The Hotel New Hampshire

window. The Metropolitan Museum stood in the pre-Christmas cold like a castle abandoned by its king and queen— so abandoned it looked cursed; even the peasants were staying away.

“How can I even go out?” Franny whispered to me. “He could be anywhere out there,” she said. “I don’t dare go out,” she repeated.

“Franny, Franny,” I said, “he won’t touch you again.”

“Don’t tell her things,” Susie said to me. “That’s not the way. Don’t tell— ask her things. Ask her what she wants to do?”

“What do you want to do, Franny?” Lilly asked her.

“We’ll do anything you want us to do, Franny,” Frank said.

“Think about what you want to have happen,” Susie the bear said to Franny.

Franny shivered, her teeth chattered. It was stifling in the suite, but Franny was bone-cold.

“I want to kill him,” Franny said, softly.

“Don’t say anything,” Susie the bear whispered in my ear. There was nothing I could say, anyway. We sat in the room with Franny looking out the window for about an hour. Susie gave her a back rub to try to warm her up. Franny wanted to whisper something to me, so I bent down to her. “Are you still sore?” she whispered. She wore a little smile and I smiled back at her and nodded. “Me too,” she said, and smiled; but she looked right back out the window again, and she said, “I wish he were dead.” In a little while she repeated, “I simply can’t go out, I can take all my meals here—but one of you will have to be here, all the time.” We assured her we would be. “Kill him,” she repeated, just as it was getting light above the park. “He could be anywhere out there,” she said, watching the light grow. “The bastard!” she screamed, suddenly. “I want to kill him!”

We took turns staying with her for a couple of days. We made up a story for Father—that Franny had the flu and she was staying in bed so that she’d be all better in time for Christmas. It was a reasonable lie, we thought. Franny had lied to Father about Chipper Dove before; she’d told him she was just “beaten up.”

We didn’t even have a plan—if Chipper Dove did call back, we had no idea how Franny even wanted to deal with it.

“Kill him,” she kept saying.

And Frank, waiting in the lobby with me for the Stanhope elevator to arrive, said, “Maybe we should kill him. That would take care of it.”

Franny was our leader; when she was lost, we were all lost. We needed her judgment before we could settle on a plan.

“Maybe he’ll never call again,” Lilly said.

“You’re a writer, Lilly,” Frank said. “You ought to know better. Of course he’ll call.” Frank was making one of his anti-world statements—expressing one of his perverse theories that precisely what you don’t want to happen will. As a writer, Lilly would one day share Frank’s Weltanschauung.

But Frank was right about Chipper Dove; he called. It was Frank who answered the phone. Frank was very uncool about it; when he heard Chipper Dove’s ice-blue voice, he twitched—he underwent such a spasm on the couch that he batted the standing lamp beside him, he sent the lampshade spinning, and Franny knew right away who it was. She started screaming, she ran out of the living room of the suite and into Lilly’s bedroom (it was the closest hiding place), and Susie the bear and I had to run after her and hold her on Lilly’s bed, trying to calm her down.

“Uh, no, she’s not in right now,” Frank said to Chipper Dove. “Want to leave a number where she can call you?” Chipper Dove gave Frank his number—two numbers, actually: his number at home, and his number at work. The thought that he had a job seemed to make Franny suddenly sane again.

“What does he do?” she asked Frank.

“Well,” Frank said. “He just said he was with his uncle’s firm. You know how everyone gets their rocks off the way they say ‘firm’—the fucking firm, whatever a firm is,” Frank said.

“It could be anything, Franny,” I said. “A law firm, a business firm.”

“Maybe it’s a rape firm,” Lilly said, and we had our first good sign in days. Franny laughed.

“Atta girl, Franny,” Frank encouraged her.

“That super shit of a human being!” Franny yelled.

“Atta girl, Franny,” said Susie the bear.

“That fuck-off in his uncle’s fucking firm!” Franny said.

“That’s right,” I said.

And finally Franny said, “I don’t care about killing him. I just want to scare him,” she said. “I want him to be frightened,” she said, shivering suddenly; she started crying. “He really scared me!” she cried. “I’m still afraid of him, for Christ’s sake,” she said. “I want to scare the bastard, I want to frighten him back!” Franny said.

“Now you’re talking,” said Susie the bear. “Now you’re dealing with it.”

“Let’s rape him!” Frank said. “Who’d want to?” Lilly asked.

“I’d do it—for the cause,” Susie said. “But even with me, I think he’d like it. Men are creeps that way,” Susie said. “They could hate your guts but their cocks will still like you.”

“We can’t rape him,” Franny said. So Franny was okay, I thought. She was our leader again.

“We can do anything we want,” Frank argued—Frank the agent, Frank the arranger.

“Even if we could figure out a way to rape him,” Susie said, “even if we could find the perfect rapist for him, I still say it wouldn’t be the same: the fucker would find a way to enjoy himself.”

And then Lilly, the author, spoke up. Our little Lilly, the creator: she had the best imagination. “He wouldn’t enjoy himself if he thought a bear was raping him,” Lilly said.

“Sodomy!” cried Frank, gleefully, clapping his hands—like the cymbals he’d once used on Chipper Dove. “Sodomize the bastard!” Frank cried.

“Wait a fucking minute!” said Susie the bear. “Maybe he’ll think it’s a bear, but I’ll still know it’s him. I mean, anything for the cause,” Susie said, “anything for you, honey,” Susie told Franny, “but you’ll have to give me some time to think this over.”

“But I don’t think you’d have to really do it to him, Susie,” Franny said. “I think you could scare him enough by almost doing it.”

“You could pretend to be a bear in heat, Susie,” Lilly said.

“A bear in heat!” howled Frank, with delight. “That’s it!” he shouted, wildly. “A bear in heat goes berserk! You could wolf the bastard’s balls right into your terrible bear’s mouth!” Frank screamed at Susie. “Make him think he’s going to get blown by a bear! For the last time!” Frank added.

“I could take him right to the edge,” Susie the bear said.

“But no further, Susie,” Franny said. “I just want to frighten him.”

“Scare him to death,” Frank said, exhausted.

“Not quite,” said Lilly. “Scare him almost to death.”

“A bear in heat: that’s brilliant, Lilly,” I said.

“Just give me a day,” Lilly said.

“For what, Lilly?” Susie asked.

“The script,” Lilly said. “I’ll need a day to get the script right.”

“I love you, Lilly,” Franny said, and gave her a hug.

“You all have to be very good actors,” Lilly said.

“I’m taking lessons, for Christ’s sake!” Susie roared. “And I’ll bring my friends! Can you use two friends, Lilly?” Susie asked.

“If they’re women, I can use them,” Lilly said, frowning.

“Of course they’re women!” Susie said, indignantly.