Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel

by Jonathan Safran Foer

  "What else did he say?" "What else did he say..." "Anything." "He had a great laugh. I remember that. It was good of him to laugh, and to make me laugh. He was laughing for my sake."

  "What else?" "He had a very discerning eye." "What's that?" "He knew what he liked. He knew when he'd found it." "That's true. He had an incredibly discerning eye." "I remember watching him hold the vase. He examined the bottom of it and turned it around a number of times. He seemed like a very thoughtful person." "He was extremely thoughtful."

  I wished he could remember even more details, like if Dad had unbuttoned his shirt's top button, or if he smelled like shaving, or if he whistled "I Am the Walrus." Was he holding a New York Times under his arm? Were his lips chapped? Was there a red pen in his pocket?

  "When the apartment was empty that night, I sat on the floor and read the letter from my father. I read about the vase. I felt like I'd failed him." "But couldn't you go to the bank and tell them you'd lost the key?" "I tried that. But they said they didn't have a box under his name. I tried my name. No box. Not under my mother's name or my grandparents' names. It didn't make any sense." "There was nothing the bank people could do?" "They were sympathetic, but without the key, I was stuck." "And that's why you needed to find my dad."

  "I hoped he would realize that there was a key in the vase and find me. But how could he? We sold my father's apartment, so even if he went back, it would be a dead end. And I was sure he'd just throw the key away if he found it, assuming it was junk. That's what I would have done. And there was no way I could find him. Absolutely no way. I knew nothing about him, not even his name. For a few weeks I'd go over to the neighborhood on my way home from work, even though it wasn't on my way. It was an hour out of my way. I'd walk around looking for him. I put up a few signs when I realized what had happened: 'To the man who bought the vase at the estate sale on Seventy-fifth Street this weekend, please contact...' But this was the week after September 11. There were posters everywhere."

  "My mom put up posters of him." "What do you mean?" "He died in September 11. That's how he died." "Oh, God. I didn't realize. I'm so sorry." "It's OK." "I don't know what to say." "You don't have to say anything." "I didn't see the posters. If I had ... Well, I don't know what if I had." "You would have been able to find us." "I guess that's right." "I wonder if your posters and my mom's posters were ever close to each other."

  He said, "Wherever I was, I was trying to find him: uptown, downtown, on the train. I looked in everyone's eyes, but none were his. Once I saw someone I thought might be your father across Broadway in Times Square, but I lost him in the crowd. I saw someone I thought might be him getting into a cab at Twenty-third Street. I would have called after him, but I didn't know his name." "Thomas." "Thomas. I wish I'd known it then."

  He said, "I followed one man around Central Park for more than half an hour. I thought he was your father. I couldn't figure out why he was walking in such a strange, crisscrossing way. He wasn't getting anywhere. I couldn't figure it out." "Why didn't you stop him?" "Eventually I did." "And what happened?" "I was wrong. It was someone else." "Did you ask him why he was walking like that?" "He'd lost something and was searching the ground for it."

  "Well, you don't have to look anymore," I told him. He said, "I've spent so long looking for this key. It's hard to look at it." "Don't you want to see what he left for you?" "I don't think it's a question of wanting." I asked him, "What's it a question of?"

  He said, "I'm so sorry. I know that you're looking for something, too. And I know this isn't what you're looking for." "It's OK." "For what it's worth, your father seemed like a good man. I only spoke with him for a few minutes, but that was long enough to see that he was good. You were lucky to have a father like that. I'd trade this key for that father." "You shouldn't have to choose." "No, you shouldn't."

  We sat there, not saying anything. I examined the pictures on his desk again. All of them were of Abby.

  He said, "Why don't you come with me to the bank?" "You're nice, but no thank you." "Are you sure?" It's not that I wasn't curious. I was incredibly curious. It's that I was afraid of getting confused.

  He said, "What is it?" "Nothing." "Are you all right?" I wanted to keep the tears in, but I couldn't. He said, "I'm so, so sorry."

  "Can I tell you something that I've never told anyone else?"

  "Of course."

  "On that day, they let us out of school basically as soon as we got there. They didn't really tell us why, just that something bad had happened. We didn't get it, I guess. Or we didn't get that something bad could happen to us. A lot of parents came to pick up their kids, but since school is only five blocks from my apartment, I walked home. My friend told me he was going to call, so I went to the answering machine and the light was beeping. There were five messages. They were all from him." "Your friend?" "My dad."

  He covered his mouth with his hand.

  "He just kept saying that he was OK, and that everything would be fine, and that we shouldn't worry."

  A tear went down his cheek and rested on his finger.

  "But this is the thing that I've never told anyone. After I listened to the messages, the phone rang. It was 10:22. I looked at the caller ID and saw that it was his cell phone." "Oh, God." "Could you please put your hand on me so I can finish the rest?" "Of course," he said, and he scooted his chair around his desk and next to me.

  "I couldn't pick up the phone. I just couldn't do it. It rang and rang, and I couldn't move. I wanted to pick it up, but I couldn't.

  "The answering machine went on, and I heard my own voice."

  Hi, you've reached the Schell residence. Here is today's fact of the day: It's so cold in Yukatia, which is in Siberia, that breath instantly freezes with a crackling noise that they call the whispering of the stars. On extremely cold days, the towns are covered in a fog caused by the breath of humans and animals. Please leave a message.

  "There was a beep.

  "Then I heard Dad's voice."

  Are you there? Are you there? Are you there?

  "He needed me, and I couldn't pick up. I just couldn't pick up. I just couldn't. Are you there? He asked eleven times. I know, because I've counted. It's one more than I can count on my fingers. Why did he keep asking? Was he waiting for someone to come home? And why didn't he say 'anyone'? Is anyone there? 'You' is just one person. Sometimes I think he knew I was there. Maybe he kept saying it to give me time to get brave enough to pick up. Also, there was so much space between the times he asked. There are fifteen seconds between the third and the fourth, which is the longest space. You can hear people in the background screaming and crying. And you can hear glass breaking, which is part of what makes me wonder if people were jumping.

  Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you

  "And then it cut off.

  "I've timed the message, and it's one minute and twenty-seven seconds. Which means it ended at 10:24. Which was when the building came down. So maybe that's how he died."

  "I'm so sorry," he said.

  "I've never told that to anyone."

  He squeezed me, almost like a hug, and I could feel him shaking his head.

  I asked him, "Do you forgive me?"

  "Do I forgive you?"

  "Yeah."

  "For not being able to pick up?"

  "For not being able to tell anyone."

  He said, "I do."

  I took the string off my neck and put it around his neck.

  "What about this other key?" he asked.

  I told him, "That's to our apartment."

  The renter was standing under the streetlamp when I got home. We met there every night to talk about the details of our plan, like what time we should leave, and what we would do if it was raining, or if a guard asked us what we were doing. We ran out of realistic details in just a few meetings, but for some reason we still weren't ready to go. So we made up unre
alistic details to plan, like alternate driving routes in case the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge collapsed, and ways to get over the cemetery fence in case it was electrified, and how to outsmart the police if we were arrested. We had all sorts of maps and secret codes and tools. We probably would have gone on making plans forever if I hadn't met William Black that night, and learned what I'd learned.

  The renter wrote, "You're late." I shrugged my shoulders, just like Dad used to. He wrote, "I got us a rope ladder, just in case." I nodded. "Where were you? I was worried." I told him, "I found the lock."

  "You found it?" I nodded. "And?"

  I didn't know what to say. I found it and now I can stop looking? I found it and it had nothing to do with Dad? I found it and now I'll wear heavy boots for the rest of my life?

  "I wish I hadn't found it." "It wasn't what you were looking for?"

  "That's not it." "Then what?" "I found it and now I can't look for it." I could tell he didn't understand me. "Looking for it let me stay close to him for a little while longer." "But won't you always be close to him?" I knew the truth. "No."

  He nodded like he was thinking of something, or thinking about a lot of things, or thinking about everything, if that's even possible. He wrote, "Maybe it's time to do the thing we've been planning."

  I opened my left hand, because I knew if I tried to say something I would just start crying again.

  We agreed to go on Thursday night, which was the second anniversary of Dad's death, which seemed appropriate.

  Before I walked into the building, he handed me a letter. "What is this?" He wrote, "Stan went to get coffee. He told me to give this to you in case he didn't get back in time." "What is it?" He shrugged his shoulders and went across the street.

  Dear Oskar Schell,

  I've read every letter that you've sent me these past two years. In return, I've sent you many form letters, with the hope of one day being able to give you the proper response you deserve. But the more letters you wrote to me, and the more of yourself you gave, the more daunting my task became.

  I'm sitting beneath a pear tree as I dictate this to you, overlooking the orchards of a friend's estate. I've spent the past few days here, recovering from some medical treatment that has left me physically and emotionally depleted. As I moped about this morning, feeling sorry for myself, it occurred to me, like a simple solution to an impossible problem: today is the day I've been waiting for.

  You asked me in your first letter if you could be my protégé. I don't know about that, but I would be happy to have you join me in Cambridge for a few days. I could introduce you to my colleagues, treat you to the best curry outside India, and show you just how boring the life of an astrophysicist can be.

  You can have a bright future in the sciences, Oskar. I would be happy to do anything possible to facilitate such a path. It's wonderful to think what would happen if you put your imagination toward scientific ends.

  But Oskar, intelligent people write to me all the time. In your fifth letter you asked, "What if I never stop inventing?" That question has stuck with me.

  I wish I were a poet. I've never confessed that to anyone, and I'm confessing it to you, because you've given me reason to feel that I can trust you. I've spent my life observing the universe, mostly in my mind's eye. It's been a tremendously rewarding life, a wonderful life. I've been able to explore the origins of time and space with some of the great living thinkers. But I wish I were a poet.

  Albert Einstein, a hero of mine, once wrote, "Our situation is the following. We are standing in front of a closed box which we cannot open."

  I'm sure I don't have to tell you that the vast majority of the universe is composed of dark matter. The fragile balance depends on things we'll never be able to see, hear, smell, taste, or touch. Life itself depends on them. What's real? What isn't real? Maybe those aren't the right questions to be asking. What does life depend on?

  I wish I had made things for life to depend on.

  What if you never stop inventing?

  Maybe you're not inventing at all.

  I'm being called in for breakfast, so I'll have to end this letter here. There's more I want to tell you, and more I want to hear from you. It's a shame we live on different continents. One shame of many.

  It's so beautiful at this hour. The sun is low, the shadows are long, the air is cold and clean. You won't be awake for another five hours, but I can't help feeling that we're sharing this clear and beautiful morning.

  Your friend,

  Stephen Hawking

  MY FEELINGS

  A knocking woke me up in the middle of the night.

  I had been dreaming about where I came from.

  I put on my robe and went to the door.

  Who could it be? Why didn't the doorman ring up? A neighbor?

  But why?

  More knocking. I looked through the peephole. It was your grandfather.

  Come in. Where were you? Are you OK?

  The bottoms of his pants were covered in dirt.

  Are you OK?

  He nodded.

  Come in. Let me clean you off. What happened?

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  Did someone hurt you?

  He showed me his right hand.

  Are you hurt?

  We went to the kitchen table and sat down. Next to each other. The windows were black. He put his hands on his knees.

  I slid closer to him until our sides touched. I put my head on his shoulder. I wanted as much of us to touch as possible.

  I told him, You have to tell me what happened for me to be able to help.

  He took a pen from his shirt pocket but there was nothing to write on.

  I gave him my open hand.

  He wrote, I want to get you some magazines.

  In my dream, all of the collapsed ceilings re-formed above us. The fire went back into the bombs, which rose up and into the bellies of planes whose propellers turned backward, like the second hands of the clocks across Dresden, only faster.

  I wanted to slap him with his words.

  I wanted to shout, It isn't fair, and bang my fists against the table like a child.

  Anything special? he asked on my arm.

  Everything special, I said.

  Art magazines?

  Yes.

  Nature magazines?

  Yes.

  Politics?

  Yes.

  Celebrities?

  Yes.

  I told him to bring a suitcase so he could come back with one of everything.

  I wanted him to be able to take his things with him.

  In my dream, spring came after summer, came after fall, came after winter, came after spring.

  I made him breakfast. I tried to make it delicious. I wanted him to have good memories, so that maybe he would come back again one day.

  Or at least miss me.

  I wiped the rim of the plate before I gave it to him. I spread his napkin on his lap. He didn't say anything.

  When the time came, I went downstairs with him.

  There was nothing to write on, so he wrote on me.

  I might not be back until late.

  I told him I understood.

  He wrote, I'm going to get you magazines.

  I told him, I don't want any magazines.

  Maybe not now, but you'll be grateful to have them.

  My eyes are crummy.

  Your eyes are perfect.

  Promise me that you'll take care.

  He wrote, I'm only going to get magazines.

  Don't cry, I said, by putting my fingers on my face and pushing imaginary tears up my cheeks and back into my eyes.

  I was angry because they were my tears.

  I told him, You're only getting magazines.

  He showed me his left hand.

  I tried to notice everything, because I wanted to be able to remember it perfectly. I've forgotten everything important in my life.

  I can't remember what the front door of the house I g
rew up in looked like. Or who stopped kissing first, me or my sister. Or the view from any window but my own. Some nights I lay awake for hours trying to remember my mother's face.

  He turned around and walked away from me.

  I went back up to the apartment and sat on the sofa waiting. Waiting for what?

  I can't remember the last thing my father said to me.

  He was trapped under the ceiling. The plaster that covered him was turning red.

  He said, I can't feel everything.

  I didn't know if he'd meant to say he couldn't feel anything.

  He asked, Where is Mommy?

  I didn't know if he was talking about my mother or his.

  I tried to pull the ceiling off him.

  He said, Can you find my glasses for me?

  I told him I would look for them. But everything had been buried.

  I had never seen my father cry before.

  He said, With my glasses I could be helpful.

  I told him, Let me try to free you.

  He said, Find my glasses.

  They were shouting for everyone to get out. The rest of the ceiling was about to collapse.

  I wanted to stay with him.

  But I knew he would want me to leave him.

  I told him, Daddy, I have to leave you.

  Then he said something.

  It was the last thing he ever said to me.

  I can't remember it.

  In my dream, the tears went up his cheeks and back into his eyes.

  I got up off the sofa and filled a suitcase with the typewriter and as much paper as would fit.

  I wrote a note and taped it to the window. I didn't know whom it was for.

  I went from room to room turning off the lights. I made sure none of the faucets were dripping. I turned off the heat and unplugged the appliances. I closed all the windows.

  As the cab drove me away, I saw the note. But I couldn't read it because my eyes are crummy.

  In my dream, painters separated green into yellow and blue.

  Brown into the rainbow.

  Children pulled color from coloring books with crayons, and mothers who had lost children mended their black clothing with scissors.