The Man in the Window

by Jon Cohen

  Louis, in the bed, breathed more slowly.

  He touched another strawberry to his tongue and sat in the grass, gazing down into the small valley at the pond. He could just see Gracie at the end of the dock, her feet dangling in the dim water. Beyond her, Atlas floated on a black inner tube, his body turning slowly this way and then that way, like a compass settling on a bearing. At last, he did settle for a long moment, facing the hillside where Louis sat half-hidden in the grass. Louis saw him lift an arm out of the dark water, and as Atlas waved, drops of water like glittering diamonds fell into the pond. When the last diamond disappeared below the surface of the water, Louis returned his wave.

  Louis, in his bed, raised an arm, then let it fall back on the quilt.

  Did he know Iris was standing just outside his door? If he did, it was only for an instant, and then he was gone again, beyond her presence to a place she couldn’t get to. The place was Malone’s Hardware on a Saturday long ago, and he was standing on Yank Spiller’s shoulders reaching toward a top shelf for a spool of 10-gauge brass wire.

  “Tell you a secret,” Yank whispered to Louis as he eased him back down to the floor. “That ain’t brass at all. It’s gold.”

  Louis’s eyes grew wide.

  “Sure,” said Yank, smiling. “Gold. Malone’s Hardware is full of stuff like that, stuff you think is one thing but is really something else.”

  Louis fingered the spool of deep yellow wire, then looked up at Yank. “Well, how come we sell it? How come we don’t keep it?”

  “We did keep it, didn’t we? For a while, anyways. And now it’s time to let someone else have it.”

  Louis started up the aisle where Mr. Jimmons waited at the counter for his wire. “Do you think Mr. Jimmons knows it’s gold?” Louis whispered to Yank just before they reached the counter.

  “I’m not sure. But you and me know, and that’s good enough.”

  The store was crowded with Saturday customers, and Louis, in his shorts and T-shirt, moved easily among them, answering questions, fetching ball-peen hammers and jigsaw blades, making trips to the basement for Atlas. Atlas eased the customers through the store like a traffic cop, pointing, gesturing, maintaining a steady flow, avoiding snarls in the cluttered aisles and around the counter. He was a marvel, and so was his deputy, Yank, although Yank’s efforts were more subtle—he was not a man to draw attention to himself. Yank would often appear with something off a shelf before a customer had articulated his need for it.

  “I need that gadget,” Louis overheard one man start to say to Atlas, “you know, that thingamabob that goes around the, um, the…” and then easy as you please Yank was at the customer’s side, holding a two-way stopcock. “That’s it!” the man exclaimed with a smile. “Give me three.” And Yank pulled two more out of his pocket and nodded in anticipation of the “Thanks” the customer didn’t have time to say before Yank disappeared to the back of the store.

  Louis, unmoving in his bed, his breathing slowed now to a rate that just sustained his heartbeat, whispered a word. “Thanks,” he said.

  Louis looked around the hardware store, at the Saturday customers coming in and out, at Atlas grinning and telling a story as he rang up a sale on the old cash register, at Yank lining a shelf with new stock, arranging and rearranging until everything was just right. Louis looked at the worn wooden planks of the store, at the rows of shiny tools, and at a reflection of himself in a box of bicycle rearview mirrors, a reflection of a young boy in the perfect place for boys. He smiled at himself, astonished by the pink health of his cheeks, the sleek shape of his nose, the curve of his soft lips. He wanted to stare at himself forever, to stay in the moment forever, in the hardware store, in the world he and Yank understood, watched over by Atlas. Yes, this is where he would stay.

  “Louis.”

  Louis looked once more into the mirror, then turned slowly to the customer’s voice, which repeated his name.

  “Louis,” came the woman’s voice. “Are you there?”

  He turned to face the woman, but he was alone in the aisle. He moved his eyes this way and that, in search of her among the dense clutter of the store.

  “It’s me,” said the voice, pulling at him. “Iris.”

  In bed, Louis opened his eyes, and stared at the blank white of his bedroom ceiling. He took a deep breath and closed them again.

  “You’re there, I know you are,” said Iris. She waited. Then she spoke again. “I heard, Louis. About last night. I heard what happened.”

  Louis closed his eyes tightly and tried to leave again. He imagined the grassy hills of the farm, and the crowded store.

  But Iris came after him. “It was a terrible thing, what Kitty Wilson did.” Iris placed her hand on his door, gently, as if she were touching Louis. “But she was just talking crazy, you know that. You know that.”

  He knew only that Kitty would never find him in the hardware store, hidden amidst its protective abundance. Yank and Atlas would never let her get to him. Iris, stop talking. Let me go.

  “No one believed her. The minute she said it no one believed her, I heard Gracie say so. You saved that awful woman, you rescued her. That’s what everyone believes, because it’s true.”

  Louis shifted on the bed.

  Iris pressed against the door, grateful for the sound of life within the bedroom. “I know what you’re doing, Louis. But you can’t go back to the way it was. You won’t make it in there another sixteen years. I seen you, Louis. I know.” Iris leaned her head against the door and stared at the floor.

  She said, “It’s gonna be that way. You just have to move past it. That’s what I been doing for thirty-seven years, Louis. I just keep moving, right past people like Kitty Wilson, right the hell on by. And, Louis, you see, if it was me and you, together, if it was the two of us, don’t you see, nobody could get to us, because we wouldn’t care. We wouldn’t even notice them. I’d have you,” she said, her voice dropping to a whisper, “and you’d have me.” She pressed so hard against the door, the hinges creaked.

  Oh Iris, Louis thought, his mind flashing to the grassy hillside again. But this time he had brought Iris with him, she was at his side, they were arm in arm in the warm sun, roaming the hills, picking strawberries.

  At last, Louis spoke. “Iris.”

  Her head pulled back from the door. “Yes?” she said. “Yes Louis?”

  “Stay here with me,” he said.

  She waited for him to go on, but he didn’t. “How do you mean?”

  “In here with me. Stay in this house with me.”

  “I’m not sure what… I don’t get what you’re saying, Louis.”

  Louis sat up on the edge of the bed and faced the door. “Don’t go back out there, Iris. You don’t have to go out anymore. You and I would be together in here, and we wouldn’t have to worry. We wouldn’t bother anyone, and no one would bother us.”

  “But, Louis,” Iris started.

  “I do want to be with you, Iris.”

  I do want to be with you. Iris placed a hand on his doorknob, and she would turn it, and enter his room, the room of the only man in the world who wanted to be with her. Together, they would sit before the window, hands joined, at a distance from all that might harm them. In the spring, they would be there watching the azaleas. In the summer, they would listen to the crickets. In the fall, they would smell the leaves, and in the winter, the snows would not touch them. Nothing would touch them, and they would sit, hand in hand, together, day after day, Iris and her Louis.

  She did not turn the doorknob. “Oh Louis,” she said softly, letting her hand drop as she stepped back from the door.

  Louis, from his room, could feel her decide.

  “Oh Louis, I’m sorry. I can’t do it.” Her eyes filled as she spoke. “You see, I live outside. It hasn’t ever been easy for me. But I done the best I could with it, and I found things I enjoy, and lots of things I don’t, and it’s evened out somehow. I’d miss it, Louis. If I stayed in this house, even with you,
I’d miss it. I can’t just watch. I got to be out here, because it’s where I belong, even though looking at myself I don’t always believe it, that I belong here, but I guess I really do, no matter what. So what I’m saying is…”

  “Good-bye,” whispered Louis.

  Yes, he knew what she was saying. She touched one finger to his door, as if to his cheek, and turned quickly down the stairs.

  Louis listened to the sound of Iris leaving him, her footsteps on the stairs, the front door slamming behind her. Silence. His dark room instantly silent, and too small, and Iris gone. He needed light. He touched the light switch and that wasn’t enough, because the light he craved came from outside. He ran to his window and pulled up the shade, and there was a blaze of light, he was immersed in it, revealed by it. Iris walked in the light, across his lawn toward the street, her back to him. Louis saw Iris, and below him, in the light of his vision, Gracie and Arnie together on the porch steps, and at the edges of the light, apart from Iris and Gracie and Arnie, there were others. At first he couldn’t see them, but gradually, as he stood before his window, he did. There was Atlas, yes, Atlas, and at his side stood a woman Louis didn’t know but who must have been LuLu. They were smiling. They lifted their hands in greeting, and so did Bev and Bert, because they were there too, and Yank Spiller. Yank smiled shyly, and he waved, and so did Carl, and Mrs. Meem, with her dog sitting beside her wagging its tail. Yes, there was Harvey Mastuzek, and Jim Rose, and Mr. Hollister, his old gym teacher, and all of Louis’s school friends, and Francine Koessler lifting Minky’s paw and waving it up to him. Ariel Nesmith touched her hand to her lips and threw him a kiss, and Mrs. Bingsley stepped out from behind her red azalea, smiling and waving. Everyone was there.

  Louis pressed himself against the window glass, turned away from his room and the years alone that he had spent there, his eyes on Iris moving across the front lawn, his eyes on everyone he had ever known. The glass trembled and bent as he pressed still harder against it, as he understood that he would join them and the world they lived in, the world they were. Louis, the window splintering around him, entered the light.

  “Iris,” he cried.

  Iris already knew. What made her turn at the moment before Louis jumped through his window, how did she know? But knowing, she did turn, and ran toward him, ran as she had never run before. She was back across the lawn in an instant, even before Gracie, standing on the porch steps, had time to react. Iris positioned herself, planted her feet firmly in the tulip bed, and watched him come to her, the two ends of his scarf fluttering behind him like purple wings. She looked up at Louis, and beyond him to the sky, her strong arms outstretched, ready to break his fall.

  Afterword

  The world was all before them, where to choose

  Their place of rest, and Providence their guide:

  They, hand in hand, with wandering steps and slow,

  Through Eden took their solitary way.

  John Milton, Paradise Lost

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank: Nancy Pearl, Theresa Park, Alex Greene, Peter Knapp, Alan Turkus, Mary Hasbrouck, D.E.A. Dalton, Molly Cohen, Lucia Kearney, Merrie Lou Cohen, Peter Folger Torrey, Kathy Malone, National Endowment for the Arts.

  Reader’s Guide for

  The Man in the Window

  Discussion Questions

  I SPENT a lovely afternoon in April with Jon Cohen and Mary, his wife. I asked him if there were any questions about his novel that he thought would be interesting for book groups to discuss. He suggested questions 3, 4, and 5.

  The original American and British editions of The Man in the Window have slightly different last paragraphs. Here is how the American edition ended: Louis pressed himself against the window glass, turned away from his room and the years alone that he had spent there, his eyes on Iris moving across the front lawn, his eyes on everyone he had ever known. The glass trembled and bent as he pressed still harder against it, as he understood that he would join them and the world they lived in, the world they were. Louis, the window splintering around him, entered the light.

  And here’s the British version:

  Louis pressed himself against the window glass, turned away from his room and the years alone that he had spent there, his eyes on Iris moving across the front lawn, his eyes on everyone he had ever known. The glass trembled and bent as he pressed still harder against it, as he understood that he would join them and the world they lived in, the world they were. Louis, the window splintering around him, entered the light.

  “Iris,” he cried.

  Iris already knew. What made her turn at the moment before Louis jumped through his window, how did she know? But knowing, she did turn, and ran toward him, ran as she had never run before. She was back across the lawn in an instant, even before Gracie, standing on the porch steps, had time to react. Iris positioned herself, planted her feet firmly in the tulip bed, and watched him come to her, the two ends of his scarf fluttering behind him like purple wings. She looked up at Louis, and beyond him to the sky, her strong arms outstretched, ready to break his fall to earth.

  As you can see, the edition you’re holding has a third version. Which one do you prefer? Why? Do the different versions lead you to interpret the ending differently?

  Cohen avoids a Hollywood treatment of his characters: Iris never joins Weight Watchers and becomes svelte; Louis doesn’t find a plastic surgeon who can make his face look like it did before the fire. If he had embraced those stereotypically “feel good” conclusions, how would that have changed your feelings about the novel?

  What are we to make of Atlas seeing an angel, and later Louis seeing his father as an angel, or the Tube Man—who is in a coma—foretelling a meeting between Iris and Louis? Why would Cohen include some elements of magical realism in what is otherwise a very realistic novel?

  When they reveal their inner thoughts, all the characters in The Man in the Window have deep, almost spiritual revelations about the world and their place in it. Is there a specific worldview that all of the characters in the novel share?

  Is it healthy to see the world in the “unfiltered” way that Louis does? That is, is he overly sensitive to wonder? Do we need to have blinders on to be effective in the world?

  Suggestions for Further Reading

  IF WHAT you enjoyed about The Man in the Window was the adroit mix of humor and poignancy, try:

  It’s the early 1940s in Steve Kluger’s Last Days of Summer, and 12-year-old Brooklynite and baseball fanatic Joey Margolis—who’s badly in need of a father figure in his life—develops an improbable friendship with the N.Y. Giants star rookie Charlie Banks.

  Don Robertson’s The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread introduces us to 9-year-old Morris Bird III (known by unkind classmates as Morris Bird the Turd) who decides, one day in 1944, to walk to the other side of Cleveland to visit a friend and, pulling his little sister in a wagon, comes face to face with history.

  If you enjoyed looking at the world through the eyes of Louis and Iris, two outsiders, try:

  In The Dork of Cork by Chet Raymo, Frank Bois, who’s 43 years old and 43 inches high, finds that nothing in his life is the way it was before he wrote a book about the night sky that, totally unexpectedly, became a best seller.

  The title character in Mendel’s Dwarf by Simon Mawer is Dr. Benedict Lambert, a geneticist with an abiding interest in his own condition, who finds that his love affair with a shy librarian changes their lives in quite unexpected ways.

  In Elizabeth McCracken’s The Giant’s House, a spinster librarian finds companionship and love with a teenage boy who suffers from a growth disorder that eventually makes him the tallest person in the world.

  Thirty-year-old Lyman, the main character in Joe Coomer’s The Loop, spends his days driving Fort Worth’s loop road picking up road kill for the county and his evenings taking one class after another at the community college. But all that changes when first a parrot, and then a young woman (another librarian!), ent
er his life.

  In Sonia Gernes’s The Way to St. Ives, the deaths of her overbearing mother and only brother give Rosie Deane, a middle-aged spinster, the chance, at last, to blossom.

  For those who enjoyed meeting an assortment of quirky characters in The Man in the Window, try:

  Tim Winton’s Cloudstreet is the story of two families—the Pickles and the Lambs—who are brought together at first by the hard times in Australia following World War II and at last by a marriage.

  Timothy Schaffert’s The Coffins of Little Hope features quirky characters, humor, compassion, and insight into human strengths and foibles. The narrator, 83-year-old Essie Myles, copes with the numerous complications of family and work as she writes the obituaries for the County Paragraph, her grandson Doc’s small-town Nebraska newspaper.

  When Quintus Horatius Flaccus, the eponymous main character in Horace Afoot by Frederick Reuss, tries to seal himself off from the rest of world by moving to a small town called Oblivion, he finds the task much harder than he expected.

  And Jon Cohen suggests these novels for readers who enjoyed The Man in the Window:

  T. R. Pearson’s A Short History of a Small Place is a marvelous celebration of small town eccentrics.

  Nicholson Baker’s The Mezzanine illustrates how even the smallest bit of the world, acutely observed, can fill the soul; very similar to the way Louis observes the minutiae of his world.

  Karen Russell’s St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves is a celebration of the very off-kilter (as are her next two works of fiction: Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove).

  Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet are meticulously sensitive letters that Louis Malone might have written to the world.