Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

by Jonathan Safran Foer

  I told them, Go.

  All of you.

  Go.

  And they went.

  And they didn’t come back.

  Happiness, Happiness

  INTERVIEWER. Can you describe the events of that morning?

  TOMOYASU. I left home with my daughter, Masako. She was on her way to work. I was going to see a friend. An air-raid warning was issued. I told Masako I was going home. She said, “I’m going to the office.” I did chores and waited for the warning to be lifted.

  I folded the bedding. I rearranged the closet. I cleaned the windows with a wet rag. There was a flash. My first thought was that it was the flash from a camera. That sounds so ridiculous now. It pierced my eyes. My mind went blank. The glass from the windows was shattering all around me. It sounded like when my mother used to hush me to be quiet.

  When I became conscious again, I realized I wasn’t standing. I had been thrown into a different room. The rag was still in my hand, but it was no longer wet. My only thought was to find my daughter. I looked outside the window and saw one of my neighbors standing almost naked. His skin was peeling off all over his body. It was hanging from his fingertips. I asked him what had happened. He was too exhausted to reply. He was looking in every direction, I can only assume for his family. I thought, I must go. I must go and find Masako.

  I put my shoes on and took my air-raid hood with me. I made my way to the train station. So many people were marching toward me, away from the city. I smelled something similar to grilled squid. I must have been in shock, because the people looked like squid washing up on the shore.

  I saw a young girl coming toward me. Her skin was melting down her. It was like wax. She was muttering, “Mother. Water. Mother. Water.” I thought she might be Masako. But she wasn’t. I didn’t give her any water. I am sorry that I didn’t. But I was trying to find my Masako.

  I ran all the way to Hiroshima Station. It was full of people. Some of them were dead. Many of them were lying on the ground. They were calling for their mothers and asking for water. I went to Tokiwa Bridge. I had to cross the bridge to get to my daughter’s office.

  INTERVIEWER. Did you see the mushroom cloud?

  TOMOYASU. No, I didn’t see the cloud.

  INTERVIEWER. You didn’t see the mushroom cloud?

  TOMOYASU. I didn’t see the mushroom cloud. I was trying to find Masako.

  INTERVIEWER. But the cloud spread over the city?

  TOMOYASU. I was trying to find her. They told me I couldn’t go beyond the bridge. I thought she might be back home, so I turned around. I was at the Nikitsu Shrine when the black rain started falling from the sky. I wondered what it was.

  INTERVIEWER. Can you describe the black rain?

  TOMOYASU. I waited for her in the house. I opened the windows, even though there was no glass. I stayed awake all night waiting. But she didn’t come back. About 6:30 the next morning, Mr. Ishido came around. His daughter was working at the same office as my daughter. He called out asking for Masako’s house. I ran outside. I called, “It’s here, over here!” Mr. Ishido came up to me. He said, “Quick! Get some clothes and go for her. She is at the bank of the Ota River.”

  I ran as fast as I could. Faster than I was able to run. When I reached the Tokiwa Bridge, there were soldiers lying on the ground. Around Hiroshima Station, I saw more people lying dead. There were more on the morning of the seventh than on the sixth. When I reached the riverbank, I couldn’t tell who was who. I kept looking for Masako. I heard someone crying, “Mother!” I recognized her voice. I found her in horrible condition. And she still appears in my dreams that way. She said, “It took you so long.”

  I apologized to her. I told her, “I came as fast as I could.”

  It was just the two of us. I didn’t know what to do. I was not a nurse. There were maggots in her wounds and a sticky yellow liquid. I tried to clean her up. But her skin was peeling off. The maggots were coming out all over. I couldn’t wipe them off, or I would wipe off her skin and muscle. I had to pick them out. She asked me what I was doing. I told her, “Oh, Masako. It’s nothing.” She nodded. Nine hours later, she died.

  INTERVIEWER. You were holding her in your arms all that time?

  TOMOYASU. Yes, I held her in my arms. She said, “I don’t want to die.” I told her, “You’re not going to die.” She said, “I promise I won’t die before we get home.” But she was in pain and she kept crying, “Mother.”

  INTERVIEWER. It must be hard to talk about these things.

  TOMOYASU. When I heard that your organization was recording testimonies, I knew I had to come. She died in my arms, saying, “I don’t want to die.” That is what death is like. It doesn’t matter what uniforms the soldiers are wearing. It doesn’t matter how good the weapons are. I thought if everyone could see what I saw, we would never have war anymore.

  I pressed Stop on the boom box, because the interview was over. The girls were crying, and the boys were making funny barfing noises.

  “Well,” Mr. Keegan said, wiping his forehead with a handkerchief as he stood up from his chair, “Oskar has certainly given us a lot to think about.” I said, “I’m not done.” He said, “That seemed pretty complete to me.” I explained, “Because the radiant heat traveled in straight lines from the explosion, scientists were able to determine the direction toward the hypocenter from a number of different points, by observing the shadows cast by intervening objects. The shadows gave an indication of the height of the burst of the bomb, and the diameter of the ball of fire at the instant it was exerting the maximum charring effect. Isn’t that fascinating?”

  Jimmy Snyder raised his hand. I called on him. He asked, “Why are you so weird?” I asked if his question was rhetorical. Mr. Keegan told him to go to Principal Bundy’s office. Some of the kids cracked up. I knew they were cracking up in the bad way, which is at me, but I tried to maintain my confidence.

  “Another interesting feature that has to do with the explosion was the relationship between the degree of burning and color, because dark colors absorb light, obviously. For example, a famous chess match between two grand masters was going on that morning on a life-size board in one of the big city parks. The bomb destroyed everything: the spectators in the seats, the people who were filming the match, their black cameras, the timing clocks, even the grand masters. All that was left were white pieces on white square islands.”

  As he walked out of the room, Jimmy said, “Hey, Oskar, who’s Buckminster?” I told him, “Richard Buckminster Fuller was a scientist, philosopher, and inventor who is most famous for designing the geodesic dome, whose most famous version is the Buckyball. He died in 1983, I think.” Jimmy said, “I mean your Buckminster.”

  I didn’t know why he was asking, because I’d brought Buckminster to school for a demonstration only a couple of weeks before, and dropped him from the roof to show how cats reach terminal velocity by making themselves into little parachutes, and that cats actually have a better chance of surviving a fall from the twentieth floor than the eighth floor, because it takes them about eight floors to realize what’s going on, and relax and correct themselves. I said, “Buckminster is my pussy”

  Jimmy pointed at me and said, “Ha ha!” The kids cracked up in the bad way. I didn’t get what was so hilarious. Mr. Keegan got angry and said, “Jimmy!” Jimmy said, “What? What did I do?” I could tell that inside, Mr. Keegan was cracking up, too.

  “What I was saying was, they found a piece of paper, about half a kilometer from the hypocenter, and the letters, which they call characters, were neatly burned out. I became extremely curious about what that would look like, so first I tried to cut out letters on my own, but my hands weren’t good enough to do it, so I did some research, and I found a printer on Spring Street who specializes in die-cutting, and he said he could do it for two hundred fifty dollars. I asked him if that included tax. He said no, but I still thought it was worth the money, so I took my mom’s credit card, and anyway, here it is.” I held up th
e sheet of paper, with the first page of A Brief History of Time in Japanese, which I got the translation of from Amazon.co.jp. I looked at the class through the story of the turtles.

  That was Wednesday.

  I spent Thursday’s recess in the library, reading the new issue of American Drummer, which Librarian Higgins orders especially for me. It was boring. I went to the science lab, to see if Mr. Powers would do some experiments with me. He said he actually had plans to eat lunch with some other teachers, and he couldn’t let me be in the lab alone. So I made some jewelry in the art studio, which you are allowed to be in alone.

  Friday, Jimmy Snyder called me from across the playground, and then he came up to me with a bunch of his friends. He said, “Hey, Oskar, would you rather have a handjob or a blowjob from Emma Watson?” I told him I didn’t know who Emma Watson was. Matt Colber said, “Hermione, retard.” I said, “Who’s Hermione? And I’m not mentally retarded.” Dave Mallon said, “In Harry Potter, fag boy.” Steve Wicker said, “She has sweet tits now.” Jake Riley said, “Handjob or blowjob?” I said, “I’ve never even met her.”

  I know a lot about birds and bees, but I don’t know very much about the birds and the bees. Everything I do know I had to teach myself on the Internet, because I don’t have anyone to ask. For example, I know that you give someone a blowjob by putting your penis in their mouth. I also know that dick is penis, and that cock is penis, too. And monster cock, obviously. I know that VJs get wet when a woman is having sex, although I don’t know what they get wet with. I know that VJ is cunt, and also ass. I know what dildos are, I think, but I don’t know what cum is, exactly. I know that anal sex is humping in the anus, but I wish I didn’t.

  Jimmy Snyder pushed my shoulder and said, “Say your mom’s a whore.” I said, “Your mom’s a whore.” He said, “Say your mom’s a whore.” I said, “Your mom’s a whore.” “Say ‘My’ ‘mom’ ‘is a whore.’” “Your mom is a whore.” Matt and Dave and Steve and Jake were cracking up, but Jimmy was getting really, really angry. He raised a fist and said, “Prepare to die.” I looked around for a teacher, but I didn’t see any. “My mom’s a whore,” I said. I went inside and read a few more sentences of A Brief History of Time. Then I broke a mechanical pencil. When I came home, Stan said, “You’ve got mail!”

  Dear Oskar,

  Thanks for mailing me the $76.50 you

  owed me. To tell you the truth, I never thought

  I’d see that money. Now I will believe everyone.

  (cab driver) Marty Mahaltra

  P.S. No tip?

  I counted off seven minutes that night, and then fourteen minutes, and then thirty. I knew I’d never be able to fall asleep, because I was so excited that the next day I’d be able to search for the lock. I started inventing like a beaver. I thought about how in one hundred years every name in the 2003 Yellow Pages will be for someone who’s dead, and how once when I was at The Minch’s I saw a TV show where someone ripped a phone book in half with his hands. I thought about how I wouldn’t want someone to rip a 2003 Yellow Pages in half in one hundred years, because even though everyone will be dead, it still felt like it should make a difference. So I invented a Black Box Yellow Pages, which is a phone book that’s made out of the material that they make the black boxes on airplanes out of. I still couldn’t sleep.

  I invented a postage stamp where the back tastes like crème brûlée.

  I still couldn’t sleep.

  What if you trained Seeing Eye dogs to be bomb-sniffing dogs, so that they’d be Sniffing Eye Seeing Bomb dogs? That way, blind people could get paid for being led around, and could be contributing members of our society, and we’d all be safer, too. I was getting further and further from sleep.

  When I woke up it was Saturday.

  I went upstairs to pick up Mr. Black, and he was waiting in front of his door, snapping his fingers next to his ear. “What’s this?” he asked when I handed him the present I made for him. I shrugged my shoulders, just like Dad used to. “What am I supposed to do with it?” I told him, “Open it, obviously.” But I couldn’t keep my happiness in, and before he got the paper off the box I said, “It’s a necklace I made for you with a compass pendant so you can know where you are in relation to the bed!” He kept opening it and said, “How nice of you!” “Yeah,” I said, taking the box from him because I could open it faster. “It probably won’t work outside your apartment, because the magnetic field of the bed gets smaller the farther you get from it, but still.” I handed him the necklace and he put it on. It said that the bed was north.

  “So where to?” he asked. “The Bronx,” I said. “The IRT?” “The what?” “The IRT train.” “There isn’t an IRT train, and I don’t take public transportation.” “Why not?” “It’s an obvious target.” “So how do you plan on us getting there?” “We’ll walk.” “That’s got to be about twenty miles from here,” he said. “And have you seen me walk?” “That’s true.” “Let’s take the IRT.” “There is no IRT.” “Whatever there is, let’s take it.”

  On our way out, I said, “Stan, this is Mr. Black. Mr. Black, this is Stan.” Mr. Black stuck out his hand, and Stan shook it. I told Stan, “Mr. Black lives in 6A.” Stan took his hand back, but I don’t think Mr. Black was offended.

  Almost the whole ride to the Bronx was underground, which made me incredibly panicky, but once we got to the poor parts, it went above-ground, which I preferred. A lot of the buildings in the Bronx were empty, which I could tell because they didn’t have windows, and you could see right through them, even at high speeds. We got off the train and went down to the street. Mr. Black had me hold his hand as we looked for the address. I asked him if he was racist. He said poverty made him nervous, not people. Just as a joke I asked him if he was gay. He said, “I suppose so.” “Really?” I asked, but I didn’t take back my hand, because I’m not homophobic.

  The building’s buzzer was broken, so the door was held open with a brick. Agnes Black’s apartment was on the third floor, and there was no elevator. Mr. Black said he’d wait for me, because the stairs at the subway were enough stairs for him for one day. So I went up alone. The floor of the hallway was sticky, and for some reason all of the peepholes had black paint over them. Someone was singing from behind one of the doors, and I heard TVs behind a bunch of others. I tried my key in Agnes’s lock, but it didn’t work, so I knocked.

  A little woman answered who was in a wheelchair. She was Mexican, I think. Or Brazilian, or something. “Excuse me, is your name Agnes Black?” She said, “No espeaka Inglesh.” “What?” “No espeaka Inglesh.” “I’m sorry,” I said, “but I don’t understand you. Could you please repeat yourself and enunciate a little bit better.” “No espeaka Inglesh,” she said. I pointed a finger in the air, which is the universal sign for hold on, and then I called down to Mr. Black from the stairwell, “I don’t think she speaks English!” “Well, what does she speak?” “What do you speak?” I asked her, and then I realized how dumb my question was, so I tried a different approach: “Parlez-vous français?” “Español,” she said. “Español,” I hollered down. “Terrific!” he hollered back. “I picked up a little Español along the way!” So I brought her wheelchair to the stairwell, and they hollered to each other, which was kind of weird, because their voices were traveling back and forth but they couldn’t see each other’s faces. They cracked up together, and their laughter ran up and down the stairs. Then Mr. Black hollered, “Oskar!” And I hollered, “That’s my name, don’t wear it out!” And he hollered, “Come on down!”

  When I got back to the lobby, Mr. Black explained that the person we were looking for had been a waitress at Windows on the World. “What the?” “ The woman I just spoke with, Feliz, didn’t know her personally. She was told about her when she moved in.” “Really?” “I wouldn’t make that up.” We went out to the street and started walking. A car drove by that was playing music extremely loudly, and it vibrated my heart. I looked up, and there were strings connecting a lot of the wind
ows with clothes hanging on them. I asked Mr. Black if that’s what people meant when they said “clotheslines.” He said, “That’s what they mean.” I said, “That’s what I thought.” We walked some more. Kids were kicking rocks in the street and cracking up in the good way. Mr. Black picked up one of the rocks and put it in his pocket. He looked at the street sign, and then at his watch. A couple of old men were sitting in chairs in front of a store. They were smoking cigars and watching the world like it was TV.

  “That’s so weird to think about,” I said. “What is?” “That she worked there. Maybe she knew my dad. Or not knew him, but maybe she served him that morning. He was there, in the restaurant. He had a meeting. Maybe she refilled his coffee or something.” “It’s possible.” “Maybe they died together.” I know he didn’t know what to say to that, because of course they died together. The real question was how they died together, like whether they were on different ends of the restaurant, or next to each other, or something else. Maybe they had gone up to the roof together. You saw in some of the pictures that people jumped together and held hands. So maybe they did that. Or maybe they just talked to each other until the building fell. What would they have talked about? They were obviously so different. Maybe he told her about me. I wonder what he told her. I couldn’t tell how it made me feel to think of him holding someone’s hand.

  “Did she have any kids?” I asked. “I don’t know.” “Ask her.” “Ask who?” “Let’s go back and ask the woman who’s living there now. I bet she knows if Agnes had any kids.” He didn’t ask me why that question was important, or tell me she already told us everything she knew. We walked back three blocks, and I went up the stairs and brought her wheelchair back to the stairwell, and they talked up and down the stairs for a while. Then Mr. Black hollered, “She didn’t!” But I wondered if he was lying to me, because even though I don’t speak Spanish, I could hear that she said a lot more than just no.