Michel trudged through the sand in the room and slowly moved the door open, pushing away the sand that had mounted against it. In the hall there was more sand. It was pitch black so he couldn't really see clearly, and he could only discern the forms lying on the ground. He could smell the blood; but what froze the flow of his own veins was that there wasn't a sound at all from the club: not a murmur or a groan or a cry. It was absolutely still: not a stirring or a footstep. Lauren, he said. No one answered. He turned in the doorway and in the moonlight saw the sand fall from the ledges above the corners.
He went to the window. The moon was rising over the dunes and they looked like the waves of the Atlantic, as he had seen them before he returned from France.
He realised then that the sand had piled high against the building so that it wasn't a drop at all from the window. If there had been footprints, they would buried by now.
Disgusted, he turned from the window, went back into the hall and called again. Again, there was no answer. The entire building seemed to be shifting, and a door broke open and swayed. Part of the ceiling gave and the sand fell through; he saw the dark sky beyond the torn ceiling; the wind was dead and the night was clearing.
[Days Between Stations, Erickson, S.]
Tuesday, 30 September 2014
...of lonesomeness
She loves you, she said.
She doesn't know what she feels, he said. She thinks she loves me.
After a moment Lauren began to shake, pushing the palms of her hands into her eyes to stop it; she cried on through the nigh, and let him hold her. He kicked the suitcase onto the floor and took off her clothes. He had her; but whereas before, always before, she had rested on his chest never wanting to leave him or lose him, this time she blinked at the walls, listening to him sleep, and realised she had come very close to doing it.
He told her the next morning he was leaving again, for Texas this time. Another race.
Another dusk, and from the window she saw one of the kittens in the street, and ran down the stairs to the front door and stood in the long shadow of the block that touched her feet. In the setting sun the windows of the street gleamed like gold teeth, and first in a low din, ascending to something like sirens, she heard all the cats the way she used to in thee fields. She opened her mouth to call them the way she used to; she was so alone she couldn't stand it. She opened her mouth again, closed it again. She said nothing, looking up at the cats watching her. She could see their eyes glimmering between the gold teeth of the buildings; the way they watched her she knew she didn't belong. One flash after another struck her. She stood in the light looking at all the cats far from her. She was terrified that she would call them and none of them would answer. After a while the cats turned from their posts and disappeared, leaving her there in the doorway.
[Days Between Stations, Erickson, S.]
She doesn't know what she feels, he said. She thinks she loves me.
After a moment Lauren began to shake, pushing the palms of her hands into her eyes to stop it; she cried on through the nigh, and let him hold her. He kicked the suitcase onto the floor and took off her clothes. He had her; but whereas before, always before, she had rested on his chest never wanting to leave him or lose him, this time she blinked at the walls, listening to him sleep, and realised she had come very close to doing it.
He told her the next morning he was leaving again, for Texas this time. Another race.
Another dusk, and from the window she saw one of the kittens in the street, and ran down the stairs to the front door and stood in the long shadow of the block that touched her feet. In the setting sun the windows of the street gleamed like gold teeth, and first in a low din, ascending to something like sirens, she heard all the cats the way she used to in thee fields. She opened her mouth to call them the way she used to; she was so alone she couldn't stand it. She opened her mouth again, closed it again. She said nothing, looking up at the cats watching her. She could see their eyes glimmering between the gold teeth of the buildings; the way they watched her she knew she didn't belong. One flash after another struck her. She stood in the light looking at all the cats far from her. She was terrified that she would call them and none of them would answer. After a while the cats turned from their posts and disappeared, leaving her there in the doorway.
[Days Between Stations, Erickson, S.]
...of left aghast
"Lauren?" said Martha.
Lauren turned in the hall and went back to the room, and didn't look at Jules or anything around her. She stood before the window and the lights of Columbus Street poured past her to the bay, and she finally took her wallet and put it in her purse and walked out of the room, leaving Jules on the bed. Martha was still in the hall. She asked if Lauren was all right. Lauren said nothing, and Martha looked back to the room. "Do you want me to watch the baby?" she said. Lauren didn't answer.
Forty minutes later Lauren was at the airport. She never remembered later how she got there. She bought a plane ticket. She assumed she was buying a ticket for Kansas. She sat in the lobby waiting for her flight, and as she heard him tell it all again, just as he had on the telephone, a voice cut in announcing her flight. She was in the airplane ten minutes later. And hour and ten minutes later she was in Los Angeles.
She walked out of the terminal, somehow under the impression she was in Kansas. In the taxi she vaguely peered out the window and looked at the tall grass. At Sunset and La Cienega she got out of the taxi and began walking west along the Strip. It was one in the morning. She didn't know the time. In her head, over and over, as in the airport, she heard the things he'd said to her on the telephone; she didn't hear the jangling guitars, or the comments men made as she passed. She wasn't thinking so much about what he had said as simply hearing it again and again; she wasn't mulling over the betrayal of it, or becoming enraged that he should stay for the birth of a child who was illegitimately his when he didn't care enough to be present for the birth of the child he had with his own wife. No. She walked the Strip at one in the morning as though the phone conversation had hurled her into her own time, when it was not one in the morning, or ten in the morning, or ten in the evening, or midnight. She was too brutalised by it to care much for the fine shadings of betrayal or bitterness or especially rage; rather she was somehow set on course toward the most foreign thing she could find, whatever that might be. Walking there on the Strip, with the shop windows passing her and the faces of strange men caught in the glow of their cigarettes, she was only vaguely aware of the danger, and not aggressively running from it or for it; she didn't care. She didn't care. She wanted only to walk away from whatever became too familiar to her too quickly; the moment she passed a shop window, it was as though she had stared into it forever. She wanted to walk away from the men and the stunning glow of cigarettes. The clubs emptied, bottles rolled across the sidewalks, the bars glistened of bourbon. Like a torch, the blonde glided along the Strip under the gaze of a hundred men.
[Days Between Stations, Erickson, S.]
Lauren turned in the hall and went back to the room, and didn't look at Jules or anything around her. She stood before the window and the lights of Columbus Street poured past her to the bay, and she finally took her wallet and put it in her purse and walked out of the room, leaving Jules on the bed. Martha was still in the hall. She asked if Lauren was all right. Lauren said nothing, and Martha looked back to the room. "Do you want me to watch the baby?" she said. Lauren didn't answer.
Forty minutes later Lauren was at the airport. She never remembered later how she got there. She bought a plane ticket. She assumed she was buying a ticket for Kansas. She sat in the lobby waiting for her flight, and as she heard him tell it all again, just as he had on the telephone, a voice cut in announcing her flight. She was in the airplane ten minutes later. And hour and ten minutes later she was in Los Angeles.
She walked out of the terminal, somehow under the impression she was in Kansas. In the taxi she vaguely peered out the window and looked at the tall grass. At Sunset and La Cienega she got out of the taxi and began walking west along the Strip. It was one in the morning. She didn't know the time. In her head, over and over, as in the airport, she heard the things he'd said to her on the telephone; she didn't hear the jangling guitars, or the comments men made as she passed. She wasn't thinking so much about what he had said as simply hearing it again and again; she wasn't mulling over the betrayal of it, or becoming enraged that he should stay for the birth of a child who was illegitimately his when he didn't care enough to be present for the birth of the child he had with his own wife. No. She walked the Strip at one in the morning as though the phone conversation had hurled her into her own time, when it was not one in the morning, or ten in the morning, or ten in the evening, or midnight. She was too brutalised by it to care much for the fine shadings of betrayal or bitterness or especially rage; rather she was somehow set on course toward the most foreign thing she could find, whatever that might be. Walking there on the Strip, with the shop windows passing her and the faces of strange men caught in the glow of their cigarettes, she was only vaguely aware of the danger, and not aggressively running from it or for it; she didn't care. She didn't care. She wanted only to walk away from whatever became too familiar to her too quickly; the moment she passed a shop window, it was as though she had stared into it forever. She wanted to walk away from the men and the stunning glow of cigarettes. The clubs emptied, bottles rolled across the sidewalks, the bars glistened of bourbon. Like a torch, the blonde glided along the Strip under the gaze of a hundred men.
[Days Between Stations, Erickson, S.]
Saturday, 6 September 2014
...of a haunted house
I knew, in that hospital, my mother would shake and scream. All right. Perhaps she would only moan. I tried to tell myself it would be for the best if both my parents were put away. My aunt was yet another fruitcake. The two of us together could not take care of an unopened can of corn. It would be best this way, it would be, and oh, indeed, it was: the house was quiet; empty for most of the day, it stored up silence, and spent it in the evening when I would lie like a length of silk ribbon in the crack of a book, and read the way the famished eat, almost wildly for a while, and then slowly as though the words made up my cud. It was accomplished; they were gone for their good and I was glad; the house was quiet; there was a calm to its objects which involved more than their sitting in their customary situations - which is nearly all they did anyway - because they had to feel their release from the accidents of ill or drunken ownership deep in their braces, slats, and naps, as if the dust they continued to collect was no longer the dust of indifference or of slovenliness, it was silence's sand, and so was suitable to the quiet light which fell now through afternoon windows, and the hush which hung like another drape where their stuff stood as a sentry stands in a watchful place: like my father's things racked in the hall closet, his gangsterism felt hat, his pot, too, stored, his trays, and cane, and chair pushed into a corner, waiting for the day of his death, whence their removal, dispersal, and sale, since, when the sounds of such a sad life went, when the pain, the acrimony, which contrasted with this calm, departed, they didn't go away for a week's vacation, a trip taken for their health; they were sounds doomed, nevermore to be made, as the poet says: no more piss hiss in the pot, or the carpeted tap of my father's cane, his soft groans, I always thought, like rotting fruit, and the small sniffs and elongated sighs my mother emitted like something on low heat, or the radio tuned to Jack Benny or the voice of my father talking back to the news, the special rattle, I remember, of his paper, as he wrestled to refold its pages, the snip of his reading light coming on in the dusk, water running in the kitchen sink, the scuff of my mother's slippers over the linoleum which told me if she was well enough to fix dinner, the click of cards she played, and the sound of their shuffle: when we die what we do dies: good or ill, both lose their patron; when we leave our house, our place of life, however sordid, what we did their leaves, and the rooms we occupied - insulted, misused - breathe, as though in and out a different lung, another atmosphere; yes, I had forgotten that fact, that we then - ma and pa, father, mother, me - when we die what we do dies. What a loss! what a never matter! what a mercy!
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
...of personality
Aunt had no preferences. Aunt was a guest, grateful, without requirements, adaptable, no one to worry over of accommodate - cup in its cupboard, spoon in a drawer - yet she hoped she was sometimes useful, and not always unwanted. Her characteristic response to any suggestion was, It makes no never mind to me. In short, she went along. When she went along. She had no plans, had formed no expectations, none she announced anyway, so no one was supposed to feel bound by what she might have intended, nor did she ever have to seem to sacrifice or bend. However, her secrecy was as limiting as a steel fence, her passivity as daunting as a cliff. How could you move if you didn't know the location of the edge? It drove my dad mad. Aunt spoke less than the grave: never about money, though she paid board and room for Gran and herself, and liked to surprise you with little gifts; never about vacations, though she always had two weeks, and usually went along on our car trips; never about hopes, fears, health, happiness, friends from work, never of dreams about tomorrow or next year; never about special pleasures, hobbies, interests, or concerns. If their were any delights in her life, any anxieties, any loves, they were locked away out of reach like whatever was still in her trunk.
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
...of a place of one's own
They'd designed our building like a pair of paper mittens, but the left mitten had been limp when we moved in, otherwise we might have been warned; and when its new tenants arrived, we found nothing amiss in the movers' tread or the gruff reality of their voices. The clear scrape of cardboard cartons did not trouble us, or the thump of heavy chests. Besides, it was warm, and the windows were open. We simply had new neighbours. There was a hand now stuffed in the other glove. The noise was natural. Things would settle down. We hoped they would prove to be sympathetic types, maybe even friends. Then a headboard bumped rhythmically against what we'd thought was our most private wall. Their vacuum cleaner approached and receded like a train. Water's were released which gushed and roared and even whistled. Didn't I hear a male voice singing "Lazy Mary" one morning? Whose life could ever be the same?
After that we tiptoed, grew footpads, became stealthy. When we heard their closet hangers jangle like cattle on a hill far away, we shut our doors so silently the latches snicked like a rifle. I had heard his heavy smoker's hack (hollow, deep, and wet as a well), so we took multivitamins to ward off coughs, then syrups to stifle them when colds caught us anyway, and increasingly felt like thieves and assassins.
Our ears were soon as sensitive as a skinless arm, and we spoke in whispers, registered the furtive drip of remote taps. It was like living in front of a mike as you might pose and smirk in front of a mirror. We heard ourselves as others might hear us; we read every sound the way we read the daily paper; and we came to feel as though we were being chased, caught, charged, and humiliatingly arraigned for crimes against the public silence - for making obscene phone sounds at the symphony or crying out loud at the circus.
In the flush of our shame, we wanted no one to know us, so we held our hats in front of our voices, coats over our sinks and drains. We treated even the crudest iron cooking pot as if it were Limoges, slowing our motions as movies had shown us we should defuse explosives. I ceased singing in the shower. We kissed only in distant corners, and as quietly as fish. We gave up our high-spirited games. Martha no longer cried out when she came, and I grew uncertain of her love. Small incidents were absurdly enlarged the way the shine of a mosquito is magnified by an enclosing darkness: a fallen spoon sounded like a broken jar, a shattered glass was a spilled tray, a dropped book a bomb. I exaggerate now, but it's true that as our neighbours sensed our presence the way we had theirs, they sent their sounds to Coventry too, and the house was shortly filled - palpably stuffed - with silence like a stomach's ache.
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
After that we tiptoed, grew footpads, became stealthy. When we heard their closet hangers jangle like cattle on a hill far away, we shut our doors so silently the latches snicked like a rifle. I had heard his heavy smoker's hack (hollow, deep, and wet as a well), so we took multivitamins to ward off coughs, then syrups to stifle them when colds caught us anyway, and increasingly felt like thieves and assassins.
Our ears were soon as sensitive as a skinless arm, and we spoke in whispers, registered the furtive drip of remote taps. It was like living in front of a mike as you might pose and smirk in front of a mirror. We heard ourselves as others might hear us; we read every sound the way we read the daily paper; and we came to feel as though we were being chased, caught, charged, and humiliatingly arraigned for crimes against the public silence - for making obscene phone sounds at the symphony or crying out loud at the circus.
In the flush of our shame, we wanted no one to know us, so we held our hats in front of our voices, coats over our sinks and drains. We treated even the crudest iron cooking pot as if it were Limoges, slowing our motions as movies had shown us we should defuse explosives. I ceased singing in the shower. We kissed only in distant corners, and as quietly as fish. We gave up our high-spirited games. Martha no longer cried out when she came, and I grew uncertain of her love. Small incidents were absurdly enlarged the way the shine of a mosquito is magnified by an enclosing darkness: a fallen spoon sounded like a broken jar, a shattered glass was a spilled tray, a dropped book a bomb. I exaggerate now, but it's true that as our neighbours sensed our presence the way we had theirs, they sent their sounds to Coventry too, and the house was shortly filled - palpably stuffed - with silence like a stomach's ache.
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
...of consciousness
When I hear the bursting of the rockets, my hearing makes no noise; when I see the sky, my seeing's silent; consciousness, just like the dead, is also quiet. So quiet. Am I any less indifferent and a coward if the voice I failed - the moan I ran from - was a phantom... was my own? My brick passed through that window like a ghost. I never heard it land. I was simply never fated to break glass. That's why, Lou, I couldn't continue us. And that's why windows are important to me.
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
[The Tunnel, Gass, W. H.]
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