Collected Fictions

by Gordon Lish

  Like just, in their case, the toilet seat.

  God, I am already getting sick from just seeing it with the eye in my mind. So, fine, so we won't speak of it. Better if we do not speak of it. I am not permitting us to proceed as promised and, you know, and speak of it. But you get what I am getting at, don't you? Whereas my own personal toilet seat, it's okay, I am keeping close tabs on it, I do not let it out of my sight for one instant, but the kitchen sink, but what about the kitchen sink? You think they can't come in and give your toilet seat a satisfactory rating but then right in the same breath one lousy look at your kitchen sink sends the dirty stinking rats mincing right back out the door again with their stinking vicious filthy tongues wagging? And could you run after them and call out to them wait a sec, hang on a sec, it's just this thing which just so happens to right now be going on with me as per my period of me adjusting?

  It's no good.

  People don't give you any credit for you adjusting.

  This is the whole thing of it with people—they sneer at you behind your back even though all you are doing is you're just coming around to another period of you adjusting. I'm telling you, as far as people, all adjusting is maladjusting or else forget it.

  But losing things like mufflers, this is where we have to draw the line. This muffler in particular. Because this was honestly some muffler I had. You couldn't go out and buy a muffler like this muffler no matter what generation the people are saying you're a member of. It was one of a kind, this muffler of mine. People used to stop me on the street and get up close to me and take a good sharp look at me and say to me, "Mister, this muffler you got, no kidding, it is definitely a honey."

  But days like those days, hey, they're gone for good now, days like such as those days.

  Never mind.

  What's not gone for good except the nights?

  And the awful algebra.

  Nor need it be added—the nocturnal build-up of untold rue until—fuck!—I'm dead from it and didn't even go with my neck nice and warm at the time.

  PHYSIS VERSUS NOMOS

  SO I SAYS TO THE WINDOW-SHADE MAN, I says to him you see this window shade, this window shade's no good, this window shade is beat to shit, this window shade has been in my window since who knows when, I need a new window shade, how about a new window shade, you got another window shade for me just like this one, and so the window-shade man takes the window shade from me and the window-shade man, he says to me just like this one, just like this one, there can be no window shade just like this one, even this one cannot be just like this one when you said to me just like this one since this one is now not a window shade in your hands, this one is now a window shade in my hands, whereupon I says to the window-shade man yeah but barring all that, but barring all that, let's get down to cases, cases, says the window-shade man, you want cases, says the window-shade man, here's cases for you just to begin with, says the window-shade man, as in see this grommet you got here in this window shade, what we do here is we don't do a thing like this grommet you got here, you want a grommet, you don't come here, you want a grommet in it as far as a window shade, you go down the block you get a grommet in it as far as a window shade, down the block they do it for you with a grommet in it for you as far as a window shade for you, here we do it with you screw in this thing here like a button here and then the pull itself, you take the loop like this and it goes around and winds around it like it's like a button you're winding the loop of the pull around, but grommet forget about it, grommet you're spinning your wheels, you have to have a grommet in it, then we are not the window-shade people for you and your people, you have to have a grommet in it, the window-shade people for you, these are the window-shade people down the block or up the block depending on which direction, that's where they do a grommet, that's where you get a grommet, this place we don't do a grommet, this place you can't get a grommet, us what we do here is you get home and you screw in this screw-in thing which is like a button we give you at the bottom in the stick on this side, on that side, whichever side you want and then the pull, all you do is you take the loop and go wind it any way you want to wind, the wind is up to you the way you decide you want to wind it, but a grommet, not a grommet, you want a grommet, you go to the other people, they can do a grommet for you if a grommet is what you want, but so are we doing business with you or are we facing an impasse with you as far as the stipulation with the grommet with you, and so I says to the window-shade man, I says to him the only thing different if I go ahead and get the window shade with you people and not with the other people is with you people the grommet, it's just the grommet, or is what you're telling me is there are other things which you are going to tell me which are also in the nature of things which are going to be different as far as the window shade we're getting rid of, whereupon the man says to me, whereupon the window-shade man says to me brackets, let's talk brackets, let's review what at your residence the situation is as far as brackets, which way are you set up in your residence as far as your brackets, and so I says to the window-shade man brackets, you mean when you say brackets you mean these like bracket things which they go up there where you screw them into the wall with like these anchors or something, plugs, up into the insides up at the top of the window and you get up and you hang the window shade from them, like these two little things which one of them goes on one side and the other one goes on the other side, those things like brackets are what you mean when you say to me brackets, and so the window-shade man says to me sided, they're sided, they're like one side is for one side and the other side is for the other side on the other side, so the question which I am asking you is which way do you want for us to set you up with the window shade we're making for you as far as replacing the old window shade with regard to the question of conforming to the old brackets, or is it in your thinking at this stage of the game what you want for your agenda to look like is you take out the old ones which went with this window shade here and get us to give you new ones so you can start over fresh from the beginning with new ones, in which case don't forget we also have to charge you for new plugs as far as anchoring it, and so I says to the window-shade man, I say to him look, it should only all I know is roll up so it's rolling up on the outside and not up on the inside and so it's facing out on the side facing into the window, this cuff down here at the bottom where it turns around and makes the opening where the stick is, or goes through, okay?

  "Oh," he says.

  "What's the matter?" I say.

  The window-shade man says to me, "Go home and look it over and get your agenda straight before you come in here with things like this for me when you are obviously so obviously ill-prepared to go ahead and do business with me as your preferred window-shade tradesperson in the neighborhood." The window-shade man says to me, "This is not a criticism. Don't take this as a criticism. It is not my policy here to stand here and offer criticism." The window-shade man says to me, "I am giving guidance. I am giving counsel. Do not take it as a rebuff. Do not take it as a reproof. First go see what's your setup as far as the specifics is so you can come in here unencumbered and act freely like a human being unfettered by the conditions."

  So I say to the window-shade man, "Look, believe me, I am here on your premises in good faith and am ready and able to do business with you with a clear conscience as a fully endowed citizen in complete possession of his wits as well as his teleology."

  "Yeah," the window-shade man says to me, "but I'm not arguing, it's not an argument, no one here is standing here endeavoring to take issue with you as far as an argument, but the brackets," the window-shade man says to me, "your qualification with the brackets is they go this way or they go that way, which is not for one minute to say they can't go up and get screwed in either way which you want them to, but once they're in on whichever side which you screw each one of them in on, everything devolves from that fact and therefore develops the repercussion of which way the window shade rolls, does the window shade roll in or does the window
shade roll out. So you understand what I'm saying?" the window-shade man says. "Devolves or debouches."

  "How could I not understand what you're saying?" I says. "I understand what you're saying," I says. "But I'm just saying myself," I says. "So this makes sense or not?" I says.

  "Stay with me with this," says the window-shade man. "You mention cuff. I heard you mention cuff. Okay, cuff. Talk to me, talk to me—you want the cuff you can see from the inside or you can't—which or which?"

  "Right," I says, "right." I says to the window-shade man, I says to him, "This is the question," I says, "and the answer to the question is I don't know if I can answer this question with an uncluttered mind. I mean, now it's all cuff-wise."

  "Well, it's your brackets," the window-shade man says. "It all goes back to your brackets," the window-shade man says. "We're getting nowhere with this until we get a better grip on your past setup as far as brackets," the window-shade man says. "But," the window-shade man says, "this is where your age-old question as far as volition comes in. Plus, you know, plus ataraxy."

  "You mean at home," I says.

  "Check," the window-shade man says. "So what you do is you turn around and you go home and you get home and you look up there at the top of the window and you see what your situation shapes up like on a current basis as far as shall I say the sidedness of your brackets and then you turn around and you come back here to me here and you talk to me and the two of us will do business or not do business, but first we got to know what we are talking about as far as what is in the wall as of now and is it to continue on in it on the current basis or be reversed."

  I says, "You want me to go home and look."

  He says, "That's it—you go home and you look."

  I says, "Right, right, but like what am I looking at?"

  "Where you stand with the brackets," says the window-shade man. "What your setup is as far as the brackets," the window-shade man says. "What's what as far as the current sidedness when you get up on a stool and you inspect each respective bracket constituting the totality of your brackets non-dereistically."

  "And that's it?"

  "Providing we don't come to an aporia as far as the cuff and so forth," he says.

  "But no grommet is what you're telling me no matter what, an affection for dereism notwithstanding."

  "No matter what, you get no grommet for the pull, not here. What you get here for the pull is you get this screw-in thing we give you instead. See? Like a button. It's like a button with this like screw-in thing it's got on it sticking out going one way. Whereas what you already got yourself here on this one, it's a grommet. See this? This is a grommet. But me, when you do business here in this place with us as your window-shade people, it's exclusively this button treatment which I give you—lucid yes or lucid no?"

  "Definitely, definitely," I says to him. "But so I should like go home, you're saying to me," I says to the window-shade man.

  "Go home," the window-shade man says to me.

  "See what the setup is."

  "The situation," the window-shade man says to me.

  "Check it out," I says.

  "Check out the brackets," the window-shade man says to me. "Then you come back here and we get down to cases with a grasp of what the score is. Or you go up the block. Because you can always, you know, go up the block. There is always the freedom of you go up the block. Because with some people it's grommet and the question of the cuff is secondary or even absent."

  "It's not a factor with me, I don't think."

  "The grommet's not."

  "The way I feel about it now at this stage of the game, the grommet is a non-issue."

  "I know this," the window-shade man says. "I appreciate this," the window-shade man says. "I have every confidence," the window-shade man says.

  "I can go with the screw-in," I says to him.

  "The button," he says.

  "I can definitely go with it," I say.

  "Go home," says the window-shade man. "Get up on a stool. Take a look. See what your situation is. Look at it honestly. Take an honest look. Then if there is something for us to discuss as business people, I promise you, we will go ahead and discuss it."

  "As people doing business," I say.

  "Ah, yes, caught Homer at his nodding, did you? Yes, of course—as you say, as you say—as people doing business," says the window-shade man.

  "In his nodding, I would say," I say.

  "In? Yes, yes—in. Or caught out at, of course," the window-shade man says.

  "So I go home?" says I to the window-shade man.

  "That's it," says the window-shade man. "Unless it is your wish," says the window-shade man, "for us to linger over any of these imponderables of ours."

  "Perhaps upon the occasion of my return," say I.

  Says the window-shade man, "Should you choose for there to be one, that is. For there is the shop up or down the block," says the window-shade man.

  Says I, "But it goes with me or stays here?"

  Says the window-shade man, "You mean this window shade here. You mean while you go elsewhere, do you leave this window shade here."

  "Home," says I. "Home only," says I. "Not elsewhere at all," says I. "But ascertain. Verify. Scope it out."

  "I don't know," says the window-shade man. "It is for you as a person of reflection to resolve," says the window-shade man. "There are difficulties I cannot resolve for you," says the window-shade man. "Pretty multitudinous ones."

  So I says to him, "But it's decidable, you think."

  The window-shade man says to me, "I think—yes, I think. But now I think no—from your point of view, it's maybe going to turn out to be too apophantic for you."

  So I says to him, "Yet mustn't something be done one way or the other?"

  "You're saying this to me as conjecture?" he says.

  "Am I conjecturing?" I say.

  "You want to determine if you are actually, in saying what you said, formulating a conjecture," he says.

  "Absolutely," says I. "But at another level, you could lock the door. You could bar me from the topos."

  "I could come to believe business hours had come to their end," says the window-shade man.

  "Where's the law?" says I.

  Says he, "Belief and the law, you're saying to me belief and the law, they cannot be tessellated."

  "Friendly relations, it makes for friends." says I.

  "Well," says the window-shade man, "extensity and intensity, there's also always all that, isn't there?"

  "Scum-sucking swine," says I. "Grommetless dog."

  "Not grommetless, sir!" asserts the window-shade man. "Never been proved grommetless!" asserts the window-shade man.

  "Point," says I. "Therefore," says I, "speak not to me of gussets," says I.

  "But see you, don't you see you," says the window-shade man, calmer not by half but by much, "that are we not, in this matter, made claimants, then, the pair of us, on common but non-relational ground?"

  "Good," says I to the window-shade man.

  "Which makes this mine," says I to the window-shade man, leaving the window shade to keep to its place in the hands of the window-shade man and plucking the fascia from the face of the window-shade man, no more himself a window-shade man than I a shopper in want of even infrequent dark.