Donald Barthelme

by Donald Barthelme

  “Why should I want unhappy love affairs?”

  “Maybe you want to have love affairs but feel guilty about wanting to have love affairs, and so they become unhappy love affairs.”

  “That’s subtle,” Pia said. “You’re insecure.”

  “Ho!” Edward said.

  “But why then am I happy when I wake up?”

  “Because you don’t have to feel guilty anymore,” Edward said glibly.

  “Ho!” Pia said.

  Edward resisted The Interpretation of Dreams. He read eight novels by Anthony Powell. Pia walked down the street in Edward’s blue sweater. She looked at herself in a shop window. Her hair was rotten. Pia went into the bathroom and played with her hair for one hour. Then she brushed her teeth for a bit. Her hair was still rotten. Pia sat down and began to cry. She cried for a quarter hour, without making any noise. Everything was rotten.

  Edward bought Madam Cherokee’s Dream Book. Dreams in alphabetical order. If you dream of black cloth, there will be a death in the family. If you dream of scissors, a birth. Edward and Pia saw three films by Jean-Luc Godard. The landlord came and asked Edward to pay Danish income tax. “But I don’t make any money in Denmark,” Edward said. Everything was rotten.

  Pia came home from the hairdresser with black varnish around her eyes.

  “How do you like it?”

  “I hate it.”

  Pia was chopping up an enormous cabbage, a cabbage big as a basketball. The cabbage was of an extraordinary size. It was a big cabbage.

  “That’s a big cabbage,” Edward said.

  “Big,” Pia said.

  They regarded the enormous cabbage God had placed in the world for supper.

  “Is there vinegar?” Edward asked. “I like . . . vinegar . . . with my . . .” Edward read a magazine for men full of colored photographs of naked girls living normal lives. Edward read the New Statesman, with its letters to the editor. Pia appeared in her new blue, red, and green dress. She looked wonderful.

  “You look wonderful.”

  “Tak.”

  “Tables are women,” Edward said. “You remember you said I was jumping on tables, in your dream. Freud says that tables are figures for women. You’re insecure.”

  “La vache!” Pia said.

  Pia reported a new dream. “I came home to a small town where I was born. First, I ran around as a tourist with my camera. Then a boy who was selling something—from one of those little wagons?—asked me to take his picture. But I couldn’t find him in the photo apparat. In the view glass. Always other people got in the way. Everyone in this town was divorced. Everybody I knew. Then I went to a ladies’ club, a place where the women asked the men to dance. But there was only one man there. His picture was on an advertisement outside. He was the gigolo. Gigolo? Is that right? Then I called up people I knew, on the telephone. But they were all divorced. Everybody was divorced. My mother and father were divorced. Helle and Jens were divorced. Everybody. Everybody was floating about in a strange way.”

  Edward groaned. A palpable groan. “What else?”

  “I can’t remember.”

  “Nothing else?”

  “When I was on my way to the ladies’ club, the boy I had tried to take a picture of came up and took my arm. I was surprised but I said to myself something like, It’s necessary to have friends here.”

  “What else?”

  “I can’t remember.”

  “Did you sleep with him?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “What did the ladies’ club remind you of?”

  “It was in a cellar.”

  “Did it remind you of anything?”

  “It was rather like a place at the university. Where we used to dance.”

  “What is connected with that place in your mind?”

  “Once a boy came through a window to a party.”

  “Why did he come through the window?”

  “So he didn’t pay.”

  “Who was he?”

  “Someone.”

  “Did you dance with him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you sleep with him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Very often?”

  “Twice.”

  Edward and Pia went to Malmö on the flying boat. The hydrofoil leaped into the air. The feeling was that of a plane laboring down an interminable runway.

  “I dreamed of a roof,” Pia said. “Where corn was kept. Where it was stored.”

  “What does that—” Edward began.

  “Also I dreamed of rugs. I was beating a rug,” she went on. “And I dreamed about horses, I was riding.”

  “Don’t,” Edward said.

  Pia silently rehearsed three additional dreams. Edward regarded the green leaves of Malmö. Edward and Pia moved through the rug department of a department store. Surrounded by exciting rugs: Rya rugs, Polish rugs, rag rugs, straw rugs, area rugs, wall-to-wall rugs, rug remnants. Edward was thinking about one that cost five hundred crowns, in seven shades of red, about the size of an opened-up Herald Tribune, Paris edition.

  “It is too good for the floor, clearly,” Pia said. “It is to be hung on the wall.”

  Edward had four hundred dollars in his pocket. It was supposed to last him two months. The hideously smiling rug salesman pressed closer. They burst into the street. Just in time. “God knows they’re beautiful, however,” Edward said.

  “What did you dream last night?” Edward asked. “What did you dream? What?”

  “I can’t remember.”

  Edward decided that he worried too much about the dark side of Pia. Pia regarded as a moon. Edward lay in bed trying to remember a dream. He could not remember. It was eight o’clock. Edward climbed out of bed to see if there was mail on the floor, if mail had fallen through the door. No. Pia awoke.

  “I dreamed of beans.”

  Edward looked at her. Madam Cherokee’s Dream Book flew into his hand.

  “To dream of beans is, in all cases, very unfortunate. Eating them means sickness, preparing them means that the married state will be a very difficult one for you. To dream of beets is on the other hand a happy omen.”

  Edward and Pia argued about “Mrs. Miniver.” It was not written by J. B. Priestley, Edward said.

  “I remember it very well,” Pia insisted. “Errol Flynn was her husband, he was standing there with his straps, his straps”—Pia made a holding-up-trousers gesture—“hanging, and she said that she loved Walter Pidgeon.”

  “Errol Flynn was not even in the picture. You think J. B. Priestley wrote everything, don’t you? Everything in English.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Errol Flynn was not even in the picture.” Edward was drunk. He was shouting. “Errol Flynn was not even . . .in . . . the goddam picture!”

  Pia was not quite asleep. She was standing on a street corner. Women regarded her out of the corners of their eyes. She was holding a string bag containing strawberries, beer, razor blades, turnips. An old lady rode up on a bicycle and stopped for the traffic light. The old lady straddled her bicycle, seized Pia’s string bag, and threw it into the gutter. Then she pedalled away, with the changing light. People crowded around. Someone picked up the string bag. Pia shook her head. “No,” she said. “She just . . . I have never seen her before.” Someone asked Pia if she wanted him to call a policeman. “What for?” Pia said. Her father was standing there smiling. Pia thought, These things have no significance really. Pia thought, If this is to be my dream for tonight, then I don’t want it.

  Can We Talk

  I WENT to the bank to get my money for the day. And they had painted it yellow. Under cover of night, I shrewdly supposed. With white plaster letters saying CREDIT DEPARTMENT. And a row of new vice-presidents. But I have resources of my own, I said. Sulphur deposits in
Texas and a great humming factory off the coast of Kansas. Where we make little things.

  Thinking what about artichokes for lunch? Pleased to be in this yellow bank at 11:30 in the morning. A black man cashing his check in a Vassar College sweatshirt. A blue policeman with a St. Christopher pinned to his gunbelt. Thinking I need a little leaf to rest my artichokes upon. The lady stretching my money to make sure none of hers stuck to it.

  Fourteenth Street gay with Judy Bond Dresses Are On Strike. When I leaned out of your high window in my shorts, did you really think I had hurtling to destruction in mind? I was imagining a loudspeaker-and-leaflet unit that would give me your undivided attention.

  When I leaned out of your high window in my shorts, did you think why me?

  Into his bank I thought I saw my friend Kenneth go. To get his money for the day. Loitering outside in my painted shoes. Considering my prospects. A question of buying new underwear or going to the laundromat. And when I put a nickel in the soap machine it barks.

  When I leaned out of your high window in my shorts, were you nervous because you had just met me? I said: Your eyes have not been surpassed.

  The artichokes in their glass jar from the artichoke heart of the world, Castroville, Calif. I asked the man for a leaf. Just one, I said. We don’t sell them in ones, he said. Can we negotiate, I asked. Breathing his disgust he tucked a green leaf into my yellow vest with his brown hands.

  When I asked you why you didn’t marry Harry you said it was because he didn’t like you. Then I told you how I cheated the Thai lieutenant who was my best friend then.

  Posing with my leaf against a plastic paper plate. Hoping cordially that my friend Victor’s making money in his building. Then the artichokes one by one. Yes, you said, this is the part they call Turtle Bay.

  Coffee wondering what my end would be. Thinking of my friend Roger killed in the crash of a Link Trainer at Randolph Field in ’43. Or was it breakbone fever at Walter Reed.

  Then out into the street again and uptown for my fencing lesson. Stopping on the way to give the underwear man a ten. Because he looked about to bark.

  When I reached to touch your breast you said you had a cold. I believed you. I made more popcorn.

  Thinking of my friend Max who looks like white bread. A brisk bout with my head in a wire cage. The Slash Waltz from “The Mark of Zorro.” And in the shower a ten for Max, because his were the best two out of three. He put it in his lacy shoe. With his watch and his application to the Colorado School of Mines.

  In the shower I refrained from speaking of you to anyone.

  The store where I buy news buttoned up tight. Because the owners are in the mountains. Where I would surely be had I not decided to make us miserable.

  I said: I seem to have lost all my manuscripts, in which my theory is proved not once but again and again and again, and now when people who don’t believe a vertical monorail to Venus is possible shout at me, I have nothing to say. You peered into my gloom.

  My friend Herman’s house. Where I tickle the bell. It is me. Invited to put a vacuum cleaner together. The parts on the floor in alphabetical order. Herman away, making money. I hug his wife Agnes. A beautiful girl. And when one hugs her tightly, her eyes fill.

  When I asked you if you had a private income, you said something intelligent but I forget what. The skin scaling off my back from the week at the beach. Where I lay without knowing you.

  Discussing the real estate game, Agnes and I. Into this game I may someday go, I said. Building cheap and renting dear. With a doorman to front for me. Tons of money in it, I said.

  When my falling event was postponed, were you disappointed? Did you experience a disillusionment event?

  Hunted for a Post. To lean upon in the black hours ahead. And composed a brochure to lure folk into my new building. Titled “The Human Heart In Conflict With Itself.” Promising 24-hour incineration. And other features.

  Dancing on my parquet floor in my parquet shorts. To Mahler.

  After you sent me home you came down in your elevator to be kissed. You knew I would be sitting on the steps.

  Game

  SHOTWELL KEEPS the jacks and the rubber ball in his attaché case and will not allow me to play with them. He plays with them, alone, sitting on the floor near the console hour after hour, chanting “onesies, twosies, threesies, foursies” in a precise, well-modulated voice, not so loud as to be annoying, not so soft as to allow me to forget. I point out to Shotwell that two can derive more enjoyment from playing jacks than one, but he is not interested. I have asked repeatedly to be allowed to play by myself, but he simply shakes his head. “Why?” I ask. “They’re mine,” he says. And when he has finished, when he has sated himself, back they go into the attaché case.

  It is unfair but there is nothing I can do about it. I am aching to get my hands on them.

  Shotwell and I watch the console. Shotwell and I live under the ground and watch the console. If certain events take place upon the console, we are to insert our keys in the appropriate locks and turn our keys. Shotwell has a key and I have a key. If we turn our keys simultaneously the bird flies, certain switches are activated and the bird flies. But the bird never flies. In one hundred thirty-three days the bird has not flown. Meanwhile Shotwell and I watch each other. We each wear a .45 and if Shotwell behaves strangely I am supposed to shoot him. If I behave strangely Shotwell is supposed to shoot me. We watch the console and think about shooting each other and think about the bird. Shotwell’s behavior with the jacks is strange. Is it strange? I do not know. Perhaps he is merely a selfish bastard, perhaps his character is flawed, perhaps his childhood was twisted. I do not know.

  Each of us wears a .45 and each of us is supposed to shoot the other if the other is behaving strangely. How strangely is strangely? I do not know. In addition to the .45 I have a .38 which Shotwell does not know about concealed in my attaché case, and Shotwell has a .25 calibre Beretta which I do not know about strapped to his right calf. Sometimes instead of watching the console I pointedly watch Shotwell’s .45, but this is simply a ruse, simply a maneuver, in reality I am watching his hand when it dangles in the vicinity of his right calf. If he decides I am behaving strangely he will shoot me not with the .45 but with the Beretta. Similarly Shotwell pretends to watch my .45 but he is really watching my hand resting idly atop my attaché case, my hand resting idly atop my attaché case, my hand. My hand resting idly atop my attaché case.

  In the beginning I took care to behave normally. So did Shot­well. Our behavior was painfully normal. Norms of politeness, consideration, speech, and personal habits were scrupulously observed. But then it became apparent that an error had been made, that our relief was not going to arrive. Owing to an oversight. Owing to an oversight we have been here for one hundred thirty-three days. When it became clear that an error had been made, that we were not to be relieved, the norms were relaxed. Definitions of normality were redrawn in the agreement of January 1, called by us, The Agreement. Uniform regulations were relaxed, and mealtimes are no longer rigorously scheduled. We eat when we are hungry and sleep when we are tired. Considerations of rank and precedence were temporarily put aside, a handsome concession on the part of Shotwell, who is a captain, whereas I am only a first lieutenant. One of us watches the console at all times rather than two of us watching the console at all times, except when we are both on our feet. One of us watches the console at all times and if the bird flies then that one wakes the other and we turn our keys in the locks simultaneously and the bird flies. Our system involves a delay of perhaps twelve seconds but I do not care because I am not well, and Shotwell does not care because he is not himself. After the agreement was signed Shotwell produced the jacks and the rubber ball from his attaché case, and I began to write a series of descriptions of forms occurring in nature, such as a shell, a leaf, a stone, an animal. On the walls.

  Shotwell plays jacks and I write descripti
ons of natural forms on the walls.

  Shotwell is enrolled in a USAFI course which leads to a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Wisconsin (although we are not in Wisconsin, we are in Utah, Montana or Idaho). When we went down it was in either Utah, Montana or Idaho, I don’t remember. We have been here for one hundred thirty-three days owing to an oversight. The pale green reinforced concrete walls sweat and the air conditioning zips on and off erratically and Shotwell reads Introduction to Marketing by Lassiter and Munk, making notes with a blue ballpoint pen. Shotwell is not himself but I do not know it, he presents a calm aspect and reads Introduction to Marketing and makes his exemplary notes with a blue ballpoint pen, meanwhile controlling the .38 in my attaché case with one-third of his attention. I am not well.

  We have been here one hundred thirty-three days owing to an oversight. Although now we are not sure what is oversight, what is plan. Perhaps the plan is for us to stay here permanently, or if not permanently at least for a year, for three hundred sixty-five days. Or if not for a year for some number of days known to them and not known to us, such as two hundred days. Or perhaps they are observing our behavior in some way, sensors of some kind, perhaps our behavior determines the number of days. It may be that they are pleased with us, with our behavior, not in every detail but in sum. Perhaps the whole thing is very successful, perhaps the whole thing is an experiment and the experiment is very successful. I do not know. But I suspect that the only way they can persuade sun-loving creatures into their pale green sweating reinforced concrete rooms under the ground is to say that the system is twelve hours on, twelve hours off. And then lock us below for some number of days known to them and not known to us. We eat well although the frozen enchiladas are damp when defrosted and the frozen devil’s food cake is sour and untasty. We sleep uneasily and acrimoniously. I hear Shotwell shouting in his sleep, objecting, denouncing, cursing sometimes, weeping sometimes, in his sleep. When Shotwell sleeps I try to pick the lock on his attaché case, so as to get at the jacks. Thus far I have been unsuccessful. Nor has Shotwell been successful in picking the locks on my attaché case so as to get at the .38. I have seen the marks on the shiny surface. I laughed, in the latrine, pale green walls sweating and the air conditioning whispering, in the latrine.