The Uses of Enchantment (27 page)

Obsess, I said. How many times have you read this book?

I’ve never read it. Not in the way that you’ve read all of these books.

She gestured at my bookshelf.

You think I read differently from you?

I’ve never read it straight through, from beginning to end.

Because you find it boring, I said.

No, she said. It’s more complicated than that.

Can you try to explain it to me, I said.

It depends, she said. Earlier today you didn’t care about my feelings.

I do care, I said. Why haven’t you read
Dorcas Hobbs
.

Because, she said. I’m afraid to ruin what I’ve imagined is a really good story.

What Might Have Happened

T
hey stopped for lunch in a small town not far from the quarry. Their second diner meal together in as many days of knowing each other, the girl observed.

Actually, the man said. We’ve barely known each other a full day. Not even twenty-four hours.

The girl poured four creamers into her coffee cup until the liquid came even with the rim. Her thawing hands still smarted; tearing open the sodden paper creamer tops, she feared her fingernails might bleed.

Depends on what you think of as a day, she said. Let’s say your doctor tells you that you shouldn’t drink more than three cups of coffee a day. How do you know when one day is over and the next has begun?

Usually when you go to sleep, the man said. Which is why I count in hours. Sometimes I don’t sleep for six consecutive twenty-four-hour periods. Which could be construed as the same long day.

Your ex-wife wanted you to try meditation, the girl said. She claimed you were anxious.

I’m sure she did, the man said. My ex-wife believes if you die from cancer it’s your own fault.

You can also die from lack of sleep. Did you know there’s a Jewish family in Bologna who has a hereditary sleep condition? Starting near the age of thirty their bodies stop making a protein and they can no longer sleep. They stay awake for seven years, then they die.

Being awake for seven years is like being alive for fifteen years, the man said.

They did age more quickly, the girl said. I saw pictures. Did you notice that sign as we were driving last night?

What sign, the man said.

The sign that said “Next Gas: 23 Days, 37 Nights.”

What about that sign, the man said.

I thought it was funny, the girl said. To measure the distance of gas in days and nights.

Those were mileages based on—

I know, the girl said. But I misunderstood it for a moment. It made me think of Scheherazade and the
Thousand and One Nights
.

Is that how you see yourself? the man said. You are my Scheherazade?

I’m a teenager, she said. It’s my prerogative to see myself reflected everywhere throughout the ages. You’re not eating.

I should eat more protein, the man said. Sleep is a protein. It can be found in eggs.

Of course the real reason you can’t sleep is because of me, the girl said.

You.

The terrible guilt you feel, the girl said. Before it was a part of your daily life. But now that you’ve “forgotten” the guilt, it keeps you awake at night. You must come to terms with who you were, and then you’ll sleep like a baby.

The man laughed. He jammed his fork into his eggs, shoveled the quivering jumble into his mouth.

The girl cringed. He was ugly when he ate.

He clanged his egg-messy fork on the Formica tabletop.

You need to start coming up with some different story lines, Scheherazade, he said. I’m getting sick of this one.

The man paid the check while the girl visited the restroom. In the milky mirror she could see that she’d aged, too, like the sleepless Jewish family from Bologna. Fifteen years in one night. Her cheekbones were more mounded, her mouth wider and resting more flatly on her teeth. She was so tired that her eyes felt like balls of lint, incapable of locating contours or anything more specific than the gross outlines of things. Everything seemed very far away—her exhaustion, her vinegar-chip canker sores, her need to pee. She knew that she must not sleep before the man did. She vowed to herself that she would not. They were having a parallel experience that would be disrupted if she abandoned him like that.

The man drove them to a small general store that was, he said, only three miles from the cabin.

Supplies, he said. What do you like to eat?

Nothing in particular, she said. Should I come in?

All the same to me, he said, turning off the Mercedes and pocketing the key.

Won’t they know you here? she said.

These people up here love to not know me, he said.

She followed him into the ancient store, the floorboards cupped, the front door weighted with a Diet-Rite can on a dirty string. The old woman behind the glass deli case aggressively did not notice them.

The food here dates back to about the mid-century, the man said, not out of earshot of the old woman. He showed the girl a box of cereal, its front sun bleached to a puke-beige color. The man picked up a carton of milk, a dozen eggs, a cardboard flat of bacon. The girl added a packet of dried biscuit mix and some black tea to their basket. The man struck off in search of toilet paper, leaving her alone beside the chips display.

Hello, she heard a woman say.

Hello, she heard the man say.

Fancy meeting you here, the woman said.

Fancy that, the man said.

I didn’t know you and Laura were still together. I heard you split.

We—we did split, the man said.

Oh. So then—

But it was an amicable split. From a property perspective. I have visiting rights with the house.

The woman laughed. Those are the best kind of divorces, she said. I had one of those with my first husband. Did you know that my cabin here originally belonged to his family?

I didn’t know that, the man said.

It’s the truth, the woman said, as though she’d asked him to believe something very unbelievable. Are you alone?

The woman’s voice sounded mockingly hopeful.

The man paused. The girl poked her head out from the aisle in which she was eavesdropping.

No, the man said, spotting her.

Hello, said the girl.

Hello, said the woman. The woman was hyper-blond with a faceful of orange makeup.

Who is this? The woman’s eyebrow raised as though she expected a delicious answer.

I’m his daughter, the girl said.

But I though you and Laura—

From a previous marriage, the girl said.

Ah, said the hyper-blonde.

Actually, the girl said, he and my mother were never married.

Really, said the hyper-blonde.

She was so clearly a gossip, the girl thought. Clearly she saw herself in her own mind repeating this story to great acclaim. This was how she best envisioned herself. This was when her image of herself came most colorfully to life.

Now now, the man said, his tone sweet and chiding. No need to air our dirty laundry in public.

He smiled fake-tensely at the hyper-blonde.

He didn’t have a clue I existed until last year, the girl said. My mother never told him.

This is just our little get-to-know-you father-daughter trip, the man said. Did you find what you needed in the bread aisle, sweetie?

Even though we got to know each other pretty well already on the camping trip, the girl said.

The camping trip, said the hyper-blonde.

With our church group. He was my leader. We almost made a very large mistake because we thought we were strangers. We realized at the last minute that we were related.

Huh! the hyper-blonde exclaimed.

We mistook our attraction to one another as sexual, the girl said. In fact it was familial. He was attracted to me because I reminded him of a lost part of himself. It’s easy to confuse those attractions.

There are some very confused people in this world, the man said.

The hyper-blonde licked her teeth.

I have to meet Alain, she said. But it’s been great seeing you. And meeting—I’m sorry, what was your name, dear?

Ida, said the girl.

Great to meet you, Ida. You’re a beguiling young lady.

She smiled approvingly at the man and told him to give her best to Laura—
whoops I mean
, she struggled.

No problem, said the man.

The woman tucked her chip bags under her fitted parka and headed toward the cash register.

The man and the girl hid in the beer aisle until they heard the rise and fall of the Diet-Rite can.

The man paid for the groceries with cash, of which he had very little remaining.

Do you know who that was, the girl asked, after he’d pulled the Mercedes out of the parking lot.

Of course, the man said. I mean…a friend of my ex-wife’s I’m guessing.

And of yours, the girl said.

I doubt that, the man said.

She was always hitting on you. Trying to make you cheat on your ex-wife.

Her? the man said. Surely I’m not her type.

Exactly, the girl said. She liked you because you were a dullard with a shrimp allergy. If only she knew.

She’s beginning to know, the man said. Nice tale spinning, Scheherazade.

The girl took this as a compliment. She was pretty certain it was meant as a compliment.

Her advances made you uncomfortable, the girl continued. She pretended to be your ex-wife’s closest friend. Also, you found her physically repulsive.

That remains true, he said. Why did I tell you this?

Because it’s easy to confuse attractions, the girl said.

Ah, the man said. Am I confused?

You were confused. And yes. You are confused.

Before I was confused…

Before you were confused because you were a father figure who experienced sexual feelings toward his daughter figure. Now you’re confused because I may or may not have information about you, and this desire to know the truth—this curiosity—has evolved into an erotic attraction.

Interesting interpretation, the man said.

I’m not wrong, the girl said. Do you want to know why I know I’m not wrong?

Does it involve more terrible secrets about my past?

No, it involves terrible secrets about my past.

Absolutely, then. I want to know why you know you’re not wrong.

I know I’m not wrong, the girl said, because I had a best friend when we were neighbors.

Did I know her?

The girl shook her head. I was worried you might decide you’d rather be sexually attracted to her as a daughter figure.

Did I really seem so fickle to you?

This story isn’t about you, she said. It’s about me.

Sorry, the man said.

You really are a hog, the girl said. I’ve been spoiling you with all these stories about yourself.

I said I was sorry, the man said.

This friend, the girl said, moved to Michigan when I was ten. We lost touch. I didn’t see her again until last year, when I was sixteen. We were both attending a weeklong field hockey camp in Virginia.

What a fun coincidence, the man said.

Unfortunately she sprained her ankle the first day of camp and had to go home, the girl said. So I spent that night talking to her until two a.m. in her dorm room. Finally she asked me to leave so she could sleep, and I felt the most unbearable urge to kiss her.

Did you? the man said. Kiss her?

No! the girl said. But I wanted to kiss her. This disturbed me very much. I worried I was becoming a lesbian.

Late-onset lesbianism, the man said.

The girl stiffened in the passenger seat.

Sorry, the man said. Is irreverence off-limits suddenly?

For the rest of this story it is, the girl said.

Sorry, the man said. So you worried you were a lesbian.

But then I realized that I wanted to kiss her not because I was attracted to
her
but because I wanted some physical way to make contact with a former version of myself. She reminded me of a part of my life for which I had no memory touchstones. We no longer lived in the house. Our photos and belongings had burned. She was the only remnant of that part of my life.

There’s me, the man said.

OK but—until you, the girl said. She was the only remnant.

So the point of this story?

You mean, the girl said, as it pertains to you?

Since all things must pertain to me, the man said.

The point is that you feel attracted to me because I am your memory touchstone. You think you’re attracted to
me
, but in truth you’re attracted to a lost part of yourself. That’s why you want to kiss me. You’re trying to get it back.

The man jammed on the Mercedes’s breaks. The car snaked and slid to a stop.

Jesus, the girl said.

I missed the turn, the man said.

So do you agree?

Do I agree with what?

That you want to kiss me so that you can get back a lost part of yourself.

Who says I want to kiss you, the man said. The road onto which they’d turned was badly plowed and required all of the man’s concentration. The girl could see only trees—to the sides of them, ahead of them, even behind them now that they’d rounded a corner and the main road became lost from view. She should have been scared, but instead, because she was so obliteratingly tired, she felt happy and resigned. This was what it was like to be boiled alive, to freeze to death. Yes yes she understood it now, the drifting-off that equals submission to one’s circumstances. She was no longer responsible for what happened to her. She had positioned herself in the path of the inevitable.

The Mercedes struck a rock and bounced to the right. The front tire embedded itself in a snowdrift. The man pumped the accelerator. He slapped the wheel with both hands, not angrily.

That’s it, he said. Looks like we’re walking. Leave the groceries. I’ll come back with the sledge.

The girl and the man started down the road, each of them huddled inside their own inadequate clothing. After about five hundred feet the road took a dogleg turn to the right. She could see a cabin, the shutters pulled over the windows as if it were asleep.