The Saskiad, page 32
"What a lightweight," Marco sneers.
The Captain disappears into thin air.
"Thank God that dweeb is gone, eh boys? Drink up! Another round, Saskia." He gives her a significant look.
They have arranged this ahead of time. She is supposed to creep secretly under the table, take a hold of Tycho's stiff man-thing, and milk it into a golden pitcher. She goes off to get more coffee.
When she returns, Tycho is saying cheerily, "Getting uncomfortable, boys? You look a little on edge, Marco. Are you trying not to think about running water? Isn't it funny how hard it is not to think about something once you've started? Damned if those images of streams and rivers flowing, the sound of water gushing down over the rocks, just keeps coming back to you, no matter —" Marco turns cramoisy. "Oops! There goes another one!" Marco disappears.
Odysseus looks impassively at the two pools, the empty chairs.
"Now it's just between me and you, Odysseus. Now we're down to the real men." Tycho gives Saskia a long significant look.
She goes off to get more coffee.
When she returns, Odysseus takes a tankard from her tray and drains it straight off. He gazes expressionlessly at Tycho.
Tycho sips from his tankard. "I've got to hand it to you, Odysseus, you're doing well. Very well indeed." He lasers Saskia with a long and intensely significant look.
She goes to get more coffee.
When she comes back, Tycho is talking through clenched teeth. "It won't be long now! You can't possibly hold out much longer!"
Odysseus gathers the handles of two tankards in one huge hand and pours the contents of them both with a gushing gurgling sound down his throat. Tycho turns to Saskia, his eyes beseeching. "Saskia . . ." His face turns pale. "Ohh," he moans. His eyes turn up in his head. He collapses. There is no pool below his chair. His bladder has burst inside him.
Pandemonium. Saskia screams, dropping the tray. Tycho rolls out of his chair and hits the floor with a sodden sound. Odysseus calmly drains the last tankard and rises, unhooks the tube from his leg and empties the can strapped to his ankle into the sink. The sink overflows with a gurgling rushing foaming sound and Saskia finds herself in up to her ankles, then up to her thighs. The two-ton table rises off its feet, and Saskia with it, and they and the tankards, trays, and pitchers are swept toward the door, where they jostle each other in the warm froth before rushing out onto a plain. "Interesting," Saskia thinks as she bobs and twirls in the bubbling liquid, "this means I need to go to the bathroom. A textbook case."
And with that thought she realizes she is asleep, and with that realization she asserts control with the magisterial ease that comes of long practice. She pulls the plug on the mighty river. She dries her clothes and inserts herself effortlessly into Wholeworld's bathroom. Now that she has gotten rid of all that unconscious Freudian imagery she can feel quite distinctly that she needs to relieve herself. The toilet is right here, and the lid is up. How easy!
But wait a minute. She is still asleep. In reality, she must be in bed with Mim. She needs to wake up and go down to the bathroom for real.
She wakes up, gets out of bed, goes downstairs and settles herself with a sigh of relief on the toilet.
But wait a minute. She is still asleep. She must still be in bed with Mim.
Wake up!
She opens her eyes. Mim is lying next to her. Yes, this time she is awake. She gets out of bed and hurries downstairs. She settles herself with a big sigh of relief on the toilet and starts to let go.
Hold it. She is still asleep. For pete's sake! She flies out through the window, reenters through the one above. There she is, asleep with Mim. She feels the beginnings of fright. How, exactly, do you wake from a waking dream? Why hasn't she ever thought about this problem before? She can do anything she wants to in this universe: she can fly above the rooftops, travel between galaxies, give herself orgasms. She can do everything in this universe except leave it. She commands, Wake! But the answer comes back, with incontrovertible logic: I am awake.
When she goes to sleep, she draws her bubble down. She must make the bubble go back up. Surely she can do that. She closes her eyes and concentrates. She is at the bottom of the ocean. She starts to swim upward. That's the way! She claws her way up and up out of the pit. She must have been incredibly far down. She can feel the medium (water? air?) lightening around her as she pulls herself upward and upward. The feeling of blankets and mattress begins to coalesce around her. Yes, that's it! Higher! She can feel that she is lying on her side. Her palms are pressed between her drawn-up legs. She really needs to go to the bathroom. Open your eyes, now. Come on, eyes, open up. Open!
She is only raising her eyebrows. She is lying in bed next to Mim, desperately needing to go to the bathroom, and all she can do is arch her eyebrows. The lids! Open the lids!
Her eyes fly open. Her room is around her, clear and solid. She tries telekinesis on the door. It doesn't work.
She is really awake.
She jumps out of bed and runs downstairs, lifts the lid of the toilet and settles on it in the nick of time, just as the stream bursts from between her legs, ahhhh, thank God. The painful pressure in her bladder pleasurably subsides.
She wakes. Her nightgown is soaking wet. Horrified, she sits up and turns on the light. The sheets are wet. The cow and calf are wet. Saskia touches Mim's nightgown. Wet. Like brother, like sister.
21
The morning is still dark and cold, but the walk up the dirt road warms her. The county route is quiet. She turns south toward Ithaca, walking along the shoulder. This must have been what Thomas did, walking in the predawn dark under the stars, turning with his thumb out to face the occasional headlights that sprang up behind him. What did he feel? Disgust? Disappointment?
She runs her hand over the short brush of hair on her head. It feels good to have released that ballast. Bombs away! A balloon, she surged higher. Lighter and lighter. Where will she go? Wherever the winds take her. She is getting out just in time, lifting away from the taff-rail as it disappears into the water beneath her. There is a note on Lauren's door: "You never told me anything so I won't tell you anything either."
Cars are few and far between. The fourth one stops. "Ithaca?" the driver says.
"Fine." She throws in her pack.
He scrutinizes her in the rising light as he drives. "How old are you?
"Eighteen."
He laughs. "No one's going to believe that."
"Seventeen?"
"Fifteen is more like it."
She gives him an impressed look. "Pretty good! Actually, I just turned sixteen."
He rubs a war-drum belly, pleased with himself. As they come into town he observes, "You're crazy to be hitchhiking, a little thing like you. It only takes one wrong number and you're gone, left in a ditch somewhere."
"I'm just going to the bus station." She only says it so she won't have to argue with him. Ten minutes, and he's already playing the father figure. But it turns out the bus station is on his way, so he drops her off. She decides that while she is there she might as well look at the schedule, and as it happens, the next bus is leaving in only half an hour, and as it happens, it's going to the City. What the hell. Wherever the winds carry her.
She buys a ticket, realizing now why she got into the hemp business, so she would have the money to fly away. The sky has lightened to teal, and a persimmon haze in the southeast shows where the sun is about to rise. A triad of gongs shimmers in the gelid air and she looks over the roofs of the orderly Ithacan houses, up to the ridge, where the stone clock tower of Huge Red stands sentinel, asking, "What's the password?" She has no idea. The bus arrives, blotting out the view. She ascends into the gloom, now you see her, now you
PART 5
SASKIA
And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not defrauded you.
With the great wisdom you have gained, with so much experience,
you must surely have understood by then what Ithacas mean.
— Cavafy, "Ithaca"
1
"IS THIS SEAT FREE?"
Curly dark hair, slight frame, soiled windbreaker. She shrugs. "Looks that way." She returns to staring out the window, at a train yard, at fading paint on old brick: Senate Brand Fancy Canned Foods. "This is Brmbledm," the driver said when they left the highway.
"Where are you headed?"
Her gaze drifts back to him. Small dark eyes, wispy mustache. Eighteen? Nineteen? "The City."
"Me too. I'm Russell." He holds out his hand.
"Hello Russell." Shaking it, she throws in a little bonecrushing action for the hell of it.
He smiles uncertainly, showing little gaps between little teeth. It doesn't look good. "Do you have a name, too?"
"Yeah." She lets him wait.
"Do you ... tell people what it is?"
Ishakta Wise? Estasha Kiwi? Thea Iwaskis? "Jane," she says.
"Hello, Jane." He puts his hand out for her to shake again. It's meant to be a joke, this repetition of the handshake, but also, of course, a chance to touch her again. She decides to give him an alluring smile as she treats his hand to some more bonecrushing action. Then she goes back to looking out the window.
"Do you have a last name?" A conversational whiz.
"Jane isn't enough?"
"Jane's fine."
"No," she assures him in a fatigued tone. "It's boring. Plain Jane."
He looks puzzled. She can see crossing his face the decision not to pursue this. "My last name is Tierney," is all he can think to say.
"Hello, Russell Tierney." This time she holds out her hand first and he eagerly inserts his into it for some more bonecrushing.
"Dark," she concedes.
"Excuse me?"
"My last name."
"Is Dark? Dee ay are kay?"
"Yeah."
"Well that's not boring. I never heard of anyone named Dark."
"Funny, everyone in my family is named that."
He laughs, drawing his upper lip behind his mustache and revealing those unfortunate gaps.
"Or was," she adds. "They're all dead."
The smile drains away. "That's too bad. I mean, that's terrible, I guess. I'm sorry." In fact, he does a fairly good imitation of regret.
She gives a shake of her head, a dismissive frown. "It was a long time ago."
He waits a decent interval before asking, in a voice conscientiously emptied of morbid curiosity, "Was it an accident?"
"I really don't want to talk about it."
"Sure." He colors. "That was rude of me to ask, huh?"
"No," she smiles sadly. "People always do." She turns back to the window, to be alone with her thoughts. Car crash? Fire? Boating accident? Execution-style slaying?
She turns from the window. "And you?" she asks briskly, changing to a lighter subject.
"Me?"
"What about your family?"
"They're fine, I guess."
"Big, happy?"
"Excuse me?"
"Big happy family?"
"Pretty big. My aunt's a cool lady. I'm coming from her place right
now. I was up for Thanksgiving. Had a whole week off. Man, it was great."
"Did you eat a turkey?"
Sure.
"Sounds nice."
"Didn't you have Thanksgiving?"
"No. Let's see ... That was the day it was snowing, wasn't it? I think I spent most of the day in a haystack. Good place to stay warm."
He gapes. "Don't you . . . you know, have some relatives or something you go to?"
Jane Dark considers the matter. "No. I've been on the road ever since my family died." She counts the seasons on the ceiling. "About three years, now."
"How old are you?"
"Sixteen."
"You've been on the road since you were thirteen?"
"Is that surprising?"
"It's amazing!"
"It's no big deal."
"Where have you been?"
"Easier to say where I haven't been."
"I mean ... I don't know, like Europe?"
"Europe, India, Tasmania, you name it."
"How do you pay for food and stuff?"
"I deal some. I steal some. But only from the rich. I usually hitchhike, I'm only on a bus today because I met this guy who had a return ticket he didn't need and I saw it was for the City and thought, What the hell? It'll be good to see the old City again."
"Have you ever had any trouble, hitching?"
Jane Dark laughs. "I'm trained in self-defense."
"You do have kind of a strong grip."
"That's nothing. Imagine five times that around your testicles." He looks blank, then guffaws. "It works."
"I bet it does!"
"I could also put my thumbs on your eyeballs and jam them into your head. Incredibly painful."
"Man!"
"You wouldn't be able to see for days."
"Stop!" He cups his palms over his crotch, then over his eyes, then over his crotch again, as if he needed four hands. "I guess I've been warned."
"Tell me about your Thanksgiving, Russell," she says dreamily. "What about it?"
"Tell me some cozy things. What's your aunt's place like?" "Its nice."
"Give me some details."
"I don't know, it's just a nice place. She makes you take your shoes off when you come in." "Carpeting?" "Wall-to-wall."
"Tell me what you had for Thanksgiving dinner." She settles back in her seat, closing her eyes. "Well. . . turkey . .." "Golden brown?" "Yeah."
"Who else was at the table?" "My aunt and uncle and Ryan. He's my cousin." "How old is he?" "Seven." "Cherubic?" "Excuse me?" "Blond, beautiful?" "He's got dark hair." "He looks up to you?" "I guess. Sure." "So what else is for dinner?" "String beans, mash potatoes." "Stuffing?"
"Sure."
"Heaped high on your plate, steaming?" "Yeah, I guess." "What's for dessert?" "Apple pie a la mode." "What flavor ice cream?" "French vanilla." "Mmm."
"I know what you mean, it makes me hungry just talking about it." "And then you went to bed?"
"No, we saw the football highlights. Then I played ping-pong with my uncle."
"In the wood-paneled basement." "In the game room." "Wood-paneled." "Wallpaper. I'm pretty sure." "You won."
"My uncle kicked my butt." "I'm sorry."
"Nah, it was OK. He gets kinda pissed off when he loses." "And then you went to bed." "Yeah, eventually." "Where?" "In Ryan's room." "Where did Ryan sleep?" "Same room. They have this foldout cot." "You slept on the cot." "Yeah."
"Under a thick quilt." "Just a sheet." "And you slept deeply." "Sure." "Naked." "Excuse me?"
"You slept without clothes on."
"I. . ." There is a pause, and he goes "huh."
"You sound like a steam engine when you do that. Did you sleep without clothes or didn't you?"
"I sleep in my underwear. I can't believe we're talking about this."
"Mm." Jane opens her eyes and wriggles sensually in her seat, stretching in a feline manner. "Thank you, Russell, that was nice. Now I've had Thanksgiving, too. I'm going to take a nap now." She brings up her weather-beaten feet and turns toward the window, closing her eyes.
2
A man is but a man; he can do no other. In the City bus station, Russell asks, "Where are you staying?"
"No idea. Something will come up, it always does."
It's kind of funny, really, watching him count off the seconds before saying it, so he won't seem too pantingly eager. "You can stay where I'm staying, if you want. I'm sure my friend won't mind."
Jane Dark gives him a frank scrutinizing smile. "All right."
"Great! Here, let me take your pack."
"No, don't."
On the shrieking subway he wedges his knapsack between his feet, looping one shoulder strap around a sneaker. "Keep an eye on your pack," he says. "What am I saying, you already know that." He performs an odd hobbling of his eyes and shoots himself in the temple. They walk up into daylight. A steel shutter is spray painted with "Magnolia" in berserk letters, black and orange. An electronics store suffocates in fluorescent signs. "You can go that way and live to tell the tale," he points left. "One block this way," he points right, "puts you in Zululand."
They walk past stoops divided by spear-tipped iron fences which give the impression that dirt and wind-blown trash will be stolen if they're not protected. Glancing up and down the street, Russell mounts to a metal grate, unlocks it and the door behind, draws her through. "I lived in North Dakota with my grandparents for a year," he says as they ascend the dark stairs. "In winter you'd hear about some bozo who didn't have his keys ready when he came home and they'd find him the next day, frozen solid on the doorstep. That's what it's like around here. You got to present at least a moving target." On the top floor he wrestles with the bolts on a metal-clad door and calls into the apartment as he opens it, "James?" "Yo!"
"I'm back! I brought someone with me."
In the kitchen, James looks up from a plate of waffles drowning in Log Cabin. "Who's this?"
"Jane Dark. I met her on the bus."
He stands in a mock courtly manner and holds out a clammy hand. He is built like a padded door, with that thin film of fat all over that you first notice in the way it rounds chin and shoulders. If humans tasted any good, he would be the one the lions would lick their lips over. "Is she staying here?" he asks Russell, returning to his lunch.
"I said you wouldn't mind."
"You could try asking me first. No offense, Jane. I would have said yes. But it's the principle of the thing."
"I figured —" Russell says, casting an embarrassed look at Jane. "Forget it. Look, I've got a gig in Astoria tonight, so I gotta eat and get ready. We'll talk. Good meeting you, Jane, make yourself at home." He disappears behind the plate as he raises it to slurp the syrup.
The apartment is as gloomy as the tiled halls of Tyler Junior. The view from the soot-streaked windows is a wall of yellow brick. The common room is empty except for a television on the floor, a plastic couch, and a pile of boxes that turn out to hold Tab. "You'll sleep on the couch, I guess," Russell says sadly. He indicates a closed door. "That's James's room. Here's mine."
