Naja Aidt - Rock, Paper, Scissors

“It’s Jacques,” Thomas says. “It’s all because of Jacques.”

Helena shakes her head. “Unbelievable. .”

“Thomas is right,” Luke smiles, moving onto the couch beside Alice. “It’s all Jacques’s fault.”

“It’s my turn now.” Kristin sets her glass down with a thud.

“But you’ve had a turn, Kristin!” Alice peers from behind the pillows, wagging her finger— no, no, no —clucking her tongue, glowing, smiling, laughing.

“Yes! But now it’s my turn again! Listen up. This is how you capture life. This one is. . like the waves on the ocean. I hope I don’t stumble over this. I only recall a small chunk of it by heart. It’s difficult stuff, this. . No, I’m getting the book.” And before Luke or anyone else can protest, Kristin has begun reciting. She has removed her scarf and wrapped the book in it, so they can’t see the title. She’s on her feet. Standing in all her grandeur in the middle of the room. The tall, straight body, the sinewy arms. The effortless elegance she carries around like something she was born with. She recites loudly and lucidly, bobbing her head rhythmically and systematically, which, considering her growing inebriation on tequila, defies all reason. Her hair, thick and gray, swishes from side to side. “ Even the children remember that as a year in the slums, threatened with change, where the speakers in the vans invited theft. Sticky finger licking chicken. Clichés and lamentation. We were floating the logic in a rushing medium. I want to be free of you, in order to do things, things of importance which will impress you, attract you, so that you can be mine and I can be yours, forever. ” Kristin rolls through the text. My mother could have been here, Thomas thinks, right here, beside her sister. She could have resembled her. She could have enjoyed Kristin’s ferocity and enthusiasm. She could have loved it or recognized it. Or she could have been irritated. But then he thinks about what Patricia said about his mother, that she was wild and decadent; that’s not how he remembers her. How does he remember her? Was she distant? Was she loving? Was she gentle and motherly or high, drunk, strange, unreliable? Was she irascible? Did she play with him for hours? Did they build things with blocks? Did she teach him how to draw a house? Did she leave him to fend for himself? He doesn’t remember. He remembers only these tiny glimpses that have always haunted him: the feel of her raw tweed dress when he sat on her lap, the smooth nylon stockings, her rounded knees, the distracted way she ran her hand through his hair. But what was her hand like? He can see her standing in the little kitchen, her back to him. Now she turns her clear blue eyes to him. She hands him a plate of sliced apple. He closes his eyes. The stories about her brothers, her soft voice. He would often reach out his hand and touch her earlobe, rubbing it between his index finger and thumb; sometimes she let him do this, sometimes she didn’t. And her laughter, which seemed to come from somewhere else, another room, maybe the living room. Her laughter, and her light, easy footsteps across the wooden floor. He hears Kristin: “ A child is a real person, very lively. They are like plump birds along the shore, standing, watching the local flags snap. It is the sea salt in our blood. A mere drop in the cup. A mirror makes it turn over. ” He’s riding in a bus with his mother. She’s wearing a light-blue jacket. The baby is Jenny, and the baby’s drooling. He hears clearly the chugging of the bus’s motor, the swoop of the door opening and closing, every time the bus stops. Can hear someone talking in the seat behind them. He feels lonely or insecure and clutches his mother’s jacket. She stares out the window. She’s wearing sunglasses. But it’s raining outside, the water’s sliding down the glass. And it’s dark. Where are they going? And is this really a memory? Can it be considered a true memory? No. He shakes his head and empties the bottle into his glass. She’s nothing but a jacket and stockings and a plate of apple slices that are already turning brown. He cannot grasp her presence. It doesn’t work. “ It seemed that we had hardly begun and we were already there, watching people for an instant framed in windows, never finding out what happens to them, or what they mean. ” Kristin beams. Alice is asleep on the couch. And Luke, deep in concentration, sits on the edge of his flimsy chair. Patricia has returned now, and she leans against the doorframe. She looks spent. “ The air we breathe: the air we breathe ranging in size contains flakes of sound, dark, silence, and light. ” Kristin claps the book shut and glances around the room victoriously. Helena begins to gather glasses and bowls, which she places on a black lacquered tray. No one says a word. “None of you know that poem?” Kristin asks, shocked. “C’mon! That can’t be. Patricia?”

She shakes her head.

“Luke?”

“Never heard it before.”

“Ignoramuses!” Kristin plops into the beanbag chair, sighing. She squeezes the shrouded book against her chest.

“I’m going to bed now,” Patricia says, exhausted, “It’s 1:30 in the morning. Are you coming, Thomas?”

“No,” Luke says firmly, unexpectedly. “He’s staying. We’re not quite finished with the game.”

Thomas looks at Luke, and Luke stares insistently at him, insistent and challenging. “Luke’s right,” Thomas says. “But I’ll be there soon.” He wants to stand up and take Patricia’s hand, he wants to apologize, to do something, kiss her, but she’s already gone. Luke covers Alice with a blanket. Helena helps Kristin out of the beanbag chair and hands her the empty bottle of tequila. After they’ve said goodnight and are on their way out of the room, Kristin turns abruptly in the doorway, yelling: “It was LYN HEJINIAN, YOU MEATHEADS! From My Life ! A masterpiece! First published in 1987. Three hundred thousand points for me. You don’t know shit about poetry!” Her eyes glow. She gestures threateningly with the empty bottle, so that the dead, alcohol-soaked worm bounces up and down, smacking against the glass. She shakes her head resignedly. From the kitchen Helena calls for her, friendly but firm, and Kristin curses under her breath, tromping off in her soft moccasins.

Thomas and Luke go outside to piss. Standing side by side in the wet, cool night air, they splash their urine against something that, in the dark, resembles a bank of earth or an anthill. Wind cuts through the treetops. They stand close to one another. They’re quiet. Thomas’s mouth is dry. Wind whips through his hair and his shirt, which fills with air and lifts from his back like a sail. He shivers. The sky seems pale with light. Huge cloud masses scuttle swiftly toward the northeast. Luke zips up his fly. They walk single file back to the house. They get beers in the utility room. “Let’s go to the sunroom so we don’t wake up Alice,” Luke suggests. The bench is hard and the sunroom cold, but Luke pulls pillows and wool blankets from the couch in the living room. Thomas lights the candles resting in some small, amateurish ceramic candleholders, which the twins must have made when they were in kindergarten. A gust of air wends its way through the glass partitions, causing the flames to shoot up until again they shrink, flickering weakly. The wind howls outside, shivering in the trees. Luke uncaps the beers with his lighter, and they light cigarettes. Thomas lays a quilt across his legs, and Luke drapes a blanket around his shoulders, now like an Indian chief. Although Thomas feels less drunk, a headache already thumps behind his left eye. An awl in his head. He stares at the plants in the room, standing in pots, their branches and leaves outstretched. It smells strangely of geraniums, smoke, and candlewax. Luke turns abruptly toward him. With a soft, low voice, he says, his words threading the air between them: “ What did I / do? / Seminated the night, as though / there could be others, more nocturnal than / this one. . ”