William Gaddis - J R

— Don’t be silly there’s no one… she paused at the top, thrust aside with her foot a packet of letters tied with a shoelace to push the door opening off the balcony, — it would be hopeless wouldn’t it…

— No what’s, what…

— All these papers, to start looking for any they need for this estate in all this… she passed through without pausing her glance at the bed’s faded coverlet ripped half to the floor, turning up to the skylight — do you sleep up here too?

— Too…? the can quivered at her back, — sometimes yes I, all the times I’ve tried to imagine what it would be like but I, it’s still like you’re not really here all the times I’ve been working when I’ve thought about you when I, even when I try not to I do Stella what you saw on the piano down there in the dark of, those lines I even thought I’d play that how she turned her, her bosom shaken with a sudden storm of sighs…

— Edward… her turn that close dropped his eyes to the sighing fall of her breast against his wrist there, — I don’t…

— All the spirit deeply dawning in the, the dark of hazel eyes that’s why I, what I’ve always remembered your eyes when you smiled I’ve always remembered your smile but your, how sad your eyes are when you smile that’s why I, what I’m working on that’s why it’s…

— You’ll let me hear it won’t you, when it’s finished? She brushed past him for the door where the strings rose again, gaily framing an empty trap in the eaves beyond, — it sounds charming…

— Charming is that all you, old-fashioned is that what you mean old-fashioned? Is…

— Oh a bit perhaps, but…

— It doesn’t matter no I just said you wouldn’t understand anyhow if you couldn’t even…

— But I’ve never heard it, how could…

— I said it doesn’t matter! he plunged after her jamming the bubbled knot into the beer can as she gained the stairs, — that’s why you laughed isn’t it why you’re laughing at me you’re not even laughing, you…

— Edward please, you’re not being…

— What I’m not being what, I said you wouldn’t understand it anyhow that’s why I, what it’s about that’s what this is about if you’ll listen…

— I can’t stay now Edward, my…

— Why not because you don’t want to hear it, because that’s what it’s about that, when you married that…

— But… she paused as he broke from the foot of the stairs behind her — you, you’ve never met him Edward, what ever could have given you the…

— What given me the what I, those summers when we…

— But Edward really what ever could have given you the idea that I…

— Why couldn’t it! he came on as the strings sounded now in gashes from the eaves above them — that’s why you, why you’re smiling you just smiled it’s not even a smile it’s just, that last summer once when we all went swimming up on the mountain that stream with the deep pool where we, where you went to the one above it you went up there alone to wash your hair I thought you’d just, I came up to bring you something a towel or something you were taking off your bathing suit and I, I can still, that night I couldn’t sleep that night and I can still…

— But, is that all? Above them the strings withdrew for a long-due trouncing by the solo, filling the space around her with the presence of empty sound. — And Edward after all, you’ve grown up since then haven’t you and…

— There! you, there it’s not even a smile no you let people try to do something they can’t you know all the time they can’t you let them try anyhow you just watch and, and then when it’s too late and you smile that sad smile and it’s still in your eyes that you knew all the time that’s why it’s wait, wait where…

— My cab’s out there Edward, I…

— Your what? what’s…

— My cab, I called a cab for the next train and it’s…

— Cab you didn’t tell me you called a cab wait…

— I can’t, really…

— No but, wait wait I’ll ride over with you… he came still clutching the beer can, crowding her for the front door, leading her the way so anyone watching might have thought it was she pursuing him over the grown grass, through light ending the day with a lustrous quality that brought to vivid life the yellows in what green remained past the crucified crabapple and torment of honeysuckle, grape and rose, toward the drive where he got the cab’s door opened for her, stared at the can in his hand and then jammed it in the corner of the seat starting to follow.

— But Edward…

— No wait…! Behind them, in exultant pursuit of its routed enemy, the orchestra burst full tilt from the studio — wait let me run back and turn that off just a second, wait…

— But driver…

— You wait a second now lady, you’ll wait two hours for the next train.

— All right… The door slammed with the cab’s lurch, — hurry then. Hurry… And she was swept down that arboreal veterans’ ward, its splintered inmates staggered at parade rest for her plunge out the hedge, flung round the corner past the scarred pepperidge tree and hurled up the open highway in the careering interior teeming with static the entire way to the station where he turned to indicate the can couched in the corner of the seat.

— You don’t want to leave something like that in my cab, lady…

The only trash basket in sight was one metal and smashed flat, the only voice one spilling urgency from the radio of a police car parked emptily by. Unseen now, unpursued, she rose to the elevated platform with steps as ponderous as the concrete stairs that took her to the top but one, and there stopped dead. He’d looked at her full before he’d turned away, before her voice brought him round again, books and papers disheveled under one arm wrapped outside with the Turf Guide and appearing in his shoulders’ sag to grow heavier each slow step toward her. — Hello Stella… He stopped out of reach.

— Jack? She paused, and took the last step up. — How are you.

— Stella Bast… his arm fell from a gesture of wellbeing — I’m, as you see…

— Yes it’s, it’s Stella Angel now I…

— Way it’s supposed to be Stella, honest oaf get half the kingdom too?

— But what…

— Old king having trouble with his price earnings ratio offers his beautiful daughter and half his kingdom for somebody to straighten things out, the halfbaked prince botches it some honest oaf crawls out of the woodwork gets the production lines humming and taps the old king for…

— Jack please he, he just died and…

— And you’re on the next train out.

— Why would you say that.

— Just figured you’d done it Stella, put him out of action and…

— It was my father who died Jack he, you’re still drinking aren’t you…

— And you? been out here to a party? He was staring at the thing in her hand, its contents dangling — or you the new Miss Rheingold…

The platform shuddered with a train going through in the wrong direction and a tremor lingered in her frame, turning away, following its lights receding as though desperate to lose distinction among lights signifying nothing but motion, movement itself stilled by distance spreading to overwhelm the eye with the vacancy of punctuation on a wordless page. She reached an empty trash bin and dropped the can clattering into it. — I’d forgotten what you could be like.

— Tried to myself but I gave that up too. I said some cruel things to you then didn’t I Stella.

— Yes but, I’d forgotten almost, you don’t need to feel…

— No, no I meant every word.

— Jack, you…

— What? he followed her again.

— No, nothing… she stood staring out where burning neon forced the eye to read. — How did you end up in a place like this.