Crossings (21 page)

‘For going away. For rejecting you.'

‘You're only going on holiday. You've got to have a holiday from the nuts.'

‘From you, you mean. I've got to have a holiday from you. That's what you mean.'

‘Me and all the others. I don't mislead myself that I'm that important. You need a rest.'

‘But it is a rejection, to go away and leave you. And you will punish me.'

‘Of course not. That would be stupid.'

‘I'm going away, I'm leaving you, just like your mother.'

‘My mother didn't leave me. She just kicked me out.'

‘I see. I'm not like your mother.'

‘Not in the least.'

‘And Mik isn't like your father. Mik isn't queer.'

‘My father wasn't queer.'

‘Your mother told you he was queer.'

‘No. Someone told
her
he was queer, and then she told me what they'd said. She never believed it.'

‘That's the facts, eh?'

‘Yes.'

‘And he killed himself, and Jason too.'

‘No! I told you. That was an accident.'

‘But your aunt said.'

‘She wasn't well. I told you.'

‘I see. It was an accident. That's a fact.' She comes to then. Looks again to her watch. Rises. ‘You've done it again, haven't you?'

‘What?' All innocence.

‘Made me run over.'

 

YOUR FATHER killed his lover and now you want Mik to kill you.'

‘It's interesting,' I say, ‘how you can make a perfectly feasible pattern out of the details. You can take reality and tell it a hundred ways.'

She smiles. ‘Tell me about the abortion.'

‘I've told you.'

‘You've told me the facts.'

I feel sheer rage. ‘You want me to tell you a
story?
'

‘I want to know how it felt.'

‘All right. I will tell you how it felt.' And I do. And when I am through, her eyes are moist.

She looks at me and says, ‘You never cry.'

‘No. I've done that.'

‘Didn't you feel anything when you told me all that?'

‘No. I was making you feel.'

‘And, this ability, to make me feel, it is part of your sickness, isn't it?'

‘Yes. Don't cure me too much. Don't melt it.'

‘Melt it?'

‘The jewel. Inside me. What my mother saw from the first. Don't take it all away, just the part that hurts people.'

‘I can't melt one without the other. I can't melt it at all. You must do it. You must give it up.'

‘It's too much. It's all I have.'

‘Then you love it too, this power. You want it.'

‘I don't want to hurt people.'

‘Maybe you do.'

‘Maybe I do.'

‘Wouldn't it be interesting if it melted and you could still tell stories anyway?'

And, ‘I'm always right, aren't I? You always agree with me.'

‘I respect you. Sometimes I don't see your point at first.'

‘You respect your mother too.'

‘Yes.'

‘She's the lady, you're the slut. Like I'm the lady, you're the nut.'

I laugh.

‘She
never had sex.'

‘As it happens, she didn't. Except with my father.'

‘And all those years since he died, never once.'

‘Never once.'

‘And she never did anything wrong.'

‘I explained about that. I explained why she had to get rid of me.'

‘And you were never angry.'

‘Yes. I was. But now I understand.'

‘Now you understand.'

‘Yes. She needed a rest.'

‘From you.'

‘Yes. I was always so sick, you see. My mother can't bear sick people.'

‘So she let your grandfather take you away.'

‘The doctor said I had to leave. The house was too damp.'

‘I see. The house was too damp.'

‘Yes.'

And, ‘But you said that was when you were five.'

‘It was. I was five.'

‘But just now, you said you were nine.'

‘Just now?'

‘What happened when you were five?'

‘I was kicked out.'

‘No. That was when you were nine.'

I sit there a long time. ‘I've lied. I've lied.'

‘What happened when you were five?'

‘I was sure it was when I was five, but you're right. You're right. I was nine. I've lied.'

‘What happened when you were five?'

‘I lied.'

And the hour comes to an end and she half rises.

‘All right. Maybe she was jealous of me. Maybe she was trying to hurt me. She said he didn't love me, not like the others. Because of the way I was. When I was born. Maybe it wasn't right to tell me that. About not sucking and so on. I had to suck, I see that. I had to or I'd be dead. I mean, I had to suck on a bottle. I see that. You're right. But you see, she felt rejected. When he died. I mean, it was an accident and everything, but still she felt he'd done it on purpose, so she just struck out, and I was handy, that's all. She went through a bad time. She was only thirty. It was a terrible thing. She was angry at him, even though.'

She is smiling at me.

‘I've done it again, haven't I? I'm sorry. I don't know why. I always seem to start to talk at the end. It's strange.'

‘Yes,' she says, ‘it's quite interesting, isn't it? How you keep me on beyond the time.' And, dryly, ‘I wonder why.'

And, ‘You're really very good at it,' I say to her. ‘When I get out of here I'm wobbly for hours.'

‘Why do you want to reassure me?'

‘I'm not. I'm just saying you're getting to me. You're good at it.'

‘And that's what I'm supposed to do. Get at you.'

‘It's your job.'

‘I'm being a good therapist, aren't I?'

‘Yes.'

‘You think I'm in need of your protection?'

‘No! Why should I have to protect you?'

‘From the nuts maybe?'

‘Well, it's good you're going on holiday.'

‘Yes, it is, isn't it? I might crack up. You might drive me crazy. I need a rest, don't I?'

‘I expect you need a rest.'

‘I wonder,' she says, ‘how you're going to do it.'

‘What?'

‘Get back at me. For going away.'

I laugh. ‘Well, there's still lots of time for me to think of something.'

‘Hmmm.'

 

‘THE NUT LADY says if I can get you to kill me, that means my father really loved me.'

‘She's sick.' Mik frowns at me. ‘Why do you go anyway?'

‘I like to see what she'll say next.'

‘There's nothing wrong with you. Nothing wrong a man couldn't cure.'

‘She says I've got a nitch for homosexuals.'

‘Yeah? Who?'

‘Well, when Ben left Crease, the psychiatrist said …'

Mik guffaws. ‘Him? They thought he was a fairy? No way.'

‘Well, he said it was latent, but.'

‘You bet your sweet ass it was latent. It was so latent it pointed the other way! Listen, that guy wouldn't bend over for a real piece of soap. He's got his cheeks so tight you couldn't give him an enema.' Mik considers me. ‘Your ex is no fairy. He's just a … a nothing. He wouldn't have the guts to do it, one way or the other. How many times did you and him do it anyway?'

‘Well, at first it was quite normal.'

‘On the average.'

‘I don't think it's proper to discuss intimate details …'

‘You don't have to tell me. I knew the moment I laid eyes on the creep. Once a month, if you're lucky, right? And you had to start it. Right?'

My mouth gets tight, like my mother's.

‘Don't worry. You didn't marry a fag. You just married a zero. He comes around here and he's just a poor creep, is all. I've seen his kind. They crawl around with their guts in their hands and ask you to be sorry for them. And if you don't watch out, you step on them with your boot. You don't mean to, you just don't see them. You know your problem? Eh?'

‘I have a feeling you're going to tell me.'

‘You bet your sweet ass. You needed a man, that was your problem. That's sweet fuck all, baby. You just needed a real man. You were just all screwed up and that's all you needed.'

‘A real screw up.'

We laugh.

‘But, you did say, when you were in the Pen …'

‘You tell
her
that? Shit. Sweet Jesus. You tell her everything?'

‘Not everything.'

‘'Cause she wouldn't understand. These social worker types, they got filing cabinets for cunts. Look. I wasn't a fag. I was hard up. You get hard up, is all. You close your eyes and you grab some guy, and he's got perfume on, and you say, ah shit. So the Nut Lady's got me pegged for a queer, has she?'

‘No. Actually, she said you don't sound like a …'

‘You bet your sweet ass!' He takes me by the arms, hard, and looks me in the eye. ‘Listen. Don't make it complicated. You got a thing, you like to make things complicated. You're all woman, you are. If you're hung up, then it's just you don't believe it. You just don't believe your good luck, is all.' He grins dangerously down at me. ‘You think I'm gonna do you dirt, so you think, this can't last, how do I screw it before he does. I know all about it, tough guy. I'm three steps ahead of you.' He hesitates, then gives me a love tap with his fist. My teeth jar in their sockets. But I don't pull away. ‘Ten steps ahead of you. I'm out-thinking you, tough guy. You got pretty fancy footwork, but I been in the ring longer.'

‘Are you saying I try to manipulate you?'

‘You try,' he says, grinning. ‘You give me a hard time.'

‘You don't usually complain of
that.
'

He looks at me. ‘Yah!'

‘But I'm honest with you. I've always been honest with you.'

‘Go get your sexy swim suit.'

‘No. If I'm deceptive or dishonest, I want to know.'

‘Dummy up, tough guy.'

‘Why won't you be serious?'

‘You want to know what I really think? Really?'

‘Really.'

He leans toward me and says, very seriously, ‘You got a tight twat. Never met such a tight twat.'

 

I THOUGHT TRUTH was something you could work out, like the logarithms upon which a slide rule is premised. I thought if you could once discover the base, you could work it out from there. I thought if I could ascertain facts, it would all come clear. Multi-dependent, multi-causal perhaps, but there in some solid and satisfying way.

When Sister Mary Joseph said to me, ‘It's you who should have been the nun,' is that another dimension or another template?

Or is it all just a story and would Sister Mary Joseph's be just as real as the Nut Lady's, or Mik's, or Ben's if he could tell it? And is Jeff right when he says I fictionalize everything anyway and no one need fear, for I could not ever tell the truth? ‘You insist on living,' he said, ‘in a plethora of emotion. The rest of us are satisfied with the solid meat and potatoes of life, but for you the plethora is all that counts. What we turn to for respite, for diversion from the humdrum of our days, you insist must be the All.' And, ‘No one could live with you.'