In the City of Shy Hunters (40 page)

Instead, in the afternoon Mother took a bath. She stayed in the bathroom a long time, and I could hear her crying in there.

When she got out of the tub, after she set her hair in pin curls, Mother walked in her yellow terry-cloth bathrobe into the front room where I was playing with my Tinkertoys. She sat down on the green couch and put her bare feet together on the flowered carpet.

Lunch at the Waldorf? I said.

Mother's eyes up, Saint Theresa Gone to Heaven, full of tears.

Who am I? I said.

I WAS HEDY
Lamarr that day, because Hedy Lamarr wore the green taffeta dress with the big buttons and the white shoes.

Mother put the cloth tablecloth on the table and put coffee into the percolator and plugged the percolator in. She set the table with the coffee cups with matching saucers, the little spoons, the fancy bowl with the sugar cubes, and the fancy creamer. She made toast in elegant shapes
and sandwiches with the toast with watercress or dandelion leaves or mint jelly. Mother wore the violet dress with the orchid all the way down the front, and fluffed her hair and put on her eyebrows and the Orange Exotica lipstick, and a touch of Evening in Paris behind each ear from the tiny deep-blue bottle, her high heels with the holes in the toes, her nylons with the seams.

In the kitchen, at the table, we started with Mother saying, Oh, how I love lunch at the Waldorf!

Then I'd say, Oh, how I love lunch at the Waldorf too.

But this day, because she was crying, only I said it. I had to say everything that day, do everything.

I poured the coffee, mixed the cream in, and one cube of sugar the way she liked it, had to get out the Herbert Tareytons she hid from Father in the drawer next to the kitchen sink. I gave her a Herbert Tareyton and lit the kitchen match on the stove and watched her pull the flame into the cigarette. Then I went in her bedroom in the second drawer of her nightstand and got the magenta velvet photograph album with the gold edges, and put the photograph album on the table between us, the way she always did, but this day I did it.

First, I rubbed my hand over the velvet of the book, smoothing each comer. Touching the book that way made it there. When you opened the book you could smell the pictures. The sound the book made when you turned the pages was like it was on fire.

On the first page was the first photograph of her. I told the story the same way, the same words she used, like I was her telling me.

This is when I traveled by train alone to visit my cousins in Saskatchewan, I said. I put my finger at the bottom, careful not to touch the photograph, then pointed around to each corner, to the four black corners that held it in the book.

I said: I was eighteen and that old car was a Model A and it's my Uncle Fritz's. You can't see it, but Uncle Fritz is playing the accordion and I started dancing, lifted up my skirt just a little and started dancing. I always loved that hat.

When I turned the page to the second photograph, during the sound of the page, the smell, I looked sideways over to my mother. She was smoking and wasn't crying.

That's when I worked at Newberry's, I said, pointing my finger the way she always pointed hers, first on the page, then at the four black comers. I said, A dollar five an hour. That was just before I married your father. This photograph was taken my last day at work. The night
before, I went to a liquor store and bought a pint of whiskey even though I wasn't twenty-one. I lived in the Dolley Madison Arms, a rooming house for women, and I took the pint of whiskey home in my purse. I had taken some snow and made the snow into ice cubes and set the snow ice cubes on the windowsill outside. I had stolen a glass from Newberry's—you mustn't ever tell that your mother was naughty and stole something—the crystal kind you put whiskey in, and I took the snow ice cubes I had made and put them in the crystal whiskey glass. I had my room just the way I liked it with everything clean and just the one light on. Then I opened the closet door with the mirror so I could see myself, and I put on my favorite dress, this one I'm wearing—the violet one with the orchid all the way down the front—and my nylons with seams in them, and my high heels with holes in the toes. The mother-of-pearl earrings. Then I sat and drank the whiskey, looking in the mirror, watching myself sip, listening to KSEI on my radio, the top ten hits, and I danced, I really danced.

Perfect, I said. Just perfect.

I love to dance, I said.

That's when we'd dance in the front room to Mother's two records, her only records, her favorite ones, “My Buddy” and “Slow Poke.” “My Buddy” first because it was slow and easy and got you into the mood, and then “Slow Poke” because it was faster and we could twirl.

The best part was waiting for the record to drop, standing with her in the front room, always the boy when we danced, my hand on her hip, my other hand holding up her hand, our feet on the flowered carpet, the drapes pulled, the light through the drapes, Evening in Paris, waiting for the record to drop.

Both of us silent, both of us all one thing.

The needle on the record, that sound, my first invitation to far away, Mother and me dancing in the front room, smiling, somewhere else, the both of us, somebody else.

But that day, she wouldn't dance.

So I turned the page, the sound of the page, the smell, to the third photograph, looked sideways over to Mother and she still wasn't crying, and I got her the ashtray that said 30 Club on it.

My wedding day! I said, pointing again to the page under the photograph, the frame of the black comers. I sighed, deep, the way she always sighed, and said, On the steps of Saint Veronica's. Look! Your father's big hand is on my shoulder, his other big hand about to scoop
me up. What a dreamboat! Took me three weeks to make that dress, white satin, and the veil—I thought I'd never get it right. The bouquet is Baby's Breath and daisies, white daisies. It was snowing.

The fourth photograph was the last one, and when I turned the page, I looked over sideways to Mother and she was smiling. Mother was smiling.

Honeymoon's over! I said, and clapped my hands, and then my mother clapped her hands, the way she always did, and that's when Mother started laughing.

That's the damn Holstein cow my mother gave us as a wedding present, I said, A kicker! And that shack the cow's tethered to, behind us, is where I lay down with him. Never expected that. Didn't know what to expect, bliss I guess, but not sex.
Gott im Himmel.
Sure never expected sex!

That was the end of the photographs. I closed the album. Mother was laughing so hard her gums were showing and she wasn't making a sound, and for a while I thought maybe she was crying and that she'd run out into the field, but she was laughing, her gums were showing, and she was laughing so hard she lost all her eye makeup, and I loved that she was laughing, and I was laughing too and it was so funny that mother and son went away between us and there we were in all the world, two people laughing.

I remember I promised myself I'd always try and make Mother laugh that way.

Then Mother put her arms around me—something I never got used to—and held me real close up to her big belly with my brother in there, the beads of the orchid of her violet dress against my face.

What else.

I made another promise, the promise she asked me to make.

Oh, Willy, she said. Promise me one thing, will you?

Yes, I said, anything.

The horrific whisper.

No matter what happens, even if something bad happens, Mother said, promise that you will always love me. That you won't forget me. That you'll remember me. Promise me you'll never leave me.

Herbert Tareyton breath, green eyes right into my eyes, her hands on my shoulders, Evening in Paris, Orange Exotica lipstick, my mother said this to me: Why else do we live, except to be loved and remembered by those we love?

I promise, I said.

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

A
t Columbia University, in Dodge Hall, the guy with real red hair and black horn-rimmed glasses behind the desk said Sebastian Cooke was still on sabbatical and Janet was on vacation.

I pulled the chair up, straddled the chair, started rolling a cigarette.

Where'd you learn to roll smokes like that? Red Top said.

A friend of me and Janet's, I said.

Cool, Red Top said.

Then: You know Janet?

And Sebastian, I said. Met them through Charlie 2Moons.

Red Top pushed his black horn-rimmed glasses back up his nose.

God, he said, Charlie was so
cute
.

Wasn't he? I said. And a real sweet talker.

Red Top's glasses were tinted yellow. Made it look like his eyes were soaking in piss. He started moving papers around on his desk.

Then: What the hell, who cares what a bunch of assholes think?

I just said: Did you and Charlie ever, I said, Have sex?

Red Top turned beet red all over. Even his fingernails were blushing.

No, Red Top said, I didn't really know him. I was in Sebastian's class with him.

He and Sebastian an item? I said.

Red Top just stayed red. Through his black horn-rimmed glasses, he watched my fingers finish up the cigarette.

Janet said they were in love, I said.

Red Top's eyes were red inside all the yellow.

When will Janet get back from France? I said.

I'm not sure, Red Top said.

How's Sebastian? I said. I hear the French hospitals are good.

Yeast infection in the stomach, Red Top said, Then pneumocystis, now this.

Karposi's? I said.

Janet told you? Red Top said.

Yeah, I said.

Then: I lost Sebastian's address, I said. Can you give it to me?

Sure, Red Top said.

THAT NIGHT
,
I
got out my favorite fountain pen and the bottle of black ink. I filled the pen with the ink, and in my circle of light, at the
Father Knows Best
table, in my best penmanship, my words out of the pen were beautiful onto the yellow page. Just how one word looked next to the other was beautiful.

Dear Sebastian Cooke
. I forget all of what I wrote. I told him what my Art Family told me to tell him. Told him everything. I folded the yellow pages into thirds, put the pages into the business-size envelope, licked the flap, stamped it.

ONE NIGHT
,
RIGHT
after I got home from work, my red telephone rang. I didn't pick up.

On the tape, around and around, traffic noise, breathing. Ruby coughing coughing. Then Ruby hung up.

A half hour later another call.

Ruby.

Just like that, I decided to go find Ruby. I quick grabbed my wallet and my keys and I was out the door. At Second Avenue, I hailed a cab.

I didn't know where to go, so I said, Below Houston, south of Alphabet City.

ON THE CORNER
of telephone and telephone, Saint Jude phone booth, last call. I didn't know who it was in the phone booth at first.

At first, it was some kind of painting of a skinhead in a bright telephone booth, a cyclone fence, shiny bits of light in the dirt of the vacant lot. In all that dark.

I walked up slow behind the booth, looked in through the glass on the side.

The man was bald and he was wearing a Hawaiian shirt and khakis hanging low, no butt to hold up his pants. Brown boots square toe with the gold ring on the side. Two blue moons tattooed to his forehead. On his forearms, on his neck, purple bumps.

The skeleton poking through Ruby's smile.

Ruby had a quarter in his hand. He was trying to get the quarter into the coin slot. In slow motion—between his thumb and finger, the quarter held up next to his nose—Ruby in slow motion dived his head and his hand and the quarter to the coin slot but missed.

Then, slow motion, Ruby stood up straight, held the coin again next to his nose, and dived his head, his hand, and the quarter slow motion to the coin slot, but Ruby missed again; he missed the telephone altogether and almost fell forward, slow motion, caught himself, stood up straight, held the coin next to his nose, dived his head, his hand, and the quarter slow motion to the coin slot, missed.

Who knows how long I stood there, leaning up against Saint Jude phone booth, so close to Ruby I could smell him. Ruby slow motion high, horse diving at AT&T.

I'm still standing there.

Then, some kind of miracle, Ruby got the quarter in the slot and the quarter dinged.

Then: Six, Ruby said aloud, and slow motion dived his head and his finger to the six, but missed.

Then: Six, Ruby said aloud again and slow motion dived his head and finger to the six, hit the six, pulled the dial to the right.

Then: One, Ruby said aloud, and slow motion dived his head and his finger to the one.

Then: Four, Ruby said loud.

I pressed my forehead against the glass, reached my hand around, touched Ruby Prestigiacomo on the shoulder, but Ruby couldn't feel me.

Seven eight seven zero, I said.

But Ruby couldn't hear me.

THE MONSTER
'
S HEAVY
footfall.

I had to sit down right there on the curb, my head between my knees, my sensible black shoes on New York City pavement.

Big sobs, snot running out my nose, my chest up and down, up and down.

Who knows how long I sat there.

I'm still sitting there.

Then, out of the blue, a black guy in an African hat put his hand palm out to me.

I reached up and took his hand. In his palm was a dollar bill.

Peace, brother, the guy said, and walked on.

Chin quivering, snuffing up, I was staring at the dollar bill in my pink palm. Then—abracadabra!—out of nowhere, an Asian woman, a little girl holding onto her hand, reached in her pocket, pulled out a quarter, and put the quarter on top of the dollar in my hand.

AT HOME
,
AFTER
I showered, I pushed
PLAY
on the red answering machine.