A Single Man

by Christopher Isherwood

  ‘And how do you feel about her?’

  ‘Oh, I like her a lot.’

  ‘And she likes you, doesn’t she?’

  ‘I guess so. Yes, she does. A lot.’

  ‘But don’t you want to marry her?’

  ‘Oh sure. I guess so. If she were to change her attitude. But I doubt if she will. And, anyhow, I’m in no rush about marrying anyone. There’s a lot of things I want to do, first —’ Kenny pauses, regarding George with his most teasing, penetrating grin. ‘You know what I think, Sir?’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I don’t believe you’re that much interested, whether I marry Lois or not. I think you want to ask me something different. Only you’re not sure how I’ll take it —’

  ‘What do I want to ask you?’

  This is getting positively flirty, on both sides. Kenny’s blanket, under the relaxing influence of the talk and beer, has slipped, baring an arm and a shoulder and turning itself into a classical Greek garment, the chlamys worn by a young disciple – the favourite, surely – of some philosopher. At this moment, he is utterly, dangerously charming.

  ‘You want to know if Lois and I – if we make out together.’

  ‘Well, do you?’

  Kenny laughs triumphantly. ‘So I was right!’

  ‘Maybe. Maybe not. . . . Do you?’

  ‘We did, once.’

  ‘Why only once?’

  ‘It wasn’t so long ago. We went to a motel. It’s down the beach, as a matter of fact, quite near here.’

  ‘Is that why you drove out here tonight?’

  ‘Yes – partly. I was trying to talk her into going there again.’

  ‘And that’s what the argument was about?’

  ‘Who says we had an argument?’

  ‘You left her to drive home alone, didn’t you?’

  ‘Oh well, that was because. . . . No, you’re right – she didn’t want to – she hated that motel the first time, and I don’t blame her. The office and the desk-clerk and the register; all that stuff they put you through. And of course they know damn well what the score is. . . . It all makes the thing much too important, and corny, like some big sin or something. And the way they look at you! Girls mind all that much more than we do —’

  ‘So now she’s called the whole thing off?’

  ‘Hell, no, it’s not that bad! It’s not that she’s against it, you understand. Not on principle. In fact, she’s definitely – well, anyhow. . . . I guess we can work something out. We’ll have to see —’

  ‘You mean, maybe you can find some place that isn’t so public and embarrassing?’

  ‘That’d be a big help, certainly —’ Kenny grins, yawns, stretches himself. The chlamys slips off his other shoulder. He pulls it back over both shoulders as he rises, turning it into a blanket again and himself into a gawky twentieth-century American boy comically stranded without his clothes. ‘Look, Sir, it’s getting as late as all hell. I have to be going.’

  ‘Where, may I ask?’

  ‘Why, back across town.’

  ‘In what?’

  ‘I can get a bus, can’t I?’

  ‘They won’t start running for another two hours, at least.’

  ‘Just the same —’

  ‘Why don’t you stay here? Tomorrow I’ll drive you.’

  ‘I don’t think I —’

  ‘If you start wandering around this neighbourhood in the dark, now the bars are shut, the police will stop you and ask what you’re doing. And you aren’t exactly sober, if you don’t mind my saying so. They might even take you in.’

  ‘Honestly, Sir, I’ll be all right.’

  ‘I think you’re out of your mind. However, we’ll discuss that in a minute. . . . First – sit down. I’ve got something I want to tell you.’

  Kenny sits down obediently, without further protest. Perhaps he is curious to know what George’s next move will be.

  ‘Now listen to this very carefully. I am about to make a simple statement of fact. Or facts. No comment is required from you. If you like, you can decide that this doesn’t concern you at all. Is that clear?’

  ‘Yes, Sir.’

  ‘There’s a woman I know who lives here; a very close friend of mine. We have supper together at least one day a week; often more than that. Matter of fact, we had supper tonight. Now – it never makes any difference to her, which day I pick. So what I’ve decided is this – and, mind, it has nothing whatsoever to do with you, necessarily – from now on, I shall go to her place for supper each week on the same night. Invariably, on the same night. Tonight, that is. . . . Is that much clear? No, don’t answer. Go right on listening, because I’m just coming to the point. . . . These nights, when I have supper with my friend, I shall never, under any circumstances, return here before midnight. Is that clear? No – listen! This house is never locked, because anyone could get into it, anyway, just by breaking a panel in the glass door. Upstairs, in my study, you must have noticed that there’s a couch bed? I keep it made up with clean sheets on it, just on the once-in-a-blue-moon chance that I’ll get an unexpected guest – such as you are going to be tonight, for instance. . . . No – listen carefully! If that bed were ever used while I was out, and straightened up afterwards, I’d never be any the wiser. And if my cleaning-woman were to notice anything, she’d merely put the sheets out to go to the laundry; she’d suppose I’d had a guest and forgotten to tell her. . . . All right! I’ve made a decision and now I’ve told you about it. Just as I might tell you I’d decided to water the garden on a certain day of the week. I have also told you a few facts about this house. You can make a note of them. Or you can forget them. That’s all —’

  George looks straight at Kenny. Kenny smiles back at him faintly. But he is – yes, just a little bit – embarrassed.

  ‘And now get me another drink.’

  ‘Okay, Sir.’ Kenny rises from his chair with noticeable eagerness, as if glad of this breaking of tension. He picks up George’s glass and goes into the kitchen. George calls after him, ‘And get yourself one, too!’

  Kenny puts his head around the corner, grinning. ‘Is that an order, Sir?’

  ‘You’re damn right it is!’

  ‘I suppose you’ve decided I’m a dirty old man?’

  While Kenny was getting the drinks from the kitchen, George has felt himself entering a new phase. Now, as Kenny takes his seat again, he is, though he cannot have realised it yet, in the presence of a George transformed; a formidable George, who articulates thickly but clearly, with a menace behind his words. An inquisitorial George, seated in judgment and perhaps about to pronounce sentence. An oracular George, who may shortly begin to speak with tongues.

  This isn’t at all like their drunkenness at The Starboard Side. Kenny and he are no longer in the symbolic dialogue-relationship; this new phase of communication is very much person-to-person. Yet, paradoxically, Kenny seems farther away, not closer; he has receded far beyond the possible limits of an electric field. Indeed, it is only now and then that George can see him clearly, for the room has become dazzlingly bright and Kenny’s face keeps fading into the brightness. Also, there is a loud buzzing in George’s ears; so loud that he can’t be certain if Kenny answered his question or not.

  ‘You needn’t say anything,’ George tells Kenny (thus dealing with either possibility), ‘because I admit it – Oh, hell, yes – of course I admit it – I am a dirty old man. Ninety-nine per cent of all old men are dirty. That is, if you want to talk that language. If you insist on that kind of dreariness. I’m not protesting against what you choose to call me or don’t. I’m protesting against an attitude – and I’m only doing that for your sake, not mine —

  ‘Look – things are quite bad enough anyhow, nowadays – we’re in quite enough of a mess, semantically and every other way – without getting ourselves entangled in these dreary categories. I mean, what is this life of ours supposed to be for? Are we to spend it identifying each other with catalogues, like tourists in a
n art gallery? Or are we to try to exchange some kind of a signal, however garbled, before it’s too late? You answer me that —!

  ‘It’s all very fine and easy for you young things to come to me on campus and tell me I’m cagey. Merciful Christ – cagey! Don’t you even know better than that? Don’t you have a glimmering of how I must feel – longing to speak?

  ‘You asked me about experience. So I told you. Experience isn’t any use. And yet, in quite another way, it might be. If only we weren’t all such miserable fools and prudes and cowards. Yes, you too, my boy. And don’t you dare deny it! What I said just now, about the bed in the study – that shocked you. Because you were determined to be shocked. You utterly refused to understand my motives. Oh God, don’t you see? That bed – what that bed means – that’s what experience is —!

  ‘Oh well, I’m not blaming you. It’d be a miracle if you did understand. Never mind. Forget it. Here am I. Here are you – in that damned blanket; why don’t you take it right off, for Christ’s sake? What made me say that? I suppose you’re going to misunderstand that, too? Well, if you do, I don’t give a damn. The point is – here am I and here are you – and for once there’s no one to disturb us. This may never happen again. I mean that literally! And the time is desperately short. All right, let’s put the cards on the table. Why are you here in this room at this moment? Because you want me to tell you something! That’s the true reason you came all the way across town tonight. You may have honestly believed it was to get Lois in bed with you. Mind you, I’m not saying one word against her. She’s a truly beautiful angel. But you can’t fool a dirty old man; he isn’t sentimental about Young Love; he knows just how much it’s worth – a great deal, but not everything. No, my dear Kenneth – you came here this evening to see me; whether you realised it or not. Some part of you knew quite well that Lois would refuse to go to that motel again; and that that would give you an excuse to send her home and get yourself stranded out here. I expect that poor girl is feeling terrible about it all, right now, and crying into her pillow. You must be very sweet to her when you see her again —

  ‘But I’m getting off the point. The point is, you came to ask me about something that really is important. So why be ashamed and deny it? You see, I know you through and through. I know exactly what you want. You want me to tell you what I know —

  ‘Oh, Kenneth, Kenneth, believe me – there’s nothing I’d rather do! I want like hell to tell you. But I can’t. I quite literally can’t. Because, don’t you see, what I know is what I am? And I can’t tell you that. You have to find it out for yourself. I’m like a book you have to read. A book can’t read itself to you. It doesn’t even know what it’s about. I don’t know what I’m about —

  ‘You could know what I’m about. You could. But you can’t be bothered to. Look – you’re the only boy I ever met on that campus I really believe could. That’s what makes it so tragically futile. Instead of trying to know, you commit the inexcusable triviality of saying he’s a dirty old man, and turning this evening, which might be the most precious and unforgettable of your young life, into a flirtation! You don’t like that word, do you? But it’s the word. It’s the enormous tragedy of everything nowadays. Flirtation. Flirtation instead of fucking, if you’ll pardon my coarseness. All any of you ever do is flirt, and wear your blankets off one shoulder, and complain about motels. And miss the one thing that might really – and, Kenneth, I do not say this casually – transform your entire life —’

  For a moment, Kenny’s face is quite distinct. It grins, dazzlingly. Then his grin breaks up, is refracted, or whatever you call it, into rainbows of light. The rainbows blaze. George is blinded by them. He shuts his eyes. And now the buzzing in his ears is the roar of Niagara.

  Half an hour – an hour, later – not long, anyway – George blinks and is awake.

  Night, still. Dark. Warm. Bed. Am in bed! He jerks up, propped on his elbow. Clicks on the bedside lamp. His hand does this; arm in sleeve; pyjama sleeve. Am in pyjamas! Why? How?

  Where is he?

  George staggers out of bed, dizzy, a bit sickish, startled wide awake. Ready to lurch into the front room. No – wait. Here’s paper propped against lamp:

  Thought maybe I’d better split, after all. I like to wander around at night. If those cops pick me up, I won’t tell them where I’ve been – I promise! Not even if they twist my arm!

  That was great, this evening. Let’s do it again, shall we? Or don’t you believe in repeating things?

  Couldn’t find pyjamas you already used, so took these clean ones from the drawer. Maybe you sleep raw? Didn’t want to take a chance, though. Can’t have you getting pneumonia, can we?

  Thanks for everything,

  Kenneth.

  George sits on the bed, reading this. Then, with slight impatience, like a general who has just glanced through an unimportant dispatch, he lets the paper slide to the floor, stands up, goes into the bathroom, empties his bladder, doesn’t glance in the mirror, doesn’t even turn on the light, returns to bed, gets in, switches off bed-lamp.

  Little teaser, his mind says, but without the least resentment. Just as well he didn’t stay.

  But, as he lies on his back in the dark, there is something that keeps him from sleep; a tickle in the blood and the nerves of the groin. The alcohol itches in him, down there.

  Lying in the dark, he conjures up Kenny and Lois in their car, makes them drive into Camphor Tree Lane, park further down the street, in case a neighbour should be watching – hurry discreetly across the bridge, get the door open – it sticks, she giggles – bump against the living-room furniture – a tiny Japanese cry of alarm – tiptoe upstairs without turning on the lights —

  No – it won’t work. George tries several times, but he just cannot make Lois go up those stairs. Each time he starts her up them, she dematerialises, as it were. (And now he knows, with absolute certainty, that Kenny will never be able to persuade her even to enter this house.)

  But the play has begun, now, and George isn’t about to stop it. Kenny must be provided with a partner. So George turns Lois into the sexy little gold cat, the Mexican tennis player. No trouble about getting him upstairs! He and Kenny are together in the front room, now. George hears a belt drop to the floor. They are stripping themselves naked.

  The blood throbs deep down in George’s groin. The flesh stirs and swells up, suddenly hard hot. The pyjamas are pulled off, tossed out of bed.

  George hears Kenny whisper to the Mexican, Come on, kid! Making himself invisible, he enters the front room. He finds the two of them just about to lie down together —

  No. That won’t work, either. George doesn’t like Kenny’s attitude. He isn’t taking his lust seriously; in fact, he seems to be on the verge of giggles. Quick – we need a substitute! George hastily turns Kenny into the big blond boy from the tennis court. Oh, much better! Perfect! Now they can embrace. Now the fierce hot animal play can begin. George hovers above them, watching; then he begins passing in and out of their writhing, panting bodies. He is either. He is both at once. Ah – it is so good! Ah – ah —!

  You old idiot, George’s mind says. But he is not ashamed of himself. He speaks to the now slack and sweating body with tolerant good humour, as if to an old greedy dog which has just gobbled down a chunk of meat far bigger than it really wanted. Well, maybe you’ll let us sleep, now? His hand feels for a handkerchief from under the pillow, wipes his belly dry.

  As sleep begins to wash lightly over him, he asks himself: Shall I mind meeting Kenny’s eye in class on Monday?

  No. Not a bit. Even if he has told Lois (which I doubt): I undressed him, I put him to bed, he was drunk as a skunk. For then he will have told her about the swimming, too. You should have seen him in that water – as crazy as a kid! They ought not to let you out on your own, I said to him.

  George smiles to himself, with entire self-satisfaction. Yes, I am crazy, he thinks. That is my secret; my strength.

  And I’m about to get m
uch crazier, he announces. Just watch me, all of you! Do you know what – I’m flying to Mexico for Christmas! You dare me to? I’ll make reservations first thing in the morning!

  He falls asleep, still smiling.

  Partial surfacings, after this. Partial emergings, just barely breaking the sheeted calm of the water. Most of George remaining submerged in sleep.

  Just barely awash, the brain inside its skull on the pillow cognises darkly; not in its daytime manner. It is incapable of decision, now. But, perhaps for this very reason, it can become aware, in this state, of certain decisions apparently not yet made. Decisions that are like codicils which have been secretly signed and witnessed and put away in a most private place, to await the hour of their execution.

  Daytime George may even question the maker of these decisions; but he will not be allowed to remember its answers in the morning.

  What if Kenny has been scared off? What if he doesn’t come back?

  Let him stay away. George doesn’t need him, or any of these kids. He isn’t looking for a son.

  What if Charlotte goes back to England?

  He can do without her, if he must. He doesn’t need a sister.

  Will George go back to England?

  No. He will stay here.

  Because of Jim?

  No. Jim is in the Past, now. He is of no use to George, any more.

  But George remembers him so faithfully.

  George makes himself remember. He is afraid of forgetting. Jim is my life, he says. But he will have to forget, if he wants to go on living. Jim is Death.