got. Greek hair, just like mine. You ought to move downtown. This is a dump out here.”
“You live here.”
“For me it’s right. For you not.”
The three boys irrupted into the kitchen and at once made Treese cry by grabbing her box of cereal and stuffing their mouths. They were so cataclysmic as a group that it was always surprising to find that, one at a time, each was a mousy little boy with a husky, mumbling voice. Mary had no control over anything they did outside the house, and they ran wild; indoors her sense of decorum prevailed over all the mindless disorder of their existence, and they obeyed her. She cleared them straight off to watch television, and turned back to her elder daughter. She was smiling, the slow, happy smile that showed her bad teeth and gums. She told the good news, the news too good to tell at once, too good to put off telling any longer: “Michael telephoned.”
“What did he say?”
“Just how he was, and he asked about everybody here, you and everybody. He’s got a car, too.”
“Why doesn’t he drive it over to see us?”
“He’s working very hard,” said the mother, turning away to close the doors of the dish cupboard.
So he’s working hard, Irene thought, he could come see his mother once a year. But telephoning’s a big enough favor for Big Mister Man to do. And Mister Man’s mother laps it up and says thanks … .
I can’t take it, I really can’t take it any more. Now I just hurt mama saying that about why doesn’t he drive over to see us. Everybody I know just hurts each other. All the time. I have got to get out. I can’t keep coming home. Next time Victor tries to cop a feel or even touches me or treats her like shit I’m going to blow, I can’t shut up any more, and that’ll just make it worse and hurt her more, and I can’t do anything, and I can’t take it. Love! What good is love? I love her. I love Michael, just like she does. So what? God help me, I’ll never fall in love, never be in love, never love anybody. Love is just a fancy word for how to hurt somebody worse. I want to get out. Clear out, clear out, clear out.
That night when she left her mother she did not go down the road to Chelsea Gardens, but turned left from the house, walking up the gravel road till she was out of the glare of Victor’s floodlight and then cutting off left again across the fields. It was unpleasant walking in the dark, for the ground
was hard and uneven under the tangled grass, and she carried no flashlight for fear of attracting the attention of a bunch of leatherjackets or the suburban weirdo gang that sometimes hung around near the factory. The same stupid fear that spoiled all walks alone since her school friend Doris had been raped by a gang in a half-built house in Chelsea Gardens, the stupid fear that left no free place except the sweet desolation of the ain country.
But in the woods the path did not lead down between the laurels and the pine into the clear, eternal evening. It was warm, dark; crickets sang loud and soft, near and far; under that singing was a heavy, continual sound or vibration, cars on the highway perhaps or the sound of the whole city, whose glow in the heavy night sky made it possible to walk even here in the woods. But there was no sound of water running. She walked a few steps past where the threshold should have been, and then turned back. There was no way.
She remembered then how she had watched him go through the gate, across the threshold, the heavy stranger, how he had walked on and the twilight had flowed on before him like a wave. That had been frightening; she did not like to think of it. It had been his fault. It had happened to him, not to her. She could always get back. She had brought him back. It was from this side that she could not always cross.
Could he? Was he there now, where she could not come?
Dogged, she came back to Pincus’s woods the next afternoon after work, and every two or three days for a
“You live here.”
“For me it’s right. For you not.”
The three boys irrupted into the kitchen and at once made Treese cry by grabbing her box of cereal and stuffing their mouths. They were so cataclysmic as a group that it was always surprising to find that, one at a time, each was a mousy little boy with a husky, mumbling voice. Mary had no control over anything they did outside the house, and they ran wild; indoors her sense of decorum prevailed over all the mindless disorder of their existence, and they obeyed her. She cleared them straight off to watch television, and turned back to her elder daughter. She was smiling, the slow, happy smile that showed her bad teeth and gums. She told the good news, the news too good to tell at once, too good to put off telling any longer: “Michael telephoned.”
“What did he say?”
“Just how he was, and he asked about everybody here, you and everybody. He’s got a car, too.”
“Why doesn’t he drive it over to see us?”
“He’s working very hard,” said the mother, turning away to close the doors of the dish cupboard.
So he’s working hard, Irene thought, he could come see his mother once a year. But telephoning’s a big enough favor for Big Mister Man to do. And Mister Man’s mother laps it up and says thanks … .
I can’t take it, I really can’t take it any more. Now I just hurt mama saying that about why doesn’t he drive over to see us. Everybody I know just hurts each other. All the time. I have got to get out. I can’t keep coming home. Next time Victor tries to cop a feel or even touches me or treats her like shit I’m going to blow, I can’t shut up any more, and that’ll just make it worse and hurt her more, and I can’t do anything, and I can’t take it. Love! What good is love? I love her. I love Michael, just like she does. So what? God help me, I’ll never fall in love, never be in love, never love anybody. Love is just a fancy word for how to hurt somebody worse. I want to get out. Clear out, clear out, clear out.
That night when she left her mother she did not go down the road to Chelsea Gardens, but turned left from the house, walking up the gravel road till she was out of the glare of Victor’s floodlight and then cutting off left again across the fields. It was unpleasant walking in the dark, for the ground
was hard and uneven under the tangled grass, and she carried no flashlight for fear of attracting the attention of a bunch of leatherjackets or the suburban weirdo gang that sometimes hung around near the factory. The same stupid fear that spoiled all walks alone since her school friend Doris had been raped by a gang in a half-built house in Chelsea Gardens, the stupid fear that left no free place except the sweet desolation of the ain country.
But in the woods the path did not lead down between the laurels and the pine into the clear, eternal evening. It was warm, dark; crickets sang loud and soft, near and far; under that singing was a heavy, continual sound or vibration, cars on the highway perhaps or the sound of the whole city, whose glow in the heavy night sky made it possible to walk even here in the woods. But there was no sound of water running. She walked a few steps past where the threshold should have been, and then turned back. There was no way.
She remembered then how she had watched him go through the gate, across the threshold, the heavy stranger, how he had walked on and the twilight had flowed on before him like a wave. That had been frightening; she did not like to think of it. It had been his fault. It had happened to him, not to her. She could always get back. She had brought him back. It was from this side that she could not always cross.
Could he? Was he there now, where she could not come?
Dogged, she came back to Pincus’s woods the next afternoon after work, and every two or three days for a
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