Why Did I Ever. Mary Robison

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СКАЧАТЬ would say to this or that ex: “Maybe I didn’t understand you or pay enough attention. There was a little bridge or something I failed to cross over. It was on the day you helped me wax the hallway and the little stairs, when you said to me, ‘The floor will be dry in a minute.’ Between the time you said that and when you asked me, ‘Do you think my pubic hair’s such an unusual color?’”

      And Another Thing

      I have now done Blockbuster. Little Dorrit, Parts One and Two.

      44

      I’m pressed up against a telephone pole, nailing it with a poster of my missing cat.

      Now I’m bustling off, for I’ve noticed the Ichabod landlord working in the bushes. He strictly does not allow pets.

      Now I’m at the next pole making a loud production of nailing Flower Girl’s poster because I know right from wrong and my dealings with the landlord are less important than the swift return of my cat.

      45

      Through the window is a lavender sky and a red orb of sun and the Deaf Lady out there with a half-filled air balloon. She’s staring ahead, her cheeks flushed, her eyes intense, readying herself to pump up the rest of it.

      Inside here is Hollis, and the clock, and the “wick-wick” of the ceiling fan, and the television left going out on the sun porch, transmitting the voice of Paul Newman in Hud.

      “Hollis,” I say. “On that thing we were discussing. What are my other choices?”

      He blows a smoke ring into the reach of the fan. “No others,” he says. “You don’t get any more.”

      I gaze at the fireplace, at its yellow-tiled face, at the mantel, with its huddle of red votive candles.

      He can never just answer me. If I ask, “How’re you doing?” he asks, “Compared to whom?” I ask, “May I tell you something?” and he says, “Still America.” That is what I have to put up with, day, after day, after day.

      Chapter Two

      Life in the Car

      I drive all over the American South, all night long, and nobody gives me trouble.

      Maybe this farmer would but I buzz down my window and scream at him, “Remember Goat’s Head Soup? What an album! To my mind, it is worth hearing again!”

      47

      Couples, in the cars on this interstate, I think, “Ugh. They are stuck.” I think the women must envy me, driving a hundred and five with nobody saying not to, barefoot and chain smoking and squawking along to a song.

      And Yet

      Overconfidence is a mistake for me. Not a big one, but it kicks open the door for several others.

      49

      Now I don’t care about sitting up straight and I’m going to break speed records in Alabama.

      Or no I am not, because the U.S. Army is in front of me. You would think that the Army would drive very fast. Not so, at least not in peace time. Good, one more reason to hate the Army. They’re holding me up.

      50

      Here’s a sign that reads: “pork!” Some signs aren’t there to make you happy.

      51

      In sleepiness, I see a rabble of dogs in a steamy heath, their hard-featured faces mottled with light from the yellow moon. I wonder if my cat’s sleeping somewhere, if she’s dreaming.

      There could be nothing worse than wondering about my son Paulie’s dreams.

      52

      “work for us” reads the purple neon writing over a trucker’s garage.

      I say, “Thanks, but I just want to drive right now.”

      53

      Paulie’s hands. They’re large to begin with, and make him bashful and can sometimes seem in his way. Now he has, in reaction to some goop he’s taking, a rash and must wear white gloves. Big ridiculous gloves. So it’s even more like he’s in a cartoon.

      Turn Off the Radio

      There are alcoholics all over the South. Many of them are inside the cars on this same highway. The alcoholics left over are minding the store.

      55

      My wheel explodes as I’m ripping past Mobile. The drunk road workers left a concrete chunk of debris out for me, smack-dab in the center of the interstate.

      But I shouldn’t talk. I’m just one more thingamabob.

      Waiting around.

      And there are two capital letters on my gearshift panel that I can’t identify. I’ve never had to go down there.

      56

      Maybe I should be dead sixteen ways, but they can sledgehammer my rim back into shape and plug on any old tire; I’ll pay. Because these folks are fine at the wheel replacement facility. They’re no different. They’re practically the same as the same people I meet over and over in the middle of the night in Mobile when something very frightening is happening to me.

      We’re congregated in a stifling hut—the stucco mechanics’ garage.

      I lean on a tiled wall. There are fizzing snapping light tubes overhead. The room seems hollowed out to me, a green cavity.

      I try to talk to them. I say, “Did you ever read Pierre; or, The Ambiguities? It’s the most disturbing Melville.”

      I am crying but I try to stop. “White Jacket is more accessible,” I say.

      57

      Here’s a resting place for me—an all-night laundromat. It has a padlocked washroom, a line of shrimp-colored scoop chairs bolted to a wall.

      My doctor did not prescribe enough drugs for me. If that ever was, in fact, his intention.

      A tumble dryer is spinning my bandanna and the raggedy shop towels I carry in my trunk.

      A berserk ringing noise issues from a game machine all the while.

      Now a length of red hose untwists itself on the floor between me and the washers, snakes over and squirts water on my sandals and toes.

      My car keys are where? They’re my only keys. I know I had them. I got here, didn’t I? Mightn’t those be they, clangoring around in the clothes dryer?

      Men Who Are Too Young

      “Clean as you go,” Hollis tells me. He says this is something he’s lived and learned.

      He says so during this phone call he’s made to me at four a.m. Clean-As-You-Go is his reason for calling.

      59

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