Donald Barthelme

by Donald Barthelme

  “Monday!” he says. “Sliced oranges boiled grits fried croakers potato croquettes radishes watercress broiled spring chicken batter cakes butter syrup and café au lait! Tuesday! Grapes hominy broiled tenderloin of trout steak French-fried potatoes celery fresh rolls butter and café au lait! Wednesday! Iced figs Wheatena porgies with sauce tartare potato chips broiled ham scrambled eggs French toast and café au lait! Thursday! Bananas with cream oatmeal broiled patassas fried liver with bacon poached eggs on toast waffles with syrup and café au lait! Friday! Strawberries with cream broiled oysters on toast celery fried perch lyonnaise potatoes cornbread with syrup and café au lait! Saturday! Muskmelon on ice grits stewed tripe herb omelette olives snipe on toast flannel cakes with syrup and café au lait!” The zombie draws a long breath. “Sunday!” he says. “Peaches with cream cracked wheat with milk broiled Spanish mackerel with sauce maître d’hôtel creamed chicken beaten biscuits broiled woodcock on English muffin rice cakes potatoes à la duchesse eggs Benedict oysters on the half shell broiled lamb chops pound cake with syrup and café au lait! And imported champagne!” The zombies look anxiously at the women to see if this prospect is pleasing.

  A houngan (zombie-maker) grasps a man by the hair and forces his lips close to those of a dying cat. If you do heavy labor for a houngan for ten years, then you are free, but still a zombie. The Bishop’s car is working well. No daughter of this village has had in human memory a true husband, or anything like it. The daughters are tired of kissing each other, although some are not. The fathers of the village are tired of paying for their daughters’ sewing machines, lowboys, and towels. A bald zombie says, “Oh what a pretty lady! I would be nice to her! Yes I would! I think so!” Bad zombies are leaning against the walls of the buildings, watching. Bad zombies are allowed, by law, to mate only with sheep ticks. The women do not want the zombies, but zombies are their portion. A woman says to another woman: “These guys are zombies!” “Yes,” says the second woman, “I saw a handsome man, he had his picture in the paper, but he is not here.” The zombie in the corral finds a temperature of a hundred and ten degrees.

  The villagers are beating upon huge drums with mops. The Bishop arrives in his great car with white episcopal flags flying from the right and left fenders. “Forbidden, forbidden, forbidden!” he cries. Gris Grue appears on a silver sled and places his hands over the Bishop’s eyes. At the moment of sunset the couples, two by two, are wed. The corral shudders as the cattle collapse. The new wives turn to their new husbands and say: “No matter. This is what we must do. We will paste photographs of the handsome man in the photograph on your faces, when it is time to go to bed. Now let us cut the cake.” The good zombies say, “You’re welcome! You’re very welcome! I think so! Undoubtedly!” The bad zombies place sheep ticks in the Bishop’s car. If a bad zombie gets you, he will scarify your hide with chisels and rakes. If a bad zombie gets you, he will make you walk past a beautiful breast without even noticing.

  Morning

  —SAY YOU’RE frightened. Admit it.

  —In Colorado, by the mountains. In California, by the sea. Everywhere, by breaking glass.

  —Say you’re frightened. Confess.

  —Timid as a stag. They’ve got a meter wired to my sheet, I don’t know what it measures. I get a dollar a night. When I wake suddenly, I notice it’s there. I watch my hand aging, sing a little song.

  —Were you invited to the party?

  —Yes, I was. Stood there smiling. I thought, Those are tight pants, how kind of her. Wondered if she was orange underneath. What shall we do? Call up Mowgli? Ask him over? Do you like tongue? Sliced? With mushrooms? Is it a private matter? Is Scriabin as smart as he looks? This man’s a fool—why are you talking to him? Yes, his clothes are interesting, but inside are dull bones.

  —This gray light, I don’t see how you stand it.

  —A firestorm of porn all around—orange images, dunes and deserts. Bursts of quarreling through the walls. I wonder who the people are? I tried that Cuisine Minceur, didn’t like it. Oh, it looks pretty—

  —Say you’re frightened.

  —I’m frightened. By flutes and flower girls and sirens. We get a lot of sirens because of the hospital. By coffee, dead hanging plants, people who think too fast, vestments and bells.

  —Get some Vitamin E. I take eight hundred units.

  —The sound of glass breaking. I thought, Oh Christ, not again. The last time they got a bicycle, fancy Japanese bicycle somebody’d left in the hall. We changed the lock. Guy left his crowbar. Actually it wasn’t a crowbar it was a jack handle.

  —I’m not afraid of crime, there’s got to be crime, it’s the manner or mode that—I mean if they could just take it out of your bank account, by punching a few buttons or something . . .

  —I’m not afraid of snakes. There was a snake-handling bunch where we spent the summers. I used to go to their meetings now and again, do a little handling.

  —Not afraid of the mail, not so much as I used to be, all those threatening letters, I just say sticks and stones, sticks and stones, see the triage nurse.

  —It’s only when you stop to think about it. I don’t stop.

  —Not afraid of hurricanes because we used to have them, where I lived, not afraid of tarantulas, used to have them too, they jump, have to chop them up with a hoe, long-handled hoe as opposed to the stoop hoe, by preference.

  —Nature in general not seen as antipathetic. Nor are other people, except for those who want to slap your ears back without first presenting their carefully reasoned, red-white-and-blue threats.

  —Behavior in general a wonderful sea, in which we can swim, or leap, or stumble.

  —She got out of bed and, doing a cute little walk, walked to the bathroom. I dreaded the day I would see her real walk.

  —There’s the sunset gun. That means we can loosen up and get friendly. Think we can get any of that government money?

  —I sent for the forms. Merrily merrily merrily merrily.

  —Think we can get us some of that good per diem?

  —If you decide to run for it a bus is better. No one’s seated facing you. They’ve got bigger windows now, and the drivers are usually reliable.

  —Well that’s one thing I want to stay away from. Flight, I mean. Too much like defeat.

  —But when I get to all these strange places they seem empty. Nobody on the streets and I’m not used to that. Their restaurants all have the same things: filet, surf ’n’ turf, prime rib. Spend a few days in a hotel and then check out, leaving a dollar or two for the maids.

  —Turkeying around trying to get situated.

  —Searching the room for someone to go to bed with. What if she agrees?

  —That’s happened to me several times. You just have to be honest.

  —The love of gain is insatiable. This is true.

  —What are you afraid of? Mornings, noons, or nights?

  —Mornings. I send out a lot of postcards.

  —Take a picture of this exceptionally dirty window. Its grays. I think I can get you a knighthood, I know a guy. What about the Eternal Return?

  —Distant, distant, distant. Thanks for calling Jim it was good to talk to you.

  —They played “One O’Clock Jump,” “Two O’Clock Jump,” “Three O’Clock Jump,” and “Four O’Clock Jump.” They were very good. I saw them on television. They’re all dead now.

  —That scare you?

  —Naw that doesn’t scare me.

  —That scare you?

  —Naw that doesn’t scare me.

  —What scares you?

  —My hand scares me. It’s not well.

  —Hear that? That’s wolf talk. Not bad is it?

  —Scarcely had I reloaded when a black rhinoceros, a female as it proved, stood drinking at the water.

  —Let me give you a hint: Find me one animal that is capable o
f personal friendship.

  —So I decided it was about time we got gay. I changed the record, that helped, and fiddled with the lights—

  —Call up Bomba the Jungle Boy? Get his input?

  —Fixed up the Kool-Aid with some stuff I had with me. Complicated the decor with carefully placed items of lawn furniture, birdbaths, sundials, mirrored globes on stands . . .

  —That set toes to tapping, did it?

  —They were pleased. We danced Inventions & Sinfonias. It wasn’t bad. It was a success.

  —It is this that the new portraits are intended to celebrate.

  —Then, out of another chute, the bride appeared, caracoling and sunfishing across the arena.

  —I knew her. I was very fond of her. I am very fond of her. I wish them well.

  —As do I. She’s brave.

  —Think we can get some of that fine grant money?

  —If we can make ourselves understood. If I applaud, the actors understand that I am pleased. If I take a needle and singe it with a match, you understand that I have picked up a splinter in my foot. If I say “Have any of the English residents been murdered?,” you understand that I am cognizant of native unrest. If I hand you two copies of a thesis bound in black cloth, you understand that I am trying to improve myself. Appeals to patriotism, small-boat warnings up.

  —Say you’re frightened.

  —I’m frightened. But maybe not tomorrow.

  —Well that’s one thing I want to stay away from. You can get mad instead. I got mad, really got mad.

  —Put-on anger. A technique of managers.

  —Got so mad I coulda bit a chisel in two.

  —And very graciously. Skin of dreams, paint marks, red scratches, grass stains. We watched 60 Minutes. Fed on ixias, wild garlic, the core of aloes, gum of acacias. She’s gone now, took an early plane. How do I feel? O.K.

  —Another bright glorious day. How do you feel? Have you tried to get a drink on one of these new trains? It’s as easy as pie. Have you got anything we could put over the windows? Tarpaper or maybe some boards? Do you want to hear “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”? Is there any more of this red?

  —Jugs and jugs. Two weeks would do it, two weeks in a VW Rabbit.

  —Going home.

  —No, thank you.

  —You’re afraid of it?

  —Indeed, do I still live?

  —What are you afraid of?

  —One old man alone in a room. Two old men alone in a room. Three old men alone in a room.

  —Well maybe you could talk to them or something.

  —And say: Howdy, have you heard about pleasure, have you heard about fun? Let’s go out and bust up a bar, it’s been a long time. What are you up to, what are your plans? Still lifting weights? I’ve been screwing all night, how ’bout you? “You please me, happiness!”

  —Well I don’t think about this stuff a lot of the time.

  —Humility is barefoot, Lewdness is physically attractive and holds a sprig of colewort, the Hour is a wheel, and Courage is strangling a lion, by shoving a mailed fist down its throat.

  —How did the party end?

  —I wasn’t there. Got to scat, I said, got to get away, got to creep, it’s that time of night. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, bless the bed that I lie on.

  —Say you’re frightened.

  —Less and less. I have a smoke detector and tickets to everywhere. I have a guardian angel blind from birth and a packet of Purple-top White Globe turnip seeds, for the roof.

  —Want to see my collection of bass clarinets? Want to see my collection of painters’ ears? This gray light, I don’t see how you stand it.

  —I grayed it up myself. Sets off the orange.

  —A fine person. Took the Fire Department exam and passed it. That’s just one example.

  —All women are mortal, she explained to me, and Caius is a woman.

  —Say you’re not frightened. Inspire me.

  —After a while, darkness, and they give up the search.

  On the Steps of the Conservatory

  —C’MON HILDA don’t fret.

  —Well Maggie it’s a blow.

  —Don’t let it bother you, don’t let it get you down.

  —Once I thought they were going to admit me to the Conservatory but now I know they will never admit me to the Conservatory.

  —Yes they are very particular about who they admit to the Conservatory. They will never admit you to the Conservatory.

  —They will never admit me to the Conservatory, I know that now.

  —You are not Conservatory material I’m afraid. That’s the plain truth of it.

  —You’re not important, they told me, just remember that, you’re not important, what’s so important about you? What?

  —C’mon Hilda don’t fret.

  —Well Maggie it’s a blow.

  —When are you going to change yourself, change yourself into a loaf or a fish?

  —Christian imagery is taught at the Conservatory, also Islamic imagery and the imagery of Public Safety.

  —Red, yellow, and green circles.

  —When they told me I got between the poles of my rickshaw and trotted heavily away.

  —The great black ironwork doors of the Conservatory barred to you forever.

  —Trotted heavily away in the direction of my house. My small, poor house.

  —C’mon Hilda don’t fret.

  —Yes, I am still trying to get into the Conservatory, although my chances are probably worse than ever.

  —They don’t want pregnant women in the Conservatory.

  —I didn’t tell them, I lied about it.

  —Didn’t they ask you?

  —No they forgot to ask me and I didn’t tell them.

  —Well then it’s hardly on that account that—

  —I felt they knew.

  —The Conservatory is hostile to the new spirit, the new spirit is not liked there.

  —Well Maggie it’s a blow nevertheless. I had to go back to my house.

  —Where although you entertain the foremost artists and intellectuals of your time you grow progressively more despondent and depressed.

  —Yes he was a frightful lawyer.

  —Lover?

  —That too, frightful. He said he could not get me into the Conservatory because of my unimportance.

  —Was there a fee?

  —There’s always a fee. Pounds and pounds.

  —I stood on the terrace at the rear of the Conservatory and studied the flagstones reddened with the lifebloods of generations of Conservatory students. Standing there I reflected: Hilda will never be admitted to the Conservatory.

  —I read the Conservatory Circular and my name was not among those listed.

  —Well I suppose it was in part your espousal of the new spirit that counted against you.

  —I will never abjure the new spirit.

  —And you’re a veteran too, I should have thought that would have weighed in your favor.

  —Well Maggie it’s a disappointment, I must admit that frankly.

  —C’mon Hilda don’t weep and tear your hair here where they can see you.

  —Are they looking out of the windows?

  —Probably they’re looking out of the windows.

  —It’s said that they import a cook, on feast days.

  —They have naked models too.

  —Do you really think so? I’m not surprised.

  —The best students get their dinners sent up on trays.

  —Do you really think so? I’m not surprised.

  —Grain salads and large portions of choice meats.

  —Oh it hurts, it hurts, it hurts.

  —Bread with drippings, and on feast days cake.

  —I’m as gifted a
s they are, I’m as gifted as some of them.

  —Decisions made by a committee of ghosts. They drop black beans or white beans into a pot.

  —Once I thought I was to be admitted. There were encouraging letters.

  —You’re not Conservatory material I’m afraid. Only the best material is Conservatory material.

  —I’m as good as some of those who rest now in the soft Conservatory beds.

  —Merit is always considered closely.

  —I could smile back at the smiling faces of the swift, dangerous teachers.

  —Yes, we have naked models. No, the naked models are not emotionally meaningful to us.

  —I could work with clay or paste things together.

  —Yes, sometimes we paste things on the naked models—clothes, mostly. Yes, sometimes we play our Conservatory violins, cellos, trumpets for the naked models, or sing to them, or correct their speech, as our deft fingers fly over the sketch pads . . .

  —I could I suppose fill out another application, or several.

  —Yes, you have considerable of a belly on you now. I remember when it was flat, flat as a book.

  —I will die if I don’t get into the Conservatory, die.

  —Naw you won’t you’re just saying that.

  —I will completely croak if I don’t get into the Conservatory, I promise you.

  —Things are not so bad, you can always do something else, I don’t know what, c’mon Hilda be reasonable.

  —My whole life depends on it.

  —Oh God I remember when it was flat. Didn’t we tear things up, though? I remember running around that town, and hiding in dark places, that was a great town and I’m sorry we left it.