Читать книгу Love Slave - Jennifer Spiegel - Страница 4

Saturday, January 7, 1995

Into my world he comes. After I wake up early and write my column for two hours, I reward myself by doing laundry. "I'm trying to picture what you do during the day." I'm sitting next to a guy wearing orange pants in a grimy Laundromat on West Fourth at the beginning of a new, hopefully stunning, year. Saturday morning calls for wearing red sweatpants featuring Mickey Mouse on the left hip, dragging dirty clothes in a blue plastic basket with a broken handle five blocks to a slightly cheaper Laundromat than the one around the corner from my basement apartment, stuffing as much as humanly possible into a single machine, and relaxing while drinking deli coffee with half-and-half and eating a low-fat berry muffin while reading the Times as my laundry spins. This is the way it's been for over four years. Any variation and I'm thrown. Possibly made angry. Maybe I'll mope. I focus on the guy in orange pants. "You have to have another job. You can't be mak ing it by playing a club once or twice a week." I look at him doubtfully, trying to quickly remember how much I weighed when I woke this morning. "Can you?" I blow on my coffee and suck in my stomach, which is tough when sitting down.

Kim, the Korean man who works behind the counter, adjusts the TV picture. We've known each other for as long as I've lived in the West Village. When it's only the two of us, he'll play an Anne Murray tape in his cassette player and sing out loud: Could I have this dance for the rest of my life? I pretend not to listen. This image is something I hold on to: the Korean man singing Anne Murray songs at the Laundromat on West Fourth.

I know who the guy in orange pants is. He's the lead singer of Glass Half Empty. Alternative rock, Manhattan scene. Madeline would be very, very envious. Jeff, however, wouldn't care. Out of nowhere, Rob Shachtley, rock 'n' roll singer, strolled into my Laundromat to do his laundry on a Saturday morning in the West Village. We spoke immediately, without shyness or formality. He said, I recognize you from somewhere. He recognized me from the audience. From the Fedora, Sin-é, the Cooler, the Mercury Lounge, other clubs. Madeline has a crush on Dave Stomps, the drummer. What began as Dave Stomps Watch turned into a weekend plan. Something to do, almost like commitment.

"I bet you're going to say you work with underprivileged kids, aren't you?" I cross my red legs. "Don't even say Teach for America." With two fingers, I pinch a fat cranberry on my muffin. "You work for Blockbuster Video, I know it. Admit it." I pop the berry into my mouth.

He looks around my age: thirty, thirty-one. He resembles Roy

Orbison, with thick-rimmed glasses, dark sideburns, and a slight but unobtrusive gut. He's a young, rather tall Roy Orbison. His clothes are mismatched and he probably got them in the East Village, which means they're pretty expensive. The white t-shirt he wears has the Burger King logo on it, but instead of Burger King, it says, Burger Christ. He's wearing East Village garb but he's doing his laundry in the West Village.

When I lived on the West Coast, girls asked each other, "Is he cute?" Back East, they ask, "Does he have money?" Looking at young Mr. Shachtley, I'm not sure how I'd respond. He's not drop-dead gorgeous, but— among certain girlfriends— I'd say, "I'd do him." He sings in an unknown band, but he dresses in trendy attire; he's not rich, but he's got spending money. A nice-looking guy who lives above the poverty line.

"Close, but no cigar." He eats sour-cream-and-onion potato chips. I hear them crunch in his mouth. "Catering. I cater."

"You're divine." I practically suckle the word. I mean it too. I mean it because I like his goofy hair, his slight but unobtrusive gut, and the way he eats potato chips at 8:30 in the morning. " Chips so early?"

"I haven't really gone to bed yet, so this is like a late dinner."

I lean forward. "What's the Burger Christ t-shirt all about? Are you trying to make a point?"

He leans forward too. "You know, usually I am, but this time I'm not." He smiles. "Does it make you uncomfortable?"

I look at his t-shirt. "I'm just wondering if there's a message I should be getting. I'm wondering if you're commenting on yourself, on contemporary life, or on Burger King. Which is it?"

He winks and clucks his tongue against the roof of his mouth. "Just remember me as the groovy guy with potato chips and mixed messages you met in the Laundromat. That's all."

"What do you wear when you cater?" I ask, imagining he has to wear something besides that t-shirt.

He doesn't stop munching. "Did you ever work in a movie theater in high school?"

He's killing me softly. "As a matter of fact, I did." How does he know? And should I ask for a chip?

"You remember the outfits?" When he tilts his head to the side, his hair shifts. Most people only dream of eating potato chips the way this guy is doing it.

I look at a water stain on the ceiling and envision the black vest and matching pants I wore at sixteen. I came home smelling of popcorn, the bottoms of my shoes tacky from cola. " There was a shiny strip of satin down the seam of each polyester leg."

Rob nods, excited. "That's what I wear." He stuffs more chips into his mouth.

"Wow." He's the lead singer of a rock 'n' roll band and he caters in black polyester. "Do you live around here?" I'm bold, an opportunist.

He shakes his head and brushes crumbs from his lips. "Nah. I stayed at Dave's house last night."

"Dave Stomps?" I nonchalantly ask as if I already know. I'm in the know. Dave, Dave Stomps, the drummer.

He clicks his tongue twice and points a finger at me. "Yep. Dave lives around the corner. Sometimes I stay over. I had to do laundry— a girl vomited on my leg last night."

"Gross." I look at his washer, the clothes spinning around in bright colors.

Rob scrunches up his nose. "You have no idea." He crumples the bag of chips into a ball and shoots it into a garbage bin loaded with used fabric-softener sheets. "I'm doing Dave's towels too. I really live in the East Village." He sucks in air. "What do you do?"

I sip coffee. "Columnist." I pause, deciding to try something out. Why shouldn't I? He's wearing orange pants, for God's sake. "I'm a writer for a hip paper with mass circulation."

His jaw drops open. "You write for the Village Voice?"

I can't hide the frustration. "No." I shake my head violently. "New York Shock. I write for New York Shock "

"Oh." He smiles. "I like New York Shock." He's possibly lying. "Who are you?"

" 'Abscess.' "

Glittery eyes. "I love 'Abscess.' " He leans forward, looking like Rodin's The Thinker, but with clothes on. "I don't even know your name, 'Abscess' writer."

" Sybil Weatherfield." My name embarrasses me. Too pretty. I secretly like it.

Rob Shachtley extends his hand. "Nice to meet you, Sybil Weatherfield. Wow. 'Abscess.' " We shake. "You're like a celebrity."

Abscess— an open wound. Sounds a lot like obsess. "It's a neurotic little feature," I tell him. The racing of the mind, the bouncing off walls, the manifestations of cerebral overload . . .

Rob Shachtley stares at me the way people stare at newscasters at the mall, weathermen on the street.

" 'Abscess' sold. There was practically a bidding war for it." I look him in the eye to see if he's buying this. I can't tell. "Not only did New York Shock want it, but so did a small college paper in Wyoming. The paper was called Bitch and Moan, Stick and Stone. Lots to grumble about in the boonies."

Rob, still leaning over like The Thinker, straightens, crosses one leg over the other, and looks at me strangely. No longer like I'm a lesser celebrity. For a second, he just stares. Under his gaze, I become self-conscious, aware of my physical appearance. I remember the recent trip to the gym, where they squeezed way more than an inch and gave me a percentage to keep with me, in my heart, perhaps to wear in writing on fine parchment inside a locket around my neck. I feel my medium height, my medium weight, the overall average quality of my presentation. I move a strand of brown hair behind an ear. It's brown hair I've described as chestnut on better days. I turn my hazel eyes to the ground— eyes I've called gray on my driver's license since gray suggests something stormy, smoky, enigmatic. Under Rob's scrutiny, I remember my fair but dry complexion, my pretty but unmemorable face, the scar on my forehead— the one I got when I ran into the dining room table at three. I raise my hazel eyes to his and see him hold me in his gaze. A baggy t-shirt covers a lot, but it doesn't mask certain aspects of the body. Mostly, when men look at me, I know what they see: a pretty girl they won't remember later. Rob's eyes hit the indentation on my forehead. They travel the length of my low-maintenance long hair. They pass over cheekbones, throat, clavicle. They pause over breasts, invisible but medium-sized. His eyes go down my legs, past the sharp angles of knees, and up again, pausing briefly once more— this time on lips. I blush but know he can't actually measure body fat; he can't detect the realities of skin and bone. I watch his face and see him assess the beauty. I see it. I've seen it before; I've seen men take in my appearance. I know it's an unspectacular beauty— it isn't breathtaking or earth-shattering. I look at Rob and wonder how long he'll hold on to his admiration. He speaks. "You know, you're divine too." And then he smiles, turning his eyes to the ground.

I blush.

He squints, looking at me through a line of eyelashes.

A few copies of New York Shock are scattered in the corner of a table people use to hold their coffees and put down their bleach. After a long moment, Rob Shachtley stands and walks over to the disarrayed pile.

He picks up New York Shock, which is like— I have to admit— picking up a little piece of me, even if it's a silly, sanctimonious, possibly offensive suggestion of who I am as a woman: effete, alone, brainy, bitter. He thumbs through last week's issue, arriving at my column. For a second, I think of snatching it away. I'm self-conscious about him seeing it, about him being made privy to my meditations. He spreads it open on his lap, lifts his index finger into the air, and says, "Two minutes."

And while he reads, I work on my low-fat berry muffin.