They Is Us

by Tama Janowitz

  “I have my own money. The place at the mall, Shrimp Chips, you don’t even need to make an appointment.”

  “I am not taking you! Julika, it’s awful! It’s going to look terrible. Why you want to do this thing?”

  “I just do! It’s the style, Daddy.”

  “Right, and then in a few years they’re going to start sagging and… what did they say, they’re going to be pendulous, and –”

  “You can’t talk! Look what you did when you were my age – you had your nose pierced, and your eyebrow, and your tongue slit, and your belly button. And you thought it was terrible to have a microchip implant, but look, now everybody has one and it’s no big deal.”

  “This was stupid of me, Julya, because then when I arrive in this country the piercings were already out of style, and it just made me look dated. Like an old guy wearing white shoes.”

  “So what, it’s my choice!”

  “So it is your choice, but why you can’t learn from me? Look what I had to go through, the stupid hole in my nose that people always point at and say, ‘Excuse me, sir, you have something on your nose’.”

  “I know, I know, you’ve told me that a million times. But Mom is glad all the old people at the nursing home have nose rings – that way the aides can chain them to the wall. Dad, this is different. Guys now are only interested in girls who’ve had it done. It’s totally safe, they inject them with FBI-DA-Homeland approved lichoneÑÒ –”

  “That’s the style this year that you think guys want. Then when the style changes, you’re going to have to have them shortened.” Slawa adores his daughter. He never wanted her to suffer, nothing bad must happen to her, yet there is nothing he can do, life is going to happen to her anyway. “Listen, you know the saying: the lord is with you, getting and spending. But now is not the spending time, not on a foolish fad!”

  “I don’t care!” She is petulant. “There are lots of places that do it; you just go there and they inject them with the stuff and that’s it – I mean, you can go back for more, if you want them bigger – all I’m asking, Daddy, is for you to take me there. There’s no way I can wear a bathing suit otherwise –”

  Slawa gives up. He has never thought he could love someone so much. How he worships her, she provokes an emotion he has never imagined possible; he had been such a tough unthinking kid, desperate for basic survival and here she is – when he still lived at home, when the washing machine still worked, he would go through Julie’s pockets before doing the laundry and find them stuffed with seeds, nuts, bits of bread. She always carried something to feed the rats in the park. And now with her poor puffy hands, that somehow got all burnt; let her do what all the others her age want. “Okay,” he sighs, giving up, “not this time, but next. Right now, I got no money.”

  “Ooo, yay, yay Daddy!” She jumps up and down exaggeratedly.

  She isn’t pretty but to him she is beautiful, a fat, plain serious little child with dark, close-set eyes – he never saw what she actually looked like. He would croon to her in Russian while she slept, his little dumpling, his stuffed cabbage, and songs he did not even know he knew came back to him, Russian songs from his childhood.

  He thinks about her during the day, the way she twinkles through a room, no more solid than the shifting light or dust motes, an electron floating capriciously and speeding up to the ceiling and then the floor. When she was little he found her crying in bed one night after she read how pearls are created. How old then, six? Eight?

  “And they take the oyster and put a grain of sand in it, so it has to live with constant irritation, that’s what people go around wearing, a poor oyster’s drop of torture.”

  “Okay, but now, you know, don’t worry, there are no more oysters.”

  That only made things worse; she sobbed and sobbed. He had to sing to her for hours to get her to calm down, fragments of songs that popped into his head: “And there we had a collective farm, all run by husky Jewish arms, who says that Jews cannot be farmers, lies?” and “My father was the keeper of the Eddystone Light and he slept with a mermaid one fine night. From this union there came three – a porpoise and a porgy and the other was me!” Finally she slept, her face flushed and puffy from salty tears, he had never loved her so much.

  And now his baby wants to have something done to her… bits. Of course it is the fashion. Or is it? He worries about Tahnee’s influence. He had known her since she was tiny but he had never exactly liked her. Tahnee was always beautiful to look at but after a short time he no longer thought so… There was something in her eyes, an inward glance, as if she didn’t see the world or other people, she has no need for them, a little spoiled face begging to be smacked. He never did smack her, but she never warmed to him, either, no matter what excursions he took her on. And he had tried!

  Once he had taken them on an outing to the beach, which for him was something very special; growing up in Moscow he had always wanted to visit the ocean… They set off early in the morning but… the public parking lot was full, there was a three-week waiting list. Otherwise it cost almost a thousand dollars to park unless you had a summer home here. Finally he let them out and drove around for seven hours before at the end of the day, when the sun was setting, he managed to find a public spot.

  His family: Murielle, the girls, perched on a plaid blanket on the middle of the… beach.

  Only it wasn’t so much sand as rubbish, mile upon mile of plastic bottles, condoms, rubber balls, crushed cups, garbage cans full to overflowing. The sea was miles away, apparently it had shrunk. Certainly it was not the way he had envisioned it from childhood storybooks and old movies.

  And when he finally did get to the water’s edge, he could barely push his way through the water which was more garbage than liquid, viscous, slimy, as much sugar as salt. It was a sea of hair.

  A Sea Dirge

  By Lewis Carroll

  There are certain things – as, a spider, a ghost,

  The Income tax, an umbrella for three –

  That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most

  Is a thing they call the Sea.

  Pour some salt water over the floor –

  Ugly I’m sure you’ll allow it to be:

  Suppose it extended a mile or more,

  That’s very like the Sea.

  Beat a dog till he howls outright –

  Cruel, but all very well for a spree:

  Suppose that he did so day and night,

  That would be like the Sea.

  I had a vision of nursery-maids;

  Tens of thousands passed by me –

  All leading children with wooden spades,

  And this was by the Sea.

  Who invented those spades of wood?

  Who was it cut them out of the tree?

  None, I think, but an idiot could –

  Or one that loved the Sea.

  It is pleasant and dreamy, no doubt, to float

  With ‘thoughts as boundless, and souls as free’:

  But suppose you are very unwell in the boat,

  How do you like the Sea?

  There is an insect that people avoid

  (Whence is derived the verb, “to flee”)

  Where have you been by it most annoyed?

  In lodgings by the Sea.

  If you like your coffee with sand for dregs,

  A decided hint of salt in your tea,

  And a fish taste in the very eggs

  By all means choose the Sea.

  And if, with these dainties to drink and eat,

  You prefer not a vestige of grass or tree,

  And a chronic state of wet in your feet,

  Then – I recommend the Sea.

  For I have friends who dwell by the coast –

  Pleasant friends they are to me!

  It is when I am with them I wonder most

  That anyone likes the Sea.

  They take me a walk: though tired and stiff,

  To climb the heights I madly agree;

/>   And, after a tumble or so from the cliff,

  They kindly suggest the Sea.

  I try the rocks, and I think it cool

  That they laugh with such an excess of glee,

  As I heavily slip into every pool

  That skirts the cold cold Sea.

  The entire ocean had filled with human hair flushed down the lavatories as people cleaned their brushes.

  A man was giving a nature lesson to a group of others who watched him as he emerged covered with hair and used condoms. “It is so much better now that we are able to raise our food products in factories, no creatures are killing any other creatures… And can you imagine having to swim with all those things in the water around you? Fish, sea urchins, electric eels –”

  The group gathered at the shoreline shook their heads in disgust and disbelief.

  They drove home in sticky silence and no one ever made a request to go back. But he never forgot the seaside, how he had taken the girls, one at a time, into the soft gray waves filled with garbage and oily soap, and when he picked up Tahnee to carry her out he saw her lip had curled and she said with disgust, “You are so hairy!” If it was possible for a child to be born bad; anyway, he hadn’t liked her even when she was so little.

  It was absurd, she was only a child but he couldn’t help but feel there was something evil about her. Still, he would never forget the taste of the air and the flat slap of the waves lapping on the sour brown sand.

  God knows he had tried, but what had it led to? His wife hated him, she was trying all the time to throw him out. And Tahnee, older now, had appreciated nothing he had done, either. He suspected her of being a bad influence on Julie. It was thanks to Tahnee, no doubt, that Julie – who was smart – wasn’t interested in beauty school to become a hairdresser or a product marketing stylist, something like that. What will become of her?

  The years went by so quickly. No more little girls; sometimes he came back and the house had a funny smell and Tahnee and Julie sitting there with a shiny polyurethane expression in their eyes: “What have you two been doing?” he said. “What is that smell?”

  “We were painting, Daddy, painting and playing with Sue Ellen… dat’s de paint smell.”

  Now that he is no longer living at home it occurs to him the children had not been painting, they had been taking drugs of some sort. How stupid could he have been? Abruptly he can feel his own liver, a large spongiform entity, occupying more than its fair share of space on the lower right side. He has accomplished nothing he had planned and now the bubbling… whatever it is, a bubble of rage, coming up from his stomach, blocking his throat. He has to get away from this place, especially before Murielle gets back, even though he hasn’t helped Julie with homework nor any of the other things for which he had come, he has to get out of there.

  Especially before Murielle gets back. Though his past remains fuzzy he can see his future, his hands as alien and thick as that of a gorilla’s, joining the plump flies in a stubby circle around Murielle’s neck.

  15

  No time is wasted. Important and rich men cannot afford it. Besides, her dress is only half on! Or half off – it’s more than that, the whole thing is unraveling, more holes than fabric. Dumbest seduction ploy he has ever heard of but she is giggling coyly, “Oh, this is so embarrassing,” clutching the threads of shreds, “I’m coming unglued!”

  Jesse pushes Murielle backward, onto his king-sized bed, pulls up what is left of her skirt and down with the peplum then goes to work; it is some time before he lifts his head. “Sweet Intelligent Designer! Murielle, you are my dream come true, I don’t know how to say this without sounding insulting, but believe me I mean this only in the nicest possible way, it’s like… when I eat you out, it’s like a Swiss cheese and salami sandwich, you’re my pudding, my hairy meat pudding sandwich, oh don’t be offended I mean this in the best possible sense, Murielle, I haven’t had any problems with getting overexcited like this since I was a kid, I started to dribble as soon as I saw you.” As he says this, he pulls her breast free from the brassiere on the right side and bites it, hard enough that she thinks he might leave tooth marks.

  Gently, dreamily, she bats him on the head like an irritated lioness with a cub. His head flies back sharply. “Aw honey, honey, honey, be nice.” He returns to his activity, slurping beneath her dress and thinking, it better be worth it, having to do this! The woman has pubic hair nearly down to her knees, black and coiled, kind of sexy in an odd way, if a person wanted to get down in the primordial ooze and fuck the universe into existence.

  There are mirrors on the ceiling, which alarm her slightly, particularly as she finds it uncomfortable to have the one breast swinging free while the other is still caught in the fabric cage of heavy-duty nylon.

  It is a shame but A. explains that due to his Sausberger’s and heavy dosage of Verisimilac, he is impotent. Nevertheless, he hopes he has gratified her to some extent and he would like to spend more time with her. “Perhaps, Mommy,” he says, “You might want to come out to Nature’s Caul and do some skiing, or the beach.”

  The West Coast really has a beach, a very nice one, because at great cost to the taxpayer, sand has been placed on the broken edge of what was once inland California. And many miles out to sea, a great net of indestructible steel has been built to act as a garbage filter and hairnet.

  “Nature’s Caul?” Murielle sits upright; it is impossible. No one in the world she occupies has ever been to such a place, not inside anyway. It is for the rich, only the very rich, and in Nature’s Caul there is grass and sunshine and fresh air and little tiny multi-layered pastries in a myriad of colors, delicate as butterfly wings and petals. He even says he will send his private plane back for her; and she can bring the girls! “When do you think you’ll be able to get some free time?” he asks.

  “When? Why… I dunno, I can come with you tonight. I’ll just call the office and…”

  “And the girls?”

  “Oh… sure, they can miss school.”

  “No, no,” says A. Jesse firmly. “You know how much I believe in education; I could never allow that. I think it’s fairly obvious your younger child is happy at her school and her work. She’s also very sick. She needs your attention and I don’t want to disrupt anything, at least not right now. But I tell you what: I can take the older one, I’m a board member of the Nature’s Caul School, I’ll arrange for her to have a scholarship. And when the little one is better and finishes the semester you and she, or just you, can come out to join me later. What do you think?”

  She will join him later, she thinks, and lies back pulling the fluffy white comforter over her, a comforter that smells so sunny and fresh. Oh the happy contentedness of a sea cow, princess of the water, landed on some rocky beach and basking in near zero warmth, the thin trickle of Arctic sunlight, a warm yellow-gray paint tasting of mackerel and kelp, being oh-so-gently prodded into warm gelato.

  “You know, Murielle, you might really want to talk to my lawyer about a lawsuit. Just the other day we got an amazing settlement for a little girl who had a case similar to your younger daughter.”

  “What?” She is startled. With an alarmed groan she slides back and opens her eyes to find two pink freckled hands like starfish, one on each bosom, in a kind of kneading motion. Peeping up from between her legs, the swiveling eyes of… a crab? Some sort of light blinks from across the room. “Are you sure the hologramo-camcorder cam isn’t turned on?”

  “You sure are paranoid, Murielle. Just relax. I am enjoying my work. I don’t like to rush things.” The earnest crab eyes, as if on retractable stalks – only these were fringed with pink lashes – disappeared into… the sand. She lies back but more terrible images… legless things washed up on the beach… appeared in her head once again.

  “No, no, Jesse, stop… What were you saying? What kind?”

  “What kind of settlement?”

  “What kind of defect?”

  “The baby was born with a partial
brain. The baby got to be about ten years old when they found out. The remaining brain was rotting away… That’s called anencephaly. In this case there was a basic cortex. The child was able to sleep, defecate and eat; actually it was pretty much like an ordinary person! I think that may be something similar to Julie’s problems.” He is relieved to remember Tahnee’s sister’s name.

  “But what are you talking about? There’s nothing the matter with Julie.”

  “Oh.” He pauses. “I’m sorry. I saw her a couple of times, I just assumed.”

  “It’s true she hasn’t been herself, not since the plane crash.”

  “I’ll arrange for Julie to get into my hospital here, if she gets better you’ll bring her with you; if not, you’ll come by yourself. Meanwhile, Tahnee can get something resembling an education out West; you know, that is one bright girl, I hate to think of her being squished by the school system here. I have a daughter or two just about her age, they’ll be happy to help out, kind of a long-term Fresh-Air kid project.”

  “Tahnee is quite smart but… she’s no scholar, you know, she’s not much for the studying!”

  “Nor my girl. Maybe they’ll be a good influence on each other.”

  Of course, if Tahnee is gone for a while, she will have a room for Dad, and after all isn’t she finally entitled to some happiness of her own? Imagine that, Tahnee already out there in Nature’s Caul and she will join her! It’s a boarding school, she can see Tahnee on the weekends, and, my gosh, it is so good to get the human touch. A. Jesse strokes the back of her neck. It’s strange, but certainly there had never been much physical affection between herself and Tahnee, even when the girl was only an infant, she would not allow herself to be cuddled, she held herself stiffly. But then Julie, who had been cuddly, somehow just didn’t do it for her, she always felt there was something slightly sodden about Julie, or heavy, or just plain uncomfortable. In any event if you had a child and it was affectionate, it was only for a few years, by age eight no kid wanted to be kissed by a wet-lipped adult. Now the only affection she gets is when Breakfast wants to sit on her lap, but even that is highly unsatisfactory. The dog hits her with its paw, “Feed me. Feed me.” Or “It’s too crowded! I’m not comfortable.”