Anne Tyler - Noah's Compass

“Oh, well, I-”

“You have been speaking to classes, all these years.”

“That’s not the same, somehow.”

“But suppose there was a meeting of people objecting to something. And you were asked to make a speech telling them why they were wrong. I’m thinking you would be good at that!”

When she got going this way, he could understand how he had first taken her for a much younger woman. She was leaning toward him eagerly, holding on to her Styrofoam cup with both hands, oblivious to the bra strap that had slid down her left arm. (Her bra would be one of those no-nonsense white cotton items, circle-stitched, in a super-duper size. He could detect its outline through her blouse.) He shifted his gaze to his coffee. Judging from the strand of bubbles skimming the surface, he wondered if it might be instant. “I’m just not a very public person,” he said.

“If we could point up the classroom angle… like, stress your persuasive abilities. Every teacher has persuasive abilities!”

“You really think so,” he said noncommittally.

Then, “Tell me, Eunice. Have you been working for Mr. Cope long?”

“What? Oh, no. Just a few months.”

She sat back and began unwrapping her cake. He seized his advantage. “I like your attitude toward him,” he said.

“How do you mean, my attitude?”

“I mean, you’re helpful but respectful. You allow him his dignity.”

“Well, that’s not so hard.” She took a bite of her cake.

“Not for you, obviously. You must have a knack for it.”

She shrugged. “Want to hear something funny?” she asked when she had swallowed. “My major was biology.”

“Biology!”

“But I couldn’t find a job in biology. Mostly, I’ve been unemployed. My parents think I’m a failure.”

“Well, they’re wrong,” he said. He experienced a kind of rush to his head. He had not felt this strongly in years. “Good Lord, you’re the diametrical opposite of a failure! If only you knew how you seem from outside, so efficient and discreet!”

Eunice looked surprised.

“At least,” he said hastily, “that’s how it struck me when I saw you in front of the Cope building.”

She said, “Why, thank you, Liam.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I do work really hard at this job. Not everybody appreciates that.”

“That’s because your purpose is to make it not look hard,” he said.

“Oh, you’re right!”

He took a sip of his coffee and grimaced. Yes, instant, beyond a doubt, and barely lukewarm besides.

“It isn’t only names I was talking about,” he told her. “When I said I could use reminding, I mean.” He shot her a glance. “The fact is, I was hit on the head by a burglar a few weeks ago. Since then I seem to be suffering a bit of amnesia.”

“Amnesia!” she said. “You’ve forgotten your identity?”

“No, no, nothing so extreme as that. It’s just that I’ve forgotten the experience of being hit. I have no recollection of it.”

He waited for her to ask, as everyone did, why he would want such a recollection, but she just made a tsk-ing sound.

“I guess I should be glad,” he told her. “I’m better off forgetting, right? But that’s not how I feel about it.”

“Well, of course it’s not,” she said. “You want to know what happened.”

“Yes, but there’s more to it than that. Even if someone could tell me what happened-even if they told me every detail-I would still feel… I don’t know…”

“You would still feel something was missing,” Eunice said.

“Exactly.”

“Something you yourself have lived through, and it ought to belong to you now, not just to someone who tells you about it. But it doesn’t.”

“That’s it exactly!”

He was grateful to hear it put into words. He felt a sudden flood of affection for her-for the errant bra strap, even, and the headlamp look of her eyes behind her big glasses.

“Eunice,” he said consideringly.

She paused in the midst of licking a dab of frosting off one finger.

“Properly speaking,” he said, “it should be ‘You-nike-ee.’ That’s the way the Greeks would have said it.”

“‘You-niss is bad enough,” she told him. “I’ve always hated my name.”

“Oh, it’s a fine name. It means ‘victorious.’”

She set down her cake. She sat up straighter. “So…” she said, “um, tell me, is your… wife a teacher too?”

“Wife? I’m not married. The Romans would have said ‘You- nice -ee.’ But I can understand how that wouldn’t work in English.”

“Liam?” Eunice said. “I really meant it when I said you should apply for a job.”

“Oh. Well, actually, since I’m sixty years old-”

“They can’t object to that! Age discrimination’s illegal.”

“Yes, but I meant-”

“Is it the résumé you’re worried about? I’ll help you. I’m really good at résumés,” she said, and she gave a little laugh. “I’ve certainly had enough practice.”

“Well, actually-”

“We could get together and whip one up after I finish work. I could come to your house.”

“Apartment,” he said without planning to.

“I could come to your apartment.”

She would walk into his den and see the patio door where the burglar had slipped through. “Hmm,” she would muse aloud. She would turn and examine Liam’s face, cocking her head appraisingly. “In my experience,” she would say, “a memory that’s associated with trauma…” Or, “A memory that’s imprinted in someone roused from deep sleep…”

Oh, don’t be absurd. This was just a glorified secretary, working at a made-up job her mother had cadged from a friend.

But even as he was thinking that, Liam was saying, “Well, if you’re sure you can spare the time.”

“I have all the time in the world! I get off at five o’clock today. Here,” she said, and she reached to the floor for her purse and turned it upside down over the table. A wallet and keys and pill bottles and bits of paper fell out. She chose one of the bits of paper-a ruled sheet torn from a memo pad-and thrust it toward him. Milk, toothpaste, plant food, he read. “Write down your address,” she ordered. “Is it someplace I can find?”

“It’s just up Charles near the Beltway.”

“Perfect! Write your phone number too. Darn it, where’s my pen?”

“I have a pen,” he said.

“Hello? Hello?” she shouted.

Liam was startled, until he realized she was calling their waitress. “Can we get our bill?” she asked when the woman appeared.

Without speaking, the woman dug in her housecoat pocket and handed over a chit of paper that seemed as unofficial as Eunice’s memo page. Liam said, “Please, let me pay.”

“I wouldn’t think of it,” Eunice said.

“No, really, I insist.”

“Liam!” she barked, and she sent him a mock frown. “We’ll hear no more about this. You can buy me coffee once you land a job.”

Liam looked up at their waitress and found her frowning at him too, but with an expression of utter contempt. He bent meekly over the memo page and wrote down his address.

There was no way on earth that he could work for Cope Development, even if they were misguided enough to offer him a position. And it was nice of Eunice to take an interest, of course; but face it: she was really sort of… hapless. People like Eunice just never had quite figured out how to get along in the world. They might be perfectly intelligent, but they were subject to speckles and flushes; their purses resembled wastepaper baskets; they stepped on their own skirts.

Actually, Eunice was the only person he could think of who answered to that description. But still, there was something familiar about her.