Fall and Rise

by Stephen Dixon

  “I’ll be very surprised if you do come over.”

  “Shoot, what am I going to do with you? Are you a friend of Sven’s?”

  “Yes. Are all of them as unself-confident as I?”

  “No, just wondering. Sven’s a lawyer, so it makes sense. I don’t recall Dorothy mentioning you, but maybe she did.”

  “We’re not in the same firm and he’s not Yale. We served under the same district attorney.”

  “You were an assistant D.A. too?”

  “In Queens. I can’t say we’re the closest friends, but we’re evidently on friendly enough terms where he thought to invite me. Were you at the ceremony?”

  “Sure, how could you have forgotten? I was her maid of honor.”

  “I wasn’t there. That wasn’t what I meant. I wasn’t invited. I was very happy for them, of course, but anyway, I was out of town then on a tax case.”

  “I see. Okay. At the smoked fish table. If you’re not there, don’t worry about it—I’ll know you found someone else to talk to.”

  “Never. Why would I?”

  I nod and smile, think Poor guy, and head for the ladies’ room. It’s at the entrance to this room and I have to walk around the dance floor to get to it. A man grabs my hand and says “Show me how to jitterbug. You look like you know how to do a great jitterbug.”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t.”

  “You’re the best lady, be my best lady. You’ve got to be good if you’re Dorothy’s best, since she’s the best, so be good to me. Don’t be annoyed with what I say. I’m smashed, best lady.”

  “Thank you. I’m a bit smashed too. Now please let me go.”

  “Jitterbug one solitary jitterbug step with me first.”

  “Leave her go, Teddy,” the woman he was standing with says.

  “When she jitterbugs one solitary step with me.”

  “I don’t know how to jitterbug,” I say to her. “Really, Teddy, I don’t.”

  “I’ll show you.” He puts his arm around my waist, continues to hold my right hand with his left and walks me forward, walks me back, quickly switches hands and flicks his right leg around his left and faces me again.

  “There, I did what you said, now let me go.”

  “We have to do it once the same way from the other side.”

  “Not fair,” Lon says, dancing by.

  “It was an accident.”

  “No accident,” Teddy says. “The best man gets the best lady wherever he goes, always.”

  “Sven’s brother was the best man,” I say.

  “So I’m Sven’s oldest cousin on both sides, so that’s why I’m here and who gets the best lady.”

  “Leave her alone, Teddy,” the woman says. “Can’t you see you’re too old for this girl and a disgrace?”

  “God,” I say, “is this what happens when everybody gets drunk? What have I been missing?”

  “Me, sweetheart. Marry me tonight, best lady. My wife won’t mind.”

  “No, I won’t mind,” she says, “but I don’t think she wants to. Leave her go Teddy. I’m sure you’re hurting her.”

  “Release me, sir,” I say commandingly.

  “By your leave, best lady.” He lets go, gets down on his knees, cups my shoe between his hands and kisses the tip of it.

  “Ouch,” I say. “Really, get up, this is terrible.”

  “What’s happening?” Arthur says. “Make another conquest? You’re too unbelievable. Still want to meet at the food table? You don’t, my turn to understand.”

  “I want to go to the bathroom, Arthur. Lead me there?”

  I put out my hand. Teddy jumps up and takes it and whispers into my ear “I’ll ball you silly, you whore, just give me half the chance,” and I say to him “You son of a bitch. Go shit in your hat,” and stick my nails into his hand and he jerks it away. I walk to the ladies’ room.

  “What the hell was that about?” Arthur says.

  “Where’s that man now?”

  “Still where you left him, staring at you and not too nicely, and showing a woman his hand. What he say? Should I have done something?”

  “What a schmuck. And violent? That bastard hurt my hand. Ah: Ladies’.”

  “Want me to wait outside?”

  “No thanks.” I go inside, go into one of the stalls, put paper down in case I happen to graze the seat, squat above it and let go. Where’s it coming from? Usually I’m so regular. Once in the morning after exercises and that’s it for the day. Must be the food. The drink—what am I thinking of, the food? Maybe it’ll make me feel better. I stand up, wipe myself, get a sharp stomach pain and squat above the seat and more comes, worse than before. This is going to make my anus hurt. I stay that way for a minute. Then my thighs can’t take any more and I rearrange the papers so they’re all in place and sit. Smell is awful. I flush the toilet but don’t get up. Someone comes in. Sorry, ladies, who from the sounds of their handbags opening, apparently came in to fix their faces and hair.

  “It smells like a pig factory in here,” one says.

  “Wasn’t me,” another woman says.

  “I wasn’t saying that. I know what it was.”

  “It’s from one of the closets,” second one says much lower.

  “It’s me and I apologize,” I say, “but I’m not feeling too well. Believe me, it doesn’t smell any better in here!”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t know anyone was still in there,” the first one says. “I should have, by your door. You have any perfume on you?”

  “I left my bag at my table. Brilliant. It’ll probably get stolen.”

  “I have some,” she says. “I’ll spread it around,” and I suppose she sprinkles toilet water in the air, because I begin smelling it. “Also, flush your johnny.”

  “I did.”

  “Flush it again and again if it’s not too uncomfortable for your rear end. Just getting the new water around freshens up the area and it also assures the stuff of going all the way to the sewer and the smell of it from backing up.”

  I raise myself off the seat a little and flush twice.

  “That isn’t Ginny Scoletti in there, is it?” the second one says.

  “No,” I say.

  “There was someone by that name suddenly missing from the next table and people were worried, that’s why I asked.”

  “No.”

  “You from the Tallin bar mitzvah?”

  “The Nustermann-Baker wedding. Please, if you don’t mind I’d prefer being anonymous right now, and silent. My stomach.”

  “By all means,” the first one says. “But you’re not throwing up also?”

  “No, it’s only from one end. Excuse me, I’m going to be silent.”

  “By all means. Take care. But if you need help, yell. Just because we don’t know you doesn’t mean we shouldn’t help. Men are comrades like that to perfect strangers all the time.”

  “Are they?” I say. “I suppose.”

  “Well, how about it?” the first one says to the second. “You haven’t said yet, because I thought little Mickey this morning sang like a dream.”

  “He sang it beautifully and read it well.”

  “And Lillie looks so lovely. Does she look like the mother of a sixteen-year-old bar mitzvah kid?”

  “He’s that old? I thought fourteen.”

  “Sixteen. That’s why he sang so well. His voice has already changed. Mostly those kids sing awful, and at thirteen the worst. Cracked voice, like a cracked bell. Bong-g-g,” and they both laugh. “Here, take a whiff of this.”

  “I’m high enough.”

  “Go on, it’s the best. If you’re worried about Miss Anonymous inside, she won’t mind. She can even join us. Want a whiff, Silence-in-the-Closet?”

  “Whatever it is, no thanks.”

  “Whatever it is, I promise you will like. It’ll pacify your problems and make you dance like it was your last chance in your life.”

  “That’s very generous of you, but I don’t touch anything but too much cha
mpagne. At least not for years. Drugs, which I suppose is what your whiff is, make me tired and dumb, which I already am.”

  “This will make you feel lively, honey, and as for feeling dumb, feel dumb. That’s what you’re supposed to do. You’re supposed to feel high. You’re supposed to feel weird, cracked, bats, uninhibitively loose and detached and dumb. Every now and then, I’m saying.”

  “Every now and then she’s saying,” the second one says, “but look at her: she isn’t giving. Here, might as well—for it smells too good.”

  I’m all done, nothing else came, and I don’t want to stay in here any longer, nor do I want to see them. But I wipe up, pull up, push the paper in, flush the toilet, and leave. “Hi,” I say. They’re around my age. I wash my hands, say “Thanks” to the one with white powder on her fingertip she’s extended to me, “but I don’t want any, good as it looks. I once tried that stuff and everything felt and looked so cold for half an hour that I thought I was in a huge icebox. Enjoy your party,” drying my hands.

  “And enjoy yours,” the second one says. “Maybe we’ll hop over for a visit. Any nice-looking guys there?”

  “Some. All looking for women it seems, married and unmarrieds alike. Chances should be a lot better there than at your party, I’d think.”

  “Tatlin, you said?”

  “No, you said, and Tallin. I’m Nustermann-Baker.”

  “There’s so many parties on this floor. It’s hard to know where to keep track where you are unless where you come in here.”

  “You dummy,” the first woman says. “You’re so high you can’t speak straight.”

  “Speak straight where? What are you speaking about, and about me? Freaking-A right. This shit is strong. Where in world am I? Ich, don’t tell me—I see. Think you better help lean me up against something for I’m gonna take a spill.”

  “Does she really need help?” I say, grabbing the high woman’s arm.

  “I’ll take care of her, honey, thanks,” snapping her powder tin shut and putting it in her handbag.

  The high woman sits on the floor against the wall, head between her knees, crying. The other woman rinses a paper towl and pats it on the back of the high woman’s neck.

  “Sure she’ll be all right? I’ll help, or get someone if you need.”

  “That rag’s too cold,” the high woman says. “Warmer. I’m getting better but want a rag not so cold.”

  “She’ll be okay. I’ll see to her. She talks a big game but she can’t hold anything.”

  I leave. Arthur’s outside. “You were a long time. Two women walked in soon after you and I bet myself you all started chatting about hair waves or whatever women do. I never know what goes on in your toilets but always wanted to.”

  “Dress in drag.”

  “Ideally, I’d like to get a video camera and set it up in a woman’s room and watch it live off a monitor for a day. Or tape and record it—just like this one one night—but naturally when you’re not in there, or if you are, then when you know you’re on camera and you’re maybe even the star. And I’m talking about potties and tampon dispensers and anything else you might have in there that we don’t. It’d make a good thirty-minute movie, don’t you think? I’m serious, because I’m sure there’d be plenty for me and every man to learn from it.”

  “Ask me anything. We shit, we pee, we get sick, we brush our teeth, and sometimes we even wash our hands and comb our hair.”

  “Someone will do it before me, you’ll see, and make a small fortune from it and get all the awards. Some smoked fish?”

  “What?”

  “The smoked fish table. I was just there and they’re now down to two of them, though one’s sable, so we better hustle.”

  “I don’t want anything to eat. Fact is, I’m about to go home.”

  “You’re still tired. That’s too bad, because I was kind of getting used to you here. Listen, before you go, could I ask if it’d be all right if I called you.”

  “I guess, but I have to tell you I’m a bit tied-up with someone these days.”

  “Every woman is and every man isn’t, it seems.”

  “I didn’t quite get that. But more to the point, the reason I’m not more than occasionally tied-up with someone is that I don’t want to see anyone regularly these days.”

  “If the right guy came along, you’d see him. I’m not him. So it is. Believe me, sometimes I even meet someone who’s attracted to me and once in my life I even had to turn a woman down.”

  “I’m sure you do. I think I even suggested as much. Look, Arthur, I don’t want to get into it. I wasn’t feeling well in there, which is why I took so long.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

  “I didn’t say it for sympathy, just stating a fact.”

  “I can still say I’m sorry, can’t I? That’s common human courtesy and compassion.”

  “Please, Arthur, don’t argue with me. Because you are arguing and it’s too damn silly to. We don’t know each other.”

  “That’s why I want to call you.”

  “Call me—I said for you to if you want—but I don’t think I’ll be going out much with anyone for a while, even that occasional friend. I have things to do. I don’t mean to hit you with it, but papers, class preparations and exams, references to write, which can take a long time. Besides all that, my writing work, and not only reviews.”

  “What other writing?”

  “No other writing. At least no other right now. To talk about. You’re pressing me again and it’s not right or fair.”

  “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t do that. Sorry, sorry—an unbreakable habit I’ll break. But if I do call, you can always make it for a single drink, can’t you?”

  “I suppose so if I’m not tied-up with work or friends.”

  “Or a coffee or lunch some weekend afternoon.”

  “Even there, you’ll just have to call. I work weekends too.”

  “I’ll call, you can count on it. Can I see you to the door?”

  “I’m not leaving this moment. I have to say my goodbyes first. I’m not even that sure I want to go yet. Look, I’m hungry. I guess my stomach’s better. Why don’t we go to the food table after all? Not the smoked fish. Too late to make good use of that one and I doubt I could take it for pure eating pleasure now.”

  “Something more substantial? Potato salad. I’m serious—the oil in the mayonnaise should bind you. And the meatballs looked solid, simple and good.”

  “Maybe just a plain cheese sandwich if they have.”

  “They’ve got to. With all the meat, cheese and bread, I could prepare one for you.”

  We head for the food table.

  “Hi, Helene,” Agnes says. “Super reception, hm?”

  “Super.”

  “The band—who could afford it? I’m still waiting for you to get on the floor again. You were walking off when we came in before.”

  “You saw all there’ll be. Hello,” I say to the man she’s with. “Helene Winiker, an old friend of Agnes’s. Arthur…Oh God, Arthur, help me out.”

  “Arthur Rosenthal, like the china. That’s how people remember it.”

  “Excuse me,” Agnes says. “My husband, Jim Walsh. We were all at P.A. together. Dot, Helene—you were already dancing at City Center then. The kitty corps, or one notch above.”

  “So it’s true,” Arthur says.

  “Why, she ever lie to you? I’d be surprised. Mademoiselle Truth, we called her. Signorina Social Conscious, if I have it right.”

  “Not true,” I say.

  “There, I lied. Never even fib in front of apreternaturallike—apredestiterminally—just a superhuman truthspinner when you’re hip she knows the truth. Funny, but I was always so good at making up bombastic maxims. Anyway, I was telling the truth, so don’t make me out a liar. And I think Dot and I were the only ones who stayed in theater of our group, true?”

  “Shawn too,” Jim says.

  “She didn’t go to P.A. I’m talking of my city h
igh school friends.”

  “She didn’t? I thought she had. And how’d I know till now Helene was a classmate of yours?”

  “We’re off to the food table,” I say. “How’s work?”

  “You know how it is, since it never changes. But Jim, the rotten dog, gets every TV commercial available. Every actor hates him, including this one, he’s so gorgeous, talented and lucky.”

  “I am neither. I happen to have the looks and mannerisms of someone who genuinely seems like, when he’s lathering a product into his scalp or splashing it on his skin—”

  He’s saying this to her, so I wave goodbye, nudge Arthur and we go.

  “So you were really a dancer,” he says. “How about that. I bet you still dance exceptionally—classical steps. When I was a boy I wanted to be a poet. I was one. Won all the poetry prizes in school and some for money, making out a lot better than most poets today. I’d stay up nights with a flashlight writing that stuff. Then it just leaves you—it did me. My family said business is what I should be interested in—money, position and a sensible intelligent wife to go along with it, but one with her own burgeoning career so she won’t get bored and she could bring in something, and they were right. I love money. I can be honest about it—does it bother you to hear?”

  “I already said money’s okay.”

  “I love what it brings. Cars, vacations, any book I want to buy. Even a boat once, and an island last summer—rented one, didn’t buy. And I don’t do well compared to a lot of the lawyers in my graduating class. I’m satisfied with a hundred thousand a year—this year—who needs more? Uncle Schmuel only gobbles it up when you only have one deduction besides yourself every other year and no cooperative or house. I’m buying one though.”

  “You have a child?”

  “A boy—eight. Lives with his mother. She’s one who was in my class and nowhere near me in grades or on the Review and makes more than I. Corporate law, that’s why. And because she works harder and doesn’t like to play as much as I. No boats, only business trips—There, told you we should’ve hustled faster for the smoked fish. They always run out of it first. I can take you to a great restaurant if you crave some—even now. It’s open till one. Has the best smoked sturgeon and salmon in town.”