For the first time since she’d met him she felt herself brimming with an uncontrolled and dangerous happiness. It terrified her.
Choked her. Took her breath away. Crushed her. Clawed at her. Left her in pieces. Like a river in flood, like a tempest of breaths.
Her eyes filled with tears as she measured that happiness so much bigger than herself, than her heart or her soul. And as soon as the tears began to fall, erasing his kisses, and the imprint of his yearning hands, she felt a burning pain, like sandpaper rubbed on a scar.
Because this happiness was going to drive her mad.
In a second the pain was shrieking inside her, deafening, and silent at the same time; deep down, there where she could still its heat. All at once the pain was swept away by a wave of desperation. Her breath came more quickly, panting, almost choking her.
She leaped up, incapable of thinking, incapable of stopping herself, and got dressed as quickly as she could, tears still streaking her face. She snatched up her camera bag silently and, like a thief, hurried out of the bedroom where he had made her so happy. And so crazy.
She crept on tiptoe to the front door, holding her breath even though she wanted to scream. She heard Christmas’ voice coming from the kitchen.
She slipped out and hurried across the garden. She opened the gate and started running down Sunset Boulevard. Escaping, falling, scrambling to her feet, hiding every time she heard a car coming up behind her, scratching herself on every twig and thorn, digging her nails into the earth, skinning her knee. And as she fled away from unbearable felicity, she kept on weeping, sobbing.
When she no longer had enough breath to keep running, she crouched behind a bush and tried to catch her breath. Without knowing why she she’d run away, but knowing it all the same. She was afraid now. Only afraid. Of hearing that crack, that interior snap, that made her lose her balance. The crack of a finger being chopped, pruned like a dead branch. The crack that had sounded inside her when she’d stepped out the window of the house in Holmby Hills. The terrible sound of Bill’s fists, of her ripped panties. The sound of violation. It was too much like the sound of a string that had been stretched too tightly that it had to break, like a happiness that was too intense, a passion that was uncontrollable, a love that she couldn’t contain. That would shatter her.
For she wasn’t born for happiness, she told herself. Happiness was so close to violence. Because neither one of them had any limits. Because neither one of them had a fixed outline, a perimeter, a boundary; they were both wild. Like a ravaging beast.
She stood. Just then she saw an Oakland Sport Convertible speed past. And in the car, a glimpse of Christmas’ blond hair. She plunged back into the shrubbery.
He mustn’t find me, she thought. Because if he were to find her, she wouldn’t be able to resist the happiness he was able to give her. She would go mad, she would hear that crack. No, she wasn’t meant for happiness. Not since that evening when she’d sneaked out of the house with the gardener, only because he laughed, only because he made her laugh, too. Everything had started that night when she had sought a happiness greater than herself, that didn’t belong to her, that was never meant to be hers. Because her search for happiness had coincided with shame and violence. With the crack.
She could see all the way down Sunset Boulevard. The Oakland’s taillights were far away now. Christmas was certainly rushing back to Venice Boulevard. He’d wake up Clarence, and then he’d stay there, waiting for her. And at last he’d find her. Then, once again, Daniel came into her mind. IF she went to Daniel’s, she’d be safe, thought Ruth. Safe from great happiness. Safe from violence. Swaddled in that mild emotion that was all she could permit herself to feel.
She got up and started walking toward the rows of houses, all of them alike, inhabited by families that were all alike, smelling of flour and apple tart, and lavender sachets in the linens.
Fleeing the infection of happiness.
“Carne asada and guacamole. I don’t know what it is, but it smells good,” Christmas said, laughing, as he came back into the bedroom with a large plate in his hand. Not seeing Ruth in the bed, he spoke towards the bathroom door. “And the housekeeper’s name is Hermelinda. She’s Mexican.” Nobody answered. He sat down on the bed and dipped a finger into the salsa next to the meat, and licked it. “You’d better hurry, or I’m going to eat it all myself,” he said, raising his voice. He smiled happily then, and closed his eyes, searching in the air for the smell of Ruth’s skin. That aroma that had entered into him and that he would never have enough of.
But the meat was sending up its own strong fragrance. He got up quickly and went over to the chair where Ruth had left her lilac dress. He wanted to bury his face in it, smell it until she opened the door. So that he wouldn’t feel her absence for a second. But the dress wasn’t there. “Ruth,” he called towards the bathroom door, in a thin voice, alarmed. He looked around and saw that the camera bag was also gone. He ran down the hall. “Ruth!” he called, louder now.
“Señor?” said the housekeeper from the ground floor.
Christmas didn’t answer her. He came back into the bedroom and looked out the window. “Ruth!” he shouted into the evening darkness. “Ruth!” Then he saw the open gate. Hastily he pulled on his shirt and shoes, ran down to the car, and set off at high speed.
He drove a ways down Sunset, and then he stopped. He turned the car around and went back in the opposite direction, peering into the darkness. But there wasn’t a trace of Ruth. “Why? Why? Why?” he shouted, banging his fist on the steering wheel, driving towards Venice. She had to have gone back there. She had to be there, he told himself, driving much too fast.
But now, having stopped the car on the sidewalk, having run up the stairs, now that he was knocking furiously at the door of the photo agency, he was so longer sure of finding her. “Ruth! Open up, Ruth!” he shouted with all the breath he had.
“Hey, quit that, or I’m calling the police,” said a voice behind him.
Christmas whirled back, fierce. He saw a man’s frightened face peering out of the barely open door of the apartment across the hall. “Get fucked, you piece of shit!” he shouted at him.
The man slammed the door.
Christmas banged even harder on the door that said “Wonderful Photos,” battering it with his fists, as hard as he could. “I know you’re in there Ruth!” he cried, his voice breaking with fading hope.
“Don’t break down my door, young man,” said Clarence, coming down the stairs with an alarmed expression. He was wearing a bathrobe with red and blue stripes.
Christmas rushed at him. “Where’s Ruth?” he gasped, clutching Mr. Bailey’s pajama collar.
The door to the neighbor’s apartment opened again. “Should I call the police, Mr. Bailey?” asked the man.
“No, no, Mr. Sullivan,” said Clarence, his voice stifled by Christmas’ grip. “Everything’s fine.”
Clarence looked into Christmas’ eyes. “Let go of me, young man,” he said.
Christmas released him and sank back against the wall of the corridor. “She’s not here, right?” he said in a beaten voice.
“Close the door, Mr. Sullivan,” said Clarence to the man who was still peering out at them fearfully.
“I’m going to have to complain to the management,” the man began.
“Shut it!” Christmas roared. The man closed the door.
“Where’s Ruth?” Christmas asked. Hopelessly. Like an automaton.
“I thought she was with you,” said Clarence, suspiciously.
Christmas took his face in his hands and slid down the wall, squatting on the floor. “Why?” he asked softly.
“Did you hurt Ruth?” Clarence asked him, his voice suddenly hard.
Christmas raised his head and looked up at him stunned. “Of course not. I love Ruth …”
Clarence scrutinized him for a moment and then shook his head. “Young fellow, I need a good strong cup of coffee,” he said. “And I think it would
do you good, too.”
Christmas just stared at him without seeing him.
“Come on up to my place,” said Clarence, reaching down a hand to him.
“If she’s not here, where is she?” Christmas said dully.
Clarence sighed. “You really don’t care for a coffee, do you?” he said. Then he bent his old knees, with a grimace, and sat down on the floor next to Christmas. “What happened? Is Ruth all right?”
“I don’t even know …”
“Why don’t you tell me everything?”
“She’ll come back here, won’t she?”
“You’re beginning to make we worry, young man. I’ll ask you just one more time, and then I’m calling the police,” said Clarence firmly. “Is Ruth all right?”
“I don’t know … I … We were laughing, we were so happy, and then … then she just wasn’t there. She ran away.” Christmas looked at Clarence. “Why?” he asked him. “Help me.”
“Help me, Daniel,” Ruth whispered.
Daniel looked at her, frightened. Her hair was tangled, with leaves caught in it, her knees were scraped. She was dirty, sweaty. “What happened?” he asked her.
When she got to the Slater house, Ruth hadn’t knocked at the door. She didn’t want them to see her looking like this. She didn’t want any questions. She’d gone around to the rear of the house and thrown a stick at Daniel’s window. His light was still on, and the boy opened his window right away. Ruth put a finger to her lips and beckoned to him to come outside.
Now they were standing, facing each other, next to the white picket fence, hidden by a big tree.
“What happened?” he asked her again.
“Not now, Daniel,” said Ruth, looking worriedly toward the house. “Just help me.”
“What do I have to do?”
“Hide me.” Ruth looked at him. “And hold me tight.”
Daniel looked back at the house. Then he took Ruth in his arms. “Why do you have to hide?” he asked her softly.
“Not now, Daniel. Please, not now.”
“Come on, we’ll go inside,” said Daniel, taking her hand.
“I’ll sleep in the garage,” she said, pulling back.
“Don’t be silly. You’re going to sleep in my room.”
Ruth took a step backwards.
“I’ll sleep in Ronnie’s room,” he reassured her.
“What will we tell your family?”
“Why do you need to hide, Ruth?”
She looked down.
“We’ll just tell Mom and Dad that your lousy landlord changed the locks,” Daniel suggested.
“What, just like that?”
“Well, he’s a lousy landlord, isn’t he?”
Ruth smiled faintly.
“But tomorrow, you have to tell me what’s going on,” Daniel said seriously.
Ruth looked at him. She should embrace him. He was her savior. “Tomorrow,” she said quietly. She should kiss him. Someday, she thought, and she let him guide her into the house with its odors of flour, yeast, apples, and lavender.
They climbed the stairs quietly. Daniel stood guard at the bathroom door while Ruth washed the dirt off her hands and cleaned her scraped knees.
Then Daniel took her into his room, showed her where the light switch was, blushed as he handed her a pair of clean pajamas from a tidy drawer, and then pointed to Ronnie’s room.
“I’m in there,” he said. He stood there, looking at her. Then he leaned his face next to Ruth’s.
Ruth turned slightly away and offered him her cheek.
Daniel kissed it. “Good night,” he said with an embarrassed smile, and then he went out of the room, closing the connecting door.
Ruth put out the light, came to the door. She opened it a crack, noiselessly, and listened.
“Huh?” said Ronnie sleepily.
“Move over and keep quiet,” said Daniel.
“Lowlife bastard, you’ll pay for this,” muttered Ronnie.
“Go to sleep,” said Daniel.
Then Ruth saw the gleam of light from under the door go out, and the house was in darkness. She came over to the bed, undressed, and put on the pajamas. She slipped under the sheet. Moonlight barely came into the room, shaping shadows and rounding corners.
Ruth pressed her face into the pillow and breathed in Daniel’s clean odor. But her nostrils still held the acrid smells of love, of sex, of passion. The smell of Christmas’ skin. And when she closed her eyes she could see his face, tense and sweating. She could see his mouth, his moist lips. She could feel his hands, the heat of his body. And she could hear the echo of their gasping breaths, growing in unison, becoming a single breath, like the breath of a mythical animal that exhaled over their bodies, each fitted into the other, fastened, fused together. Imprisoned in each other. Wedded by desire. By the promise of ecstasy that still lurked between her legs, overwhelming and primal. That was still pulsing impetuously there where she had felt only pain and humiliation. That had choked the breath in her throat when the burning sensation of pleasure had reached its peak and had torn away all light from her eyes, all sounds from her ears. That had negated all control of her muscles, left her rigid in a spasm as if an electric shock had made her tremble and jerk helplessly, as if her very soul were made of pulsating flesh. That blazing timeless chaos, so much like dying. So close to absolute life.
Ruth’s opened her eyes wide. She switched the light on, troubled. She sat on the bed, holding back her tears.
She got up and curled up in a flowery chair by the window. She didn’t feel comfortable in Daniel’s bed, in those clean-smelling sheets. She felt as if she were dirtying them with her woman’s odors that no laundering was ever going to cleanse. That she herself would never try to wash away, she admitted, sniffing her skin, then caressing herself slowly, seeking in that counterfeit gesture something to compensate her for the beatitude she had decided to renounce forever, so that she wouldn’t go crazy again. Even if it made her crazy to remember it. Forever. Remembering what neither Daniel nor any other man would ever be able to give her. What she wouldn’t let Daniel or any other man give her.
She woke up suddenly at dawn. She didn’t know how long she had slept. The first rays of sun had burned off the foggy moonlight.
She got up from the chair. Her head was heavy, everything ached, her scraped knees felt tight. She looked once more at Daniel’s bed. She smoothed the pillow tenderly. Without passion. She imagined the Slaters waking up. She imagined their breakfast, all together, with pancakes and honey. The odor of coffee mingling with shaving cream. She thought how warm that awakening must be, and how her presence was going to trouble it. The lies, the embarrassment. She imagined having to tell Daniel that she’d been with a man, and that she’d felt like a woman. She imagined telling him about Christmas, of their promise, of their synchrony, their bench in Central Park, the red lacquer heart; Bill, the hospital, of how she’d left New York just when she’d decided she could kiss the sweet wild boy from the Lower East Side. And immediately she imagined Daniel’s sensitive face, the way he’d look. How his shoulders would sag, ready to accept that weight.
Then Ruth knew she’d have to lie to Daniel, too.
She got dressed. She took her black bag. She opened the door a little bit, and listened. The Slater house was still immersed in silence. They were sleeping, lulled by the clean smell of their family, dreaming about selling cars, of cutting through the ocean waves in a sailboat, warmed by the sun on the beach, with salt on their skins. They were dreaming the dreams of a family.
She went silently down the stairs. She opened the back door and went furtively outside.
She was running away again, she told herself. But she didn’t stop.
“Ruth will come back here. This is her home,” Clarence had told him.
Christmas had spent the night in the car, in front of the entrance to the office on Venice Boulevard. Awake. Because he couldn’t lose her. He didn’t want to risk not seeing her come in. He had to know why
she had run away.
But now the rising sun was burning his eyes. Christmas could feel how heavy his head was. He mustn’t sleep, he told himself. But his eyelids closed and his thoughts were more and more confused. He looked down the street and saw Ruth coming around the corner. She wore a lilac dress and had a black shoulder bag. Then he went to meet her. When was that? Only the day before, and yet it seemed like a memory faded by time. As if it happened a thousand years ago, a lifetime ago.
Christmas closed his eyes. Just for a minute, he thought.
He felt dizzy. He opened his eyes, suddenly, to find his balance again. He clutched the steering wheel. He blinked. And again he thought he could see her, with the sunlight behind her, coming around the corner in her lilac dress and short black hair. She was beautiful. Then Ruth stopped and recognized him. He closed his eyes. He thought he could hear her light steps on the sidewalk. She smiled as he sank dizzily into sleep. Now Ruth was running. But she wasn’t running toward him. She was running in the opposite direction. Fleeing.
“Ruth,” he called softly, suspended between wakefulness and the sleep that was overwhelming him, trapping him in the nightmare.
He took a deep breath, as if he had just emerged from a long dive in deep water. He forced his eyes to stay open. He rubbed them. He looked down to the end of the street again. It was deserted. He opened the car door and got out. He looked around. The aroma of coffee floated out of the cafeteria across the street. With heavy steps, he crossed over and went inside. There, at the end of the room, he saw Ruth sitting at a table. And next to her a man with blond hair. The boy turned and smiled at him. It was himself. A Christmas who longer existed. The Christmas of the day before. Of a whole life before. He felt his legs grow weak.
“Are you all right?” said the waitress behind the counter.
Christmas turned and tried to focus on her. Then he looked toward the corner table. A toothless old woman was stuffing a piece of blueberry pie into her mouth. The filling ran down her chin.
The Boy Who Granted Dreams Page 57
