His hard fist landed high on Aaron’s cheek. Aaron could not remember having been hit like that before and he expected to tumble backward, like in the movies, falling over something, gracefully jumping to his feet, ready for battle. Bogart would have reacted that way. But this was different. Aaron didn’t tumble, didn’t fall. He simply grunted once and stepped backward one step. “Ow,” he said. “Ow,” and his hands raced to protect his swelling cheek.
Walker swung again, this time to the mouth.
Aaron tasted blood. His lip was gashed and it hurt, it hurt. He should be fighting back, he knew, hitting out with his own fists, but he didn’t know how, and his lip hurt as the blood burst loose. “I haven’t got any money,” Aaron whispered. “Just enough for the movies, that’s all.” His breath came in gasps and he wasn’t sure the words made any sense until he heard Walker whisper “You better,” and then another punch landed, doubling his pain.
The black fist collided with Aaron’s neck, slamming at the Adam’s apple, and Aaron dropped straight down to his knees. He knelt there, helpless, his long arms dangling until Walker hit him again, then again, punch after punch, bending Aaron over backward with their power. At last an elbow crashed against his cheek and Aaron sprawled full length on the hot pavement. He lay still, trying to breathe, trying to crawl, anything to stop the pain.
“Faggot!” Walker said. “Fuckin’ faggot!” and he punched down with his fist, hitting the bloody side of Aaron’s face, driving it brutally against the pavement.
After that, Aaron didn’t feel much.
Oh, he was aware. He was aware of Walker’s black hands as they scurried over his body, finding pockets, ripping out their contents; he was aware of Walker’s panting, of his whispered curses; he was aware of the final gratuitous kick that was probably aimed for his face but missed, skimming and scraping his ear, making it bleed. But he didn’t feel much. He just lay there. He never lost consciousness. There was no point in trying to move—not for a while. He could not command his brain sufficiently to order his limbs into action. Aaron lay stretched, without thought, without movement, lifeless, alive. Some time later he heard a sound that frightened him, an animal sound, a rhythmic gasping and it took him a while but he finally deduced he was hearing himself and that spurred him into action.
He moved his hand.
Not much, not far, simply from the back to the palm, flip-flop. The cost of the movement was enormous—motionless, he had forgotten the pain; now he remembered it—but it made him proud. See? I can move my hand. Flip-flop. Flip-flop. Hey, everybody, looka me. I can move my hand.
The rain, long promised, finally arrived after an endless prelude of thunder. A deadly bolt of lightning lit the night and then the first drops ticked down, gentle and soft—incongruous following such an introduction. The gentle drops stopped. Nothing. Then with a hiss the rain started, sheet after sheet, cold. Aaron licked the wet pavement with his tongue. The rain picked up tempo, drumming. Puddles began to form, filling the irregularities in the pavement. Aaron called for his right arm and after a moment it drew in under his body. He rested, letting the rain beat down. Then his left arm began to move, not stopping until it too was tucked beneath him. He rested. A bolt of lightning followed a clap of thunder and Aaron strained, pushing himself up on his elbows. Puddles were all around him now and as he looked down, another bolt of lightning exploded and for just an instant Aaron saw himself in water. And seeing, gaped in disbelief. You? Here? Like this? On the ground? At night? Crying in the rain?
Crying? Am I crying?
He was. Big boys didn’t, they weren’t supposed to, but there he was, a big boy crying, for the first time in ever so long, crying, filling the night with regret, and though he tried to stop—Aaron thrashing, thrashing in the rain—he could not, and at last his long body subsided, and he closed his eyes, and he gave himself up to his tears.
In the morning, shortly after dawn, two small boys entered the playground, bouncing a basketball back and forth between them. They were chattering, but when they saw the gaunt object lying stretched and still, they stopped, advancing on it slowly, standing over it, looking from it to each other, back and forth.
“Hey, mistuh,” the first boy said.
Aaron gazed at him.
“You O.K., mistuh?” the second boy said.
Aaron transferred his gaze.
“You bettah go home, mistuh,” the first boy said.
Aaron went home.
Aaron sat stiffly in the chair. At the desk, the doctor smiled at him—an encouraging smile. Aaron took out a cigarette and put it in the corner of his mouth but he had difficulty lighting it. Three matches were needed. “I’m nervous,” Aaron said.
Gunther nodded.
“I’ve never done anything like this before. I don’t know where to begin.”
“Well, why don’t you begin with what brought you here?”
Aaron nodded, trying to think. “What brought me here?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I don’t seem to be getting anywhere.”
“Some days I feel that way too,” the doctor said, smiling again. “Go on.”
“Well,” Aaron said. “Well,” and then nothing. He was terribly nervous and that was the one thing he shouldn’t have been. The social worker at the Institute for Free Therapy had told him that when he was sent out for his interview that he should above all not be nervous. “Just talk,” she had said. “Relax and talk.” And here he was, at the crucial interview, unable to relax, not able to talk. If he was to get accepted at the clinic, he would have to get this Gunther’s approval; if Gunther recommended him for free treatment, and the Institute board passed the recommendation, then he could start. If Gunther said no, then nothing. Gunther was looking at him now, waiting, a pipe in his fat hands. Everything about Gunther was fat. At least three hundred pounds, Aaron guessed. Three hundred pounds and not that tall. Gunther lit the pipe. Aaron stared around the room. The walls were lined with books and the windows looked out over Central Park. The inevitable couch stood in one corner. Aaron glanced back at the books. Say something. Something.
“Well, I just don’t seem to be getting anywhere, that’s all.”
“And that’s what brought you here?”
Aaron looked out at the September sun. “No, see, I was robbed. A couple of weeks ago. It upset me. I called the clinic the next day. But they couldn’t give me an interview till now.”
Gunther nodded. “There is nothing in this world so hard to find as an analyst in August.” He paused again, waiting.
“It’s very hard,” Aaron blurted. “Just all of a sudden talking.”
“Well, why don’t you tell me about yourself? What do you do?”
“I’m a writer.”
“A writer? Wonderful. Will you excuse a stupid question, but have you written anything I should have read?”
“No. I only wrote one book. Autumn Wells, I called it. It was rejected.”
“When was this?”
“Three years ago.”
“And everybody rejected it?”
“No. Just this one place. I never sent it out after that.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know; I meant to. I just never quite got around to doing it.”
“And the past three years?”
“I ...” A shrug. “I ...” A quick smile. “Nothing. Nothing.”
“All right, we can come back to that. Tell me this. Where—”
“I went to the movies! O.K.? For three years. I went to the movies. Every day. Oh, I did other things, but mostly I just went to the movies. That’s all. That’s all.”
“I hope for your sake you like them.”
Aaron laughed. “Of course I like them. I’m not that crazy.”
“I’ll tell you if you’re that crazy,” Gunther said, and then he laughed, all of him, shaking up and down. “You’re embarrassed about it?”
“Wouldn’t you be?”
“Why did you go?”
“It passed the time. No,
more than that. I don’t know. I just went, that’s all.”
“And how did you afford this cinematic orgy?”
“Odd jobs, this and that.”
“How odd is your present job?”
“I drive a taxi. On weekends. I have the last couple of years. It gets me by.”
“Did you go to college?”
“Yessir. Princeton.”
“Finish?”
“Yessir.”
“How were your grades?”
“Good enough.”
“Honors?”
“That’s right.”
“I thought so.” Gunther smiled. “Sometimes I’m terribly acute,” he said. “Tell me, Mr. Fire, couldn’t you have gotten a better job somewhere in this city?”
“I guess so. I tried one or two. I don’t take orders very well.”
“You were fired?”
“I was fired.”
“Did that please you?”
Aaron lit another cigarette. “I don’t understand.”
“Let it pass. Where do you live now?”
“West Eighty-fourth Street. Between Amsterdam and Columbus.”
“Of your own choice?”
“Yessir.”
“That’s supposed to be the worst street in the city.”
“Yessir, you bet it is.”
“Is that why you live there?”
“What does that mean?”
“What do you think it means?”
“I live there—” Aaron jammed out his cigarette—“I live there because when I was looking for a place there was a place there I could afford, so I took it, O.K.?”
“O.K.”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I shouldn’t have talked to you like that.”
“Why shouldn’t you?”
Aaron shrugged.
“Because you’re afraid I won’t like you and if I don’t like you I won’t recommend you to the clinic, is that it?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. Fire, the last person I recommended was a young woman who was practically a carbon copy of my first wife whom I loathed beyond belief. Does that make you feel any better?”
“Yes.”
“Swear at me if you want to, Mr. Fire. Do anything you want, except please stop saying ‘I don’t know’ to questions we both know you know the answers to, O.K.?”
“O.K.”
“Now, you said you were robbed.”
“Yes.”
“Who robbed you?”
“Some guy.”
“Where did this happen?”
“Over near Ninth Avenue. Between Ninth and Tenth. At night.”
“A slum area?”
“Yes.”
“You were walking alone through this slum area at night and some guy robbed you?”
“Yes.”
“Are you lying?”
“Yes.”
Gunther put his pipe down. “Please, Fire—”
“I don’t want to talk about the robbery.”
“That’s a hell of a thing to tell an analyst. ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ ”
“I don’t. It’s not important.”
“You just finished saying it was what brought you here.”
“I was probably lying again.”
“Do you lie a lot?”
“Yes, yes, all the ti—No, I don’t lie. I never lie, except sometimes I do.”
“Well, that about covers it,” Gunther said. He emptied his pipe in the wastebasket, then filled it again. “Fire, you want to get accepted at the Institute, don’t you?”
“Oh yes. I must.”
Gunther lit his pipe. “Tell me about your family, Fire.”
“My father’s dead.”
“And your mother?”
“She’s all right. My sister too.”
“When did your father die?”
“Long time ago.”
“Do you remember anything about it?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“I mean I haven’t tried.” Try.
“How?”
“Just think about it. Close your eyes. Try and remember.”
Aaron closed his eyes. Then he opened them. “No,” he said. “Nothing.”
“Take your time. Humor me; do it again.”
Aaron closed his eyes. He sat very stiffly in the chair, his eyes shut tight. Gunther puffed on his pipe. “The grass,” Aaron said, and then he shook his head, eyes wide. “That’s funny.”
“Funny?”
“All of a sudden my throat—I felt like I wanted to cry.”
“Try it again. Please.”
Aaron leaned back in the chair, his hands over his eyes. “He died on the grass. It was very green. It—no.”
“Go on.”
“No. I had that feeling again.”
“I’ve seen tears.”
“Not mine, you haven’t.”
“True, Fire, not yours.”
“Look, he died on the grass. He fell down on the grass and he died. That’s all there is. I don’t want to talk about it.”
Gunther smiled. “That and the robbery you don’t want to talk about.”
“Correct.”
“Did you report the robbery?”
“Hell no.”
“I would have if I’d been robbed. I would have gone to the police. Why didn’t you?”
“Are you trying to insinuate something?”
Gunther said nothing.
“Look, I didn’t report it because I didn’t want to because I didn’t have much money on me so what was the point because who wants to get mixed up with the cops when you don’t have to anyway?”
Gunther heaved his bulk around in the chair so that he was facing the desk and jotted down something on a piece of paper.
“What are you doing?”
Gunther finished his note.
“What are you writing down there? Is it about me? What are you writing about me?”
“Anyone ever tell you you’re suspicious?”
“What did you write down about me?”
“It’s a reminder to myself to pick up my wife’s clothes at the cleaner’s.” He held out the paper. “Read for yourself.”
Aaron waved his hand. “No. I’m sorry.”
“What did you think I was writing?”
“What do you know about me?”
“Just what you’ve told me. Precious little.”
“I thought you were putting something down about me,” Aaron said. “There’s this thing about shrinkers. You never know what they’re thinking.”
“What in the world are you afraid of?”
“I’m not afraid of anything.”
Gunther smiled.
“I’m not. Not of anything.”
Gunther watched him, the smile lingering.
“You’re the suspicious one,” Aaron said. “Not me. Can we get a little air in here? That pipe, it’s very strong.”
“Help yourself.” And Gunther indicated the window.
Aaron rose from the chair, hurrying across the room, yanking the window up. “There. That’s a lot better.” He stared out. “Central Park,” he said. “You take the rest of the city, just leave me Central Park.”
“How long have you lived here?”
“Three years.”
“And you don’t like it?”
“I hate it.”
“Why don’t you leave?”
Aaron just looked at him. “Leave New York?”
“It’s been done.”
“I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. You come to New York, you don’t leave it, I mean, nobody’s from New York. They’re all from Kansas City or Pittsburgh or Roanoke, Virginia. But they come here. They don’t like it, but they don’t leave either. Nobody likes it here. You’re not supposed to like it here. But you gotta come anyway. It’s the place. New York’s the place. But you’re not supposed to like it.”
“And you came her
e to be a writer.”
“Yes.”
“Are you a good writer?”
Aaron said nothing.
“We haven’t got much time, Fire. Now come back and sit down and tell me.”
Aaron sat down. “I don’t know,” he said. “I used to think I was. Once, I was positive. Now I don’t know anymore.”
“These past three years—have you written?”
“It’s hard to write here. To concentrate, I mean. There’s so much to do.”
“What did you do? I know, you went to the movies. Besides that?”
“I wrote a little. Not much. Nothing, really. I don’t know. Things. Like that.”
“Social life?”
“Oh, sure. I went out with a lot of girls. I did that. I dated plenty.”
“Read?”
“Sure. No, not so much. Like I said, it’s hard to concentrate, there’s so much to do.”
“What are you afraid of?”
“Nothing.”
“I’ve had that answer. What are you afraid of?”
“Not you! I’ll tell you that. Not you and your stupid questions.”
“Then why won’t you answer them?”
“I will! Ask me anything! I’ll answer it. Go ahead. Ask me anything!”
“Why didn’t you report the robbery to the police?”
Aaron had to laugh. He looked across at the fat bland face and he roared. “I know what you’re thinking and you’re wrong. As a matter of fact, I’m living with this girl right now. A dancer. She’s a dancer and as far as sex is concerned she’s practically a nymphomaniac and I’m the first guy she’s found who can satisfy her. In her whole life, the first guy.”
“How long have you been living with her?”
“Eight, nine months; going on a year.”
“You plan to marry her?”
“Hell no.”
“Why not?”
“She’s a spic! Her name’s Chita. You just can’t go around marrying a girl named Chita. What do you think my mother would do if I brought some girl named Chita home to marry? Chita Lopez. Boy, that’d be funny if I brought old Chita home. Not that there’s anything wrong with the way she looks, you understand. She’s great-looking. She’s got this incredible body, not skinny like most dancers. I mean she’s got these great breasts and a real ass on her. But she’s lithe like a dancer. The things she can do with that body. You wouldn’t believe what she can do. And her face is pretty. Oh, she’s dark, sure, but really pretty. Big black eyes and a nasty mouth. And she’s smart, too. Not one of those dumb spies. She had two years of college—she majored in English—she reads all the time. That’s how we met, because of the reading. See, I carry a book with me in the cab and she got in and she had a book too and she said was I reading that book—it was Crime and Punishment by Dostoevski—and I said I was and she said that that was funny because most cab drivers don’t read and I pointed at her book and said neither did most Puerto Ricans and we both laughed and after that we got to talking and she gave me her name and when I got off duty I called her and we went for a walk in Central Park, talking about this and that, books mostly, and when we were done walking we went to her place and she said she really liked me but she wasn’t sure we ought to shack up on account of her being, like I said, almost a nymphomaniac that nobody could satisfy but I told her I was the boy so we hit the sack and she was a tiger growling and clawing at me but I stayed with her right to the end riding her down and afterwards she kissed me like a little baby and kept saying I was right, I was her boy, over and over, I was her boy, and then she had to go to work at this club and I went along, sitting at the best table by myself even though the place was packed with all these guys, and when Chita came out they went crazy just from watching her, screaming her name and jumping up and waving money, but she just looked at me and that was something, let me tell you, all these guys going crazy, and I sat there smiling because it was me she wanted, not any of the other guys, just me, I was her boy, so we’ve been together ever since and she loves me something awful, waits on me, does what I tell her, she really loves me and I suppose she wants to marry me and she really is a great thing, smart and gorgeous, but it’s strictly a bed relationship, what we have, at least as far as I’m concerned that’s all it can ever be, strictly a bed relationship, even though she loves me and brings me presents and is great-looking with two years of college and ... and ...” Aaron closed his eyes. “It’s not ringing true, is it?”
The Novels of William Goldman: Boys and Girls Together, Marathon Man, and the Temple of Gold Page 61