Norman Rush - Subtle Bodies

“I knew it,” Ma said.

“Well, you didn’t know it .”

“You told Ned. Ned will take care of it. You be careful.”

There was more from her mother about the LA march. Lots of unions were in. Stars were going to be in it. It was going to be bigger than the Tom Mooney demonstrations, whatever they were. I can’t listen, Nina thought.

“The only other thing bothering me is that Ned’s friends haven’t signed his petition, and he cares.”

Ma was outraged for Ned. “ What? Why not? What kind of friends? Get out of that place then.”

“I can’t. We can’t. There’s one in particular he wants to sign. So Dear Abby here’s my question: I could go behind Ned’s back and beg this person, which is what it would come down to …”

Ma was emphatic against it. She said, “Absolutely not. You’d have to make him swear never to tell and then it would be a secret and it would be like rubble under the bottom sheet you could never get rid of …”

“Ma you just convinced me.”

“How big a deal is it? I could run the cards. I know I know. But they help me think.”

“No, I said you convinced me.”

“You need to cheer him up. You know how. Get his mind off this.”

Nina laughed. “I know what you’re talking about but you don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m wearing him out in that department, poor guy. When we get through with this he won’t want to come near my chocha for a year and a half. I can see it, Get that thing out of here , he’ll say.”

“You’re right, because of theum. Okay so forget that.”

“Okay, time to go, my cell is almost dead anyway. I have to go help Ned with our stuff.”

“Call me anytime,” Ma said.

There was an argument for trying to get some hijinks going here in the cabin rather than in their room in the manse. It was quiet and private in the cabin and it was mental up in the manse. There were interruptions. Ned was looking at her in a nice way. He had liked it earlier when she’d told him that the reason she’d first gotten interested in him was because he was so verbal looking. He had brightened up. But she had decided that easing up was the best idea.

Something was heating up Ned’s confessional impulses.

Ned felt he should peel the paper off the windows before they left the place. She wanted to leave it to Serv-U. He wanted her to help him. It wouldn’t take long. Ned uncovered the first pane and went rigid, staring out into the night. She knew what it had to be .

She ran to the cabin door, threw it open, and stepped out onto the little porch and shouted as commandingly as she could, “Come here, you, Hume, you come here. Hume!”

Don’t do this, she was thinking. At the side of the house, it was Hume, rising. When he saw her coming at him, he lost his footing and fell back against the side of the building.

She hesitated. She was going to arrest him! Where was Ned? She stood over the boy. “You,” she said. She pressed an open hand over her crotch, ridiculously, to protect herself there. Unhelpful rain blew into her face. She sensed that something was wrong with the boy. He’d surely had time to run. He was wearing the same odd leather ensemble as before and he was drenched. Ned arrived and pushed her aside. And then Ned was hauling the boy around to the porch. Hume wasn’t resisting.

“Don’t be rough with him,” Nina said. She resisted the impulse to take hold of Hume’s clothing somewhere.

Hume and Ned stood apart from each other, and Ned, almost courteously, made an ushering gesture to the boy. They entered the cabin. Hume seemed to be limping. He had strong body odor.

Nina thought, How can this be? He was handsome and solid. He had a cleft chin , cut to just the right slight depth. He was a rugged boy with fine shoulders. He should be beleaguered with girlfriends following him around. He was as tall as Ned.

Hume was being compliant. Everything remained to be seen. Apparently she was the only one he would make eye contact with, for now. He was something like a fine animal, a fine horse, which was a stupid thought. Whoever had cut his hair was a criminal. The two cropped dark ridges running back were like dorsal fins. There were scabs and scratches in the shaved areas of his scalp. He wasn’t taking care of himself. His eyes were maybe the best color for a man to have, a pale blue, which she thought of as a bitter color. He had accepted a seat on one of the kitchen chairs. Ned was sitting opposite him. There was no chair for her so she leaned against the wall.

How she could bring this into the discussion she had not the slightest idea, but she thought it might improve things for this kid if he could comprehend the bizarre image of a woman he’d stumbled in on, naked, upside down, legs stretched up the wall. She thought, This is the definition of hopeless.

Ned seemed uncertain. She knew what was happening — he had too much to say and he didn’t want to start off with clichés. And he was sitting too close to Hume. It made it inquisitorial. So what she could do was go over and pull on the back of his chair a little. He would get the point. She did it and it worked.

Ned said, “I’m Ned and this is my wife Nina and I am an old, old friend of your father. And I, I want to say something to you: I’m really sorry.”

Hume was rolling his right pant leg up, with difficulty because it was leather and it was wet. A grossly swollen ankle was emerging.

“Okay,” the boy shouted, stunning Ned with the violence of his delivery. Hume was picking bits of something off his flesh. Nina thought, You cannot run around over boulders in the rain in shoes like that. He was sockless, wearing what appeared to be espadrilles in the last stages of disintegration.

Ned stood up. “Why are you shouting at me? I mean God damn you anyway, Hume, you know what you did this afternoon, God damn you …”

Nina took Ned by the arm. Ned was shaking. Nina mouthed the word Stop.

Ned wouldn’t. “Now God damn it, you violated my wife’s privacy. Who are you? Why do you think you can do that? You can go to jail for that …”

Nina said, “ Hume , nobody knows about it. We haven’t told anyone.”

“I’m sorry I looked at you,” Hume said, slowly, in a tone that seemed to deny what he was saying.

Ned detected slyness and couldn’t control himself. “Now God damn you again . Listen, what is going on with you? What are you doing besides running around in the woods, for Christ’s sake?”

She thought, I hate it here, the whole fucking area: it’s dank and I hate the boring trees and the towns are decrepit … and peculiar without being in any way picturesque … somebody said that about someplace. In Kingston she had seen the ghost of a nineteenth-century sign on the side of a brick building in white letters barely legible, CORSETERIA.

“What about your mother?” Ned asked Hume harshly.

“What about her?” Hume answered.

“Your mother was devastated — is, I mean. Why aren’t you helping her?”

“She wants me to leave,” Hume said.

“What does that mean?”

Hume said, “She does. You don’t know anything about my mother.”

“And that’s all you have to say about spying on my wife?”

“Sorry. Apologize.” The sly tint would not leave his voice.

Ned said, “What does your father mean to you, nothing? I want to know. Was he not a good father to you?”

“You don’t know anything. My mother is stupid.”

Nina bent over Hume and took him by the shoulders. She said, “If you want to be a monster, be one, but now you have to come up to the house and let somebody take care of your ankle. How did you do that?”