White Summer Chapter 9

WHITE SUMMER

(Chapter 9)



Where does it all go wrong? Can anyone ever tell? Does anyone ever know? Can you put a finger on an incident, a time, a place and say for certain, here, here’s where it all started? Is it something simple? I didn’t study enough. Or something cosmic? I should have taken a right instead of a left.
These thoughts threaded through my brain, and tangled together as I stood in the streaming morning light staring at the prostrate form of Warlock sprawled across his bed in the disaster of his room, his stove in Gibson lay ruined on the floor.
Did I really see him in a crowd arguing with his girlfriend, Debbie? How did he do in the audition? Did Jorma Kaukonen say something to him? Did Grace Slick? Should I wake him? No, not just yet, let him sleep. Besides, I needed breakfast. The dining hall should still be open. I wish I could walk down there barefoot. It felt like too much effort to find my sandals, but I did. The rest of the floor seemed to be awake, doors slammed, music swelled and faded as I passed. I stopped by my room and opened the door. Hunter was still asleep under the folded hills of a gray blanket, one foot sticking out. I pulled the door to.
Outside was bright and fresh and cool. Everything seemed alive and yearning. I heard robins everywhere.
In the foyer, I stopped to fiddle with the lock on my mailbox, a long white envelope bordered in red leaned inside. Campus mail was never good news. It was always a fee or a fine. I ripped it open and began to read as I walked down the corridor that lead to the serving area. ‘Dear, (they always left this part blank to insert the luckless name), you have been placed on Academic Probation by the Dean of Students.’ It was like a kidney punch. My mouth went dry as phrases one by one popped out and took their shots at me, ‘Our records indicate...less than 2.0 Grade Point Average...Critical...RISK ACADEMIC SUSPENSION.’ I clutched a plastic serving tray to steady myself. I had only seen my counselor once, at the beginning of the semester, when he rubber-stamped my course load. I needed to talk with my professors, today, to see if I could salvage something.
The powdered eggs and fatty bacon did nothing to elevate my mood . I mixed milk in with my coffee to wash it all down. On my way back, I had to stop in to see Seth. He was right next door to Warlock, maybe he knew what had happened.
I peeked in on my roommate. His foot had moved three and a half inches and he turned his head to see who had disturbed him.
“Your eyes are open! That’s progress! See ya!” and I shut the door.
Seth’s room was the same, with his bed unmade, clothes lying where they were shed, and an unwashed, organic smell overlaid on everything.
“What’s doin’, Jase,” His hand scratched his ample belly underneath his t-shirt. “What brings you round?”
“Warlock’s room is...” I looked around Seth’s den and wondered if he would understand. “Did you hear Warlock trashing his room, yesterday? What’s happening with him? He broke his good guitar.”
“Yeah, he was really pissed!” He pulled his arm from underneath his shirt and pushed books and papers around on his desk until he found an almost empty pack of cigarettes. He popped one out and lit it, taking several hard, hungry puffs. “He broke up with his girl friend, you know that?”
“No! I didn’t even know he had one until yesterday. Debbie, right?”
“Yeah, he was pretty protective of her.”
“You give him any ‘stuff’? I mean he broke his guitar, he loved that thing. It looks like he went crazy.”
“Hey, don’t lay that on me! He did that all by himself. I guess things didn’t go so well with his, what, audition? I just helped him out. The man was in pain, you know?”
“Helped him out...” I took hold of the doorknob.
“Yeah, what are friends for?”
“Right. Thanks.”
“You mean it, Jase?”
“No.” I went next door to Warlock’s room.
He was sitting on his bed slumped over crying when I walked in. I felt uncomfortable and was about to back out, when he looked up. He pressed the crook of his arm to his eyes and snorted his runny nose. He motioned me in.
“S-sorry, man. I don’t know what...”
“It’s okay. Sorry to intrude... you all right? I mean, I can...”
“No, no. I want you to stay. I need you to stay. Sit down. I’ll get it together.”
“ I’m sorry about your guitar.”
“ Yeah, me too. I sure did a number on it.” His voice sounded wounded. “I’m such a dumb-fuck. I just fuck everything up.” He looked at me, black troughs under his eyes. “You know that candy-ass Hollies’ song, ‘King Midas in Reverse’? That’s me! Everything I touch is fucked.”
“Not true! Come on, Warlock .”
“Oh no? Just look around you, Jase. Just look around you. I can’t play worth shit, Kaukonen told me as much. Forget California. D-Debbie, Debbie and I broke up...”
“I’m sorry to hear. What was the problem? You kept her such a secret?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “It doesn’t matter now. Just drop it.” He took a deep breath and exhaled.
“Okay, no sweat. Say, listen, you hungry? I could...”
“No, not really. I’ll get something from a machine, if I need to. Thanks for listening, Jase. I think I’m going to take a shower, maybe I’ll feel better.” He stood up. “Yeah, that’s what I’ll do. Hey, look.” He picked a white towel from the floor. “I didn’t put it away.” The old Warlock smile dimly flickered.
“Well, I better go.” I stuffed my hands into my front pockets. “ I’ve got some shit of my own to deal with, grade-wise.”
“You in trouble, not making G.P.A.?”
“You might say that.”
“That’s tough.”
“What are you doing?” He was on his hands and knees pulling clothes out from the back of his closet.
“What does it look like?” He pulled out his little stash box.
“You need to lay off...”
“Fine-est,” he held up a tiny blue square of L.S.D., “Kind!” He touched it to the tip of his tongue. It curled around the tab and pulled it into his mouth. “Want a hit?”
I started to shake my head.
“Oh, yeah, that’s right, you don’t do acid. Mind if I have yours? Thanks, pal.” He placed another hit on his tongue and closed his mouth around it.
“Why?” I looked at him. “I’m not going to be your babysitter. I’m not going to stand around and watch you screw yourself up.”
“Who asked you to? Go take care of your shit. This is my trip. I can take care of myself.” He tapped another tab to his tongue. “There see!” He grabbed his towel and dopp kit. “Go ahead, go.”
He followed me out of the room.
“Good luck with your grades, man,” he said, before he veered into the restroom. I went to my room to get a new shirt, one that was a button-down.
Hunter was propped up in bed, his arms cocked behind his head.
“Long time, no see.”
I pulled my shirt over my head. “Yeah. What’s happening?”
“Not a whole lot, lying here thinking about getting up. You? Get that painting finished?”
“Yeah.” I slipped a light blue shirt off the hanger. The starched collar scraped stiff against my neck.
“Guess you won’t be seeing anymore of her sweet bod.”
“Nope, guess not.”
“What’s up with the shirt? Someone die?”
“Maybe, unless I can get my grades up.” I turned toward him, as I buttoned the front of the shirt. “I’m going to visit my professors, see if I can repair the damage.”
“All play and no work makes...” He sat up, his forearms rested on his knees. “Just what does that make you?”
“Stupid. I have to make some phone calls.” I pulled out the desk chair and flipped open the campus phone book.
“Be my guest. I’ve got some reading to catch up on.” He picked a book up from beside his bed and pulled a pack of cigarettes from beneath his pillow. I heard the metallic click of his lighter as I started to dial.
Luck was with me, if you could call it that. I was able to set up appointments with all my professors, at least the ones where my grades were on life support. I didn’t worry about my studio class. I picked-up my toothpaste and toothbrush and went to the restroom.
As I brushed, I heard a guy bang on one of the shower stall doors.
“C’mon, asshole you’ve been in there long enough! What’s taking so long? You beatin’ your meat?”
Another voice shouted over the showers. “I think he’s sitting in there in his clothes. Hey, dude!”
I cupped the water to my foam filled mouth. I wasn’t going back there. I wouldn’t. Why did I feel I had to?
Steam billowed out, all the stalls were in use. The guy in the towel stood in front of the last one.
“Warlock?” I asked tentatively, you in there?”
“Wug...,” was all the response I received.
“Hey, if that’s your buddy, tell him to get the fuck out.”
“Warlock, open the door.” Nothing. I swore I wasn’t going to do this anymore. I wiggled under the partition door, the back of my clean shirt, now sopping. I crabbed my way in and stood up and pulled back the plastic curtain. Warlock sat cross-legged on the floor, fully clothed. He was wet as a wash rag.
“I have to count these drops, Jase.” He looked up at me, his eyes wild. “There are so many, too many, to count alone. Help me, Jase. Help me, count them, brother.”
I unlatched the door and turned off the water. “Hey, man, could you help me pull him up? Then the shower is all yours. Sorry for the hassle.”
By the time I walked Warlock back to his room, I felt soaked as he was.
Inside, I threw a towel at him and lifted some clothing from the floor. “Here’s dry stuff. Put it on.”
He just stood there dripping, as he held the towel. He stared intently at it, fingered and pinched each fold as if examining them, searching for something contained in the texture of it’s whiteness.
“Oh, man, I don’t have time for this. Get your shirt off!” I pulled the soaked piece of clothing off him and slapped it to the floor then forced the shirt over his head and yanked his arms through the sleeves. “Get your pants off! I’m not going to leave you like this. Help yourself!”
He did manage to slosh his pants down and step out of them. I got his feet into the dry jeans as he struggled to pull them up over his still wet legs.
“This is all I can do for you, you understand?” I said, as I stared into the blank pools of his eyes. “I’ve got to go. My grades are on the line! Have you heard a single thing I’ve said!?”
Warlock gingerly sat down on the edge of his bed. “Don’t smear the color,” I heard him mumble. He leaned over and picked up the shattered guitar. With his thumb and forefinger he tried to straighten the kinked line of the broken string. He bent over, as he ran his fingers along it’s length, as if listening to a note only he could hear.
“Stay here, man. Stay in this room, okay? Wait until I get back.”
He looked up, his eyes in another country. I had to leave. I couldn’t cancel my appointments. I pulled the door closed behind me. I didn’t want Seth to be involved in any way, shape, or form, but I was desperate. Seth might be able to keep an eye on him. I decided to chance it and knocked on his door. No answer. Just as well. I had to change clothes anyway, maybe Hunter. The door was locked. Hunter was gone. I couldn’t even get him. I forced myself to concentrate on my dilemma. I had to impress my instructors. This time I added slacks to my new shirt and put on a pair of loafers. I didn’t even think about wearing socks. These clothes all seemed so foreign. Like they belonged to someone else. The loafers pinched my heels.
As I walked down Fee Lane, there were students out and about, but I carried an image of myself alone as Frodo on his quest, fit for battle against ogres and impossible odds.
On Seventh street I turned right, I don’t know why, but I walked until I came to the steps that led to the front of the Lutheran church. It was small for a church, a dark brick building, all cornices and narrow stain-glass windows, a slate roof and copper down spouts discolored with a green patina. It was hemmed in by intimidating oaks and the astringent odor of the spruce bushes that crowded it’s corners. If God dwelled anywhere on campus, it would be here. I guess he could just as well have occupied the Catholic church on Third street, but that was off campus and too far away, one of my loafers was already beginning to hurt.
I walked up the well-worn steps. I hadn’t trod upon them in over a year. My first semester on campus I had dutifully followed my parent’s and my pastor’s wishes and attended. I even took communion, but it all, by degrees, fell away, just as surely as wearing socks and a tie, my visits to the barber. My doubts grew like my unclipped hair. I put my hand on the cold iron door handle and entered the once familiar portal.
The interior was still the same, the wine-red carpet down the center aisle, the curved rows of wooden pews, the octagonal glass shaded lights that hung suspended by thick chains from the vaulted ceiling, and at the end, what was it called, the chancel, I still remembered, where the tall severe shape of the cross hung above an altar, draped in white cloth, that bore letters embroidered in gold, letters whose meaning I had forgotten, Greek no doubt, another language that barred me from true intimacy. Above the right pulpit, the eternal light winked, suspended in a red fluted glass. The space still smelled of old hymnals, brittle wood and damp stone.
I was alone in the...nave, I remembered that, too,it amplified the silence. I sat down in the last pew on the end nearest the aisle. I clasped my hands and laid them on the hard wood back of the seat in front of me. I bowed my head and the tears welled up. I would not let them over-flow my eyes. But the prayers flooded out. Watch over Warlock, protect him. I can’t. Lead Wolfman home to those who love him. Heal Suzy, in her heart and mind. Give her a good life. Guide Verlaine, open her eyes to a better path. And...Ingrid, thank you for her. Let what we share be what we take with us. And forgive me for Karen, for what I let happen. Let her and my...let them be with you. I stopped and gripped the dark wood, my knuckles white, before I could continue. Help ease the pain. It wasn’t there all the time anymore, thanks to Ingrid. ‘They ne-ver will leave you, the pain and the so-r-row...’, a lyric from a Marianne Faithful song floated into my head. My mind kept falling into these cracks. “Amen.” I said aloud, it sounded harsh in the stillness.
I unclasped my hands and rose, but immediately fell back to my seat. Please don’t let me flunk out, I prayed. Please let my instructors show me mercy, let me redeem myself. I don’t want to go to Viet Nam. I can’t go to Viet Nam. Please. In Jesus’s name, Amen. My hands squeezed together hard. I drew in a deep breath and now I stood. I pulled my wrist across my eyes and slid from the pew. The heavy door opened to the bright day and birdsong everywhere.
I headed to the art building, my first stop, to see Professor Sturm about my art history grade. In the foyer, today, the sculpture of the naked girl in the alcove seemed to have an air of acceptance about her, her legs slightly spread, her arms to her sides, open in a welcoming gesture. I wondered if it was a good omen.
I climbed the marble stairs to his office and knocked on the front of the pale wood door. I saw his silhouette move behind the frosted glass panel in the center.
“Come in,” he answered in his German-accent.
He was holed-up in a cramped space, a desk and two chairs were wedged inside, along with a couple filing cabinets, and a bookshelf that ran the length of one wall, crammed with over-sized art books. His field of expertise was Italian sculpture of the Renaissance. Oddly, an African fertility carving of a woman with pendulous breasts and a protuberant belly sat perched on top of a pile of papers on his desk.
“Yes, and how can I help you today?”
I sat down in the uncomfortable chair. “It’s about my grade in class, H-205.”
“What is your student I. D.? I’ll look up your records.”
I rattled it off and he went to one of his filing cabinets. He barely had enough room to open the lower drawer.
“You are missing a paper on Cimabue,” he said, as he leafed through the papers. “You received a zero on a pop-quiz on March 3rd.” He looked up. “ What goes on? Did you attend that session?”
“I’m not sure.”
“On the last test your grade was D-. What seems to be the trouble? Is the subject matter too challenging, or are you just not studying?”
“A bit of both, I guess. If I turn in that missing paper could I raise my grade?”
“Perhaps. It would depend on the quality of the paper, would it not? Of course it would be late and points deducted accordingly. I have a paper listing the requirements for that assignment somewhere.” He delved back into the filing drawer. “Here it is.” He pulled a paper from a folder and passed it to me.
“When do I turn it in?”
“As soon as possible,” he looked at me intently, as if he could not quite comprehend this ‘dense’ creature who now sat in front of him. “I thought that would be implicit.”
“Oh yeah, well, of course, I’ll get right on it. What about any quizzes I missed?”
“Those were ‘pop’ quizzes, by intention, of the moment. You do not retake ‘pop’ quizzes. This would not be fair to the other students who regularly study for, and attend my classes.”
The interview was rapidly deteriorating. I stood up, “Well, thanks for your time.”
“Very good, oh and...” He scanned the paper for my name. “Jason, it would serve you well, if the times you did attend my class, you did not fall asleep during the slide presentations. Good day.”
‘Nazi’, I thought as I limped out of his office and folded the outline for the paper, and stuffed it in my back pocket. I paused by the water fountain and examined my heel. I had a bright crimson blister, the skin bubbled out milky-white in the center. There was nothing to do but remove my shoes and go barefoot. I carried my loafers like a book tucked in the crook of my arm, as I tripped down the smooth cold stairs. I kissed the statue on the cheek as I left.
My next stop was the Student Building in the heart of the campus to visit my anthropology professor, to see if I could effect some benevolent voodoo on my grade. I stayed on the soft grassy strip beside the walk-way where I could, and leaped over the loamy beds of yellow daffodils. Outside his door, I slapped any dirt off the soles of my feet, and gingerly slipped the traitorous leather on once again. Best impressions come with a cost.
Professor Hathaway’s office was larger than Sturm’s with a solid oak desk and even a rug on the floor. This was my first face to face meeting with him, except for registration at the beginning of the semester, where he sat at the Anthropology table in the dust and cigarette smoke choked field house. After that, I only saw him behind the lectern in Woodburn’s large auditorium.
“Greetings, greetings! You are Jason?” I nodded. “Have a seat.” He motioned to a matching oak chair in front of his desk. “I have your folder right here.”
Up close, he was still smokey and indistinct, gray and gaunt with pale blue eyes, white crew-cut hair that could once have been blonde. In comparison to his face, his red bow tie and suspenders seemed shocking in their intensity.
“I see you scored a D on your last test. The one before that you did a bit better, a C. I gave you the benefit of the doubt and put you at a C-. You are right on the cusp.”
“How can I raise it, is I guess what I’m asking.”
“Well, like I said, it could have been a D+. Have you been going to the study sessions conducted by the T.A.’s?”
“I may have missed a couple.”
“Well, that’s the place to begin! There is really nothing I can do at this point. Any questions you have over the reading assignments you need to bring to the attention of the T.A.’s. Nothing is ever on the test, that hasn’t been covered in my lectures. That’s the best advice I can offer, attend the lectures, read the text, any questions you have, bring them to the T. A.s.”
“Thanks.” My fingers dug into the leather armrests as I pushed myself up.
“Thank, you, he replied, as he leaned forward and scribbled across the sheet of paper in front of him. “I’m always pleased to meet my students.”
I pulled the door shut behind me. What did I expect, I thought, as I pulled off my increasingly murderous shoes.
I walked barefoot to the Union. The sidewalk was warm where the sun rested on it, the air cool, the trees and shrubs were alive with darting birds. Students flowed around me, their faces set with purpose and determination, books in hand, their eyes focused on some bright, shiny future. I just wanted a Snickers. I padded down the cold stairs. Beside the machine, I squatted on the black marble floor as I unwrapped the bar and bit off a hunk . A girl walked by with nice legs and I mentally sketched the curves of her calves. I studied a short brunette leaning on the opposite wall as she talked to one of her friends. I bit off another piece of gooey chocolate. My mind drew, in fat lines, the folds of her sweater, as they swept across her breasts. I finished the candy bar and sucked the melted chocolate from my fingers. Two down, two to go. I stood up. The next stops were both in Ballantine Hall. I wouldn’t have to trek clear across campus barefoot. Nevertheless, the sidewalk and grass on the way was strewn with more than enough half-buried acorns and little twigs to poke and stab me at every step.
I pushed through the glass doors, crowded by the other students, and passed the giant globe that rested on a pedestal in the lobby. I couldn’t help humming to myself, ‘I’ve got the world on a string, sitting on a rainbow...’ no matter how untrue it was, as I pressed the elevator button to go up.
These office cubicles were taking on an over-familiar sameness in their interior decoration: a desk, a couple of chairs, a bookcase, and file cabinets, usually beige or gray.
Professor Appleworth seemed to exude more vitality than my other instructors. He had a shelf of a jaw that protruded over a sharp Adam’s apple. His hair was thick and coal black and his eyes, brown as chestnuts, looked large and intense, behind his black, thick-framed glasses, the kind Superman wore to assume his secret identity. When he shook my hand, my fingers throbbed.
“So you’re our M.. I. A.”
A veil of incomprehension must have unfurled over my face, because he continued, explaining. “You’re one of the students that has been missing in action during my lectures. How else to explain your performance on the last blue book exam. Of course you could have been one of those sleeping in the back row. Were you sleeping?”
I shook my head. But I actually did have a bad habit of nodding off at intervals during his class.
“I enjoyed the answers you jotted down in your bluebook. It reminded me of Hubert Humphrey’s verbal gymnastics. When a reporter asks him a question, he dances all around the issue without ever once providing an expository answer,” He paused. “Sadly, I had to give you a zero.”
“Professor Appleworth, I’m here to see if there is anyway I could raise my grade somehow, do a paper, or retake a test or something.”
“You sound distressed,” He looked at me with his x-ray vision. “Are you in danger of academic probation?”
“Suspension.”
“And you don’t want to face the possibility of having your draft classification changed to 1-A.”
“Yes.”
He thumbed through the papers on his desk. “I see you have two missing assignments, one on Fielding’s ‘Joseph Andrews’ and one on Shelley’s ‘Ozymandias’. Turn those in and I’ll bump you up a letter grade. Do you still have the sheets that list the criteria?” He swivelled around in his chair and pulled a file drawer open. “Just in case.” He handed me two sheets. He knew me or maybe my type. “You know you don’t have much time. The semester ends in about a month. So I would start on these as soon as possible.”
“Thank you, Professor Appleworth,” I jumped up and extended my hand over his desk and he mashed my fingers again. Maybe he really did have super powers.
“Thank me, when you turn those papers in,” he smiled.
The hallway was bare, except for a cork bulletin board that was scaled with papers in a variety of colors, overlays of announcements, notices, and various services. They fluttered as I passed. I punched the grimy square button. I needed to go up two more floors.
The elevator deposited me on the fifth floor where the sociology department was housed. I lost my bearings amid too many corners and doors and nondescript hallways and went the wrong way before I turned myself around. I had slipped my loafers on in the elevator and now my blisters were broken. They burned as I hobbled to his office.
Professor Noonan was sympathetic as I explained my plight, his elbows resting on his green desk blotter, his fingers locked together beneath his chin. When I finished, they broke apart and he rested his fists on the edge of his desk. “But you must understand my position...” He was fishing for my name. It must be hard to remember a name when you have 250 attend your lectures. “Ah,...Jason. It wouldn’t be fair to the other students who study hard and do the work and attend the sessions.” His lips were cracked, and he had the color and complexion of a boiled shrimp.
I nodded my head like one of those plastic cocktail novelties that perpetually bob up and down and said I understood perfectly, even though, when it came to my disastrous future near at hand, I absolutely did not.
“The best I can offer, is for you to re-read the materials and any questions that may arise, bring them to the attention of the T.A.’s. Do well on the final and you should have no problem.” He stood and poked back his glasses. “Sound good?”
What could I say? I had heard this all before. I agreed, even though it sounded like another doomsday scenario. We shook. My fingers weren’t crushed this time, quite the opposite, it felt like he laid a day old fish in my hand.
I closed the door behind me and let out a sigh. I was like Kirk Douglas in ‘Spartacus’ having defeated a Roman legion on his flight to safety, only to find one more arrayed against him. I slipped my feet out of the loafers I had no doubt were cobbled together during the inquisition, and walked to the elevator. I pushed the down button. I was hungry and tired and ready to go back to the dorm and knuckle down to the mountain of work I had before me. Oh, yes, and I guess check in on Warlock.
The elevator hissed to a stop and I stepped out onto the smooth marble floor. Outside under the limestone overhang, I took the stairway down to the courtyard, my mind focused on my tenuous future. I turned the corner at the landing, and ran right into Warlock coming up. We were face to face. He didn’t recognize me. His eyes were dark, like windows in a vacant house.
“What are you doing over here?” He didn’t reply but sidled around me. I called to him. “Warlock! Hey, Warlock!”
He was on the patio under the overhang. He looked beyond me, as if I had called to him from the bottom of a well. He jerked his head around and continued on. I ran back up the steps and across the slate. I grabbed him by the shoulder.
“Hey! Warlock, what’s up? You okay?” No, of course not, I realized. He was still high.
He cringed and wiped frantically at my hand as if a tarantula had just dropped on him and jumped away. I stood for a conflicted second and watched as he broke into a run down the sidewalk, and collided with other students as he tried to veer around them. I dropped my shoes and chased after him. The ivy choked embankments and overhanging branches around Ballantine Hall fell away as I dodged the approaching walkers. He passed Simon Hall. His stride didn’t ease. He turned around and looked at me with a smile that held a joke only he knew. As we passed Jordan Hall, I was gaining on him, even though, I felt every sharp twig and stone cast in my path. Where was he going? What was he trying to prove? I didn’t have time to play his games. When I caught up with him, I’d hit him so hard, I swore. We were nearing 3rd. St. when my foot came down hard on a rock that sent a shaft of pain shooting through my arch. I grabbed my foot and crumpled to the concrete. That’s when I heard the sharp squeal of tires and a thud, metal hitting...what? A dog had been struck! Then I heard a girl scream. It was unlike any sound I had ever heard a human make before. It made me sick and afraid. I limped and walked the rest of the way. Traffic was slowed, there was a car skewed toward the curb. A man in the street shouted, as he ran forward. “I didn’t see him! Is he okay!? He ran right out in front of me, he came out of nowhere! I swear! It wasn’t my fault!” I looked around for Warlock . I couldn’t find him anywhere. The screaming was coming from across the street in front of the Pi Beta Phi house.
“Todd! Todd! Someone call an ambulance! Call an ambulance!”
A girl collapsed next to the figure sprawled by the curb. It had to be a slapstick routine, some comic slipped on a banana peel and did a prat fall, elbows and knees every which way. He’ll get up and dust himself off and take his bow. It was Warlock . More girls poured out of the columned, white mansion of the Pi Phi house and ran down the long green lawn. I stepped out into the street and a car horn blared. I gazed at an angry face behind a windshield and kept walking. More cars slowed. I heard a distant siren. Girls clustered around. In the center, the crying girl held his head in her lap as she stroked his hair over and over. It was Debbie. Some of the girls, weeping, wrapped their arms around her. He seemed smaller, his black hair, so much blacker. There was a squib of blood from one nostril. That’s all. That didn’t seem too bad. He probably had a broken leg, that’s for sure. I just wished he would move. That would be better, that would be so much better. I saw his hand, lying careless by his side, his fingers curled gently inward. I slumped down a few feet away on the sorority house lawn. The siren was louder, almost tangible in the air. Police appeared from nowhere and diverted traffic, to snake down side streets. The white ambulance coasted to a stop, it’s siren silent. It’s lights pulsed crimson. The huddled figures by the curb, ebbed back.. The attendants rushed forward with their gear and went to work. They pulled Debbie sobbing away, as she broke into a keening wail. Arms wrapped around her. They laid him on the stretcher like a marionette, tubes attached to him instead of strings. Then everything receded. The world pulled away from me slowly like taffy, some long tunnel of color and light and sound muffled and hollow. I was standing, then I was walking. I couldn’t catch my breath. I was sweating. I unbuttoned my shirt, and pulled it out at the waist, as I walked and walked and walked. I didn’t know how far or where. Nothing seemed familiar, the buildings, the sidewalks, the streets. I passed people, but I didn’t hear them, everything was so faraway. I pushed through heavy double doors. The black phone was ahead of me on the wall. I picked up the receiver. Who was I going to call? Where was I? My finger poked into the dial and turned it, let it ratchet back, then turned it again, numbers only my finger knew. On the other end, the hard, insistent, dull, metallic ring, again and again and again, for all eternity, until I felt someone tap me on the shoulder and I gave up the phone. I went over to a large marble column and slid down. I huddled there and watched the forest of feet flow past, until two pairs of feet stopped in front of me. I looked up. I should know these faces.
“Jason? Why are you here? What is wrong?”
A girl kneeled down beside me. A face loomed in front of me, “Something’s wrong, Ingrid. Maybe warlock dosed him.”
“Wa-Warlock...”
“See?! Talk with us, Jase! Are you tripping?”
“No. No!” My breathing quickened. My eyes began to water. I stood up, unsteady.
“You’ll be okay, understand? Ea-sy, now, easy.” Arms were around me.
I shook my head. “No, not okay.” Everything was breaking inside of me. The hydraulic doors hissed open and I entered an elevator.
In the room, sitting in a chair, all the images began to tumble back into my head like leaves wind blown from a tree. I broke down. “Warlock! He ran from me. I wanted him to stop. I tried to stop him!” The tears washed my cheeks. “Why didn’t he stop. It was my fault he was hit. I chased him. I made him run into the street. A car hit him! He was hit by a car! I think he’s hurt. I think he’s hurt very badly, but he’ll be okay. He’ll be okay.” I looked at them both for affirmation.
“Where? Where did this happen? When?” Verlaine, yes it was Verlaine, pulled the phone out and thumbed rapidly through chunks of the directory. She cupped the speaker with her hand and turned toward us. “God, what’s his name!? I can’t ask if a ‘Warlock’ has been admitted!”
Ingrid, yes, dear God, Ingrid held me. The scent of her skin and hair pulled me back. My head ached.I fashioned the word in my brain before my tongue let it out, “T-Todd.”
“Todd? That’ll do me a lot of good.” She turned back to the phone. “Hello. Has anyone recently been admitted to your hospital that has—okay. Hi, I need to know if anyone named, ‘Todd’ has recently been admitted to your hospital that has been involved in a traffic accident. I understand. I’m just a friend, but could we...I realize that! I just need to know is it serious or not! Why can’t you?! Do you know what floor?! Thanks for nothing! Bye!” She slammed the phone down and turned toward us. “We need to go to the hospital! They won’t tell me anything. I’m not immediate family!”
I pulled away from Ingrid. “I can’t go. I don’t, I don’t want to go.”
“Jason,” Ingrid’s hands, held my head, her eyes wavering close to mine, “you must.”
“Let’s go, we’re taking my car.” Verlaine stooped in front of me, her keys jingling. “You’re going Jase. You need to be there.”
The downward plunge of the elevator made my weak legs, feel more wobbly. In the parking lot I felt every stone under my feet. The yellow Volkswagen was too bright.
She flipped the seat forward. “Get in. Watch your head.”
The seat flapped back and Ingrid folded in, she turned to hold my hand and look at me as the car shuddered to shaking life, like a wet dog. Verlaine floored the accelerator and I sank back into the vibrating seat. We reached the hospital in what must have been minutes.
The emergency wing doors slid open, as we entered and approached the admittance area. A nurse came out from behind the desk. “I’m sorry, he’ll have to leave.” She looked at me. “We have strict policies and he can’t enter without shoes.”
“Listen, we just need to see a friend of ours,” Verlaine, answered, “ to see if he is all right. He was struck by a car.”
“I’m sorry unless you’re next of kin...”
“What do you mean, next of kin?” Verlaine fired back.
“He passed away forty minutes ago and unless...”
Verlaine’s hand flew to her mouth, trembling. Ingrid gasped.
“I’m sorry. But we can’t let you in until we notify his relatives.”
“Oh, my God. Sweet fucking Jesus...there must be some...,” her voice broke, as she burst into tears.
“Miss,” the nurse warned, “I can’t have you using that kind of language in here...”
“Shut the fuck up!” Verlaine shouted . She turned and fell on me, her arms hugging my neck. “Jase, I’m sorry.” Ingrid leaned in and draped her arms around us both, as her tears joined ours.
“I’m sorry, but I have to follow protocol. If you want,” the nurse said awkwardly, “on the other side of the partition, there’s an intern conferring with another person who I believe also knew your friend. If you’d like to talk to him...”
Verlaine lifted her head and wiped her eyes, “yeah, let’s.”
In the middle of a row of plastic chairs, a girl I only knew by a first name, Debbie, sat beside the intern. Her sobs now were weak and sporadic. She pressed a wadded up tissue to her nose. Her face was puffy, washed in deep despair, her eyes ringed in red. The intern stood when we approached.
“Hello, I’m Dr. Fleischer. Do you know each other?” He motioned to us as a group.
“I-I know her,” I managed to say.
“Jase?” She looked up. “You knew Warlock .Why, why did it have to happen? He was coming to see me. He wanted us to get back together. Oh, Jase. If I could take back what I said?” Her racking sobs renewed. The doctor seemed helpless .
I didn’t want to hear. I didn’t want to see. I wanted to be far away from this place.
The doctor intervened finally, and looked at me. “I’m sorry I couldn’t have done more for your friend. He had severe trauma to the head, when that occurs...it’s just not a good outcome. Are you religious at all? Do you have a church affiliation? That can help in times like these.”
I thought back to this morning, the empty church.Was it just hours ago? What becomes of all the unanswered prayers? First Karen and now Warlock, how many deaths will I gather to me? I chased Warlock into the path of that car. I killed him. Just like when I was a boy I chased a tom cat from our house. I ran after him shouting and clapping. I just wanted him out of our yard. He was a big beautiful yellow cat. I watched as he sprinted in blind terror across the field ,and cut under a fence, and run right beneath the wheels of an oncoming car. I saw the lifeless rag of his body bounce and roll to the side of the road, the car long gone, by the time that torn patch of fur came to rest.
I was so cold in the waiting room. I buttoned up my shirt. I couldn’t stop shaking. I shrugged off Ingrid’s arm and stalked out. I stood in the chill spring air next to a concrete column and wrapped my arms around myself. When the girls came out, still wiping sniffles, I wouldn’t let them come near me. I hung back as they walked ahead and conversed in low tones. They were involved in an animated discussion. Ingrid would turn to look at me. When they stopped by the side of Verlaine’s yellow beetle, he stepped away and Ingrid turned and slapped me.
“Jason, stop! Stop now! It is over. There is nothing to do!” She plucked the Gitane from her lips and pushed it to mine. “Here! Smoke! Inhale!” I pulled in the pungent tobacco and coughed, hacked the strong smoke back up as soon as it tickled my lungs. “You see!” She retrieved the cigarette and gripped my face hard with her hand, leaning in close. “You are still alive! He has left. You are still here! Leave him!” She opened the door and told me to get in. She slammed the door and Verlaine urged the car to life.
Above the engine noise, as we pulled out of the lot, I overheard Ingrid and Verlaine. “I must do this to help him. Now is the time. I desire to. I know, I know, I do not care. I do not think he realizes...”
They were talking about me. I just wanted to be left alone.
“ Take me to pharmacy first. Then you find a place, leave us. Trust me, this is how I want it to be. I would not if I did not think...”
“Ingrid...are you sure? I mean...”
“Yes, this is good. You do this for me...for us. Look, there is pharmacy, turn here.”
The light was already draining from the sky above the orange sign as Verlaine braked to a stop at the curb and Ingrid leaped out and ran into the store. She reappeared moments later with a small brown paper sack .
We swerved back into traffic and drove through the streetlight spawning dusk .Tree-lined streets gave way to strip-malls and clusters of fast food restaurants, then open country, dark clumps of trees, the interchange, random motels.
“That one, that is fine.” Ingrid pointed to a neon wrapped motel, ‘The Sunset Inn’.
Gravel popped under the VW’s tires as Verlaine eased it into the parking lot.
Ingrid opened the door. “Wait here, I am to be right back. I have money.”
She entered a door marked in silver letters, OFFICE.
“What is this?” I asked.
Verlaine twisted around. “Help. Help to get you back, Jase.”
“I don’t need help. I can deal with this on my own. I know what I did.”
When Ingrid returned she was dangling a brass key on a green oval of plastic. She opened the door and said to Verlaine, “ Room 108. I will call you,” and she retrieved the sack from the floorboards and motioned for me to get out. I could only follow her gesture. The gravel hurt my sore feet as I stepped tenderly to the concrete walkway under the neon hum. The lights of the yellow VW winked on as Verlaine backed around. She drove to the edge of the gravel lot and peeled onto the highway, picked up speed, and was gone.
Ingrid fit the key in the lock and swung the door open. “Go in.”
Inside she slipped off her sandals and locked the door and switched on a dim light on the little table by the bed.
“I killed him, Ingrid.” I stared at the patterned orange curtains drawn across the window. “I killed him.”
“ Stop it, Jason. You did not.”
“I chased him. I ran after him. I knew he was high. I was going to stop him but... I made him run into the street. If I hadn’t chased after him...”
She grabbed me and spun me toward her . Her eyes jeweled in tears. “ You say yourself. He was high. He did not know!” Her fingers dug into my arms. “It was not your fault! What about driver of the car? What about this girl friend? What about him? You try to save him! He would not let you! He was stupid! You cannot save a person from stupid.” Her face was a soft blur. “Do not let death be your life! I will not allow you to!” She forced her lips on mine. Then drew away and rubbed her finger over my mouth.
“This is why we are here. I brought you here for this.”
“But it’s my fault. I chased him. I killed him!”
The flat of her hand scalded my cheek.“You! You, goddamn you! You do not listen!” Her fingers tore my shirt open, the buttons ricocheted like bullets. The flat of her hands slammed into my chest and I staggered back. She came at me again and I landed awkwardly, half off the bed. She jerked the shirt off my arms and fell on top of me and smashed her lips relentlessly against mine. She pinned my shoulders and rose, her breathing strained. “You think everything bad happens because of you.” She tugged at the tongue of my belt and the buckle popped open. She skittered the zipper down. “There is no reason for anything, Jason, except this.” She yanked my pants over my legs and lowered herself. I closed my eyes and yielded to the warmth of her mouth.
The instant she was gone, my eyes snapped open. I saw her remove her shirt and bend over to kick off her jeans. She came back to me.
“Move up. All the way. To the pillow.” She slapped my thigh. Her legs straddled my chest. She looked down, “You like the taste of me?” she asked. She leaned back to rub me.
My breathing deepened in anticipation. “Yes.”
“Bon.” She wiggled up higher and grabbed my hair in her hands. “Mange-moi,” she breathed.
I did what I knew to do, as I felt, all the while, the caress of her hand on me. Her nostrils flared, as sounds came from deep within her throat.
Again she hopped off and my lungs heaved and I heard the rustle of the paper sack. She was back on the bed, kneeling beside me. She tore open a foil packet with her teeth. I felt the cool latex unroll down over me. She straddled me once again and slowly lowered herself. Strands of hair hung in disarray over her face. I reached up and swiped them back. She smiled. I pulled her face to mine and kissed her, cupped her breasts in my hands. Her palms pressed to my chest, as she began her movements, my hands rested on her thighs. She possessed a fierce shadow across her face as she looked down at me.
“Jason,” she whispered in a husk of a voice, just above silence. “ Je vais foutre... la mort... de vous.”
Her rhythm continued, subtle, and feeling, mesmerizing. I was engulfed in her heat, her taste, her scents, her wetness. When she came, her pleas nipped the air, and she pulled me with her. Hours were blotted from my memory and I was left with only this spent second. When her weight slipped from me, the lids of my eyes surrendered finally their hold on wakefulness. I slipped into a dream that held the pervading smell of her Gitane.
I awoke chilled, conscious of my nakedness in the heavy shadowed room. She was beside me, propped on an elbow, the black pools of her eyes fastened on me. She twisted my hair languidly in her fingers.
“This is how we forget,” she whispered. “This is how we go on.” She pinched my nipple and I flinched. “Come, let us shower. You have dirty feet.” She grabbed my hand.
“What time is it?”
“What do you care?” She yanked me up.
“God, I’m hungry.”
“Order us a pizza then,” she jumped from the bed and strode toward the bathroom. “I will turn the water on.”
I swung my legs over the side and found a phone book.
“Enrico’s Pizza, okay?” I called.
“I don’t care!” She shouted above the hiss of the shower.
“What do you want?” I asked as I dialed.
“Anchovies and black olives.”
“Anchovies!?” I yelled. “Who eats anchovies!?”
“Me! I do!” She stuck her head out of the slot of white light that poured from the bathroom. “Order!”
“Pepperoni, too?”
“Yes, fine,” she called, “Get in here!”
I placed the order. “Thirty minutes!”
Steam was roiling off the white tiles as I closed the bathroom door. I felt like I was inside a cloud.
The frosted glass panel slid open, Ingrid’s streaming face appeared. “Get in.”
I stepped in. The hot water cut like razors across my skin. I cried out.
“Be’be’!”
“What?” I faced her. It was the first time I had ever seen her naked in a bright light. Her breasts pleasing, gleamed under a thin sheen of water. Her nipples were pink as salmon flesh under the hot spray, as rivulets raced over her belly, to be lost in the wild tangle of the dark hair between her legs.
“Jason? Jason! I will teach you French!” She held out the beige wafer of soap. “Savon. Re’pe’tez.”
“Savon,” I sputtered.
“Bon. Turn around. Turn! I wash your feet, ‘pieds’.”
“Pieds,” I dutifully repeated.
She stooped and tapped the front of my ankle, meaning for me to raise it. She drew my leg behind me. I braced myself against the tile wall, as I felt her soapy hands knead the instep of my foot .
“Bon. The other.” I dropped my foot to the slick porcelain and bent my other leg.
“Poor, pieds,” she murmured, as she massaged it.
She let loose of my foot as she bit my ass. I jumped and almost slipped. I heard her laugh. . “Cul! You say!”
“Cul!” I turned, sliding . I grabbed her wrists. “Enough!”
“Non, vous l’aimez.”
My arms encircled her waist. She kissed me. The spray spritzed my eyes.
She pulled back, her lashes dewed. “Le’vres, lips.”
“Le’vres.” I kissed her wet lips.
“Tres bon.” She leaned back and looked down. “ Oh! Qu’est-ce que c’est?” She took hold of me. “Pe’nis. Re’pe’tez,” she laughed.
I just blew breath out.
“Tres bon!” The soap was in her hand, as she set to work . My arms wrapped around her shoulders. It didn’t take long. She turned the shower off.
“Better?” she asked as we stepped out.
“Yes,” I exhaled.
She handed me a towel. It fell open and I pulled her’s away.
“Let me.” I rubbed her shoulders with the fuzzy softness, dried her back, and patted her... ‘cul’ dry. I turned her around and kissed her and touched my lips and her lips with my fingers. She understood.
“Embrasser.” I kissed her again.
With the gathered towel I pressed my hands to her breasts and looked down, and then to her eyes.
“Seins,” she sighed.
“Seins,” I repeated.
I wiped her belly and she giggled. I pressed the towel with a circular motion between her legs.
She responded, “Chatte.”
“Chatte.” I kneeled and kissed her there. “Tres bon.”
She rubbed my head. “Bon, Jason.”
The knock on the door was like a rifle shot
“The pizza!” I leaped up and grabbed the cast off towel and knotted it around my waist. “My pants! I need my wallet!” I ran out into the darkened room and stubbed my toe; the knocks more insistent. “Just a minute!”
Ingrid scurried out and whipped the top sheet off the bed and twisted it around her torso, an improvised toga. I flicked the light on and found my pants and pulled my wallet out. I opened the door. The kid with the pizza box in his hand took a step back.
“Whoa! Party, alright! Uh,” he managed to look at the receipt, “medium pizza with anchovies, pepperoni, black olives, four Cokes. You guys like anchovies?”
“How much?”
“Oh, yeah, right. $6.87.”
I flipped my wallet open and my towel fell. “Shit!” I stooped to grab it.
“Dude!” The pizza guy took a giant step back.
I heard Ingrid stifle a laugh behind me. I thrust a ten at him and gathered the towel to my waist.
“Change?”
“Yeah...no!” I noticed him ogling Ingrid. “Keep it.” I clamped a forearm to my stomach as I tried to hold both my wallet and the towel. I took the pizza box, the Cokes balanced on top and kicked the door shut.
Ingrid jumped on top of the bed. “Who am I?” Trailing the sheet, she struck a heroic pose, legs spread, forearm barred in front of her as if holding a shield. Her left breast was exposed.
“Blind Justice,” I said, as I dropped the box on the bed, and the Coke cans toppled and rolled. I re-tied my towel.
“Non! I am Marianne! Symbol of the Republic!”
“Republic? What Republic?” I popped open one of the sodas. It spouted caramel-colored foam. “Have a Coke, Marianne?”
“France, Imbecile!” She kicked her legs out in front of her and dropped with a bounce.
I slammed the Coke on the table and leaped on her, my fingers scrabbling across her sheet-wrapped mid-section, as she screamed laughing, and kicked her legs.
“Take it back, take it back!” I held her down, my face inches from hers.
“I take back! You are not imbecile!”
I kissed her and let her up. “Now eat.”
She crossed her legs under her folded garb and pulled a slice out. “Is good?”
“It’s salty,” I said.
“Umm, and spicy,” she added.
“Like us?”
“Oui.” She laughed and took another bite.
I looked at her wrapped in the bed sheet her hair still wet and stringy. “Look at you. What’s to become of us?”
She looked at me with serious eyes as she held the slice in front of her. She shook her head. “Nothing. Nothing will become of us. This you should know. Enjoy for now.”
I took another bite and another. I stuffed my mouth. Of course I understood. It was there like a tiny seed buried in the back of my mind. It would never be like this again. Never this right. She was here to pull me back from the precipice she saw me standing on. She had given me a gift I could never return. I gulped down the Coke.
“How are you, Jason?”
“Okay, I guess. I feel I should have done more to help Warlock. I have regrets but I guess those can’t be helped, right?”
“There are always two ways.” She took a sip from her can. “We only ever take one. We must believe it best.”
I opened another pop and placed the metal tab on the table. “You know I’ll want to go to the funeral.”
“Yes, you must. It would only be right.” She bit the tip off of her pizza. “Verlaine will want to go also. Where do you think it will be?”
“His folks live in Dwight, Illinois.”
“It is far?”
“I don’t know. Not too far.” I pulled off a piece of pepperoni and placed it on my tongue.
“May I go too?”
“Of course, sure. I would lo...yes, please. It’s going to be so hard from now on. I’ve been out trying to shore up my grades. But now...I don’t know...god, god, god.” I peeled off another piece of pizza. “I hate anchovies,” I laughed, as I tore the piece in two with my teeth.
“They are good!” She reached over and rubbed my knee. “You, too.”
I dropped the half-eaten slice back in the box and wiped my hands on my thighs. I pushed the carton aside and crawled on my hands and knees to her.
“Jason, no! You will spill my drink!” I removed the red can from her hand and set it on the table. “Jason...”
I switched off the light. I kneeled at her feet and raised her legs and unwrapped a length of sheet. “Now–where–was–I?” I whispered, as I kissed her toes, “before we were interrupted?” She reclined across the bed with a long sigh.
I pulled more sheeting free to reveal her thighs that glowed pale in the darkness. I pressed my fingers to the soft wiry patch between her legs. “Teach me more French,” I said. And she did. Later, I went over to the brown paper bag and pulled the rest of the condom packets out and tossed them on the bed. I went back and laid beside her. We pleased each other again and again through that so short night. We would fall asleep, limbs entwined, only to wake up a short time later and go at each other again. We sated our lust, to keep the abiding sadness at bay until the stash of condoms was used up and dawn’s sun washed the rude room in pastel colors.
A strip of light burnished my eyes and I woke sore and exhausted. Ingrid was clothed, sitting in a functional chair, talking low, as she clenched the dull black phone to the side of her face. She was trying to brush her hair into some semblance of decency. I rolled to my side and willed myself upright.
“I could use some toothpaste,” I mumbled.
She hung up and followed me into the bathroom. She lowered the cover on the porcelain bowl and sat down and watched me as I brushed my teeth.
“Jason, I want you to remember this, the sadness not so much.”
I spit the white foam out into the sink.
“You will remember me?”
I cupped my hands under the tap and rinsed my mouth. I wiped them on a towel and pulled her to me. “Always.” I hugged her and kissed her and pressed my eyes to her shoulder.
She rubbed the small of my back. “I want this. Verlaine will be here soon. You need to get dressed.”
I looked at her, half-smiling. “In what?” I asked. “You did a pretty good job on my shirt.”
The papers for my assignments were still folded up and stuffed in the back pocket of my
distressed slacks. My shirt was a rag, the few buttons left, dangled by a thread. My shoes were gone, cast off somewhere in the vicinity of Ballantine Hall.
When the knock arrived, it was the familiar couplet, ‘shave and a haircut, two bits’. I swung the door open. Verlaine stood there, her hands on her hips, that crazy cocked grin across her face.
“Good morning,” she smiled. “Sleep well?”
All I could do was smile back and hug her.
We piled into her yellow VW bug and drove back to the dorms. She dropped me off in front of McNutt. Ingrid got out when I did and we kissed so long, Verlaine had to beep her horn to be funny. I watched as Ingrid got back in and they drove off with another beep. I turned around and walked barefoot to my wing. I can get through this, I thought. That would be my mantra until the end of school. God forgive...I was half-way up the stairwell when I stopped. There was nothing I could think of I had done to be forgiven for. If he was listening, God bless Ingrid. God bless Verlaine. I took the next step.