July 7th

by Jill McCorkle

  Sam Swett is still sitting in front of the window at the Marshboro Hotel, a Kleenex that he found in the drawer rolled into his typewriter; he’s got to record what has happened to him before he passes out. It is getting harder and harder to remember what has happened. Why is he here, in this room, cracked green walls, an air-conditioner that sputters and shakes, putting forth as much air as a two-year-old blowing out a candle? There is a chrome straight chair with a plastic orange seat, like in a school cafeteria; he remembers a school cafeteria, remembers having to buy his lunch, slimy plate on a slimy tray, while other kids had little brown bags and thermos jugs with good stuff from home. One day somebody said that there was rat hair in the pizza stroganoff and he had run run run to that rundown bathroom, got sick, went home. Got sick, ought to go on home. Got to remember why he’s here. There’s this lumpy bed, bicentennial bedspread, stars and stripes forever with a big bald eagle resting its head where his ought to be and he hates that fucking bird with its fucking bald head but what’s a man to do when he can’t decide, when there’s murder and rape and robbery everywhere. That’s why he left New York, car got stolen, most of it got stolen, left him the backseat and two doors, a dashboard; got robbed, stereo, T.V., liquor, cash, got scared, shouldn’t get scared, people watch on the subway, get you; all of them look alike, shaved his head so he’d look different, so people would be scared, got rid of everything so people wouldn’t want it; yes, he tossed all of his clothes from the fire escape except these, just these that he has on, and people came like ants after a piece of bread, nine minutes is all it took, in nine minutes it was all gone, but they couldn’t get enough, came back for more, just like everybody, had to have more, couldn’t be satisfied, and he was afraid of becoming just like them, thinking like them, not sleeping like them, sick and starving. He is a modern hunger artist, witnessing the death of society, of America, the world. There is a story in all of that, but it will not come to him because he can’t keep his head held up, like a ton of bricks. He rubs his hands around and around his head, feels the stubble, sees the vacancy vacancy vacancy neon sign, red and green blinks like a short-circuited Christmas tree. He can see himself between blinks, his hands on his head, looks like someone washing a coconut, vacancy, looking for the monkey face, vacancy, to drain the milk all of that sweet rich milk, vacancy, split the skull to get that rich white meat, vacancy, eat it up. He can’t remember the last time that he ate. But that makes him different from these ants crawling around, formication, eating and sleeping, defecating and fornicating, eventually dying. He can be above all of that; eat just enough to keep him alive, detach himself from the gluttonous world, remain an individual even though everything else is becoming the same, then he will be able to tell it, in his own words.

  “I saw a dead man.” It takes a long time to type that, because he has to hold onto his head as well, but he does and then leans forward and stares at the words. Never in his life has he seen a dead man that was not all fixed up and in a casket, not even in New York. But you can’t escape it, can’t escape unless you shut yourself away from everything. He tries to remember more but all he can see is that man with napkins stuffed in his mouth. He could be anywhere and that fucking bald bird propped up over there like it’s something, a symbol of some sort. That bird means nothing, a symbol of nothing, and this realization, the man with the napkins in his mouth, makes his stomach churn, heave upwards into his chest, but there is nothing left to come out; all traces of human weakness have dried up and he is cleansed, sick as hell but cleansed, crying like a baby. He rubs his head furiously, tries to remember more, types a row of zeroes, big fat zeroes, zero, zero, zero, Zorro, he remembers a black caped man named Zorro; he remembers a beach towel around his neck and he mounts a broom or is it a rake. He mounts something and rides away, far far away from South Cross. Zorro! Zero! He remembers a candy bar, creamy white caramel. He bobs his head rapidly with these memories and he can hear that sweet rich milk sloshing around. The memories are as close as his prickly scalp, as far away as another planet, but there is slosh, he hears a slosh, milk behind his very own monkey face. He has never been this drunk in his life, never had such thoughts flowing into his head from such tangents, brilliant thoughts. He failed as a great writer because he could not live in New York, but he will drink like a great writer; everyone knows that they are alcoholics, homosexuals, suicidal, schizophrenic! He could be all of those things, maybe, maybe. He has never tried any of those things. Now, the idea. He will write about the country as it will be when fully homogenized and people will all look just alike, a colony of clones with plastic bug eyes who all live inside of Howard Johnson’s, all committing murder and rape and robbery until there is only one left, the cream rising to the top, showing that homogenization cannot continue and then the world will end and start all over and the narrator will have been a young, middle class person like himself who had the sense to lock himself away and observe the process.

  Call me Zorro. Some years ago—never mind how long precisely—having little or no money in my bag, and nothing particular to interest me on earth, I thought I would fly and hide a bit and see the slimy parts of the world. This is my substitute for pistol and ball.

  There, he has started, going through the Kleenex but he can read the words, words so true and so real that they almost sound familiar. All great works should sound familiar even though they have never been said before. He must do it again, again and again, until it is just perfect—

  Once upon a time and a very bad time it was there was a fucking bald eagle coming down along the road and this fucking bald eagle that was coming down along the road met a nicens little human named baby Zorro. Baby Zorro had his own song that he liked to sing. It went: If you want action the world you’ll see, they got rape and murder and robbery, got all kinds of things can happen to you, got broken glass and dog doo-doo.

  There, but again it is as if he remembers all of that. It’s got to be original, painful, truthful, so difficult that nobody else will ever understand it. After all, isn’t that the mark of excellence? Something so difficult, so far beyond the human mind that only the author understands it? That’s what will make him different. Yes, yes, the sweat trickles through the coconut stubbles; it makes him cry, all of it makes him cry, a little Sammy playing Zorro all by himself, eating school food all by himself, living in New York all by himself, being anywhere all by himself, afraid to go home all by himself, afraid someone will put napkins in his mouth and leave him to die all by himself. He pulls the Kleenex from the typewriter and wipes his face, the ink smudging on his cheeks and around his eyes. It will never work; he cannot stay awake, can’t drink another drop, can’t kill himself all by himself, and sure as hell can’t be gay. What’s a man to do except to climb on that lumpy cover, rough but cool, face on top of the eagle, pitiful bald bird close to extinction, like society, his Toyota. He is a failure, a drunk, tired loser, his eye staring right into the eye of that eagle, that pitiful fucking bald-headed bird that reminds him of that pitiful fat baldheaded man, napkins in his mouth, dead.

  Ernie Stubbs feels cheap, used; powerful and manly, but cheap and used. He has done it, after all these years he has been unfaithful, and it is more difficult than he would have ever thought, mainly because he thoroughly enjoyed himself, because he could lose everything if Kate ever found out. He is as sordid as Juanita Weeks, no, not quite. Juanita Weeks is an example of lower class animalism and he has merely fooled around, had a little fling as the boys say. It is confusing because the actual thought of being unfaithful never entered his mind when Rose was a little girl, when his hours were filled with work and reaching a goal. It was only after the goal had been reached, only after plans were made for the new house that he had begun to think, that he even made a move on Juanita one time. She never told Harold; obviously she never did, besides if she did, all he’d have to say is that it was the other way around, especially now that Juanita has shown her true colors. Adultery, it seems like a lower class and upper class thing t
o do, and how can that be, that the same thing that goes on over on Injun Street could be going on in Cape Fear Trace as well? No, but it’s not the same thing. A poor man does it because he’s ruthless and crude, doesn’t know any better, a dog after a bitch in heat. But men like Ernie Stubbs are different; they aren’t attaching any strings, a little friendly recreation simply because there is too much power bottled up inside of a successful man to limit his limits.

  The ticking reminds him; he is aware that the comfort of those nimble fingers has worn off, reminded that his mother is going to be furious that a black child was playing with his hair, reminded that he might have to get one of his doctor friends to give him a shot or something to ward off any diseases. He is aware that he is standing in his office, in a pair of baby blue boxers that Kate picked out for him. Kate picks out all of his clothes. He is aware that underneath his Polo oxford cloth shirt, there on the floor, wearing nothing but chipped up putridly pink nail polish, is Janie Morris. Her head is rolled to one side and there’s a little piece of Dentyne hanging out of one side of her mouth. Her blue shiny eye shadow is smeared up to her brows. They always say that they don’t look near as good afterwards as they do before; it’s funny, a man’s joke to be told on the boat or golf course. And she had acted like she wanted no part of such. All he had to do was dangle the carrot, protégée, ha! That’s all it took, that cheap little tramp, and she was ready willing and ever so able. She’s cheap, as cheap as Juanita.

  “Hi, tiger,” Janie whispers and sucks that Dentyne back into her mouth. “I really like this overtime.”

  “Overtime? For the whole time?” Ernie throws back his shoulders with his superiority, sucks in that white fleshy roll around his middle.

  “Why sure, I mean your wife’s been doing the payroll for you, hasn’t she?” Janie Morris tosses his nice starched Polo onto a chair and stands up, turns around in front of him with her arms raised like some kind of deformed ballerina. “Wow, I’ve never been a protégée before. You know I help Tommy out sometimes when he’s making pots, but that’s about it.”

  “Who’s Tommy?” Ernie quickly puts on his shirt and buttons it, wrinkled, what’s he going to tell Kate?

  “Just a friend, a close friend really, but don’t let that bother you a bit.” She creeps over and rubs her hand through his hair. “Hairspray, I’ve never known a man who wears hairspray.” She wipes her hand on her bare thigh. “Hey, but don’t you worry about Tommy. You know, we play it loose. I mean Tommy wouldn’t get upset at all over you.” She bends over and pulls up her underwear, nylon bikinis that say “sock it to me.” God, nobody has said “sock it to me” in years, and they’re raggedy and frayed on the elastic, must be a hundred years old. Kate doesn’t have an ass like that but at least she wears clean-looking underwear.

  “Why wouldn’t he care about me?” Ernie stuffs his shirt into his pants and zips up his fly.

  “Well, you know, you’re sort of old.”

  “You didn’t think I was that old a little while ago. I mean what young man could have ever accomplished all that I have unless it was handed to him on a silver platter?”

  “Oh, for sure, for sure.” She puts back on those little spectator pumps and pulls on her skirt and blouse. “What time should I come in tomorrow, I mean today, wow it’s after 2:00.1 really am going to have the cash come Friday, huh?”

  “Take it off.”

  “Oh, now you know I would, but I just got all dressed and really need to go.” She smiles great big with her head thrown back and he can see fillings, silver fillings in her back molars. “Don’t you ever get tired?”

  “No, no, the day, take the day off.”

  “Oh, I couldn’t let you work alone.”

  “I’ve got somewhere to go tomorrow, family thing. Just come in Friday.”

  “Oh great!” Her feet click clack over to where he is standing and she kisses him on the mouth. “Maybe well work overtime Friday?”

  “Well see.” Now, he cannot bear to look at her, and to think that just a little while ago he was feeling so passionate, a surge of strength that made him feel like there was nothing but that very tick tick of a second. He had wanted so badly to fulfill his appetite, a change of diet, a bite of lobster, only to find out that he has wasted himself on perch. Now she’ll hold it over his head, blackmail him for sex and money. He never would have made it where he is if Kate hadn’t been willing to claw and scratch her way to the top, to have big dinner parties with the most prestigious people, to buy him all of the latest clothes, to give him all of that land.

  “See ya,” she says, and her feet click click over that heart pine floor, the door closing behind her. Ernie sits in his desk chair and runs his hands through his hair. Maybe it wasn’t worth it. He feels as much shame right now as he ever did over on Injun Street, and it’s not his fault; it wasn’t his fault that he was born and raised on Injun Street, and this is not his fault.

  Juanita Weeks has walked all around her house four or five times, done situps and the waist twister and still her mind is thinking on and on. That very well could have been Harold Weeks, though she doubts it; “I am washing my hands of you,” he had said that last day when she came running in from the Winn Dixie to find him packing a bag.

  “I can explain,” she said and grabbed his arm, but he pushed her down on that crushed velvet spread and left her there without touching her. “You’re not leaving, are you?”

  “Does a wild bear shit in the woods?” Those were his last words and that was so like him to answer a question with a question, and he had turned and left, just like Rhett Butler, and she had sunk down on the door stoop because they don’t have a staircase, and her thoughts had wandered off to all the various reasons that Harold Weeks had for leaving her, even though Harold didn’t know about most of those things. There was that time when she was eight months pregnant with Patricia and she had this awful craving for sour cream and bean burritos. Harold wasn’t home so she drove down there all by herself. Ace Macho was there alone, sweeping the floor under those dim lights that they use so that people will know they are closing. Ace was good-looking at the time with his big hairy arms and thick moustache, and she always has just loved to see people who could wear body hair and have it look good on them, though heaven knows she is thankful for those whose body hair is not attractive on them or she wouldn’t have anything at all. She knocked on that door and bent down so that Ace could see her under the Closed sign. Sure enough he did and he let her in. She remembers exactly what she had on, too. She had on terry cloth slippers and one of Harold’s big work shirts and some of those stretchy pants that have the little stirrups so they won’t ride up. “What can I do for you?” Ace Macho asked after giving her the one two.