Betty Blue

22

The little cable car whined as if it were at the limits of its strength, its cabin swinging to and fro in the breeze, two yards off the ground. The only other people in the car were an old couple, so there was lots of room. Still, Betty squeezed herself against me.

“Oh God, oh God… I’m scared…” she said.

I was not exactly at ease myself, but I told her, You must be kidding-this fucking cable car isn’t about to snap TODAY! Millions of people have ridden in it safely. Maybe it’ll crash in ten years, maybe five even-a week from now, perhaps-but NOT NOW, NOT JUST LIKE THAT!! In the end, reason won out. I gave Betty a wink.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “It’s a lot safer than riding in a car…”

The old man nodded his head and smiled.

“It’s true,” he said. “There hasn’t been an accident here since the end of the Second World War.”

“That’s what I mean,” said Betty. “We’re overdue…”

“DON’T SAY THAT!!” I roared. “Why don’t you just look at the scenery like everybody else?”

Whi-i-i-ine…

I got out my vitamin C and gave her one. She grimaced. On the bottle it said eight tablets a day. I rounded that out to twelve, which meant one every hour. They weren’t bad, either… orange flavored. I insisted.

“I can’t take it anymore!” she complained. “I’ve had that taste in my mouth for two days now…”

I didn’t give in. I shoved a yellow tablet into her mouth. I had calculated that at bedtime she would swallow the last tablet in the bottle. According to the label, it was just what the doctor ordered. Add to that a few days in the mountains and a balanced diet, and what more could you ask for to put a little color back in her face. I had given my word to Lisa on the day they left. We were saying good-bye. She begged me to see that Betty didn’t get sick. She said she was worried about her.

Whine… whi-i-i-i-i-ine… If you ask me, they purposely didn’t grease the thing. Taking it up, and taking it down, day after day, year after year, over and over-those people probably had cable cars coming out their ears. The maintenance mechanics probably loosened the bolts once in a while to keep from getting bored-a quarter-turn once a month, a whole turn on days when life seemed too hard. I’m all for facing one’s death, but let’s not go overboard.

“They should relieve those guys every two weeks,” I said. “And keep one in the cabin at all times.”

“Who are you talking about?” she asked.

“Those guys who hold life and death in their hands.”

“Hey, look at all the little sheep down there!”

“Shit, where?”

“Don’t you see those little white dots?”

“OH JESUS!”

There was a guy waiting to open the door for us when we arrived. He had a cap on his head, and a newspaper folded in his pocket. Despite his gentle air, he had the face of an ax-murderer. A few people were waiting to go back down. Not young people with the rage to live, but oldsters, with hats on their heads and big cars waiting for them down below. It gave the place a feeling of wilting flowers. Who cared, though-we weren’t there to have fun.

I took a look at the schedule. The coffin would be back up in an hour. Perfect-just enough time to get some fresh air, before dying of boredom. I turned around, taking advantage of the scenic panorama. It really was beautiful. There were no words for it. I whistled through my teeth. I don’t remember anymore what the place’s claim to fame was, but one thing was sure-it didn’t draw crowds. Except for the sadist who greeted the cable car, there was only the old couple and us.

I set my sack down on a sort of concrete table with compass points on it and pulled up the zipper of my coat. I called Betty over to drink her tomato juice.

“And you…?” she said.

“Listen, Betty, don’t be ridiculous…”

She made like she was going to put her glass down, so I poured myself one, too. It was torture for me. I hate it-I always feel like I’m drinking a glass of blood, but Betty would drink hers only if I drank mine. Though it was a cheap shot, I paid the blackmail-it was just one of those little deaths that we live through every day.

My efforts seemed to be reaping results, though-her face was getting some color back into it, her cheeks were less sunken. For the last three days, the weather had been fabulous. We’d crisscrossed the whole area on foot, breathing the fresh air and sleeping twelve hours a night. We were starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I was sure that if Lisa had been there to see her just then, lovely as the day is long, sipping her tomato juice in the sun, she would have called it a miracle. I myself had to be content with that. I still had a disquieting feeling when I looked at her closely. I felt like I had lost something important that I could never get back, but I didn’t know what. I wondered if I was just imagining things.

“Oh wow! Come here quick-take a look at this…!”

She was looking into a viewer-one of those big jobs on a pedestal that magnifies, the kind you have to keep shoving coins into every two seconds. It was aimed at a neighboring mountain top. I went over to see.

“Incredible!” she said. “I see eagles! Geez, there are two of them, perched on a nest…!”

“Right, it’s a daddy and a mommy.”

“Shit, it’s beautiful…”

“Really?”

She stepped back to let me take a look, but just as I bent over to see, the thing stopped working-all I saw was black. We rummaged through our pockets but we didn’t have any change left. I took out my little nail tile. I tinkered with the slot. But no dice. It was hot. I started to get irked. To be so close to Heaven, and still have to put up with mechanical bullshit-I couldn’t believe it.

The little old lady tapped me gently on the shoulder. Her face sagged, but her eyes were bright-you could see that she’d preserved the essential. She put her hand out to me. There were three coins in it.

“This is all I have,” she said. “Take it…”

“I only need one,” I said. “You keep the rest.”

Her laughter was a tiny stream of water, flowing through foamy lace.

“No, I can’t use them,” she said. “My vision isn’t as good as yours.”

I hesitated for a moment, then took the coins. I looked at the eagles. I told her a little bit about what I saw, then turned the thing back over to Betty. I thought she could describe it better than I could. Though there wasn’t any snow, mountains for me have always been synonymous with avalanches. I had brought a little flask of rum with me. I went over to the sack and took a few swigs. The old man was there, sitting on the table, smiling in the sun, scraping the mud off his shoes, the little white hairs trembling on his neck. I offered him the bottle, but he refused. He motioned to his wife with his chin.

“I promised her when we met that if we lived together more than ten years I’d never touch another drink.”

“And I bet she’s never forgotten that,” I said.

He nodded.

“You know, you might think it’s silly, but I’ve lived with that woman for fifty years now, and I’d do it all over again tomorrow.”

“That’s not silly. I’m kind of old-fashioned myself. I’d like to be able to do the same someday.”

“Yep, it’s tough to go it alone…”

There was enough in my bag to feed a whole family, all delicacies-almond paste, marshmallows, dried apricots, health crackers, those little crunchy things made out of roasted sesame seeds, and a bunch of organic bananas. I put it all out on the table and invited the old couple to eat with us. It was beautiful out. The silence was lovely. I watched the old man busily chewing a cracker. It made me feel optimistic. Maybe I’ll be like that fifty years from now, I told myself… well, let’s say thirty-five to be on the safe side-it seemed less far away than I thought.

We talked easily, waiting for the cable car to come. It arrived, whining. I bent forward a bit and looked down the dizzying descent of the cable. I shouldn’t have looked. I pushed a finger against my throat, pressing on the point of my anxiety. Two women followed a colony of children out of the cable car. One of them looked scared to death, her pupils dilated. As she walked past me, our eyes met.

“If that miracle of modern technology hasn’t come back an hour from now, you’ll know that it was your lucky day and not mine.”

Whereas the trip up had proved to be quite frightening, the trip down was fear itself. The brakes were likely to snap any second-you could distinctly hear them grinding. I was sure they were going to burn up. With all that rubbing there was no doubt in my mind; the car was too heavy. I considered throwing all unnecessary objects-the seats and all accessories, for example-overboard. According to my calculations, the car must have weighed one ton. Once the brakes failed, we would eventually reach a cruising speed of 750 miles per hour. Just behind the finish line, there was a huge buffer made of fortified concrete. Result: impossible to identify the bodies.

I started eyeing the emergency brake, as if it were the forbidden fruit. Betty pinched my arm, laughing:

“Hey, you okay? Take it easy!”

“It’s not a sin to be prepared,” I explained.

One night at the hotel, I woke up suddenly. There was no explainable reason for this-we’d spent the day taking a ten-mile hike, stopping only to drink our tomato juice, and I was beat. It was three o’clock in the morning. The bed was empty beside me. I saw light coming from under the bathroom door. Now it happens that even girls get up during the night to pee-it was something that I’d been able to verify on several occasions-but three o’clock in the morning seemed a bit unusual. Anyway, so what, I yawned. I stayed there stretched out in the dark, waiting for her to come back, or for sleep to overtake me again. But nothing happened. I couldn’t hear anything. After a while I rubbed my eyes and got up.

I pushed open the bathroom door. She was sitting on the edge of the bathtub, her hands clasped behind her neck, elbows in the air, staring at the ceiling. There was nothing to see on the ceiling-nothing, just white. She didn’t look at me-she just rocked lightly back and forth. I didn’t like it.

“You know, sweetheart, if we’re going to make it to the much talked-about glacier tomorrow, we’d better get some sleep…”

She looked right through me. I could see right away that all my work was out the window. She was horrifyingly pale-her lips were gray. I felt the bamboo slivers go under my fingernails as she flung her arms around my neck.

“Oh my God, tell me it’s not true!!” she said. “I HEAR VOICESI!”

I held her head against my shoulder, pricked up my ears. I thought I heard something. I breathed easier.

“I know what it is,” I said. “It’s the radio! The news. There’s always some nut in every hotel who has to know what’s going on in the world at three o’clock in the morning…”

She burst into tears. I felt her stiffen in my arms-nothing was more fatal to me than this, nothing more killing.

“No, God, no… I hear them inside my head. THEY’RE INSIDE MY HEAD!!”

Everything suddenly turned cold-abnormally cold. I cleared my throat, like a jerk.

“Come on, calm down now…” I whispered. “Come tell me all about it…”

I picked her up and carried her to the bed. I switched a lamp on. She turned the other way, poised like a hair trigger, her fist shoved in her mouth. I ran and got a washcloth-I was incredibly efficient-and folded it over on her forehead. I kneeled down beside her. I kissed her. I held her fist to my lips.

“And now do you still hear them?”

She shook her head no.

“Don’t be afraid, it’ll be all right,” I said.

But what did I know? Dumb-ass that I was, what was I supposed to tell her? What could I promise her? Did I hear them in my head, those goddamn voices? I bit my lips fiercely. Next thing you know, I’d be singing her a lullaby, or offering her a cup of poppy-flower tea. So I stayed close, tense and silent, about as useful as a refrigerator at the North Pole. Long after she’d gone to sleep and I’d turned off the light, I was still there, eyes wide open in the dark, waiting for a tribe of banshees to come screaming out of the night. I’m sure I wouldn’t have known what to do.

We came home two days later and I immediately made an appointment for myself with the doctor. I felt tired, and my tongue was covered with bumps. He made me sit down between his legs. He was wearing a karate outfit, with a small light bulb strapped to his forehead. I opened my mouth, death ringing in my soul. It took three seconds.

“Vitamin overdose,” he said.

I coughed delicately into my fist while he filled out some forms.

“Uh, doctor, I wanted to tell you… there’s something else bothering me…”

“Huh?”

“Sometimes I hear voices…”

“It’s nothing,” he said.

“Are you sure?”

He leaned over his desk and handed me the prescription. His eyes became two tiny black slits, and his mouth twisted into a kind of smile.

“Listen to me, young man,” he snickered. “Hearing voices, or punching a clock for forty years of your life, or marching behind a flag, or reading the stock market returns, or tanning yourself under a sunlamp… what’s the difference, really? Believe me-don’t worry about it. We all have our little quirks.”

After a few days my bumps went away. Time seemed to have gone haywire. It wasn’t yet summer, but the days were already warm, white sunlight sprinkling the streets from dawn till dusk. Delivering pianos in such weather was like pulling teeth, but things had gotten back to normal. The pianos were starting to get to me, though-it sometimes felt like I was selling coffins.

Naturally I avoided saying this out loud, especially when Betty was around. I didn’t want to rock the boat. I wanted to keep swimming, making sure her head stayed above water. I kept all daily problems to myself, never saying a word to her about them. I had acquired a certain look in my eye which I used to stare down people who threatened to bother me. Folks are quick to recognize someone who would just as soon kill them as say hello.

I did a good job of keeping trouble away from her. Things went fairly well. What I didn’t like were the times I’d find her sitting in a chair, staring into space. Or when I had to call to her two or three times, or go and shake her. It caused certain physical problems too. Saucepans burning, bathtubs overflowing, and washing machines turning with nothing in them. But all in all it wasn’t horrible. I’d learned that you can’t live under the sky without seeing a few clouds. Most of the time I was happy with the way things were. I wouldn’t have traded places with anyone.

Along the way, I noticed something strange happening to me. Though I had not, in the end, become the writer she dreamed of, and though I could never put the world at her feet-no use looking back-still, I was able to give her all that was inside me, all that I had to give. It wasn’t easy, though. I found myself producing these spoonfuls of honey each day, but not knowing what to do with them. They accumulated into a stone that swelled in my stomach-a small rock. I felt like I had an armload of presents and no one to give them to. As if I’d grown a new, useless muscle, or had arrived with a pile of gold bullion on Mars. It did no good to cart pianos around until my veins were ready to pop, or to run around the house puttering-I simply could not exhaust myself. I could not sap the ball of energy that was inside me. On the contrary-fatigue seemed to feed it. And even if Betty herself didn’t use it, it was hers, I’d given it to her. I couldn’t do anything else with it. I felt sympathy for the general who has hundreds of bombs on his hands, and no war.

I had to watch myself closely-holding onto such a treasure made me nervous. I almost lost Bob as a friend because of it. I’d gone to give him a hand with his inventory. We were on our knees among the boxes, and for some reason we got to talking about women. Ile was the one who started it-it was not exactly my favorite topic of discussion. The gist of what he said was that he was dissatisfied.

“You don’t have to look too far,” he said. “Mine has hot pants, and yours is half crazy…”

Without thinking, I grabbed him by the neck and plastered him against the wall, between the instant mashed potatoes and the Cheez Whiz. I nearly strangled him.

“Never say that again about Betty!” I growled.

I let him go. I was shaking with anger, he was coughing. I left without saying a word. Back at the house, I calmed down. I regretted what had happened. Betty was fixing something in the kitchen, so I took advantage of the situation. I took the phone into the bedroom. I sat down.

“Bob… it’s me…”

“What, you forget something? Wanted to know if I was still alive?”

“I don’t take back what I said, Bob, but… I don’t know… I didn’t mean to do it. Let’s forget it ever happened…”

“It feels like I got a scarf around my throat, made out of fire…”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“Shit, don’t you think you went a little overboard?”

“I don’t know. Only real Love and real Hate can make you do great things.”

“Yeah? Well, then you want to tell me what you used to write your book?”

“I loved it, Bob. I really loved it!”

Bob was one of the privileged few who had read my manuscript. He’d made such a big deal out of it that I finally gave in. I went and got my only copy out of the bottom of a bag. I snuck out of the house with it while Betty was singing in the shower. I really love the way you write, he told me later-but why isn’t there any story?

“I don’t know what you mean, Bob-no story…”

“You know what I mean…”

“No, honestly. Bobby, don’t you get enough stories every morning in the newspaper? Aren’t you a little sick of reading police novels, or science fiction, or the funnies? Haven’t you had it UP TO HERE with all that crap? Don’t you want a breath of fresh air for a change…?”

“Nah, all that other stuff bores me stiff. All those things that they’ve been publishing for the last ten years-I can’t get past the first twenty pages…”

“Of course. Most of the people who write nowadays have lost the faith. You’ve got to feel the energy in a book, the faith. Writing a book should be like knee-jerking four hundred pounds-you should see the author’s veins pop.”

This conversation had taken place a month earlier. I realized now that my readership was too small to go around strangling them, especially the readers I needed to help me finish my roof. There were certain things I couldn’t do alone. It had been Betty’s idea to do it, but it was me who did it.

The idea was to remove about six square yards of roofing and replace it with glass.

“Do you think it’s possible?” she’d asked.

“I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t.”

“Then why not do it?”

“Listen, if you say you really want it, then I’ll give it a try.”

She gave me a hug. I went up into the attic to see what I was in for. I was in for trouble. I came back down and hugged her.

“I think I deserve a second helping,” I whispered.

The job was almost finished. All that was left was to waterproof the joints and install the panes. Bob was supposed to come over in the afternoon to help me carry the glass up, but after the little incident that morning, I was afraid he would manage to forget. I was wrong.

It was extremely hot up on the roof. Betty handed us some beers. She was very excited about spending our first night under the stars-she even laughed once or twice. God knows I would have turned the house into Swiss cheese if she’d have asked me to.

We put our tools away in the last rays of sunset. Betty climbed up to join us with a few Carlsbergs. We spent a while up there together, shooting the breeze, squinting into the light. Things seemed absolutely clear.

After Bob left, we emptied the attic and swept it out. Then we brought the mattress up, along with some munchies and the minimum necessary to avoid dying of thirst. We put the mattress right under the window. She fell backward onto it, her hands clasped behind her head. The night was upon us. We could already see two stars, up to the left. A whole week’s work. The sky was a bargain at twice the price. I asked myself whether we should eat a little or fuck first.

“Hey, do you think we’ll see the moon go by?” she asked.

I started unbuttoning my pants.

“I don’t know… maybe…”

My own tastes were simpler. I didn’t have to go searching the sky for what was in my own backyard. Her underpants knew me so well, I could pet them without getting bitten. I looked under her skirt and found that I had only three fingers left. It didn’t bother me at all.

“Wow, I see shooting stars…!” she said.

“I know what I’m wishing for. Try not to add anything else to the order.”

“No, I mean REAL ONES!!”

I knew that it was either me or the sky. I didn’t chicken out. I decided to fight to the finish. I shoved my head down between her legs. I more or less ate her panties whole. Where were all our problems now? Where was all the shit of the last few weeks? Where was Paradise? Where was Hell? Where had it gone to, the invisible machine that had been grinding away at us? I spread her crack and put my face in it. You’re on the beach, Daddy-o, I said to myself, you’re on a deserted beach, with waves rolling in, lapping at your lips. Daddy-o, I understand why you don’t ever want to stand up again.

When I picked my head up, I was glowing like a nebula. My eye was totally glued shut.

“It’s a little annoying-I’ve lost my sense of depth perception,” I said.

She smiled. She pulled me to her and cleaned my eye with her tongue. I went inside her then, and for quite a while I heard nothing more about the sky-I simply felt the stars behind me, gliding gently past.

Betty was especially into it that night. I didn’t have to outdo myself to ring her chimes. It thrilled me to see her enjoying it. I even slowed down to make it last longer. She got lathered up before I did. I felt it coming. I thought about the Big Bang theory. We lay there stuck to each other for a good ten minutes afterward, then dug into the chicken. I’d brought up a bottle of wine, too. By the end of dinner her cheeks were light pink and her eyes shone. It was rare that I saw her so calm and relaxed, so-how can I say it-almost happy… yes… almost happy. It made me forget to sweeten my yogurt.

“How come you’re not like this more often?” I asked.

She looked at me in such a way that I didn’t want to repeat the question. Why insist? We’d already discussed it a hundred times. Why always come back to it? Was it that I still believed in the magic of words? I remembered perfectly our last conversation on the subject. It hadn’t been very long ago. I knew it by heart. Jesus Christ, she’d said, shivering, can’t you see that life is against me-that all I have to do is want something to know that I can’t have it? I can’t even have a baby…

When she said that, I could see the doors slamming shut all around her, and there was nothing I could do to open them. There was no use arguing, no use trying to show her how wrong she was, how easily things could be worked out. There’ll always be some joker around who shows up to treat a third-degree burn with a glass of water. Me, for instance.