It is cold and I can feel the blood in my heart freezing into clumps, pumping, squeezing my chest, constricting, breathe, puff, puff of fog. There is a magnolia tree. Run to it. He’s coming closer and closer. You can do it you can do it you can you can. I run around and around and the huge magnolia leaves are brushing against the ground like brooms, brushing against my legs. He is coming, calling my name and it echoes up against the huge brick dorm, up to the lit rooms. I must crawl under the branches and hide. My knees are cold and rough and I wait, barely breathing, wait. I climb the tree slowly; I see myself: I say put this foot here, hold onto this branch and I get up higher and higher so that I can hide and get warm. I can see the windows, my room, that robin egg blue like two wide eyes. All the windows look warm and the girls are inside painting their nails, playing albums, watching T.V., studying for one last exam as though nothing has happened, as though Jo Spencer has never been born, as though she does not feel her scalp being peeled away like the skin of an onion.
III
His voice gets louder and louder; it disrupts her reading. She watches Becky putting on makeup. Becky is pretty and Becky is smart; Becky has lots of fun and remains cool and calm. Something is wrong with Becky. She is too nice, too curious.
“Jo? What’s wrong?” Becky faces her and Becky reminds her of someone. Who?
“Nothing’s wrong,” she says and smiles perfectly.
“Why have you got your ears covered up?” Becky laughs and starts putting on mascara. “Does the radio bother you?”
“No, no reason.” Becky doesn’t hear it. She is the only one that can hear him and he is doing it on purpose. This is what they did to Beatrice. This is how it all happened and it’s going to happen again. Get out! Get out!
“Jo? Where are you going?” Becky stops, the mascara tube poised gracefully in her hand. Jo Spencer has never worn mascara. Why should she?
“Out,” she says.
“Well, good!” Becky squeals. “I’ll be ready in just a sec. There’s this really neat bar where everybody goes!”
“No, I’m going for a walk,” she says because she can’t go where “everybody” goes. People would see. She must get outside where she can breathe and the air is so cold that it shoots up her nose straight to her brain. She has to walk very very fast; run by dark bushes; run, run fast as you can. Climb a tree, it’s safe in trees. Climb it like you climbed the oak tree in Mr. Monroe’s yard when his cat got stuck. Hear that cat getting louder and louder. “She’ll find her way back down,” Mrs. Monroe says. “She’s always getting herself in some place that she can’t get out of.” Yes, she’s always getting herself up on some place that she can’t get out of. “But she needs help, Mrs. Monroe. I’ll climb the tree.” And she does, slowly, carefully, put this foot here, grab that limb. Meow! Meow! Higher and higher she climbs and then it is safe; it is warm.
He’s not down there; he just called on the telephone from Moon Lake. But, he could be down there; he could’ve used a phone close by, made it sound long distance, could’ve lied about Beatrice. She must be very careful. She must recite aloud to silence any noise, any sound. “And all the while, for every grief, each suffering, I craved relief with individual desire; Craved all in vain! And felt fierce, fierce . . .” What are the words? Those words to finish it? Give the correct words and you may climb back down, take kitty home, be safe. “Felt fierce, fierce Fire! about a thousand people crawl; perished with each,—then mourned for all!” Yes, you may go now. Hurry, though because it’s spooky here. The big blue eyes just closed and you will be all alone in that room. “Hurry up, please, it’s time, Hurry up, please, it’s time.”
It was a blue Christmas just like Elvis says, like Elvis said. She had seen Elvis just the summer before and it was sad to see him because he looked a little bad, because people talked about how he looked bad. Why did they have to talk about that? Why couldn’t they remember how he used to be? Why don’t they think of what it took for him to get that way? Why doesn’t everyone who says how good Beatrice is looking think about what it took for her to get that way? Jo Spencer looks bad and the blue Christmas didn’t help. Everyone kept asking her how she felt and she felt fine! It was none of their business. Everyone at church had stared at her because they knew all about her; God knew and it was depressing. The story about the Virgin Mary was so depressing that she had had to cry and get up and run into that little part that always stays dark, up against the big wooden dark doors where the stained glass is so dark that only specks of light get through. She had waited and watched all the people that she knew crawling like ants for a little piece of bread; a piece of flesh, a drink of blood, bloodthirsty; they are saved. Her brother was there; he was going to be a doctor; he was in love and happy. Little brother was there; he is thirteen, a bad year. Red had been there and it had occurred to her first that it was very funny to see him in a church. Was he repenting? No, no, he was following her. It occurred to her second that she wished his last name was Green and then he could only come out once a year when the colors were right.
Yes, it was a blue Christmas like Elvis always says but now everything is going to be okay. A new semester has begun, a beginning, and she is taking Geology (a necessary lab science), Introduction to Poetry Writing, Philosophy of Religion, English II and French II. She thinks: This is a deadly combination. Je ne sais pas why exactly, why God exists or doesn’t exist, why rocks are rocks. In the beginning God created the heavens and the rocks or was it the big bang theory? Can it be encompassed into one thesis, one statement of purpose? Is there a ballad about this? Tout le monde!
Too, things are going to be just fine because she has made new rules to follow. The rules encompass all of the basics and they must be followed to a tee or something awful will happen. She must eat only once a day at exactly five-thirty while Andy Griffith is on T.V. She cannot get off of her bed from the minute that the show begins til the very last whistle of the music at the end. Therefore, she must begin preparations for dinner around five, go to the snack bar and get either one cup of Dannon’s yogurt (preferably banana) or one cup of cottage cheese. On special occasions she may get one can of chunky chicken soup and of course, a Tab. These things (one of the foods, a Tab, a pack of cigarettes, an ashtray, and a book to skim while the commercials are on) must be placed right beside the bed, turn on the T.V. at five-twenty-five and wait. She must try not to sleep at night because that is when the dream comes, the dream where she is running, running, running, looking for him because something is wrong but the people that she finds can’t hear her; they can’t see her. She screams and screams but no one knows that she is alive. No, she must sleep in the afternoons when other people are awake. She must be like a fish and swim around all night with her eyes open, work very hard, make good grades like Bobby so that everyone will know that she is okay. All the while that she is awake, she must think big profound thoughts, points to ponder (except when Andy is on) so that she will stay small and she must write all of these thoughts down in a journal. She must keep a journal for English II but any entry that sounds poetical may be handed in twice, once for English II and once for Poetry Writing.
For just a quarter, she can get on the bus system and ride all day long around the same loop. If she rides long enough, she can know where she is at any given moment and that is a comfort. It is a very pleasant way to ease the guilt of skipping classes. There are too many people in the classes and they all sit too close together. If she does all of the reading then she can still make good grades. It is just that simple and it is a big secret that only she knows. Becky thinks that she goes to class every day and she does. She goes to English II on Monday, Wednesday and Friday at eight o’clock and she goes to Poetry on Tuesdays and Thursdays at nine o’clock. Then she hops a bus and rides all day. She wouldn’t even go to English II except that she only gets three cuts and she is saving them for when they are absolutely necessary. Thus far, English II has not been bad because the reading is very nice. Yes, the man in Zen and the Art of Motorc
ycle Maintenance is a very fine man to read about because he is looking for definitions of things which have no definition and she found The Bell Jar terribly amusing. It came as a terrible shock when the professor said that Esther Greenwood was crazy. She had never even considered that Esther was crazy, not really crazy. Beatrice had tried to kill herself and she was not crazy, different but not crazy though that’s what everybody says now that it’s over, that Beatrice must have been crazy. Nobody wants to believe that someone who is not crazy would try to kill themselves, that they would have a good reason. Who knows what crazy is anyway? The reading is very good and that is why she doesn’t mind saving her cuts for a big event when one comes along.
Legally, she could cut Poetry Writing or at least she could have in the beginning but not now. No, it is a personal rule that she must not cut that class except when absolutely necessary. The poetry professor is very funny and this is why she cannot miss class. Another reason is because he has these piercing steel gray eyes and she knows that he can tell about a person just by looking at them. She must attend regularly so that he will find her worthy of being there. He is very encouraging of what she COULD do even though she is not yet doing it and this is the first time that anyone has ever looked into her Could Be’s as opposed to her Already Are’s. She must not let this man down on these Could Be’s the way that Red let her down. If she does, then the man will hate her the way that she hates Red. She is very pleased with the poem that she has worked on all day on the bus. She began it at ten-fifteen, right after class and it is now five o’clock and time to begin dinner preparations. The poem is called “Amoebae” and there are so many good words about amoebae, slither, slide, shapeless, spineless, splitting. They put a false foot forward and never draw it back. It is a pleasant point to ponder, one that can keep her busy until she sees Andy and Barney.
Jo Spencer wakes late at night; the green hands of the clock show that it is three-fifteen. How did this happen? She has not really been asleep, not really, because she doesn’t sleep at night, because the thoughts were there, the panic that will not dissolve in the gray morning as it used to, as it used to be sucked away like a snake’s venom, bubbles down the bathtub drain. She wants that Saturday night squeaky clean, skin rubbed to a vigorous pink, wrapped in flannel jammies—sit on the floor and let the big dog Jaspar chew on the fuzzy slippers that came last Christmas—rest your head on Daddy’s knee and watch the gray T.V. light flicker on the knotty pine paneling, watch every fear of the day dissolve into the gray, into the hum and the lullaby will hum in the warm bed where only nice dreams are allowed.
Taking a shower is difficult: She must tiptoe down the hall, that fluorescent glaring hall that never changes whether day or night. Quietly, check behind every shower curtain, check every toilet stall for someone lurking there and waiting for this to happen. Do they disappear when she looks only to come back once she is in her shower stall, behind her own curtain, the one at the very end, the last to be gotten should someone come after her?
The water is hot and her skin breathes the stream. Her body becomes full like a plum, rosy and full while it drinks, that thirsty prune. She leans against the side of the stall, now warm, and slowly, ever slowly, slides down and sits in the corner, her feet straddling the drain. From here, she can see; if anyone comes, she will at least see. The water swirls down the rusted hole and is gone like the years of young girls who have been in this same place—the hair that must be squeaky clean on ballgame Saturdays, the legs that must be shaved on those warm days when it is hot enough to lie out, then afterwards to remove suntan oil.
There is one hair and she knows it is there without looking—stuck near the top of the stall where it stays dry, protected—one pubic hair, stripped from its home, isolated, and God only knows WHERE it came from, how it manages to stay there night after night. It is familiar and she can count on it. She cannot imagine what she would do if it was not there.
She turns off the water and waits. The water runs from her body and the cool air seeps through the damp cloth curtain. It should be embroidered like a shroud, that damp cloth. She puts back on her flannel gown and pulls it to her back, her chest to blot the water and tiptoes out, quickly, never looking back to see if there are feet in any of the toilet stalls. It is four-thirty and she is very tired but cannot sleep. She must read in the hall where it is light, where no one is breathing.
Hesiod says that the world order begins with the separation of earth and sky. Anaximander agrees. Isn’t that just like him, though?! “The opposites, which are present in the one, are separated out from it. The ‘opposites’ are the hot, the cold, the dry, the moist, and the rest.” It makes sense but how did they separate the earth from the sky? It seems simple but what about the horizon, where one starts and the other ends, that point where they appear to come together and yet you cannot reach that point because of the curve, that constant curve and the very way that the world moves. Way to go, Chris! Hesiod says there is a region between the earth and the sky, the chaos, it means “gap.” Yes, the inbetween person has a gap. Red is gapped, crapped, but why does his name stay on her brain? Why does every single bus stop remind her to think of him? Why does Hesiod have to be so damned sexual? She cannot escape S-E-X. All beginnings have to depend on S-E-X: Adam and Eve, Hesiod’s “wide bosomed Earth and Tartarus of the dark mist.” Amoebae are not that way: her poem is very important for this reason. Amoebae reproduce themselves; they just slide around having sex with themselves. She has read about people who slide around having sex with themselves, she bets that Red does this often, but a person cannot reproduce themselves by themselves. It is not fair. Only Mary was able to do this and that example is not even worth citing. It is depressing, all of it is very confusing and depressing, but she can’t stop reading it because eventually, she thinks, an answer will spring forth. The Old Testament says that the “vital substance” should not be wasted. Red does that, too; he wastes his vital substance. She hopes that he will run out of this fluid at an early age and that his hair will go limp and stringy, his body limp and stringy and that his voice will get real high like the Pardoner in The Canterbury Tales and she will say, “I told you so.” That merde tête!! Why does he haunt her brain? Why does she have an urge to write a mournful poem for him when she hates his guts? She must do something better, something to lighten her mind. T.V. tunes is the best way to do this. She must think of a show and then hum the music. I Love Lucy—that one is easy; lean against the wall, curl into a ball, you have two hours of solitude before the day begins. Leave It to Beaver—yes, that one is easy because you can see Beaver coming up the walk with his school books, or is he going down the walk with his school books? Who are his parents? That’s easy—Ward and June Cleaver. Another one—Bewitched—easy because she is in that black dress like a cartoon; it starts when the frying pan starts smoking and at the end she is a black cat and leaps into Darrin’s arms. Oh no, what is Dick Van Dyke? She can hear the little trill where he trips over the stool but what is the part before that? What is it? Her brain is numb, can’t think, too late, can’t sleep, not yet. With Rose Marie and Morey Amsterdam! She can hear it all except the music. She will go crazy if she can’t remember that music. Red will remember! He was always so good at this game. She must tiptoe into the room, do not disturb Becky or she will want to know what you are doing. Becky must never know what you are doing. Get a dime, carefully; there is one in the pocket of the jeans that you wore last week. Go to the dorm lobby, tiptoe, count the stairs down all four flights. Put in the dime, dial the number. Do you remember the number? Oh yes, that’s easy. Ring-ring-ring-ring—it is early so let it ring a long time. “Hello?” Red sounds so sleepy, like a tiny person, a child. “Hello?”
“Hey,” she whispers.
“Jo?” It sounds like he is waking up. “What in the hell are you doing? What time is it?”
“I don’t know, some time,” she whispers.
“What do you want?”
“I’ve got a problem.”
“You know?” she asks. Isn’t that just like him, though? “Well, what’s the music?”
“What?” There is noise at the other end. Is it another person? No, Red is just shifting around.
“Dick Van Dyke, I can’t seem to get it. I get this part.” She does the little trip over the stool part. “And then I can just hear them saying ‘with Rose Marie and Morey Amsterdam’ but I can’t get all the music.”
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. I can’t help you.”
“You used to know,” she says and cannot help but to cry. Has he forgotten everything?
“That must have been another one of your boyfriends,” he says. “Maybe it was Pat Reeves. I hear you see right much of him these days.”
The Cheer Leader Page 14