Nathan Hill - The Nix

Cut to a shot, wide angle, of a hallway filled with students: bearded, long-haired, unkempt, shouting slogans, playing music.

“Good lord,” says Faye’s mother. “Look at them. They’re like hoboes.”

“I’m going out,” Faye says.

“They probably started as nice boys,” says her mother. “They probably took up with the wrong crowd.”

“I have a date tonight.”

Her mother looks at her finally. “Well. You look very nice.”

“I’ll be back by ten.”

She passes through the kitchen, where her father is twisting off the top of the percolator. He’s brewing coffee and fixing a sandwich in preparation for his ChemStar shift tonight.

“Bye, Dad,” she says, and he gives her a quick wave. He’s wearing his uniform, his gray jumpsuit with the ChemStar logo on the front, the interlocking C and S on the chest. She used to joke with him that if he removed the C he’d look like Superman. But they haven’t joked like that in a long time.

She’s opening the outside door when he stops her. “Faye,” he says.

“Yeah?”

“The guys at the factory are asking about you.”

Faye pauses in the doorway, one foot in the house and one foot out. She looks back at her dad. “They are? Why?”

“They’re wondering about your scholarship,” he says as the percolator’s top clatters off. “They’re asking when you’re leaving for college.”

“Oh.”

“I thought we agreed not to tell anyone.”

They stand there in silence for a moment, her father scooping spoonfuls of coffee grounds, Faye gripping the doorknob.

“It’s not something you have to be ashamed of,” she says. “Me getting into college, and getting a scholarship. That’s not — what did you call it? Bragging?”

He stops fussing with the percolator then, and looks at her and smiles his tight smile. Puts his hands in his pockets.

“Faye,” he says.

“That’s just — I don’t know what that is. Doing a good job. It’s not bragging.”

“Doing a good job. Right. Does everybody get this scholarship?”

“No, of course not.”

“So you’re special then. You’re singled out.”

“I had to work hard, get good grades.”

“You had to be better than everyone else.”

“Yes, I did.”

“That’s pride, Faye. Nobody is better than anyone else. Nobody is special.”

“It’s not pride, it’s…reality. I got the best grades, I scored the highest marks. Me. It’s an objective fact.”

“Do you remember the story I told you about the house spirit? The nisse ?”

“Yes.”

“And the little girl who ate the nisse ’s meal?”

“I remember.”

“She wasn’t punished because she stole his food, Faye. She was punished because she thought she deserved it.”

“You don’t think I deserve to go to college?”

He chuckles and looks at the ceiling and shakes his head. “You know, most fathers have it easy. They teach their daughters to value hard work and a day’s wage. Chase off the wrong boys and buy an encyclopedia set. But you? You complain if a book is a poor translation. ”

“What’s your point?”

“Everyone already thinks you’re a big shot. You don’t have to go to Chicago to prove it.”

“That’s not why I want to go.”

“Trust me, Faye. It’s a bad idea, leaving home. You should stay where you belong.”

“You did it. You left Norway and moved here.”

“So I know what I’m talking about.”

“Do you think it was a mistake? Do you wish you’d stayed back there?”

“You don’t understand anything.”

“I earned this.”

“What do you suppose is going to happen, Faye? Do you really believe that because you work hard the world is going to be kind to you? You think the world owes you something? Because the world isn’t going to give you a damn thing.” He turns around to attend to his coffee. “It doesn’t matter how many straight-A report cards you have, or where you go to college. The world is cruel.”

Faye is still angry about this as she drives to the pharmacy. Angry at her father’s cynicism. Angry that what always earned her the most praise — being a good student — is now the thing that makes her a target. She feels double-crossed by this, betrayed by some implicit promise made to her long ago.

And she thinks maybe it’s providence that she’ll be seeing Mrs. Schwingle tonight. Because if there’s anyone in this entire town who would not accuse Faye of being pretentious, it is Mrs. Schwingle, who brags about her world travels and worships whatever new thing the elegant ladies of the East Coast are doing. Certainly Mrs. Schwingle, of all people, could sympathize.

Faye arrives at the pharmacy and walks up to the counter, where she finds Harold Schwingle standing with a clipboard counting aspirin jars.

“Hi, Dr. Schwingle,” she says.

He considers her sternly and coldly for what seems like an oddly long moment. He is tall and wide, his hair cut high and tight with military precision.

“I’m here to pick up my package,” Faye says.

“Yes, I suppose you are.” He leaves and remains somewhere in the back room for what seems like far too long. Over the tinny speakers a brass band plays a waltz. The automated air freshener releases a small poosh and a few seconds later there’s the cloying, perfumey odor of synthesized lilacs. There is nobody else in the pharmacy. The overhead lights flicker and buzz. On the counter, buttons for Richard Nixon’s presidential campaign stare woodenly back at her.

When Dr. Schwingle returns he’s carrying a dark brown paper bag, stapled shut. He drops it — and not particularly gently — on his side of the counter, too far away for Faye to comfortably reach it.

“Is this for you?” he says.

“Yes, sir.”

“Will you swear to that, Faye? You’re not buying this for someone else, are you?”

“Oh, no sir, it’s for me.”

“You can tell me if it’s for someone else. Be honest.”

“Cross my heart, Dr. Schwingle. This is mine.”

And he breathes in a dramatic way that reads as exasperation, maybe disappointment.

“You’re a good girl, Faye. What happened?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Faye,” he says, “I know what this is. And I think you should reconsider.”

“Reconsider?”

“Yes. I’m going to sell this to you because it’s my duty. But it’s also my duty, my moral duty, to tell you I think it’s a mistake.”

“That’s very nice of you but—”

“A big mistake.”

She was not prepared for the intensity of this conversation. “I’m sorry,” she says, though she doesn’t know what she’s apologizing for.

“I always thought you were so responsible,” he says. “Does Henry know?”

“Of course,” she says. “I have a date with him tonight.”

“Do you?”

“Yes,” she says, as instructed. “We’re going out tonight.”

“Has he proposed to you?”

“What?”

“If he were a gentleman he would have proposed to you by now.”

And Faye feels defensive under his criticism. What comes out sounds hollow. “All in good time?”

“You really need to think about what you’re doing, Faye.”

“Okay. Thanks very much,” she says, and she leans over the counter and closes her fist around the brown paper bag with a loud, poignant crunch. She doesn’t know what’s happening here, but she wants it to be over. “Goodbye.”

She drives quickly to the Schwingle house, a grand thing that sits on a rocky bluff overlooking the Mississippi River, a rare point of elevation in the otherwise gentle rolling flatness of the prairie. Faye drives up through the trees to the house, which she finds unexpectedly dark. The lights are off and everything is silent. Faye panics. Did she get the date wrong? Were they meeting somewhere else first? She’s considering driving back home and calling Margaret when the front door opens and out she walks, Margaret Schwingle, in sweatpants and a baggy T-shirt, hair disheveled in a way Faye has never seen before, scooped to one side like she’s been sleeping on it.