This All Happened(95)
He once asked Maisie to marry him, and she started chatting to a man at another table. I have told him that he fears success. What? When something good comes by you sabotage it.
He nods slowly at this.
30 Been reading Thucydides. Where he says he’s not interested in the applause of the present, but writing for future attention. Here I am, 2,500 years later, reading his words, feeling his person.
The ancients were equal to us in diplomacy and civilization. It might take them an afternoon to bone up on warfare (theatre of the air), and then they’d be a match for anyone. Technology does not outstrip diplomatic methods.
December
1 Today I polished shoes. I took my old leather coat and stitched the armpit. I soaked my feet in an enamel basin. I threaded new laces. I scoured the bathtub. I drew a sketch of the harbour. I bought the Manchester Guardian. I finished a novel. It takes just as long to read a novel as it did ten years ago. It still takes nine months to have a baby. If a woman walks away from you, it’s with the same gait as if it happened in the eighteenth century.
I have stopped eating pasta. I will make pastry and bake a pie. I will ignore the clock. I will wash down the windowsills. I will study the town with binoculars. I will extract the precise quality of love that objects possess.
2 We are learning carols at Oliver’s. Max’s new baby asleep in Oliver’s bedroom. Una sitting by the piano hugging a stuffed cheetah.
Me: I dont think this is what Maisie had in mind. Oliver: I think Maisie can have her mind changed. Think she won’t mind?
Oliver: I think she’ll look in and say this is something else.
Maisie arrives. She has a box of beer and the carol sheets. A studded leather belt that makes her tough. She’s letting her hair grow. She had asked my opinion on this, quietly, and I’d said let it grow. Around the piano she has Daphne and Alex while she plays and they try harmony.
Me: How can you know the next note?
Maisie: It’s all written down on the sheets. You dont have to guess.
I look around for Oliver’s pregnant student. I’ve forgotten Oliver is circumspect.
Being shocked at how badly Alex sings. Knowing she has said she can’t sing but never knowing it was that bad. She was reticent about singing and we were all, separately, encouraging her and finally she blurts out a random note and at least her ear understands it’s outlandish or maybe she recognizes now the reaction of others to tone-deaf singers but she stops after three notes and retires to the couch.
Oliver leaves on Silent Night because he can’t handle singing a song that possesses serious, sentimental conviction. He doesnt have the bone you need to shift the corniness aside, the irony and the slyness to allow the heart room to manoeuvre in the mood of a genuine song. He left to get a beer and I wonder if he is bereft of a clear bone of sincerity.
Then I see he’s just gone because he can’t handle Maisie back in his house and all of the above is false.
Max and Daphne are leaving with Eli, and Max admits to taking a half-carton of egg nog topped up with my Old Sam. He has it tucked in the tweed pocket of his overcoat. Sorry about this, Max says. Will make it up to you. He opens the mouth of the carton to show me the contents. This is while it’s sticking out of the coat pocket. I love the fact that he thinks he can do this. I love the comfort.
3 Maisie says, After Christmas, I want to party hard. I want to go out with Max and Wilf and I want to have a good time. What about work.
I’ve been working. After Christmas I’m going to devote myself to partying.
I meet Oliver in the bathroom at the Spur. He says, You just missed out. A guy was sharing a line of coke. Man, it burnt my nostrils. I couldnt tell the guy it had no effect because it was a freebie. But good coke, Gabe, doesnt burn at all. If it burns, you know it’s full of Old Dutch.