Love and Will Page 5

“You’d be surprised. Gets me an octave higher. And they do it now in modern ballet and Broadway musicals. And how else do you think American opera’s going to survive once the great patrons pass away and if the national endowment funds don’t rise? But you better get. My voice teacher comes here.”

  “That was fun. Can I call you sometime?”

  “I see other men, so I get enough. Including two big bassos who I’m even in love with, so it’s only like every so often when I’m suddenly horny and the opportunity presents itself that I make use of it, and today you were one of those. Bye-bye.”

  She put on her bathrobe and threw me my socks. We kissed for the first time when I had one foot out the front door. I put my arm around her and with the other hand twiddled her nipple, first time for those two too. She said “Come on, let up, I want you out of here allegro, as I also have these pre-lesson thoracic exercises to do.”

  I left, headed downtown again. In the theater district I saw my brother leaving a movie house. He didn’t see me. Last year he said not seeing me for the rest of his life would be just enough time. Curious thing was that the previous evening I dreamt of us bumping into each other on a cloud in heaven and giving him my finished sonata to read and possibly orchestrate and he telling me to shove off. The reason for all that was because Clark thought I should have acted sooner in calling a doctor for our father. Clark was living in Cincinnati then. I was sleeping almost every night at my father’s apartment. A private nurse stayed days with my father while I worked at two crummy jobs to pay her. One night my father complained of pains in his chest. I said it must be the knockwurst I’d told him not to eat for dinner and gave him two antacid tablets. I think I called him a big baby when he continued to complain. He told me to dummy up and phone the doctor. I said “What the hell will a doctor do for you: you’ve only got gas. I’ll phone and he’ll tell me to call an ambulance. You’ll be in the hospital for two weeks undergoing tests. You’ll end up with bed sores as big as grapefruits and possibly pneumonia because of your inactivity there and because of that maybe die.” He said I had a point and I gave him belladonna drops in water and told him to call it a night. Early next morning he got a heart attack and died in the hospital the same day. That was when Clark flew in and said he was disowning me for life. Because he’s older and we were now orphans and he was the sole benefactor of our father’s small estate, I suppose he could say that. Now he was walking with a young girl. It could be my niece. Clark and his wife were musicologists and conductors of little orchestra and choral groups and because they couldn’t stand the names Polyhymnia and Euterpe, named their only child Clio.

  I followed them for a block. As they were going into a chili place I said “Hi, Clio.”

  “Hello,” she said, “but who are you?”

  Clark pulled her into the restaurant. I said “Oh well.”

  Walking farther downtown I met in succession a grade school teacher of mine who asked if I’d become the miracle physician I swore I would, an old boss who wanted to know if I’d come to no good as a glazier and served the prison sentence he prophesied the day he fired me, a former roommate who asked if I was still chiseling wizened landladies out of rent and beating out on loans and lost bets with good friends and being evicted from apartments because my playing was unremitting and too loud. Then I saw Lettie. It was near the southern tip of the city. She teaches film-making at an upstate high school but for some reason was leading a class up the Stock Exchange Building steps. She was with a man. They were holding hands. Lettie was the woman I’d been seeing every weekend for two years and spent last summer with attending concerts and visiting dead composers’ homes in Europe. I’d wanted to marry and move in with her and compose at home while finding part-time work in her area, but she said that after talking blue flames in class all day all she wanted was to come home to her plants, highstrung son and singing birds.

  I yelled “Lettie.” She turned to me, took her hand out of the man’s. I climbed the steps, kissed her cheek.

  “Bud, this is Dom.” We shook hands. “Dom asked me to help chaperon his economics class today. I had a light work load, so it was easy shifting my classes around to come.”

  Dom’s class was standing at the entrance to the building. “I think we have to get up there,” she said to me.

  “I’ll take care of them for a while,” Dom said. “Nice to meet you, Bud,” and he left.

  “That your new beau?”

  “I see Dom from time to time.”

  “Does it ever get further than the hand?”

  “Please don’t ask silly questions.”

  “You never mentioned him.”

  “I don’t see why I had to.”

  “You never mentioned anyone else.”

  “Dom’s the only other one.”

  “He seems like a nice fellow.”

  “You can’t tell in so short a time. But he’s nice, though different than you in many ways you wouldn’t like. He hates classical music and cracks up at operas.”

  “It’s been a day of coincidences for me, meeting you and so many other people I know.”

  “With you everything’s a coincidence. Your associative powers can get a bit much for me. Sometimes I don’t believe you.”

  “We’re not getting along very well this minute.”

  “What do you expect?”

  “Do you make it with Dom?”

  “Sure we make it. What do you expect?”

  “You never told me.”

  “This is also a day of repetitions for you. Anyway, you must have other women during the week.”

  “No one.”

  “You should. You’re talented. If you ever get fed up with all the frustrations inherent in composing, you could probably survive all right passing around the other stuff.”

  “Will I see you this weekend?”

  “Not this weekend. Maybe the next.”

  “I don’t think I like our arrangement anymore.”

  “Then I guess we have to decide against having any arrangement.”

  “It’s decided then.”

  “Done.” I put out my hand to shake. She said “Oh yes, shaking. That’s about the one physical thing I haven’t done with you. Now I can say I did everything I ever wanted to do with you, except teasing your hair. Goodbye.”

  She went upstairs. I walked to the tip of the city where the ferry stations are. I didn’t meet anyone else I know. I took the subway home, bought a bottle of wine, got sleepy reading while finishing the bottle, sang lots of familiar airs to my own nonsensical words as I usually do when I get high, and went to bed.

  Grace Calls

  Grace calls. Grace called. I stand. I sit. I go to bed. I dream. I dream about my childhood. I dream about my birth. I dream about being an old man. I wake. Grace calls. Grace called. I make breakfast. I eat. I go to the bathroom. I read. I wash. I make lunch. I eat. I drink a glass of water. I read. I listen to the radio. I make a sandwich. I eat. I drink a glass of milk. I put water on for coffee. I read. I smell something burning. It’s the tea kettle on the stove. I open the window to let out the smoke. I watch a pigeon feather float in and land on the floor. I close the window. I throw away the burnt kettle. I sit. I read. I make supper. I eat. I wash the dishes. I put the trash outside the front door. I run in place. I shave. I bathe. I read. I drink a glass of beer. I read. I listen to the radio. I make a snack. I eat. I read. I undress. I go to bed. I think about what I did today. I think about what I dreamt last time I slept. I think about my father. I see him waving at me and saying “Juney boy.” I think about my mother. She’s in an evening gown coming downstairs. She’s sitting on the sill washing my window. She’s in a suit going to work. She’s in her doctor’s coat examining someone’s ear. A boy’s ear. My ear. I’m sitting on her examining table and she’s examining me with that instrument that has a light. She says “No good.” She says “Stick out your tongue.” She says “Just what I thought.” She says “Sit still while I make a call.” She comes back with her recep
tionist and says “You must be a brave boy now, you mustn’t be afraid.” I fall asleep. I dream about eggplants. They’re purple, with faces, and my size. I’m running down a steep hill with a slew of them on my way to see our housekeeper Anna. We cross a country road. One eggplant stays on the other side of the road and all the eggplants and I move our heads for it to cross the road. It bounces across the road on its bottom and gets hit by a big car. The car keeps going. Hit and run, I say. We drag the eggplant off the road and form a circle around it and talk about its qualities and weaknesses and cover it with dirt and most of us cry. I wake. I go to the bathroom. I wipe sweat off my face and back. I drink water from the tap. I go back to bed. I think about what my eggplant dream could have meant. And where is Anna now and what hill was that I ran down? I fall asleep. I dream. I dream of my father treating me in his office. His waiting room’s filled as it was always filled with patients and friends. He says “Say ah.” He says “Spit it out.” I lean over the dental bowl and spit out pieces of an old filling and blood. He says “Now sit back and open wide.” He says “Wider.” He says “Wider.” I watch him look through his thick bifocals at what he’s drilling and picking at. He says “All done.” He sticks cotton rolls in my mouth and says “Keep it open till I fill it.” He mashes and mixes my future silver filling in his porcelain mortar with his porcelain pestle. A man comes into the treatment room and says “Doc, got a moment?” I wake. Grace calls. Grace called. I dress. I run in place. I put water on for coffee. I go to the bathroom. I read. I smell something burning. I see smoke passing the bathroom door. I flush the toilet. The water pot burnt. A kitchen wall’s on fire. I try putting the fire out with water I spray from the sink tap. The doorbell rings. Several neighbors come and help me put out the fire. The landlord comes. He speaks to the neighbors. I mop the floor. The neighbars leave. The landlord says “That’s your third fire in five weeks. The other two weren’t that serious, but this one is. I’m going to get an eviction notice out on you immediately, so don’t bother paying next month’s rent.” The landlord leaves. I hang the mop and rags out to dry. I close the window. The landlord returns. He says “Forget what I said about not paying next month’s rent. You pay it, all right, and all the other months till I get you thrown out.” He leaves. I read. Grace calls. Grace called. I put water on for coffee. I throw away the burnt pot. I stand by the stove till the water boils. I make breakfast. I eat. I read. I drink coffee. I get the newspaper off my doormat. I read. I reheat the coffee. I stand by the stove till the coffee’s reheated. I drink coffee. I read. I make lunch. I eat. I drink a glass of water. I brush my teeth. I look out the window. A boy kicks a can into the street. A car passes. A taxi drops off its passenger. The postman delivers mail. A woman walks her dog. A delivery boy rides by on a bike. A man walks past holding an opened umbrella over his head though it isn’t raining or sunny. It’s cloudy and the temperature’s mild. A sanitation truck picks up garbage. A man yells “Hey you. Stop thief.” Another man runs up the block toward the park with the first man’s brown paper bag. A police car comes. The policemen talk to the man who lost the bag. The man gets in the police car and the police car goes. A man and woman walk by holding hands. They stop. He ties his shoelaces. They kiss. They go. They stop, kiss, go. A woman dressed in white with white makeup on her face and neck and her hair powdered white and shoes polished white and everything on her like her nail polish and hands and ears painted or made white though she’s black, walks past. Only the shopping cart she’s lugging behind her isn’t white. It’s aluminum, though its one wheel and all the wheel’s spokes and the axle are white. The two filled shopping bags in the cart and material and packages she has over the bags are white. I don’t know what she means. She has breasts so large and round that it could be she isn’t a woman but is a circus clown with balloons or whatever they use to make it seem like they have enormous breasts stuffed under their costumes. But she’s a woman, or she isn’t a woman. Sparks fly from the sidewalk where the wheelless side of the axle drags. The postman watches her and smiles to himself as he unstrings a bundle of mail. I still don’t know what she means. There could be several meanings. I have to go to the bathroom. I get a glass of water. I return to the window. Two motor scooters go past. The drivers ride side by side and the two helmeted passengers holding on in back talk to one another. The woman of white is now at the avenue end of the block, still dragging the cart. I recall the intense look to keep going that never left her face. I still don’t know what she means. A black woman. Or perhaps not a woman but a man made up to look like a woman. But a black man made up to look like a white woman, but a woman in white leotards and white walking shoes and enormous breasts and possibly a stuffed enormous behind and lugging a filled shopping cart with only the basket part of this one-wheeled cart not painted white and with light panties under the leotard and a white undershirt over it and with every visible part of the cart’s contents and her body except the irises made or being white. Grace calls. I don’t answer. I drink the water. I go to the bathroom. I pour milk into the water glass. I sip once from the glass and pour the milk back into the container and return the container to the refrigerator. I read. I feed my plant. I listen to the radio. I run in place. I sweep the rug. I dust some shelves. I sit. I read. I nap. I dream of something that actually happened when I was three. It was my birthday. I was very small for my age. Too small to climb onto my parents’ double bed without someone’s help. I thought they must use a ladder to get on their bed. I visualized a ladder against the side of the bed. I ask them to help me get up on the bed. They don’t understand my words as I wasn’t able to make a single word understandable to adults till I was past four. I put out my arms in the direction of the bed. My father picks me up and drops me on the bed. He takes a pillow and swipes me lightly on the head. As far as my memory goes, the real incident ends. The dream goes on. My mother complains my father’s messing up the newly made bed. He lifts me off the bed, looks for a place to set me and puts me in my mother’s arms. He folds the bedspread back over the pillow, straightens the bed, goes to the kitchen, puts his sandwich and tangerine into a manila envelope, kisses my mother and I goodbye and leaves for work. My mother says “Happy birthday, sweetheart, you’re three.” She says “From your father and me.” She gives me a wrapped present. I can’t get the ribbon off. She opens it. It’s a dog doll. She kisses my ear and goes to work in her office at the front of the house. I play with the ribbon and wrapping in the room Anna’s ironing in. The dream ends. I wake up. Grace calls. Grace called. I go to the bathroom. I read. I shave. I clean the toilet bowl and tub. I look in the mirror. I tweeze the hair out of my nose. I part my hair in the middle and pretend I’m someone else. I brush my hair back the way I always wear it. I work on the crossword puzzle. I check the movie listings. I put water on for coffee. I stand at the stove till the water boils. I make lunch. I eat. I drink coffee. I make a snack. I eat. I peel a carrot. I eat. I look through the cookbook. Grace calls. I don’t answer. Grace calls. Grace called. I look out the window. Across the street a woman in the second-story apartment directly opposite mine is looking at an oil truck delivering oil to her building. The oilman reels in the hose and the truck leaves. I stare at the woman. She looks at me. I smile and wave. She leaves her window seat. I look up and down the street. I can’t see a person, animal or vehicle moving on the block. Curtains move in one of the buildings across the street and now a sheet of newspaper moves in the street but nothing else. The leaves on the block’s tree move. A sparrow flies out of the tree and disappears over the row of buildings on my side of the block. A man comes out of a building reading a magazine. He pats his pockets. “Dam,” he seems to say. He goes back into his building. Several children on rollerskates and with hockey sticks pass. A car passes. A bus. I’ve never seen a bus come down this sidestreet. Maybe the street the bus usually goes down is blocked up. The man leaves the building again carrying a briefcase and with the magazine under his arm. The bus stops a few doors down from my building. The car in
front of it is double-parked too far from the car parked adjacent to the curb and the bus can’t get past. The bus driver honks. His passengers read, talk, look outside, one’s asleep. The bus driver and the drivers of the two cars and a truck behind the cars honk. A woman comes out of a building. She jiggles her keys to the bus driver. He honks. She points to her watch and raises her shoulders and hands. The bus driver and the drivers of the cars and the truck behind the cars honk. She gets in the double-parked car and drives off. The bus starts for the comer right after her but has to stop for the light. The woman just made it through the light. The bus and car and truck drivers honk and honk. Grace calls. Grace called. I drink a glass of water. I go to the door. The afternoon paper’s on the mat. I throw the paper away. I reheat the coffee. I do exercises and run in place. I wash my hands and face. The pot’s burning. I put out the fire. I throw the pot through the window. The police come. One policeman says “Your landlord called to complain. First fires, he says. Now deliberately destroying his property.” I hear honking from the street. I go to the window. The policeman says “When I’m talking to you you don’t move.” The driver of another bus is honking the double-parked police car in front of my building. I point to the street. The policeman says “What now, for god-sakes?” He looks outside. He says “I’ll take care of our car, you take care of him.” He leaves. The second policeman says “Why you do these things we don’t know. You’ve a nice place. Nice and neat. Plenty of room. It’s a good building. Your landlord seems like a nice enough guy. It’s a nice street and good neighborhood. You’re lucky to live here, believe me, and from what I hear, you’re getting it cheap. So no more fuss now, please.” He leaves. I go to the window. The bus is gone. The police car’s backing into a parking spot. The policeman who just left my place taps the police car’s roof. The car stops. He gets inside. The car drives out of the spot and goes through the red light. Several people across the street have come to their windows. Some are looking at me. I smile at the woman sitting on the window seat. She lets down her Venetian blinds and flicks them shut. I drink water from the kitchen tap. I let the water run to get cold. Grace calls. Grace called. I see water trickling out of the kitchen. In the kitchen I see I’ve caused a small flood. I shut the water off. The fire department comes. They drag a hose through my place. The fire chief says to these men “No need.” He says to me “For the safety of all your neighbors, you ought to be locked up.” They leave. I get the mop from outside the window. Someone knocks. I mop. The landlord says “This is your landlord, Mr. Lingley, open up.” I mop. He says “I said open up.” I open the door. He says “I’ve called the police and department of buildings and mayor’s office. If you aren’t out by tomorrow morning I’ll be very much surprised.” He leaves. I lock the door. He says from the stairway “Remember what I said last time about your paying next month’s rent? Don’t.” Grace calls. I drink a glass of beer. I hang the mop over the bathtub. I cut my hair. Grace calls. I run in place. I eat a celery stick. I hear music. I go to the window. A street band’s passing. I haven’t seen one in years. I throw a ball of aluminum foil at it. The flutist salutes me. He opens the foil and shakes his flute at me. I forgot to put money in the foil. I throw two quarters at him. Both coins roll under a parked car. The banjoist says “Thank you, thanks a lot.” The violinist hands his violin to the base player and gets down on his knees to retrieve the coins. A car drives by and nearly sideswipes him. The trumpeter blasts his horn at the car. The car honks back repeatedly and makes a turn at the corner. The band resumes playing and walks to the end of the block. I’m leaning out the window to watch them and nearly fall off the ledge. The landlord says from the sidewalk “Don’t tell me. You’re going to jump. That’ll save you the trouble of appearing in court. But jump from someone else’s building, as what I don’t need now is my insurance rates going up.” I climb back inside and slam the window down. It’s the window I threw the pot through and it completely shatters from the impact and the glass crashes below. The landlord says “That’s it. Out you go today.” He runs into the building. I make supper. Police come. I go into the bedroom and eat and drink. Police knock. I lock the bedroom door and try to nap. A policeman yells “Come on now, sir, you’ve got to unlock.” I throw my hairbrush and shoes through the bedroom windows. The landlord yells “Break down the door before he destroys my house.” I set fire to my bed and toss the chair and lamps into the flames. Grace calls. The police are banging on the bedroom door. Grace calls. The fire department comes. They enter through the bedroom window this time. They put out the fire on my clothes. They put out the fire in the room. I’m put on a stretcher. Grace calls. I’m carried downstairs. In the street I look up at the window where that woman usually sits and see her leaning outside at me and shaking her head. I’m driven down the block. I see that black man or black woman made up to look like a white woman peering into the ambulance as we go through the red light. I hear the street band play. I pass out. I wake up. I’m in a hospital. I’m in a hospital bed. A tube’s in my arm. Another tube takes my pee. Several machines and monitors are at the foot of my bed. One doctor says to another that I’ve third degree burns over fifty percent of my body and I’m not expected to live. A hospital aide says “Someone by the name of Grace called.” A nurse says “You really in great pain?” She gives me something to sleep. I fall asleep. I dream of my parents and my dog Red. My mother says “Red’s been taken away.” I say “Where away?” My father says “No use lying to you. Big Red’s been run over.” I say “Where over?” My mother says “She was run over by a steamroller and won’t be coming back.” I cry. The dream ends. I wake up. That incident never happened in real life. I once did have a dog named Red. She got old and bit me in the face. They had to kill her. I remember when they took her away. They came to our house and put her in a cage. I remember hoping Red would bite them. There was something about her viciousness so late in life that I really liked. But Red was put away. “Where away?” I said. “You still don’t know what we mean when we say she’s been put away?” my mother said. “No,” I said. “Not in a trunk or chest of drawers,” my father said. I cried then. I’m lying on my back now in the hospital bed. The food and antibiotic tube’s been taken out of my left arm and put in my right. The catheter’s still taking my pee. With all the painkillers the nurse says they’re giving me, I’m still in great pain. The doctor says “You’re improving.” The aide says “That person named Grace called just before. What message you want me to give should she call again?” But I can see by their faces that it’s hopeless and I fall asleep.