A Fraction of the Whole: A Novel

by Steve Toltz

  —He is not a man. He is not in the world, she said & my suspicions hardened into conclusions: that this woman is insane.

  Always small canvases, always the same painting, only the colors differ browns & blacks & muted reds. I can see her frenzy in that face.

  Later I study the painted faces hoping that in the hallucinatory state in which she paints slips of her subconscious have dropped clues onto the canvas. The paintings perhaps elegantly symbolic maps that can lead me to epicenter of her morbid condition. My eyes train on them, dissecting them furtively under the weak lamplight. But I can’t see anything in that face other than her horror of it that fast has become my own. It really is a horrible face.

  Yesterday

  Whatever religious sentiments she has banked up in her interior stirred up in all this painting. Sometimes she’ll be lost in painting & she’ll call out Forgive me Lord! then go about chatting to him in half whispers leaving lengthy pauses presumably where he responds. When today she said Forgive me Lord! I did his part & said OK. You’re forgiven. Now shut up.

  —He doesn’t believe in you, Lord.

  —He’s right not to believe in me. I’m not very believable. Besides, what have I ever done for him?

  —You have led him to me!

  —And you think you’re such a gift? You aren’t even honest with him!

  —Yes I am, Lord, I am honest with him.

  —You don’t tell him anything about your past.

  —I tell him about my feelings.

  —Oh for fuck’s sake. Go and take him a beer. He’s thirsty! I shouted & a few seconds later she entered the room carrying the beer smiling sweetly & kissing me all over & I didn’t know what to think.

  Curiouser & Curiouser

  This is how we communicate. How I’m finding out a little more about her. Is there really a possibility she doesn’t know it’s me doing the part of God?

  This morning she painted as I sat beside her and read.

  —Oh Lord! How long! she shouted suddenly.

  —What?

  —How much longer!

  —How much longer what? Astrid, what are you talking about?

  She wasn’t looking at me she was looking up at the ceiling. I thought for a few minutes then went into the next room & half closed the door & peering through the crack tried this experiment and shouted back How much longer for what? Be specific, my child.

  I’m not a mind reader.

  —The years! How much longer will I live?

  —A long time! I said and watched the light behind her face galloping away.

  I couldn’t get any more out of her after that.

  & Curiouser

  Only when painting her ghastly sickening faces does it happen. I was sitting on the toilet when I heard from the living room Lord! I am afraid! I am afraid for this baby!

  I opened the door a little so she could hear me.

  —That’s ridiculous! What’s there to be scared about?

  Speaking as God from the toilet lent the whole situation some authenticity, the acoustics made my voice echo just like his would.

  —Will he be a good father? she asked.

  —He’ll do his best!

  —He won’t stay. I know it. One day he’ll go and I’ll be alone with this baby this sick baby!

  —There’s nothing wrong with the baby.

  —You know he must be sick like me.

  Then she laughed long & horribly & lapsed into silence.

  These chat sessions with the Lord i.e. me seem to take on proportions of a fabulous opera. Calling out from across the room, she confides in me as never before.

  —Lord?

  —Talk to me.

  —My life is a waste!

  —Don’t say that.

  —I have wandered everywhere! I have no friends! I have no country!

  —Everyone has a country.

  —I moved too fast! I saw too much! I forgot nothing! I am incapable of forgetting!

  —Is that such a bad thing? So you’ve got a good memory. Listen, whose face are you painting?

  —My father.

  —Really!

  —My father’s father.

  —Well, which is it?

  —My father’s father’s father.

  —Listen, Astrid. Do you want me to smite you?

  She said nothing more. I’d put the fear of Me into her.

  Sigh

  Eddie & I discussed tonight my pathetic financial situation & he offered to give me money not as loan but as gift. Out of fictitious pride I refused it biting my inner lip. Wandered streets randomly picking cafés & asking in patchy French if I might work there. Answers came in wordless sneers. What am I going to do? Clock’s ticking. A nine-month gestation period just isn’t enough preparation time. I pray the baby won’t be premature—undercooked people are trouble.

  Love Is Hard Work

  I was in the kitchen & Astrid in the living room painting her soul’s leftovers & I heard her shout Dieu!

  —What?

  —Dieu! Vous êtes ici? Pouvez-vous m’entendre?

  —English, my child.

  —I saw a child’s corpse today, oh Lord.

  —Yuck. Where?

  —Outside the hospital. A couple were carrying him in their arms to the emergency room, they were running but I saw that the child was already dead.

  —That’s hard, I said.

  —Why did you take him, O Lord?

  —Why blame me? I was nowhere near that kid!

  She fell silent for ten minutes then said Where are you, Lord?

  —In the bathroom.

  —WHERE ARE YOU, LORD?

  —IN THE BATHROOM!

  —What if after the baby’s out, nothing’s changed?

  —Are you nuts? A baby changes everything.

  —But inside me? In my blood.

  —Astrid, have you been to the doctor’s?

  —Yes, God, I’ve been to doctors in Austria & in Italy & in Greece & in Germany & in Turkey & in Poland & they all say the same thing. I have the healthiest blood they’ve ever seen.

  —Well, there you go. Did you really go to a doctor in Turkey? Did he wash his hands?

  —I’m doomed.

  —You’re imagining it. There’s nothing wrong with you. Everyone says so. You’ve been given a clean bill of health. You can’t go on imagining there’s something wrong with your blood. That’s just crazy talk, OK?

  —OK.

  —Are we together on this?

  —Yes, Lord.

  —Good. Now what’s for dinner?

  Three in the Morning

  Tonight I worked!

  Eddie—without consulting me—convinced someone to give me a job.

  —I didn’t authorize you to do that.

  —You’re almost out of money. You’ve got a child to think about now.

  —Well, all right then, what will I be doing?

  —You’ll be working with me. Loading crates.

  —That sounds all right.

  —It’s hard, backbreaking work.

  —I’ve heard about that kind of thing I said wondering why people always boast about doing something that breaks your back.

  Pont Neuf at dusk—no boats. Dark waters of the Seine, not flowing. We waited on the stone banks of the river & watched the brown water just sit there.

  —What do we do now? I asked.

  —We wait.

  Boats & barges ambled languidly by. A soft rain fell & night fell down with it. Colored city lights reflected on the body of the river. Rain fell unabated.

  Two hours later Eddie said Here we are then.

  The boat came forward relentlessly, a nightmare littered with heavy packing crates. Two men stepped off, faces hardly visible between where beanies stopped & scarves began. We worked wordlessly in the anonymous night clearing crates one by one from the boat & carrying them up the ramp to the street where truck was waiting.

  Driver of truck had sluggish dozy eyes & as we worked I tried guessing his in
ner sufferings but couldn’t come up with anything other than “hates to work at night.” Eddie & I unloaded those heavy crates for hours while others shouted orders to each other in harsh whispers. By end as the empty boat putted out to sea my everything hurt.

  Driver of truck gave Eddie envelope & we walked off together sweating in the cold moonlight. Eddie handed envelope to me, in an attempt to get me to keep all the money to feed my sudden & unwanted family but I gave him half—my greedy self chafing against my principled self.

  I came home & was distressed to see I was spotless after heavy night of toil. Imagined my face would be covered in black soot but there’s just no soot in lifting crates no matter how heavy they are.

  —How was it? Astrid asked as if I’d been to see a much-hyped movie. I looked at her belly & it occurred to me there was nothing inside not a baby not even a digestive system just a vacant hollow shell puffed up with air & I walked over & put my hand on her growth which she took as a loving gesture & she kissed my hand which made me feel cold all over & I thought I am incapable of loving this woman the mother of my child, and maybe I won’t be able to love the child either. And why am I like that? Is it because I have no self-love? I have self-like but is it enough?

  A Week Later an Accident

  We work night after night, silent silhouettes sweating in the dark. The hours grind by & I make time pass by imagining I’m an Egyptian slave constructing one of the lesser pyramids. My reverie broken when I mistakenly articulate it to Eddie by saying when we drop a crate for the third time Come on Eddie, for the love of Ra!

  Tonight when I came home Astrid was on the floor.

  —Are you OK? What happened?

  —I fell down the stairs.

  First compassionate thought was for the baby—his head will be dented & all squashed in at one side I thought.

  I took her to bed & fed her & read to her like my mother read to me tho she was by all appearances unharmed by the fall. She lay in bed staring with only the whites of her eyes. Her pupils lay there like little broken pieces of night. She told me not to fuss. Do you think the baby’s all right? I asked. Should we take your stomach to the hospital?

  —You don’t want this baby, she said not looking at me.

  —That’s not true! I shouted defensively. I didn’t want this baby but now that it’s coming I’ve accepted the inevitable I lied hoping to talk myself into stoic fortitude. It didn’t work.

  Tonight

  Something happened tonight. Laboring away as usual, a useless moon shedding diffused light through a thin veil of clouds, the night like a bite of cold apple—it made my teeth sting. Tied the boat to the pier & thought how if someone bottled smell of wet rope & sold it over the counter I’d buy it.

  Sudden shouting. Above us a group of four Arabs descended the steps walking closely together—a tough-guy walk, a mean bounce. Long black coats & longer faces. The Arabs shouted something & our guys shouted back & stopped working & grabbed whatever was handy, pipes crowbars metal hooks. The two groups argued in a spattering of French & Arabic. I didn’t know what they were arguing about but tension chewable. The two groups menacingly close to one another & there was a little show of pushing & shoving & they looked so much like rival football supporters full of beer the whole scene made me homesick.

  Eddie said to me We should keep out of it. What do you think?

  Didn’t tell him what I thought because what I thought was this: Everyone here but Eddie & me has a beard.

  Couldn’t pick up the meaning of all those guttural sounds—only the hostility was clear. After the group broke up & climbed back up the sloping ramp the leader of the Arab group spat on the ground, a gesture that always says to me I’m too scared to spit in your face so I’m just going to put some phlegm about half a meter from your left shoe OK?

  Dawn

  Am I changing? Is a man’s character changeable? Imagine an immortal. Revolting to think he might be making the same old booboos over the centuries. To think of the immortal on his 700,552nd birthday still touching the plate even when someone has told him it’s hot—surely we have deep capacity for change but our 80 years doesn’t give us ample opportunity. You have to be a fast learner. You have to cram infinity into a handful of lousy decades.

  This morning passed horribly deformed beggar who was for all practical purposes merely a torso rattling a cup—was it really me who gave him 100 francs & said Take the day off? It wasn’t me, not exactly. It was one of my selves, one of the multitudes. Some of them laugh at me. Others bite their nails in suspense. One snorts with derision. That’s how they are, the multitudes. Some of the selves are children & some are parents. That’s why every man is his own father & his own son. With the years if you learn enough you can learn how to shed your selves like dead skin cells. Sometimes they come out of you & walk around.

  Yes I’m changing. Change is when new selves come into foreground while others recede into forgotten landscapes. Maybe definition of having lived full life is when every citizen in the hall of selves gets to take you for a spin—the commander the lover the coward the misanthrope the fighter the priest the moral guardian the immoral guardian the lover of life the hater of life the fool the judge the jury the executioner—when every last soul is satisfied at moment of death. If only one of the selves has been nothing but a spectator or a tourist then the life is incomplete.

  My commander, that highest voice in the hierarchy of my head, is back—tyrannical bastard. He orders me to stay w/ Astrid & ride it out. No wonder am in confusion. Am oppressed by totalitarian police state in which I live. There must be a revolution one of these days. A revolt of all my selves—but I’m not sure I have the one needed to lead them: a liberator.

  Escape!

  Baby escaped! Fluid has become flesh. No turning back now. We’ve named it Jasper.

  A cause for celebration & fear & trembling. Astrid proud mother—me semiproud. Never been much of a collaborator. Baby was joint project & my personal stamp hard to ascertain.

  Today baby on a blanket kicking chubby legs in the air. Told Astrid to keep him off the floor—would be embarrassing if he was eaten by rats. Bent over baby & looked but really wanted to peer into his skull to see if any evil or cruelty or intolerance or sadism or immorality in there. A new human being. Am not impressed it’s mine.

  Can’t help thinking that in this baby we’ve forged an absurd monument to our passionless relationship—we’ve created a symbol of something not worth symbolizing: a crazy edifice of flesh that will grow in equal proportion to our dwindling love as it dies.

  The smell! The smell!

  There’s more feces here than in the Marquis de Sade’s prison cell.

  Silence

  Baby doesn’t cry. I don’t know anything about babies except that they cry. Ours isn’t crying.

  —Why is he so damn quiet? I asked.

  —I don’t know.

  Astrid sat in the living room all pale staring out the window. Can’t help but look at this baby & see not a child or a new human being but an old one. A sickening idea has taken hold—this baby is me prematurely reincarnated. I loathe this kid—I loathe it because it is me. It is me. It will surpass me. It will overthrow me. It will know what I know, all my mistakes. Other people have children. Not me. I have given birth to something monstrous: to myself.

  —I think he’s hungry, I said.

  —So?

  —So get your tit out.

  —He’s sucking me dry.

  —OK, OK. Maybe I’ll just give him some normal milk.

  —No! That’s no good for him!

  —Well, fuck, this is not my field of expertise. All I know is the baby needs some kind of nourishment.

  —Why don’t you read to him? she said laughing. Last night she’d caught me reading him passages from Heidegger.

  —He doesn’t understand, she’d howled.

  —I don’t either! I shouted back. Nobody does!

  A very bad situation. Of the three of us, it’s clear whose
welfare must be provided for at all costs, who is the most important here.

  Me.

  I Almost Died Tonight!!!!!!!

  The boat’s never on time so we wait & read the newspaper & then it arrives like the four horsemen of the apocalypse on a moonlight cruise. The darkness broken by bobbing lights of the boat heading toward us & as it moors the rigid faces of our employers wedged tightly in the dark.

  Tonight Eddie & I were lifting a particularly heavy crate that just wouldn’t budge & I’d only got it a quarter of an inch off the ground when I realized in a panic I wasn’t bending my knees. Fearing for longevity of my spine I lowered the crate & stepped away from it & tho it was too late I bent my knees.

  —What are you doing? Eddie asked.

  —Let’s have a break, I said & pulled out a book from my back pocket & started to read—a novel I’d bought at one of the stalls next to the Seine: Journey to the End of the Night by Céline.

  Didn’t read more than a line—my eye caught dark mass moving toward us, a group of men you’d think were out for a brisk walk if not for guns in their hands.

  A shot fired in the air. Our coworkers fled in all directions running up & down the bank of the Seine. It’s funny watching people’s stony indifference disappear when their lives are at stake.

  Eddie & I walled in behind a tower of crates. Our only escape route would have been the freezing Seine or the sudden appearance of a golden staircase to the clouds. We ducked down behind crates.

  —What have you gotten me into? I asked Eddie eager to assign blame.

  Eddie ran forward & untied the ropes mooring us to the bank & pushed with his foot & ran back & joined me behind the crates. The boat slowly drifting.

  We listened to the footsteps as they came closer to the boat & we listened to the footsteps as they jumped onto the boat now gliding down the Seine.

  —Come out of there, a gruff voice said.

  Maybe he’s not talking to us I thought optimistically & was annoyed at Eddie’s automatic compliance. He stood his hands high in the air like he’s done this before.

  —You too, the voice said to someone, hopefully not me. Come on, I can see your shadow.

  I looked across at my shadow & realized it’s only the head that gives you away. Otherwise crouched down you could be any old sack of potatoes.