Honeymooners A Cautionary Tale (57 page)

Then, to top off such a wonderful night, and
I have debated telling you this but I am going to, Bill showed up
at my door. It must have been 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning, God
knows. He was amazingly drunk. He had pulled his car right up into
my front yard, across the sidewalk, and stopped only inches from my
porch steps. The headlights were on, the driver’s door was wide
open, the radio was blaring. He was coatless, and his shirttail was
hanging out, and, dear God, he was in his stocking feet. He lurched
in the door and grabbed me. He pulled me into the living room and
made me sit by him on the couch. The he announced he was going to
forgive me for fucking you. And he kept calling me Kathy. And he
kept telling me how sorry he was about our dead baby. But that he
loved me and that we would have other babies. And all this time he
was grabbing me and pulling at me. I know how this must pain you.
It pained me. But it really wasn’t me he was hitting on. It was
crazy. I just kept fighting him off and then he suddenly got up and
lumbered out of the room. When he got to the front door he called
out Nightie-Night. Really. Nightie-Night. As cheerily as you
please. And then he roared off. Perhaps I should not have told you
this. Perhaps I won’t. I’ll decide tomorrow.

Just read back over this letter. I can see I
have managed a real downer. I regret. Know you are having enough
anxieties of your own without having to share mine. Think most of
this is just coming down off the hectic, meaningless pace I have
maintained since you left.

It is now Sunday. Kathy and I just completed
a four-hour bike ride through the streets of Missoula. Stopped at a
couple of bars, but found drink not much to our liking, thank God.
A beautiful day, a bit chilly still, but the sun warm, The activity
felt good. Maybe that’s half my problem – not enough activity.
Thus, into an already tight schedule of mindless activities I shall
include a good bike ride each day. Permit violation only on
occasion of violent hangover and other good things. Exercise
program is already up to half hour a day. See a whole different
life than I have known in a number of years. But, oh, the boredom
of it all. Must have caught some sort of cold today, for I have
been coughing up blood for a couple of hours. Not serious enough to
warrant any drastic measures like quitting smoking, however, But I
am practicing in front of the mirror, just in case, so that I can
look the part of a tubercular lost soul.

I do hope all will go better for you in the
days to come. It simply must. You couldn’t have more difficulties
than you have already had this year. Really don’t know how you
manage to stay together through everything. But, as you have told
me, you are a survivor. As am I, We will come out of this together.
Love you so much. Love you.

L.

Dearest L –

Just a few words, and I’ll plan to put this
into the mail this afternoon. Hope my last letter wasn’t too much
of a bummer – had just gotten up, still bleary-eyed and generally
cranky. Got myself together later that afternoon and did attend to
business, as I’ve been doing all this morning as well. Good
feeling, yes, to get it under control again. “Birds got to fly,
fish got to swim,” as Cole Porter – or was it Rogers &
Hammerstein? – said. Think I am fish and fowl, which creates
difficulties now and then. Simply put, this is just a hard period
for me, about the hardest ever, but I’m going to come through, and
so will we all. I know what I want, exactly what I want, and that
is a life with you. The constant postponement, the waiting, is
killing. I’m sorry about it all. I’m going to grit my teeth and
survive it, though, and then we’ll simply have to make up for it
when we’re together. Can’t tell you how much I long to see you, be
with you. You’re in my thoughts constantly. I wish the days could
just fly until you can come down to Berkeley. And, yes, for God’s
sake, plan on staying at least two weeks – ifin you can arrange it.
I’ll be very busy of course, what with student manuscripts and
such, but we’ll still get out for a few dinners, a film or two, I
promise. But you must try and come as soon as possible, and you
must stay as long as you can. Alice Ann asked me yesterday what my
plans were for next summer. Said she was going to Europe. Then
suddenly she asked me to go with her. For us to just drop
everything, rent the house, farm the kids out, and go off to Europe
together like we had always planned. To give ourselves one last
chance. That we owed it to one another, for all we had once been to
one another, for all the years we have shared and all the things we
had been through together. Maybe we could rekindle our romance in
Europe, she said. I told her flat-out that I wasn’t going to
Europe. Europe was no place I wanted to go anymore. Europe was a
vast graveyard, I told her. A boneyard! Europe was full of the
reminders of death and dashed hopes, I told her. I went on and on
like that, in this vein. Why I don’t know. I was crazy I guess. She
knows that I am very much in love with you, and, I feel, quite sure
that I intend to make a life with you. What makes it so hard here
sometimes for both of us – though generally we are acting decently
toward one another and being good and even gentle to each other –
is just that final sad realization. Someday when the smoke settles
I think you and she will be good friends. In the larger sense it
doesn’t matter, of course, but it would be nice to think it could
work out that way. In any case, I think that Alice Ann and I are
going to come through this with mutual respect and even affection.
And best that we do, of course. Anyway, I love you, love you.
Please take care of yourself. Don’t fall asleep with contact lenses
in your little eyeballs and know and believe in our love. God, I
guess I’m sounding terribly sentimental, huh? It’s true though,
that sentiment, as is this one: I love you, L, and will love and
care for you always. Oh, and by the way, damn it, but I wish the
Buffalo would quit trying to hit on you. Hope you got the message
through to him that last time. Does he do it only when he’s drunk?
Which, come to think about it, is most of the time. You’ll have to
tell me more about that scene. Goes without saying that I’ll never
say a thing to him or anyone. Love him like a brother, but, ahem,
settle down, Bill! And when you see him tell him I still haven’t
received that little loan he promised me. Maybe it has slipped his
mind. I sure need it though. Anyway, I love you, you know, and that
is a constant that is no check-in-the-mail promise. Wow. And I am
right now envying that little kitty of yours, who gets to nibble on
your neck and warm herself in there between your sweet legs. I
mean, I know she can’t do both at the same time. I can though, and
will!

love love love

R.

Dearest little fish …

How are you, love? Missing you so much these
last few days. Can’t tell you, can’t wait to get my hands on you,
can’t stop loving you, missing you, thinking about you. (Ever had
the likes of such nutty love letters from the likes of such a nutty
individual as me?) Listen, your big, fat, newsy letters are great.
I tell you. That one on Wednesday! Read that one over several
times. Don’t know how or where to begin answering some of the
things you brought up. No, of course I don’t want you to stop going
to parties, etc. I can’t possibly make any demands there, and I
wouldn’t if I could. Rest easy there, please. Whenever we get
together, and goddamn it, it seems like just an infinity ahead of
us, between now and then, that will be a different situation; we’ll
hit those parties together. Meanwhile, follow your heart and your
head – and I’m sure enough of your love at this point to know that
what you do will be all right. Once we’re together, and we will be
one of these days, no question – and you are mine, so to speak, you
know what I mean, all mine – then I’ll become possessive, though
nothing ludicrous or scary, of course. Think men and women –
lovers, husbands, wives – have to feel a certain degree possessive,
jealous even, as to me it’s a clear sign of caring, loving. Not to
an extreme degree of course, like Buffalo Bill’s feelings about
Kathy, those sick suspicions. There’s a big difference. Maybe I’m
sounding too old fashioned? The fact is, I love you, deeply, and
trust you in every regard and am not worrying about anything,
anything, you hear? I’d trust you with my life and am doing just
that. Whatever, whatever you do is right for you at the moment, and
that’s good, too, and in a way right for us in the future, so I’ll
assume your judgment on any situation is correct, right, for you,
for us, okay? What am I saying? Afraid, even myself, to read this
over. Fear it won’t make any sense at all. Really just want to say
I’m loving you and missing you so much, little fish. –Me, I feel
like I’m damaged goods, and have been for a long while, and
probably will be for a while to come yet. (you’re not!) Need to be
around you, be with you, need your healing. Remember when I told
you I didn’t think I could ever love anyone again. That’s part of
it. And there is so much more, my love. Where was I? Telling you
how much I love you, how much you mean to me – Dismissed class
early today, not much happening and I’m not feeling too well. Woke
up at 3:30 this morning after going to bed at midnight, or there
abouts. Sleeping at home as we’d been to a function at Stanford.
Stayed up, made a quart of orange juice and drank it all, then a
pot of coffee, drank all that too. Tired right now, feel spaced,
for some reason. Alice Ann and I have spent more time together this
week – trying to sort out finances, smoothing out our lives.
Nothing has been swept under the carpet, we’re just not talking
about anything at the moment, trying to act decently to each other,
and respect the other’s feelings about things. Haven’t mentioned
your name in ten days, and won’t, period. And, yes, I do want to
change my life. Want another life, to begin with, with you. And,
yeah, I’ve felt my life has been disordered to a large extent.
There’s a good solid middle-class burger in me who wants and needs
some sort of order and schedule in his life. Truly, I thrive on a
writing schedule. As I see it that’s the only way any substantial
work will ever get done, and I’ve proven that to myself the time or
two in my life when things have been more or less right and quiet.
There’s a cross between Zorba and maniac in me, but there is also
this burger who needs and wants to pay his bills on time and have a
quiet clean, well-lighted place to work, slippers on the hearth
etc. Presently I have a hearth but no slippers and no fireplace
screen or even logs to burn, but I want it all with you
someday.

Guess I’ve gone on and on, eh? Going to call
you this afternoon. Miss you terribly, miss you so much I feel like
weeping right now myself.

love love

R.

Dearest Lindsey –

Hello, sweetheart, little fish, how are you
this morning? Am feeling such a love for you right now and these
last few days, am almost dizzy with it. I’m high, really I’m high
on you – you and us – just zapped with it. Each day that passes
brings us that much closer to being together – each day that passes
I’m feeling that much more in love, that much more secure, that
much more certain, if any of that is possible, if any of these
things could be measured – they can’t, of course. Only to tell you
that we are going to make it, baby, a fruitful, productive, good
life together, and we have what it takes to do it. Hey, I could go
on and on in this vein, on and on. Okay, I will. Was in Berkeley
last night for a benefit reading for Fiction magazine. Hit me so
hard, walking the streets, peering into little shops, glancing up
at the lighted windows of apartments, that we, you and I, are going
to be doing all this together, and soon, soon. Not soon enough,
God, I wish it were tomorrow, not weeks from now. Can you imagine.
Such fun we’re going to have, Jesus. I want you with me, in
Berkeley, everywhere. Choice? Missing you something awful. This
separation has been so hard to bear – we mustn’t ever be so long
gone from each other again, no matter what or how!

Hey, it was a good reading last night, by
the way. Lasted until one o’clock in the morning, then everyone
went to a big party. God, I wish you could have been there. We’ll
get to a few of those when you are here. I read first, thank God,
before the master of ceremonies, the audience, and the other
readers got drunk. Hilarious evening in some respects. Jim Houston
was the fifth reader – after an intermission – and after he had
read about 2 pages of a story and paused to take a drink of water,
the MC got up, drunkenly, accidentally, and slurred “thank you” and
began trying to introduce the last reader. Then, after falling
around all over the place, said MC stepped out the door at the very
end of the affair and fell down, and a big bag full of money and
all Fiction West important papers, receipts, statements, letters,
mss, went blowing and sailing down and across a rainy Berkeley
street. Had to gather him up and then everybody spent an hour
searching rain-filled gutters and under parked cars. More funny
stuff happened then and later – haven’t laughed so much since we
were together, that crazy night we met at Bill’s party, when he
stole the police car while the cops were inside trying to shut
things down. And, by the way, ahem, must in all modesty admit my
story was a knockout and kind of brought the house down. (Just
thought I’d throw that in so you could see what an honest fellow I
am). Anyway, it was a good reading, and all in all fun. Going to
play poker tonight with these people from Stanford (if I can hit
Mom up for a few bucks). Max Carver will be there, and Chuck
Kinder, Jim Stark, Richard Price, Scott Turow, guys you’ve heard me
talk about. And who you will meet someday and drive crazy with envy
for me and my good luck. Much as anything, although I do enjoy
playing, understand, I want to fill in the days and nights until we
can be together.