What Is All This? (58 page)

“Pity is right,” and I pat his shoulder.

Though nice chat we had.”

“Yes, while it lasted. No, that's not what I wanted to say or how I wanted to say it. One of those, not both. But I think you know what I mean without my going into it or repeating what I wanted to say the right way.”

He doesn't say yes or no or nod or shake his head. He smiles, a weaker smile than the ones before, and sticks out his hand. I stick out mine and we shake. It starts to sprinkle.

“See you sometime,” he says. “But I better run. Don't want to ruin my clothes.”

“I guess I don't mind getting—” I begin to say, but he walks away. Put up his umbrella and is heading further downtown. That where he live? Maybe he was shopping in midtown. But he had no package. The djellabas. But they weren't bagged or wrapped. Maybe he came to midtown to get them from a friend, or even the umbrella or book or hat or he bought something that can't be seen in a pocket or around his neck or wrist. Or even his ankle. Men sometimes wear ankle bracelets, though that's the least likely prospect I mentioned. Or maybe he strolled all the way to around where I live and possibly beyond, and just to stroll—for exercise, let's say—and I caught him walking back to his home downtown. But that doesn't explain the djellabas. The book he could be carrying for any number of reasons. For instance, just to read in a stopping-off place like a café. What was the subject matter of the book again that I was going to look up? Forgot. Such a long, complicated and unfamiliar word, I doubt I'll ever be able to remember it. Maybe he hurried off with that rain excuse because he knows something more about this area than I. I rarely get this far from my block. The last time was when? Can't remember. Well, lots of questions, and nothing like a little mystery in one's life. What's the mystery in mine? That personal experience I brought up and didn't explain? Bet he's wondering about it now. Woman, hmm, I can see him thinking. Actually, I can still see him walking downtown, the umbrella still protecting him. He's a block away but not many people between us. Then he disappears. Maybe he ducked in someplace to get out of the rain. Doesn't even want a few drops on his clothes, if that excuse was the truth. What I was going to tell him before he left was “I guess I don't mind getting caught in the rain as much as you.” He would have asked why. I would have said “My clothes are quite old and used. First old, then used. I mean by that: made old by someone else, or who knows how many people, because who knows how many thrift shops they were in, then further used by me. In plainer language: I bought all the clothes I have on in a thrift shop. Several thrift shops, but they all came from one. Meaning: several different thrift shops, but they're all thrift-shop clothes. In even plainer language: they're worn, shabby, very cheap clothes that were the only ones I could afford in several very cheap thrift shops. What could be called work clothes if I worked. Worked at a laborer's job where one didn't need good clothes. In the plainest language possible: I don't mind ruining them; they're already ruined.”

I look in all four directions, I seem to be one of the few pedestrians on the streets, and those that are on them are protected by rainwear or umbrellas or both. But why get wet? It's pouring now, so I mean why get wetter? I duck under a store awning. But why duck? Ducks take to rain, don't they? That might have elicited a laugh from that man. A good joke, I think, and I laugh out loud. Oops. Someone's under the awning with me. A woman, also with no umbrella or rainwear.

“Howdy-do,” I say to her, “Nice day, eh?” She gives me the fisheye, looks away. One of those. Meaning: she is.

“Just a joke,” I say. “Minor. Harmless. Didn't mean anything by it. Just the good mood I'm in. But some rain. Cats and dogs, yes? Bats and hogs, no.” Fisheye, looks away. Still one of those. No letup. She nor the rain. Me too, I guess. Strangers. But maybe I'll get to her yet. In a good way, I'm saying. “Okay, I understand, madame. Takes all kinds, and I love that it does. But must say good-day. I must, not you. For ducks take to rain as they do to water, don't they? In fact, rain is water. Rainwater, of course.” Fisheye, mutters, clutches her handbag closer to her, moves two steps away from me but still under the awning. I laugh to myself, but inside this time. Sort of to balance the last time I laughed out loud, which was to an inside remark.

I salute her goodbye and step into the rain. Really pouring now. Buckets. I start running north. Every so often I duck under a store awning or building overhang and try to make talk with someone there, and the awnings and overhangs I choose I choose because someone's there, but have no luck. Could be the clothes and that I'm so wet. And more I run, wetter I get. And there's nobody I know under these overhangs or who seems to know me. If they do, they're not saying, something I can also understand. A man so drenched and who keeps running in the rain without any protection can seem crazed. I run a few more blocks, keep ducking under overhangs, more because I'm tired than to talk to anyone, so some of the overhangs I duck under don't even have anyone there. Run a lot more blocks, but I'm really just jogging now, and walk fast and then at a normal pace the last five blocks till I reach my sidestreet. I run down the block—there's nobody out or at the window to wave to—and go two steps at a time up my building's stoop into the vestibule, where the landlady's mopping the floor under my mailbox or letterbox I don't open but do peek through and see nothing inside.

“Some day out,” I say, but she's in no mood to talk. And when she's mopping while it rains she usually gets less in the mood with each succeeding dripping tenant. “Have a good day, though,” I say, and run up the three flights of stairs to my apartment to do some undressing, showering, maybe soaking in a tub, drying, dressing, wet-clothes hanging, eating, resting and sleep. All that and more till later today or early tonight or tomorrow or tomorrow night or sometime this week, depending if the rain stops and if it's not too late in the day, I can go out again.

“Don't worry; there'll be better days.”

“No doubt.”

“For both of us, I mean.”

“I know, or at least I hope. But you were going?”

She leaves. I putter around the house: sweep up, put away dishes, mop the kitchen and bathroom floors. She comes back.

“I got all the way to the bridge when I realize I forgot something.”

“Forgot to stay away.”

“Don't be nasty. I'll get it and then I'll go and I won't be back.”

“Promise?”

But she's upstairs. Comes down with her hair dryer.

“Your hair dryer, no less. Oh, you really needed to come back for that.”

“I thought why bother buying another one as long as I have one here. Because you weren't planning on using it, were you?”

“Oh sure, can't you see me under it with my five hairs on top and short side hair. But what you should've thought in your car was why have a dryer at all?”

“You can't let up?”

“You can't dry your hair with a towel?”

“With a trowel, that's how I'd like to dry your hair. Anyway, my dryer makes drying quick and easy. Saves me time for more important things.”

“Like prolonging affairs?”

“One affair. The others weren't even minor romances. Not even mini-minor ones. Just tosses in the hay if there was hay.”

“A turn or toss in the sack, then.”

“If the sack's supposed to be the mattress on the bed, then for most of them, that's correct.”

The sack is the bed. Old word for it, and the tossing or turning business, old expression. I think it comes from the navy—if not the expression, then the word, or maybe both.”

“You were in the navy?”

“You saying you didn't know?”

“I thought it was the Marines.”

“Navy. Private first class.”

“I know they don't have privates.”

“Sailors don't have privates? Oh, new joke if it isn't an old one. They've privates, privies and privileges as in liberties, or they did when I was junior grade.”

“You were an ensign, now I remember. Well, I salute you, Ensign Wilkerson, and say ahoy there or whatever the nautical term is for goodbye.”

“Shove off.”

“Shove off. Okey-doke and adieu, my dope, as the French navy might say,” and she leaves.

“Screw you too, once my hope, now my rope. Good riddance, my former deliverance, and…and…nothing. Just nothing.” I throw a coffee mug, only dish I didn't wash and put away, through one of the front windows. She comes back.

“You know, I was opening my car door when I heard the crash. At first I thought let him get his anger out. It's good for him. Then he'll be calm, like seas are calm after a storm, which all JGs are familiar with, right? Then I thought hell, I still own half this house, so my warning to you. Ensign Wilkerson, first class jerk, is don't go busting up any more of it or I'll get my rear admiral on your ass, or whatever the legal officer is in navy talk, for more than just a divorce. In other words—”

“In other words, go hang myself or slit my own throat, you were going to say?”

“No.”

“Ah, you were always so considerate and sweet: property, more important than people, in your book. To that I say, screw property, yours and mine, jointly or singly held,” and I throw a lamp through another front window. She runs to the phone, looks in the directory, and dials.

“Police? I'm in your precinct. Thirty thirty-five Waverly, and my husband is tearing up our house and I want him arrested…Yes, it's a domestic dispute. It always is if it's between husband and wife, but that shouldn't stop you from coming here. It's half my house, and after he gets done destroying it, I fear he's going to start on me…Good. Edith Wilkerson, his is Walt. Please hurry.” She hangs up.

“So you're going to stay after all.”

“Till the police arrive and then just long enough to have you put away in jail or a mental institution. In fact, the hell with my beating it out of here. You're the one who'll have to go and be barred from this house for life, even if I'm the one who carried on and am ending this marriage.” She picks up the receiver and dials. “Mrs. Silbert, please.” That's her lawyer. “Miriam? It's Edith. Walt's destroying our house. Literally, I mean. I was in the process of leaving…No, I don't think his breaking up the place is natural.” I pick up the extension. “He's on the extension so watch what you say. He's already broken two front windows that are full pane, not little French ones, and I've called the police and would like you to be over here soon as you can,”

“I can't come now, Edith. I'm tied up all day.”

Then get a writ out against him, or something, but quickly, because I don't want him staying here. He's going to wreck the whole house, I know it.”

“Did he threaten that?”

“Ask him. I told you he's on the extension.”

“You also told me to watch what I say. Okay. Walt, this is Miriam Silbert, Edith's lawyer who's handling her divorce. You've received several letters from me and notices from the court with my name on them, so you know who I am. My question is, are you planning on doing further harm to the house?”

“And her lawyer. And the police who come here. Everything. The front and back yards and basement and Edith too. I am going to murder her.”

“Walt, just what you're saying now could land you in jail for a while and provide even additional grounds for a divorce, so try to be reasonable and answer me.”

“All right. I'll only murder her lawyer.”

“I'm serious, Walt. What my advice is—”

“Lawyers always have advice. Don't you people have marital and social and psychological problems of your own?”

“Of course. I was born poor to insane parents and had a miserable childhood and adolescence and got divorced twice. That's neither here nor there except for the experience and know-how and insights into human nature it gave me. Now I'm happy.”

“You know this creep Edith is supposedly in love with?”

“I am in love with him, no supposedly,” Edith says.

“Edith, let me talk to Walt. You're in business, Walt. You know that a lawyer, even in court under oath, can't divulge what a client's told her. Especially not to the client's contestant.”

“Her client, his contestant, party of the first tart, the second fart. Bull. Divulge. Bulge. Bilge. Reveal. God, you people are creeps. You ought to be her lover, not lawyer.”

“And what's that supposed to mean? Little more of it and you'll be hauled into court by me.”

“It was nothing. Silliness. Senselessness. Man in distress. You were about to suggest? Perhaps that I leave this house for a hotel, agree to the divorce proceedings and give in to everything and make your work easier than pie-eating, yes? Okay, I will. I did I do and now I will. But no big settlement in her favor, you hear? I'll pay half the divorce costs and that's it. Two kids in college and I'll do my best to keep them there, but to only pay half. My share of the house and all its belongings I'll give free and clear to the three of them, but let the kids work for the rest of their college costs if Edith can't come up with it. It'll do them good. You worked. I worked. Edith didn't much but she'll have to now.”

“Times have changed, Walt,” Miriam says.

“Why? Because schools are much more expensive now? So pay is a lot more also than in your day or mine.”

There aren't that many available jobs for college students. That's why they do unpaid internships.”

“Manure. Kids can always find work. Picking dead tree leaves out of pachysandra bushes or whatever pachysandra is. A ground covering. An herb. A friend of mine has a son who did that last month for four bucks an hour, imagine that?”

“Walt, I'm very busy. Appointments and meetings. We'll talk about leaves and manure another time.”

“But I'm divulging the dog-eared ruth, Miriam, the ragtagged forsooth.”

“You are what?”

“Nothing. I'm crazy. Rather, feeling rather crazy today. Where's the nearest lamp? There's still one front window to blow out.”

“Walt?”

“He's left the phone, Miriam. I think he went looking for a lamp. Here he is, unplugging one now. No, ripping it out of the wall. Hold it. I've got to stop him.”

She tries to stop me. I shove her to the floor. She jumps up and grabs the lamp by the cord while I hold it by the top. Tug, pull. “Walt, Edith,” I hear Miriam on the phone. Edith now has the lamp by the base. I drag the lamp to the phone with Edith pulling back at her end and say into the receiver “You don't think I should do it, Miriam?”

“If you mean throw the lamp through the window, of course not.”

“Strangle Edith with the lamp cord, I mean.”

“Miriam, will you get someone here to restrain him?” Edith yells a few feet from the phone.

“Walt, I'm hanging up now and calling the police to get over there right away. Maybe Edith didn't tell them how serious it is.”

“Too late. They're here.” I hang up. The doorbell rings. “Go answer it, please. I'm bushed, and you invited them.”

“Only when you put the lamp down and promise to back off.”

“I promise.” I put it down. She goes to the door. I throw the lamp through the one front window left. Two cops come in with drawn guns. “Welcome, strangers.”

“He's tearing up the house,” Edith says.

“We can see,” one of them says. “You want to relax a second, Mr. Wilkerson?”

“And your names, my friendly police?”

“I said to relax; now cool it.”

“I think I'm allowed to have your names. You're in fact both supposed to be wearing name tags above your badges.”

That's in the city, not here in the county.” They've put away their guns.

“You want me to relax and cool it, I want your names.”

“As you say. Allen and John.”

“You were born and went through life without cognomens?”

Those are our last. I'm Jim and he's Russell.”

“Howdy, fellas. I'm Walt Wilkerson. I live here. I broke those three windows, as you must've heard. You at least heard the third being broke. Or created those three holes. No, the panes will have to be replaced, so they've more than holes; they're broken for life. This is my wife, Edith. Show them the sunny side of your teeth, Edie. We were married twenty-one years ago, or are about a week shy of that anniversary date. Or maybe just I'm shy, but she's not, for lately she's had many dates and this month she's taken up seriously with another man. Before then, just dates with others. Maybe six altogether. I can't say she's had those six altogether, though I'm sure in pairs and maybe even one as a trio they've been in the altogether. As you can see I've become quite torn up about it, which I've begun demonstrating by tearing up this house. But they were nothing-much affairs, the previous six. A night. Maybe two. A morning or three. A couple of summer weeks when she met them on the beach and. I could only come out weekends because I worked. We have two children who used to vacation with us when they were younger, Sue and Chuck. You can chuck Chuck and though I don't think Suzie's thinking of suing me, I'm sure her mother and brother are. Insufferable kid, Chuck, but Sue's okay. Both are away in college and spending plenty of money and getting so-so grades. Neither thinks much of me and my work or have much to speak about with me, and though the feeling wasn't mutual, it's become so the last year. I'm naturally mad at what's happened to me, or if you listen to my wife, just mad naturally. Mostly because she told me last night about the quick six and this recent heartthrob and that he's the main reason she instituted the divorce. Now she's going to try to institutionalize me. Hot flash: fat chance. Edith, dear, could you get these men coffee and cake while we talk?”

“I wish they'd just take you away.”

“I think I've a better solution,” Jim says. “How about if we try to settle the dispute without your having to press charges or our booking him at the station house and both of you going through the whole court scene?”

“I'm sorry, fellas. If pressing charges is the single best way of getting him out of here, that's what I want to do.”

“I won't go without a row,” I say.

“Don't tempt us,” Russell says. “So far we've let you run off at the mouth and scare the daylights out of us with your third broken window there, and now we're having a nice discussion. But don't speak about making tough.”

“I know judo and other martial arts.”

“No, he doesn't,” she says, “or never showed it. It's true he was in the navy during some Asian war, although I thought it was the marines. An ensign.”

“Long time ago. Garbage barge. Skippered it around the bigger ships and smaller destroyers. But I was a lousy sailor. Bad sea legs. I also can't stand to fight. The judo and stuff was just for mental discipline and body tone. I'm really a peaceful man experiencing a painful crisis. But if your wife suddenly told you she's slept with six other men in the last year and in the last few months with one in particular and that she hates your guts and sight and said all this in the dark of your bedroom moments after you told her how much you still adore her and long to make love with her, I doubt either of you would have taken it any better than I.”

“I never married,” Russell says.

Then you, Jim.”

“I was. To be honest, splitting up was the next best thing that ever happened to my wife and me, the first being our brood.”

“You see, Walt?” she says. “If the marriage isn't working out, why postpone the divorce?”

That's how we felt, Mrs. Wilkerson.”

“Oh, do call her Edith,” I say. “Anything more than that, she'll begin to mind.”

“We had three kids. Bing, bang and boom, that's how quickly they seemed to come. But we'd gotten hitched too young. So, very amicably, no dillydallying with legal advice or anything, we decided, after we'd seriously talked it over, and have continued to honor our original arrangement once we knew the marriage was through—”