'I killed Cheep,' she said.
'Our bird?'
'Yeah. Could you move on your side of the car while I talk about this?'
I moved to my side of the car.
'It's complicated, Hap. Cheep was not only our bird, he was a symbol of our relationship.'
'Sounds to me like you been reading Chub's books.'
'I been thinking is what I been doing; thinking for years. Trying to figure why I'm no good at relationships. I go into them full tilt, mean for them to work, but I can't maintain. You were the best. I had a shot there. But I messed it up. I mess them all up. You see, I got to have my white knight. I know better. Be your own person, and a woman is a person too, and all that shit, but I got to have my white knight. And if the man I'm interested in isn't a knight, I try to make him one. I send him on a quest, and soon as he's no longer on the quest, or is dealing with the consequences of the quest, I lose interest in him, and the cause I've sent him on. I may get interested in the cause again, but I got to have my white knight with me if I'm going to do anything. I see my knight as going out there and doing what he's doing not only for the cause, but for me. I suppose it makes me feel loved. Important. Understand?'
'What's this got to do with Cheep?'
'I'm coming to that. But when the cause really takes the knight—in your case prison—I feel cheated. Like it's not for me anymore. Things come apart. I want to start over, get a new knight. But I couldn't do that with you because of Cheep. Just a bird, I know, but he made me feel tied to you. Other things wouldn't do it, the cause, the love we shared, but the bird was a living reminder. He wouldn't fly away. Depended on me completely. And I couldn't just leave him. He wouldn't have lasted any time in the wild, and in fact would have suffered. But I didn't want to start life anew with him. He reminded me I was a failure at things. Relationships, what have you.
'So I filled the bathtub with water and took Cheep and held him under till he drowned. It didn't take long. He didn't suffer. But I still think about it. I carry that goddamn bird's ghost on my soul like a weight.
'But when I did it I felt good. Not that Cheep was dead, but that I had made a strong decision without anyone's help, or without me leading someone else into doing what I wanted. It should have been a turning point. But I didn't really understand why I did what I did at the time. I knew I wanted to be free of something, but I wasn't sure what. You were my first major love, but on a smaller scale, with boys in high school, couple in college, I had already established a kind of pattern. Building someone up so they could be special, and since they were special, and they loved me, it made me special. Against all odds, we two… that sort of thing. You see, killing Cheep was killing a symbol.'
'Cheep might disagree.'
'But the sense of freedom didn't last. I fell back into my old ways. I found a new knight and let him lead, and when he led away from me, I went knight hunting again, and again. I understand all that now. What I'm saying, Hap, is that I'm ready to kill a bird again. This time, the bird is the old me. I'm going to drown that bird and be a new person. Someone who believes in herself. In idealism for its sake. Not as a symbol of worth, or love. I want to be a woman who doesn't need a man to put out front and pretend he's leading and suffering for me, his fair- haired damsel. Don't have to say, 'Look at my man go.'
'Jesus Christ, Trudy. You been doing some major rationalizing here is what you been doing. You're not learning to be independent. You're realizing how selfish you've always been is all, and you're justifying it with some bullshit self-analysis, like Chub would do.'
'Think what you want.'
We were silent for a time.
'This thing you're going to see through,' I said. 'It sounds serious.'
'Let's say I'm serious. I'd like to have you with us, but I don't need you the way I used to need you. I don't need Howard either.'
'Don't need us, how come you got us?'
'I want your help. But I don't have to have it. Not the old way, as my knight. All I want is to believe in something so strong, that belief and my own inner conviction carry me. Like those monks who set fire to themselves to protest the Vietnam War. I want to have that kind of dedication.'
'They had dedication, all right. But they also got burned up.'
'It's all gone bad out there, Hap. Worse than the sixties, because now no one cares. Someone's got to do something, even if what they do is nothing more than stirring the soup. We could start people thinking. They're all so apathetic. So what if the ozone layer is being eaten away by pollutants in aerosol cans? So what if people are starving on our city streets? Why have government funding for AIDS? It's a disease for queers, right? People don't even vote anymore, because they know it's all a lie, Hap.'
'Don't forget the destruction of the seals,' I said. 'The whales? The sparrows like Cheep?'
'I did what I had to do, Hap. It was a terrible thing, but sometimes you have to do terrible things so you can make progress. Sometimes you do something terrible so some good will come of it.'
'Trudy, you got to grow up sometime. You can't take the world in to raise. No one can.'
'I feel sorry for you, Hap. You got nothing left inside to hold the dark away.'
When we got to Tyler, Trudy turned around and we started back.
I said, 'You seem to be avoiding telling me exactly what it is you have planned.'
'I thought I'd tell you tonight, Hap. But I've decided not to. You might try and mess it up out of spite.'
'I may disagree with you, but I'm not spiteful.'
'You might be. You've changed. Could be I don't know you good as I thought. I wanted you with us, but I think now you should do your job and take things as they come to you.'
