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FICTION-ONLINE
An Internet Literary Magazine
Volume 2, Number 6
November-December 1995
EDITOR'S NOTE:
FICTION-ONLINE is a literary magazine publishing electronically through e-mail and
the Internet on a bimonthly basis. The contents include short stories, play scripts or excerpts,
excerpts of novels or serialized novels, and poems. Some contributors to the magazine are
members of the Northwest Fiction Group of Washington, DC, a group affiliated with
Washington Independent Writers. However, the magazine is an independent entity and solicits
and publishes material from the public.
To subscribe or unsubscribe or for more information, please e-mail a brief request to
ngwazi@clark.net
To submit manuscripts for consideration, please e-mail to the same address. Back issues of
the magazine may be obtained by e-mail from the editor or by anonymous ftp (or gopher) from
ftp.etext.org
where issues are filed in the directory /pub/Zines. AOL users will find back issues under
"Writer's Club E-Zines."
COPYRIGHT NOTICE: The copyright for each piece of material published is retained
by its author. Each subscriber is licensed to possess one electronic copy and to make one hard
copy for personal reading use only. All other rights, including rights to copy or publish in whole
or in part in any form or medium, to give readings or to stage performances or filmings or video
recording, or for any other use not explicitly licensed, are reserved.
William Ramsay, Editor
ngwazi@clark.net
=================================================================
CONTENTS
Editor's Note
Contributors
"Love and So On," poems
Diana Munson
"The Pampers Bandits," fiction
George Howell
"Modern Romance," short story
Judith Greenwood
"Mannheim Rose," an excerpt (chapter 9) from the novel "In Search of
Mozart"
William Ramsay
"Thirty," short story
William Ramsay
=================================================================
CONTRIBUTORS
JUDITH GREENWOOD, international interior and garden designer and West Virginia farmer,
also writes fiction. She was the founder of the Northwest Fiction Group of Washington, DC.
GEORGE HOWELL is a fiction writer living in Takoma Park, Maryland. He has written art
reviews for "Eyewash" and the "Washington Review."
DIANA MUNSON is a therapist in Washington, D.C. She writes short stories; her latest,
"Earrings," was recently published in _Rent-A-Chicken_. She has published numerous poems in
magazines and anthologies.
WILLIAM RAMSAY is a physicist and consultant on Third World energy problems. He is also
a writer and the coordinator of the Northwest Fiction Group. His comedy, "The Importance of
Being Elvis," was recently produced at the Source Theater Ten-Minute Play Festival.
==============================================================
LOVE AND SO ON
by Diana Munson
LETTER FROM AN OLD FRIEND
As the marriage gets older
the gardens get smaller
and the corn --
planted later this year --
develops worms.
The Simple Life grows hard
and hardly simple;
and the summer? You hardly saw it, you said.
And the sun sought eagerly
now burns, and the gentle rain
fails to fall on places
where it used to fall;
earth cracks, mocking
the erosion of our faces
but we still sit
all together on the pine porch
silently listening
to the creaking of our chairs.
AUBADE
Silent-white interstices of some Salt-box fate,
We lay, New England framed, shot through with Providence.
Outside stood Autumn, but in our estate
The warm-all-sun-morning found us in our sleep awake,
Bed-safe and summer strong and knowing
That once we had and also now we did, belong.
======================================================
THE PAMPERS BANDITS
by George Howell
. . . so I'm hurrying down the street, in Hollywood. It's a Friday night & I'm on my way to a club,
one of those pricey places tucked away in a former studio warehouse, a run down brick palace
behind the row of houses with collapsing porches that line this street. I pass these two guys,
maybe they're early twenties, & they've got this baby with them, a little guy, blue pampers,
scruffy brown hair. Just a baby. These guys are leaning against a porch or some steps or
something. I'm in a hurry, right, I'm not paying that much attention. And one guy says, "hey,
man, you got a light?" He's pointing a cigarette at me. He's not wearing any shoes.
I stop, pat the pockets of my crisply pressed pants, real quick, to show him "sorry, no
matches here." But before I can take off, the other guy, a lanky guy without a shirt, is pointing a
gun at me. It's early evening, on a side street in Hollywood, & here's this guy without a shirt
pointing a gun at me & a baby in blue pampers crawling around on the sidewalk.
"Give us your money, dude."
"What's that?" Something just isn't right here. The baby is crawling around this guy's
shoes & he's holding a gun on me.
"You heard me. What you waiting for? We gotta go someplace & we're in a hurry."
They just lean against the porch or steps or whatever it is they're leaning on, not moving, not
doing anything except ignoring the baby and holding a gun on me.
"Look, you're gonna rob me in front of this baby? What kind of example is that?"
"We're teaching him what to do to guys who don't cooperate. You gonna cooperate or
what?"
Just then, the baby starts crying. He's standing up, leaning on the lanky kid's leg & there's
this bad smell. Wet stuff starts running down his legs & he's jiggling and twitching.
"Instead of hassling me, you ought to take care of your baby."
"He's got a mother takes care of him. And the faster you hand over your money, the
faster he gets taken care of. Let's go, man."
The baby is now whining & whimpering, the smell even fouler. I notice nobody is
walking on this side of the street. People on the other side seem to glance over, act like they
don't see what's going on & keep walking. Hollywood. Wonderful town.
"Ok, Ok, I give up." I reach into my wallet & pull out the wad that was supposed to get
me into this club. The baby is staring at me, big tears rolling down his dirty cheeks. I hand the
wad to the baby. "Here, you take it."
"Hey, way to go, kid," the one with the gun tells the baby. "That's your college money."
"Yeah, you're paying for the kid's education. Thanks, mister."
The baby, meanwhile, is still crying and twitching. He doesn't even look at the bills.
Instead, he is rubbing his butt with the bills.
"No, no, dirty," says the lanky one & grabs the cash before it gets too soaked. "Phew!"
He makes a face, shaking a stained $20. "Phew! Here, man, you can keep this one!" and he
tosses the stinking bill on the sidewalk. He sticks the gun into the top of his pants & both guys
take the baby by the hand -- neither one of them wants to pick him up. They stroll down the
street & disappear into an alley.
Just great, I think. I'm standing there, looking down on the wet, stinking $20. Here I am,
all dressed to kill, and there's Andrew Jackson, with gravy poured on his mashed potato hair-do.
The baby could care less about Andrew Jackson. All he wants is someone to change his diaper,
wipe his nose. Which one of those guys is the baby's father, anyway, or is the kid just a prop
they borrow so they can rob foolish scenesters like me who naively wander through Hollywood
in pursuit of pleasure? I can just picture this kid when he grows up, running around without
shoes, without a shirt, sticking a gun in people's faces.
I stare at the bill. That's all that's left of my dreams for this evening. Can't impress any
babes with a $20 you wouldn't even stuff in your own pants pocket. I give up. I'm not going to
touch it. The neighbors can have it.
Just then, I hear heels clicking and shoes scuffing behind me. Here come two other
scenesters, dressed in slick black -- she's wearing black skirt, black fishnet stockings, jet black
hair. He's got on tight midnight black slacks and a white shirt under a black jacket. I can tell
they're a couple from the touches of red they share. She wears red lipstick and red button ear
rings. Red cufflinks hang from his sleeves, a red bow tie flutters at his neck. They both eye me
warily and march past without a word, until they see the $20. She swoops down and picks it up,
but before she can really look at it, I warn them. "Hey, be careful. There's guys with guns
around here."
"Really?" she says, dismissing me. She stuffs the $20 into her boyfriend's hand. "We'll
just pay off the little shits." They march on.
I turn around and walk back towards my car. I hope it's still there. Hollywood.
Wonderful town.
=======================================================
MODERN ROMANCE
by Judith Greenwood
Carol Hubbard doesn't drive after dark. It is a rule so inflexible that if she is caught by
nightfall unexpectedly, she will call a taxi and leave her car where it is. She says that her night
vision has failed, that she gets lost, that she's afraid of hitting something or hurting someone
because she doesn't see.
She remembers when it was that she stopped night driving, but she doesn't quite recall
how she knew it was time to stop.
In 1981, Carol met Harmon Kramer at an Adult Ed class called "Simple Motor
Maintenance." There was theory then that Adult Ed classes were good places to meet men. She
and he had the same difficulty finding the place where oil could be drained from the practice car.
They fell behind their classmates who went on to other possibly more intricate chores. Carol, at
least, wasn't faking. Harmon may have been, but he grew up in a Jewish inner-city
neighborhood where in the Fifties few had cars, so perhaps not. Anyway, it seemed that
ignorance was all they had in common.
So Carol was startled when he asked her out for coffee, but it was, after all, why she took
the course, so she said yes.
"I'm married and I'm not going to leave my wife," he announced immediately, "so do you
want to? Or did you just want some coffee?"
She stared. If she were to break her promise to herself for the tenth or twentieth time,
(the promise to stop the same old self-destructive cycle,) then he was perfect. She had a
weakness for sleazy, meaningless affairs with men whose characters could bear no examination.
"All right," she said, and took him home.
He went home with her every Tuesday night after the class. It was obviously what he'd
had in mind from the start. They made love -- or at least performed fairly ordinary and
uninteresting acts upon each other -- settling in quick order what each one liked and then doing
as much of it as it took.
Although Carol had never seen him before the class, she began to see him here and there
around town. She wasn't doing anything different -- was he? Once she saw him with his wife,
an anorexic-looking woman whose features seemed sharp and huge because of her emaciated
condition. The wife wore white eyeliner, which was both pitifully ugly on her and exactly right
for the woman Harmon claimed couldn't bear sex, even with a man she adored.
Carol searched for a reaction in herself -- guilt, pity, jealousy. It was a little like
prodding yourself to find pain after a busy weekend, only to find that you hadn't played or
worked as hard as you'd imagined. There was nothing to find.
Harmon never complimented Carol, but dropped mildly critical phrases into pauses,
often saying something slightly stinging just as he was leaving. She would stand at her doorway
in her bathrobe, arms folded across her chest so that his barbs would not be fatal, and his words
made her feel satisfied that she wasn't doing anything cruel to his wife, she wasn't getting too
much or taking anything that the wife wanted.
And she certainly didn't want more. She found him just despicable. He used poor
English -- she wondered how he argued cases. Did people pay him to sound ignorant and low?
He dressed so poorly that she sometimes felt guilty sending him into the street looking like that.
He usually wore blended short-sleeved shirts that bore a tell-tale sheen, and pants that proudly
required no belt. On the rare occasion that he wore business clothes, he wore a chalk-striped suit
(whose stripes were too large and bold for a short man with bad posture) or a badly cut camel
colored blazer that looked as if the lapels and elbows would pill momentarily.
She once had a nightmare that the wife died and he came to her expecting her to want
what he'd withheld from her for so long. She woke up feeling sick. When she saw him the next
Tuesday, he said he'd found a way for them to spend a whole night together. She was so relieved
after her dream that that was all he wanted, that she agreed to his arrangement.
It seemed that he owned a chalet with some friends in a ski resort a few hours distant.
The season was over and it was Harmon's responsibility to close the place for the spring.
"Take this key and let yourself in. I should be there about ten o'clock, but you go when
you want to," he explained. "The bed in the master bedroom should be made up, but if it isn't
you can make it. The sheets would be in the dryer."
"I'd rather drive down with you," Carol objected. "I've never been there before."
"Nothing to it. And I don't want anyone to see us. No point in taking chances."
She didn't somehow think of refusing, although she didn't want to go, and when the night
came, she waited until quite late to leave. Harmon said it would take about three hours; she left
at seven.
Dark closed in soon after she left and long before she reached the first of the mountains.
She pushed car into the grades, and it pleased her that it went so easily through the hills. She
slowed entering the curves, accelerated when she was well into them, and the road straightened
under the big Oldsmobile. She overtook everything as she wound through the high passes. Soon
there were no more houses, barn lights or filling stations. Her high beams raked still naked
branches that arced over the road.
Once as she drove behind a pickup she saw that they traveled in a dull ball of light
through thick and heavy blackness. And then she passed him, and there were only her own
lamps forking ahead of her.
The deer leaped out of roadside bushes and onto the road. She braked hard, skewed and
skidded, but she hit him just as he turned his head toward her. Harmon looked calmly through
the windshield at her, dressed in his camel blazer. Then he turned and crashed into the woods.
He must be dead, she thought. No one could survive that. It rocked me.
But what if he's only wounded, maybe even crippled, but salvageable? O God, what
should I do?
By that time she had driven another mile or more. She would stop, she decided, at the
very next telephone and notify the authorities.
She drove on through the night for miles and miles, searching for a telephone sign. After
twelve miles she found the blue smudge she sought neared a closed up mill.
She reached an operator and she sighed out, "I want the police. There's been a death."
"Do you need an ambulance?" the woman asked.
"No." She could hardly get the air up to make the words. "He went into the woods, but
he's dead."
"Ma'am?" a man's voice said. "This is the Sheriff's office. Who's dead?"
"Harmon," she breathed. "No, wait. That's not right. It was a deer."
"Where are you?"
"I'm at Roloplastics," she explained. "I just want you to find him in case he isn't dead, or
if -- maybe you'd need to shoot him. He's at the top of the hill just after the ranger station sign."
"Who did you say is dead?"
"I made a mistake. It's only a deer I hit. No one is dead, maybe. I don't know. He ran
into the woods."
She became aware of the faintest sound of a siren in the dead still of the overcast night.
The headlight beams of her car washed over the phone booth and she stood in the light, the
brightest thing for miles. She dropped the receiver and ran to her car. She switched off the
lights and drove carefully up and out of the factory yard.
She reached the chalet at midnight. She let herself in with the key. There was no one
there, not in the stripped master bed or anywhere.
She crawled into an upper bunk that had been left made up, and slept soundly until full
daylight.
She didn't look at anything the next morning, but got out of the bunk, went out, locking
the door behind her. She drove down to an artificial lake in the center of the development, a
lake built to reflect the scarred mountains, and threw the key as far as she could into the gray
water.
She thinks Harmon called her to make some excuse or other. The memory is no clearer
than the memory of his face staring at her over the star ornament on the hood of her car. Both
memories are exactly what they ought to be -- indistinct, but astonishingly correct and plausible.
=================================================================
MANNHEIM ROSE
by William Ramsay
[Note: This is an excerpt, chapter 9 of the novel "In Search of Mozart"]
It was the end of October and the letter from his father had come, the smudged ends of
the black penstrokes almost epileptic in their agitation: "Make haste, don't waste time!"
Wolfgang must move on to Mannheim, find a position -- his father was depending on him would
cut off his credit at the bankers again if he didn't get moving.
Mannheim -- and its famous Court Orchestra. Mannheim, the court of the cultured
Electoral Prince Karl Theodor: sophisticated literary conversation, the finest Rhine wines, the
smooth white shoulders of bejewelled ladies. Not bad to dream about.
The day was brilliant, he could see his mother's breath in the air as the servant handed
her up into the coach. A long-faced Thekla give a vigorous wave of her arm as they pulled
away. The street in front of the Mozart house had been recently swept and washed, and the
cobblestones shone. Wolfgang waved and watched his Baesle's figure flash by and then
disappear from the isinglass pane of the tiny side window. He settled himself into the horsehair
seat. It felt good to be back riding in their splendid new coach with its extravagant brass
fittings. His father had spared no expense, he remembered the old man saying: "The right
impression, my boy, you'll be judged by your coach, your clothes. Always get the best --
whenever you can." The coach's springs were the latest in design, built for hard traveling, but it
was still a rough ride over dusty tracks that dry autumn in Southern Germany. They bounced
along the fields and through the forests of Bavaria and Franconia. The stubbled rye and wheat
fields were rimmed with the remains of an early snow. He thought about music as he was
jounced to the rhythm of the coach: first a clattering, irregular, exciting, then a dull sort of
rumbling, a soothing slow descent into the secret rooms behind his eyelids. Ahead lay
Mannheim, the glitter of the court, the gold- and silver-braided uniforms of the courtiers, the
rouged smiles of lovely, elegant women. It was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, a grown-up man,
who would be visiting Mannheim. He regretted leaving his Baesle. But after all, there _were_
other women in the world. Who knew what might happen in Mannheim?
They arrived under a gray sky covered with mackerel clouds. Ah, the lavish onion
domes of the Jesuitenkirche, he remembered the church from his visit in 1763, when he was
seven. They passed the Schloss, and he vaguely remembered meeting the Electoral Prince. Karl
Theodor, the Kurfuerst, had the reputation of loving wine, women, and song, but more than just
"song" -- he loved _music_. The orchestra was one of the best in Europe, and Wolfgang
remembered well the principal flutist, Hans Wendling, as well as a few of the other players.
Still in his dusty travel clothes, he left his mother at their inn and then stopped at the
Wendlings' to get some advice about lodgings. Wendling, tall and now balding, welcomed him,
kissing him noisily on both cheeks. "Christian will be so anxious to see you."
Oh, will he now? thought Wolfgang. Christian Cannabich was the conductor of the state
orchestra. He had met Cannabich in Paris in 1766 -- he remembered that Cannabich had made a
harsh, biting rejoinder when he, the young boy prodigy, had joked about how much larger Paris
was than Mannheim. He hadn't meant anything by it! Why were some people so touchy? It
made him nervous to think of meeting Cannabich again.
The Cannabiches lived in crowded but handsomely furnished lodgings above a cloth
merchant, just on the other side of the square from the elaborate baroque facade of the Town
Hall. Cannabich was tall and thin, darkly handsome in a light gray suit with a red twill
waistcoat. The Music Director of the Palatinate looked at him searchingly for a long moment,
bowing and greeting him curtly: "A pleasure."
"Herr Kapellmeister, a great honor to see you again," said Wolfgang, rushing into the
gap. "I've heard so much about the great things you've been doing here in Mannheim.
Everybody in Munich was talking about it."
"No, really," Cannabich said. "People are too kind."
"Yes, your orchestra is the talk everywhere. People are coming from Paris to study your
methods."
Cannabich smiled broadly and took him by the hand. "Herr Mozart, it's been so long.
Let me introduce you to my wife."
Wolfgang bowed and kissed the hand of Frau Cannabich, a blonde, buxom and very
pretty lady. Old, of course, maybe thirty-five, but still attractive.
"And my daughter Rosa."
He bowed low to a pretty teenaged girl, with tightly curled brown ringlets and large
brown eyes. He smiled shyly and bowed very slightly, not looking directly at him.
"Rosa studies the piano. I'd be grateful if you could find time in your busy schedule to
give her a few lessons."
"Never too busy for your daughter, Herr Cannabich. I should be more than honored."
And he bowed again at the girl, who looked down at her lap.
"Christian has taken quite a liking to you," Hans remarked, as they came down the stairs
and out into the square again.
"I'm relieved. And isn't his daughter a little dream!" said Wolfgang. He put his arm
around Hans' shoulders and squeezed, then he patted his friend several times on the chest. "Yes,
I like Mannheim!"
He found himself adopted by the Mannheim musical set: the Cannabiches, the
Wendlings, and other friends of theirs -- like Fritz Ramm, the oboist, and the Lang brothers, Fritz
and Martin, who both played the horn in the Court Orchestra. They were his kind of people.
One day Liesel had just made a joke about the small size of her husband's penis:
"You'll never go to heaven if you talk that way, Liesel," said Martin Lang.
"Who said I wanted to go _there_?" said Frau Cannabich.
"Yes," said his brother Fritz, "as the song goes" -- and he sang out in a fine basso voice --
"Im Himmel gibt's kein Bier, doch trinken wir es hier."
"Well," said Dorothea Wendling, "If as you say there's no beer in heaven, I hope they
have it in hell, so you won't go thirsty."
"Beer won't be the problem with 'the other place' for me. It would be the company," said
Liesel Cannabich.
"Who are you afraid of meeting?" said Wolfgang.
"It's all the priests I figure I'd find down below. They bore me to tears in this world, think
about hanging around with all those sour faces throughout eternity!"
Priests in hell! Wolfgang thought of the Mozart house back in Salzburg -- lots of jokes,
but not jokes about religion. But here! And when he told Christian how impressed he had been
by the beauty and sophistication of Hans Wendling's daughter, Augusta, his friend said: "Oh, yes,
she's had a good deal of training at court. In all positions, horizontal as well as vertical."
"You don't mean it!"
"Oh, yes, the very dignified Fraeulein Wendling was for several years the mistress of my
revered prince and patron, His Electoral Highness, Karl Theodor, the great man himself."
A shiver of titillation swept over him. Imagine. How it must feel to be the mistress of
the Electoral Prince -- as a matter of fact, how _odd_ it must feel to be the ex-mistress! And
there she sat, in the Cannabich drawing room, cool as could be, self-possessed and smiling. In
Paris, maybe, he wouldn't have been surprised. But here, among _people_ _like_ _us_! What
would Papa think?
He went home and reread the letter he had just received from Thekla in Augsburg. He
wrote her a long answer, opening a new bottle of red wine halfway through. It felt good to
reminisce about the garret room in Augsburg. And a person who gave him love -- and laughed at
all his jokes. He closed the letter:
...Well, so long. I kiss you a thousand times. Regards from your little old pumpkin-eating Peter.
Wolfgang Amade Eggbeater
...To his friends he sends to be remembered dismembered. Good-bye, turkey lurkey.
4 U 4 ever more
Until as an angel I soar
Miehnnam, Rebmevon 5, 7771
He sealed the letter with a drop of melted wax from the candle. The image of Augsburg
seemed to fade as the hot wax slowly solidified and became opaque. The following
Wednesday, he was to give a concert in the Schloss for Karl Theodor and his court. After the
concert, his new friend Cannabich was to present him formally to his Electoral Highness.
People told him that Karl Theodor had gracious manners.
"Oh, he's smooth, all right," said Fritz Ramm, a smile on his freckled face. He grasped
his wine glass in his small hand and lifted it in a silent toast to smoothness. It was Tuesday
evening and they were sitting in the "Old Hobbyhorse," an elegant tavern down a side street just
half a block from the Rhine. The brass fittings on the lamps glistened in the half light.
"You mean he's not _too_ arrogant," said Wolfgang. He was proud that he himself had
been around a little and knew something of the great world.
"Did I say that about a person of such high rank? I'm sure I didn't express such a
seditious sentiment."
"_Naturally_! I understand."
"Surely, Herr Former Konzertmeister Second Class Mozart, you know that our esteemed
Electoral Prince Palatine has the reputation of being very 'condescending.' I need not remind
you that such a designation is the highest compliment someone of our miserable lowly rank can
pay to one of such exalted status." He held the back of his hand up and stared thoughtfully at the
reddish hairs that covered it. Then he pretended to kiss it. "You mean that if I grovel in
the dirt before him, he'll treat me like an equal."
"Oh, no no, no groveling, a very low and humbling kowtow will do."
"I stand abashed -- or rather prostrate myself abashed -- before His Graciousness." He
raised his arms in front of himself and lowered his head onto them.
"Good, good, Wolferl, you've got it now, you're all ready for your 'audience' at the
Schloss."
***
Across town, Hans and Dorothea Wendling were talking as she sewed up a worn pair of
his underpants.
"Something's wrong with Wolferl's attitude, I don't know what it is. He's young, but he's
experienced. He ought to be able to handle this, but he doesn't seem to know how."
Dorothea, pretty, bright, and a noted opera singer, said, "What's the matter, won't he
debase himself enough?"
"I suppose. You know, the Prince acts as if he were 'democratic,' but he expects a good
deal of deference. And he's no fool, he knows when he's not getting it."
"Well, he won't get that from Wolferl."
"But why not, Dolly? He should know what has to be done to get along with princes."
"Hans, do you realize what kind of life that boy has led? The adulation? How can you
have associated with kings and emperors since the age of six and still be impressed by a mere
prince? He _may_ learn, but it will take a while."
"I suppose. Poor Wolferl."
"Maybe you should say 'poor Karl Theodor'! I wouldn't want to face the famous Mozart
disdain, no matter what my rank was!" And she shook her head, no, no -- her black curls
flopping to and fro.
***
The Schloss was a baroque jewel. Even he, who had seen many palaces, drew his breath
in a bit when the magnificence of the landing-hall at the top of the main staircase came into
view. It was large and ornate enough to be a throne room in a less opulent princely
establishment. He walked slowly into the salon. It was crowded. Who were they all? Some
wore their own hair powdered in the latest Parisian fashion, others wore old-fashioned periwigs.
In the front rows of chairs, facing the piano, most of the men wore richly embroidered court
dress. He bowed and sat down to play. In the third measure, the G below middle C stuck.
Nothing, no response. He stopped at the end of the next measure. He looked up and saw
Wendling's face, frowning. He motioned his friend to come over.
"Get someone to fix this key," he said in a sharp voice. What disgusting sloppiness!
Hans walked up to an old man in a gold-embroidered purple suit. There was a whispered
conversation. Meanwhile, Wolfgang stood up and walked over to chat with Dorothea Wendling.
He heard conversations starting up among the audience. His mother, in her best blue silk dress,
was whispering to Christian Cannabich. Finally, the old man came over to him and said, "I'm
sorry, Herr Mozart, there is no one available."
"Bring me a small hammer then!" When the old man, running with a limp and breathing
hard, brought the hammer, the took it and his penknife and easily loosened the action and freed
the stuck key. He took care not to get any dust on his pink silk suit with its silver facings. He
handed the hammer to a page boy standing behind him, sat down, breathed deeply a moment,
and began to play. He felt relaxed and at ease, his arms seemed to ripple over the keys by
themselves, the fingers following along like pistons. The silence in the room was broken only by
two spells of coughing. At the end, the applause was loud and there were shouts of 'Well done"
and "Magnificent." The old man came forward, introduced himself as Count Savioli, and
apologized. Wolfgang shook his head and smiled graciously at him.
Cannabich then presented him to the Electoral Prince: "May I say how ...," Wolfgang
started to say.
"Certainly, charmed, Herr Mozart, happy to see you again. It's been a long time," said the
Electoral Prince. He was a small spare man, but with a tiny pot belly that seemed to want to
burst out of his silver suit jacket. His thin saturnine face with its aquiline nose was held proudly,
chin tilted up.
"Yes, Your Highness, it is fourteen years since I had..."
"You play admirably!" Karl Theodor broke in again.
The compliment was nice -- but the Prince kept interrupting him in mid-sentence. He
was used to rudeness from these people -- but he still didn't like it. Arrogant aristocrappy
bastard, he thought.
"May I say what a splendid theater you have in Mannheim, Your Highness." "Splendid
compared to Vienna?"
"Well, not exactly, Your Highness. I mean, it isn't a fair comparison."
"Or Munich?"
"Why yes. Certainly."
"Well, I'm glad you find us at least up to the standard of my close friend Maximilian. If
not of our beloved _Emperor_."
"I didn't mean that, Your Highness. Mannheim is renowned. My dearest wish is to write
an opera here."
"That could easily happen. Anything is possible." Karl Theodor smirked at him, and
with a slight circular twirling of his hand indicated that the interview was coming to an end.
"I'm so happy you were able to visit us here. Please let the Count know if you need anything."
"Thank you, Your Highness, I am most, most grateful," he said with the lowest, most
sweepingly flamboyant bow he could manage. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart -- grown man, and
growing courtier. Growing groveler. Kissing ass was even worse when you were a man, he
thought. But as he walked out onto the plaza after the concert, he still felt a glowing in his belly.
If he had groveled, it had been worth it: he had obviously made a good impression, it could only
be a question of time.
In the days that followed, Count Savioli was all smiles when they met: "Herr Mozart,
what a pleasure, good to see you," "Herr Mozart, a lovely day!" The Count hired him to give
lessons to the little prince and to write some keyboard pieces for the youngest little princess.
The Electoral Prince also sent him another gold watch to add to his collection -- he noted
ironically that it was only fourteen-carat. But no word on a permanent post at court.
***
A few weeks later, in his dressing room, the Electoral Prince asked Count Savioli what
he thought of Mozart.
"A very talented young man, Your Highness," said the wrinkled-faced but tall and elegant
Count, who still wore an old-fashioned periwig.
'Young' is the key word, I think." The Electoral Prince looked at his reflection in the tall
mirror. His breeches had already been removed, but he still took a minute to adjust the tie collar
on his shirt.
"Perhaps a bit immature, Your Highness?"
"Perhaps a bit too arrogant. Did you see the way he curled his lip while I was saying
some nice things to him about his playing? The boy genius! Now a little long in the tooth for
that, I'd think. Is he always that cocky?" Savioli shrugged his shoulders. The Electoral Prince
shook his head. "Musicians! I wonder why we would need someone who might enjoy sneering
at us poor backward souls here in provincial Mannheim. I know Vienna and Paris are grander
places. If he's too good for Mannheim -- well! I wouldn't want to be the cause of holding him
back, would I?"
"Certainly not, Your Highness." Savioli smiled very faintly.
"Well, we'll see, won't we?"
"Certainly, Your Highness. These matters eventually clear up by themselves."
***
Wolfgang, waiting impatiently for good news from Savioli about a position, was finding
Mannheim to be a whole new world. Even new kinds of music. He found himself goaded into
making up naughty songs, little ditties that would send his new friends into convulsions of
laughter:
"Oh, he pulled up her long gray skirt
And stuck his hand down under
And found all sorts of lovely things
He said: 'You are a wonder.'"
Wolfgang, at the piano, changed into a minor key and a pathetic falsetto voice for the
second stanza of his little improvisation:
"The pretty maid gave him a smile
'Oh sir have you no pride?
Most gentlemen I know prefer
To try the other side.'"
Frau Cannabich, Liesel, roared out in unladylike laughter. "Oh, Wolferl, that's just
darling! I love it!"
Christian laughed appreciatively, the Wendlings clapped boisterously. Even Rosa
Cannabich giggled, until her father gave her a stern look to remind her that -- even in the
Cannabich household -- young girls are supposed to blush, not laugh, at such humor. Rosa
looked grown up, but she was actually still only thirteen.
And he had become such fast friends with Christian. Christian talked optimistically. He
shouldn't worry about the lack of a vacancy. Christian's good friend Wolferl Mozart should have
a permanent post, his talent was so great, he could be the "chamber composer," a post could be
created for him, something certainly would be done.
At least one person of stature realized how very good he was!
Later, Wolfgang overheard Liesel saying to Dorothea Wendling, "Oh, isn't Wolferl a
dear!" He felt himself blushing with pleasure. He loved being a dear. He gloried in it. To have
his music, even his trivial party ditties, appreciated, to be loved as a person, that was heaven -- or
almost. Heaven -- except perhaps for a sweet angel of his very own.
His body cried out for more than conversation, though. If only his Baesle were there!
She had sent a reply to his "pumpkin-eater" letter but didn't include the picture of herself that he
had asked for.
Back at his room, he sat down at his table and started writing a reply:
...My very dear niece! cousin! daughter! mother, sister, and wife! Heavens, a thousand
curses, Croatians and damnations, devils, witches, sorcerers, hell's battalions without
end, by all the elements... What a package to get: no portrait!... Keep loving me, as I
love you... I kiss your hands, your face, your knees, and your _______, well, everything
that you'll let me kiss...
He stopped for a minute. Oh, God, how he wished he could give her those kisses in
person! Right that moment! Ohhh God!
"Are you all right, Wolferl?" His mother's voice. He must have groaned aloud.
"Yes, maman." No I'm not all right, but it's nothing a mother can do anything about!
Daydreaming after waking up the next morning, dreading getting out of bed and stepping
on the cold floor, he began to imagine himself in possession of a special angel, a woman who
would complete his joy. More than an angel, maybe -- a goddess! Someone gentle and kind,
someone who would think he was talented -- but also very nice. Someone who could make
everything good and happy come true.
He thought about Rosa Cannabich -- he was to give her another piano lesson that very
day. She was pretty, with the loveliest eyes and the most delicate coloring. But how could such
a young girl be his goddess?
It was her third lesson with him. She sat at the keyboard and he stood facing her in the
large oak-paneled drawing room at the Cannabiches: "What are you looking at, Herr Mozart?"
she said.
"Me? I'm enjoying the vision of a lovely young girl playing the piano with great attention
and sensitivity! And don't call me Herr Mozart."
"You're teasing me, Herr Mozart." Rosa looked embarrassed.
"Well, only a bit." He smiled.
She smiled shyly back. "You must have met a lot of girls in all your travels," she said.
"Ah, but no one like you!" He smiled at her and tried to look longingly. He hoped it
didn't come out like too much of a leer. Goddess or not, she did excite him!
***
Afterwards, Rosa talked with her fifteen-year-old friend Gabrielle. "Do you think those
things he says to me actually mean anything?" They were both seated on her bed in the dormer
attic, with its window overlooking a bare back court.
"I don't know. But I think men just say those things." Gabrielle, dark- haired, pudgy, and
intense, looked searchingly at her friend.
"He is rather odd-looking. But I suppose that doesn't matter."
"I think he dresses very well."
"Yes, he does."
"He struts around as if he owned the world."
"Yes!" She giggled.
"Why don't you talk to your mother about what he says to you?"
"Oh, she'd _die_!" And they both giggled.
***
Wolfgang felt discouraged, walking home along the banks of the Neckar River after his
lesson with Rosa. He stopped, leaning on a wooden fence, numerous of its gray weathered slats
missing, looking out over the water. He stared down at a boat with lateen rigging pulling a barge
full of charcoal. He knew that Rosa was only a child in years. In his more thoughtful moments,
he wondered if that was all she was -- a child. But he was also conscious of a great hungering
for her love. How could he make this sweet young girl love him? And if he succeeded in
charming her, a respectable girl, what could he do about it? He was poor, out of a job. The only
prospects were in his talent. He needed a success -- maybe an important piece of music, one that
would be recognized even in London and Paris as extraordinary. Yes, he might well have to
_compose_ his way to success.
He walked into his room and threw himself down on the bed. The left edge of the
mattress shifted under his weight and knocked over a bottle of wine. Damn it! He cleaned it up
the best he could with a towel. Then he drank some of the wine that was left in the bottle.
Why hadn't he heard from his Baesle? You could get enough of schoolgirls for a while.
He wanted a real woman.
Or did he? No, he wanted a goddess. Someone special. He wanted somebody, for God's
sake!
He got up, picked up some manuscript pages, and sat down at his writing table. He had
lost his place. What was he trying to do when he had repeated the theme twice in the last eight
measures? Had he meant to repeat it a third time? It looked like a repetition with variations.
But he hadn't written himself a note about it. Shit!
He searched among his papers. He found his notes on that fellow Schuster's
recapitulation schemes. Why not? He remembered now about reversing the melodic line.
Instead of a third repetition in the next four measures of the sonata, he reversed the line, turning
the sequence C, E-flat, G, B-flat, D around for two measures: D, B-flat, etc.
Maybe his Baesle would come to visit him in Mannheim -- he could always ask. He went
back to the original theme, stated in the bass, with rhythmic accompaniments in the treble clef.
Then he transposed the original C, E-flat sequence to E-flat, so that it ran E-flat, G-flat, B-flat,
D-flat, F. And then he reversed that. He ran it through on his portable keyboard. It was all
right, but he wasn't quite sure.
A stray thought -- a fantasy of climbing into Rosa's tiny bed and pulling down the
comforter from her slender little body. He pushed the thought out of his mind and tried a third
repetition of the transposition, but he hung the melody for an extra beat on the E-flat and then
resolved to E natural. That was better! Now he could return to C with no trouble. Schuster had
a good idea, but there was always "good" and "better."
By the time he had finished the first movement, it had long been dark. There was no fire,
and even bundled up in an overcoat and a blanket, he was shivering. His knees felt numb. The
wine bottle was empty. And he was hungry. He hadn't arranged to have dinner sent in tonight.
It would be faster if he went to the tavern by the Jesuitenkirche. Then he could come back and
work some more. God, he was hungry. He began to write even faster.
Music. His savior. His torture. He was a slave to the fatal muses, beings that lived in a
world of their own -- neither godlike nor human. At least he had his muses. Goddesses were
another matter entirely.
***
One day in early December, in the throne room of the Schloss, Count Savioli was
running through some business with the Kurfuerst.
"What's next, Savioli?" said Karl Theodor.
"Kapellmeister Cannabich has spoken to me again about Herr Mozart, Your Highness.
He apologized for bringing the matter up if it displeases Your Highness, but he had promised
Herr Mozart..."
"Ah, yes, Herr Mozart." The Electoral Prince frowned. "I do get tired of hearing all
these gushing stories about genius. Especially when they're attributed to _him_!"
"Do you have any commands for me in regard to him, Your Highness?"
"I? No. I think not."
"I beg your pardon, Your Highness, but what shall I say to the Kapellmeister?"
"Say? Why, tell him that perhaps he had better resign his own job if he needs to find a
vacant post for his friend." Seeing the shocked expression on Savioli's face, the Electoral Prince
smiled and said, "No, no, I'm just joking. Just tell him there is no vacancy _at_ _present_. He'll
get the idea."
"As you wish, Your Highness."
"Tell me Savioli, confidentially, do you think that the Kapellmeister will be unduly
heartbroken at not having the young genius here at his side?"
"I'm sure I couldn't say, Your Highness."
"You mean you're too cautious to say, you consummate politician! Well, go on with
you!"
That afternoon, the Count told Christian Cannabich the bad news. "'No vacancy at
present'?"
"That's right, Kapellmeister."
"Any word about a court composer post?"
"No, Kapellmeister." After a pause he said, "Did you want me to broach that subject
again?"
"Should I, Count?"
"I have no opinion, Kapellmeister."
"You _look_ like you have an opinion."
"Your servant, Kapellmeister."
A thirty-second silence. Cannabich s mouth pouted and then smiled. "Never mind, let it
all go."
***
At the rehearsal that afternoon for the Christmas concert, Hans Wendling asked
Cannabich: "Any word on Wolferl's post?"
"Whose post?" said Cannabich. "Oh, you mean that idea we had about Mozart."
"Yes, have you heard anything?'
Cannabich averted his eyes. "No, not yet. No, no, nothing." Wendling looked at him
searchingly, then smiled sarcastically as he sat down again to pick up his flute.
One day the following week, Dorothea Wendling said to her husband: "Wolferl Mozart
was over today, railing against the Court, and how they won't find a position for him."
"Yes, yes, for a boy who has seen so much of the world, he doesn't understand much
about people."
"You mean about Christian."
"Yes, he's quite blind to it all."
"You know," said Dorothea," I think that's one thing that's wonderful about Wolferl. All
this envy really passes him by. He would never suspect that his close friend Christian hasn't
been putting his greatest efforts into getting him a job in Mannheim."
"Well, we can't very well tell Wolferl that."
"No, what would be the point?"
***
Sometimes he thought that Liesel Cannabich was becoming the best friend, man or
woman, that he had in the world. He could talk to her for hours, he could say anything to her --
except he couldn't very well talk about his passion for her daughter Rosa. But he knew that she
knew. It was infuriating. He could tell that she didn't take his love seriously. Why not? What
was wrong with him? Frau Cannabich obviously enjoyed his company. Wasn't a musician good
enough for her daughter? But her husband was a musician himself. It didn't make sense. Why
wouldn't people take him seriously?
***
Wolfgang held his head in his hands, his arms on the table. Wouldn't his mother ever
stop talking?
"...And especially if you don't show up at all, and God knows what you're up to, and I
know you're young and restless, but all the same, I don't see how you can keep up the pace, and
do you really think that it was all right not to press on and head for Frankfurt -- and Paris -- as
soon as possible? After all, I'm sure that your father will be fretting, and when he gets so excited
and upset it is really bad for his digestion, Leopold is lucky his health had been so good, he's
doing quite well for his age, but then again you never know...
"Wolferl, you aren't paying attention, you never listen to what I have to say, I wish your
father were here..."
Sometimes he almost wished that too. Almost. But his father wasn't there. Thank God.
His mother was certainly easier to get around.
"I'm twenty-one years old now, Mama," he said.
"But your father told me ..."
"Twenty-one, Mama, an adult. Twenty-one!"
"I know, I know, all right, Wolferl, all right. But you're making a mistake hanging on
here."
"Thank you, Mama. Thank you."
But as she walked out the door, she turned and said, "You don't want to listen to me,
Wolferl, because I'm the only one who will tell you the truth when you don't want to hear it."
"Good night, Mama," he said loudly. "Good night!"
"You don't have to shout at me," she said. She looked at him, but he bent his head low
over his book. She turned and walked out. He got up and slammed the door after her.
She and her "lion strength of the Pertls." What nonsense!
***
It was a cool but not frosty night for his visit to the Sternwarte, the cylindrical
observatory that Karl Theodor had had built next to the Jesuitenkirche. He looked at the craters
and seas of the moon through the telescope. The Electoral Prince had enough imagination to be
intrigued with the universe -- what was wrong with Karl Theodor's imagination when it came to
musical talent? He gazed up at the Milky Way, while one of the Fathers talked about gravitation
and light and the nature of the universe. He thought of Guido. Guido was now married and in a
very important new post in Florence. Did he still have his telescope, or was he grown up out of
such things, had he forgotten his adolescent dreams?
What about his own adolescent dreams? Was this what he had come down to, giving
lessons to little girls? Now he was lusting after babies, cradle- robbing. He had touched Rosa's
hand and she had giggled and told him he was crazy. "Crazy"! Then she had told him about the
handsome sixteen-year-old son of Felix Ramm's. If he had let her, she would have gone on and
on about the boy. Rosa Cannabich be damned -- he had just been deceiving himself.
He wished now he hadn't written the piece for her.
***
It was a drizzly Saturday afternoon as the audience began to leave the Cannabiches'
drawing room after the piano recital by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
"His execution, as usual, was flawless," whispered Georg Ritter, bassoonist with the
Mannheim orchestra, to Dieter Schreier, one of the violinists. But Ritter had a frown on his
face, Schreier noticed. As they walked out the door and into the cold, wet street, Schreier asked
him what he thought.
"I don't know, it was well played, but..."
"You know," Schreier said, "they say he has described the Adagio movement of the
sonata as portraying the soul of Rosa Cannabich."
"Rosa Cannabich!" exclaimed Ritter. "My God!"
They both laughed. "Yes, that's the trouble," said Schreier, "Like little Rosa's soul --
pretty, but oh so lightweight!" He smiled. "Our young colleague certainly doesn't know much
about women." They went off down the narrow side street, ducking to avoid the dripping
rainwater from the overhanging mullioned windows above them, and chuckling comfortably
together.
Back in the drawing room, Wolfgang thought bitterly about the Adagio. What
magnificent music he would write for _her_ -- when he found her -- his true goddess!
==================================================================
THIRTY
by William Ramsay
Birthdays are supposed to be worse for women. But maybe only for women who
live only for men. I'm a woman, but I live for myself.
Hey, it's only a number.
30.
Decimal: 3*10 + 0*1.
Binary: 11110.
Roman: XXX. (Birthday kisses?)
My thirtieth year to heaven.
To heavin-ess. (Am I getting fat? Those scales are useless.) Obsolescence,
senescence. Then putrescence, deliquescence.
Professor Alyson Jean Schwarzerd lay on the queen-sized bed, her regally shaped
body sprawling, her head with its dark curls propped up on two pillows, one a bed pillow
covered with a greasy percale pillow slip, the other a worn wine-red sofa cushion. The
eyes in her broad handsome face were open, but otherwise she lay cautiously still. She
was wearing only a red tee shirt with white lettering that said: "Ballooners Blow Better."
Her roommate and loving companion still lay asleep on the other side of the bed,
one leg over Alyson's left shin.
Alyson Jean Schwarzerd. I loathe each name individually. But the three
together! On the other hand: Nomen habeo, ergo sum. I'm named, therefore I am. And
those three awful names. They must be real. Who would make them up? With all three
of them, I can't be fictitious, I'm definitely here. But not for ever. Death approaches.
Slowly but -- securely. If you could only kill death, stab it, rip it to shreds, or take a meat
cleaver to it and butcher it to pieces.
She moved her head slightly to look at the venetian-blinded slats of sunlight
hitting the wall over the travel poster of Rijeka, Croatia. A Norman Rockwell picture of
a pack of firehouse dogs was attached with scotch tape to the wall next to it. A Xeroxed
article lay rumpled on the floor: "Implications of Goedel's Proof for Aleph- Zero Infinite
Sequences of Nested Sets, by A. J. Schwarzerd."
30*365. Over 10,000 days. 10,957 to be exact, counting leap years. How many
days more? And then, nox est perpetua una dormienda. Plenty of blackness for all. Not
just for me, but including me.
She now looked at the intrusive limb of her roommate. On the thigh and shin, the
three black-and-blue spots -- from the fight last Thursday when she had found out that
Lynn had gone to the movies and to Ferdy's afterward with Caroline -- were now yellow,
the larger one laced with violet streaks. Alyson shook the leg, impatiently. "Lynn, move
off of me!" She picked up a nail file and poked it into the slim calf. Still no reaction.
The nail file was old and blunt. Then she poked harder, really hard. A high-pitched
squeal, and then her lover said omigod, yanked away the pretty, hairless leg, and pulled
both a pillow and an edge of the thermal blanket over her narrow face and blond curls.
***
The card was by this time well on its way. It had been stamped in the post office
in Santo Domingo, had been bagged and transported in a Nissan truck out the palm-lined
boulevard along the rocky coast to the airport at Cruce. There the bag, its thirty kilos of
letters hugging the card in a smothering grip, had been conveyer-belted onto a American
flight stopping at San Juan and transferred at Miami It was now resting in the post office
in Washington, awaiting the late morning delivery truck.
***
Lynn was only 23.
Bitch!
She closed her eyes and felt herself drifting into a dream.
A million birthday candles flame, some sputtering, some going out -- little girls,
no boys, just girls, keep blowing them out. But then they magically sparkle to life again.
Finally the flames jump to the filmy window hangings, the fire roars to an inferno, and
both Lynn and she burn to a crisp. Blackened and flattened out, like overdone barbecued
fish. Two overdone fishes. Counting the cat, two fishes and one minnow. Little Puke
would hate that, being a fish.
Luckily there were no filmy curtains in the apartment.
No birthday candles either.
Time moves forward, never backward. Except maybe for elementary particles.
Could I become elementary enough to turn the clock back? My elements live on, why
not me? The moving finger writes, and having writ, having shit all over everything,
before anybody can catch it, it zooms around like a Concorde, giving itself to everybody.
The finger: wrinkles, aches, decay. The moving finger giving the finger to all mortals
who happen upon it. Or whom it happens upon.
Metaphysical anguish.
"Wake up, wake up, hey!" Alyson started shaking Lynn by the shoulder,
clutching at her body through the sheet. "Hey, hey, how about metaphysical anguish?"
Lynn peeked out warily from underneath the covers.
"Metaphysical what?"
Alyson felt herself trembling. "Metaphysical anguish, anguish, anguish!"
"Oh, come on!" Lynn said, frowning and drawing away.
"Hey, hey, tell -- meta, meta, meta, and then physical, you know physical, don't
you? You're big on the physical -- like with Caroline!"
"Oh, come on, that wasn't anything, Alyson."
"Come on, yourself, answer the question -- I'll say it slowly: me-ta-phy-sic-al."
Alyson pulled her lips back into a stiff smile as she prolonged the "al" sound.
Lynn lifted her narrow shoulders. "Honestly, I always forget what exactly
metaphysical means. It's like otherworldly or something, isn't it?" She raised her face,
smiling like a baby.
Alyson stared at this stranger. Otherworldly! Jesus! She hungered for the bright
intelligent faces of the students in her sophomore logic class.
"I'm sorry, Alyson, I forget."
"You forget, you always forget. I suppose you've forgotten my birthday, too."
The middle of Lynn's ice-white brow puckered up. She sat up, her large blue eyes
open wide. She picked a long, dark hair out of her broad, beautiful mouth.
"God, is today, your...? Oh, God!"
"Yes, today, today. You dumb-ass bitch."
Alyson threw the red pillow at her roommate, then she began to pummel her with
her heavy fists. "Get out, get out of here. I'm tired of dumb-ass bitches!"
Lynn gasped and, her chin tense, jumped quickly out of the bed. Alyson Jean
Schwarzerd, thirty years old today, leaped after her, waving the nail file. "Dumb-ass
bitch, dumb-ass bitch. Get out of here!"
She stabbed repeatedly at her friend's flailing bare arms with the file. Some of
the lunging strokes connected, and tiny red welts appeared. Lynn broke away and raced
across the cluttered room in little nervous jumps. Alyson dived into her path to cut her
off from the bathroom. Alternately stabbing, hitting, and pushing with her powerful
arms, she drove her roommate out of the apartment and slammed and locked the door.
Then she threw the nail file at the kitchen sink. It plinked against the refrigerator and
bounced down onto the kitchen floor.
The yellowish-brown cat, startled, ran out of the kitchen and hid under the sofa.
Screw you too, Little Puke. She threw a pillow at the cat. It missed him but
knocked down one of the numerous pictures of Lynn's family on the left half of the side
table. The picture hit the floor and clucked like a disembodied tongue. The right half of
the side table displayed a photograph of Alyson and Lynn holding hands against the
background of the Statue of Liberty, a sticky spruce cone from Catoctin Mountain Park,
and a four-year-old postcard from Quito, Ecuador signed "Dad."
There was a shuffling noise outside the door. "Please. Let me back in." Alyson
examined her big toe. The nail needed clipping.
"Please, I'm sorry about your birthday." Lynn's voice squeaked.
I've got to be more careful from now on. Time is catching up. Conserve my
efforts. Don't hang around with trash like her.
Alyson returned to bed, sitting, knees crossed, feeling Buddha-like and free.
What I have to put up with. Reduced to living with an office manager for an animal
clinic.
"If you won't let me in, then just toss me some clothes, I'm in my nightgown.
Come on, O.K.?"
What existential difference does it make? Or is it metaphysical? Dumb-ass
bitch.
"Please, Al, please."
Alyson screamed, "I hate it when you call me Al."
Clothes, clothes. That's all she cares about.
Alyson glanced over at the easy chair. The silver lame blouse that Lynn had worn
the night before now lay sprawled over it.
God. Six hundred bucks I paid for that. I must be out of my mind. "You'll get
your clothes. Later. Much later. Much, much later."
"Please."
Who was already dead at this age, was it Mozart? No, he lived longer. Schubert?
Maybe. No. I don't think so. Well, Keats, Abel, Marlowe. So -- I'm ahead of some of
them. Not Holy Jesus, though. Not yet. Will I make it to 33?
***
In the sense of the theory of special relativity, the card was getting closer to its
addressee. Time was passing. It sat in the bin at the Capitol Heights Post Office. Its
spatial dimensions did not change, but its time coordinates were moving along the t-axis
-- the clock ticked on: t1, t2, t3....
***
That ridiculous little whore. Twenty-three and an absolute airhead! Alyson
squirmed, reached under herself, and plucked out a small brown stuffed raccoon from
under the bedclothes. "And take your goddamn artificial babies with you!" She threw
the raccoon at the door of the apartment. Her throw didn't reach it, and the animal
bobbled up to the floor lamp.
Alyson heard something scraping on the door.
"Oh, God, Alyson. People will come by."
People. Teeming masses, being born, living their lives. And sooner or later --
dying.
***
Outside, under a hazy warm sky, a female dove with a tiny tar spot on its right
wing perched on the window ledge. She defecated gracefully, the feces dropping down
nine stories onto 17th Street. The dove was joined by another dove, a male. They
pressed themselves close to each other, the male's throat quivered, and a coo echoed
along the window.
***
I'll take her clothes and cut them up, no, I'll burn them. No, too much smoke and
mess. Maybe pour bleach on them. No, I think we're out of bleach.
She doesn't love me.
"Alyson, you know you're going to let me back in. You always do. And you'll be
embarrassed if somebody sees me all undressed out here!"
Embarrassed. Em-bare-assed. Poor miserable bitch.
"I'm sorry about the birthday.
I'm sorry too. God, am I sorry! Thirty unbelievable years old!
Lynn said again through the door: "You wouldn't have remembered my birthday."
Her birthday! I don't need to remember that. She always reminds me of it, just
like a little kid. It's exactly like living with a child!
Stretching her arms with clenched fists rigidly away from her body, and tensing
her throat muscles, she yelled, "Get lost!"
Silence, and after a minute, the sounds of crying on the other side of the door.
The sound of the Lynn's weeping sent a thrill through Alyson.
***
In Santo Domingo, in a small $1500 per month apartment, the air in the living
room ruffled by a faint refrigerated breeze, the kitchen floor speckled with cockroaches,
a large, pudgy man with a wrinkled face was trying -- with difficulty -- to penetrate the
inner labia of a nineteen-year-old woman with wheat-colored skin, wide red lips, and
white blonde hair.
Dammit, dammit. No importa, querido, estoy satisfecha. Dammit, dammit. No te
apures, Jim, esta bien. Dammit, dammit.
***
The card was in one of the sacks in the white truck with the red and blue stripes
as it moved out of the Capitol Heights Post Office onto Florida Avenue, turning by the
check cashing shop on the corner of 18th, retracing once again its invariable daily
delivery route.
***
A hoarse alto voice from down the hall outside the Schwarzerd-Feinstein
apartment on 17th Street: "What's all the racket? Are you locked out or something?"
"No, Mrs. Colonna!" Steps sounded. "Well, I mean yes. Never mind."
"I can get a key from the desk and let you in."
"No, no. No, Alyson's in the bathroom, she'll come and open up in a minute."
"You're sure?"
"Sure."
"O.K."
Receding footsteps.
"Al, Al, for God's sake!" More sobs. "Just last week, you said how lucky we
were to have each other!"
Don't call me Al. You frivolous little bitch. All you care about is TV sitcoms and
doing your nails. And you're so stupid. Stupid!
***
The doves were back in their nest under the eaves overhanging the ventilation
unit on the roof of the building. Cloacae tightly joined, with little flurries of movement
they successfully mated.
***
Jim had succeeded in gaining a floppy entry. He grunted and felt a throbbing in
his head. The wheat-colored blonde held him close and kept kissing him -- his cheek and
hair and arm.
***
"Alyson, the mail's here! Don't you want the mail? Come on, Alyson? Alyson?"
Silence.
"Alyson, there's a letter for you. It's got a foreign stamp on it." A siren screamed
up from New Hampshire Avenue. "Al?"
Oh, shit. O.K.
Alyson got up, picked up Lynn's tennis shoes, jeans, and a tee shirt from a pile on
the floor, walked over to the door, unlocked it, and opened it up. Lynn, clutching the
hem of her nightgown, recoiled a step. She held several letters, folders, and a magazine
in her hand.
Alyson threw the clothing at her and grabbed the letters, dropping the other mail
on the floor, the glossy magazine gliding as far as the wall.
Lynn winced and rubbed the spot on her thigh where one of the tennis shoes had
hit her.
"Alyson, can't I come in?"
Alyson pursed her lips and then, with a wide sweep of her arm, said, "Shit! Come
in. Who cares!"
Lynn, head lowered and red-rimmed eyes averted, entered the apartment and
padded softly toward the bathroom. Alyson went back to the bed, sat down on it, and
opened the envelope with the stamp reading "Republica Dominicana, Correo Aereo." It
was a greeting card with the picture of a red-haired teenaged girl in a long black dress on
the outside, and the words: "En tu cumpleanos; Pensando en ti, querida hija." Inside,
backing up this wish for a daughter's birthday, there was a short verse in Spanish which
she didn't understand. Below it, there was written, in a large, twitchy hand:
Happy Birthday, Ducks. You'll always be my best girl. Don't worry, life
begins at thirty. Many happy returns.
Been on this job down in the D.R. for the past few years. Having a good
time. You know me, Al. Must get to see you one of these years.
Ever hear from your mother? Hope her health is better. I never hear from
her, but I understand she's remarried.
Love
Dad
xxx ooo xxx
***
In Santo Domingo, Jim Schwarzerd gave up on his trembling body and, unable to
reach orgasm, sank back into the arms of the blonde with the wheat-colored skin. Her
fingers gently, lovingly massaged his upper thigh. He finally pushed her hand away
impatiently.
I wonder how the kid is.
***
On 17th Street, Lynn was sneaking out of the bathroom. She looked furtively
over at the bed. Alyson was facing her, sitting on the bed with her leg muscles bulging
beneath her. The birthday card lay on the floor in front of the bed. Alyson's shining
brown eyes were staring blindly at the refrigerator, streaks of moisture matted her
cheeks. Lynn ran over to the bed. "Oh, Alyson, Alyson!" She seized the larger woman
and pulled her down on top of her. Alyson sobbed, trembling, for a minute. Then her
body relaxed. She snuggled up to Lynn and hugged her, straining the soft flesh of her
torso against her friend's flat, narrow belly.
"Alyson, my baby!"
Lynn pulled up her dirt-streaked white tee shirt. Alyson lifted her runny mouth
and nose to one of her friend's small breasts and, taking the erect nipple carefully
between her teeth, began to suck gently but firmly. Lynn oohed.
----30----
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