in matters of love we never renounce our loved ones. Instead we replace them.
He realized that he didn’t want to replace Lila.
So he was stuck with his job, his bar, his television and the glove , his long empty evenings like the one facing him. Ferlinghetti had talked about waiting for a rebirth of wonder. Schilling would have settled for a rebirth of practically anything.
He was working on it with this Pye business.
It was really all he could think to do.
He pulled into the driveway and cut the engine and stared at the house, as though trying to figure out who exactly lived there and then he went inside.
Chapter Thirteen
The Cat/Sally
The cat sat perched on the windowsill peering in at the sleeping man and woman on the bed inside.
The man was the one who fed her.
She wished the man would wake and feed her now. Since sundown half an hour ago she had felt that familiar ache in her belly. The ache was insistent and would not let her sleep. All day long the cat had wasted her store of energy chasing birds but she wasn’t good at chasing birds and it was possible she never would be. Still the hunger and their chatter in the trees drove her to try.
She placed both front paws on the windowpane, stood on her hind legs and scratched at the glass. The woman inside moved in the dark, coughed, shifted to her side. Encouraged, the cat scratched harder. The woman had never fed her but she lay beside the man who did. The woman shifted again and then lay still and the cat sensed she was deep asleep now as the man was.
She leapt from the windowsill to the branch of the tree, dug in with her back claws and placed her front paws down along the tree trunk, dug in with those claws too and inched herself forward until she felt secure she could safely make the drop, let go and fell through the thick humid air to the dewy grass and began moving slowly, watching for movement, for something smaller than herself of which she could make a meal, stalking in the twilight.
Sally registered the sounds at the window and dreamt she was in school only ten years younger, just a little girl. Sitting at her desk watching a teacher she didn’t know and had never known, a small mousy woman writing on the blackboard. The class was quiet and well-behaved. She turned to her left and saw Jack Wolff and Larry Pierce sitting with their hands politely folded on their desks in front of them which in life they had never done. In life Jack and Larry were a pair of cutups. Class clowns. She felt disoriented, as though she didn’t belong there and sad too because her parents had simply left her in this room, just dumped her here and she knew in her heart that she was stranded, that they weren’t coming back.
The mousy little teacher had her back to the class and was still writing. Long loopy letters in an elegant hand but which, because she kept on moving back and forth in front of them, Sally couldn’t read. Cindy Wildman, the prettiest girl in the school, sat to her left. Sally looked over at Cindy and tried to smile in a friendly way, but her heart wasn’t in it. She felt close to tears. Cindy leaned over and whispered, it doesn’t matter, she’ll be gone before you know it , which made no sense to her but scared her somehow because if the teacher was gone then who was left to help her? And then the teacher turned away from the letters on the blackboard, standing to one side of the letters and facing the class and smiled and Sally could read the words that said put me in the landscape over and over and then she did start to cry because she knew that the words were meant to frighten her and as soon as she did she felt a hand on her shoulder, someone standing behind her and she turned and it was Ed. He was smiling and he gave her shoulder a tiny squeeze. You take it easy , he said. You’ll be fine .
The dream twisted and folded into another dream, this one she felt of little consequence. She was in a garden sorting through a bale of apples
He realized that he didn’t want to replace Lila.
So he was stuck with his job, his bar, his television and the glove , his long empty evenings like the one facing him. Ferlinghetti had talked about waiting for a rebirth of wonder. Schilling would have settled for a rebirth of practically anything.
He was working on it with this Pye business.
It was really all he could think to do.
He pulled into the driveway and cut the engine and stared at the house, as though trying to figure out who exactly lived there and then he went inside.
Chapter Thirteen
The Cat/Sally
The cat sat perched on the windowsill peering in at the sleeping man and woman on the bed inside.
The man was the one who fed her.
She wished the man would wake and feed her now. Since sundown half an hour ago she had felt that familiar ache in her belly. The ache was insistent and would not let her sleep. All day long the cat had wasted her store of energy chasing birds but she wasn’t good at chasing birds and it was possible she never would be. Still the hunger and their chatter in the trees drove her to try.
She placed both front paws on the windowpane, stood on her hind legs and scratched at the glass. The woman inside moved in the dark, coughed, shifted to her side. Encouraged, the cat scratched harder. The woman had never fed her but she lay beside the man who did. The woman shifted again and then lay still and the cat sensed she was deep asleep now as the man was.
She leapt from the windowsill to the branch of the tree, dug in with her back claws and placed her front paws down along the tree trunk, dug in with those claws too and inched herself forward until she felt secure she could safely make the drop, let go and fell through the thick humid air to the dewy grass and began moving slowly, watching for movement, for something smaller than herself of which she could make a meal, stalking in the twilight.
Sally registered the sounds at the window and dreamt she was in school only ten years younger, just a little girl. Sitting at her desk watching a teacher she didn’t know and had never known, a small mousy woman writing on the blackboard. The class was quiet and well-behaved. She turned to her left and saw Jack Wolff and Larry Pierce sitting with their hands politely folded on their desks in front of them which in life they had never done. In life Jack and Larry were a pair of cutups. Class clowns. She felt disoriented, as though she didn’t belong there and sad too because her parents had simply left her in this room, just dumped her here and she knew in her heart that she was stranded, that they weren’t coming back.
The mousy little teacher had her back to the class and was still writing. Long loopy letters in an elegant hand but which, because she kept on moving back and forth in front of them, Sally couldn’t read. Cindy Wildman, the prettiest girl in the school, sat to her left. Sally looked over at Cindy and tried to smile in a friendly way, but her heart wasn’t in it. She felt close to tears. Cindy leaned over and whispered, it doesn’t matter, she’ll be gone before you know it , which made no sense to her but scared her somehow because if the teacher was gone then who was left to help her? And then the teacher turned away from the letters on the blackboard, standing to one side of the letters and facing the class and smiled and Sally could read the words that said put me in the landscape over and over and then she did start to cry because she knew that the words were meant to frighten her and as soon as she did she felt a hand on her shoulder, someone standing behind her and she turned and it was Ed. He was smiling and he gave her shoulder a tiny squeeze. You take it easy , he said. You’ll be fine .
The dream twisted and folded into another dream, this one she felt of little consequence. She was in a garden sorting through a bale of apples
Similar Books
