by Joe Meno
Jack nods, even though she can’t see. “Sure.”
“You don’t have to, you know.”
“No, I know. But I want to.”
“Jack, I think maybe …” but she doesn’t finish her sentence. There is just the steady electronic pulse of neither one of them speaking, until finally she coughs a little and says, “My flight’s at eight.”
“I’ll be there,” he responds, and then hangs up the phone, staring at its black rectangular shape, as if it has just betrayed him. And he holds the tape player up to his ear and listens to the sound of the balloon playing there again. And for some reason it reminds him of her. And so he does no other work for the next hour, only listens to the tape playing, ignoring the noise of the people moving all around him. And then he remembers what he’s supposed to do today and so he climbs out of his seat and sneaks across the office.
OFFICE JOB.
A few moments later Jack walks past the girl Jill at the front desk toward the PHOTOCOPY DEPARTMENT and the four machines are already going and the intern Daniel is looking over the copy requests and the sound—the thrum, the mechanical buzz, the paper whooshing into the tray covered in fresh ink, the clatter of the stapler, of the paper as it is automatically collated—it’s the sound of these copiers that he loves the most about working in the office. It’s like the sound of nothingness. Or airplane engines crashing. Daniel says he’s going to go get some coffee and Jack says great and then Daniel leaves and then Jack glances over his shoulder to be sure no one is watching and switches the job on copier one to copier three. And then it’s go time.
BECAUSE HE’S A CARTOONIST. AND A MUSICIAN. AND A DABBLER TOO.
Because he works at a faceless corporation, he is often asked by various friends to make fliers for their awful art bands, bands with names like VIDEO GAME FEVER and STANISLAV LEM’S NIGHTMARE. And he sneaks these onto the copy machines whenever he has a chance and sometimes his friend Birdie asks him to make copies of her cut-and-paste zine, which is called YOU AND YOUR VERY INTERESTING BEARD, and there are always pencil drawings of many different hairy beards talking to one another, having these very philosophical discussions about art and literature, like Lenin’s beard talking to Walt Whitman’s beard, but today he is making copies of his own work, which is a comic strip he started back in art school called LOG, about a young boy who goes to a museum and sees a petrified log, and how the boy falls in love with the log, and escapes with it, and the comic strip follows their adventures together, which is secretly all about his relationship with Elise, though even to her it’s thinly veiled, and almost always upsetting. And in this episode, which is just crudely drawn black-and-white line art depicting the boy holding the petrified wood, the boy is asking the log, What do you want me to do now? and the log does not answer and so then he drops it over a bridge into a snowy river, and the log, the petrified wood, floats away, and the boy waves to it and then rests his head on the railing of the bridge and says, What the fuck do I do now? and then the docket is cleared on machine one and he slips the comic strip onto the machine, and it is at that moment when the office manager Charlie comes in, her long earrings dangling, flashing like some kind of alarm.
And at first she just smiles awkwardly, places her copy order sheet on the pile beside the work desk, and does not say anything—and he tries to stand in front of the copier as it shoots out page after page of his comic which ends with the gigantic phrase, What the fuck do I do now? and so he asks Charlie, “Did you get that info on the Plaxic shoot? They want us to build another giant stomach?” and she coughs a little and says, “I think so,” and he says, “Great,” and she says, “Good,” and he sees her glance down at the copier behind him on her way out, looking more than a little stiff-necked. But nothing happens right away. No one calls him from the black telephone at the corner of his desk, no one peeks their head inside his cubicle to see what he is up to now, and at noon, when he goes to lunch, no one says anything.
But when he comes back, there is a pink message that says, See Charlie, and when he looks up there is the office manager at the end of the aisle, nodding at him. She’s motioning to him, entreating him to come talk to her, her drawn-on eyebrows rearing up. And he doesn’t go. He doesn’t know why he doesn’t go. He knows he is not going to be fired but he doesn’t want to have to talk to anyone right now. He doesn’t want to have to explain everything, why he walked out of the meeting, what the comic means, and his lack of attention these last few weeks, and what’s going on in his personal life right now. And so holds up his finger, like he’s in the middle of something, and then grabs his coat from the coat rack in the break room and runs out.
TAPE RECORDINGS.
And he does not go home right away. He does not want to see Elise, he does not want to see her pale yellow scarf, he does not want to see her put on her white winter hat with the ball on top and then pick up the matching suitcases, which were actually a gift from his stepfather, and say whatever it is she is going to say. And so he rides around for three more hours, until it’s dark, through the ice and wind, recording the lost sounds of the city. As he pedals, he notices that on almost every other corner there is a shabby newspaper stand, and on the covers of all the newspapers and magazines are headlines shouting some remarks about the ongoing impeachment trial. There always seems to be some new and lascivious detail or a photograph of the president looking contrite. Jack has been ignoring all of this, as his own personal life is depressing enough. And so he rides along, trying to distract himself, recording the unending disquiet of the people passing along the crowded streets: A woman coughing at a bus stop. A neon-blue pharmacy sign buzzing. A trumpet player blowing his instrument in the cold. And there, at the corner of Michigan and Oak, he stops and sees a green glove lying in the snow.
It’s one of the most interesting gloves he’s ever seen, elbowlength with narrow fingers, obviously some girl’s.
And so he reaches into his gray coat pocket, finds the silver tape recorder, and then leans over, recording ten seconds of the glove lying there. “A green glove in the snow,” he says. “Do they have green gloves in Germany, Elise? Probably. Probably. They’re probably better than the ones we got here. They’re probably way more functional. They’re probably all going to grad school and studying economics. And they’re all going to be way happier. Happier than they ever thought,” and he says all of this directly into the small microphone. And then he slips the tape recorder back into his pocket, pulls up his hood, gets on his bicycle, and begins to pedal toward home.
IT’S ALL BEING ERASED.
And the front door is unlocked and there are the two suitcases, placed side by side, to the left of the sofa. And she is pacing around, asking, “What did I forget?” and he wants to say, Everything? and he takes a seat on the couch, which no longer feels like his couch, their couch, and the gray cat comes over, and it acts like it doesn’t recognize him, because it’s her cat, really, even though it’s staying with him, and the cat has an air about it now, it arches its neck against his hand and he gives it a pet but it does not seem interested, and everywhere there are his stupid shoe boxes, stacked eight or nine or ten high, in awkward-looking towers, dozens and dozens and dozens of these boxes, and each of these boxes are labeled by theme, like CRYING or CRIME or EPIPHANIES, and in each of these boxes there are four or five or even ten minicassette tapes, each of these labeled by theme again and also date, and Jack sits on the couch, staring at the idiotic shoe boxes sprawled around, knowing this is one of the reasons why; all this childish nonsense, all these unfinished projects have to be what’s ended this, their relationship, and there in the corner is his desk, which is piled high with manuscript pages for a screenplay he will never get done, and there beside the reclining chair is his oboe, which he hasn’t played in months, and Elise has curled her hair for some reason, and it looks elegant, and he can see her clear braces which make her teeth sit funny, and she’s doing that thing, tilting her head to put on her earrings, and Jack stands and says, �
�I recorded the sound of a balloon today. It made me think of you.”
And she looks at him and smiles a sad little smile, the smile of a kindergarten teacher looking at the drawing of a rather dull student, and she tilts her head to the other side now and affixes the left earring, and he says, “I recorded some snow too. In case you wanted to take it with you. The snow in Germany might sound totally different,” and here she pats him on the shoulder, and the pat just about breaks his heart, because it is the pat of someone who is about to leave, someone who is done, someone who is going away and never coming back, and she says, “You keep it,” and she turns to pick up her purse and it’s then that Jack kicks the cat.
“Why did you just do that?” Elise asks, eyes filling up with tears. She leans over and holds the cat to her chest and it leaps from her arms to go hide behind the radiator. And Jack does not know what to say.
“I really don’t know,” he says, and they both stand there, staring at the spot where the cat had just been kicked. “Shit. This is what you’re doing to me. This is the kind of person you’re making me.”
“What?”
“I got you some Christmas presents. A few months ago. I didn’t give them to you because … But I want you to have them now.”
“No,” she says. “I don’t want them … Besides, I don’t have any more room.”
“They’re Christmas presents. There’s nothing wrong with them.”
“Thanks. But I can’t.” And she nods, tears still coming on in full.
“I’m really going to miss your braces,” he says, and then she is smiling and crying at exactly the same time. “They’re kind of my favorite part about you.”
“What?”
“I don’t know too many other people who are in their twenties and who decide to get braces. I think it’s pretty great that you did.”
“Thanks.”
“Do they have good orthodontists in Germany?”
“It’s not like I’m not going to be back here at some point. My parents still live here and everything.”
“Okay,” he says, and then looks around the apartment once more. “You know, we were married for less than a year. Your mom was right: we were way too young.”
“Yeah. Somehow it seems a lot longer than a year.”
“It does. So do you still have your keys?”
And she nods to the small card table where she has left them.
“Okay. Then here we go,” he says, and switches off the lamp. And then, in the near dark, it’s like neither of them exists.
IN THE SNOW-COVERED CAR WHICH IS A HATCHBACK.
And the same car he had back in art school. The tape player spits out a song by Guided by Voices and as soon as it comes on, she switches it off. It’s from a tape she made him and they both know it. So they watch the snow come down in silence and let the beat of the loosened heater belt be their parting song.
OVER THE NEPTUNE.
The snow piles neatly along the airport’s windows though her flight has not been canceled. Below their waists are two pairs of nervous knees and two pairs of uncertain shoes: there are her silver and white heels, and his gray-looking loafers. Neither of the shoes’ owners will look the other in the eye and so this is all they see.
“You don’t have to do this.”
“Yes, I do.”
“We could maybe try …”
“No. Not anymore,” and here she points the toe of her shoes away from him.
“But why don’t we—”
“Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,” she says.
And then they both laugh nervously.
“But why? Why Germany?”
“It’s the only place I can do this. You know that. Okay. I’ll call you when I land.”
The boarding call warbles its garbled message over the intercom.
“It could be different,” he says. “You don’t have to leave.”
“No, it can’t. And yes, I do.”
“Please,” he says, looking around. “Don’t go. Please. Let’s not do this. Let’s stay married.”
And she begins laughing and he isn’t and then she sees he isn’t and then she feels embarrassed for the both of them.
“This sucks. This is bullshit,” he says.
“Auf Wiedersehen,” she says, and he can see her feet disappearing into an aimless-looking line of sneakers and dress shoes and comfortable slippers.
(THEN THERE IS THE SOUND OF AN AIRPLANE TAKING OFF.)
And he records it with the small silver tape recorder, hoping it is hers, knowing it isn’t.
THEN THERE ARE OTHER SOUNDS AND OTHER TAPES.
And he tries to record them all.
(There is the sound of an alarm clock. It’s ringing somewhere. Somewhere. There it is. Ten seconds of that.)
(It isn’t even his alarm, he realizes, hearing it. It’s hers, which she forgot to pack.)
(There is the sound of her empty gray pillow, of the empty side of the bed, which is like the sound of a gallows. Twenty seconds of that.)
(And a sigh he makes that is like nothing he has ever heard come out of a human being’s body. Which he does not bother to get on tape.)
(And there are his bottles of Lexapro and Wellbutrin, which he has not taken in days now. Four seconds of each of these pill bottles sitting beside the sink, unused.)
(And the song that’s playing on the alarm clock right now is Hall & Oates. And he records some of that. Why? Why not? And then he holds the tape recorder up to his mouth and says, “This is the sound of Monday, February 2. You’ve been gone twelve days.” And then he says, “I’m better off on my own. Really. Seriously.” And then he sets the tape recorder back in his lap. And then it’s time to get ready for work. But two weeks have gone by and he hasn’t been to work and now he probably doesn’t have a job anymore. And this is when he stops sleeping normal hours. And he doesn’t return anyone’s phone calls, not his friend Birdie’s or his other friend Eric’s. And so he begins riding around the city all night long, looking for interesting sounds to record.)
TAPES.
But it’s getting late and he’s been riding his bicycle around for a while now: it’s kind of awkward to watch but that’s okay. In the unplowed street, he almost falls off the bicycle twice. This city, it’s a random clash of single noises, and he tries to record them all, steering the ten-speed with his right hand, holding the tape recorder out with his left.
A couple holding hands, splashing in a puddle together. Five seconds of that.
The elevated train roaring by sounds like a kid whose teeth are all being pulled out at the same time. Ten seconds of that.
Someone sneezing into a pink handkerchief.
A car skidding in the snow.
There’s a poodle barking at its own reflection in an icy window. Five seconds of that. And he looks down at his calculator watch and sees it’s five to ten and he decides he will ride around until the sun comes up so he doesn’t have to try to sleep by himself again.
BECAUSE THIS IS WHAT HE’S BEEN DOING.
Ever since he graduated art school four years ago: recording sounds, almost any kind, the noises, the exclamations, the abstract music of the nervous city. There are minicassettes, more than four hundred of them, in shoe boxes rising like modern buildings all around the apartment, from the front door to the bedroom closet to the bathroom. All these tapes, all these shoe boxes, are probably part of the reason why Elise decided to leave. He knows this now and does not blame her in the slightest. Because it’s just one other unending project that keeps getting bigger and bigger. And he doesn’t know why he can’t just get rid of them all. Because there’s just something about the tapes that he loves, something he can’t explain. For example, in the shoe box marked CRYING, there are five or six tapes of nothing but the noise of people sobbing in public. And each of them are incredibly lovely in their own way. Another box is GIRLS ON SUBWAY, and mostly these are just tapes of girls, pretty ones, reading books or folding their legs, or dreamily staring out the win
dows of the train, or even snoring. And there are other boxes: BAD WEATHER, CRIME, HAPPINESS, FAMILY, NEWS, DEATH, MYSTERY, and BIRDS, each of them filled with tapes that are stark or strange or sublime. And it’s a whole world, a self-portrait of his life built through single moments of sound.
And there is a box, somewhere in one of those piles, which is marked FAVORITES, and there are exactly five tapes inside. One is from the intersection near Division Street and Ashland—an old woman singing “Look for the Silver Lining” to a fountain of warbling pigeons, their coos being what he assumes is the birds’ way of showing their appreciation.
Another tape is full of nothing but weather reports from the local radio station—the wordy weatherman describing a cloudy day as “gray cumulus, just like ponies jumping over a fence.”
One sound, which he has titled Mystery Sound #20, is a strange ghostly whistle, which used to come from the bedroom closet every night. And together he and Elise would listen in wonder and laugh.
Another tape is a series of long knock-knock jokes between two young black girls which Jack recorded on the westbound Chicago Avenue bus.
“Knock-knock.”
“Who’s there?”
“Banana.”
“Banana who?”
And then there’s Jack’s favorite tape ever, of all time, which he recorded at the Milwaukee Avenue bus stop, the sound of a young woman in a purple coat talking softly to the young man beside her, and which goes exactly like this: “I ate a plum today and thought of you.”
And he does not know why this is his favorite sound of all time, only that there is something so perfect in its briefness, in its sense of longing. It’s the way he has been feeling for some time, and in the sound of this other person’s words, the plastic cassette tape itself is maybe the most beautiful thing he has left in his life.