“Ow!” Alan screamed, dropping the rat, who scurried away. Alan leapt off the wall and chased his rat, shouting to people, “Catch him! Catch him! He’s my pet!”
The policemen ran after Alan, who finally caught up with his rat and managed to grab him. Furious, Alan turned to the cops. “How dare you make me almost lose my fucking pet! What do you want? I’m naked because there’s a fire in my building, and I didn’t have time to put on clothes, is that a crime?”
“We need to take you in for questioning.”
“Because I’m naked?”
“No, it’s about another matter.”
“I’m not the one who started the fire. Everyone already knows it’s the woman from 14C. She confessed.”
“It’s about another matter.”
“What other matter?”
“Get in the car.”
“But I’m naked and covered in chocolate and honey. I’ll dirty your car.”
“It doesn’t matter. We’ve seen worse.”
The police questioned Alan about Max, eventually revealing to him that Max had been found dead. Alan told them about his last exchange with Max and about catching Max having sex with Jessica. They questioned Jessica, who answered all their questions truthfully, and immediately fell into a deep depression, believing she had been the cause of Max’s suicide when she had told Alan, in front of Max, that she had no intention of seeing Max again. They questioned Lynn. They also questioned Roland, even though as far as anyone knew, he hadn’t been at the inn in over a week.
After their brief investigation of Max’s death, the authorities chalked it up to suicide.
Jessica left New York and decided to stay with her parents in the Midwest for a few months to think about her life and the people she had hurt.
Twelve
Four months passed, the dead of winter came, and, remarkably, nothing changed, the stalking chain remained intact.
Alan’s building hadn’t been seriously damaged by the fire. All the residents were able to continue living there, except for the fire starter, whose apartment had been destroyed. Alan still checked the stairwell doors every day.
After the fire and the news of Max’s suicide, it had no longer seemed so important to Alan that Roland had beaten him up in a field, had come to his apartment and shot at him with a gun that easily could have been loaded, and had then carried Lynn off over his shoulder.
Alan did mention those offenses to the police when they questioned him, which was what led them to question Roland, but Alan didn’t bother pressing charges against Roland or putting a restraining order on him. His magnanimity was not brought on by a feeling of strength, but quite the opposite, by feeling overwhelmed and numb.
Misfortune eats at one’s self-confidence. Alan’s strong new self had gotten weaker. He had learned the falseness of the saying “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” He now knew that what didn’t kill you made you weaker and weaker. He was no longer in touch with the friends he had made during his new life, which was now old and gone. His recovering stalker friends had stopped calling him, because he lacked the energy to give them pep talks and help them resist the temptation to stalk. He himself had not been gripped by an urge to resume stalking, but so what? He wasn’t happier now than when he was a stalker. He was depressed and lonely and he shamefully admitted to himself that being followed was somewhat comforting. So dim did his life seem to him that his stalkers had become sparks of light. Even though he rarely spoke to them, he thought of them as his support group.
It had taken Roland a couple of weeks to adjust to living without the cyanide, without the reassurance that he could end things at a moment’s notice if he wanted to. He felt vulnerable. But he also felt closer to his fellow beings, as though they were all in the same boat. He and they now had something important in common: They weren’t carrying cyanide on their persons. He still wore the locket so that he wouldn’t be reminded, as often, of the cyanide’s absence.
As for being a murderer, it wasn’t much on his mind. He found the topic uninteresting; it wasn’t suicide, after all.
He hadn’t committed any grave offenses since then. Granted he had tried to shoot Alan with a gun that might have been loaded, but it hadn’t been—thank God, because he couldn’t have passed that off as suicide. He had carried Lynn out of Alan’s apartment against her will, but he’d let her go as soon as they hit the sidewalk—it’s not easy for a man to carry a screaming woman down the street. She had then taken a cab home. He’d been glad he’d at least gotten her out of Alan’s building.
The next day the stalking chain had resumed as if nothing had happened.
Patricia was surprised that Lynn, despite stalking Alan every day and being in a perpetual state of rejection by him, was still applying to clubs that wouldn’t want her as a member, just to play it safe.
Alan, Lynn, and Roland continued to give money to Ray the homeless ex-psychologist who still held his breath and closed his eyes when the stalking chain passed him, particularly now that he had seen one of its links act so strangely, perform chocolate-covered naked ranting on a wall with a rat, before being whisked away by cops.
One snowy winter day, Alan stopped in front of the homeless man longer than usual, wondering why his eyes were so often closed and his breath so often held. Alan took off his coat and placed it in the arms of the homeless man. It was a beige shearling coat that Alan had worn for three years and didn’t want anymore. Ray held the coat, stunned. He didn’t usually accept presents, since his homelessness was relatively intentional, but a present from a link in the stalking chain was hard to resist.
Ray cleared his throat. “What is this?”
“A gift. Put it on, won’t you?” Alan said.
Ray didn’t move. He had to admit he was somewhat curious, somewhat seduced, despite his better judgment, despite knowing full well that deep inside, this nut was probably terribly banal.
Alan took back the coat, walked behind Ray, and held it up for him to slide his arms into. After a moment’s hesitation, Ray placed his hand in the armhole. He could not help relishing every second as the enticing crazy person slid the sleeve up his arm. And then the other.
“There, that looks good, it fits you well,” Alan said. What he meant, of course, was, “It fits you well for a coat that’s two sizes too small for you.”
“Thank you,” Ray said. It was the perfect opportunity for Ray to ask Alan why the stalking order had changed, but he did not permit himself to ask any questions. He would not pander to his curiosity disorder.
Alan smiled and walked away.
Lynn witnessed the gesture and ruminated. She came up with an idea that excited her. In order to impress Alan, she paid a gourmet store on the corner to give the homeless man two meals a day, in a paper bag, for a month. It was not an inexpensive gesture, but if it had any chance of impressing Alan, it was worth it.
After handing Ray his first lunch and informing him of the ones to come, Lynn said to him, “The only thing I ask in return is that you mention this to Alan. Alan is the man who gave you your coat. Bon appétit.” She smiled and walked away.
As soon as Lynn was far enough away, Roland stopped in front of the homeless man. “What did that woman say to you?”
“She said she paid that store to give me two meals every day for a month.”
Roland walked away, dropping a button and ruminating. He came up with an idea that made him smile hesitantly and invisibly.
Roland rented an apartment for Ray. He broke the news to him on the street the next day.
“Listen, I don’t know how you feel about sleeping on the street,” Roland said, “and I don’t want to seem presumptuous, but I got you a small studio for the winter if you want it. You’ll owe me nothing except to speak well of me to Lynn, and to tell her about this little favor I’ve done for you.”
Ray didn’t respond at first. Finally, he said, “Sure, why not.”
He had had the willpower not to ask questions, and still did,
but he did not have the willpower to refuse these advances. He knew he should turn down the presents, he knew it was fate, taunting him, but he couldn’t.
He went to the apartment wearily.
Despite his coat, meals, and studio, Ray still stood at the corner to beg. The next time he saw Alan, he felt somewhat obligated to tell him of Lynn’s gift of the meals. And while he was at it, he also mentioned Roland’s gift of the winter studio. Alan stood, dumbstruck, in the snow. Ray found it irresistible to add, “Feel free to visit me sometime.”
Alan was upset by Lynn’s and Roland’s gestures, because he knew that this beggar would eventually feel let down when the two stalkers stopped supporting him. He felt responsible for having unwittingly started this chain reaction. To assuage his guilt, Alan bought Ray some clothes. And when he visited Ray’s new place and saw the squalor he lived in, meaning no TV and not much furniture, he went shopping for a sofa, a table, and chairs, and had them delivered to Ray’s.
When Lynn saw how much the other two had done for the homeless man, she wanted to surpass their gestures, in order to impress Alan, but she didn’t know how to. Then she figured he needed a social circle, so she gave him one by throwing a party at Ray’s place.
Roland was in a corner, at the party, talking to a man he didn’t know. “We’ve created this creature by the force of our group energy. It’s as if we’ve given birth to a being. It is our child,” he said, referring to Ray.
“Isn’t that a little presumptuous?” replied the man, popping a peanut into his mouth. “I mean, giving food and shelter to a homeless person suddenly makes you a creator of life?”
Ray talked to the guests politely, but they didn’t interest him; they were just ordinary people—not like his nuts. His eyes couldn’t help seeking out the nuts and observing them. He was falling for them, he realized. If he were to discover now that their core was banal (and he still thought it probably was), he would be frustrated. Therefore, he continued not asking them questions. People’s business was their business. Knowing was disappointing.
Curiously, what was almost as extreme as Ray’s curiosity about the nuts, was the nuts’ lack of curiosity about him. They felt guilty about their complete disinterest in him. They knew they really should ask him one or two questions about his life, his past, whatever, just to seem polite, but they kept procrastinating, afraid of a long answer, a boring answer, afraid of getting to know him. During the party, decency didn’t allow them to postpone asking him a question any longer. They formed a semicircle around Ray. Roland held his hand behind his back and dropped a paper clip.
“So, what did you used to do before you became homeless?” Alan asked. The others nodded.
Ray didn’t want to tell them the truth, that he used to be a psychologist and could analyze them if he wanted to, and could even, perhaps, help them. So he told them he used to be a locksmith.
“Ah, a locksmith!” they said, with civil enthusiasm. “And what happened? How did you become homeless?”
“I became disillusioned.”
“About life?” Lynn asked.
“No. About locks.”
“Really? How so?”
“I used to think locks were complex and exciting, but the complexity hides dullness. I was hoping for a lock that was somewhat difficult to unlock, to understand, relatively unpredictable, and therefore interesting, but no such lock.”
“What made you become a locksmith in the first place?” Roland asked.
“I like having the key to things. And unlocking things. If I had been Bluebeard’s wife, I’d be dead, too. I would have done what she did. I would have used the little key to open the forbidden room and see what was inside.”
“You’re a very curious person?” Lynn asked.
Ray lowered his eyes and softly confessed, “Yes.” He added, “But unfortunately, what’s inside is almost always disappointing.”
“You do sound like a disillusioned locksmith,” Roland said.
Weeks passed. Ray gradually got to know a fair amount about the nuts’ situation, because even though he never inquired, bits and pieces were inevitably revealed along the way. On top of it, the nuts were not particularly secretive about their feelings.
Ray still hadn’t been disappointed in them, but he remained skeptical. Every time a new layer fell off, he was surprised that it hadn’t hit dullsville yet. Anytime one of them said to him, “Let me tell you about myself,” or the equivalent, Ray replied, “Ugh, please don’t.”
Eventually, Ray began having the urge to exercise his influence on them. He saw how deeply unhappy and dysfunctional they were, and he was curious to see if he could improve their lives. He reasoned with himself that this was not as dangerous as asking them lots of questions. Asking questions had landed him in jail, but he had never really tried actively to improve someone’s life, unless one counted the therapeutic comments he had whispered to them in the street. The most obvious way he could think of to improve their lives was to find them mates.
For a month, he searched. He met singles on buses, gathered e-mail addresses and phone numbers, he recontacted old friends who used to be single back in the days when he was a psychologist, to see if they still were. He asked around.
Finally, he threw a matchmaking party at his winter studio.
The nuts did not find mates, but others did. He was encouraged to throw another matchmaking party. He did. More people found mates. Not the nuts. Ray got sucked into the matchmaking business.
The nuts started to find Ray more interesting. They were impressed when people clamored for another matchmaking party. The nuts became curious about him. It didn’t hurt that they overheard an old friend of Ray’s at one of his parties say to someone, “Ray used to be a psychologist.” Stunned, they went up to the man who’d just spoken those words, and asked him if this was true. The man, realizing he had made a blunder (for Ray had instructed all his old friends not to reveal his true ex-profession and to stick to the story that he was a locksmith), fixed his blunder by saying, “No, you mis-heard, I didn’t say psychologist, I said psycho locksmith.”
“Ahhh, okay, that makes more sense,” the nuts said. “But in what way psycho?”
“Compulsive need to open things. Picking at locks until they give.”
Ray threw more matchmaking parties. Word spread. He began charging a fee. People sought out his matchmaking services. Someone helped him build an Internet matchmaking site called ChockFullONuts.com, which took off beautifully even though people had advised him against that name, saying it would scare off potential clients, especially women. He was glad he had finally found a profession he was good at.
No matter how many times he repeated to himself that the nuts weren’t that interesting, they were always on his mind. And to make matters worse, they’d been hanging around a lot since he’d become successful with his matchmaking business. They were growing to admire him.
They came up with excuses to visit him—not that they needed excuses, since the studio belonged to Roland, the furniture to Alan, and the food to Lynn. Sometimes they were all three hanging out at Ray’s place at the same time. Their obsession with each other had been slightly diminished because a portion of it had been transferred to Ray.
Ray looked at them, seated side by side on his couch. He asked them nothing, listened to them, and answered their questions.
Eventually, Ray felt things couldn’t go on this way anymore. No one should have to live in such skins. He could see they were still not happy, and neither was he, really. He spent many hours trying to come up with a solution to help his friends. He took long walks around blocks, staring at the pavement, thinking.
He came up with the solution—a cure of sorts. He hadn’t worked out the details of his idea yet, but he had the general concept. It was an unusual one. It would make them happier and make them realize there was more to life than each other, while preserving their unique nutty flavor.
At the attorney general’s office, Roland was called into his b
oss’s office, the solicitor general, Mary Smith.
She said, “I recommended you for the committee for policy on Section 71 cases, and now Suzan Kahn told me you haven’t shown up for a single meeting.”
“They don’t need me on that committee.”
“That’s not an excuse.” She stared at him in silence before going on. “And that’s not all. It appears that you lie. You said you had an oral argument in Seligman against the Department of Health, but Jerry Corman was at court for an argument and told me that the Seligman case was submitted without argument.”
Roland kept his eyes downcast.
“You say nothing. That’s fine, I don’t especially want to hear your excuses.” She sighed. “Look, this is happening too much. You’re sacrificing the interests of the client, you’re missing court dates, and your mind is obviously somewhere else when you’re editing briefs. I just don’t have any other choice but to let you go.”
Thirteen
Ray invited the nuts to dinner at a restaurant. They were delighted.
After ordering their food and engaging in some small talk, Ray got to the point. “I don’t think we live wisely. We are bored. You may not think you’re bored, but I believe you are, we all are. Our lives are the equivalent of a sensory-deprivation tank, and that’s not healthy. It makes many of us go nuts.” He gave them a significant look. They were not aware that he thought of them as nuts, but that look was meant to be a hint. He continued. “Human beings evolved in a manner that makes them well suited to a certain kind of lifestyle, which involves danger in daily life. Through the ages, human beings managed to significantly decrease the frequency of dangerous occurrences. Do you follow me?”
They nodded. They thought he spoke well for a locksmith.
He went on. “This decrease in dangerous occurrences may have seemed like a good idea. It made our lives happier and more pleasant on a certain, immediate level. But the lifestyle that originally made us into what we are was not a safe lifestyle. Therefore, by inflicting upon ourselves a safe lifestyle, we experience certain unfortunate side effects,” he said, pulling a small chalkboard out of a bag. “These side effects are, I believe, the following.” He wrote on the chalkboard:
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