Джозеф Хеллер - Something Happened

"I don't talk to myself."

"You bite your nails and don't even listen to any of us."

"Do I? What makes you think I'm angry when I'm like that?"

"We're all afraid."

"That doesn't mean I am. Sometimes I'm just feeling unhappy. Or concentrating. I can be unhappy too, can't I?"

"Would Mommy be angry if I asked her?"

"What?"

"If you fuck her."

"Only because of that word. Maybe not. Don't do it in front of anyone."

"I better not."

"You already asked me. I already told you. If you ask her too, it wouldn't be to find out, would it? It would just be to see if she gets angry."

"Was it all right? To ask you?"

"You already asked me that three times. I'm not angry. Do you want me to be angry?"

"I thought you'd be. I bet other kids' fathers would be."

"Maybe I ought to be. I'm better than other kids' fathers. Is that why you keep asking me? Are you trying to make me angry?"

He shakes his head positively. "No. I don't like it when you're angry. I can tell. You're starting to get angry now, aren't you?"

"I don't like it, either. And I'm not."

"Emphasis?" he remembers.

"Emphasis," I confirm.

"I don't like Derek," he remarks without pause. He wears a troubled, injured look.

"You're not supposed to say that," I instruct him mildly. "You're not supposed to feel that way, either."

"Do you?"

"You're not supposed to ask that."

"You just told me I could ask you anything. That's another thing I always think about."

"Yes. You can. It was okay for you to say what you did and ask me. And it was also okay for me to answer you the way I did. It was all right for both of us. Can you understand that? I hope that's not too confusing for you. I'm not trying to duck out on the question."

"Am I supposed to say it or not? I don't know."

"I don't know," I admit resignedly. "I'm not sure I like Derek, either, the situation I mean, the way he is, maybe even him too. I'm not sure. But we often have to live with things we don't like. Like my job. Me too. I don't know what to do about him yet. And nobody can help me."

"He makes me uncomfortable."

"He makes me uncomfortable."

"I'm ashamed to bring friends here. I think they'll make jokes about me."

"So are we. But we try not to be. We shouldn't be. And you should try not to be too. It's not our fault, it really isn't, so we pretend we aren't. Ashamed. What else?"

"Money."

"What about it?"

"You want me to tell you what's on my mind, don't you?"

"Yours too?"

"Do we have any?"

"What do you want?"

"That's not why."

"What is?"

"You buy me everything."

"So far."

"Have we got too much?"

"For what? We're not millionaires."

"Have we got enough?"

"For what?"

"You make it hard," he charges. "You're kidding now. And I'm not."

"To give away?" I kid some more, taunting.

"You give money away," he rejoins in defense.

"To cancer and things like that. Not to other people. Not to kids. I don't shovel it out to kids I hardly even know like it's too hot for me to hold on to."

"Leukemia?" he asks.

"I knew you'd ask that. Do you want me to?"

He shrugs almost indifferently. "I would like it, I think. But don't take it away from cancer."

"I knew you'd start worrying about leukemia the second I told you. I'm sorry I told you."

"I'm not worrying about it. I don't even know what it is yet."

"Don't you ever worry about things you don't know about?"

"Like what?"

"Why should I tell you if you don't know about them?"

"Now I'll worry about them. Now I'll worry about things to worry about," he adds, with another gloomy laugh.

"That's what a lot of people do worry about."

"You don't like me to give money away," he observes. "It makes you angry, doesn't it?"

"Is that why you do it?"

"I'm not gonna tell."

"You're not gonna do it."

"Yeah?"

"I'll kick your ass," I warn him jocularly.

I am happy we are talking together so freely. (I relish those moments when he seems to enjoy being with me.)

He used to give money away (probably still does, or will start giving money away again when the warm weather comes and he finds himself outside the house a lot with other kids), pennies, nickels, and dimes (money that we gave him for himself, or that he took from us, although I don't believe he has started stealing coins from us yet or lighting matches. That will come with masturbation. That's the way it came with me. I stole coins from everyone in my family and set fire secretly to everything I could find in the medicine cabinet that I discovered would burn with a flame. I squeezed blackheads from my face and fiddled with cigarette lighters with enormous fires. And jerked off. We didn't want him to. I used to try to explicate for him with professional authority why it was improper for him to give presents that we gave to him away to somebody else, and that the money we gave to him was a present. It was talking to the wall. He would hear me out dutifully every time; but he would not grasp what I meant. His face was vacant, patient, and condescending. I did not know what I meant either, or why I even tried to make him stop. And continued to try. It was only pennies, nickels, and dimes, and yet I moved in on him with the same zealous dedication with which I used to attack the blackheads around my nose and squeeze from my skin tiny yellow filaments that could have been pus. I think I felt him ungrateful). I think he still does give money away, for I have noticed that he and his friends, like my daughter, who is not normally generous, and some of her closest friends, tend to give money and other things back and forth to each other without keeping record or demanding return. I hope he does (even though I've told him he shouldn't), for I would like him to be unselfish. So why did I harangue him? I would like him to grow up to be one of these young people I see so many of today who seem to want to be very good to each other. They even lend cars. We never lent cars. I wish I were one of them; I wish I had a second chance to be young and could be part of them. I wish I could be sure they are as happy and satisified as I think they are. (My daughter isn't happy, and neither is my son, and maybe she will be, and so will my son. Maybe they still have a chance.) Every once in a while my gaze falls on a young boy and a young girl (she doesn't even have to be pretty) walking or sitting in public with their arms around each other trustingly and intimately and I can almost fall down in pain with piercing envy and lust. No, not lust. Envy. Longing. Every once in a while I do find myself with a young girl something like that; but I think she thinks I'm "square," even though she may like me (and sleep with me) for a while. And I think she's right: I am square. I am even gauche. I even feel gauche when I'm making my pitch for some girl with my customary flip, suggestive (and predictable) (and trite) repartee, and I think less of myself for being that way even while I am that way and see myself succeeding. I don't enjoy adultery, really. I'm not even sure I enjoy getting laid. Sometimes it's okay. Other times it's only coming. Is there supposed to be more? There used to be. There used to be much more heat. My wife and I used to upbraid him fiercely each time we learned, through crafty and persistent interrogation, that he had given money away again. Sometimes it would not even be to a kid he liked much or knew particularly well, but to one he had just met that summer who simply happened to be with him on the boardwalk or street and seemed to want it more. Sometimes that was the only reason he gave us for doing it. He gives cookies away too, and candy, and lets other children play with his toys, even when new. For some reason, it still galls me (my wife reacts similarly — a mood of jealousy and rejection is what I feel) when we see him permit some other kid to play with some new present we have just given him. (We feel it is still ours, rather than his.)