John Irving - The World According to Garp

“I'm taking Duncan home,” Garp told her. She nodded.

“If I were you,” she said, “I'd take him home, too.”

Garp fought back another “I'm sorry,” suppressing it after a short but serious struggle.

“Do me one favor?” said Mrs. Ralph. Garp looked at her; she didn't mind. “Don't tell your wife everything about me, okay? Don't make me out to be such a pig. Maybe you could draw a picture of me with a little sympathy.”

“I have pretty good sympathy,” Garp mumbled.

“You have a pretty good rod on, too,” said Mrs. Ralph, staring at Garp's elevated track shorts. “You better not bring that home.” Garp said nothing. Garp the puritan felt he deserved to take a few punches. “Your wife really looks after you, doesn't she?” said Mrs. Ralph. “I guess you haven't always been a good boy. You know what my husband would have called you?” she asked. “My husband would have called you “pussy-whipped."”

“Your husband must have been some asshole,” Garp said. It felt good to get a punch in, even a weak punch, but Garp felt foolish that he had mistaken this woman for a slob.

Mrs. Ralph got off the bed and stood in front of Garp. Her tits touched his chest. Garp was anxious that his hard-on might poke her. “You'll be back,” Mrs. Ralph said. “Want to bet on it?” Garp left her without a word.

He wasn't farther than two blocks from Mrs. Ralph's house—Duncan crammed down in the sleeping bag, wriggling over Garp's shoulder—when the squad car pulled to the curb and its police-blue light flickered over him where he stood caught . A furtive, half-naked kidnapper sneaking away with his bright bundle of stolen goods and stolen looks—and a stolen child.

“What you got there, fella?” a policeman asked him. There were two of them in the squad car, and a third person who was hard to see in the back seat.

“My son,” Garp said. Both policemen got out of the car.

“Where are you going with him?” one of the cops asked Garp. “Is he all right?” He shined a flashlight in Duncan's face. Duncan was still trying to sleep; he squinted away from the light.

“He was spending the night at a friend's house,” Garp said. “But it didn't work out. I'm carrying him home.” The policeman shined his light over Garp—in his running costume. Shorts, shoes with racing stripes, no shirt.

“You got identification?” the policeman asked. Garp set Duncan and the sleeping bag, gently, on someone's lawn.

“Of course not,” Garp said. “If you give me a ride home, I'll show you something.” The policemen looked at each other. They had been called into the neighborbood, hours ago, when a young woman had reported that she was approached by an exhibitionist—at least, by a streaker. Possibly it was a matter of attempted rape. She had escaped him on a bicycle, she said.

“You been out here a long time?” one of the policemen asked Garp.

The third person, in the back seat of the police car, looked out the window at what was going on. When he saw Garp, he said, “Hey, man, how you doing?” Duncan started to wake up.

“Ralph?” Duncan said.

One policeman knelt beside the boy and pointed the flashlight up at Garp. “Is this your father?” the cop asked Duncan. The boy was rather wild-eyed; he darted his eyes from his father to the cops to the blue light flashing on the squad car.

The other policeman went over to the person in the back seat of the car. It was the boy in the purple caftan. The police had picked him up while they were cruising the neighborhood for the exhibitionist. The boy hadn't been able to tell them where he lived—because he didn't really live anywhere. “Do you know that man with the child there?” the policeman asked the boy.

“Yeah, he's a real tough guy,” the kid said.

“It's all right, Duncan,” Garp said. “Don't be scared. I'm just taking you home.”

“Son?” the policeman asked Duncan. “Is this your father?”

“You're scaring him,” Garp told the cop.

“I'm not scared,” Duncan said. “Why are you taking me home?” he asked his father. It seemed that everyone wanted to hear this.

“Ralph's mother was upset,” Garp said; he hoped that would be enough, but the rejected lover in the police car started to laugh. The policeman with the flashlight shone his light on the lover boy and asked Garp if he knew him. Garp thought: There is no end to this in sight.

“My name is Garp,” Garp said, irritably. “T. S. Garp. I am married. I have two children. One of them—this one, named Duncan, the older—was spending the night with a friend. I was convinced that this friend's mother was unfit to look after my son. I went to the house and took my son home. Or, I'm still trying to get home.

“ That boy,” Garp said, pointing to the police car, “was visiting the mother of the friend of my son when I arrived. The mother wanted the boy to leave— that boy,” Garp said, again pointing at the kid in the police car, “and he left.”

“What is this mother's name?” a policeman asked; he was trying to write everything down in a giant pad. After a polite silence, the policeman looked up at Garp.

“Duncan?” Garp asked his son. “What is Ralph's name?”

“Well, it's being changed,” Duncan said. “He used to have his father's name, but his mother's trying to get it changed.”

“Yes, but what is his father's name?” Garp asked. “Ralph,” Duncan said. Garp shut his eyes.

“Ralph Ralph?” the policeman with the pad said.

“No, Duncan, please think,” Garp said. “Ralph's last name is what?”

“Well, I think that's the name being changed,” Duncan said.

“Duncan, what is it being changed from ?” Garp asked.

“You could ask Ralph,” Duncan suggested. Garp wanted to scream.

“Did you say your name was Garp?” one of the policemen asked.

“Yes,” Garp admitted.

“And the initials are T. S.?” the policeman asked. Garp knew what would happen next; he felt very tired.

“Yes, T. S.,” he said. “Just T. S.”

“Hey, Tough Shit!” howled the kid in the car, falling back in the seat, swooning with laughter.

“What does the first initial stand for, Mr. Garp?” the policeman asked. “Nothing,” Garp said.

“Nothing?” the policeman said.

“They're just initials,” Garp said. “They're all my mother gave me.”

“Your first name is T ?” the policeman asked.

“People call me Garp,” Garp said.

“What a story, man!” cried the boy in the caftan, but the policeman nearest the squad car rapped on the roof at him.

“You put your dirty feet on that seat again, sonny,” he said, “and I'll have you licking the crud off.”

“Garp?” said the policeman interviewing Garp. “I know who you are!” he cried suddenly. Garp felt very anxious. “You're the one who got that molester in that park!”

“Yes!” said Garp. “That was me. But it wasn't here, and it was years ago.”

“I remember it as if it were yesterday,” the policeman said.

“What's this?” the other policeman asked.

“You're too young,” the cop told him. “This is man named Garp who grabbed that molester in that park—where was it? That child molester, that's who it was. And what was it you did?” he asked Garp, curiously. “I mean, there was something funny, wasn't there?”

“Funny?” said Garp.

“For a living ,” the policeman said. “What did you do for a living?”

“I'm a writer,” Garp said.

“Oh, yeah,” the policeman remembered. “Are you still a writer?”

“Yes,” Garp confessed. He knew, at least, that he wasn't a marriage counselor.