* * *
§
My patio—the deck of a ship that’s stuck on earth—was finished. What next?
I spent summer evenings there, reading and smoking, as the sun set, and as the filigreed lilac leaves of the Liquidambar blended with the twilight, and as a deer roamed the woods, or maybe it was a unicorn—who’s to say?
Can’t make out the words on the page anymore.
Every person has their own angel, for protection and compassion. The angel comes in different sizes, depending on the circumstances. Sometimes he’s the size of a dachshund—if you’re visiting a friend or if you’re in a crowd; sometimes he’s the size of a person—sitting in the passenger seat of a car, if you’re hurtling down the highway, shouting and singing; sometime he comes in his full size, approximately as tall as one telephone pole atop another, and hangs quietly in the air, the stuffy and empty evening air of a pointless July in a year unknown. In a certain light, with your peripheral vision, you can glimpse the micaceous glint of his wing.
You can talk to your angel. He’ll sympathize. He’ll understand. He’ll agree. That’s his way of loving you.
What next? you ask him. What comes next? Exactly, he’ll agree, what next? You love and love someone and then you look up and the love is gone, and if you feel sorry it’s not for him but for your feelings—you let them out for a walk and they come crawling back to you, all bruises and missing teeth. Yes, yes, he’ll agree, that’s how it is. And also people die, but that’s just nonsense, isn’t it? They can’t just disappear, can they, they still exist, you just can’t see them, right? They must be up there, with you? Yes, yes, they’re here, all here, no one’s disappeared, no one’s been lost, everyone is well.
A transparent sort, hard to make out, like a jellyfish in water, he hangs in the air and undulates as fireflies pass right through him; and if starlight is refracted when piercing his aetherial body, it is refracted just a little.
* * *
§
Almost all the money that I was earning at the college was going toward the upkeep of the house. And working at the college was killing me. Only a few years before, I had the ability to see through things, but now a mental glaucoma descended upon me, dark water, as they say, and I needed to put an end to it and to go home—to my old apartment, to Moscow, for instance. Or to Saint Petersburg. Okay. Once my contract ends, I’ll leave.
I allowed tenants to move in. I rented out everything but the magical room to an elderly Russian couple. They were kindred spirits—he was a theoretical physicist, she was a journalist—such kindred spirits, in fact, that I felt uncomfortable taking their money. Every Wednesday evening, when I returned from the gulag up north, I’d climb out of the car, my legs weak, and see them already waiting for me, table set with a bottle of wine; they were happy to see me, and I them, and we’d sit around discussing everything we knew, even my knowledge of quantum mechanics, pumped into my brain via books on tape during long and grueling journeys north.
He’d come to our United States of America for medical care, but the doctors couldn’t save him. And the house stood empty again.
That’s when I decided to rent it out entirely and to find a cheap apartment for myself near work. Turns out, it’s not so simple to rent out a house in America. That’s not because there are no takers, but because all of those people are your potential enemies.
The law comes down squarely on the side of the renters. For instance: I, as the owner, must abide by a certain sense of égalité, may it rot, and consider everyone to be equal. A nice intellectual couple, let’s say two Princeton professors, shouldn’t in my eyes be more desirable than a family of strung-out junkies, or a gang of Gypsies with shifty eyes, or a foreign couple who don’t speak any English. If I express too distinctly my displeasure at the possibility of their inhabiting my house, in theory, they can sue me. So one’s forced to express regret: Oh, so sorry and what a shame, but the space has just been rented.
There is a danger of renting to people too poor to afford it. If these people have nowhere to go (and can’t pay you), they have the right to just stay in the house until their situation improves, and of course it never will. Meaning that I can’t just kick them out. That I myself may have nowhere to live; the law doesn’t give two shits about.
There is also a danger of renting to a handicapped person, or to a family with small children, who’ll stick their head through the balusters, those rascals, or slip and fall, breaking their leg, and it’ll be my fault for not making sure the place was childproof.
So I kept my eyes open. First to arrive were a couple, both Indian programmers. Exactly what I wanted: a young married couple, with beautiful British English, clean-cut and very sweet. But they were looking for something else. They wanted carved door frames and marble everywhere. My barn was too simple for their tastes.
Then an elderly black couple, both around sixty, came by. He walked through the door with no problem, but she took one step and got stuck in the door frame, couldn’t move. He, apparently used to this, grabbed her by the hand and pulled her in—about 650 pounds in all, I’d guess. We exchanged smiles and on they went to inspect the rooms. I didn’t follow them—I was afraid that my house would tilt. The wife tried the bathroom but couldn’t fit through the door. Trying again, sideways this time, she fit, although a quarter of her remained in the hallway. A muffled consultation between them could be heard. They continued on their tour and I sat there, full of trepidation that she would decide to check out the basement. She decided to check out the basement.
I sneaked in from the other side so I could eavesdrop and not miss the impending disaster.
“This won’t work. Let’s go,” said the husband.
“No, I want to look downstairs.”
“This house is clearly not an option for us.”
“So what, I still want to look.”
“I’m telling you, it’s best we go.”
She began squeezing herself through the narrow basement door, and…
“Benjamin!”
“I told you.”
“Okay, sir, less talk, more action!”
He leaned against her and with both hands forced her through the door. The stairs were next. She took one heavy step and I heard the wood cracking.
“Vanessa, damn it!”
“Language!”
She was clearly the queen of the household, and he was just a footman. A few more ominous tremors from below. Then silence. I tiptoed back to my den and pretended to be working on the computer. Benjamin peeked in and asked nonchalantly:
“Um. Is there another way out from the basement? Or just the one?”
“Just the one.”
“Oh, okay, just wondering.”
He disappeared again, and I turned on SimCity; I loved laying underground water pipes there and watching them come to life, elbow after elbow, blue musical water streaming down them at last. Besides, I had some cheat codes for the game and I didn’t need to be stingy with my virtual money when irrigating my virtual cities. And those two will probably be down there for a while anyway. Benjamin popped in once again:
“Do you happen to have a screwdriver?”
“Maybe in the garage? It’s through this door. I also have ropes there and other things.”
“Got it. What about a hammer?”
“Also there.”
About half an hour later—I was already running electricity to the prison, university, and hospital—they reappeared together. I had my best poker face on, and so did Benjamin. Vanessa looked a bit disheveled.
“The house is lovely, simply lovely. But we’re going to think about it. What a wonderful, wonderful garden!”
“Thank you! Yeah, let me know.”
“So lovely meeting you!”
“Same here!”
He pushed her through the green front door to t
he street, and through the window I could see them walking down the brick path: she, marching regally, and he, scurrying behind, weaving around her from side to side. They still had loading into the car ahead of them.
And then Nielsen came. He was twenty-two. Shrimpy, pasty white, with bleach-blond hair and the hands of a prepubescent boy, an expression of mild disgust on the flat face of a mealworm.
“It’s dusty in here,” whined Nielsen.
“Dusty?” I responded, surprised. The house was spick-and-span—scrubbed with renters in mind.
“I need the house to be sterile,” grumbled Nielsen. “I am allergic to even the slightest bit of dust. Once the entire house is sterile, I’ll take it. And I need this fireplace to be completely clean, like new.”
Oh, curses! The fireplace? More expenses! By definition, a working fireplace cannot be “sterile.” Thirty years of soot on its stone walls, traces of ash—and anyway, it’s not like you’ll be performing open-heart surgery in there! And what could be cleaner than fire, Nielsen?
In New Jersey, sterility was provided solely by two Belarusians. They were here illegally and so they took on any hard labor that the local Russian-Americans would hire them for: from housecleaning to roof repair. They overcharged woefully, but at least no job was too dirty for them. These two terminators were also married to each other, and it should be noted that against any expectation the wife’s last name was Kock and the husband’s Chik. This, seemingly, was not their only perversity. Keenly aware of their irreplaceability, cruel and adept in their united front, they always performed the same routine: give an approximate, acceptable estimate, but warn that there might be unforeseen adjustments, and shortly before finishing the work, just when everything is torn apart and upside down, jack up the price to a horrific sum. Chik looked to be the brutal sort. Kock had an elfin face, and her case history included work in a bar: perhaps this was why, when it came to arranging glassware, for instance, she would line the glasses up not randomly but strictly by type, one behind the other and deep into the cupboard, away from the owner’s eyes.
Kock and Chik finished their work—polished all surfaces, horizontal and vertical, with their potent acids and ammonia, destroying all that lived, sterilizing the fireplace—and Nielsen, after playing hard-to-get, at last rented my house for a year and gave me a security deposit of fifteen hundred dollars. Legally, I was supposed to keep this money in an escrow account, and not to touch it until the end of the lease. But I had no money at all to my name. And I needed to rent something for myself, and even a dog kennel required a security deposit. So I borrowed his money unbeknownst to him. What difference would it make? I’d return it at the end of the year anyway.
Yes, yes, I’ve falsified the plummet of the scales, played foul with bank accounts and cheat codes; I’ve exceeded the speed limit at times, driven under the influence, and stolen from the military prosecutor’s office; I’ve given false testimony in court; and I’ve committed adultery in my heart, numerously. What’s more, I intend to keep on doing so in the future. Dear Lord, what obnoxious messengers You send to remind us of our sins, and of our promises made to You and then forgotten. Even so, not according to my will, but Yours. You truly do work in mysterious ways! Please forgive and forget.
Something was wrong with Nielsen. I must have made a mistake.
This was my house, after all, a living thing that I loved, and that had put its trust in me; where the sun danced on the golden floor; where the invisible glass table, the one I loved to sit at, existed: when I was away, the shadows of the dead and departed would take my place at it, no longer alive but still refracting the light that went through them, like prisms—where else could they gather to converse and drink wine? And now Nielsen was walking through this house touching everything with his sterile, prepubescent hands.
Perhaps it was Nielsen permeating my nightmares. He appeared as worminess, as decay, as rot, white fungus, pustules, lichen. A meaningless path that veered left onto a dimly lit road, or a treacherous scree—that was him. Houses with open doors, strange faces in the twilight, wet shoes—that was him. Ominous beaches, lost keys, leftovers, missed trains, a threat from above—that was him, all him. This house was my earthly pod, one of my shells. He infiltrated it, making his way under the skin. And he called upon the forces of darkness to unleash the evil eye.
I’d betrayed my treasure and I alone was to blame.
* * *
§
It was a bad year. I lived near the college that was sucking my soul dry, bleeding me of all that was alive inside me. There was extraordinary beauty everywhere: tall spruces, white snow; Beauteous Death. I was already in the habit of waking up at five in the morning, but there was nowhere to go at that hour, and nothing to see other than my ceiling. Hang in there, I’d tell myself, the year will go by quickly. Nielsen will leave, then I’ll sell the house and go home. This isn’t the right place for me. Once again it’s not right. I should know by now that the right place is inaccessible; maybe it exists in the past, over the green hills, or maybe it’s drowned, or, perhaps, it hasn’t materialized yet.
What if the Lord wants us to know that we can’t get anywhere on this earth, can’t own anything, can’t hold on to anyone. Perhaps only at five in the morning, though not every day, is the truth revealed to us: everything, everything that we’ve ever desired is simply a mirage, or a mock-up. Maybe…But then the night begins to vanish, the outlines of rented furniture come into view, and it’s time to get up and make coffee, strong, the way they brew it in the East, not this muddy American dishwater, and then set off for the college to give out unearned grades: I’m leaving soon anyway. I have already decided.
I gave an A to a Haitian girl for a short story that wasn’t worth a C. She knew this and freaked out when she saw the A, expecting there to be a catch. There was no catch. It was just the story of her escape in a boat, illicit, with bribes, from her island to the United States. The crew—their guides—collected payment in the form of dollars and sex: they raped all the women and girls on board. They gave no water—that was also paid for with sex. A baby died and was thrown overboard. All these details seemed matter-of-fact to her: “Does it happen any other way?” She made the journey with her mother, grandmother, and boyfriend; everyone suffered the same fate, but all were happy: they’d made it from a grave world into an aetherial one. Not everyone gets to finish that journey.
The story was simplistic, poorly put together; showing no imagination, she told everything exactly as it had, alas, happened. I sat with her for an hour after class, asking questions. Her family members were well settled here: the grandmother back to practicing voodoo, the mother taking in laundry. The boyfriend had already bought a Mercedes, and we don’t want to dwell on how he managed, but we have an inkling. As for the girl herself, thanks to a government program, she was taking a creative writing class to rack up credits toward a degree.
She was gathering her papers into a pile with trembling hands; I was collecting mine and also trembling. She couldn’t understand why she got an A and so she had come to find out; my job was to hide the reason—My goodness, I’m a dishonest Russian person, I’ll throw ten As your way: go ahead and rack up the necessary credits, you sunny, pure being who holds no grudge against her tormentors!
Oh, these scales of mine. What weights and plummets!
My lying was inspired—yes, I’m good at that!—and she bought it, trusting me that there was value in her composition, that the details had been ably chosen, that the beginning was great and the ending even better—Of course, you can improve slightly here and rewrite a bit there, but you do understand, don’t you, nothing’s ever perfect, and some writers rewrite their novels six times, if you can believe it!
I acquired a taste for this sort of thing and broke bad. I walked around with a horn of plenty, pouring out splendid grades, generously bestowing them upon anyone whom I perceived to have even the tiniest of d
reams, the slightest timidity before the darkness of being—howdy, folks!—the smallest desire to get on their tiptoes and peer over the fence. Mean idiots got Ds from me, kind idiots got Bs. I forgave some slackers and not others, according to whim. When, at the end of the semester, my teacher evaluations came from the dean’s office, I tossed the entire package without even taking a look. I was done!
Goodbye to the North, to the snow and the cliffs, to the fairy-tale wooden cabins, to the faraway blue mountains, beyond which Canada lies, and to you, my friends—ours were real friendships, and I did love you, but now it’s your turn to become translucent jellyfish, now fireflies will pass right through you, as starlight is refracted just a little.
I came back to this Princeton of mine, which wasn’t really Princeton. Nielsen had already left. I walked into my house and began to inspect the rooms. I was gripped by terror and dread.
Everything that could have been broken was broken, everything that could have been damaged was damaged. This was no accidental destruction, not the result of boisterous horseplay, which could be expected from a young man—no: this was premeditated, demented, and bizarre. It was as if a worm, or a large arthropod, or a mollusk, had inhabited my house, and in some obscure stages of its life cycle hurled heaps of roe, sprayed the walls from its ink sac, laid eggs high up under the ceiling, stopping, perhaps, for a week or so in its pupa stage, and then, cracking its chitinous cocoon, emerged in new form and with a fresh need to crawl through things.
Aetherial Worlds Page 14