Last Stories and Other Stories (9780698135482)

by Vollmann, William T.

  From his shirt pocket he withdrew the card through whose means she had first reestablished communication: distantly formal, and as haughty as ever—how he would have hated to be married to her! You, for all I know, do not remember me. But, I think you remember at least a little. That was Victoria for you—certain of her effect. I’ve always felt bad for snubbing you so awfully. There were extenuating parenting and adolescent circumstances, but I was very horrible. I’m sure you would have been dumped (or vice versa) but later I learned to do it and accept it with some small degree of grace. The next lay tidily folded in its envelope, with a cancelled twenty-nine-cent stamp of wild columbine: Even though I have been thoroughly faithful in every possible way, Ryan, I think, lives in fear he’ll lose me to something: a cause, a job, another man, and I’ll bet you liked it that way, didn’t you, Victoria? The third was typed singlespaced and went on for several pages. She had confessed to calling him and then hanging up. There are probably unresolved feelings for you that probably contributed to my feeling embarrassed. Please be flattered. I don’t have feelings for many people—at least, not embarrassing feelings! I think it is ridiculous that there has to be closure for every relationship, friend, choice. Yes, you would think that. No wonder you hated to die. I can’t tell if you mind questions. I think that in fact you do. I hope this reaches you before you are gone again to find your cigarette stand girl. How were the polar bears? The cold north, it sounds very appealing to an ice princess like me.

  I dislike other people’s children but they like me because I treat them well and feed them and bring goldfish to class.

  The moon resembled a marble wreath when he poured the liquid onto Victoria’s grave.

  12

  Her smile was a flower without scent. He felt more saddened than beguiled.

  13

  When he came home, he took his pain pills and pored over the moon map. Then he read two or three of her oldest letters. Playfully, the cancer flexed its fingers within his entrails. Taking up a pen, he began to write a reply, for practice, so that he would know what he ought to say to her.

  14

  The second time he visited, worn down by the sweaty brightness of his summer evenings, Victoria was sitting on her tomb, in one of those midlength skirts which had been in fashion when she was seventeen, with her white hands in her lap and her knees shining like moonlight. She had combed her hair just so over her shoulders; he had never seen her so formal. She gazed straight ahead.

  You must have suffered so much, he said.

  Don’t speak of it.

  He thought her way of expressing herself old-fashioned.— Do you mean it still hurts you? he said.

  Actually, I guess it doesn’t make any difference now.

  The last time I called you, the nurse said you were too weak to talk. And then I didn’t know for a long time. I was afraid to disturb your family. But I could imagine your physical agony, and the emotional agony of leaving your children behind—

  She turned half away.

  Has he remarried?

  I think those questions are intrusive, said Victoria.

  Which ones?

  Any of them. I’m not asking you any.

  I did notice that. Come to think of it, maybe you don’t know if he—

  You believe that I don’t want to know anything about you.

  Or maybe that you know everything you care to. Can the dead read minds or see the future?

  I’ve learned not to force any issue, said Victoria.

  Why should that be such a secret? he demanded, which he would never have done at seventeen.

  Surprisingly, she smiled at him.

  He said: Next time I’ll bring you flowers.

  You’re having a bad year, aren’t you? said Victoria.

  You could say that.

  You think you used to love your life, but you never did.

  How do you know?

  I’m not in a position to complain about anything.

  Not with a marble slab on your chest! he replied, meaning to be wry but merely achieving bitterness.

  Sometimes it hurts me. It’s the heaviest thing I ever had to bear.

  I’m sorry. You’re having a bad time, too. Should I get you out of there?

  It wouldn’t do any good. But flowers, flowers would be nice—

  What kind would you like? I never got you any before, so I don’t know.

  I love moonflowers. But you won’t be able to get them. You don’t even know what they are.

  At seventeen he would have been crushed or at least disconcerted. Now he barely noticed humiliations of this sort. Rising, he said: I’ll bring you six white roses.

  To go with my complexion?

  And with your pretty winding-sheet.

  I’m not wearing one.

  Then don’t wear anything.

  Victoria’s ghost giggled. He blew her a kiss and went away.

  15

  The disk on the lunar map was more or less the same tarnished yellow-silver-green as the key which had finally unlocked his desk drawer. Through the loupe which formerly belonged to Luke’s jeweler friend Raymond, he observed the Fra Mauro formation where Apollo 14 landed. The enlarged dots taught him nothing, for even the acutest seeing, if it is of the wrong sort, can mislead more perplexingly than sincere blindness. Do you believe me? Sit down at the cemetery’s edge; send your eyes into the ground. Behind the raspberry leaves lies a fern between whose green ribs ivy manifests itself like grey-green shadow; between the ivy leaves hang teeth and fangs of crisp darkness scattered in air as if new-smitten from a monster’s jawbone; but now, just when you begin to wonder whether you might in time perceive moonflowers within those black places, the noon sun intrudes, perching like a hot puppy upon your shoulder, panting light into your sweating ear, slobbering rays of brightness into the sweet black places, chasing away their darkness more quickly than your vision can follow; so that all that remains behind the ivy leaves is tea-brown dirt partitioned by grey stalks. Now you must go away until late afternoon; not until then can you ever hope to find moonflowers. So flee the sun; lay down the loupe; and may the eyeballs of desire be your jewels.

  Below the Mare Tranquillitatis, just east of where Apollo 11 touched down, the narrower, canyonlike windings of the Mare Nectaris went south, petering out in a confusion of craters of which Fracastorius (latitude 20˚ S) was the most impressive; and in the cratered badlands to the northwest was Catharina, which allured him because it was a woman’s name. Rheita, Vega, Biela, Messala, Agrippa, Caroline Herschel, Gemma Frisius and Hypatia kept her company. He had a fancy that after he died, if he really wished to, he could take Victoria to that region. Well, wasn’t it all fancy at this stage? There was no reason he should prefer her over others, since for so long she’d scarcely visited his thoughts. Come to think of it, that might be the very reason he dwelled on her—because he hadn’t; in which case the excavation had to do with self-knowledge. But what the dirt that rooted her had to do with the moon, that he certainly could not say.

  16

  Not wishing to show himself up by asking for moonflowers, he wandered discreetly into a florist’s shop, glancing into the dimmest refrigerator cases in case some bluish-white or greenish-yellow blossoms might whisper. Before he had completed his escape, the darkhaired young woman coaxed him back, promising that she could help him. Like many people who work with plants, she had unassuming ways, which must have reassured the shy and the sorrowful. He hesitated.

  If you feel like describing the occasion, said the woman, carefully snipping off a rose stalk, I might be able to put something together for you.

  Thank you, he said. But it’s difficult to describe.

  I understand, she said. Well, thank you for coming in.

  Do you always have white roses in stock?

  Almost always. Most of the time you don’t need to call ahead.
r />   Thank you, he said. The woman gazed after him in alarm; he must have looked unwell. When he got home, he vomited, then lay down for the rest of the morning. In the afternoon he telephoned the doctor.

  Can you explain your problem? said the advice nurse. The doctor will call you back.

  I’m dying.

  Sir, if this is an emergency you’d better come straight in.

  It’s not an emergency.

  Then what would you like the doctor to do for you? Do you need a refill on your pain medication?

  I’d like something stronger.

  Then you’ll need to make an appointment. What’s your date of birth?

  I could give you my date of death.

  That’s not what we go by, sir.

  What do you go by in your life?

  Sir, the doctor can fit you in tomorrow at three-o’-clock. Make sure you bring your insurance card with you.

  You, too, he said. He hung up, chewed up three antacids as delicately as if he were making love to them, waited a quarter-hour, then swallowed three pain pills.

  Down on the far side of the cemetery lay Hal Murmuracki’s Chapel of Flowers, an establishment whose black hearse never left the carport and whose lights whispered day and night through the closed blinds. It was early evening now, and the pills supported him. He turned the long doorlatch. On the left an old man sat behind a half open door, verifying accounts by means of a silent adding machine.

  Yes, said the man. Please sit down.

  I’d like some flowers. To . . .

  What kind of flowers?

  Moonflowers, he replied.

  I don’t believe I’ve heard of those.

  They’re . . . Well, I’ve never seen them myself.

  Just a moment, said the old man. He summed zero to zero, slowly, then shut off the adding machine.

  For a remembrance, is it? the old man asked sadly.

  Yes.

  She must be very special to you. Well, let’s see what we have in our floral section.

  Across the hall was a door inset with a black window. The old man knocked three times, then unlocked it.— It’s only me here today, he explained.

  The darkened room, not much larger than a closet, smelled of jasmine and sweet pea. The old man turned on the light. There was nothing inside but a sink and a long steel table.

  I’m expecting a delivery right about now, said the old man. Ah, here it comes.

  Through the mail slot sped a cylindrical tube wrapped in black paper. The old man caught it as it came, then slowly rolled it round and round on the table.— Yes, he said, this must be your order. A hundred dollars, please. It’s best to keep them in the package right up to the graveside, because this species is perishable, unfortunately. Quite light-sensitive, you see. They might last until sunrise tomorrow.

  Thank you for helping me.

  You won’t suffer as much as she did, said the old man. Don’t be afraid.

  Are you Mr. Murmuracki?

  No, I’m his father. Would you like a receipt?

  Suspecting that this might be a test, he gazed into the old man’s sorrowful eyes and said: I trust you.

  17

  Thank you for coming to see me, said Victoria. It makes me happy. There’s not a lot to do down here.

  Nor much for me up here. I’m glad it’s getting dark—

  I loved what you said to me last time. It had me laughing and laughing . . .

  What did I say? Anyhow, were you truly laughing?

  I was laughing down here but I didn’t want you to know.

  Why didn’t you?

  So you wouldn’t have power over me. It’s bad enough that you called me up. I had no choice but to come to you.

  If you’d had a choice, would you have come?

  I have a choice now. I don’t have to be with you unless I want to.

  Well, that’s a compliment, he said wearily.

  Don’t get irritated. If you do, I’ll hide. What did you bring me?

  Moonflowers, I hope.

  Did you really? It’s been ages since anybody brought me a present! Please, please open them right now. Oh, they’re pretty!

  Where shall I put them?

  Lay them down across my headstone, and then I’ll sit here and hold them in my lap, like this. Do I look beautiful?

  So beautiful—

  I’ll tell you a secret. I’ve never seen moonflowers before!

  Where did you learn about them?

  A long time ago I overheard the family in that mausoleum arguing. It was quite nasty, actually; I won’t repeat what they said. And the wife said that she wouldn’t forgive the husband for a hundred and one years, unless he gave her moonflowers.

  And did he?

  I don’t know. How could he get them? I don’t care about that couple really, although the elder daughter can be sweet. I don’t care about very many people. Do you think I should keep flirting with you like this?

  Well, why do you suppose I’m here?

  For love or advice.

  Or both, if you’re interested. But I’ve spent so many years assuming that you weren’t—

  But here you are, she laughed. As if we might have a future.

  Or a past.

  It upsets me that everyone up here mentions the future so unemotionally. Why don’t they scream death, death, death?

  Because we—

  Because you don’t care! It’s too awful and far away.

  You’re not far away. Not from me.

  No. But I’m awful. I was always awful to you.

  You’re being nice to me right now. What was in your mind when I came to you?

  Well, my first thought was, you still have the hormones of a seventeen-year-old, and you’ll never get beyond that with me. Then I thought: How sweet, actually! You must have considered what would cheer up a rotting skeleton with her eyesockets full of worms—

  But that’s not your form—

  Look! See!

  He nearly screamed. But he compelled himself to be brave, and advanced toward her with outstretched arms.

  At once she became as pale as a spring sky at twilight, but she was waveringly seventeen. The beauty of that he couldn’t bear; he would rather have her be a skeleton.

  18

  One of the reasons Victoria had left him was that at seventeen he was intensely morbid, and when he sent her a notebook filled with poems about skeleton women, she responded with angry disgust. This notebook and her final letter to him lay within a large yellow envelope in that drawer of his desk, buried, probably accidentally, beneath her other letters; whenever he saw that yellow envelope, which had turned orange with age, he felt sickish, and so he had never looked inside it since that first time, when they were seventeen. (Very slowly and cautiously, in tiny bites, he chewed a wisp of bread, hoping to calm his stomach.) In point of fact, whatever nausea the envelope recalled or engendered could not have afflicted him, since he forgot it for so many years at a time, and never reopened it. Since then he must have become, it seemed safe to say, a successful, alluring individual, for just look at all those letters from other women! When he was seventeen, no girl but Victoria had been at all interested in him. The reason that the envelope’s contents might unsettle his belly was that (until we begin dying, of course) the future is a new blank notebook unmarred, in which all our wishes may perhaps be written, while whatever has been written, being utterly real, must be utterly imperfect. And thank goodness he had done better and better since then! Why on earth would he care to wallow in the grief and humiliation of that time before he had begun to do well? Hence opening the notebook would have been painful enough; as for rereading Victoria’s stinging final letter, no, thank you.— So as he pulled fat or thin envelopes out of that pile, at first it was with a feeling of sweetness; and then, as the probability of drawi
ng a letter similar to the one in that orange envelope increased (and probably he would open the orange envelope sometime, out of mere thoroughness), he found the nausea beginning to waft up out of his guts and into his throat.

  19

  And yet, strange to say, Victoria had herself been morbid. She had written him a romantic letter: Jesus, I want to die of leukemia, too!

  Why on earth had the two of them wanted that? He had forgotten. And there were ever so many letters left to reread; perhaps he would never find the answer; very likely neither of them had known, being only seventeen.

  (Seventeen is actually a perfectly aware and decisive age, he reminded himself. I am no wiser than I was then—merely farther away from being seventeen.)

  It was certainly strange not to remember the circumstances of so peculiar a thing. Why had he written those poems? And what was he supposed to be learning now? But since his reacquaintance with Victoria had rendered the close of his life a sort of fairy tale, such incidental failures of recollection and understanding failed to trouble him. On certain hot afternoons when he felt so unwell that even a crumb of bread on his tongue made him retch, and Victoria’s letters were too much for him, he lay down with a volume of someone else’s fairy stories. One of Hermann Hesse’s parables accompanied someone away from the blue iris flower of his childhood. With growing sorrow and fear, the poor man painfully saw how empty and wasted the life behind him had become. It no longer belonged to him but was strange and disconnected, like something once memorized that could be recalled only with difficulty in the form of barren fragments. For the man who loved Victoria, the past was not this way. To be sure, it no longer belonged to him, but he did not wish to be seventeen anymore; and however much he had forgotten scarcely mattered, since he would so soon lose the rest. Moreover, had his life been any more empty than Victoria’s, or anyone’s? Could he have done better? If not, regret would be misplaced. So the hot days embraced him as he lay sweating and queasy on his bed, and only occasionally did her old letters speak to him. Sometimes they charmed or embarrassed him, but did they hint at anything of which he had lost sight? Had Isaac been correct in his way of life, and Luke in his death, then the thing to do was to open his hands and let the letters fall away. Well, should he? The women whom he had clung to (and who had clung to him), the erotic gardens in which he had played, entering and leaving them through caverns of loneliness, these had offered him ever so many blue irises, including Victoria herself; and the flowers, now pressed and preserved in his desk drawer, retained as much fragrance as any dying man deserved. They proved that his life had not been wasted.