Dana Spiotta - Lightning Field

“What are you talking about?” She looked up at him. He clutched his book and smiled, as though he was joking.

“Six — strong breeze. Seven — moderate gale. Eight — fresh gale. Nine — strong gale. Just who is she, this Gale? I want to meet this minxish thing.”

“Shut up.”

“Ten — whole gale. Oh, yes, yes, yes.” He laughed and clutched his book. His fingernails were dirty.

“If you don’t stop, Michael, I’m going to leave the room.”

“Eleven — storm. Twelve through seventeen — hurricane.”

“Will you just stop this?” Mina walked to the doorway and glared at him.

“Wait, Mina, wait, the best part, over seventeen— devastation.” Michael smiled.

“Why do you do that? I hate when you recite things. It has nothing to do with anything. What’s your problem?” Michael just stared at her, for a moment confused, then he laughed.

“I don’t know, it’s funny.” Michael looked at her. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re weird. You act strange,” Mina said, pouting, moving back to the couch. “What’s with that book? Is it really necessary to carry it with you at all times?”

“This? I like to read it sometimes.” Michael tossed the book in front of her. Mina ignored it. He smiled at her, then spoke flatly. “All propositions are of equal value. The sense of the world must lie outside the world. In the world everything is as it is and happens as it does happen. In it there is no value — and if there were, it would be of no value.”

“Michael—”

He continued, smiling as if he were telling a joke, his eyes glancing right as they always did when he recited things, his performance face. Michael had always been what Mina’s father called mnemonically performative. But not so relentlessly, not with her.

“If there is a value which is of value, it must lie outside all happening and being-so. For all happening and being-so is accidental. What makes it nonaccidental cannot lie in the world, for otherwise this would again be accidental. It must lie outside the world. Hence there are no ethical propositions.”

“Yeah, whatever.” Mina picked up the remote control and started skipping channels with a ridiculous velocity. “I’m sure you could recite the whole thing and I would never speak to you again. So stop. It’s—” She saw he was looking at the book, and she could tell he was saying it anyway, to himself. She felt he was not only not her brother, but a sort of imposter who took the superficial details of Michael and distorted them, ridiculed them.

“So like what’s it about, anyway?” she asked. He stopped his trance and looked at her.

“I don’t know. Mina, I have no idea. It’s abstracting yourself,well, self-reference, anyway, to a kind of philosophical autism. It’s like falling off a cliff, and then you’re stuck in a labyrinth of solipsism.”

“Yeah, whatever. Like as if anything you said actually means anything to me.”

“Well, that’s the point.” “

What. . ever.”

He frowned at her. “When did you become so flip?”

“I don’t know, maybe when you became such a freak.” She shook her head. He stopped fingering the book.

“Look,” he said, gesturing at the TV. “Imitation of Life.”

“Who cares,” Mina said. “I hate those old movies.”

“Yeah, right, Mina.” Michael smiled and tried to pull her down to the floor next to the TV.

“Don’t.”

“Mina, Lana Turner. Did you hear me? Lana. Lana Turner. Just her name, the way it sounds, like wanna turn her. Her aging platinum-poached face. Her turbaned head. Her dressing gown, her vanity set. All those amazing Edith Head clothes.” Mina reluctantly glanced at the TV. Michael took her hand and pulled her to the floor in front of Lana’s Technicolor fuchsia-lipped head.

“Frosted everything,” she said.

“Sandra Dee, Mina,” Michael said.

“Troy Donahue.”

Mina put the phone down. She had to check in with the restaurant. Then she had to see Max. Again. Nearly every day now. Just the thought of how it would go once she got there, how they would start right in without talking, was enough to make her feel better.

* * * VIDEO # 2

Outside MAX’S house. Surveillance black and gray, video hazy. Static angle down on doorway. Obviously from a fixed security camera. We see nothing but the doorway for a moment.

TITLE: ARRIVALS AND DEPARTURES

GIRL appears at door. Her face has been pixelated to obscure her features. She is wearing a sun hat. She leans into the intercom. She pauses for a moment, then pushes the door open.

CUT TO: SAME DOORWAY AGAIN.

Exact same shot of still entrance. The door opens and GIRL exits. She pauses, puts on her sunglasses, and walks off camera.

CUT TO: SAME DOORWAY AGAIN.

GIRL enters the frame, no sunglasses. She pauses, opens her purse, and takes out a compact. She checks her face, touches her hair. She returns compact to purse and presses buzzer. She waits, looks directly at camera, and waves. She rests her hand on the doorknob and then goes inside.

CUT TO: SAME DOORWAY AGAIN.

Entrance is empty for a few seconds. The door opens and GIRL exits, rushing right off camera in an instant.

CUT TO: SAME DOORWAY AGAIN.

END TITLE: A MINAMAX PRODUCTION

Saturday.

Mina had to go to work today.

Lorene called her early, waking her. She sounded upset, but Mina pretended not to notice. All she could think about was no Max today. Instead she would have to cover the lunch shift at the restaurant. She would have to get it together and smile and be the face of calm and confidence. She had lied to David about having to work and now she really did have to work.

Lisa had to go to work today.

The twins could not be left with their father on Saturdays. He slept in and by the time he was up and about, the children had been awake for hours. In his misery and exhaustion, he had no patience. Mrs. Brenshaw was feeling ill today and couldn’t baby-sit even for a few hours. Lisa decided she would take the children to Lorene’s. She’d let them play in the living room and watch TV while she cleaned. This was not allowed by her company. But she couldn’t leave them alone with Mark.

Lorene did not have to go to work today.

She canceled her appointments and her session with Beryl at St. John’s. She would stay in bed and do nothing. She would let Mina handle everything and sleep in.

She would perhaps spend the day under her sheets, in the dark, trying to be still. She was contemplating some self-touch therapy when she heard the door unlock. She froze under her sheets, and then she remembered Saturday morning the cleaning woman, Lisa, came. She wouldn’t have any peace, not even one morning of it. She put on a chartreuse vintage silk kimono painted with tiny Eiffel Towers and black velvet Chinese slippers with sequins. She went down the spiral stairs intending to ask Lisa to cancel today’s cleaning. In the living room Lisa had her two five-year-olds, each grasping one hand. They were a boy and a girl, and Lorene watched as the heavyset woman arranged them on her couch with their toys in front of her large TV. Lisa had on a T-shirt that said “California” in looping cursive letters, with a stylized palm tree punctuating the final a.

“Mom, it’s much bigger than our TV,” the boy said.

“Yes, it is. Now, you guys watch cartoons just like at home. Don’t touch anything. Sit right here and afterward we’ll get ice cream.”

The children nodded and smiled and were already too occupied with the TV to bother with their mother any longer. When Lisa turned away from the kids and saw Lorene, she nearly fell back.