Fall (22 page)

I tried to make my way back toward Ant. I remember feeling suddenly like a stranger, that everyone belonged but me. I heard people laugh. A girl shouted, “Whoo!” I heard a laugh again. I saw Red Cap, who was standing with his friends. He had a beer in his hand.

I pushed my way through to him, not knowing what I was going to say. When I got close to him I felt a pain throb through me that ended in my throat and I realized he had kneed me in the groin.

While my mind was catching up to the pain, someone bumped my shoulder and knocked me off balance. I couldn’t see Red Cap and I felt like I wanted to be hugging my knees in bed.

I made my way back to Ant. He had ordered some beer. I stared at the now full dance floor and thought about everyone hoping to love. “I’m going to kill someone tonight,” I said. Ant didn’t hear me. I drank the beer quickly and walked away with the glass in my hand. I heard Ant shouting, “Where you going?” behind me.

I found my way to Red Cap, who had his back to me. I focused on his hat and tried to smash the glass on his head. The handle broke off but the glass didn’t break. He was on the ground and his hat was knocked off.

My neck cracked and I was on the floor, holding my eye before knowing why. I felt a shoe. My nose popped and my throat was soaked in warmth. I felt fingers under the back of my collar and I was yanked up. I tasted more blood in my throat and through my tears I saw one of the other caps winding up. I ducked and tried to punch him in the stomach but I hit his belt buckle.

I saw Red Cap still lying facedown on the floor. There were hands under my arms and my feet left the floor and I was spun around and thrust through the crowd. The bouncer was carrying me. I squirmed to try to get both feet on the floor but he was able to keep me up and was carrying me to the back of the club.

He lost his footing and I ran for the back door and out into the winter. I ran as fast as I could.

My nose felt like it was being permanently pressed against metal. I could only breathe through my mouth, but I ran without thinking of breathing. I ran away from all the bars, away from the lights, through the courtyard of an office block. I heard running and shouting behind me and felt like everything was catching up to me, a feeling that unless I ran I would have to be myself.

“Will you please fuckin’ wait!” Ant shouted.

I looked over my shoulder and saw him running. No one else was around. I leaned forward and my heart was sending pulses of pain to everything I had injured.

“Let’s get a cab,” Ant said.

Neither of us had coats.

I awoke the next morning with a sheet stuck to the back of my hand. I made my way to the bathroom and saw blood on the sheet. I needed to get my head lower. I kneeled by the toilet and looked around at his aunt’s luxurious bathroom. The sheet was stuck to my hand with dried blood. I pulled it back slowly and revealed a gash between my knuckles which I had opened when I punched the belt buckle. I pulled the sheet right off and vomited. My hand was bleeding without the bandage of the sheet. I slept or passed out.

Ant woke me and said, “Are you okay? I need to piss.”

We looked at my hand and decided I needed stitches. Ant had to go to a lunch with a family friend that day. He loaned me a coat.

On the bus to the hospital everyone looked away from my face. I got thirteen stitches in my hand and they set and bandaged my nose.

“We’re supposed to report this sort of thing,” the doctor said.

I
COULD KISS
you all night she says.

She hugs me like I hugged that pole when I was a kid and I’m not telling anyone about that.

When I was a kid I’m saying, maybe eight, I hugged a pole, really pressed myself into it, right there in the playground. I guess my body was waking up I say.

I said it.

That’s so cute she says.

I think we should see a movie tomorrow.

I’ll do anything you want she says.

I believe it. I can’t believe I’m free I say.

It’s midnight she says. I should go.

She’s not moving because she’s mine.

I guess so I’m saying.

I’m gonna see her tomorrow. It’ll be Saturday and bright and I’ll open every door like a present.

Today!

We’re walking and I had too much popcorn.

Look at that guy I say.

I saw him she says.

Hilarious I say.

We’re walking.

I had too much popcorn I say.

She doesn’t like talking about movies so I’m not talking about it but I want to say something otherwise the movie didn’t exist.

Did you like it.

What.

The movie.

Yeah.

Me too.

She’s holding my hand.

I need to fart. Which way’s the wind blowing.

It was kind of violent she says.

Yeah.

She doesn’t even like seeing someone get punched in the face.

I want a frozen yogourt she says. And a small piece of chocolate.

Slürp’s over there I say.

Let’s go to Slürp.

I’m farting.

Why the little smile she says.

Our anniversary’s in a week I say.

I know she says. I wanna plan something she says.

I’ve got plans I say.

Do you.

An idea.

Yeah.

A red hotel I say.

Really.

Kind of.

William, as per the secret man’s secret agreement, will be standing outside the servant’s entrance, because William says he’s my servant. I love the grey in his sideburns, and I’ll have the same one day but I’m blond.

Hey fellas I’m just getting something from the house, ok. Hush hush. And William’s gonna drive me back to school, ok. Bum knee. Right. Hush hush.

I love the wink. I love a winking marine. I love to be understood. I love cigarettes.

William’s lit up over there like a spy movie. He’s sucking the fire through his cigarette and I’m thinking about the grey in his burns and a crackle of age and sex and secrets, snap.

You look excited he says.

I am excited I say.

I saw a woman today he says, flick, get in the car, who was putting on lipstick.

Chunk.

I was down in the food court he says through the window and he’s walking around and he’s in.

Chunk.

And she was putting on lipstick with one of those contact, compact things, what’s it called, and she was
loving
her lips he says. I could tell by the look on her she was loving her lips. The sight of herself. She was applying . . . caressing, with the lipstick, her beautiful lips. I found it very sexy.

You find everything sexy I say.

And it was nice. I liked how much she loved her lips. I remember getting my first sunburn when I was a kid and thinking, I like the look of that sunburn. I haven’t liked myself since. I like how much she loved her lips.

I like lips I say and I know exactly what he’s gonna say,
be careful
 . . .

Be careful of lips. I’ve had two wives.

I know.

You know. Be careful of lips he says.

I’m gonna wait while he drinks some beer I’m thinking.

I love William.

You’re nice to me, William.

Well, you tell your girl to be nice to you.

She is.

So tell her to be mean. Tell her to be something she’s not. That’s my advice.

Dad says you don’t get wise you only get old.

Your father’s wise he says.

We’ll drive down to the Chateau Lafayette and William will take his hat off and put it on the seat just there and he’ll be a bald chauffeur with salted burns going away to drink some beer I bought him. I’m the luckiest guy alive.

I’m thirsty he says.

I know.

No you don’t. You don’t know thirst.

No.

There’s something . . . I don’t know. One day on my boat when you’re grown up . . .

Hair . . .

When you have hair on your balls, we’ll talk over a beer about what life is really like. You’re going to find out. And I mean that with all due respect. You’re going to find out what life is really like.

Go have a beer, William. Please go have a beer. I have to be back by ten-thirty. How many beers in an hour and a half I say.

Fifteen minutes a pint. Enough to get the fat and muscles humming.

I can’t wait to see you.

You’re young. Look in the mirror and remember that.

William scratches his sideburns.

William makes noises like a fattish guy on a car seat.

William smells like a party.

I’ve had hemorrhoids on and off for a decade he says. I don’t wish them on you, young Julius, it’s a piece of your gut pinched out of your ass and when you’re young that’s a troubling idea.

Yes it is I say.

So keep your girl out of my bathroom cabinet there, the one above the sink, and otherwise the place is yours, you can use it as you like.

You’re such a buddy William.

Well he says. Maybe don’t drink the whisky either. Or the gin. Maybe none of the, uh, spirits there. Beer, sure. One each.

I won’t drink your booze man.

I wouldn’t say no to a beer right now come to think of it.

You just had some.

True enough. And thanks for getting me off duty there for a spell.

You bet.

But I’ll tell you. You have your father to thank. He always lets me off, most weekends, so if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t be going fishing this weekend and my apartment wouldn’t be empty for you and your beautiful romance. Keep your seed off my sheets by the way. Be decent about it.

Where do you fish in December I say.

I don’t want to think about sleeping in his bed.

A place called Mullet Lake way up. It’s tiny. Freezes early. We drink. We stop at the liquor store on the way up and buy SCOTCH. Big goddamn vat of it at the store with no name except SCOTCH. And my buddy and I we talk about life and how hard it is to find a woman to love and it’s not because we’re fat. I’m telling you, Julius, the older you get the pickier you get.

Ok.

You know, people my age they’re more willing to forgive the human things, the hemorrhoids and the mistakes, but somehow it’s harder than ever to find that perfect match because we’ve got our habits and by now we really know what we don’t like.

Right.

So we sit in the boat and once we saw a trout but we didn’t know how to catch it. We never get drunk enough he says.

Anyways it’s really nice of you.

It’s nothing.

It’s just one night I say.

It’s nothing. And don’t eat my food either.

We’ll go out.

That’s the way. Take her out to dinner. Lots of places around there.

William, man, have you noticed you give me a lot of advice. Instructions.

Well you’ve got your girlfriend and your looks and your whole life ahead of you. But I know better about everything.

I appreciate it.

And don’t tell your father.

There’s a noise of scratching, he’s whiskers and fat.

Of course I’m not telling dad.

And don’t make too much noise. The neighbours are really nice. Don’t wake them up.

Ok.

And meet them. Meet the neighbours. Meet some people, Julius.

I just want some space I say.

Yeah, well he says.

I
FELT HOMELESS
. I think part of me actually wanted to go back to Ant’s aunt’s place. I felt like I could hide there amidst her strangely frigid luxury and be absorbed by a new life. I thought about my parents in Australia and how distant we were. I never felt comfort from parents, though I know my mother loved me. Our culture, with its unquestioning belief in psychological consequence, in the ramifications of childhood, seems to have no room for the agency of a child. The onus is on parents to create the ideal life, and their inevitable failure is the cause of a child’s maladjustment. There is little credit given to the possibility that a child might not love, that there can be unbridgeable distance, even ill will, that has nothing to do with how his parents treated him. I was born hungry, and no matter what my parents did to determine what I ate, my hunger was always my own. Distance was what I felt; distance was my choice.

I had thought I had a home with Julius, but I couldn’t get Fall out of my mind. I got angry when I thought about her. I was so cold that Sunday, with black eyes, my nose in a bandage, my hand wrapped up, the internal pain spreading through my body.

I had read G.K. Chesterton’s letters that term and had marked a passage: “For children are innocent and love justice, while most of us are wicked and naturally prefer mercy.” I think I had underlined it because I no longer felt innocent. I wanted comfort that Sunday.

Naturally everyone was curious about my face. I told the masters I had broken my nose playing basketball. Ant told everyone else about my fight. Julius asked all about it. I told him the details in the
dark before we slept. It was the first time that we spoke in the old intimate way.

“There’s nothing fun about fights,” he said. “Every one I’ve been in has been . . . I don’t know. There’s that second when you step back and think
we’re hurting each other
.”

He was trying to understand. The pain in my nose made my eyes water anyway, but I was crying. He was being so nice. I wanted to tell him that I liked the idea of hurting someone.

Her mother came to the school to drop something off, and the comforting idea that Fall had been with her all this time fell apart.

The nature of everything changed. Everyone realized that Fall was actually missing. The news spread through the school immediately and everyone’s movements slowed to the pace of incredulity.

The police were called that day. I don’t know whether they looked alien or whether their presence suddenly made the whole school seem so. In any case, it felt like they introduced a new reality, or were putting an end to a game.

Police, with their sticks and guns and cuffs and radios, seekers of truth with preposterous tools. What could those tools do to me? What would that moustachioed man with the belly and grave propriety ever know about my life?