What I Lived For

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Corky punches the car horn again. Reflex action like a boxer’s jab. Sheer nerves. The Caddy’s horn is impressive as a bull elephant trumpeting displeasure but what the hell—Corky knows this, he’s a reasonable guy—hitting the horn’s futile in a situation like this. You got to feel sympathy for the poor cop out there, blowing his whistle, flush-faced and sweating.

  The patrolman’s just a kid in his twenties. That freckled-Irish look like Corky Corcoran in fact but he’s nobody Corky knows. Though Corky knows, and is known by, a number of UCPD officers, especially at the top. Plus the Police Commissioner. Plus the D.A. Not least the Mayor. And others in the “power elite”—you got to love that term, if you’re in it!—of Union City.

  Sure, after what happened to Tim Corcoran, Corky’d had fantasies as a kid of becoming a cop, a detective, like McClure, the guys on the TV Untouchables, Steve McQueen in the movies, but common sense told him no it’s not for you, not enough money and too much shit you have to take, especially in the late Sixties when anybody in uniform was a fascist pig. Just as bad now, maybe worse, more media exposure, those TV “Action News” teams out patrolling the streets looking for trouble. Corky Corcoran would’ve had to be an honest cop and Union City’s a tough place for that, the UCPD hierarchy tight-controlled as the Roman Catholic diocese, lots of secrets you can only guess at when big budgets are involved. And every day harder for the lower-ranked cops. Neighborhood-beat cops, guys on squad patrols or even on the streets. Hard to exert their authority, to get proper respect. And the fallout from the Rodney King verdict in L.A., and a similar local incident, a worse local incident since the black victim died. Devane Johnson, 12, shot fatally in the back by UCPD Sergeant Dwayne Picket, 34. November 1991. Christ, what a mess!

  Corky’s been involved in a City Council review of the UCPD’s investigative handling of the case, there’s pressure on the Mayor’s office from the Policemen’s Benevolent Association on the one hand and the Citizens’ Crime Commission on the other, pressure from the black community for sure, that’s an understatement, plus all sorts of “rainbow” coalitions, would the Council’s proposal to set up a new board to investigate not just the Pickett case but the UCPD’s Internal Affairs Division violate the City Charter forbidding the Council to change the powers of any elected official without a referendum . . . and so on, and so forth. Don’t think of it now.

  Corky Corcoran’s on the record as a liberal Democrat solidly behind every liberal cause there is, for sure he doesn’t defend racist killer cops but he figures, he’s been interviewed on local TV and radio saying this, calmly and reasonably and fair-mindedly so how could anyone disagree for Christ’s sake—If you’re a cop on the beat in some of our inner-city neighborhoods where there’s open drug dealing and crack houses and turf wars and shootouts between gangs of kids as young as fifteen, plus “domestic violence” that’s escalating, and you’re up against it every hour you’re working, you’d be at risk using “deadly force” in the wrong circumstances, too.

  For which utterly reasonable statement, God damn, Jerome Andrew Corcoran has taken heat of his own. Him!

  Called a honky ass-kisser by black guys whose hands he’s shaken in friendship, guys he’s gone out of his way to be nice to. For Christ’s sake.

  (Corky, old family friend and longtime political supporter of Union City’s Mayor Oscar Slattery, even closer friend and supporter of Oscar’s son U.S. Representative Vic Slattery, wouldn’t want it known that he himself owns a gun. Publicly, on the record, Corky’s for gun control laws. Any sane citizen is, right? Fuck the NRA. Fuck that crap about citizens bearing arms, that’s a red herring set up by the firearms manufacturers, simple as ABC. But, living in Union City, like any big American city, you’re crazy not to be realistic. Corky owns just one gun anyway, but it’s a sweetie: a Luger automatic 7.65 mm, eight-shot magazine, German-made, a rarity and a collector’s item a UCPD detective once handed over to him in a poker game in lieu of cash and like a good citizen Corky’s got it registered—homeowner’s protection—keeps it in his bedroom in his bedside table. For self-defense. Exclusively. True, a few times he’s violated the law, and a pretty tough New York State law it is, carrying the Luger on his person, for a while he carried it in the glove compartment of his car, a specific while and for good reason, but he’s never fired the gun except at the target range, never waved it in anybody’s face. Charlotte disapproved of the gun on principle but got a charge out of it close beside the bed, sexy Corky with his gun, not that it’s his gun really, he’d explained to her it’s homeowner’s protection, for both of us, let’s hope we never need to use it, right? Corky has to admit, he likes the Luger. A lot. The classy heft of it. The history. World War II souvenir worth, how much?—thousands of dollars now in 1992. And there’s the simple fact of a gun, a gun in your hand, the sexy charge. A gun in your hand, you’re Death with a human face.)

  Still tied up in traffic. Fancy digital clock in the teakwood dash jumps to 10:49 A.M.

  Why doesn’t he call Christina, he’s got a phone right here in the car, explain he’ll be late. A few times, waiting for him, she’d said she was worried. Never yet a true quarrel with Christina but once they’d come close, Can’t you be considerate of me, can’t you think of me waiting for you, Christina keeping it light, smiling, teasing him running her hands up and down his body so they’d ended up wrestling, kissing, the issue deflected. Corky’s on the phone a lot but Corky’s not the kind of guy to explain, nor to apologize, just not his nature. None of the Corcoran males. Never show a woman you’re anxious, any sign of indecision, weakness, especially regarding her, women despise that in a man.

  Reminds them too much of themselves, maybe.

  “Fuck it”—Corky hates being stuck like this, trapped in his car. Restless, antsy. Like in church in the old days. In school. Too much adrenaline. Hates being forced to think, bad as his nighttime insomnia, stone cold sober can be a real bummer.

  Thinking, Jesus: I’m almost eight years older than my father lived to be.

  Daddy he’d called him, but afterward Father. Daddy’s too baby-sounding.

  He’s three years older than Theresa was when she finally died. Always remember: August 2, 1967. The week after Detroit went up in flames and twelve days before Union City was hit, a black “social club” down by the docks raided by cops and some heads busted and all hell broke loose, three days of “urban unrest” until the cops, the State Troopers, and the National Guard restored order. Not that Theresa knew or cared about “urban unrest.” Poor woman so ravaged those final months at St. Raphael’s, hearing voices, screaming voices she said, her beauty long eaten away as if by cancer and life a misery to her and everybody around her Holy Mary Mother of God help me! help me! Poor Mother in a frenzy stabbing at her wrist with a dull fingernail file, desperate to die. That time I took flowers to her, pushing the vase onto the floor. Having to be restrained snatching up the glass. Not recognizing me at the end. Anyway not acknowledging me.

  When you hate your life you come to be hateful. That’s why Corky Corcoran’s so upbeat. What’s the point, otherwise?

  Meet my price or it’s no deal.

  “Schizzy” Corky’s come to call Theresa, his way of summing her up, putting distance between them. “Fucked-up” he learned to think of her. Why not? Wasn’t it so? Talking of his mother in such terms to Charlotte Drummond whom he was going to marry, how shocked and disapproving Charlotte had been, or pretended to be, hearing a man speak like that of his dead mother, so Corky shrugged and grinned saying, Look, honey: the fucking woman was my mother, I’m the expert. Right?

  Which shut Charlotte up, fast. The rich man’s daughter, her widened eyes on Corky Corcoran, assessing.

  Yes and liking what she saw. When his clothes were off especially.

  Charlotte Drummond, for eleven years Charlotte Corcoran. Never seemed quite real to either of them, that name. Like Charlotte’s daughter Thalia Corky adopted, her name Thalia Braunbeck changed to Thalia Corcoran but that never took ei
ther, somehow. Why not call the kid Drummond. Cut the bullshit.

  Corky’d rather not think of Thalia right now. He’s getting hot enough as it is. Sexed up. Charged. Like static electricity is charging his prick and he’s stuck here, how many minutes, in fucking traffic when he could be with Christina Kavanaugh. Hey Corky: do you know what I love about you best? Mmmm?

  Last night when Corky got home (1 A.M. which is early for him: he’d had a few drinks, dinner with an investor interested in developing, with Corcoran, Inc., some riverside property) there was a message from Thalia on his voice mail, twenty-five years old but Thalia can sound like a child over the phone, breathy, mysterious, Corky was alarmed hearing from her after so many months when they’ve been estranged (Thalia’s choice, not Corky’s: she’s a young woman of unpredictable moods, caprices, grudges) Corky this is Thalia please call me immediately it’s serious I need your help but, God damn her, when Corky tried the number he has for her, no answer.

  Which put him into a cold sweat right away. She’s playing games with him. Or is she in danger.

  This morning, Corky tried the number again. Five, six times. From home, early; and from his office. No answer.

  There’s an old history of Thalia messing with step-Daddy’s head, messing with step-Daddy’s marriage in fact. God damn, Corky isn’t going to think of her right now.

  Chrissie?—know what I love best about you?

  Mmmmmm. And that, too.

  Corky’s drifting into a horny-dreamy reverie like in church as a kid. But he isn’t going to jerk off in the fucking Caddy is he.

  Hears a siren. What is it?—ambulance? Pretty sure it isn’t a firetruck.

  Somebody’s injured, might be dead. Traffic accident. That’s it?

  Ahead of the Fed Ex van is a Union City Transit bus, spewing exhaust. Worse idling than in motion. Diesel fuel. Grimy white and snot-green wheezing along the streets like Union City’s a Third World country. Corky’s pushed for stricter pollution control with city transport, but that costs. Too many years of riding these buses when he was a kid and now he hasn’t set foot in one of them in twenty-five years.

  10:51 A.M. Corky’s mesmerized by the digital clock, Time ticking away, your heartbeat ticking, brains cells popping one by one. That book he’s been reading, A Brief History of Time, the crippled English guy what’s his name, what is Time, everybody’s got a theory but nobody knows.

  What he knows: Christina Kavanaugh’s waiting for him. Wanting love. Wanting him. His cock in her hand, pearly-wet at the tip, astonished when she’d touched him like that, held him, that time in Corky’s car when they were so new with each other it scared him to touch her or to be touched by her, and in his car parked across the street from 8 Schuyler at dusk she’d caressed him not so he’d come in her hand which for sure neither of them wanted right then but just to caress, to comfort.

  And the last time they’d made love, in Christina’s loft on Nott Street. Last Thursday. Late afternoon. After squash at the U.C.A.C. and before dinner with a lawyer-friend of Vic Slattery’s and his wife. Christina gripping his back her hands clenched into fists, covered in sweat her hair gleaming black on the pillow whipping her head from side to side Oh Corky! Oh God! Corky! her face contorted in a look almost of agony, you’d swear it was agony.

  Wondering what women feel. Like a steel trap sprung. But it keeps springing. The cunt’s contractions, you can feel. Totally out of control. Delirious, raving. Convulsions, when it’s really strong. Whereas Corky, sometimes, with some women, many times with Charlotte those last years, it’s like his head is at one end and his prick’s at the other and there’s a detonation sweet and explosive going off he can sure appreciate but isn’t inside of. Like that time driving the Expressway with some girl he’d been going out with, name forgotten now, a real tramp, they’d been sharing a joint and she’d masturbated Corky in the car fifty miles an hour in the right-hand lane and Corky swore he never veered out of his lane: that’s control.

  Yes but with Christina it’s different. Christina’s no tramp.

  Christina Corky’d like to marry. Maybe. Never been so happy with any woman as with Christina. I swear.

  Yes but you wouldn’t like me quite so much, lover, would you?—if I were free and unattached.

  Surprising Corky with this remark. Out of the blue. Just past the Christmas holiday when (he’d gathered) there’d been tension in her family, and Corky’d been at the Key Biscayne Club, Florida, for eight days, and Corky hadn’t known how to reply, suddenly hot in the face. Kissing her, stroking her, what to say to Christina when, it must be, he doesn’t know the answer to her question.

  Look, honey, the main thing is: being alive.

  Life is sweet if the fuckers meet your price.

  “Hey, officer, can I help?—there’s an alley here, I’ll route ’em through here, O.K.?”

  Corky’s cut his engine and is out of his car calling to the harassed young cop, glad to be of service. It’s occurred to him that this one-way alley off Brisbane goes right through to Front Street and an impromptu detour can take traffic that way then over the Third Street canal bridge and back a block or two to Brisbane—why not? It’s worth trying.

  The cop must be amazed, a guy unknown to him volunteering to help with traffic control, climbing out of a $35,000 cream-and-cocoa Caddy willing to get right out in this mess and on a windy day blowing grit and crap into your eyes, sure he’s game, why not—“O.K., mister!” he calls over.

  So this happens: for five minutes or so Corky’s in the street having the time of his life directing traffic!—that’s to say, bossing people around. He’s good at that, as his ex-wife Charlotte would say. Capable, quick, springy on his feet like an athlete (he is an athlete, though always an amateur, squash, tennis, softball, for a brief while boxing in high school), basking in the attention, innocent as a kid. With his easy smile he’s the kind of guy people rarely question but take as he presents himself. You’re an American, you’re good as you look.

  Corky’s ex-wife knows too he’s the kind of guy who thrives on emergencies. It’s real life that constantly fucks him up.

  “—Down this alley, right—to Front Street, right—sure it goes through, friend!—just go.” Corky waving his arms, pointing, even whistling. That ear-splitting whistle perfected when he was a kid.

  “Yes, c’mon, ma’am, just turn your wheel, like that, right!—fantastic. Go.”

  Revved up, hot. Like on the squash court. The hotter the action the more the adrenaline pumps.

  And his fellow drivers follow his directions. A stream of cars, vans. UNION CITY FLOWERS delivery girl behind the wheel giving him the eye. The first several are hesitant but the others follow like sheep. Terrific feeling, taking charge like this, Corky loves it, like at certain crucial Council meetings he’s got the agenda orchestrated with the Council president and Oscar Slattery’s other allies primed to steer discussion to the Mayor’s advantage then call for a quickie vote or a vote to adjourn, whatever. Never fails. Or almost never.

  So the gridlock’s broken on Brisbane above Fourth, backed up for blocks but now moving. Some of the drivers grin at Corky and make the O.K. sign with thumb and forefinger, possibly they recognize him, Corky Corcoran who’s in the papers occasionally, on local TV. Not the best known of the City Council members but a straightforward guy, a one hundred percent reliable guy, no bullshit from Corky Corcoran who’s come up from Irish Hill and no bullshit about that. If only, fuck it, he was taller.

  He’s maybe five foot nine, maybe a little shorter, conscious of his height so he always stands tall, proud, cocky, a middleweight’s solid, supple body, an Irish kid’s face still smattered with freckles. Fading, but still there. Sometimes it seems Corky’s so good-looking women will look after him in the street, sometimes he’s battered-looking as an old football, just plain homely. Depends on how he’s been sleeping, and with who. Whether he’s hungover. Right now he guesses he looks pretty good. His hair that’s still a dark red, a winey-russet red, in corruga
ted waves lifting from his forehead, and his widow’s peak that’s the consequence mainly of a receding hairline but striking, dramatic, Corky is a good-looking man and has every right to take pride in his looks. Hot-skinned, intelligent, foxy-shrewd. Even people who don’t recognize him can guess he’s a local celebrity.

  And his clothes: always stylish and in good taste, not flashy, not nouveau riche. Sure he’ll go as high as $1200 for a custom-made suit like his charcoal gray pinstripe and he’s got two tuxes for formal wear one of them a cool $1500 (not custom-made, but by Valentino—he’d picked it up on a New York City junket, at a men’s boutique in the Trump Tower) and some elegant straight-guy Perry Ellis wear and a terrific-looking Burberry coat and today which is a special day he’s wearing his new Armani “sport jacket-coat,” double-breasted to give his narrow torso some bulk, it’s a sexy color somewhere between fawn and khaki, and with it a white-on-white silk-cotton shirt and a classy striped Cartier tie and good expensive Italian shoes looking just-polished—as in fact they were, in the lobby of the Hotel Statler this morning. (Weekdays, Corky eats breakfast out: he’s a regular at the Statler, and at the Hyatt, and at the Union City Athletic Club, among other places.) You see him and you register a guy who thinks well of himself who’s proud of himself and no apologies for a little healthy vanity.

  A guy not needing to think about his first drink of the day.

  So he’ll say to gorgeous Christina Hey you’ll never guess what I was doing on the way over here and Christina will say smiling No, darling, what? and Corky will say with a big grin, Directing traffic, like a cop and Christina will say astonished Corky, what—?

  More cops arrive, sirens blasting. The situation’s under control. The young cop Corky’s helped out waves at him as he moves on through the intersection—“Hey, thanks, Mr. Corcoran!”

  Mr. Corcoran!—music to Corky’s ears. His morning is made.