some of it. I ran halfway home like a bat out of hell. My whole body was steaming; my breathing filled the street, no joke. I passed under a streetlight, and everything went blue.
At an intersection, I saw the headlights of a car. I had the right of way, but I let him go first. In the pause, I tore my wig off, then plunged ahead. The rain wasn’t enough to put out the fire raging in my lungs. I gave it all I could, then forced myself to give even more. It made me moan and cry, it was so hard. I ran because I’d killed Betty. I ran because I wanted to run. I ran because I needed something else. At the same time, it seemed a perfectly natural reflex-it came from the heart, after all, didn’t it…?
27
The cops paid no attention to the story-not one of them showed the slightest interest. A crazy girl who tears her eye out, then ends it all by swallowing a box of Kleenex-they visibly couldn’t have cared less. Of course, when I’d stolen the money they’d made a big deal out of it-it was in all the papers, and they threw up roadblocks all over town. But killing her-I could have done it five hundred times and no one would even have gotten up from his desk.
As for me, everything went just fine. How could a real love story end at the police station? A real love story never ends. It’s not as easy as it seems in the storybooks-you must expect to have to fly higher, your brain light as a feather. Anyway, to this day no one has ever come looking for me. No one has bothered me. I was able to get it out of my system in peace.
I took care of the worst of it by turning over a small fortune to the people at the funeral parlor. Despite their frightening faces, I couldn’t complain-they handled all the details with the hospital, I hardly had to do anything. In the end they cremated her. I have her ashes. I keep them close by. I still don’t know what to do with them, but that’s another story.
As soon as I had the time, I wrote a long letter to Eddie and Lisa. I explained everything that had happened, without telling them the decisive role I’d played. I apologized for not letting them know earlier. I hoped they’d understand that I wouldn’t have been able to stand that. I’ll see you soon, I told them, love to you both… P.S. I won’t be answering my telephone for a while. Kisses. On my way to the mailbox I realized that the weather had turned lovely again. The heat and humidity had gone. It was mild and dry. I came home with an ice cream cone in my hand. One.
It seems stupid, but I still found myself cooking two steaks, or leaving the water in the tub for her, setting two places at the table, asking questions out loud. I slept with the light on. It’s the details that are hell-the little things that remain on the branches, like fog, like a gown of tattered lace. Every time it happened, I’d freeze in my tracks, and take my time digesting it. When I accidentally opened the closet and saw all her clothes in it, I almost choked. I tried to tell myself that each time was less painful than the time before. It wasn’t easy to tell.
Still, I didn’t die. One morning I hopped on the scale and saw that I’d lost only six pounds. What a laugh. Letting yourself go once in a while-chewing your fingers to the bone-is not what saps a man. I was not even too far away from looking good. Some people take it with them when they go, but Betty was the opposite. She left it all. ALL. So it wasn’t surprising that sometimes I felt her there, next to me.
I let several days go by without seeing anyone. I had explained things to Bob and Annie-had asked them not to disturb me. Bob wanted to come over with a bottle. I won’t answer the door, I told him. I’d decided to climb back up the hill in a hurry. For that I needed peace-telephone off, television on. One morning I got the proofs of my book to correct, and this made for a change of pace. It was her thing, after all. I took my time with it, and it was probably this that got me back on my feet-morally, I mean. When I went back to my notebooks and found that I could still put two or three good sentences together… when I smelled the eerie beauty that they breathed… when I saw that they were like children playing in the sun, then I realized that, though I’d gotten off to a bad start as a writer, the rest was going to be just fine-it was as good as done.
The next day I was a new man. It started when I stretched out in bed. Getting up, I realized that I was in good shape. I looked at the apartment in a good mood, smiling. I sat down in the kitchen to drink my coffee, something I hadn’t done in a dog’s age-usually I just drank it standing up or leaning on the sink. I opened the windows. I felt so good that I ran out to buy croissants. It was a lovely day.
To get out a bit, I went to eat in town. The cafeteria was jammed to the ceiling, the waitresses already had sweat circles under their arms. We’d had that job, Betty and I. I knew what it was all about. I sat down at a little table with my chicken, mashed potatoes, and apple pie. I watched the people. Life was like a bubbling torrent. I’d say that this was the image I kept of Betty-a bubbling torrent-and to that I’d add luminous. If I had my choice, I’d wish she were still alive, that’s understood-but I have to admit that, to me, she wasn’t too far from it. You can’t be too picky, after all. I stood up, thinking that sitting down should be left to those who really suffer.
I went for a walk. On my way back, I ran into a pretty girl looking in the store window. She was blocking the reflections with her hands, blond hairs glimmering beneath her arms. I put the key in the lock. She straightened up.
“Oh, I thought it was closed,” she said.
“No, why would it be closed? It’s just that I never pay attention to time.”
She looked at me and laughed. I felt silly. I’d forgotten that-what that’s like.
“That must get you in trouble,” she joked.
“Yeah, but I’m going to fix it. I made some New Year’s resolutions. You want to see something…?”
“Well, I don’t have much time now, but I’ll come back…”
“Whenever you like. I’m here every day of the week.”
It goes without saying that I never saw the girl again-it was just to show how bright things looked to me. That was the day I plugged the telephone back in; the day I shoved my face into a pile of her T-shirts, smiling; the day I finally looked at a box of Kleenex without trembling. It was that day that I learned that you never stop learning-that the stairway goes on forever. What did you think? I asked myself, while slicing a melon before bed. I thought I heard laughter behind my back, coming from the direction of the melon seeds.
My book came out about a month after Betty’s death. My associate was a fast worker, to say the least. He was still a small publisher. I must have come along when he had little else to do. One morning I found myself with a book on my lap. I turned it over in my hands. I opened it. I sniffed the paper. I slapped myself on the thigh.
“Oh, baby, look what’s finally happened,” I whispered.
Bob decided to celebrate. We took a little trip. Grandma watched the kids. Bob and Annie brought me home early in the morning. We couldn’t tell if you were laughing or crying, they told me later. How should I know, I answered. It’s not always easy to know if you’re attending a funeral or a birth. Writers’ brains are no more atrophied than anyone else’s. Despite what I’ve become, I’m still in the same boat as everyone else-I have more than my share of things I don’t understand. There must be a Saint Christopher for writers who are a little soft in the head.
Some guy from a small regional newspaper wrote that I was a genius. My publisher sent me the article. I’m not sending you the others, he said-they’re bad. Applause in one corner, boos and hisses in the other. Still, the summer went by calmly, and I found my pace once again. I got along fine. The store was open. I installed a bell on the second floor that rang when someone opened the door downstairs. It didn’t happen too often. I gave up the idea of moving, though I’d thought it over more than once. Maybe later I wouldn’t be against it, once my book was finished. For the time being, though, I wanted to stay put. The light in the house during the day was great-giant splashes of brightness and shadows; who could ask for anything more? The atmosphere was enough to make you drool. The Rolls-Royce of atmospheres for a writer.
Toward evening, I’d take walks, and if the spirit moved me, I’d go sit at a sidewalk cafe and watch the eyes go by in the twilight. It got me out of the house. I listened to the people talking among themselves. I sipped my drink slowly, swallowing the last drop fifty times before I decided to head home. There was nothing to rush for, and nothing to hold me.
Once I’d plugged the telephone back in, Eddie called me regularly.
“Jesus Christ, we’re up to our ears in work just now. Can’t come down…”
