by Peter Gault
“Hi, Julia,” interrupted Henry.
It was none other than the Vomiter. A pain shot through my groin. Crossed my arms in front of my crotch, I walked backwards, fending off Dracula with a crucifix. She smiled sinisterly, two devilish fangs protruding from her lips. Henry was about to make the introductions, unaware that we had already met. I turned and sprinted for safety as Henry called after me, but I didn’t look back.
8. On the Roof
I was spreadeagled on the roof of Phil’s car, barely gripping the three-quarter inch rim above the front window. I held on with aching fingertips, the cold wind hammering my forehead. Phil was driving down a snow-packed residential street while Paul and Ross guzzled beer in the back seat. The car was insane, reckless, speeding on inclines, braking on declines, sliding into snow banks. Phil’s foot danced on the gas and brake pedals, throwing the car into spins. We twirled in one direction and then in the other. The purpose of the game was to throw me off the roof.
“Ken,” shouted Phil, opening the window and bringing the car to a standstill. Heat and music poured out. “Why don’t you get a normal girl, like Elizabeth?”
“That’s all I want, a normal girl,” I shouted back. “Honest!”
The car lurched forward, resuming its erratic course. I didn’t resent being on the roof while Phil was at the controls, warm and surrounded by music. I was there by choice, a perverse desire to expose myself to the elements. I was an American cowboy, graduating from wild broncos to this mechanical monster. I was primitive man, a tragic hero, King Lear writhing on the heath.
My position was tenuous and my voice was hoarse as I roared theatrically.
“Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drench’d our steeples, drown’d the cocks!
You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head! …”
Paul and Ross applauded my soliloquy and tossed an empty beer bottle out the window. They were the commoners in the pit of my imaginary Elizabethan theater. I had dazzled my Drama professor with that rendition of King Lear and marveled at the relevance of Shakespeare to my life in twentieth-century suburbia. Shakespeare had a feel for atmosphere, black overcast skies, threatening storms, the eerie violence of nature paralleling the violence of man’s actions. Nature was as temperamental as man, capable of sublime beauty and gentleness, but subject to harsh moods and fits of rage. In this context, the violent propensities of man were almost forgivable. Man was the beneficiary and victim of this energy force, this spirit inside himself.
I had been ravaged by exams, raped and pillaged by the masked marauders of academia. I was naked, legs spread, waiting for the next assailant with fatalistic resolve. But tomorrow Shultz and I would fly to Florida for a week’s reprieve with my father: sun, women, sleep. I was lonely for sleep! When pressure invaded my life, sleep slipped away like an elusive lover.
There was a stairway that sloped towards a school yard, each step about three inches high. It had been shoveled and salted and was wide enough for the car. Phil drove down it with me on the roof, digging in with my fingers and toes, jittering around like a sack of jumping beans. Although it was night and the sky was dark and stormy, the pathway was well lit. I felt a murder was being enacted in a nearby castle.
I whispered to myself with histrionic weariness.
“Sleep that knits up the ravell’d sleave of care,
The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,
Chief nourisher in life’s feast.”
The car reached the bottom and moved fast and smooth along the path, finding its way back to the street. Phil laughed boisterously. He rolled down the window and began to throw things out of the car. Pieces of garbage caught the wind. A full bottle of beer bounced along the street into a snow bank. Phil kept a box of kitchen and bathroom appliances for sales purposes in my usual seat. His laughter increased as a hair-drier and a plastic shelving unit flew out the window. Paul and Ross joined in the laughter. There was lots of laughter. Even the wind was cackling, but I had missed the joke. I was excluded; my fingers were numb.
Paul was too drunk to face his parents and slept at my house. The basement was concrete, and pipes stretched the length of the ceiling. Mother must have cleaned up the hardened mountain of dog shit which usually covered the basement floor. There were two single beds, one on each side of the room. I was semiconscious, vaguely aware of the encroachment of morning, of the brightening room, of Shultz curled up at the foot of my bed. I drifted in and out of a dream. There was a snake in The Barren Room. I was running around the basement, looking for a gun to shoot the snake.
Paul farted and giggled. Judging from the smell of the room, he had been farting all night. I was irritated. Sleep had become a precious commodity. I wanted to shout angrily at Paul, but that would have completely awakened me, and I was hoping for a few more hours of sleep. I concentrated on oblivion, blackness, The Barren Room, and gradually drifted into a drowsy fog. I submerged myself in a warm, soothing pool of water, the balm of hurt minds.
Paul farted again, longer and louder than the last one. He thought it was hilarious and fought painfully to suppress his laughter.
“You fuckin’ pig,” I roared, which sent Paul into an uncontrollable fit of hysterics. “It stinks in here! One more time and I’ll … ram a plug up your ass.”
It took a great effort for Paul to regain his composure. There must have been a serious malfunction in his bowels to produce a smell with that kind of density. The air was as thick as syrup. A green mist hung stubbornly over the room, unmovable, a poisonous wall of gas between me and freedom. If Paul’s insides were that decayed at his age, that foul, imagine what they would be like when he got older! Beer eventually causes your internal organs to rot and putrify. That is why fifty-year-old men are so disgusting the morning after a night of drinking. Paul had the farting capacity of a middle-aged man.
I sought safety under the blankets where the air was stuffy, but unpolluted. I couldn’t sleep, kept anticipating the next explosion, waiting for it, my wrath steadily building. I resented being woken by Paul’s puerility and was too healthy to be of any challenge to Paul in a game of chemical warfare. I started playing footsie with Shultz at the bottom of the bed, letting him bite my foot through the blankets.
Paul farted a third time. His anus made a deep bass sound like a trombone. “A wet one,” snorted Paul jubilantly.
I was on my feet, naked and growling, bent on retrieving the plug from the upstairs bathtub and shoving it up Paul’s ass. En route I noticed a can of Lysol disinfectant spray and got an idea. I felt the weight of the can and realized it was full, a loaded weapon.
Paul was sitting up in bed when I yanked off the sheets, threw him on his stomach, and sat on his back. Shultz was barking and dancing and I could hear Whiskey and Tanka charging down the stairs to join the excitement. Paul had a skinny build and it was easy for me to overpower him. I sprayed through his underwear until the material was soaking wet. I held up the elastic waistband and sprayed directly onto his ass. He kicked and fought at first, but eventually gave up and resigned himself to the punishment. Everything was wet and sticky. I didn’t climb off until the can of spray was empty. Paul wiped himself with a dry corner of a sheet.
“You lunatic! My asshole is burning,” said Paul with a painful expression.
Later, at the airport, Shultz was frightened. He didn’t like airports, too much noise, cement, confusion. Shultz belonged to long grass, to nakedness and spontaneity, to the sensual world of nature. The bustling crowds of businessmen made him self-conscious and unsure of himself. He lost touch with his confidence, his natural instincts, cringing away from people and clinging to my side for protection. I provided motherly security, the only island of familiarity.
The leash upset
Shultz. It was a humiliating experience for him. Shultz was more than a dog; he was even more than a kindred spirit; he was inside me, part of my personality. I know that everyone loves his dog, but the love is tainted by an attitude of superiority and condescension. Shultz and I loved each other as equals. I didn’t believe in the hierarchy of life, with man on the top. I was arrogant, but not that arrogant. In my opinion, Shultz surpassed the average citizen of the human race. He transcended the mediocrity of suburbia.
Shultz was Shultz. He was himself, free of the pressure to fit a prescription or mold. He didn’t care what professors thought or why a girl wouldn’t dance with him or if he could go the distance in bed. He didn’t need an exterior stamp to be legitimized. He had an unintellectual wisdom, a closeness to the energy of nature, and would leap through a field of grass, humping everyone and loving everything. Few humans achieve such unbounded purity of expression, except perhaps musicians. If reincarnation exists, I want to be reborn as a dog, aspiring to no higher level of consciousness.
I picked Shultz up and he clung to me like a scared child, wrapping his paws around my neck and his legs around my waist. He dug in with his nails, fearful of being torn away and separated from me. He stuck his head under my chin, hiding his face.
“It’s OK, baby,” I whispered, kissing him on the snout and between the eyes. He looked at me occasionally and licked my face. It was an act of forgiveness.
I bought a cage for forty dollars. Shultz was to be caged and stored in a remote section of the plane. I tried to convince the lady in the uniform that Shultz was a polite, sensitive dog and should be allowed to sit on my lap for the flight. Apparently my request was outrageous and went against every regulation in the world. She was angry at me for holding up the line. Although Shultz yelped and cried, it never occurred to him to bite the miserable bitch who was handling him so roughly. I wished he would. I held Shultz until he calmed down and placed him without resistance into the cage. Shultz had absolute faith in me.
“I love you, Shultz,” I said through the bars. I noticed his limbs shivering as he disappeared down the conveyor belt.
The plane ride was long and uncomfortable. I was nowhere near a window, and the seating arrangement was designed for midgets, perfect for my sister’s boyfriends like Angel Pie. If I was an inch taller I would have had to stand on my seat and I was sure seat-standing was also against regulations. The regulations were not accommodating to dogs or people above average height.
When I thought of Shultz shivering in a cage, I felt sick to my stomach. A million things irritated me, the cramped sitting space, the fat slob beside me hogging the arm rest, the crying of a baby. It smelt like the infant had shit its diaper. I fantasized about putting the filthy brat in a cage and heaving it out the window like Phil did with the hair-drier and shelving unit. The flight home wouldn’t be as bad. Shultz would be familiar with the routine.
At the airport, a conveyor belt carried the luggage to a revolving disc. I waved to my father who was waiting behind a pane of glass, his bald head shining, and muscled into the crowd at the luggage area. I helped old ladies with their suitcases. It wasn’t an expression of benevolence, but of a desire to get rid of the old biddies. They were irritating me and Shultz would be intimidated by this mob. I wanted him to have a clear passage.
There was lots of elbow room by the time my suitcase dropped to the carousel. The interval between one bag of luggage and the next became greater until only a couple of people were left. Finally, I was alone.
“Shultz,” I shouted up the belt.
I tried to imagine Shultz gliding down the belt, tail wagging, but I couldn’t do it. I grabbed an attendant and demanded to know the whereabouts of my dog. I kept glancing at the conveyor belt, trying to create Shultz with my imagination. The attendant promised to investigate the problem. I began circling the carousel.
“Shultz!” I shouted.
My father dodged the security guard and made his way into the luggage area, breaking another regulation. He was concerned about me. I was concerned about Shultz. I was running around the carousel and Father was chasing me, like children playing tag. I belonged in the wilderness and cursed the body politic, the world of regulations.
“Shultz!” I screamed, falling over my suitcase.
The attendant stood above me. Her uniform gleamed like the cold blade of a guillotine. I rolled onto my back, panting. She was inverted. We studied each other upside down. Her eyes were shy and hesitant. She had a cat in her arms.
“Would you like a cat, Sir?” she asked.
“What!?” I exclaimed, unbelievingly.
“It’s a lovely cat.”
“But I don’t like cats.”
“They make lovely pets, Sir.”
The handle of my suitcase was greasy, like a bar of soap slipping out of my hand. Twice! Thrice! Four times! I only advanced a few yards. I got down on my knees and wrapped my arms around it, but I couldn’t lift it. It was solid rock, a boulder. I tried to push it, but it didn’t move. I was crying because it didn’t move. I was crawling along the floor, feeling my way like a blind man, trying to find my suitcase. My suitcase was lost. Tears came in a flood, splashing on the floor, blurring my vision. The floor dissolved into liquid.
It was a baptism that lasted a week, seven days and seven nights of fervent purgation. Once the tears started, they couldn’t be stopped. They gushed forth with the hearty eloquence of a Shakespearean sonnet and the passionate crescendos of a Mozart symphony. I shuddered until my stomach muscles felt like the taut sinews of a racked animal. The skin under my nose was red and chafed. My eyes were swollen. I cried enough to flush away five months of abstruse hurt, of disorientation and frustration.
Father swooped me off the floor and carried me to his nest in the darkness of a cave where I found more than emotional release. I found sleep. Real sleep. Deep sleep. Not the unsettling delirium of a troubled insomniac. I slept and cried and cried and slept. The drapes were pulled and I remained concealed from the light, no sun, no beaches, no women. I didn’t even masturbate very often. It was a ritual of mourning, presided over by my dad.
My father scurried among the shadows bearing ceremonial paraphernalia such as boxes of Kleenex and trayloads of food. We had short meaningless conversations on a variety of inane subjects. These conversations were immensely satisfying to both of us, and Father never got insulted if I fell asleep in the middle of an exposition about elevators or the weather. It’s curious the way a father and son express their love. It’s done covertly, on the sly, without direct eye contact. Men are inhibited creatures when it comes to expressing love for each other. Father and I had a lengthy discussion about the box of Kleenex on the table, the colorful design, the philosophical intention of the advertiser, the soft texture of the tissue. The subject matter was superficial. The transfer of affection was profound.
I was haunted by a dream, a collage of images and sounds. The engineer was painting the clock tower pink. I heard the horrible thud of his body hitting concrete, like the thunderclap of an apocalypse. I turned to discover Shultz standing on four healthy limbs. Relief! Shultz became Elizabeth. She was an oasis in the desert. I ran to embrace her, but she disappeared in my arms like a hallucination. She was nothing more than air, a ghost, a tremor on ether.
I awoke with a burning sensation inside me. I cried for Shultz, for myself, for Elizabeth. Where was Elizabeth? Who was Elizabeth? Did she exist in reality or was she a figment of my imagination, a sexual fantasy? There was a person inside that beautiful body of hers! I wanted to explore that person. I wanted to light a candle and study her in the flame. I wanted to seduce her imagination, discover her fantasies and fears, share in her vision. I wanted to make love in slow motion. I wanted to hear her voice in the early morning before the cars get out of bed, and the factories light up their first cigarette. I wanted to show her the hole in my armor, the secret spot where there was no protective padding. And I wanted to make her concrete, alive, not just a tremor of ether or
a passing fragrance.
It was this renewed passion for Elizabeth which inspired me to occasionally venture out of my bedroom. It helped regenerate my enthusiasm for sunlight. Sara and her daughters were kind, but reticent. They thought I overreacted. Shultz was only a dog, and although a dog is man’s best friend; a dog is not a brother, a sister, or a parent. How would I survive the death of a human being, a family member? They responded to me in the same way they responded to Father. We were excluded from the circle of women, isolated in camps according to sex and blood ties. The intimacy between father and son was intensified.
“This guy had a beautiful German Shepherd,” said Father. “It was an award-winning dog and his central interest in life. He went on a month-long holiday in Europe and got his most trusted friend to look after his dog. He wasn’t gone a week when he received a letter from his friend saying, ‘Your dog is dead,’ with no explanation and no condolences. He was appalled by the insensitivity of the letter and wrote his friend back saying, ‘You don’t say something that point blank. You ease into it with a little gentleness, prepare the person. You should have written, for example, that my dog is on the roof and you’re worried because you haven’t been able to get him down. In the next letter you could warn me that my dog had an unfortunate accident, but he’s receiving the best possible medical attention. Then say you’re extremely sorry, but my dog has passed away.’ A week later he got another letter from his friend saying simply, ‘Your mother is on the roof.’”
I laughed for the first time in a week or more. I participated in the sanity of humor. Strength returned to my finger tips and I regained my grip on mental health.
I would lobby Elizabeth for forgiveness, profess my devotion, announce that I was finally ready for love. I would take her for a drink, let the conversation and emotion pour out. I had drunk with lots of women, but not with the woman I loved. I had attempted to woo and seduce lots of women, but not the woman I loved. Does love have to be cramped by domesticity? Does love exclude the verbal activity of a bar? I would give Elizabeth more than love. I would give her a good time, adventure, music. It was through these things that I’d get to know the person inside Elizabeth’s body. She was a stranger to me. It would be a crime if we could never be anything but strangers to each other.