Well

by Matthew McIntosh

  I bribed a kid who worked in the office to tell me what her name was, what her story was—she’d been kicked out of St Mary’s for questionable behavior—what classes she had, what hall her locker was in. I changed my normal routes through campus. I made sure to pass by her locker as often as I could. I spied on her in her classes through the thin strip of window built into the doors and she always seemed bored. I found that she lived just a few blocks away from me on a cul-de-sac that, in twelve years of living in the same house, I’d never been down. And after a few days of careful observation, I discovered that she walked home from school.

  On a Tuesday, I managed to catch her at a DON’T WALK sign and I offered her a ride home. She looked around and got in. I said hello, and offered her my hand, which she shook. Her hand was very small. I told her a few rudimentary things about my life, true and otherwise, and soon we were outside of her house where, as well as I was able to, I asked her out on a date which she—and I’ve never understood why—accepted.

  I skipped school the next day and drove into Seattle to find a suitable restaurant. I toured eight in the downtown area and finally reserved a table next to a window at a pricey seafood place overlooking the Sound. I washed my mother’s car and had it detailed to the bone. I went into what had been my dad’s closet and took out one of the suits he had left behind. I had it pressed. I took a pair of his shoes, a size too large, and had them shined. And then that evening I took a shower and washed with fancy soap, combed my hair straight back with gel. I put on the suit and crammed wadded-up toilet paper in the back of each shoe. I made my brother and my mother dinner, fixed her a drink, and on my way out, I straightened the pillow beneath her head and turned the volume up on the television. “Wish me luck!” I said, and I was off.

  Emily walked out before I could get to the door. She was wearing jeans and a gray sweatshirt, her hair held back in a ponytail. She stopped in the driveway, looking concerned.

  “I thought we were going roller-skating,” she said.

  I was a bit overcome, and because of this, I couldn’t do anything but stare.

  “Will?” she said.

  “I figured we might go into the city for dinner.”

  “I said I go roller-skating on Thursdays,” she said. “Are you wearing a suit?”

  “What?” I said.

  “I told you we were going to meet some people,” she said. “Why are you wearing that suit?”

  “I already made reservations,” I said. “I’ll be out fifty bucks if we don’t show up.”

  She made a face, squinting her eyes a little in what was probably confusion. “I guess I should go change,” she said, and she turned around and walked back towards the front door. “I really wish you didn’t do that.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” I said.

  We drove to the restaurant, a few miles an hour under the limit and in the slow lane for safety purposes, and everything went extraordinarily well. We ate and talked about school and the world. I told her my dad was a somewhat godlike patent attorney—whatever that was—and my mother was a freelance marine biologist. I created a world for myself that was more hopeful than the one currently developing. I told her I was considering Harvard and Yale, but that I hadn’t made up my mind yet. They both seemed somewhat stuffy, I added, and I might decide to forego a year and stay in town. While I was talking, I pictured the two of us falling madly in love with each other and raising a litter of happy little kids. They’d have my blue eyes and her pink complexion and absolutely no resemblance to my parents. We’d be well postured and dynamic and throw dinner parties for the more stable of the families in the neighborhood. But in this fantasy, and in similar ones I would later construct in my head, there were always two people—figures, anyway—waiting patiently in the dark on the back patio for the right moment to open the door and change everything. I tried to put them, whoever they were, far into the depths of my mind.

  Eventually, because there was no way around it, I had to take her home. She thanked me and I burst from the car and walked her up the driveway, and when we were at the door she turned around and—possibly feeling obliged to—patted my shoulder softly with her hand. And then I made a grab for her breast and tried to plant one on her neck, an act that served to fundamentally change our relationship forever.

  I went home and slammed the front door loudly. I trudged upstairs and wrote in my notepad, Dinner—exquisite. Grabbed Emily’s tit. Blew it. We dig our own holes, I wrote, and attributed the quote to Anonymous. I don’t think I knew what it meant. I thought she might eventually come around and want to go out again, but she never did. I thought I could convince her to like me again, but I never did. That night I lay on my bed for a long time staring up at my fishtank, and then I drove around looking for my old man’s car.

  I was coming up with a grand philosophy that I normally believed wholeheartedly, and on my best days, at least halfheartedly. It was that We live in a world built on sorrow. That was the gist of it—it’s written that way in my notebook—and I’m not sure exactly how I clarified it, even internally, but I think the whole thing had a lot to do with the way my mother had been deteriorating the past few years. It made sense to me that she had tapped into something sorrowful and dangerous about the world and wasn’t finding her way out of it. I was convinced that I was slowly tapping into it, myself. The world was built on sorrow, that seemed clear. But I didn’t know why.

  When Emily wouldn’t talk to me, I resorted to strange manifestations of my sorrow. I began calling her at odd hours and asking her questions about sorrow and ache. I’d ask her if one could be sure of anything, really, in the world. Sometimes I would call and not say anything.

  She had my number blocked and I started slipping poems into her locker, poems filled with the most obvious and clichéd love imagery, rhymes with words like parlance and substance, and at the end (after what could be ten or twelve hand-size notebook pages), the last stanzas would inevitably grow darker, the flower would die, the bird would mysteriously fall from the sky or get sucked into a jet’s engine; the beautiful fish would flop around without oxygen and die in the throes of melancholy.

  A few times I showed up at Ivan’s Fish Bar and ordered nothing but water. I’d say that I wished to be served by the young blonde gal from the flyer. She would come out and pour my water silently, without looking at me. The third time I did this, I directed some loud and obnoxious comments toward the rest of the restaurant and was banned for life.

  I spent a lot of time sitting with my mother watching television or lying in my room, and whenever I would feel something out of the ordinary, something I was sure was a creation of my own mind, a breeze, maybe, from a closed window, or an itch on my leg that I couldn’t explain, I’d go to my desk and write another poem, make another phone call.

  And then one night, after I’d tucked my brother in, I lay in bed and listened with my hands over my ears to my mother throwing up in the bathroom. A very strange thing happened right then. I saw two figures standing in my closet among my jackets. They were of average size and stood stock-still. They seemed to be waiting for something, though what, I didn’t know. They stayed there in the shadows, just out of reach of the pool of light that spilled across my carpet from my window and the street outside—they stayed there, motionless, for probably ten minutes, and then, without warning, they disappeared.

  I knew that this—whatever it was—was extremely significant, the sort of occurrence, the sort of sign, that would be a sin to ignore. I went down into the garage and got my dad’s ladder and I carried it three blocks to Emily’s cul-de-sac and into the backyard of the house facing hers. I set my ladder up on the back patio and looked through the sliding glass doors where a man and a woman were sitting on their couch in a brightly lit room watching television. I climbed the ladder, slowly and very softly, and I crawled up the slope of the roof to the top of the V, and then I scooted down the other slope on my backside, inches at a time, until I was at the edge, facing the empty street and
Emily’s house, and then, very carefully, I put my toes against the gutter and stood up. I yelled Emily’s name until her light went on. She opened the window and put her head out.

  “I’m going to jump!” I said. “I mean it!”

  “Don’t!” she said, “Don’t!” and she left the window. More lights turned on inside. I opened and closed my hands. I cleared my throat and waited. It was an overcast night and I was sweating. In the time between coming up with the idea in my room and actually climbing up onto the roof, I’d become very frightened. My legs were shaking and they’d been shaking for a long time. I had a strange feeling in my stomach that was beyond simple fear, something much more solid, and I was afraid it would make a sudden lunge and carry me over the edge with it.

  People were beginning to come out of their houses and gather in the street. Emily ran out in a pink bathrobe with her parents close behind. I came close to falling off the roof right there.

  “What are you doing here?” she said. There was something very fearful in her voice.

  “Nothing,” I said. My own voice was shaking like crazy. “You look nice.”

  “Don’t move!” her mother said. “Don’t move!”

  The crowd was getting bigger. The man and the woman who’d been watching television came out and stood in the middle of the street, staring back at their house, confused and disoriented. I had a strange feeling right then. All those people in the street—I didn’t know them and had never seen most of them before—but I missed them terribly.

  “Someone’s coming to get you down,” Emily’s mother said. “Just stay where you are.”

  “I didn’t know it was this high,” I said.

  I stayed exactly where I was. I waited, and shortly the police came and a fireman climbed up after me and backed me down. It took a long time.

  The cops had me sit in their squad car while they talked to Emily and her parents, and then they got in and drove me toward home. I turned around and looked through the rear window as we pulled away and I saw Emily and her parents walk back toward their house, her dad’s hand on her back, and then Emily, before going in herself, turned for a second, and watched us drive down the street. There was something very touching and romantic about that. I put my hand up to the glass, like I’d seen in a movie. It was a movie where a fugitive had been caught after a chase that had lasted thousands of miles, across every ocean in the world, and his girl tore her clothes and wept and fell to the ground as they drove him away from her. I turned around in my seat and listened. The cops warned me to stay away from Emily. They said her parents were going a little bit crazy with all of this, her dad especially, and it was time I stopped what I was doing for everyone’s sake.

  I warned them about my mother before we got to the door. I said she’d been suffering from a bout of tinnitus and wasn’t feeling herself. She probably wouldn’t say anything, I said, and she didn’t. She sat on the couch while they explained everything, her neck craned back against the cushion, and she stared at the quiet television, sipping from a glass. I sat in a chair and looked from the cops to my mother and back again. I nodded my head to seem agreeable. After they finished, they thanked her for listening, and then they took me outside to the front porch and told me they were going to send someone from an agency to come and see us, but I assured them that everything was fine. “She’s not always like this,” I said. “She’s just not feeling well tonight.” And besides, I told them, my dad would be home any minute.

  When the cops drove away I went inside and stared at the television. A strange-looking man ran into an enormous church. Suddenly a brilliant light poured through the stained-glass windows and flooded the church. The man’s face was filled with the light. It seemed like an odd idea for a movie. I checked to see if my mother was watching but she wasn’t. Her eyes were closed and her head was tilted back against the cushion.

  “This is a weird movie,” I said.

  I began fooling around with a glass bird that had been on the lamp table for as long as I could remember. I stuck it to my forehead and moved it around my face. “I don’t know who those guys were,” I said. “I think they were Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

  She didn’t laugh so I kept talking. “I wasn’t trying to kill myself” I said. I felt the bottoms of my shoes with my hand. The man on the screen ran to the pulpit. He looked like he was shouting. Something bright flew in through one of the windows. “I don’t know what I was trying to do,” I said. “I thought it would just be me and her.”

  I went upstairs and lay on my bed. I watched my fish swim around above me. I felt very lonely. I kept picturing Emily looking back at me from her doorway as the police car pulled away. There were tears in her eyes. I sat down at my desk and wrote a thirteen-page poem about a man in a wheelchair who falls for a young blonde maiden, only to be hit by a semi as he rolls across the street toward her house. This one I seemed to mean more than the others. I put it in an envelope, wrote Emily’s name on it, and delivered it to her mailbox before school the next day.

  A few days later, Emily’s mother called and invited my parents and me over to their house. That afternoon I’d received the letter from the school in Nebraska asking me to come. I was flattered that they wanted me and felt a little bad that I’d have to reject their offer. For this reason, and Emily’s mother’s invitation, I was in a definite whistling mood. I put on my dad’s suit and slicked my hair back, then walked over. It was a warm night and I liked listening to the clopping sound my shoes made on the sidewalk, and the somewhat mythical tones I could make with my whistle. I waved to cars and made clicking noises at any animals I walked by.

  I explained, when I got to the house, that my parents had been unexpectedly called away on business but that they sent their regards, and Emily’s mother led me to a chair in their very large living room. She stood leaning against one wall and I sat on the chair facing Emily’s dad, running my finger over my eyebrows nervously. The house was a palace, high ceilings and paintings of little kids on the walls.

  “Well?” he said.

  “It’s nice to be here, sir,” I said. I looked around. “So this is what it looks like from the inside.”

  “Why don’t you tell me why you won’t leave my daughter alone,” he said.

  “Excuse me?” I said.

  “You heard me.”

  “I do leave her alone.”

  “I’m afraid you’ve got that wrong there, pal,” he said. He seemed much larger than he had two nights before. He was losing his hair at the front and it made him look mean. I noticed his hands were clenched like he had bottle caps in them and was trying to imbed them in his palms. I did that quite a bit, myself.

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand,” I said.

  “I don’t know where your parents are, but let me tell you something,” he said. “I want to make it clear to you that this is your last warning. If you come within ten feet of her, I’ll call the police. Quit calling, stop writing, and stop all your little fucking pranks. You’re going to get yourself killed,” he said. “Take that however you want.”

  I thought this one over while I rubbed my eyebrow. I was confused about the direction the conversation had taken. I wondered if Emily was upstairs. Her mother came and sat down next to her husband and leaned forward toward me. Her arms were crossed in front of her stomach and they pushed up her breasts. She had the same green eyes as Emily, the same color cheeks.

  “Will,” she said. “You’re not acting normal.”

  “I am acting normal,” I said.

  “No,” she said. “You’re not.”

  “I am,” I said.

  “No. You’re not!

  “This is just a bit off-setting, Mrs Swanson,” I said. “I have to admit I thought we were going to talk about something different.”

  “Will,” she said. “Listen. You’ve got to stop harassing Emily.”

  I looked at Emily’s dad. He was leaning back into the couch, very stiffly. “I’ll certainly give it some thought,” I said.<
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  “You’re a sick little fuck,” he said.

  “Frank,” his wife said.

  “You don’t have to insult me, Frank,” I said.

  But Frank was riled up. He opened his hands wide. He leaned forward and pointed a finger at me. “Look you little faggot,” he said, but he didn’t finish. He got up suddenly and went into the other room. He walked over to the bar against one wall, and very loudly, began pouring himself a drink.

  I looked at Emily’s mother for a second. She was looking into the other room, where her husband was. She seemed very concerned about him for some reason. I looked at him too.

  “She’s sleeping with Jim Pierce, you know,” I said. “They do all sorts of sick things together. I’m just telling you.”

  The glass dropped. Her dad came running at me. I saw it coming too late and by the time I did see it, I tried to brace myself against the couch cushion, I tried to turn away, but by then he had reeled back and knocked me across the side of my face. There was a pop and the world went blue. I rolled off the couch and onto the floor. I held my jaw in my hand. There was a loud, high-pitched ringing sound, and I blinked my eyes to keep from losing consciousness. I may have, actually, for a second or two. Then I was on my back, looking up at the ceiling. My soul was about to leave my body; I could taste it in my mouth. I put my finger to my lips and it came back red. Two people were yelling at each other. I made a noise in my chest and in my throat, the sound of confusion.

  Emily’s mother was kneeling over me.

  “God, he’s bleeding,” she said. “Get a towel!”