Honeymooners A Cautionary Tale (59 page)

Tried to live these past two weeks with the
conviction that all was for the best, in the long run. But my
treacherous heart has not given me any rest. I’ve read stories and
wanted so much to talk to you about them, only you. Watched spring
come on and wanted to touch you, only you. Even my friend, the
older man, though he is very kind and understanding, has been no
solace, for he wants what I cannot give him, he wants what I can
give only to you, my love. Let me end for now with just saying
this: “See, we still love each other, in spite of everything. See,
we’ve made it through almost a year now, and this whole new world
is unfolding for us. Come on, love, let’s walk out into this new
springtime together. The Ralph, the Lindsey.

L.

Dearest Ralph –

This is an Easter letter. A long note,
reportage of the scene, and a serious note; you have had a plethora
of those of late.

Events first. The scene continues unabated
in these parts. Have held fairly close to my resolves. Seldom go to
the local pub and when I do I leave before too much time has paased
or booze awilled. Bill and Kathy had a party for Dick Hugo last
weekend, Friday. Guess it was a rather bizarre but uneventful
evening. Hugo had brought along the woman he claims was the “lady”
from Kicking Horse Reservoir, but as soon as he spotted Maggie
Crumley, he abandoned said “lady” an spent the evening mooning over
Maggie, whom he has been smitten by for years. The evening
generated no real juicy scandal however. Apparently Bill was his
usual babbling insane self and fell in love a lot, but nobody even
notices that act anymore. I chose to remain at home, still
preferring to avoid a gathering where Milo might be present. He and
I have finally settled the house deal – he buys me out for a mere
$1000, the sum I invested initially as the down. A stupid deal on
my part, I know, but I want donw with this business. I see no
possibility of friendship wi him ever – too much eo damage to make
suh a thing feasible in this short lifetime.

After congratulating myself on foregoing the
literary debacle, I acceped an invitation from Kathy the next day
to jin her at her house. We sipped gin for a couple of hours while
various people came and went. Bill and Ji Welch were at hugo’s and
returned smashed. Kathy asked Bill to please carry out soe garbage.
Bill plucked a rose from a bouquet oon the coffee table and tossed
it, a fillip, over his shoulder. A rather funny geture, something
like Ferdinand the Bill. Kathy, however, ws not amused and
indicated same, whereupon Bill dragged her out of her chair and
screamed into her face that Dick Hugo had finally confessed that
very afternoon that he and Kathy had been having an affair.
Completely crazy. Bill then roared out of the house announcing that
Dick Hugo was a dead man. Kathy went upstairs to take a nap. I was
rather smashed, totally stoned, so I went home and crashed. Next
thing I knew I was on a white slab in the amergency ward at St.
Pat’s. A nurse was bending over me, trying to get me to identify
the drugs I had taken. This was a serious nightmare. I was so drunk
and out of it, I cold hardly talk, but I was afraid if I didn’t do
something they would pump my stomach. The interrogation continued
while I slipped back into slumber. Wa acused of being
uncooperatibe, asked to level with them. The somehow Bill appeared
and joined the attendants in their questioning. Only he kept
calling me Kathy, which freaked me out. And he also kept telling
the attendants that he and I, hiw wife, Kathy, had lraady lost one
baby. I kept waiting to wake up. Then suddenly Bill was gone, the
attendants were gone, an I drifted off again. Don’t know how much
time passed, but suddenly Bill was there again, telling me that it
was time to get going. I sat up, vomited immediately in their
emergency bedpan, and staggered to my feet. Don’t remember much
from here on, but apparently Bill and Jim Crumley (and this really
amazed me, for I didn’t even know Jim was back in town; I thought
he wa still in Texas, trying to stay away from Maggie) strolled me
out to Bill’s car. And then Maggie was there, looking terried, at
the way I looked I guess. At any rate, she apparently followed us
in Jim’s truck. We reached the Orange Street underpass and I began
to vomit again. Jim opened the car door and dropped my head out.
According to Maggie I was bobbing about 4 inches from the pavement.
There was a bit more maneuvering. For some reason, probably a
sudden fit of Buffalo passion, we stopped at the East Gate, where
Bill’s latest love, Delores, was barmaiding. We all staggered in.
Bill immediately accused Delores of wanting to fuck this table full
of cowboys. Jim and Maggie were supposed to take me home, but
Maggie went to the restroom and by the time she came out, maybe
three minutes later, Bill had somehow hustled me back out into his
car and we were cruising off into the night. I can vaguely remember
staggering into a few more bars. Bill kept saying we had to find,
listen to this, me, moi, Lindsey. He kept calling me Kathy and
saying that we had to find Lindsey, that Lindsey was lost,
misplaced, misplaced in America, and we had to find her before it
was too late. Tell me about it.

Anyway, the first thing I clearly remember
was a ringing phone. I was back in bed and Kathy was calling from
the Flame. She said she had heard I had OD’d. It was all over town,
she said. People out in the bars were raising toasts in my memory.
Then she suggested we have a late dinner at the Edgewater. I told
her I felt like a very old piece of shit and could not possibly
move out again. At that point I realized two things. I was stark
naked. Two, Bill was snoring on the bed beside me. Don’t panic, for
he was fully clothed, just passed out cold. But how I had come to
be al natural, I must confess I haven’t the foggiest. Kathy
threatened to come over and fetch me, and at that point I somehow
moved my exhausted muscles. Somehow I drove myself to the Edgewater
where I found Kathy in a booth by the window overlooking the river.
She was calmly rolling a joint. I said, oh-no,” but she had fired
it up before I could run. She just sat there smoking it like a
cigarette. After a time the wine steward came to the table and said
cooly, “I hope you enjoy your dinner. The police will be waiting
for you outside when you leave.” Deep in my heart I thanked Bill
and Kathy for another wonderful evening in my life and I began
considering where I could move to and begin a new life after I got
out of prison. But, really, at the time it was not very funny. It
was just too much for me. So, while Kathy started calmly rolling
another joint, I began to weep, I am talking sob-city here, my face
felt like it was literally leaking off. Finally, the maître de came
over to our table and quietly informed us that if we just got up
and left, swearing never to return, they would not call the police.
Kathy fired up the joint, inhaled deeply, blew a couple of smoke
rings into the maître de’s face, and told him that in her opinion
his fucking restaurant was strictly lowrent and just generally
sucked. With that she got up and strolled across the room, me
cringing in her wake, and flicked ashes in peoples’ drinks as she
went. God. Enough.

In the parking lot Kathy informed me that I
was very boring when I sobbed and with that she drove off, leaving
rubber like a teenage queen, which was fine with me. I raced home
where I found, thank God, that Bill had revived and left. So I
locked the door, got my precious little kitty, and pulled the
covers over my head. Clearly, to live a good and proper life, it is
not enough to get plenty of rest, drink lots of water, and stay out
of the bars. One must also stay away from friends’ houses, even in
the afternoons, and lock one’s door upon retiring, and never,
never, answer the phone. I have pieced together most of what had
happened. Apparently Bill called here, looking for Kathy or me or
anyone I guess. And apparently, though I cannot really believe
this, I informed him that I had taken all the pills in the house
and was waiting to die. So I have a terrific sense of humor in
prodomo, what can I say? Bill, being an impressionable Buffalo,
believed all of this, and he rushed over and pulled me out of bed
and carried me out to his car and sped me to the hospital and just
generally saved my life After dropping me off at the hospital and
informing them I had OD’d on all the pills in the house, Bill,
naturally, took off again for the Flame to spread the good word.
Bill had been telling the story and accepting drinks of
congratulations on his quick thinking and life-saving skills for
about an hour before Jim and Maggie showed up and Jim insisted on
them coming to see me, thank God.

But it’s not over. The doorbell rang at
about 10:30 this morning. Bill, already drunk and hyped. I mean,
why not? Afterall, it is Easter Sunday morning. He just wanted to
see if I was all right he said. I invited him in of course. He told
me to think nothing of the fact that he had saved my life. He was
tickled to do it. I told him that not only were all the pills in my
house intact, but that I didn’t believe I told him I had taken
them. He told me he had been saving women all his life. Saving
women was sort of his hobby he guessed. I fixed us both a stiff
Bloody Mary and we got off on the subject of friendship. We both
confessed to saying shitty things about each other when convenient
and both admitted our hearts weren’t really in it. I must say, Bill
was in pretty bad shape. Said he had been with a woman last night,
had taken her to a motel and was too drunk to perform, at which
point she began beating on him and they left the motel bobbing and
weaving. She continued to beat on him until he drove them back to
the East Gate and he pretended he was going inside. She followed
him in the front, pounding on his back the whole time, and then
somehow he made a successful break for the back door, got out to
his car and locked the doors just in time to keep her out. Bill
informed me that he is actually a terribly moral man, even hung-up
on morality, and tended to dislike and feel great hostility toward
women in general because they simply cannot live up to his moral
standards. So perhaps Bill’s constant womanizing is really a form
of self-flagellatio? Masochism runs in all of us – it is insidious
– it is subtle – it is brutal. He’s a terribly lonely man. Lonely
and frightened. He spoke of you, too. Aid how much he cared for
you. I told him that we, you and I, seemed to have lost contact
somewhere. He said that I must have known it could never be
otherwise. And that I would never find happiness with you. At times
Bill conjectures out of his territory, but his feelings are given
in good faith. I did have happiness with you – a lot of it – Bill
to the contrary.

Have told you before, in various way, how
difficult it is not to hear from you. If silence was not atoned for
by the imagination, but it is, and my imagination leaves me with
heavy feelings I have difficulty handling. I know you are very
busy, what with your writing and teaching load, but I cannot
understand why you have not found time to call. You know you can
all collect anytime. That’s always been understood. Perhaps you
simply question the viability of our relationship. Perhaps your
life there has begun to move through smoother waters. If the
latter, I am truly happy for you. I only protest this much: If,
indeed, I have meant something to you, it seems that you owe me
some explanation. I must continue living too, and it’s painful in
this darkness, very painful. Your silence hurts me more than any
words you can offer. That time shared was precious. For that reason
alone it seems that if we are closing doors, it is time to explain
what is being done. Your silence does not stop my existence, you
see. Though you don’t communicate, I do continue to feel and to
wonder and to hurt. I do love you. I’m not sorry about that. I only
regret deeply what has driven this wedge between us. Please tell me
what is happening. So, as I said, an Easter note. Hope you had a
happy Easter, colored eggs with your kids, hid baskets for them,
those things. I hope I had a happy Easter. Easter is such a season
of renewal, don’t you think? Love

L.