Colum McCann - Let the Great World Spin (34 page)

I as much as opened the windows and told them to be on their merry way. They flew off. Not one of them came back.
Every time a branch of mine got to being a decent size, that wind just came along and broke it.
I sat in my chair in my living room, watching afternoon soap operas. I guess I ate. I suppose that’s what I did. I ate whatever I could. Alone. Surrounded by packets of Velveeta and saltines, trying hard not to remember, switching channels and crackers and cheeses so the memories didn’t get me. I watched my ankles swell. Every woman with her own curse, and I suppose mine was not much worse than a whole lot of them.
Everything falls into the hands of music eventually. The only thing that ever rescued me was listening to a big voice. There are years accumulated in a sound. I took to listening on the radio every Sunday and spent whatever extra grief money the government gave me on tickets to the Metropolitan. I felt like I had a room full of voices. The music pouring out over the Bronx. I sometimes turned the stereo so loud the neighbors complained. I bought earphones. Huge ones that covered half my head. I wouldn’t even look at myself in the mirror. But there was a medicine in it.
That afternoon, too, I sat in Claire’s living room and let the music float over me: it wasn’t opera, it was piano, but it was a new pleasure—it thrilled me.
We went through three or four records. In the late afternoon or early evening, I wasn’t quite sure, but I opened my eyes and she was putting a light blanket on my knees. She sat back against the white of the couch, the glass held at her lips.
“You know what I’d like to do?” said Claire.
“What’s that?”
“I’d love to have a cigarette, right here, right now, in this room.”
She fumbled around on the table for a package.
“My husband hates it when I smoke indoors.”
She fished out a single cigarette. It was turned the wrong way around in her mouth and for a moment I thought she was going to light it that way, but she laughed and flipped it. The matches were wet and they dissolved at the touch.
I sat up and picked another book of matches off the table. She touched my hand.
“I think I’m a little tipsy,” she said, but her voice was elegant.
I had the horrific feeling then—right then—that she might lean across and try to kiss me, or make some strange approach, like you read about in magazines. We lose ourselves sometimes. I felt hollow inside and there seemed to be a cool wind moving along my body like a breeze down a street, but it was nothing of the sort—all she did was sit back and blow the smoke to the ceiling and allow the music to wash over us.
A short while later she set the table for three and heated up a chicken pot pie. The phone rang a few times but she didn’t answer. “I guess he’s going to be late,” she said.
On the fifth ring she picked it up. I could hear his voice but couldn’t make out what he was saying. She held the mouthpiece close and I could hear her whispering the words
Dear
and
Solly
and
I love you,
but the conversation was quick and sharp, as if she were the only one talking, and I got the strangest feeling that the response at his end of the line was silence.
“He’s in his favorite restaurant,” she told me, “celebrating with the D.A.”
It didn’t make much difference—it’s hardly like I wanted him to step down off the wall and get all friendly with me, but Claire had a far- off look in her eyes, like she wanted to be asked about him, and so I did. She launched into a long story about a promenade, a walk she was taking, a man who came towards her in long white flannel trousers, how he was the friend of some famous poet, how they used to go to Mystic every weekend, to a little restaurant there where he sampled their martinis; she went on and on and on, her eyes towards the front door, waiting for him to come home.
What drifted across my mind was how unusual it must have been, if anyone could have watched us from the outside, sitting with the light dimming outside, letting simple talk drift over us.

i can’t recall what it was led me to the small ad that was in the back of
The Village Voice.
It was not a paper I had any particular fondness for, but it was there one day, like sometimes happens, Marcia’s ad, by the strangest chance, her, of all people. I sat down to compose a letter that maybe I wrote fifty or sixty times over, at the small counter in my kitchen. I explained everything about my boys, over and over again, the Lord knows how many times, saying how I was a colored woman, how I was living in a bad place but I kept it real nice and clean, how I had three boys and how I’d been through two husbands, how I’d really wanted to get back to Missouri but I never had the chance or the courage, how I’d be fine and happy to meet up with other people like me, how I’d be privileged. Each time I tore the letter up. It just didn’t seem right. In the end all I wrote was:
Hello, my name is Gloria and I’d like to meet up too.

it must have been ten in the evening when her husband stumbled through the door. From the corridor he actually called: “Honey, I’m home.”

In the living room, he stopped and stared, as if he were in the wrong place. He slapped his pockets like he might find a different set of keys there.

He looked as if he could have aged some and then stepped right out of the portrait on the wall. His tie was a little askew but his shirt was buttoned up to the neck. The bald dome shone. He carried a leather briefcase with a silver snap. Claire introduced me. He pulled himself together and walked across to shake my hand. A faint scent of wine rolled from him. “Pleasure to meet you,” he said, in the sort of way that meant he had no idea whatsoever why it might be a pleasure, but he had to say it anyway; he was bound to it by pure politeness. His hand was chubby and warm. He placed his briefcase at the foot of the table and frowned at the ashtray.

Claire kissed him high, on the cheek, near his eyelid, and loosened his tie for him.
“I had some friends over.”
He held the empty gin bottle to the light.
“Come sit with us,” she said.
“I’m going to run and have a shower, hon.”
“Come join us, come on.”
“I’m pooped,” he said, “but, boy, do I have a story for you.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Boy oh boy.”
He was undoing the buttons on his shirt and for a moment I thought he might take the shirt off in front of me, stand in the middle of the room like some round white fish.
“Guy walked a tightrope,” he said. “World Trade.”
“We heard.”
“You heard?”
“Well, yes, everyone’s heard. The whole world’s talking about it.”
“I got to charge him.”
“You did?”
“Came up with the perfect sentence too.”
“He got arrested?”
“Quick shower first. Yes, of course. Then tell you all.”
“Sol,” she said, pulling his sleeve.
“I’ll be right out, tell you everything.”
“Solomon!”
He glanced at me. “Let me freshen up,” he said.
“No, tell us, tell us now.” She stood. “Please.”
He flicked a look in my direction. I could tell he resented me, just being there, that he thought I was some housekeeper, or some Jehovah’s Witness who had somehow come into his house, disturbed the rhythm, the celebration he wanted to give himself. He opened another button on his shirt. It was like he was opening a door at his chest and trying to push me out.
“The D.A. wanted some good publicity,” he said. “Everyone in the city’s talking about this guy. So we’re not going to lock him up or anything. Besides the Port Authority wants to fill the towers. They’re half empty. Any publicity is good publicity. But we have to charge him, you know? Come up with something creative.”
“Yes,” said Claire.
“So he pleaded guilty and I charged him a penny per floor.”
“I see.”
“Penny per floor, Claire. I charged him a dollar ten. One hundred and ten stories! Get it? The D.A. was ecstatic. Wait ’til you see.
New York Times
tomorrow.”
He went to the liquor cabinet, his shirt a full three- quarters open. I could see the protrusion of his flabby chest. He poured himself a deep glass of amber liquid, sniffed it deeply, and exhaled.
“I also sentenced him to another performance.”
“Another walk?” said Claire.
“Yes, yes. We’ll get front- row tickets. In Central Park. For kids. Wait until you see this character, Claire. He’s something else.”
“He’ll go again?”
“Yes, yes, but somewhere safe this time.”
Claire’s eyes skittered around the room, as if she was looking at different paintings and trying to hold them together.
“Not bad, huh? Penny per floor.”
Solomon clapped his hands together: he was enjoying himself now. Claire looked at the ground, like she could see all the way through to the molten iron, the core of everything.
“And guess how he got the wire across?” said Solomon. He put his hand to his mouth and coughed.
“Oh, I don’t know, Sol.”
“Go on, guess.”
“I don’t really care.”
“Guess.”
“He threw it?”
“Thing weighs two hundred pounds, Claire. He was telling me all about it. In court. It’ll be in all the papers tomorrow. Come on!”
“Used a crane or something?”
“He did it illegally, Claire. Stealth of night.”
“I don’t really know, Solomon. We had a meeting today. There were four of us, and me, and . . .”
“He used a bow and arrow!”
“ . . . we sat around talking,” she said.
“This guy should’ve been a Green Beret,” he said. “He was telling me all this! His buddy shot a fishing line across first. Bow and arrow. Into the wind. Judged the angle just right. Hit the edge of the building. And then they fed the lines across until it could take the weight. Amazing, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” said Claire.
He put his bell- shaped glass on the coffee table with a sharp snap, then sniffed at his shirtsleeve. “I really must have a shower.”
He walked over towards me. He became aware of his shirt and pulled it across without buttoning it. A waft of whiskey rolled from him. “Well,” he said. “Gosh, I’m sorry. I didn’t really catch your name.” “Gloria.”
“Good night, Gloria.”
I swallowed hard. What he really meant was “good- bye.” I had no idea what sort of reply he expected. I simply shook his hand. He turned his back and walked out along the corridor.
“Pleasure to meet you,” he called over his shoulder.
He was humming a tune to himself. Sooner or later they all turn their backs. They all leave. That’s gospel. I’ve been there. I’ve seen it. They all do.
Claire smiled and shrugged her shoulders. I could tell she wanted him to be someone better than what he was, that she must have married him for some good reason, and she wanted that reason to be on display, but it wasn’t, and he had dismissed me, and it was the last thing she wanted from him. Her cheeks were red.
“Give me a moment,” she said.
She went down the corridor. A mumble of voices from her bedroom. The faint sound of a bath running. Their voices raised and dipped. I was surprised when he emerged with her, just moments later. His face had softened: as if just being a moment with her had relaxed him, allowed him to be someone different. I guess this is what marriage is, or was, or could be. You drop the mask. You allow the fatigue in. You lean across and kiss the years because they’re the things that matter.
“I’m sorry to hear about your sons,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“I didn’t mean to be so brusque.”
“Thank you.”
“You’ll excuse me?” he said.
He turned and then he said, with his gaze to the floor: “I miss my boy too sometimes.” And then he was gone.
I suppose I’ve always known that it’s hard to be just one person. The key is in the door and it can always be opened.
Claire stood there, beaming ear to ear.
“I’ll drop you home,” she said.
The thought of it flushed me with warmth but I said: “No, Claire, that’s all right. I’ll just get a taxi. Don’t you worry.”
“I’m going to drop you home,” she said, with a sudden clarity. “Please, just take the slippers. I’ll get you a bag for your shoes. We’ve had a long day. We’ll take a car service.”
She rummaged in a drawer and pulled out a small phone book. I could hear the sound of the bath still running. The water pipes kicked in and there was a groan from the walls.

dark had fallen outside. The driver was waiting, propped, smoking a cigarette, against the hood of the car. He was one of those old- time drivers, with a peaked hat and a dark suit and a tie. He suddenly stubbed the cigarette out and ran to open the rear door for us. Claire slid in first. She was agile across the rear seat and she swung her legs across the well in the middle of the seats. The driver took my elbow and guided me inside. “There we go,” he said in a big false voice. I felt a little old- blackladyish, but that was all right—he was just doing his best, wasn’t trying to make me feel bad.

I told him the address and he hesitated a moment, nodded, went around to the front of the car.
“Ladies,” he said.
We sat in silence. On the bridge she flicked a quick look back at the city. All was light—offices that looked as if they were hovering on the void, the random pools from street lamps, headlights flashing across our faces. Pale concrete pillars flashed by. Girders in strange shapes. Naked columns capped with steel beams. The sweep of the river below.
We crossed over into the Bronx, past shuttered bodegas and dogs in doorways. Fields of rubble. Twisted steel pipes. Slabs of broken masonry. We drove beyond railroad tracks and the flashing shadows of the underpass, through the fire- blown night.
Some figures lumbered along among the garbage cans and the piles of refuse.
Claire sat back.
“New York,” she sighed. “All these people. Did you ever wonder what keeps us going?”
A big smile went between us. Something that we knew about each other, that we’d be friends now, there wasn’t much could take it from us, we were on that road. I could lower her down into my life and she could probably survive it. And she could lower me into hers and I could rummage around. I reached across and held her hand. I had no fear now. I could taste a tincture of iron in my throat, like I had bitten my tongue and it had bled, but it was pleasing. The lights skittered by. I was reminded how, as a child, I used to drop flowers into large bottles of ink. The flowers would float on the surface for a moment and then the stem would get swamped, and then the petals, and they would bloom with dark. There was a commotion outside the projects when we pulled up. Nobody even noticed our car. We glided up by the fence, shadowed by the overpass. The black steel beams were shimmying with streetlight. None of the women of the night were out, but a couple of girls in short skirts were huddled under the light in the entrance. One was leaning across the shoulder of another and sobbing.
I had no time for them, the hookers, never had. I didn’t hold any rancor for them nor any bleeding heart. They had their pimps and their white men who felt sorry for them. That was their life. They’d chosen it. “Ma’am,” said the driver.
I still had my hand in Claire’s.
“Good night,” I said.
I opened the door, and just then I saw them come out, two darling little girls coming through the globes of lamplight.
I knew them. I had seen them before. They were the daughters of a hooker who lived two floors above me. I had kept myself away from all that. Years and years. I hadn’t let them near my life. I’d see their mother in the elevator, a child herself, pretty and vicious, and I’d stared straight ahead at the buttons.
The girls were being guided down the path by a man and a woman. Social workers, their pale skin shining, a scared look on their faces. The girls were dressed in little pink dresses, with bows high on their chests. Their hair was done in beads. They wore plastic flip- flops on their feet. They were no more than two or three years old, like twins, but not twins. They were both smiling, which is strange now when I think back on it: they had had no idea what was happening and they looked a picture of health.
“Adorable,” said Claire, but I could hear the terror in her voice. The social workers wore the straitjacket stare. They were pushing the kids along, trying to guide them through the remaining hookers. A cop car idled farther up the block. The onlookers were trying to wave to the little girls, to lean down and say something, maybe even gather them up in their arms, but the social workers kept pushing the women away.
Some things in life just become very clear and we don’t need a reason for them at all: I knew at that moment what I’d have to do.
“They’re taking them away?” said Claire.
“I suppose.”
“Where’ll they go?”
“Some institution somewhere.”
“But they’re so young.”
The kids were being bundled towards the back of the car. One of them had started crying. She was holding on to the antenna of the car and wouldn’t let go. The social worker tugged her, but the child hung on. The woman came around the side of the car and pried the child’s fingers off.
I stepped out. It didn’t seem to me that I was in the same body anymore. I had a quickness. I stepped off the pavement and onto the road. I was still in Claire’s slippers.
“Hold on,” I shouted.
I used to think it had all ended sometime long ago, that everything was wrapped up and gone. But nothing ends. If I live to be a hundred I’ll still be on that street.
“Hold on.”
Janice—she was the older of the two—let her fingers uncurl and reached out to me. Nothing felt better than that, not in a long time. The other one, Jazzlyn, was crying her eyes out. I looked over my shoulder to Claire, who was still in the backseat, her face shining under the dome light. She looked frightened and happy both.
“You know these kids?” said the cop.
I guess I said yes.
That’s what I finally said, as good a lie as any: “Yes.”