arm slipping the dark glasses away from her face, her shoes from her feet. — Now will you just sit down and try to think of someone to call who can, Jack stop hopping around and sit down!

— Wet shoe just trying to get off this wet…

— Well then sit down and take it off! Jack I just, I’m just terribly nervous I want to take a hot bath and go to bed and you can’t just sit here in those awful wet clothes isn’t there someplace you, now stop what are you doing Jack you’re spilling money all, oh it doesn’t matter it doesn’t matter!

— Go out find a Chinese restaurant Amy bring in some…

— There is no Chinese restaurant! Can’t you, I don’t care what you do, I’m…

— Thought you might want something to…

— If you want a delicatessen their number’s on a pad under the phone there, I don’t care what you do…!

He got far enough up to look over the sofa’s back, down an empty hallway through an empty door. — Amy…? There was no sound but running water. Movements slowed, stalking the white telephone across white carpet, getting about the place uneven gaited with a kind of deliberate cunning as though outmaneuvering gravity, he finally answered the delivery at the door and came back with it cautiously down to hands and knees, flattening emptied bags under the sofa cushion.