The Cat's Pajamas by Ray Bradbury Page B

each experience safely. Admit it, you’re a conceited, self-satisfied person with morbid ideas of self-destruction. Hidden ideas, naturally. No one admits outwardly he wants to die, but it’s in there somewhere. Self-preservation and the will to die, tugging back and forth. The urge to die getting you into messes, self-preservation yanking you out again. And you hate and laugh at these people when you see them wince and twist with discomfort when you come out, whole and intact. You feel superior, godlike, immortal. They are inferior, cowardly, common. And you are a little more than irked to think that Anne prefers her narcotics to you. She finds the needle more stimulating. Damn her! And yet—you also find her stimulating—and dangerous. But you’ll take a chance with her, anytime, yes, any old time....
    It is once again four in the morning. The typewriter is going under your fingers as the doorbell rings. You get up and go to answer in the complete before-dawn quiet.
    Far away on the other side of the universe her voice says, “Hello, Rob. Anne. Just get up?”
    â€œRight. This is the first time you’ve come around in days, Anne.” You open the door and she comes in past you, smelling good.
    â€œI’m tired of Mike. He makes me sick. I need a good dose of Robert Douglas. I’m really tired, Rob.”
    â€œYou sound it. My sympathies.”
    â€œRob—” A pause.
    â€œYeah?”
    A pause. “Rob—could we get away tomorrow? I mean, today—this afternoon. Up the coast somewhere, lie in the sun and just let it burn us? I need it, Rob, badly.”
    â€œWhy, I guess so. Sure. Yeah. Hell, yes!”
    â€œI like you, Rob. I only wish you weren’t writing that damned novel.”
    â€œIf you cleared out of that mob I might quit,” you say. “But I don’t like the things they’ve done to you. Has Mike told you what he’s doing to me?”
    â€œIs he doing something, darling?”
    â€œHe’s trying to bleed me. Really bleed me, I mean. You know Mike underneath, don’t you, Anne. White-livered and scared. Berntz too, for that matter. I’ve seen their kind before, acting tough to cover up their lily guts. Mike doesn’t want to kill me. He’s afraid of killing. He thinks he can scare me out of this. But I’m going ahead because I don’t think he’ll have enough nerve to finish it. He’d rather take a chance on a narcotics rap than go up for murder. I know Mike.”
    â€œBut do you know me, darling?”
    â€œI think I do.”
    â€œVery well?”
    â€œWell enough.”
    â€œI might kill you.”
    â€œYou wouldn’t dare. You like me.”
    â€œI like myself,” she purrs, “too.”
    â€œYou always were a strange one. I never knew, and still don’t know, what makes you tick.”
    â€œSelf-preservation.”
    You offer her a cigarette. She is very near you. You nod wonderingly. “I saw you pull the wings off a fly once.”
    â€œIt was interesting.”
    â€œDid you dissect bottled kittens in school?”
    â€œWith relish.”
    â€œDo you know what dope does to you?”
    â€œI relish that too.”
    â€œHow about this?”
    You are near enough so it takes only a move to bring your faces together. The lips are as good as they look. They are warm and moving and soft.
    She holds you away a bit. “I relish this also,” she says.
    You hold her against you, again the lips meet you and you shut your eyes....
    â€œDammit,” you say, breaking away.
    Her fingernail has bitten into your neck.
    â€œI’m sorry, darling. Hurt you?” she asks.
    â€œEverybody wants to get into the act,” you say. You take out your favorite bottle and tap out a couple pills. “God, lady, what a grip. Treat me kindly from now on. I’m tender.”
    â€œI’m sorry, I forgot myself,” she says.
    â€œThat’s