And this is how his memory abides. On the scent of wild lavender like the kind in his yard, in the mouths of a new generation that once again feels compelled to march in the streets of Harlem, Ferguson, and Baltimore. What Baldwin knew is that he left no false heirs, he left spares, and that is why we carry him with us. So now when people ask me about James Baldwin, I tell them another truth: He is my brother, he ain’t heavy.
ELIESE COLETTE GOLDBACH
White Horse
FROM Alaska Quarterly Review
Eliese daydreams of rape.1 She imagines it happening to her in dark alleys, or during parties at swanky nightclubs, or on the asphalt after it’s just rained. She dreams of rape during the eighteenth century, under a petticoat. In ancient Rome, under a toga. She dreams of rape perpetrated by kings and princes and vagabonds. By Italians and Russians and Bolivians.2
In every daydream—after Eliese has imagined herself bloody, abused, nearly dead—a man will step into her plotline to save her life.
The proverbial man on a white horse.3 That is always the point.
When Eliese was a little girl, the family handyman used to call her Leesy Piecey. Helloooo, Leesy Piecey, he’d say as his eyes walked slowly up the length of her body. Eliese always blushed, but she didn’t know why. She loved it when the handyman came.4 He kept a box of Reese’s Pieces in his pocket. Always a box, never a bag. The candies rattled as he walked. He’d give Eliese a handful of candy if she watched him work. Eliese liked to watch.5 She loved Reese’s Pieces.
There is a paradox of logic that goes like this: The white horse is not a horse.
Eliese heard about this paradox, but she didn’t understand it. She wrote to a logician and asked him to explain the matter.
“Suppose a white horse is a horse,” the logician replied in a letter. “Then everything true of a white horse is true of a horse. Suppose a brown horse is a horse. Then everything true of a brown horse is true of a horse. So, everything true of a white horse is true of a brown horse. That is, a white horse is a brown horse. But obviously a white horse is not a brown horse. So a white horse is not a horse, and a brown horse is not a horse.”6
Eliese daydreams of rape. She dreams of violent rape—knives and AK-47s stuck inside her. Surprise rape—blindfolded and from behind. Stockholm rape—wanting more halfway through. She dreams of torturous rape and rape under palm trees and gang rape. She has always dreamed these dreams, even as a child. She dreamt of rape long before she had a word for such a thing.
Once, when Eliese was still a girl, she followed the handyman into a garage and watched him change the oil on a rusted Chevette. He promised to give her a handful of Reese’s Pieces if she kept him company.
Eliese held a white plastic horse in her hand. The horse wasn’t interested in oil changes. It was interested in galloping, so it galloped over wrenches and drill bits. It galloped across the concrete garage floor. It galloped up walls and around windows. It galloped right out of the garage. As Eliese clanked the horse’s hooves on the sunlit driveway, the handyman stood in front of her. His hands were black with oil.
That’s a nice horse, the handyman said. What’s his name?
It’s not a he, Eliese said. It’s a she.
She’s a very beautiful horse, the handyman said. He wasn’t looking at the horse. Listen, why don’t you come back into the garage and keep me company? When I’m done, we can eat some candy.
The candy piqued Eliese’s interest. She restrained the white horse’s gallop. She followed the handyman into the garage.
Eliese dreamt of rape long before she had a word for such a thing.7
Nearly ten years after her eighteenth birthday, Eliese walked down a busy street in San Francisco. An old woman grabbed her by the arm and drew her close.
Your chakras are out of balance, the woman said. Your chakras are dangerously out of balance. For twenty dollars, I can help you.
Eliese did not want unbalanced chakras, so she handed the woman a twenty-dollar bill. Together, the two women searched for a quiet place where they could examine the state of Eliese’s spiritual health. The street was crowded with tourists. The benches and bus stops were full. The two women could find only one area of relative peace: the display window at The Gap. Eliese and the old woman nestled between mannequins. The mannequins wore knitted, earth-toned cardigans. They stretched their arms toward one another, as if speaking, but they had no mouths, no faces.
When you were young, the woman said, your life was bright, hopeful. You were on the right path, cosmically speaking. But then something happened. Something happened when you were seventeen or eighteen years old.
The woman paused, as if consulting the universe.
Yes, the woman said, something bad happened. This thing threw you off. It unhinged you.
Eliese thought of the two men. She thought of their smells, their red cup. She thought of her half-naked body beneath the tree. She remembered her white underwear. The day after being raped, Eliese had searched frantically through her drawers. She gathered every single pair of white underwear in her possession. She threw them all into the trash. Even now, she will not wear white underwear.
What happened when you were seventeen or eighteen years old? the woman said.
Eliese started to cry. She looked away, into The Gap.
Nothing happened when I was eighteen, she said. Nothing.
The woman offered to align Eliese’s chakras for a fee of sixty dollars, but Eliese declined. She knew she was being swindled. Eliese thanked the old woman and left. On her way home, Eliese sat down at a bus stop and pondered her faulty chakras. It would take more than sixty dollars to fix the damage done. While Eliese thought and waited, a man at the bus stop pulled a syringe from his pocket. In the middle of the afternoon, beside several anxious BART riders, this man attempted to shoot heroin into his hand. Everyone at the bus stop looked away. They checked their phones. They stared at the pavement. But Eliese’s attention shifted to the man. She ignored her chakras for a moment and watched him struggle with the syringe. She could not help watching.
A sheer, silk blouse sagged off the man’s shoulders and revealed the thin straps of a black bra. He tied a tourniquet. He slipped the needle under his skin, wiggling it back and forth, searching for blood. It took him forever to find a vein. With every failed attempt, the man bit his lip and looked close to tears, itching madly for his junk, his skag, his white horse.8 Eliese watched the man. Her interest was driven by more than morbid curiosity. To her, watching this man in his desperation was a strange type of reverence—it drew her closer to the nasty, frantic pieces of herself. Those parts of her that bring shame. Eliese hoped that a difficult and excruciating beauty was couched in these pieces. So she watched. When the man finally emptied the syringe, he suffered an unsteady, incoherent relief. He stumbled into the street and removed his silk shirt. He stood, dazed. Eliese watched his shallow breath. She stared at his bra, his belly, his skin-tight, stonewashed capris. She thought again of the old woman’s words: Your chakras are dangerously out of balance.
Back when Eliese was a very little girl, she wrote her first book. She thought it would be the most important book she’d ever write. In this book, a woman loses herself in a snowstorm. The woman falters. She faints. A man rides over on a white horse. He takes the woman in his arms. He carries her to his home. He builds a fire. He undresses the woman and warms her. He tenderly burns her clothing. The woman wakes naked and disoriented. She tries to leave, but the man holds her down. You have no clothes. You can’t go anywhere. At the end of the story, the woman simply agrees to stay. Eliese showed the book to her mother. It’s cute, her mother said. Eliese didn’t know what she wanted her mother to say, but cute certainly wasn’t it.
In front of the bus stop, the man in the black bra dropped his silk shirt. A car sped past, and the man stumbled backward. When Eliese was a very little girl, she wanted so badly to be saved. The very thought made her woozy, light-headed. The man in the black bra lowered himself onto the c
urb. His eyelids were heavy with heroin. In a few hours, he would crave more.
Eliese wants to tell you a story. She wants to tell you a story, but there are so many things about which she cannot speak. Particle physics, for example. Also, industrial psychology, protein synthesis, polymer science, and the peculiar magic that makes water bugs skate so perfectly on a pond. She wants to tell you a story, but she lacks so many things. Multivariable calculus. Pie making. And there is so much she has forgotten. The conjugation of the verb vouloir, the purpose of a Golgi body, the middle name of her first boyfriend. Eliese does, however, know about horses. She can talk about horses. She knows equitation and conformation and equine disease. For example, Eliese knows that white horses must be bred with care. Sometimes, a white horse is born with a fatal genetic disorder known as lethal white syndrome. A foal with this disorder will appear healthy at birth. It will stand and suckle and sniff its mother’s scent. A new, white life. But deep inside the foal’s gut, something has gone wrong. Its colon has not formed properly. It cannot expel waste. These foals always die—either naturally and painfully over the course of a few days, or through euthanasia. A white, perfect body splayed dead on the straw. The violence of a harbored, hidden waste.
Do you remember that handyman? Eliese’s mother asked at dinner one evening.
Eliese was well into adulthood. Her older sister was in town, and the family had gathered for a meal. It had been a long time since she thought of the handyman.
Yes, Eliese said, I remember him. He used to call me Leesy Piecey.
I guess he got caught molesting some kids or something. In a bathtub, I think.
Doesn’t surprise me.
At least you and your sister weren’t alone with him much.
I was alone with him a lot, Eliese said loudly. Her own voice surprised her.
Everyone fell silent. They looked at their plates. It was difficult to tell whether Eliese’s assertion, which was stated with such force, was an accusation or a confession. Perhaps it was neither of these things. The conversation quickly turned to other topics—the weather, the consistency of the mashed potatoes. Eliese grew quiet and swallowed what was left of her dinner.
During her final year of college, Eliese attended a Halloween-themed drag show with her boyfriend. She wore a wine-colored Renaissance dress with a plunging neckline.
A strange man with red hair walked up to Eliese.
You look very attractive in that dress, the man said.
Thank you, Eliese said, ever polite, ever demure.
Do you like men who are well hung? the man said.
Eliese did not know how to respond. To say yes would be flirtatious. To say no would be a lie.9
Well, she said, what girl doesn’t?
I’m really well hung. And I’m a huge comer.
Good for you.
I really like to masturbate while I watch couples have sex.
Eliese rolled her eyes and turned around without responding, figuring the man would comprehend her lack of interest. She stood behind her boyfriend’s shoulder and watched the drag show. On the stage, drag queens paraded around in plumes of pink and purple. Drag kings wore wife beaters and baggy jeans.
The strange man with red hair sidled up behind Eliese. She felt his hot, wet breath on her neck. Her body tightened at his proximity. The music swelled. The crowd sang along to “Thriller.” The man unzipped his pants and began masturbating. He stood so close to Eliese that every beat of his hand made contact with her body. Eliese stood, paralyzed. Her muscles went rigid. Her diaphragm would not take in air. The man’s breath quickened. He was enjoying himself. Eliese could not breathe. She pulled at her boyfriend’s hand. She tried to call his name, but she didn’t have enough breath to form the words. She tried to pull more firmly, but her boyfriend would not turn around. He thought her tug was only a loving gesture. He would not turn around. He would not save her. The strange man drew his body closer.10 Eliese wanted to speak, to yell, to curse, to cry out. But she stood still. Why was it so difficult to speak? Why had no one taught her the words? Why was she relying on the man in front of her to protect her from the man behind?
Eliese gathered herself. She turned and faced the man. For a moment, she stuttered. The man stood still. He looked Eliese in the eye. Finally, with great difficulty, she spoke.
Can you please stop that? she said, ever polite, ever demure.
At least she said something.
Eliese has a memory. She is in her grandfather’s house, but her grandfather is not there. Sunlight slants across the kitchen tiles. She wears a dress. It must be spring. The family handyman walks past her, and a box of Reese’s Pieces rattles in his pocket. His fingernails are black with dirt. He leads Eliese to the top of the basement stairs and begins walking down. Eliese does not follow. The handyman turns to her. Come on, he says. Eliese stands at the top of the stairs, fidgeting with her dress. The handyman smiles. He promises candy if only she’ll follow along.
The memory fades. It goes black. Eliese does not know what happens next. She does not know what lies at the bottom of the stairs. She does, however, know that the memory induces panic. Her chest tightens at the thought of those stairs, but she doesn’t know why.
When Eliese was twenty-seven, she encountered the handyman at a family funeral. He had grown bloated and sallow with age. When his eyes fell on Eliese, she immediately looked at the ground. Her palms grew sweaty. She felt a strange and sudden shame. While everyone waited outside for the funeral to begin, Eliese’s young niece danced in the sunlight. Instinctively, Eliese stood between her niece and the handyman, shielding the young girl’s body with her own. Normally, Eliese encouraged jumping on couches and standing atop tables, but she felt an urgent, primal need to protect the young girl, who was already very beautiful. As Eliese stood with legs firmly planted, she wondered whether the handyman had, indeed, abused her when she was young. He’d done it to other children. Repression of traumatic childhood memories is well documented. And so many of Eliese’s childhood quirks suggested abuse. Her toy horses often raped one another. She wrote stories of sexual assault. She wet the bed well into puberty. She wet the bed so often, in fact, that her mother made her sleep on green, plastic sheets. By the age of eleven, Eliese had developed an eating disorder. By the age of sixteen, she had attempted suicide three times. Nothing else in her childhood predisposed her to such dysfunction. Eliese was not the product of divorce. Her family was not especially rich, but nor were they poor. They lived in the same midwestern suburb all her life. Her parents were loving, devoted. They took her to church, sent her to private schools, invested in extracurricular activities. Her childhood troubles do not make sense. They seem, as it were, illogical.
One statistic about childhood abuse strikes Eliese with particular interest: victims of childhood sexual assault are two to eleven times more likely to experience revictimization in adulthood.11The sexual violence Eliese experienced at the age of eighteen always felt painfully ambiguous. The two men, who were both freshmen at the Catholic university Eliese attended, had invited her into the woods for a few drinks. She had agreed. No one had forced her into the woods. No one had forced her to drink the red cup. She couldn’t remember if she said no. When Eliese told college administrators about the incident, they held a small trial judged by Eliese’s peers—mostly undergraduate students with religious, conservative backgrounds. During the trial, one of the men said he hadn’t even been in the woods with Eliese. Eliese is mistaking me for someone else, he said. She’s not remembering clearly. The man then attacked Eliese’s character. Sometimes she smokes pot behind the grocery store. Eliese could have likewise questioned the man’s integrity—You fucked your stripper girlfriend in front of the university field house—but she didn’t want to stray from the matter at hand. She didn’t want to play dirty. She still believed in that old adage, The truth will set you free. So Eliese championed what was left of her memory. She told the judges of the tree, the white underwear, the red cup. She told them t
hat the man had certainly been there. I know it was you, she said. You were wearing an army fatigue jacket. I know it was you. I remember. This, of course, created a troublesome paradox: Eliese could remember the army fatigue jacket, but she could not remember whether she had said no. After very little deliberation, the university tribunal reached a verdict. They decided that the man with the army fatigue jacket had been present in the woods. And they decided that any sexual acts had been consensual.
The verdict devastated Eliese. She stopped sleeping. She stopped eating. She’d told the tribunal everything—she’d told the truth as she remembered it—and now she was saddled with this word “consensual.” Of course, Eliese had only told the judges about the night in the woods. There were other things she could have said. For instance, she could have told the judges that she’d only ever had one boyfriend, and she’d never done anything more than kiss him. She could have told the judges that her knowledge of male anatomy came from textbooks and intuition. She could have told the judges about the morning after the incident in the woods. On that morning, she showered under scalding water and picked gravel from her palms and knees. She cried until her eyes swelled shut. She washed for hours, but the smell of the men’s bodies wouldn’t go away. No matter how much she washed, she couldn’t get clean. Those phantom smells made her vomit for weeks. Eliese did not say these things to the judges. She didn’t want to win her case on pity. She wanted to be judged on the facts. And she was. She was judged to be the type of woman who sneaks off into the woods and fucks men she barely knows. So she stopped giving people all the facts. Even now, she only tells snippets—the tree, the white underwear, the red cup. She fashions her story in a way that does not allow for ambiguity. Sometimes she simply says, I was raped. She lets the listener’s imagination decide the rest—they likely imagine knives and back alleys, black eyes and cop cars, a particular type of violence. Eliese lets them imagine. She watches their faces twist with sympathy or surprise. Eliese lets the listeners imagine, but she never lies. She never tells an untruth, but there is deceit in what she does not say. There were no knives or back alleys. No black eyes or cop cars. What happened to Eliese was not so clear. She even flirted with the man who wore the army fatigue jacket. Before drinking the red cup, she’d touched the man’s arm and smiled. But Eliese does not disclose this information when she says, I was raped. If she touched the man’s arm, then maybe she asked for it. It is easier to let people imagine the worst. It is easier to let their minds wander toward sympathy. Do not think, however, that Eliese feels no shame at these intentional omissions. Every time she says, I was raped—every time she lets someone imagine what that means—Eliese feels the weight of the judges’ verdict inside her gut. No, sweetie, you were not raped. Remember? You are the woman who sneaks off into the woods and fucks strange men.
The Best American Essays 2017 Page 7
