got no future, Farragut, and you ain’t got no future either. So let’s go down and wash up for chow.”
Farragut was working then part-time with the greenhouse crew, cutting lawns and hedges, and part-time as a typist, cutting ditto sheets for the prison announcements. He had the key to an office near the squad room and the use of a typewriter. He continued to meet Jody at the water tower and later, when the afternoons got cold, in his office. They had known one another a month when they became lovers. “I’m so glad you ain’t homosexual,” Jody kept saying when he caressed Farragut’s hair. Then, saying as much one afternoon, he had unfastened Farragut’s trousers and, with every assistance from Farragut, got them down around his knees. From what Farragut had read in the newspapers about prison life he had expected this to happen, but what he had not expected was that this grotesque bonding of their relationship would provoke in him so profound a love. Nor had he expected the administration to be so lenient. For a small ration of cigarettes, Tiny let Farragut return to the shop between chow and lockup. Jody met him there and they made love on the floor. “They like it,” Jody explained. “At firstthey didn’t like it. Then some psychologist decided that if we got our rocks moved regularly we wouldn’t riot. They’ll let us do anything if they think it will keep us from rioting. Move over, Chicken, move over. Oh, I love you very much.”
They met two or three times a week. Jody was the beloved and now and then he stood Farragut up so that Farragut had developed a preternatural sensitivity to the squeak of his lover’s basketball sneakers. On some nights his life seemed to hang on the sound. When the classes in banking began, the two men met always on Tuesdays and Thursdays and Jody reported on his experience with the university. Farragut had boosted a mattress from the shop and Jody had hustled a hot plate from somewhere, and they lay on the mattress and drank hot coffee and were fairly comfortable and happy.
But Jody spoke skeptically to Farragut about the university. “It’s the same old shit,” said Jody. “Success School. Charm School. Elite School. How to Make a Million School. I been to them all and they’re all the same. You see, Chicken, banking arithmetic and all that shit is done by computers today and what you have to concentrate on is to inspire the confidence of the potential investor. That’s the big mystery of modern banking. For instance, you come on with the smile. Every class I took begins with lessons in this smile. You stand outside the door thinking about all the great things that happened to you that day, that year, for your whole life. It has to be real. You can’t fake this selling smile. I mean you remember a great girl whomade you happy or winning a long shot if you ever had one or a new suit or a race you won or a great day when you really had everything going for you. Well, then you open the door and go in and smack him with this smile. Only they don’t know nothing, Chicken. I mean about smiling. They don’t know nothing at all about smiling.
“It’s all right to smile, I mean you have to smile to sell anything, but if you don’t smile in the right way you get terrible lines on your face like you have. I love you, Chicken, but you don’t know how to smile. If you knew how to smile you wouldn’t have those wrinkles all around your eyes and those big, disgusting cuts like scars on your face. Look at me, for example. You think I’m twenty-four, don’t you? Well, I’m actually thirty-two, but most people when they’re asked to guess my age put me down for eighteen or nineteen at the most. That’s because I know how to smile, how to use my face. This actor taught me. He was in on a morals charge but he was very beautiful. He taught me that when you use your face you spare your face. When you throw your face recklessly into every situation you come up against, you
Farragut was working then part-time with the greenhouse crew, cutting lawns and hedges, and part-time as a typist, cutting ditto sheets for the prison announcements. He had the key to an office near the squad room and the use of a typewriter. He continued to meet Jody at the water tower and later, when the afternoons got cold, in his office. They had known one another a month when they became lovers. “I’m so glad you ain’t homosexual,” Jody kept saying when he caressed Farragut’s hair. Then, saying as much one afternoon, he had unfastened Farragut’s trousers and, with every assistance from Farragut, got them down around his knees. From what Farragut had read in the newspapers about prison life he had expected this to happen, but what he had not expected was that this grotesque bonding of their relationship would provoke in him so profound a love. Nor had he expected the administration to be so lenient. For a small ration of cigarettes, Tiny let Farragut return to the shop between chow and lockup. Jody met him there and they made love on the floor. “They like it,” Jody explained. “At firstthey didn’t like it. Then some psychologist decided that if we got our rocks moved regularly we wouldn’t riot. They’ll let us do anything if they think it will keep us from rioting. Move over, Chicken, move over. Oh, I love you very much.”
They met two or three times a week. Jody was the beloved and now and then he stood Farragut up so that Farragut had developed a preternatural sensitivity to the squeak of his lover’s basketball sneakers. On some nights his life seemed to hang on the sound. When the classes in banking began, the two men met always on Tuesdays and Thursdays and Jody reported on his experience with the university. Farragut had boosted a mattress from the shop and Jody had hustled a hot plate from somewhere, and they lay on the mattress and drank hot coffee and were fairly comfortable and happy.
But Jody spoke skeptically to Farragut about the university. “It’s the same old shit,” said Jody. “Success School. Charm School. Elite School. How to Make a Million School. I been to them all and they’re all the same. You see, Chicken, banking arithmetic and all that shit is done by computers today and what you have to concentrate on is to inspire the confidence of the potential investor. That’s the big mystery of modern banking. For instance, you come on with the smile. Every class I took begins with lessons in this smile. You stand outside the door thinking about all the great things that happened to you that day, that year, for your whole life. It has to be real. You can’t fake this selling smile. I mean you remember a great girl whomade you happy or winning a long shot if you ever had one or a new suit or a race you won or a great day when you really had everything going for you. Well, then you open the door and go in and smack him with this smile. Only they don’t know nothing, Chicken. I mean about smiling. They don’t know nothing at all about smiling.
“It’s all right to smile, I mean you have to smile to sell anything, but if you don’t smile in the right way you get terrible lines on your face like you have. I love you, Chicken, but you don’t know how to smile. If you knew how to smile you wouldn’t have those wrinkles all around your eyes and those big, disgusting cuts like scars on your face. Look at me, for example. You think I’m twenty-four, don’t you? Well, I’m actually thirty-two, but most people when they’re asked to guess my age put me down for eighteen or nineteen at the most. That’s because I know how to smile, how to use my face. This actor taught me. He was in on a morals charge but he was very beautiful. He taught me that when you use your face you spare your face. When you throw your face recklessly into every situation you come up against, you
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