He opened the door, hand extended. His face: the deep lines in his forehead and cheeks had a look of violence about them, more like wounds than like the marks of age. His eyes, blank and fierce, peered from under thick folds of heavy, purpled skin. The patches of discoloration on his skin made him look almost as though he’d been beaten. I did not take his offered hand; unoffended, he retracted it. “Come in,” he said. “Sit down.”
I took a few steps in and said, “I prefer to stand.”
“All right,” he said affably. “I’ll stand with you.”
We faced each other, he leaning against his desk. I had not taken his aging into account. While he was standing, his full diminishment was apparent—the paunch, the shrunken chest and shoulders, stiffened as if in preparation for blows. I had forgotten that he would be over seventy.
“So,” he said. “Tell me about this dog.”
“It barks all day and sometimes at night,” I said without conviction. “It wakes me up.”
“And you’ve spoken to the owner?”
“Yes, I think he may be abusing”—my voice caught on the word—“abusing it. I know—does this seem strange? Has anyone ever come to you with anything like this?”
“As a matter of fact, yes. I don’t remember very well, but, yes, I believe there was . . . something.” He looked down, as if in thought.
Softly I said, “Do you remember?”
He looked up and there it was, the beam of his ruthless animal attention. He fixed me with it. I fixed back. He straightened up and went to sit behind his desk. I went farther into the room. He leaned back in his chair and said, very coldly, “Tell me what you mean to say.”
“So you remember?”
“Remember what?” Genuinely irritable, reflexively curious. “The dog case?”
“Debby Roe. Do you remember that name?” I paused. “Do you remember me?”
His lips parted, and then surprise dawned on his old, beat-up face; warmth lit his receded eyes. “Debby? The girl who came with her mother?” He relaxed and sat forward, smiling—smiling—for a long, pleased moment. “You’re much changed,” he said.
“So are you,” I said, sharply.
“I didn’t recognize you. But I remember you. How’ve you been?”
I didn’t know what to say. I just stood there. Like I had so long ago.
“Are you married? Kids?”
“Yes,” I said. “Or I was for a while. And . . . I raised his daughter from a previous marriage. Or I helped.”
He nodded vigorously. “Similar. Married, past tense. No kids. I wanted them, but she couldn’t. That, really, that broke us up. That and something else that might not surprise you.”
“Nothing would surprise me,” I said flatly.
He laughed and pointed playfully at me. “I always knew you had a dry sense of humor!” He came back out from behind the desk and casually sat on it with one hip. He indicated a chair. “Come on, sit down!”
I did. I sat down in his reality as if I’d never left it.
“I don’t think you came here about a dog.” He paused; I shook my head. “So why did you come?”
“Guess,” I said.
“I hope not to shoot me.” (Smiling.)
“Why would I do that?” (Not smiling.)
For the first time, he looked uncomfortable. “Listen,” he said. “I don’t want to play games.” He stood up straight. “I understand how inappropriate I was, especially to you. I even knew that at the time, you were so young, so—” He began to pace, walking past me to the window and back. “And there were others I overstepped with, much worse than with you. And I was punished. I mean, punished. The secretary after you—she was some years after you, I was married by then—God! That wrecked my life, my marriage, finally everything. I lost my standing, my career. I’m lucky I’m not cancelled, because, believe me, I have to work. All my money was spent—”
“On paying people off?”
His shoulders sagged. “Yes,” he said. “Yes, Debby, that was some of it.” He took a few steps closer and looked at me intensely. “Listen. I told you I was sorry at the time, and I meant it. I mean it now. It may not matter, but you were the only one I felt that way about. Because you were different.”
He stood and walked back to the desk and sat on it again, fully this time. He said, “I thought you were probably a virgin.”
“I was.”
He closed his eyes. “I knew it.”
I stood. “I guess that’s why you didn’t want to fuck me.”
He opened his eyes.
“You were too moral to spoil a virgin.”
He frowned slightly; his hand came to his jaw. “What are you—?”
I went closer. “Or were you really just ‘not interested’?”
Slowly, he took his hand from his jaw. The gleam in his eyes was filthy.
“Oh,” he said. “I was interested. I was very interested. I just—”
I tried to kick him in the balls, but he squeezed his legs together. I hit him in the face, slapping wildly; he merely ducked his head. On his desk, I saw a heavy mug of pencils and pens; I grabbed it up, spilling the contents.
“No!” he said, grappling at my arm. “Debby, stop it!”
“Minority Report,” by Mary Gaitskill
Source: News Flash Trending
0 Comments