Rebel Without a Cause (38 page)

I don’t know what to say. It seems—every day—I just pushed the day away. That’s the only two times I ever wanted to kill myself. I was afraid both times. I believe in my own mind that someday I might die by my own hands. I might live long—but—when I die—I think—I’ll kill myself. That’s the way I’ll die, or at least I imagine that’s the way I’ll die.

I tried to read a newspaper and everything but I couldn’t get interested. I couldn’t even read the funnies. I couldn’t drink the whiskey. I always saw that gun. If the maid hadn’t come in I might have shot myself. It was a small gun. It wouldn’t have hurt me much: I wouldn’t have felt it much. A small gun. I could almost
hide it in the palm of my hand. It would fit in my vest pocket. It was just a little gun. I paid ten dollars for it. It wouldn’t have hurt me if I didn’t want it to. When I was walking on that road it felt so heavy, heavy, heavy: it felt as if it weighed ten pounds in my pocket. I—it was cold. I didn’t feel the cold. I guess there was snow in my shoes—but—I—I—my feet felt as if they were on a hot plate. The cold must have been stinging them. When I was walking along—walking—walking—walking—the gun—so heavy—so heavy. I stopped. I—I didn’t know—what—what was going on. I was afraid of the gun. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to give away all the bullets in the gun. I took it out of my pocket and flung it away. I don’t know where it landed. It landed in the snow somewhere. I knew what I was doing then. I threw the gun away. Then I started walking fast. I walked for an hour, an hour or more, and when I got back to the station I took my shoes off and shook the snow out of them and got on the train and went home …

I knew how cold it was; but when I was walking away from the station I didn’t feel the cold. Only when I was coming back. Only when I was coming back …

It’s pretty hard for me to think of a lot of the things I have missed. There’s a lot of things I forgot completely. Yesterday was one of those times. You make me talk about things I forgot I even knew. My mind seems up against a stone wall. It’s hard for me to put myself in a position in the past: like walking along the road and throwing the gun away. I guess I forgot about that almost completely. That’s a long time ago.…

I had a funny dream yesterday. I dreamed my sister married to some fellow, he was one of these jitterbugs, always dancing and singing. He was supposed to go to Hollywood and get a job as a music director in the movies, and he couldn’t make the choice between going to Hollywood or marrying my sister. My sister looked different, older. This fellow—I can’t seem to place him anywhere—this fellow seemed torn between my sister and going to Hollywood for this job. He didn’t know which to take. The meaning of this is do what you want to do. Or it may mean something else …

L: ‘Whom would this person represent?’

He was a good-looking fellow. Well-built. His clothes were the typical jitterbug type. I was trying to talk him into writing some music instead of trying to be a music director or orchestra leader. That way he could do the thing he wanted to do and marry my sister too. I can’t place the fellow. The way I wanted it he could stay married to my sister. I—O—I see. The fellow represents me. My sister—that’s this treatment. He wanted—I wanted to give it up, but there is a way of doing both. Or maybe my sister, she represents what’s wrong with me and I don’t want to know it? I kept impressing on this fellow to stay where he was. He could still write music. I think I see. It was what you said was a resistance dream? Here I am in a position where I am going under treatment and something interferes with my treatment. For the last few times I have been in that position. Now I have to make up my mind whether I am going to continue under conditions where that—that incident—that accident will be talked about. Does that seem right? Are you willing to accept that interpretation, Doc?

L: ‘Alright, Harold. Go ahead.’

Well, the girl in the dream seemed so different. She looked the same as my sister but she acted different. My sister is kind of dizzy: this girl was older and my sister doesn’t act like that, so serious. O, she is a very fine girl; very pretty, about twenty now and working, making about thirty dollars a week. I think she is doing all right. She never said anything about getting married to anyone when she saw me. She doesn’t go out with anyone steadily. We always got along. Of course we had some fights when we were small. One time I brought Lila to the house. I met Lila on the street and took her home. When I opened the door I left the key in the lock. We came in and I closed the door. We were in there about an hour. We got some beer out of the icebox and I guess we were making love. My sister came home and she found the key in the door. She couldn’t open the door so she got mad. After about an hour I opened the door and let her in. She saw Lila there and she was real mad. “After all, what is the idea of locking me out? I’ve got some rights here: I live here, don’t I?” We didn’t argue about it but she sure kidded me. She used to say that I was picking the ugliest girls. She liked me though. We’d go to shows together and some nights we’d go out. Many times when I needed a little money she’d loan me a dollar or
two. She’d give it to me and never ask it back. She never got it back. When I was about twelve or thirteen I used to have a lot of blank checks and dice and things like that in my drawer. She’d search for these things and give them to my mother. I got a lot of beatings for it, so finally I started hiding things, scattering them all around so she couldn’t find them altogether. But she’d search everything. She didn’t want me to keep it. She’d tell my mother if I went in swimming when I wasn’t supposed to. I couldn’t keep her quiet on anything. She’d just run and tell my mother. I know she’s a good girl all the way through. I remember all the ways back when she started to walk. She looked funny. I tried to help her but she’d sit on the floor and cry when I bothered her too much. My father used to pet her a lot when she was young. She was just like a little wild cat: she’d scratch and pull out everybody’s hair. Later she didn’t like the idea of my going with girls. She had a girl friend she wanted me to go out with but I never liked her girl friends. She always insinuated that her girl friends were better than anyone I could find. She liked this girl Amy, the one up at my aunt’s place. My mother liked her a lot too.

When I was younger I used to get in different moods. I’m not that way anymore; at least since I started this treatment. When I got in that kind of mood I didn’t want to talk to anybody, sometimes maybe for a week. I’d agitate myself and keep in that mood. I wouldn’t even talk to my mother or my sister, and when she’d say something to me I’d just ignore her. Then she’d get mad and remind me of my mood.

One time I went away and stayed away for about three weeks. When I came back one night I didn’t go home. I went to my grandmother’s and slept there. I didn’t want my father to see me coming home so I waited here until he went to work. Then I left my grandmother’s house and met my sister on the street. She was waiting for a bus and she gave me hell right in front of everybody. She was hollering at me for staying away. I didn’t say much to her. I just asked her if my mother was well and if everything was good at home. When my father came home that night he gave me such a look … I didn’t like that look. I just didn’t like to be around my father. He works so hard. I guess I don’t blame him. If a man works hard and has a son old enough to work who doesn’t want to work … He didn’t
even like for my sister to buy clothes for herself. If she bought a dress or so for ten or fifteen dollars he was mad if she told him the right amount. If she said it cost two or three dollars then it was o.k. They always had to lie to him. My mother always lied to him. When she bought something she always said that it was cheaper than the real price she paid for it to avoid arguments. Sometimes he’d find the sales-slip with the price marked on it. Then he’d really holler! Why did she have to lie to him? and things like that.…

L: ‘Harold do you feel that your father’s attitude was the same to the rest of the family as it was toward you?’

He used to talk to everyone else more than to me. I didn’t see him much the last few years. Every time my little sister Anna came home from school she’d play on the street and she’d wait for my father to come home from work. Then he’d play with her all night. My oldest sister didn’t pay any attention to him. She told him a number of times to shut up.

L: ‘Did you ever say that to him?’

No, sir! O, no. I never said that to him. He’d really kill me then.

L: ‘Did you ever steal anything from your father?’

Only a pen knife, I think. That’s the only thing I can remember.

L: ‘A pen knife?’

Yes. He had three or four pen knives in the garage. He used to keep them in the garage where he had a big bunch of tools. The pen knives were lying around there so I took one of them. He knew it was missing so, if I remember this right, he looked through my drawers and found it, and he started hollering at me, “Why the hell don’t you leave your hands off my things?”

L: ‘Was there any special reason why you wanted to take a pen knife from your father?’

No. There were three or four of them there. I—I wanted—I wanted it to cut some wood …

L: ‘One time you took his razor, did you not?’

Yes. He really gave me a beating that time.

L: ‘Did you ever steal any money from your father?’

No; but I used to steal quite a bit from my mother. Sometimes when I was broke I’d steal maybe as much as five dollars. My mother wouldn’t say anything. I’d give it back to her. I only owe my
mother about twenty dollars altogether. I wouldn’t care if it was my mother’s last five dollars; I’d steal it all when I wanted to get away, even her last dollar.

L: ‘Did you ever take money from your mother and use it to buy a gun?’

Yes. One time I took eight dollars from her and bought a gun. Three days later I put it back. I guess she was madder when I put it back than when I took it in the first place, because she thought I must have stolen it.

L: ‘In that accident of yours, Harold, did you use a gun or a knife?’

A gun would have made too much noise. I don’t know—why I was … I used the knife. It’s quick and just as effective as a gun. It didn’t make too much noise—and—well … I didn’t use my gun.

L: ‘Where did you get the knife?’

It was a hunting knife. I’d had it for a long time. I guess I stole it from my father. I remember one time I stole a lot of stuff from the garage and somehow or other this hunting knife was among them. I liked it: it had a leather sheath. It cost only a dollar or so. I kept it and when I’d go up to my aunt’s house I’d take it out there with me. I’d practice to throw it, make it stick in a tree. It was a good knife, healthy, well put together, sturdy. I didn’t want to use the gun. The gun would have made too much noise. I didn’t like to make too much noise. It had nothing to do with my taking his pen knife. He always had them around. He used to cut leather patches with it, patches for his tubes and tires and things. I just took one. I took the best one I guess. He was sore about it. I remember when I took his razor blade. It was a straight razor. I wanted to find out how sharp it was. I was about eight or nine. I remember it as if it was yesterday.

L: ‘Harold; now think carefully. This hunting knife, when you got it did you ever intend to use it for anything? Did you ever make any particular plans for its use?’

No, I didn’t. It—I took it when I was about thirteen and I kept it around the house. When I left school and went up to my aunt’s house I took some things that might come handy on the farm.

L: ‘And you never planned to use the knife on anyone?’

No; I never did. No. No. I don’t think I would ever use it on my father. I don’t think so. I wouldn’t have done a thing like that. That way the whole responsibility of the family would fall on me.

L: ‘Did you ever think about that?’

Maybe I did, and maybe I didn’t. I guess—I guess—I planned—one time—I planned on getting rid of my father, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I was thinking of my mother and my sisters. I would have done it without their knowing it but I didn’t want the responsibility of the whole family falling on me. Even if
I
didn’t like him, my mother must have for some reason or she wouldn’t have lived with him. She intended leaving him several times and taking us kids with her. But I couldn’t bring myself to do anything to interfere with the security of my mother and sisters.

L: ‘What was your plan, Harold?’

I was going to buy a big rifle with a telescope sight and a silencer on it—that would run to about fifty or sixty bucks—and go somewhere out of the city. I’d get out in one of the suburbs somewhere and fix this gun up and then shoot one or two people: first I was going to shoot one in one part of the city, and then another one in another part, an entirely different part. I’d shoot several people, and the third person I’d shoot would be my father. In that way I’d cover myself up so that nobody would know. I’d file the barrel out—you have to file the barrel out—so that nobody would be able to tell that the bullet came from it.…

L: ‘Who were the other two people to be?’

O, just anybody … Just to cover up, you see.

L: ‘How would that cover it up?’

Well, when somebody would get shot, and then somebody else, there would be no connection between the three of them; there would be no connection between me and the other two, and no connection with my father. He wouldn’t know these people and nobody would tell why; they wouldn’t even know themselves.

L: ‘When did you think about it?’

I was about seventeen or eighteen then. I just couldn’t do it, even if he was mean to me. That was nothing. I didn’t care. He kept my mother and my sisters … This is not a pleasant thing to tell you. I wouldn’t hurt my father now.

L: ‘Was this plan inspired by any special or particular occasion?’