Honeymooners A Cautionary Tale (15 page)

Then through the screen door
Lindsay hears a motorcycle roaring up in the yard outside, and
alas, it is her ex-husband, Milo, on his brand-new Harley. He spots
Lindsay immediately and is upon her in a heartbeat for old times’
sake. Regales the audience with horrible but apparently hilarious
stories of their three pitiful years of marriage, stories which he
clearly thinks are a sitcom riot and demonstrate clearly how hip
and long-suffering he was with the bride from Belview. Lindsay is
stoned, the first time in days, for she is taking her
turning-a-new-leaf-in-life seriously (two-drink limit most nights,
six-cigarette limit daily, $23.67 on new vitamins the previous
week, a mile run two mornings earlier, and off the pill for good
so she won’t even be tempted to slip). Lindsay has to admit to
herself that she is stoned-paranoid, she knows that. And she is
utterly stricken and sick to her stomach at Milo’s onslaughts, but
she attempts to maintain a bullshitty brave smile. She tries time
and again to shove off, but Milo seems to be following her around,
doing his fucking number on her.

Then this Jim Stark
character comes up out of nowhere and starts mumbling to Lindsay,
trying to make small talk about the possibility of life on Mars or
some equal weirdness. Then Milo is upon them, and for some reason
begins telling about the time his former wife, poor dopey Lindsay,
who was Grade Allen and Lucy rolled into one in the dumbbell wife
department, once ran their transformed UPS hippie-mobile over the
hill at Snowshoe on their way to go skiing when she got her left
and right mixed up. Well, that is somewhat true, but why—why?—drag
Lindsay’s stupidity up for the world at large to savor? Then Jim
Stark asks Milo very quietly to move along, that he and Lindsay are
having a private conversation about the possibility of life on
Mars. And just who in the fuck are you? Milo barks, huffing up all
offended-biker and six-foot-two tough guy, flexing his tattooed,
muscly arms.

Whereupon Jim Stark slaps
Milo’s face. Dear God! He just slaps the shit out of Milo. With the
back of his hand. It sounds like a gunshot. How could this guy have
read Lindsay like that? Is her pain that transparent? Everything
simply freezes. Milo stumbles backward, his bloody mouth an O of
astonishment. He pulls out a handkerchief and clasps it to his
mouth. He is absolutely trembling with rage. A couple of his biker
buddies move in behind him and puff up ready for action. Buffalo
and Crumley (who looks like a fierce, bearded refrigerator) move in
behind Jim Stark, which is like having the Grand Tetons of tough
guys covering your back. Shades of showdowns in the Old West.
Milo’s biker buddies sort of say, Oh, never mind, and fade back
into the woodwork. Milo snarls and hisses and splutters with rage,
and sort of dances about flapping his arms. Stark just stands there
grinning. Then Milo suddenly swirls and stomps out of the house,
banging the screen door behind him. Poor Milo. Lindsay can hear his
Harley roar and rage in the gravel as he peels out.

Lindsay walks direcdy over
to Jim Stark and asks him if she can buy him a drink somewhere
besides here, and he mumbles shore in this heavy, hicky accent,
which cracks Lindsay up.

2

The next thing Lindsay
knows, they are out at the Trail’s End at the edge of town and they
are talking about everything under the sun. They talk of Ralph, of
Jim Stark’s wife, of Ralph, of Jim’s new novel, of Ralph of Ralph
of Ralph. Seems the truth of the matter is that Alice Ann had found
Lindsay’s letters, read them through, then tossed them into Ralph’s
lap for a little anniversary surprise. Ralph had gone into one of
his weasel who-me routines, according to Jim. Jim says that Ralph
has a student girlfriend in Berkeley and also writes another lady
in Iowa City. Jim says that Alice Ann does not have cancer, as
Ralph had told Lindsay by way of explaining why he couldn’t desert
Alice Ann right now. It is not like Jim is ratting on Ralph.
Lindsay has to pull this information painfully from him. Jim
clearly loves Ralph and is really very loyal. Jim tells Lindsay a
main reason he and his wife split is that he wants children and a
real home life, while his wife, who he says is actually a wonderful
woman, is into her career. Jim is on leave from Stanford until the
next winter’s term and hopes to have his new novel completed by
then, and also his marriage problems resolved one way or the other
so he can get on with his life. Lindsay asks Jim why he slapped
Milo, and he just smiles and shrugs and says, no. 1, Milo is
clearly an asshole who was making Lindsay feel bad, and no. 2, he
wanted to make an impression on Lindsay, and no. 3, to be honest,
he wasn’t really being brave, for even with all Milo’s leathers and
tattoos and his big Harley, Milo was still basically just a fruity
poet type.

After a third round of
drinks, Jim tells Lindsay he has something he wants to confess to
her, and he hopes Lindsay will understand and forgive him. Jim says
he has been staying pretty much to himself since he hit town, and
he has been amazingly lonely and sad. Jim tells Lindsay that on one
particular recent hard night, he had read one of her letters to
Ralph. He had felt so desperately alone and unloved, he read and
reread one of Lindsay’s letters he had pulled out at random, and
he let himself imagine it had been written to him, written by a
good woman who loved him. Lindsay tells Jim she understands.
Frankly, Lindsay says, she is touched, and she is.

Kathy suddenly appears out
of nowhere, saying she needs a break from her party, although
things are still going strong. She flops down in her bored,
superior way and Jim buys her a drink. Kathy announces that Jim’s
wife called the house a while ago and left a message for him to
call her when he got a chance. What is it your wife does, anyway?
Kathy asks Jim, blowing her perfect smoke rings into the air and
leveling her Orphan Annies on him. Jim tells Kathy that his wife’s
career, such as it is, is the main cause of their split, that his
wife insists upon pursuing a career in porno flicks. He asks Kathy
if she has ever seen Passionate Poniesi And if so, does she recall
the beautiful brunette in love with the Shetland with balls like
cantaloupes?

Then suddenly Bill appears
out of the blue, roaring drunk. He is furious that Kathy has
scooted out of the party. Who is she planning to meet, anyway,
Billy is real curious to know. Are you just dying to see some
stranger’s dick tonight, Bill is curious to know. And then, at the
top of his lungs, Bill begins requesting that everybody in the bar
who has one to haul out their hogs, please, so once and for all
Kathy can get her eyes full of dicks. That is not necessary,
Billy, Kathy says to him, then points to a table of cute cowboys
and tells Bill their peepees will do fine. Billy goes berserk.
Somehow Jim gets him out the door, Billy yelling all the way
something about Kathy deserving a death by drowning in
come.

Kathy lights a cigarette,
blows a few perfect smoke rings, levels those cold blanks on
Lindsay, and proceeds to lay her low with gleeful venom. First off,
Bill is terribly down on Lindsay, Kathy says. He wants “that
woman,” viz. Lindsay, out of their lives. Kathy confirms to Lindsay
that Bill has maligned her all along with Ralph, which may be the
true reason Ralph has balked at commitment. Bill has told Ralph
that Lindsay is infamous in Missoula as the “Black Widow,” whose
main hobby was to lay all the visiting writers who hit town to give
talks and readings, especially the famous ones. Which is why Kathy
is personally surprised that Lindsay is out with Jim Stark, a
one-book boy at this point, instead of hitting on the really
big-time Ken Kesey. Lindsay refuses to rise to this bileful bait
and simply looks away, smoking furiously.

A half hour later Jim
returns alone, saying he left Bill downtown at the Top Hat,
dancing cheek to cheek with some blackeyed Indian princess. Kathy
decides to retrieve Billy and return to the party. She says she
doesn't care who he fucks, she is simply sick and tired of him
getting his ass kicked every other night, as she was the one stuck
with bailing him out and/or wiping up the blood and come off the
backseat. That fucker is going to be killed before he pays the
house off, Kathy says, and she is gone.

3

Ralph calls in the deep a.m.
collect and Lindsay takes it in the guest room. Ralph tells Lindsay
things down there are crazier than ever, which is why he hasn’t
been in touch so much recently, for he doesn’t want to dump his
misery in Lindsay’s lap. Alice Ann is doing and saying crazy
things; she is acting crazier than a bedbug; her breast cancer has
driven her over the edge. Ralph tells Lindsay he finally told Alice
Ann (cancer notwithstanding) that he really loves Lindsay and wants
to be with her. Before he had given them to his best friend Jim
Stark to carry to Lindsay for safekeeping, he had showed Alice Ann
the stack of Lindsay’s long, wonderful letters, which were the only
things that had kept him from going nuts himself down there
sometimes, to convince Alice Ann of the seriousness of the
situation, to force her out of denial. No way, Jose, Ralph answers
Lindsay, no way has Alice Ann read any of those letters. He would
never let that happen. They are too private and precious to him.
Those letters, and his to her, too, they are meant for their eyes
only, and for whatever interest posterity might have in them. He
has, however, promised Alice Ann that he will stick by her during
her time of trouble. Then Ralph talks of his love for Lindsay and
of what their life will be like together, of the exotic ports of
call they will visit, of the fun and fulfillment they will share.
Ralph mentions his increasing fame and solvency. They will be
together soon, Ralph swears to Lindsay, just as soon as he gets a
few more ducks lined up in his row. Meanwhile, and he hates to ask,
but can he borrow fifty bucks until that big loan he is counting on
from his mom comes through?

Suddenly Lindsay confronts
Ralph with everything Jim has told her. She asks Ralph to tell her
the truth about the letters and his endless lies and his other
ladies-in-waiting and, most of all, why would he tell Lindsay that
Alice Ann had cancer?

Ralph, clearly caught off
guard, splutters that to begin with, Alice Ann has had a touch of
cancer, but might be cured any day now. In fact, if the utter truth
be told, he has already more or less left Alice Ann recently. Ralph
says that he is at a writer’s retreat, or somewhere like that,
where he is pulling body and soul back together. And as soon as he
does, which might be any day now, he fully plans to come to Lindsay
at long last, to join Lindsay, and they will begin to live their
life together. And then Ralph rails on and on about “that asshole”
Jim Stark. Ralph says that Jim Stark is a legendary liar. Ralph
implores Lindsay not to believe a single word about anything coming
from the lying motormouth of that hypocrite deceitful running dog
Jim Stark. Ralph says that Jim Stark would stab his own mother in
the back if it would do him any good. Ralph vehemently suggests
that for Lindsay’s own sake she take his advice and cross the
street anytime she sees that Jim Stark character coming.

Too late for that, is what
occurs to Lindsay. Whereupon she cuts the conversation with Ralph
short and returns to bed, to find that Jim Stark character
wide-awake, smoking dope in the dark.

White Men in the
Tropics

1

Appropriately enough, Ralph
first read Jack London’s 1913 alcoholic memoir, John Barleycorn,
when he himself was drying out at a place called Duffy’s, which was
a clinic and sort of rest camp for recovering alcoholics three
hours north of San Francisco and, by chance, hardly a stone’s throw
from London’s famous Valley of the Moon. The major characters in
London’s book were London himself, a laborer, sailor, writer, a
man of intellectual and physical vigor, impetuous, full of dreams
and doubts and frustrations; his beautiful wife, Charmian, who
lived with London in the Valley of the Moon; and John Barleycorn,
alcoholism personified. Although London first got drunk at the age
of five, again at seven, and drank steadily throughout his life, he
proclaims at book’s end that although he will continue to drink
occasionally, he has the Long Sickness under control. It will never
afflict him again.

Ralph was at Duffy’s three
days before he even tried to call Alice Ann (who had no idea where
he was, for his student girlfriend had driven him to that sorry
place, after a weeklong binge), enough time for him to get over the
worst of the willies.

Alice Ann had not been at
home then or any other time he had called since. Maybe Alice Ann
just wasn’t answering the phone. That was possible. Twice when
Ralph called he had gotten a busy signal; then when he called right
back, nobody answered. Ralph, after all these years, was on to all
of Alice Ann’s tricks. She was pissed, sure. All that other woman
business. And Ralph had been hitting the old sauce a little too
hard lately. Nobody had to tell him that. So sure, things had
gotten a little out of hand of late. But Ralph had been under a lot
of pressure, and he was just another weary human, after all. All
Ralph really needed was a little peace and quiet, and some time
alone to get body and soul back together.

Ralph just happened upon
that copy of Jack London’s John Barleycorn in Duffy’s reading room
one serendipitous morning. He read it through cover to cover that
same day. Ralph realized that there was an important import for
him, a terrible meaning, in the pages of that book, and he wanted
to take it to heart, before it was too late for him, just as it
finally got to be too late for Jack London, for all Jack London’s
physical vigor and strength and worldly success. According to Jack
London, his own drinking had gotten out of hand those two years he
had sailed the Snark throughout the tropics, for white men in the
tropics undergo radical changes of nature. They become savage,
merciless. And they drink as they never drank before, for drinking
is one of the many forms of degeneration that set in when white men
are exposed to too much white light.