I'm writing a book. This is an excerpt from Chapter 5.
She was hungry for information, so I fed her. She had a burning intelligence, and somewhere in my mind I felt that if it stopped - if I stopped - the flame would go out. When we were finished with my collection, we visited book stores and libraries. What should normally be a pleasant diversion became a difficult triage operation as we decided what we wanted to take with us, and what we could afford to leave. Dostoevsky, yes; Austen, no. Vonnegut, yes; Roth, no. I made all the decisions, and she trusted me. I wanted nothing more to take care of her in every way, and I took it upon myself to see to her education.
Sometimes I would try to talk about the author - his life, his dreams, his mistakes, the context in which the book was written. She never had any real interest. It was though her understanding, or acceptance of the literature, transcended analysis. All I could do was make elitist jokes and smile when she got them.
We lived like that for a year, moving from place to place. She would get some low-income job in a department store or a fast-food outlet. I would spend the day in our apartment, working on my book. Sometimes my mind would stop working, and nothing would appear on the page. After a few hours, I would go crazy, and when she came home later in the evening, I'd jump on her with hugs and kisses and insist on watching incomprehensible black and white movies. Other days I couldn't stop writing. The day would fly past, and when she came home later in the evening, I'd be afraid to talk to her in case it interrupted the flow. It works like that sometimes - if you have a worthwhile series of ideas in your mind and you don't write it all down soon enough, or if you get distracted, it's gone forever. It's a terrible feeling to have a hole in your mind like that - to miss something you never had. It's similar to when you can actually feel your brain lose its grasp of a recently vividly-remembered dream as you wake up. There should be a word for it, this form of reverse nostalgia. We used to make up words late in the night, lying on our bed. Pretending that a hurtful comment was a joke to save face was "jidding"; a noise in the middle of the night that you can't sleep through, but which seems to stop whenever you go looking for it, was a "doddle".
She was very tolerant of my wild mood swings, as they must have appeared to her. Over time, however, we grew less affectionate. I assumed that our relationship was maturing, that we were becoming more comfortable with each other, happy to share long silences. It never occurred to me that this was not normal for a young woman. Apart from some initial concerns, it also never occurred to me that there might be a limit to what we could have in common. She never complained about anything, so I carried on.
I paid for our rent, food and other daily expenses. All the money she earned went into her college fund. Sometimes she would complain that she didn't need a degree to do what she wanted to do, but I always managed to talk her out of it. There were times when she expressed a desire to live like that forever, hopping towns and finding unskilled jobs. She was idealistic, which was very attractive. Sometimes she would try to sneak money into my wallet, but these efforts were always short-lived and unsuccessful. She longed to be independent, to pay her own way, but college in this country is expensive, and I wanted her to get a good degree. We never stayed long in the same place. The longest sojourn was four months in a motel in South Dakota. We were registered as an uncle and niece, and told everyone we were on holiday. It was pleasant there. She found a nice job in a bakery and I felt like I could write forever surrounded by tall trees and quiet. Our cover could only hold for so long though. As before, people started asking questions I didn't want to answer.
Every Sunday, she would call her mother. During the first few months, it was always the same. I couldn't hear what her mother was saying, but it sounded to me, in the next room, like distorted screaming and crying. She would spend most of the call trying to calm her mother down. The remainder was spent alternately dodging questions and assuring her mother she was healthy and happy. Talking to her father was out of the question. After a few months, things got better. She assured me that her mother was more accepting of her decisions, even if she couldn't understand them. I had been downgraded from a sick pervert to a misguided simpleton, a trade I was happy to make. However, our travels across the nation had honed our senses into an automatic paranoia, so she assumed that her mother's change of attitude was a ruse to obtain our current location, so the local police could be informed and rescue her from her kidnapper. If only the mother knew - it was she who kidnapped me! I was under strict orders to make no noise when her mother was on the phone. Speaking with her directly was verboten, which was probably for the best. I didn't want to have any part of the lies or the stories. Everyone is entitled to present the best version of themselves to their parents.
One day we stopped at a gas station in Pennsylvania. The manager recognized her, addressing her by name with surprise. She looked at me, but I didn't know what to do. Her new friend then informed us that her mother had told him she had gone to Hollywood to be a famous actress. Apparently this is what her family was telling people. She lived in a small town where everyone knew everyone else. The more intimate the community, the greater the face which must be saved when things don't go according to the plan. Not just any actress, I thought - a "famous actress". No room for debate there, and lots of plausible deniability. Without hesitation, she confirmed her mother's story to the boy, who was staying with his grandparents for the summer. She told him she was in the area filming for some sequences of an Austen adaptation. He accepted her story, took our money, and we left. As soon as we were around the first corner, we laughed. The danger had passed for the moment.
The book was starting to kill me. Every week I didn't finish it was another failure, and the failures were mounting up, piling against every door of every motel and every hotel we wandered into. Sometimes I knew in advance that it was going nowhere, and I could almost feel the homogeneous furnishings mocking me. I had no idea how to finish the thing. It was just rolling along under its own momentum, with no hint of structure, and no end in sight. Additionally, I was constantly revising earlier chapters in light of the ever-changing impressions of its conclusion. She would rub my shoulders while I stared at the computer screen and tell me everything was going to be fine - eventually it would all come together. She believed in me, and at the start, that was enough. When someone you love believes in you, you become capable of extraordinary things. However, as my failures multiplied, my attitude became sharper, and my temper shorter. More often than not, as I had no one else to talk to, I took it out on her.
One day, she brought home a friend from work. They still had their hair nets and name tags when they came through the hotel door. I had assumed an unspoken agreement that this sort of thing would not happen, an assumption which was probably written on my facial expression at that moment. I was almost dismissively introduced as a bookish uncle, and they went back to their excited chattering. I tried to participate, but her friend grew visibly weary at having to explain both the topics of their discussions and the secret language used to advance those topics. As the night grew on, I suggested that it might be time for some of us to go to bed. They both agreed, but didn't move. I realized with horror that they wanted to be alone. I left them watching cable TV. Later, when she came to bed, she assured me that there was nothing for me to worry about, that this new friend of hers was just someone fun to talk to.
The next day, I finished the book.
Sometimes I would try to talk about the author - his life, his dreams, his mistakes, the context in which the book was written. She never had any real interest. It was though her understanding, or acceptance of the literature, transcended analysis. All I could do was make elitist jokes and smile when she got them.
We lived like that for a year, moving from place to place. She would get some low-income job in a department store or a fast-food outlet. I would spend the day in our apartment, working on my book. Sometimes my mind would stop working, and nothing would appear on the page. After a few hours, I would go crazy, and when she came home later in the evening, I'd jump on her with hugs and kisses and insist on watching incomprehensible black and white movies. Other days I couldn't stop writing. The day would fly past, and when she came home later in the evening, I'd be afraid to talk to her in case it interrupted the flow. It works like that sometimes - if you have a worthwhile series of ideas in your mind and you don't write it all down soon enough, or if you get distracted, it's gone forever. It's a terrible feeling to have a hole in your mind like that - to miss something you never had. It's similar to when you can actually feel your brain lose its grasp of a recently vividly-remembered dream as you wake up. There should be a word for it, this form of reverse nostalgia. We used to make up words late in the night, lying on our bed. Pretending that a hurtful comment was a joke to save face was "jidding"; a noise in the middle of the night that you can't sleep through, but which seems to stop whenever you go looking for it, was a "doddle".
She was very tolerant of my wild mood swings, as they must have appeared to her. Over time, however, we grew less affectionate. I assumed that our relationship was maturing, that we were becoming more comfortable with each other, happy to share long silences. It never occurred to me that this was not normal for a young woman. Apart from some initial concerns, it also never occurred to me that there might be a limit to what we could have in common. She never complained about anything, so I carried on.
I paid for our rent, food and other daily expenses. All the money she earned went into her college fund. Sometimes she would complain that she didn't need a degree to do what she wanted to do, but I always managed to talk her out of it. There were times when she expressed a desire to live like that forever, hopping towns and finding unskilled jobs. She was idealistic, which was very attractive. Sometimes she would try to sneak money into my wallet, but these efforts were always short-lived and unsuccessful. She longed to be independent, to pay her own way, but college in this country is expensive, and I wanted her to get a good degree. We never stayed long in the same place. The longest sojourn was four months in a motel in South Dakota. We were registered as an uncle and niece, and told everyone we were on holiday. It was pleasant there. She found a nice job in a bakery and I felt like I could write forever surrounded by tall trees and quiet. Our cover could only hold for so long though. As before, people started asking questions I didn't want to answer.
Every Sunday, she would call her mother. During the first few months, it was always the same. I couldn't hear what her mother was saying, but it sounded to me, in the next room, like distorted screaming and crying. She would spend most of the call trying to calm her mother down. The remainder was spent alternately dodging questions and assuring her mother she was healthy and happy. Talking to her father was out of the question. After a few months, things got better. She assured me that her mother was more accepting of her decisions, even if she couldn't understand them. I had been downgraded from a sick pervert to a misguided simpleton, a trade I was happy to make. However, our travels across the nation had honed our senses into an automatic paranoia, so she assumed that her mother's change of attitude was a ruse to obtain our current location, so the local police could be informed and rescue her from her kidnapper. If only the mother knew - it was she who kidnapped me! I was under strict orders to make no noise when her mother was on the phone. Speaking with her directly was verboten, which was probably for the best. I didn't want to have any part of the lies or the stories. Everyone is entitled to present the best version of themselves to their parents.
One day we stopped at a gas station in Pennsylvania. The manager recognized her, addressing her by name with surprise. She looked at me, but I didn't know what to do. Her new friend then informed us that her mother had told him she had gone to Hollywood to be a famous actress. Apparently this is what her family was telling people. She lived in a small town where everyone knew everyone else. The more intimate the community, the greater the face which must be saved when things don't go according to the plan. Not just any actress, I thought - a "famous actress". No room for debate there, and lots of plausible deniability. Without hesitation, she confirmed her mother's story to the boy, who was staying with his grandparents for the summer. She told him she was in the area filming for some sequences of an Austen adaptation. He accepted her story, took our money, and we left. As soon as we were around the first corner, we laughed. The danger had passed for the moment.
The book was starting to kill me. Every week I didn't finish it was another failure, and the failures were mounting up, piling against every door of every motel and every hotel we wandered into. Sometimes I knew in advance that it was going nowhere, and I could almost feel the homogeneous furnishings mocking me. I had no idea how to finish the thing. It was just rolling along under its own momentum, with no hint of structure, and no end in sight. Additionally, I was constantly revising earlier chapters in light of the ever-changing impressions of its conclusion. She would rub my shoulders while I stared at the computer screen and tell me everything was going to be fine - eventually it would all come together. She believed in me, and at the start, that was enough. When someone you love believes in you, you become capable of extraordinary things. However, as my failures multiplied, my attitude became sharper, and my temper shorter. More often than not, as I had no one else to talk to, I took it out on her.
One day, she brought home a friend from work. They still had their hair nets and name tags when they came through the hotel door. I had assumed an unspoken agreement that this sort of thing would not happen, an assumption which was probably written on my facial expression at that moment. I was almost dismissively introduced as a bookish uncle, and they went back to their excited chattering. I tried to participate, but her friend grew visibly weary at having to explain both the topics of their discussions and the secret language used to advance those topics. As the night grew on, I suggested that it might be time for some of us to go to bed. They both agreed, but didn't move. I realized with horror that they wanted to be alone. I left them watching cable TV. Later, when she came to bed, she assured me that there was nothing for me to worry about, that this new friend of hers was just someone fun to talk to.
The next day, I finished the book.