Читать книгу West Virginia - Joe Halstead - Страница 13

7

ON CHRISTMAS MORNING, Jamie got up and stared out the window and looked at the traffic going down Second Avenue. He stood there, nude, by the window and smoked a cigarette. He took a shower and kind of remembered the night before, and when he got out of the shower he checked his e-mail and then he dug around in his jacket pockets again, searching for the arrowhead, but they were empty. Even though he thought it might’ve reflected badly on him, he sent a group text that said “Merry Christmas!” to his mother and sister. He felt guilty afterward, like he was being insensitive, or like he’d gone too far, like he was just deceiving himself with all the banal stuff. It was all too close to an uncomfortable truth that he wasn’t ready to face.

Sometime later, Sara woke, and he smiled at her hesitantly.

“Who are you and what fuckin’ planet did you come from?”

“I’ll tell you, but it’s a secret,” she said. “I was princess of the Kitsune Forest but decided to live as a mortal, so I came here on a giant fox I rode covered in fairy dust.”

“That sounds very magical.”

“It was.”

Sara said she didn’t want to act like a leech, but she “didn’t think” she had any money and she needed tampons and toothpaste, weed, and, oh, Cheerios.

“Let me ask you a question,” he said. “There were things in my jacket pockets, things that mean a lot to me. Things I can’t replace. Where are they?”

She scrutinized him. “Oh god. The arrowhead.”

“So you do have it somewhere.”

“You know what today is? I love this day.”

He just stared at her blankly like he didn’t hear a word.

“And I would love it if you spent today with me on Christmas Day. Spend Christmas with me and I’ll take you to it.”

“I need to go home.” He’d been seized by something—what? Something he’d been trying to say for a long time. “And I’d like to have it back before I go.”

“Great,” she said. “Spend Christmas with me.”

Again, he didn’t say anything and she asked him about the arrowhead—was it his Horcrux or something? was there a piece of his soul trapped inside it?—and he shrugged it off. They shared a joint and watched a vaporwave music video on his MacBook: images of the World Trade Center in flames, a Windows 95 landscape with NYSE figures scrolling across it, crows flying against a scarlet sky, all through a bleak VHS filter. He’d lost count of how many times the red progress bar had reached the end and he’d started the video over again. Sara lifted her hand to type something into YouTube, saying she wanted to listen to Grimes’s new album, and he saw faint white scars crisscrossed with thinner red ones across her wrists. He took a hit and offered a tight smile and she noticed him staring.

“Oh, just—when I was a kid I was bored,” she said.

“Really,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

They spent the day around Rockefeller Center and then, that night, for Christmas dinner, he chose Royal Bangladesh Indian Restaurant because he knew it was BYOB and he was in the mood for their saag gosht and two or three IPAs, but, just in case, he took a Mason jar filled with something that looked like red Hi-C from the refrigerator and they left. Walking down Second Avenue, he stopped at an ATM and got cash for Sara’s forty-ounce Coors Light, which she bought at the bodega along with his IPAs, and then they walked down Fifth Street and the street was empty and the air was thick and loud, “thundersnow,” they were calling it, with pitchforks of lightning flashing over that Freedom Tower thing, and an old man emerged from behind a car parked across from the dry cleaners and he was homeless and begging, hunched over, his face burned, and Jamie gave him two dollars. They turned onto First Avenue, and when they got to Royal Bangladesh there were two Indian men outside, one from Royal and one from Panna II, its competitor, and predictably each was offering free things to get them to come to his respective restaurant, and Sara was about to toss a coin to decide when Jamie walked into Royal because its guy offered him free wine.

The waiter came and said the special was mixed biryani and that it was “really good,” and he asked if they’d like some sparkling water and Jamie reminded him they were supposed to get free wine. They ordered saag gosht and lamb vindaloo, and the waiter left and they both put on their Wayfarer sunglasses since the light inside Royal Bangladesh was disorienting and tended to make everything look the same reddish color. The waiter brought their wine a bit later and Jamie remembered that he had, at some point, touched two hornlike calcifications on the top of Sara’s head.

“Why are there, um, knots on the top of your head?” he said.

“Well, if you must know,” she said, then in a dull monotone: “I’m the first of a brilliant new species of human spawned by climate change. I’m supposed to breed with you humans to fast-track the advancement of our species until we start our new society.”

“Oh my god, you’re such a fuckin’ weirdo, you know that?”

“Yeah, well, we’re stronger than you and we’ll subjugate you by whatever means necessary. Even sexually,” she insisted, “which is the mating preference of our females. We’re capable of unspeakable evil, much like a human sociopath.”

He just looked at her with this WTF? expression.

“Hey, I’m a child of the nineties,” and then, looking away as if not wanting him to hear her, “Look, I’m sorry. I fucked up. I’m not perfect, but I’m trying.”

“I mean, it’s—I mean, I just want my shit back.”

“Your arrowhead.”

“Yeah.” He felt self-conscious. “My arrowhead.”

“Yeah, so, what’s up with that thing anyway? Oh god.” She stopped, a look of horror on her face. “It was his. He gave it to you.”

“Where is it?” he said instead of answering.

“I’m just trying to help you. It only makes it harder if you won’t talk.”

“I know,” he said. “I know you’re trying to help. And it’s really nice. You’re a nice person. But I just don’t know what to say right now.”

“What was his name?”

“What?”

“Your dad. What was his name?”

He wanted very badly to say it. Instead: “I need you to give it to me.”

Eventually the waiter brought their food and then he said he’d forgotten to ask to see their IDs earlier, so he looked at Sara’s and nodded and then they started eating.

“My cousin told me about what happened,” Sara said.

He took this in. “She did, did she?”

“Yeah, and I wanted to tell you I felt weird hearing about your dad and stuff since I didn’t know you and whatever. But I was like, ‘He looks so sad’; I don’t know if I’ve ever met someone sad-looking like you. Not much comes out of your mouth, but your face”—she paused—“it says a lot. Like there’s this big hole there. Anyway, I’m really sorry.”

“Well, I appreciate that, Sara.”

They ate in silence for a minute. Jamie finished his saag gosht, took a swallow of beer, and told Sara that he’d like to just go home and get stoned. She started getting emotional and he asked her what was wrong, and though she couldn’t seem to say what was bothering her, she told him that everything was absurd and therefore she felt like her personality made sense.

“People think I’m just weird and different, but I think I’m responding to how nothing makes sense,” she said. “It seems like no one realizes what’s happening. Like they all have this terminal illness they don’t know about, or like there’s a tsunami behind them and they haven’t noticed it yet.”

“Really—people try to wear all these hats but there’s nothing under them.”

“Yeah, I think we might need to get berets,” she said, squinting at his head for a few seconds. “Or maybe you might prefer an admiral’s cap.”

He burst out laughing and she smiled her perfect smile and then he smiled right back without the slightest reservation, like a goofball.

She took a deep breath. “Is it weird that I want to know why?”

“Why what?”

“Why he did it.”

“You mean my dad?”

“It’s just that I really want to know right now. It’s like killing me. I promise I’ll give you your arrowhead back if you find out why.”

He shrugged and wiped his hands on a napkin. “Well, I really don’t… I’m really not too crazy about this right now. I really just want to forget about it. For now.”

“It’s OK, I’m sorry,” she said. It was sincere, almost timid. “I know you’re upset. I understand your pain. I’ve felt pain like this before.”

“Well, you can talk about it. If you want. Your pain.”

She smiled and took another deep breath, as if she were about to tread on some holy ground. “You know, my dad believes we have power animals that guide our spirit.”

“You think so? What would you say mine is?”

“You’re a panther if I’ve ever seen one.”

She pouted her lips in this goofy way. He thought it was fascinating, the way she tried to make herself seem less attractive and in doing so made herself more attractive.

“So what does that make you?”

“Well,” she said, “I’ve been told I’m a wolf, but tonight? Tonight, I’m pretending to be a panther.”

The waiter brought out the mukhwas and Sara said she didn’t want to put a spoon that had been in some stranger’s mouth into hers, and he laughed and told her she didn’t put the spoon in her mouth, and for the first time she laughed and he liked it and asked how her food was.

“I thought the vindaloo was really, really… you know,” she paused, “good.” She looked down at her iPhone and seemed to think there was a Christmas pharm party at some squat, 337 Broome, an old event space that a Wall Street Robin Hood had bought and given to UHAB, and asked if he wanted to go.

He murmured, “We can. I don’t really care.” His tone changed. “I said you could talk about your problems. Are you gonna tell me or like what’s the deal?”

She smiled a sad smile. “I’m sure I’ll tell you all about it someday.”

Much later that night, in his apartment, she moved closer and whispered, “You’re so lonely,” with a sad expression that made her irresistible, and then she kissed him and whispered it again and he said, “Sara…” and she pretended not to hear him and then she went under the sheets and took him into her mouth and as her throat relaxed he groaned with relief as he shot into her throat. He turned out the light and held Sara and then tried to sleep, but the music playing next door, “Empire State of Mind” by Jay Z with Alicia Keys, reminded him of something and then the feeling disappeared and he started to wonder if he could go back, if he could simply get up and go home. He looked down at Sara and wondered what she’d do. He knew he couldn’t go; he knew he shouldn’t, but he wanted to go. But first he needed his arrowhead.

He went into the living room and noticed Sara’s purse, which she’d left on the futon, and looked through it. There were a lot of cigarettes in it and tampons and the usual crumpled dollar bills. There were pictures of her family, her mother and father. He was picking up an invoice from a garage when he saw his arrowhead at the bottom of the purse, just within his reach. He grabbed it and felt, despite his anxiety, deeply calm and glad to be holding it again. He went back into the bedroom and got dressed, and he didn’t know what he was doing and then he looked down at Sara, who was smiling dumbly in her sleep, and for a moment felt a slight dizziness. He walked outside and felt something in him collapse, and it was so cold that everything—the air, the music around him—felt frozen, and for some reason the people passing by looked like translucent goblins in the fluorescent lighting. Walking to Astor Place and unable to shake the feeling that he was afraid of the constricted space, he took out his iPhone and opened the Amtrak app and bought a ticket to the station in Prince, West Virginia, and then he hailed a cab and got inside and was gripping his iPhone so tightly he could barely feel his hand and a moment of doubt arose as the shadow of the city loomed against the window.

And then he told the driver, “Penn Station.”