It's a bit late in the novel to introduce new characters. Is there one single rule of fiction that I've left unbroken? Still, to leave out the basso of Lamont Dixon telling me to "leave those dykes alone," would be unconscionable. And then, what would be the point of sharing the remark without the explanation of it?
There was an apartment building North of the Garage, also owned by Charles Winston, which housed any number of interesting characters. Some of these folks parked their cars monthly and thus were known to us car jocks. Lamont had some blonde on his massive arm, she up on tippy-toes, on one occasion. She lived in that building, and had a serious crush on Lamont. I recall him saying something on the order of, "where were you twenty years ago?"
"Not even a gleam in mother's eye, Lamont."
Then commenced that basso laugh.
"No I s'pose not."
He had nothing but stern warnings for Stevie and I when we took to socializing with 'those dykes.' I recall the motivation: Azuwbah was a dope smoking artist hippy freak, and Stevie was unable to resist her. I must've gotten swept up in the temptation to have a place to hang out without having to go all the way up the block and home. Of course, the other one, Zandra, wore the pants. She had the car, the little blue Datsun that lived up on five. Bit by bit, we did get swept up.
So it was that on Sunday, February 6th, following Stevie's lead, I went up after work to hang out with the dykes. The two women were yet another pair of opposites that had attracted. Zanda was always in motion, the masculine side of the lesbian equation. She did not look the part, however. She was short and slender. The other one, Azu, was dark and exotic. I would not have attributed femininity to her either, really. Azu was the soul of repose. It was Azu that held Steven Harrison in thrall. There was the predestination at work. As seems to be so often the pattern, I inspired a change in teams, but someone else was called in to pinch hit. Steve and Azu are together still, as are Lucy and Justin. They became the pairs that made it over the years. Heidi and I have had a rougher terrain to cover.
Sitting around smoking dope with them on that Sunday after work was just the sort of diversion that was called for. It had been a long day, so that first visit was short. Beneath the entry in the appointment book, I wrote "fried," an indication that I was tired to the bone after much exertion. I soon would be asleep, resting up for the big concert that now loomed a week away.
Then, on the day after the big Eventworks event, the dance started right back up. The indications of either debilitating stress to the fabric of life and/or post partum depression, neither situation clinical, are there in the notes of the appointment book as it screams towards its de-facto end in inconclusiveness. I canceled my class with Lee on Monday the 14th of February. Instead, I went with Justin and Heidi out to Walden pond. This was an attempt to blow off steam. Justin and I went up there not infrequently, Thoreau fans that we were. That we took Heidi along in tow is striking. I don't think she was really planning to go; I think it was a spur of the moment thing. She'd stopped by just as we were getting under way, and she jumped at a chance to go on a bit of a road trip, to get out of town for a bit. Ever the traveler, mostly spontaneous.
Into the Van Dyke-mobile we got. Justin and I were all suited up. We were wearing our boots. As Lamont says, we were all bundled up like ‘polio bears.’ She was a bit under-dressed, only her down vest, her scarf, her wool cap, and her jeans. Her feet in their tube socks were clad only in her Adidas runners. Off we went.
Ah, Walden Pond. Scene of much Thoreauvian tom-foolery! All the ghosts are standing on the hill. Ellery Channing in his waistcoat and Mara Monetti with her olive skin and merciless, unforgiving half smile. Our Lady of perpetual rejection. How we all pored over “Walden” (the book, not the pond). How we devoured “Week On the Concord and Merrimac!” How we knew that the ice was still being cut into two foot cubes in late March, for there was no refrigeration other than that in the nineteenth century. These ancient patterns of nature were still being monitored and exploited by human industry. Here it was mid-February. We were experiencing a temporary warm spell, a moment of thaw.
“Let’s cross the pond on the ice,” the young Viking cries out! Down the hill she goes, trailing the scarf. We are following behind. Justin looks at me, poker-faced, maybe just a trace of smile. There is half an inch of water on top of the ice. My boots are wet in a minute. The water is bitterly cold. Ice water! Refreshing. We are now about in the middle. We have caught up to Heidi, as she has begun to be uncertain. Her pace has slowed. There are groans and cracking sounds under foot. (But the little fishing cabins are still perched out on the pond. I think you could have driven a pickup across this ice.) Justin starts telling, in a quiet, matter of fact voice, of the effects of hypothermia. “Should any of us fall in, we’ll have, what? Two minutes, three minutes at the most?” I know this is complete and utter bullshit, but the damage is done before I can offer a scholarly rebuttal. Flighty Heidi has taken flight, running, splash splash splash back towards the shore.
Van Dyke and I are alone on the ice.
I feel like Aaron Burr may have felt, after his pistol ball connected with Hamilton and he saw his rival crumple. My feet want to turn towards the stricken Heidi Walker, my friend, my sister, who I have effectively shot by this display of foolishness. But which friend do I honor? I want to run after Heidi so badly. Do I? No. Should I have? I should have… I’ve been in love with her for years, beating around the bush (to use a telling phrase) since “first I saw her on the village green.” “I love her as I loved her, when we were sweet sixteen.” But Van Dyke is beside me laughing and we are sauntering back to the car. I’m telling him that he’s wrong, that the ice is thick. He levels that half serious gaze and says ‘you’re sure?’
In the car, Heidi is a shivering sobbing mess. She’s taken off her Adidas and socks, all sopping, and her feet are purple. She’s rubbing them, weeping, shaking, rocking. I climb into the front seat, but I want to be back there and hold her, console her. My pity is like a fist in my throat. I cannot move. I’m pinned by my concern about Justin’s opinion of my behavior. He’s gone off on me before, and I can’t do anything but jockey for favor. I’m in too deep. Justin has his cynical side. He's not guided by pity. He likes it when we hoist ourselves by our own petards. It's impossible for me to go against this tide of incivility. I am in some twisted version of Romeo and Juliette, but nobody’s going to die. I can’t even get myself to sing under a balcony. I can’t even say the words. Justin, bringing up the rear, opens the door and gets in. He looks at the steering wheel for a moment, and puts the keys in the ignition. He hops out the driver's side door, which he has yet to close. He walks around to the sliding door, and opens it with a yank. So now it’s Justin that’s in the back of the bus, consoling the Flighty Heidi. She’s gasping for control, and for her eternal smile. She regains it all at last, with apologies. We’re on our way back to town. I’m silent in front, twitching my tail. He “put her down on the other side of the river” I’m sure.
In the evening, I drop by at Zanda and Azu's for a bowl. Gail is in tow, having popped by at the Garage. I'm working on the dance steps that will get me out of Gail's needy grip. I think a visit to the dykes' will help this process along. Gail is not a dope smoker, so in keeping with the theme of colliding worlds and failures of gallantry, I'm toking away while she stares at the three of us stonily. Later, it will just be the two of us in my stinking apartment. I send her home un-stroked, rebuked. In short order, I will get up the nerve to "break up" with her, ripping the band aid off with dispatch. She later tried to run me over with her car as I waved at her from a walk along the Fenway. I deserved it.
I stagger through Smith on Tuesday the 15th, and then cancel all else until Chorale rehearses at 4. In the margins, floating among the crossings out, I write that I am sick. I caught cold at Walden pond. Azu is also sick. I've been doing too many of those white crosses, stayed awake too long, and now I crash. The appointment book lasts for three more days, with its circadian rhythms of classes and work. It also breaks out in a rash of remarks, not sotto voce, but in caps encircled or boxed. "Sizzle."
"Sleep!"
"Cooked."
"Fried, burnt!"
A trip to New York is encircled and x'd out.
"To reschedule..."
On the 21st of February, 1977, I note my appointment with Anderson Lee at 11:00 AM.
That's the last mark in the book.
The rest is the silence of flipping through the empty pages.
