David Foster Wallace Ruined My Suicide and Other Stories

by D. D. Miller

  He was almost at the door. He could see it, the outside, and could feel the cool air on his burning skin. He heard Sam behind him saying his name again, but he kept going. He wanted to run, but couldn’t bring himself to do it. He wanted to run all the way back to residence and lock himself in his room.

  MajorMajor

  When did you first think about it

  LonelyGirl14

  I don’t know

  MajorMajor

  I was really young

  LonelyGirl14

  The bullying started in 7th grade

  MajorMajor

  Was that when

  LonelyGirl14

  It was probably then. I just turned 16 last month

  MajorMajor

  You seem so mature

  LonelyGirl14

  How old are you?

  MajorMajor

  19

  LonelyGirl14

  And you still think about it?

  MajorMajor

  No Im just waiting for the right time.

  LonelyGirl14

  So you know how and everything

  MajorMajor

  Of course dont you?

  LonelyGirl14

  I dont know. Moms got pills. She’s got lots. How are you going to do it?

  MajorMajor

  Dont use pills. Pills r no good. Too risky. Might not work.

  LonelyGirl14

  I dont know then

  MajorMajor

  Then yer not too serious

  LonelyGirl14

  But I cant handle it anymore

  MajorMajor

  If you havent even thought of how . . . I havent even wondered in years. Ive known for a long time

  LonelyGirl14

  We have guns. My father has guns.

  MajorMajor

  Like shotguns?

  LonelyGirl14

  He hunts.

  MajorMajor

  Could you pull the trigger?

  LonelyGirl14

  I dont know

  MajorMajor

  Could you put it in your mouth and pull the trigger?

  LonelyGirl14

  Is that the best way?

  MajorMajor

  Make sure its pointed straight up so it goes through the brain

  LonelyGirl14

  How are you going to do it?

  MajorMajor

  I have a gun right here

  LonelyGirl14

  Your doing it tonight?

  MajorMajor

  I cant wait any more. I cant do it. Its too hard. Its all too hard.

  MajorMajor

  It’s the best revenge.

  LonelyGirl14

  It’ll destroy them, right? The fuckin assholes

  MajorMajor

  Completely. Completely

  Sean lay in the bath for a long time. It was hot, and when he first got in he watched the steam rise off of his pale skin. He tried to masturbate, but his penis just lay limp against his thigh. He could think only about LonelyGirl14. It was so easy to talk to her. She was just open and raw and waiting for someone to talk to her. Lead her. He wondered how she’d gotten to the point she had? It excited him, just a bit, to think of the strength of her desire to end her own life. How much emotional energy that must take.

  He tried to picture her, but he couldn’t. He wanted to picture her in her home, perhaps in her parents’ bedroom – for effect – a conservative bedroom: a few family photos, matching dresser and bedside tables, floral bedspread. She would be dressed in black, right down to the painted fingernails. She had on big, black boots, army boots even. She was pale, he imagined, so pale that she seemed to verge on a bluish translucence. He could see the barrel of the gun in her hands, massive and thick, the butt of it resting on the ground between her legs. He could get right up to her neck and that was it. Was she crying? Was she pissed off? Was she beyond all that and just vacant?

  He could picture her positioning the gun, reaching down and slipping her thumb over the trigger. He could see it engage and could hear the blast and smell the residue of the shot. There was blood and matter spattered over the bedspread, but he still couldn’t see the face that the bullet had destroyed.

  Sean was in the booth waiting before Sam even got there. He sat very patiently and tried to remain calm. He played Pac-Man on an online arcade simulator. Between levels four and five he took off his glasses and cleaned them.

  At the time she was supposed to arrive he set up Microsoft Word. Today was the day they got down to business. Her test was so simple it was laughable to him. Mastering the basics of a word processing program. That was it.

  She rushed in five minutes late. She stood in the doorway, her bag hanging from her hand at her side. She was wearing black tights and a T-shirt that hung down over her thighs. Black flats. She stood there and stared at him. “Hey,” she said.

  Sean glanced at her only briefly. “You’re late,” he said, and adjusted himself in his chair. He’d set up another beside him. “I have Word open, we should get started.” He stared at the screen. The white space of a fresh document.

  “Um. Right. Okay,” she said and walked over to the seat. She sat down.

  “You should take notes. I’m going to go quickly. You should know all of this stuff by now.”

  “Okay.” She took out a notebook and a pen. She listened intently as Sean began his tutorial. He spoke quickly, moved the cursor around the program rapidly, clicking here and there. He could see her taking notes out of his peripheral vision.

  “Hey! Did you get new shoes?” Sam dropped her pen down on the table.

  “You’ve got to pay attention.” He didn’t look away from the screen, but he tucked his feet under his chair. He’d gone to the mall the other day. Gone to a shoe store in there that he would never even have considered going to before. It was small and sparse and the women who worked there were so attentive and attractive, but attractive like mannequins were attractive – all done up and machine-like. They were less intimidating for their automation.

  He continued, moving into formatting styles. Sam was shifting in her chair. Folding and unfolding her legs – he could hear the fabric of the tights rubbing; tapping her pen against her notebook. She brought a finger from her free hand up to her mouth and began to chew on the nail.

  “Sean,” she said, her finger still in her mouth.

  “If you’re building a report document,” he continued, “you might want to choose from one of the heading styles. During the test you’ll probably be . . .”

  “Sean,” she said again, “I’m really sorry about the other day.”

  He stopped. His hand slid away from the touchpad.

  “I don’t know what happened, okay, and whatever, it doesn’t matter.” She reached over and touched his shoulder. Rested her hand there. “Darius can be an asshole sometimes. He was drinking . . .”

  Sean turned his head just enough to see her hand on his shoulder. The way she gripped it, and just a little of the fabric bunched up between her fingers. He looked over toward her face. She was frowning, her head tilted. He thought that maybe this was the first time she wasn’t wearing lipstick, so her lips looked paler, but softer. He was certain he could imagine what they felt like. He could see her tongue, twisting and turning in his mouth. She would grab him, he knew, with those long fingers. She would grab him and pull him to her. She would lie right down on this table and pull him onto her. He wouldn’t let his lips come away from hers, his tongue leave her mouth. Her tights rolled easily down her thighs. She undid his pants, pulled him out. He couldn’t wait and thrust himself forward and into her, so easily. He could feel her squeezing around him. Her legs wrapped around his waist and she was squealing under his lips, his mouth pressed hard against hers, not letting the sound escape.

  “Are you all right?” Sam pulled her hand away from Sean’s shoulder.

  Sean looked her in the eye. She looked concerned, still frowning. She didn’t have much
makeup on at all, and Sean thought that she looked amazing. More amazing than usual.

  “I like you just the way you are,” he said.

  “What?”

  Sean turned fully to his right and leaned toward Sam. Nothing registered on her face. She tilted back her head but didn’t seem to understand what he was doing. He reached forward with his left hand and grabbed her shoulder. In one motion he pulled her forward in her chair. His right hand grabbed at her knee, thigh, slid in between her legs and felt her through the thinness of the material.

  Sam tried to scream, but he crushed his mouth against hers, eyes open and watching her face. He pressed against her and she squirmed against his rough hand, digging fingers. She brought her hands up between them and knocked his arm off her shoulder. Her eyes jumped open, and she stopped trying to scream. She brought her other arm up between them and pushed him so that he fell away from her, rocking on the back legs of his chair. Her lips curled up in a snarl, her eyebrows crushed into her face, and there was a brief moment when he stared straight into her eyes and saw that her pupils had become black and empty, and then she brought both hands up in front of her, palms out, and slammed them into his face.

  There was a great blast of light, and then sparks like static in a dark room. There was a terribly sharp pain and then nothing. He could feel the odd sensation of his blood trickling down the edges of his cheeks, up under his ears before dripping away. She stood over him. Her face was blotchy, red and contorted. She was straining not to rear back and kick him or kneel down and punch him in the face again. She said something – Sean could see her lips move – but he couldn’t hear her, and then she turned around and disappeared from his line of vision.

  He stared up at the fluorescent fixture on the ceiling. His eyes swam with tears and the stinging shock of the blow to the nose. A sharp pain gathered in the centre of his stomach. A sharp pain that radiated out, turning slowly. He rolled over onto his side, the acid taste of blood at the back of his throat, and vomited onto the carpet. His eyes continued to water, and then tears blurred his vision. He began to see a face in the blur. Glasses. Thin, black hair. He closed his eyes tight to squeeze out the water, but he didn’t open them because the face became clearer. It was a girl’s face, thin and pale. Big brown eyes, rimmed in black – makeup and the lack of sleep – big full lips, painted red. She rested her chin on the barrel of a gun. He could finally see her face, so he held the vision for as long as he could. He studied her image for as long as it remained.

  hen it occurs to me that I might be having a heart attack, my first thoughts are not of my childhood; they are not of my wife or family. I do not think, “I’m only thirty-eight, why now?” My life does not flash before my eyes. Oddly enough, the first thing that comes to mind is that I’m going to miss my mother-in-law’s Thanksgiving turkey on the weekend.

  It’s an odd thought, I think, as far as last thoughts go.

  I’m on the bus, on my way home from work, and I clutch my chest, sit up straight and look around for help. I can feel the fluttering of my heart in my hand. It’s vibrating right through my flesh. I pull open my coat and notice my phone in my pocket. I’d set it to vibrate during a meeting this morning.

  An old woman sitting directly across from me glares like I’m someone to be watched. She’s all done up in that way old ladies get done up for the mall. She’s curled her thinning, white hair and is wearing pressed pants with a nice shirt (pink stripes on baby blue). She’s got a newish jacket folded over her lap; a modest shade of lipstick that has bled into the wrinkles above her lips. She must be in her seventies. I can imagine her as a beautiful young woman, as the object of someone’s desire.

  I pull out my phone but don’t recognize the number. “Hello?”

  “Yeah, hey. I’m calling about the apartment.” It’s a male voice; a slight, unplaceable European accent.

  “Sorry?”

  “The apartment, I’m calling about the one bedroom,” he says again.

  “You must have the wrong number.”

  “Oh yeah?” There’s a pause, as though he’s waiting for something else.

  “Yeah,” I finally say, “sorry.”

  He hangs up. Almost immediately the phone vibrates again.

  “Hey, I’m calling about the apartment.” The same guy.

  “Sorry, wrong number. You just called.”

  “Is this 416-114-1976?”

  “Yes,” I say.

  “And you don’t know anything about an apartment for rent?”

  “No, I don’t. Sorry.”

  He hangs up again. I feel bad, but I don’t know why. I slip the phone back into my pocket then put my hand to my chest. I leave it there for a moment until I can feel the faint pulsing of my heart.

  Sandra’s not home when I get there. I walk into the kitchen and see that she’s got dinner prepped and ready to go: the cooked penne is clumping in a colander in the sink; there are chopped veggies on the cutting board; a jar of pesto and a container of parmesan sit on the counter. I check the oven: French bread.

  I pull a bottle of red wine down from the small rack above the fridge, uncork it and pour myself a glass. It’s not normal that she isn’t home, but things haven’t been normal since September when Sandra started her grad degree. It was around this time last year when she told me she wanted to do it. We were at our favourite Vietnamese place.

  “Tim,” she said, “I need a change. I need to do something.” It came out like a sigh, like a secret she’d been harbouring for a long time and finally had the courage to say. “I want to go back to school.”

  “Oh.” I was relieved. “Of course.”

  “That’s it? Of course.”

  I shrugged. “Why not?”

  She looked down at her bowl of pho, disappointed. “It’ll change our lives a lot. One income.”

  “Why now?” I asked. She’d been a social worker, in child protection. She’d never liked her job that much, but it hadn’t seemed like the kind of job that people actually liked.

  “If not now, then when?” She burned red. She’d been prepared for a fight. I reached over and touched the back of her hand with my finger. “We probably won’t be able to go down south for the next couple of winters.”

  “Maybe we can,” I said, and at the time, I thought perhaps we could.

  “I want to do it,” she said, “so that I can finally get out of child protection. It breaks my heart doing what I do.”

  I think back to her first apprehension, when she was just barely out of university, and how she had to come home before going back to the office. She had the baby in a car seat that she brought in with her, and there was a police officer there as well who had the stone-faced patience of someone who had done this before. She rushed in, put the baby down and fell into my arms sobbing. The officer stood by the door silently and waited, on guard.

  She gets home when I’m halfway through my second glass of wine. She’s got a flush to her cheeks and looks flustered. Her long, black hair is tied up on her head. She’s wearing compression leggings that cling to her thighs; they make her look more muscular than she is. Her sweatshirt is loose and slips down her right arm, showing the strap of her blue sports bra.

  “What are you doing home?” she asks.

  “I came home early. Where were you?”

  She brushes her cheek along mine, a short kiss near my temple. Her cheek is cool.

  “Into the wine, eh?” She taps the side of my glass with her fingernail.

  “Why not?”

  “Why not,” she says and grabs my glass and downs it.

  When we go to bed I see that I’ve missed three calls on my cellphone. There are two messages.

  “I’m calling about the apartment. My name is Angela. Please call me back tomorrow. Thanks.” She left her number. I delete the message, and as soon as the next one begins “I’m calling about . . .” I delete it too. I turn to tell Sandra about the calls for the apartment, but she has already fallen asleep. I sigh too loudly, hop
ing to wake her. She doesn’t stir, and I even watch as her mouth falls open and her eyelids shudder. I head to the bathroom to masturbate. I think about Sandra while I do it. Maybe that’s a sign of aging, thinking about your wife while you jerk off. There’s pasta sauce on her breasts; nipples salted with parmesan.

  I’m sitting in my cubicle when my cellphone rings. This is the third one today, and it’s not even noon. I take off my headset and answer it.

  “Hi, I’m calling about the apartment.” A young woman. “Hello?” She’s got a nice voice; it’s steady, smooth. Feminine.

  “Sorry,” I say.

  “I was just wondering if it’s still available. The one bedroom. I called and left a message last night.”

  There is a particular youthful quality to her voice: no hardness or edge yet. Nothing tarnished. It makes me want to listen to her.

  “Hello?”

  “How did you get this number?” My hand is shaking.

  “It was on the website. Is this a bad time?”

  “No, no, it’s fine.” My heart is beating quickly. “It’s Angela, right?” I ask, remembering her voice from the night before.

  “You think I could take a look at the one bedroom?” she asks.

  “Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?” I take a deep breath.

  “I’m not even really sure that I’m interested –”

  “Is it just you? Alone, I mean.”

  “Oh, right, yeah. No pets, either.”

  “Good.” I grab a pen and paper and begin to jot down notes. “Your employment?”