under the big black sun: a fable
Down Louisville, the numbers regress—Fourth street, Third, Second, but First is not First but Walnut instead and Zero is Riverside Drive. There Mac sits, in the right lane, lowered drawbridge before him. This is maybe the sixth or seventh time he's been in this spot tonight. The first after the Monte Carlo. He's watching.
A red Ford Falcon idles in the left lane, mid-sixties model, windows down. A boy and girl sit in the front, mouths involved. He judges them to be about sixteen. Seeing him, the girl's face does a crimson flush. Mac smiles: a small celebration.
The girl's face suddenly contorts angrily. "You pervert!" When Mac responds with a mild shrug she launches into the boy again with savage determination, eyes turned to the voyeur, tongue flicking about the boy's lips. She begins to writhe, moving his hand roughly upon her breast. The boy's surprise is evident. With violent bouncing motions she laughs aloud, watching Mac watch her, moving.
He drives on.
Mac has a fundamental aversion to the area where he currently resides. Cooper, with whom he works, moves a trailer whenever rent gets behind to the point of certified letters. His family of wife and four year old are used to abrupt still-in-bed midnight hauls behind a tractor cab borrowed from his brother. Their current base is on the south side of Highway 80 opposite the bayou a mile east of the university—sort of on the edge of the edge of town.
It is not even within the city limits.
Cooper and Sybil appear to be having an argument. Their only concession to Mac's appearance is to disguise points of reference with obscure proper nouns. The child sits on the floor absorbed in a coloring book that has long been filled, tracing lines into any available space.
Before Mac can move past, Cooper is warning him that Meyer, their employer and dispatcher, was plenty hot when Mac did not return to the warehouse after the last delivery trip that day. "I had to make another goddamn run for you at ten till five—"
Mac begins a story about two women in a white Jeep; Sybil shrieks Cooper back into the argument. Mac hits the shower, which is past their bedroom.
After Mac dries off he ventures to watch TV. Sybil is not in the room. From the sofa Cooper balefully stares at the wall above Mac's head. Abruptly his face shudders with the thought of another grievance and he rushes back to the bedroom.
Loud voices, and the door slamming. Mac asks the child if there's anything else on that's good. She says this is a scary movie, as if that were evidence enough.
Then she looks squarely up at him, her mouth pulling slightly open, and glances around the room. The child has the habit of restiveness whenever she finds herself in a room alone with an adult.
Despite the clamor of the argument she trudges down the hall, settling down upon the carpet in front of the closed bedroom door and before long is asleep.
Mac switches the channel. The scary movie is replaced by a comic whose jokes seem far away and unfinished. Elsewhere there is news and MASH reruns. He finds himself with the folks of the 700 Club.
At some imperceptible point the argument in the bedroom ceases. Sybil comes out very quietly and crosses the room, sheepish to his gaze. She has changed into a t-shirt, barelegged. Visiting the kitchen for a coke can, she winks at Mac, flashing a bit of undies.
He switches the set off.
He goes to his room at the opposite end of the trailer from the master bedroom—actually a flattened berth up a set of brief steps, containing only a shallow mattress crooked above a larger room Cooper uses for storage. His clothes are situated in the trunk of his car. He searches for what's left of his last paycheck beneath the mattress, stuffing crumpled bills into his pockets.
Lying down, he hears them at the other end of the trailer. It goes on a long time, slows, then starts again.
At this time of night solitary eighteen-wheelers on the Dixie-Overland Highway rattle through. Occasionally there is a plane from the airport, a couple of miles south. Somewhere a car radio is on. Mac can clearly hear something like a computer saying the Lord's Prayer.
Stepping lightly he goes toward the bathroom. The bedroom door is open. Mac peers hesitantly inside, above the inert child. He shouldn't look. He knows that. But here he is, drawn, as the wounded examine a cut to see if bone shows.
The room is totally trashed with clothes and spilled food and empty shoeboxes. Cooper looks asleep. Something like snoring issues from his closed mouth, only rawer. Sybil sits erect against the backboard, sheet pulled up, dull eyes forward, unfocused. Mac sees her hand beneath the sheet, working at something like a persistent itch.
At length she makes the discovery of Mac and interrupts herself with a strange arch of the mouth. She flips him the bird and yells savagely "Get the hell out! Out! Now!!"
Then it's back to 80, veering off at Louisville. Lights are on but the Holiday Grille is totally empty. Mac counts down the streets once more. He slows, coasting toward the foot of the bridge. No Falcon where the Falcon was.
He finally proceeds across the river, guided by dim globes to either side. The water below is a black abyss, visible through the drawbridge grating.
His tires—that sinking drone like crippled aircraft in some TV war show.
And then he's over, safe. Past the bridge to the west side, now Cypress Street. This is the region of forgotten motels: ancient neon and stuttering "Vacancy" signs. The names: Mab's Shady Oaks, the Century, the Canary Court, Green Gables, all U-shaped stucco buildings around a central festering swimming pool, floodlights garish against the night.
The Grotto has a new night clerk. Sixty-ish and haired only in scabrous patches above the ears, he offers grudgingly "Vincent" as Mac introduces himself. Vincent accepts the completed registration slip and cash without rising from his stool, eyes trained upon his counter-top set. Mac grasps the key and watches along for a while.
At the commercial Vincent hurriedly switches to an episode of Hogan's Heroes, one eye upon his wristwatch until the cable health show with leotard aerobic dancing returns. No chat with Vincent.
Mac wearily moves on to his room. He thinks he has been in 104 before. The wood slats of the floor sag and creak as he undresses.
After a while the play of green from the Grotto-pool sign outside collects and decorates the carpet beneath the window, lending the room a hesitant luminescence.
Just as the warm red figures begin to appear beneath his eyelids he hears the noise. He perceives grunting and heaving from some adjacent room. Lying still, he tries to vanquish the sounds so reminiscent of extreme bodily discomfort, clamping his eyes shut, fingers in ears, but the couple's staying power is remarkable.
Minutes pass with the weight of entire days. Finally he groans heavily at his run of poor luck, as if virulently retroactive from the whole night in one instant. He sits up and dials Vincent for the time. Having paid already, he gets dressed and drops the key upon the rumpled bed.
Mac will ride around for a while, getting a breakfast biscuit somewhere with the loose dollar bills left in his pocket before heading to the warehouse to begin his day of work and more driving.
Morning accomplishes itself, among its routine sounds the grunting itself, undiminishing. Around ten o clock Vincent lets himself into the empty room, looks around, finding the key. He notes the sound. He walks to the wall, listens to the cavity, envisioning the hidden aging water pump and its contingent creaky attachments. He gives the wall one stiff kick, rattling the pipes. Silence.
