Then I realize that Dave has gone back inside his apartment. How long have I been out here talking to myself ?
***
Dave once asked me if I ever sleep. He’s seen the blue glow of the television flickering in my window in the small hours of night. I tell him, yeah, the TV’s on, but only for background noise. It’s nice to have voices in the room other than my own. I can’t sleep through the night, and often wake to the pitch-black of solitude. The mind can go to bad places in the time it takes to reach the remote.
“That would drive me crazy,” Dave told me, “all that racket.”
What troubles me is the silence.
Funny thing about the Lurking Man : He’s loudest in the dark. Throw on the light and he’s reduced to a whisper. Even the dimmest light is better than none. That, neighbor, is why I sleep with the TV on at night.
***
“What is your name ?” I ask the girl sitting on her mother’s lap.
She’s a tiny thing, like her mother, who can’t be more than twenty. Two butterfly clips contain her hair behind her ear, the velvety black of it coiled around her copper neck. I’m describing the mom. She is smiling, even more than her child, like it’s her first time talking to Santa. Eventually, the kid will go gaga for St. Nick, but at this age, it’s all for the parents.
“Her name’s Aiko.”
“What a beautiful name. Ho, ho, ho.”
The webcam is a knothole into other people’s lives. This is my way to live in the world without leaving my apartment. Aiko’s house is cozy and warm. There is a red-brick fireplace, a wine glass on a wooden countertop and a dog bed in the corner.
“Is this your first Christmas ?” I ask.
“Her second,” says the mom.
I add up the photographs nailed to the living room wall and it’s a perfect ten. The house is an unbearable white. A cream-tile kitchen is in the background, with a stove, an oven, a dishwasher. I imagine myself there, making eggs Florentine for breakfast on a lazy Sunday. The computer monitor catches the glint of the mother’s wedding ring, and I imagine how the matching band would feel on my finger.
Except the ring finger on my left hand is gone. I cut it off.
The mother bounces the kid on her knee. “Can you say hello to Santa ?”
Instead, Aiko starts screaming. I should be focusing on the kid, but can’t take my eyes off the mom. She is so happy. It’s a look I can’t replicate. She is wearing a yellow top, and she’s soft and smooth around the edges.
“What’s your name ?” I ask the mother, but I don’t think she hears me.
“Aiko, can you say bear ?” she says, and I start growling to impress the mom. I stand and wave my arms like a bear, but this only disturbs the child. I realize my left hand is showing, and I quickly pull it down and stuff it into a pocket.
“Ho, ho, ho.”
“Maybe we’ll try again later,” the woman says as she slips a pacifier into Aiko’s mouth. The child spits it out. She won’t stop crying.
“Don’t go. Just tell Santa what you want. Merry Christmas. What’s your name, Mom ? Aiko, what’s Mommy’s name ?”
The connection is cut, and I decide that’s enough work for today.
***
When I told my neighbor Dave how the TV thing works, he asked me what shows I liked to watch. Sitcoms, cartoons, I told him, but always reruns. He asked why, and I told him it’s the certainty that I like. A rerun can only end one way, and that’s the way it’s always ended. People can only say the things they’ve always said. There are no variables, no risks. In a world of chaos, reruns are safe harbors where we are in control of our universe. We know everything before it happens, and we laugh not because we’re surprised, but because we knew it all along.
***
I’m shaken up by my session with Aiko, a name that I’ve transferred from the child to the mother. Aiko. My beloved. A beauty like her deserves a name, and if she wouldn’t share it with me, it’s mine to create. I think of her ivory house. I think of her pearl-white life. And then I think of mine.
I shut down my computer and take off the beard and scratch my itchy face. That beard is a killer. I work for SantaCam four weeks in December, and by the end of it my neck is as red as the Santa suit. I look at the poster behind me. It’s a mountaintop, probably in Colorado or Canada, places I’ve never been, but it’s good enough, I suppose. I’ve checked out the other SantaCam actors, and some go all out : actual Christmas trees for backdrops, plastic reindeer. One guy turned his den into a wonderland, and another put felt antlers on his Boston terrier. Me, I put up a poster, but it’s better than nothing. If not for that, the kids would see an efficiency apartment long overdue for a cleaning.
What do kids know of loneliness ? Enough. They may not understand it, but they recognize it when they see it. Maybe the poster itself is a giveaway—or maybe just the fact that a forty-year-old man would dress up in a costume and talk to children over the Internet for money. No wonder that kid was crying. Nobody wants to meet a sad Santa.
***
I realize after I take off the Santa suit that I have no clean clothes to change into. Washday passed without notice, and every piece of clothing I own is smelling up the linen basket. It’s got to be ten below outside, and all I’ve got for clean clothes is a pair of Hawaiian shorts and an undershirt. How am I going to walk to the laundromat dressed like that ? I realize the Santa suit is the warmest, cleanest thing I own. I put it back on, except for the beard, of course, and carry my linen basket outside. I pass Dave on my way out of the apartment.
“Don’t forget to check your list twice,” he says.
Asshole.
During the two-block walk to the laundromat I imagine what I could have said to Dave. Or better yet, what I should have done. I should have dropped the basket and kicked him in the side of the knee. Right at the joint. The fucker would drop in the snow, howling in pain, and I’d calmly pick up my basket and walk away.
When you have anxiety, the whole world is a weapon. Chain-link, loose rocks, subway platforms. Everywhere, I see the thousand ways I could be the victim of a killing or mutilation—or worse, the ways in which I could be the perpetrator. At the laundromat, I imagine shoving an elderly man into the dryer and loading it up with quarters. A small child could easily fit inside the turbo washer. Maybe two. The violence that could be wrought with laundry detergent and wire clothes hangers is particularly gruesome, and in a pinch, you could just fill the slop sink with water and hold someone’s face under.
These are the movies the Lurking Man shows me that I don’t want to see. The worst thing is that once seen, I can’t forget them. They keep replaying, and all I can do is watch. Imagine the worst thing you can think of—pounding a hammer against your own forearm, or gutting a loved one—and now imagine thinking about that all day. Maybe then you’d understand.
***
It’s officially evening when I get back from the laundromat. I check the mail : two overdue credit card bills and a check from Anomie Inc., the company that runs SantaCam.com. They pay me fifteen cents a minute, which works out to nine bucks an hour. Except, I don’t get paid for every minute I’m logged into the Web host—only the times I’m actually connected with a customer. Some days I’ll be logged in for eight hours, but only get paid for two.
The check is for seventy-six dollars—a week’s work.
If I have the energy, I’ll cash it tomorrow.
I make macaroni and cheese for dinner. I don’t have an oven or a stovetop, like my customers do, just a one-basin sink, a microwave and a hot plate. I eat dinner straight from the pot with ketchup for spice. I can’t stop thinking about Aiko. I wonder if she’s back online, trying to get her baby a bear. I log into SantaCam.com in case she’s there. There are only two other Santas on the clock right now. We don’t get many hits at ten at night. I sit around for a few minutes, and then I get a ping. I click on the button to go live, but instead of a child, the stupid, grinning heads of t
wo teenaged boys fill the screen.
“Check out this one,” the dark-haired one says. “Check out this fat fuck.”
There are five syllables in the phrase, Check out this fat fuck.
The other one—a skinny punk with acne so bad the right side of his face looks like a blister—points at me with a laugh so twisted it looks like he’s melting. “What is that, a ski poster ? Where’s your tree, Santa ?”
I think about that for a moment, but don’t answer. I smile and say, “Ho, ho, ho,” and this only makes them laugh harder. This happens sometimes, especially in the later hours. I complained to the web host, and he or she (I don’t know because everything is done by e-mail) said it happens to all the Santas. I think it only happens to me.
The dark-haired one has full, pink lips, and though he’s got that misshapen look most teenagers have, I bet he does better with the ladies than his pizza-faced friend. He slides his tongue across his lips. “You ass-fuck any elves tonight, Santa ?”
That question has ten syllables. It’s perfect, and I let out an easy breath. Our SantaCam training manual says to play it straight. Never break character. “Santa’s married,” I say. “To Mrs. Claus.”
The red-cheeked kid is howling now, and the good-looking one falls to the floor holding his gut. I go with it. “What would you boys like for Christmas ?”
They’re laughing so hard they squeak like rodents. The acne kid stands up. He’s got on gray sweatpants. “I know what you want, Santa,”
“Ho, ho, ho,” I say, because tacked on to what the kid just said it adds up to ten.
The kid loosens the drawstrings and lowers his pants. His tiny, uncircumcised cock fills the monitor. He shakes his hips so that it swings back and forth like the clapper of a church bell. Behind him, the other kid starts singing a Christmas carol badly off-key.
“Ho, ho, ho,” I say. “Merry Christmas.”
You might wonder, neighbor, why I put up with this, why I log in to SantaCam at a time when only cruel, shallow people are online. I’ll explain that the same day you can explain why I fantasize about cutting the webbing of my toes with a razorblade.
***
Around eleven-thirty, I turn off the computer and turn on the TV. I lie down and flip through the channels looking for sitcoms and cartoons. I’ll even watch infomercials. My favorites are for food gadgets. If someone’s found a faster way to cook a turkey, I’m glued to the screen, even if I’ve never made a turkey. There is comfort in watching other people chop vegetables, knowing they won’t suddenly start carving up their co-host.
Soon, it’s past midnight, and we’re entering the small hours. The ones, the twos, the threes—we’re a long way from ten. The Lurking Man can show up any time of day, of course. But the small hours—this is where he lives. We’re in his home now, passing through in darkness like the moon crossing the ecliptic plane.
I try to call up a new movie, one set in Aiko’s kitchen. In this film I wake up each day and actually look forward to what’s ahead. I wrap an arm around her narrow waist and don’t even mind her morning breath. I make coffee without fear of throwing it in anyone’s face. I run the blender, and there is only juice inside. No blood, no bones. I hold my left hand in front of my face and wiggle my fingers. They’re all there. They’re all there. My eye catches the glint of the gold band on my ring finger.
And here’s where the movie falls apart. There is no ring. There is no finger. Aiko’s world is illusion, and I can only glimpse it through my webcam. But if I watch the screen just right, my reflection is transposed onto the houses on the other end. This is how I inhabit their lives. On my computer screen. It’s like watching myself in a rerun. I am there in Aiko’s kitchen. In a place she can’t see.
The dog-eared notebook sits on my bedside table, numbers claustrophobically crowded between blue lines. Placing my finger in the phone dial, I gently scroll to the first number. The dial clicks along as I spin to the remaining six digits. I press the phone to my ear, shivers traveling down my spine like rain drops trailing down a window.
There’s the familiar click as someone answers the phone, followed immediately by a “Hello ?” The voice is definitely female, and a bit raspy. Probably belonging to an elder, or maybe just someone who smokes a pack of menthols a day. “Hello ?” she repeats. “Harpers’ residence.”
I close my eyes and breathe in deeply. The Harpers’ residence. The voice on the phone must be Mrs. Harper. Her hair is probably pulled back in a mousy brown bun, graying wisps framing her face. Crows feet mark the corners of her hazel eyes, and her thin lips are usually pressed together as if she’s trying to forget a bitter taste. She works in a grocery store seven days a week, even though her husband promised he would work enough to support them both. After work she smokes cigarettes, waiting for Mr. Harper to return home from the factory. Some days she smokes two or three cigarettes. Some days she finishes the pack.
“Hell-oooo ?” she says again, a hint of annoyance creeping into her voice. There’s a large exhale from across the line, a click, then the beeping of a lost connection. I will most likely never hear the voice of Mrs. Harper again, but I’ve still managed to become a tiny blip on the radio wave of her life. Our paths, for however briefly, have intertwined.
***
When I return home from working the evening shift at St. Anthony’s Senior Care Center, it is usually after ten. My back aches, my feet are sore, and everything smells of disinfectant. With my key in the lock, I often imagine what it would be like to have a family awaiting my return on the other side of the door. I would burst into the room with a “Honey, I’m home !” like a retro sitcom, and my wife would kiss me hello, a sleeping baby in her arms. I twist the key and am greeted by my apartment with its peeling floral wallpaper and wet-sock smell. The lights flicker on, and something with too many legs scuttles for safety beneath the couch. Honey, I’m home.
With no other company, I turn to my phone. I dial a number, writing it down in my notebook so I can look back on it later like a diary entry, a reminder of a life I’ve touched. Goosebumps spread as the rings reverberate. Who will pick up on the other line ? It could be the president of Australia, a whitened-teeth celebrity, or a blue-haired grandmother. The pope, my high school math teacher, or a drug lord. Maybe it’s a single mother balancing three jobs, or maybe it’s a teenager who’s already wrecked their third car. The possibilities are endless. It’s like pushing two quarters into a slot machine, turning the handle, and holding your breath as your prize clinks to the bottom of the chute.
But I never speak. I have nothing to say.
Most people think my call is just a bad connection or spam. There’s a “Hello ? . . . Hello ? . . . ” a click, and they’re gone. Others stay with me for a bit longer. Some girls listen to the silence for a moment before bidding me farewell with a “fuck off, pervert.” Some people think I’m their ex, still pining over them. “Shelley, look, I know it’s you. You have to stop calling, baby. Move on. I have . . . Shelley ?” Some think I’m a ghost. “Joshua, is that you ? What’s it like up there ? I miss you.” In the silence, people hear what they expect to hear.
My phone is my conduit, my medium, reaching through space to connect with disembodied voices. She is a beautiful mahogany rotary phone with gold detail, smooth to the touch and refreshingly cool as I press her metal handset against my ear. I do have a cellphone that I take to work, some flimsy thing that doesn’t even have real buttons—just a touch-screen. Cellphones take away the intimacy of a phone call. With my rotary phone I feel connected, as if the wire connecting the phone base to the handset also connects me to the ones I call. An umbilical cord nourishing us with the same life force.
***
Growing up at the city’s edge, my mother worked three jobs to support our two-person family. The dark bags under her eyes and callused hands proved she loved me. But with Mother at work all the time, I was a bit lonely. None of the kids at school wanted to be my friend. When I try to talk, m
y tongue swells up, and the words in my brain trip over each other as they scramble out of my mouth. That’s how I earned the nickname Stuttering Thomas—a clever parody of the biblical Doubting Thomas, or maybe just an unclever insult, since my name is Thomas and I do, in fact, stutter. The name stuck from elementary school to high school graduation. I laughed along with the kids. God, I just wanted a friend. Someone to share stories with, someone to care for, someone to sit in comfortable silence with. Someone to simply exist with.
I was ten when I made my first phone call. My mother had an olive-green rotary phone on the table near the couch, but forbade me from ever using it, except for emergencies. The only numbers I knew were the numbers of the bars and the factory where she worked, and 911. But Mother was working an overnight shift, and I was lonely. I picked up the plastic phone, and dialed a series of random numbers.
My heart pounded against my chest with each ring.
“Hello, you’ve reached the Millers.”
My words stuck in my throat. I was trembling from head to foot in my threadbare superhero pajamas, a hand-me-down from a nice mother at church.
“Hello, is anybody there ?” the voice asked. I was thrilled. It sounded like a boy my age ! I wanted so desperately to say hello, to ask him how his day was, maybe see if he needed a friend—but my tongue had swelled like an overripe tomato. I knew that if I opened my mouth, he would hear my stutter and laugh. So I only listened as he repeated “hello” a couple more times, and eventually hung up. I made several more phone calls that night, and on other nights when Mother was at work. With voices speaking into my ear, I didn’t feel so lonely.
When Mother got the phone bill at the end of the month, her face whitened and her hands crinkled the corners of the page in her tight grip. “Timmy, have you been using the phone ?” When I confessed that I had been calling my friends, she yelled. We couldn’t afford to talk on the phone whenever we pleased. I should’ve known better.
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