Voice of our Shadow

by Jonathan Carroll

  "What do you mean?" I reached over and fixed her green muffler. She looked like a bright bandit in the middle of a holdup when I was done adjusting it.

  "Don't strangle me, Joseph. Well, if nothin' else, they all laugh differently. Kind of fuller. I guess maybe it's relaxin'. Hey, can I ask you a question?"

  "Is it about last night?"

  "No, it's about her in Vienna."

  "Okay."

  We crossed the street into a patch of sunlight. The street glistened; someone passed us talking feverishly to his friend about Alitalia Airlines. She took my arm and slid her hand into mine in my pocket. It was warm and thin, fragile as an egg.

  I looked at her. She'd pulled the muffler down from her top lip. She stopped and pulled me against her with the hand she had in my pocket. "All right. What's her name?"

  "India."

  "India? What a nice name. India what?"

  "Tate. Come on, let's walk."

  "What does she look like, Joseph? Is she pretty?"

  "She's a lot older than you, for one thing. But, yes, she's quite pretty. Tall and thin, dark hair, kind of long."

  "But you think she's pretty?"

  "Yes, but in a different way than you."

  "How?" Her eyes were skeptical.

  "India is fall and you're spring."

  "Hmm."

  Five minutes later, the sun snuck behind the clouds and stayed. The sky turned to steel, and people began walking with their heads hunched into their shoulders. Neither of us said anything, but I knew the day was failing, no matter how many truths had shown their faces along the way. There was love on both sides, but it was cloudy and formless. I felt that if I didn't do something right then, this cloudiness would drain the intimacy from the day and leave us confused and disappointed.

  Ross and Bobby went to New York a lot. They explored the city as if they were looking for buried treasure and, in so doing, found just what they wanted. Manhattan is full of strange and mysterious places that hide under the city like a secret heartbeat: the windows over the front entrance to Grand Central Terminal that go up ten stories and look down over the inside of the building like God's eyeballs through dirty glasses. Or a bomb shelter on the East Side designed to hold a million people and dug so deep into the earth that a tractor moving across the floor looks, from one of the upper staircases, like a yellow matchbox with headlights.

  The two of them collected these spots and told me about them once in a while. But they shared very little, whether it was cigarettes or a bottle of stolen liquor, and they were even more tight-fisted when it came to showing anyone these unknown, magical places.

  Consequently, I almost swooned the day they offered to take me to the abandoned subway station off Park Avenue. It was the only one of their trove of places I ever actually saw with them. I decided on the spur of the moment to take Karen down there.

  When we arrived at the spot on the sidewalk, I bent down and started to yank at one end of a long rectangular subway grate. She asked me what I was doing, but I was too busy groaning and pulling to answer. I realized after too long that there was a latch beneath the grate that had to be released before anything would happen. As soon as I'd done that, the thing flew right up and almost decapitated me. The two of us were down on our knees over a subway grate, huffing and puffing to get it up, and not a soul stopped or said a word to us. I doubt if anyone even looked at what we were doing. Welcome to New York.

  A flight of steel steps went straight down into the darkness, but Karen climbed down without a question. The last I saw of her face, she had a little knowing smile on. I followed right on her heels and pulled the grate over me like a submarine hatch.

  "Joseph, my dear, what the hell is this?"

  "Keep going. If we're lucky you'll see a light in a minute. Follow it."

  "My God! Where'd you ever find this place? Looks as if the last time a train stopped here was in 1920."

  For some reason the station was still lit by two dim bulbs at either end of the platform. We stood there, and only after some time did the distant sound of a train break the enormous silence. It got louder and louder, and when it scrabbled through on an outside track, Karen put her arm around my shoulder and drew my head to hers so I would be able to hear her above the roar.

  "You are completely nuts! I love this!"

  "Do you love me?"

  "YES!"

  When we were out of there and had walked a few blocks, Karen suddenly grabbed my coat and swung me around to face her.

  "Joseph, let's not sleep together for a while. I want you so much I'm dyin', I won't be able to breathe. Can you understand? It's goin' to happen, but let's wait until" – she shook her head from side to side in a delighted flurry – "until we're drivin' ourselves crazy. Okay?"

  I slid my arms around her and, for the first time, pulled her close to me. "Okay, but when it gets to that point, it's boom and it happens. No questions asked, and either side gets to say boom. Fair enough?"

  "Yes, fair enough."

  She gave me an incredibly hard squeeze, which left me gasping. To look at her, you'd never have thought she was that strong. It made "boom" even more wonderful to anticipate.

  I was in New York for almost two months before India called. I knew that, compared to my growing feelings for Karen, I had never truly been in love with India. I felt guilty about that, but Karen and New York and the excitement of this new life drew a thick velvet curtain between me and what had happened in Vienna. When I was alone I wondered what I would do if the call or letter came. I honestly didn't know.

  When I was a boy the house next door to ours burned down. For a year after that I was terrified whenever I heard the fire alarm go off in town. It blew in such a way that you knew immediately where the fire was: five toots – western section, four – eastern . . . But that made no difference to me. No matter where I was, I would run for a telephone and call home to see if everything was all right. Finally, and it really was almost a year later, I was playing punchball after school when the alarm went off. No answering alarm echoed inside of me, and I knew I was all right again. That night the house on the other side of ours went up in flames.

  "Joseph Lennox?"

  "Yes?" I was alone in my apartment. Karen was at a faculty meeting. It was snowing outside. I watched it wisp and float as the connection went through.

  "Vienna is calling. One moment, please."

  "Joey? It's India. Joey, are you there?"

  "Yes, India, I'm here! How are you?"

  "Not so good, Joey. I think you have to come home."

  Karen came in her front door with a big package under her arm.

  "I see you lookin' at this box. Don't think it's for you 'cause it's not. I bought myself a little somethin' which I will show you in a minute."

  I was always glad to see her. Neither of us had gotten to the "boom" stage yet, but for days both of us had reveled in the delicious edge the waiting created. She dropped her coat on the couch and bent down to kiss my nose – her favorite form of greeting. The cold steamed off her, and her cheeks were wet with melted snow. She didn't notice anything was wrong because she was in too much of a hurry to get on with her show.

  I looked out the window and wondered briefly if it was snowing in Vienna. Paul had returned and so frightened India with his Little Boy tricks that over the phone she seemed on the verge of a breakdown. The curtains to their bedroom had burst into flame that night as she was getting into bed. It was over in a few seconds, but it was only the latest thing. She admitted that since I'd left he had constantly been at her, but she'd avoided telling me because she'd kept hoping he would come to her and talk. He hadn't, and now she was at the end of her taut rope.

  "TA-DA!" Karen stumped into the living room in nothing but a Hawaiian print bikini and the pair of brown cowboy boots I'd admired so long ago in the shop window.

  "You thought I'd forgotten, didn't you? Ha! Well, you old cayuse, I didn't. Happy Cowboy Boot Day. If I don't take these things off this minute, my
feet are going to warp."

  She sat down next to me and pulled them off. When she'd finished, she picked one up and ran her hand along its side. "The man in the store told me that if you take care of them with polish, this leather'll last you a hundred and fifty years."

  She looked at me with a smile so loving and excited by what she'd done that for some seconds I thought, Fuck it, I cannot go away from this woman. I don't care about anything but this face and these cowboy boots and this room and this moment. That's all. Fuck it. What could I do in Vienna, anyway? What could I possibly accomplish there that India hadn't? Why did I have to go? Close that door in my mind, lock it tightly, throw the key as far away as I could. Basta. If I could keep my mind from opening it again or, better, forget that door completely, I would be home free. Was that so hard? What was more important – love or nightmares?

  "You don't like them." She dropped the boot and pushed it a little with her bare foot.

  "No, Karen, it's not that at all."

  "They're the wrong color. You hate them."

  "No, they're the best present anyone ever gave me."

  "Then what's wrong? Why are you lookin' so sad?"

  I got up from the couch and walked to the window. "I got a call from Vienna tonight."

  Karen was unable to hide her emotions; the word "Vienna" made her catch her breath so sharply I could hear it clear across the room.

  "All right. What did she say?"

  I wanted to tell her! I wanted to sit beside her, take those lovely hands in mine, and tell her every bit of the story. Then I wanted to ask this wise and generous woman what in God's name I should do. But I didn't. Why involve her in this? It would be cruel and unnecessary. Whether I was right or wrong, for the first time in my life I realized love meant sharing the good and trying like hell to keep the bad away, no matter what shape or size. So I didn't say anything about the darkness in Vienna. I said only that India was in very bad shape and had asked me to come back and help her.

  "Is she tellin' the truth, Joseph? And are you tellin' me the truth?"

  "Yes, Karen, both."

  "Both." She picked up the cowboy boot again and placed it gently on the coffee table. She put both hands up to her ears as if suddenly there were too much noise in the room. Strangely, the Munch print of The Shriek was directly behind her and she looked eerily like the bedeviled person in the painting.

  "It's not right, Joseph."

  I went over to the couch and put my arm around her. She came, unresisting. My mind was so blank that the only thing going through it was how very cold her shoulders were. How different from India, who was warm all the time.

  "I want to say ten bitchy things all at once, but I'm not goin' to, damn it. It's just not right."

  I rocked her under my arm for a long time.

  "I want to trust you, Joseph. I want you to tell me you're just goin' back there to help that woman out, and as soon as you can you'll come back to me. I want you to say that to me, and I want to believe it."

  "It's true. That's just what I was going to say." I said this with my head resting on hers. She gave me a slight push away and looked at me.

  "Yes, you say it now, but I'm scared, Joseph. Miles said it, too. Miles told me he just had to get some things straight in his life and then he'd come back to me. Sure, sure. I was such a sap. He didn't come back! When he left for his 'little while,' he left, and that little while didn't end. I wanted to trust him, too. I did trust him, Joseph, but he never came back! That one time he called, right? You know what he wanted? He wanted to get laid. That's all. He was sweet and funny, but all he wanted was to get laid. Remember, I told you I learned some stuff that night? Well, that's what." She started rocking again; only this time it was hard and mechanical, like a machine.

  "I'm not Miles, Karen. I love you."

  She stopped. "Yes, and I love you too, but who can I trust? Sometimes I feel so small and alone that it's like death. Yes, that's what death is – the place where you can't trust anybody. Joseph?"

  "Yes?"

  "I want to trust you. I want to believe every word you say to me, but I'm afraid. I'm afraid you'll say you've got to go for this little while and then . . . Aw shit, I hate it!"

  She stood up and began walking around the room. "You see? You see? I'm so scared right now I've been lyin' to you! Even after that night with Miles, when I started realizin' things about my relationship with him, he called me. You didn't know that, did you?"

  My heart dropped on hearing his name, but I kept quiet and waited for her to go on. It was some time before she did. She paced the room the whole time. Watching her small, bare feet cross the floor in the middle of that winter night made everything so much worse.

  "He called me a couple of days ago, okay? I never have the guts to tell anyone just to stop, but with him I wanted to ever since that night. I mean, I wanted to ninety percent, but there was a little ten percent in there that kept sayin', Be careful, don't burn those bridges, dearie. You know what happened, though, the last time he called? This is the honest-to-God truth, too, Joseph, so help me. He called and wanted to take me ice skatin' at Rockefeller Center. He knows how I love to do that. Hadn't forgotten a thing, the skunk. Never misses a trick. A little hot cocoa afterward, too? But you know what I said to him, Joseph? Talk about burnin' your bridges? I said, 'Sorry, Miles, Karen's in love right now and can't come to the phone!' Then I hung up. Me! I felt so good doin' it that I picked it up and hung up again."

  She laughed to herself and, basking in the memory, put her hands on her hips and smiled at the wall.

  "But you said he used you the last time you were together. Did you still want to go out with him after that?"

  "Not at the time, no! I had you. But what about now, Joseph? You go away and he happens to call again. He probably will – he's got an ego as big as this room. What do I do when that happens?"

  "If he calls again, you go out." I didn't want to say it, but I had to. I had to.

  "You don't mean a word of that."

  "No, I mean it, Karen. I hate it, but I swear I mean it."

  "It wouldn't bother you?" Her eyes narrowed but said nothing I could understand. Her voice was ice.

  "It would drive a stake through my heart, my love, if you want the truth-truth. But you'll have to. But don't lie to me either, Karen; there's a part of you that wants to, isn't there?"

  She hesitated before answering. I appreciated the fact that she really thought for an instant before speaking.

  "Yes and no, Joseph, but I think I've got to do it now. You have to go back to Vienna, and I have to see Miles again."

  "Jesus Christ."

  "Joseph, please tell me the truth."

  "The truth? The truth about what, Karen?"

  "About her. About India."

  "The truth is, I hate the fact you'll be seeing him. I hate having to go back to Vienna. For a number of reasons I'm truly scared of what's going to happen when I get back there. I'm also afraid of what's going to happen here with you and him. Let's say I'm afraid of a lot of things now."

  "Me too, Joseph."

  3

  I wore my cowboy boots the day I flew back. I felt funny in them, the way they canted my whole body this way and that like a drunken ride at an amusement park. But I'd be damned if I'd take them off. I'd packed my bag the night before; it was much fuller than when I'd arrived. My life was fuller than when I'd arrived. But there was India and her agony in Vienna, and a part of me, a new and, I hoped, good part, said notwithstanding the near-happiness I'd recently found, my duty now was to return and do whatever I could to help her, no matter how useless it seemed or how much I wanted to stay with Karen in New York. Even watching Karen that night, so small and defeated on the couch, I knew that for once I had to sacrifice what I wanted for someone else's well-being. Despite my pain at having to leave America, the act itself might end up being the only thing in my life that would make me feel a little better about myself. What Karen had said was true – it wasn't right, but it w
as necessary. Our parting was bad and tearful. At the last moment we almost succumbed to it by sleeping together for the first and only time. Luckily we had enough strength of heart to avoid the mess that would have created.

  People think of Austria as a snowy, Winter Wonderland sort of country; it is, except for Vienna, which rarely has much snow in the winter. Yet the day I flew in, there was such a bad blizzard that we were diverted to Linz and had to take a train the rest of the way. It was snowing in Linz, too, when we arrived, but it was a crisp, light snow and the flakes came down lazily, at their leisure. Vienna was under attack. Winds made traffic lights jerk and twist on their cables. There were long lines of taxis at the train station, all of them wearing chains and covered with snow. My cabdriver couldn't get over the storm and spent the ride telling me about some poor man who'd been found frozen to death in his house, and how a roof collapsed at a movie theater under the weight of the snow . . . It all reminded me of one of my father's letters.

  I was expecting a cold, dead apartment, but the instant I opened the door, the smells of spicy roast chicken and radiator heat surprised me completely.

  "Hail the returning hero!"

  India looked as if she'd come back from a month in Mauritius.

  "You're so tan!"

  "Yeah, I've discovered tanning studios. How do I look? Are you going to put your bags down or are you waiting for a tip?"

  I put them down, and she came over and hugged me for dear life. I hugged back, but unlike the time with my father, I let go first.

  "Let me look at you. Did you get mugged in New York? Talk to me! I've been waiting to hear your voice for two months –"

  "India –"

  "I was so afraid the snow was going to keep you away. I called the airport so many times they finally got me a private answering service. Say something, Joey. Did you have a million adventures? I want to hear about all of them right now." Everything came out in a machine-gun stutter. She'd barely catch her breath before the next sentence flashed out of her as if it were afraid it wouldn't get its chance before the next one came trampling through.