[Published in 1999 in Ascent, a literary magazine. I should go through this and rewrite it. But don't we often feel that way when we look at something from another time in our lives, written in a different style?]
Dancing in the Air
Thomas Ender did not know what to say.
Dr. Leopold greeted him warmly, rising behind his desk and coming around
to shake his hand. Then the doctor sat in a chair like Ender’s but separated from it by a square marble table on which the doctor had set a plant in a yellow ceramic pot. Ender measured with a glance the distance from the window across the office to the table. He looked at the plant for a long time. The dark leaves — violets, he thought — were dusty, and fragments of fallen petals littered the soil.
The pot was perfectly circular. The table was perfectly square.
“Is it possible to say one thing,” Ender asked, “and not exactly mean something else – but not know what you mean?”
The therapist fixed him with a steady gaze. “Say again?”
“Can someone say something with all the best intentions and a week later do exactly the opposite?”
“Oh,” the doctor said. “Yes, of course.”
“Well, that’s a relief, ” Ender said, sitting back. The barrel chair pressed against the middle of his back, making it difficult to recline.
“Why is that a relief?”
“Because that’s what I did. Twice.”
The doctor crossed his legs. His jacket was open, his dark tie hung rumpled on his blue shirt. His slacks were creased, his black shoes had a high polish. “Want to tell me about it?”
Ender raised his gaze to the doctor’s face, then to the framed diplomas on the wall behind his desk. The wall was like a shadow in the late afternoon. It was difficult to focus and Ender blinked rapidly. Then he noticed the noise of distant traffic and went to the window, pushing aside the mini-blinds and looking down. Fourteen stories below, rush hour was building. Pedestrians waited at corners to cross, buses angled the corners. The snow along the curb was gone, but the sidewalk appeared to be bleached by the cold weather. Ender raised his eyes to the overcast sky and shivered, uncertain whether he was chilled by a draft or by intimations of foreboding in the lingering twilight. He touched the window with the back of his hand, feeling the cold glass.
“Tom?”
He turned. “Yes?”
“Want to tell me about it?”
Ender sat again, folding his hands behind his neck, letting his head recline. Leopold glanced at the clock on his desk.
“I’m wasting time, aren’t I?”
“Tom, it’s your hour. Use it any way you want.”
Ender sat up straight. “Okay, listen. I told Louise I would only see Mickey at work. Michelle, Mickey, is this woman I work with, OK? I said, if it has to be lunch, we’ll be appropriate. Otherwise only at the office.
“Then — three days later — I ask Mickey to meet me after work.
“We had some drinks and talked. We agreed that our relationship could never go anywhere, that for all intents and purposes, everything was over. We’re just friends, OK? OK. Everything was settled. Then we get up to go, I don’t know if the drinks or what … I smelled her hair and her perfume, I touched her cheek gently and turned her face toward me until I was looking into her eyes. Then I kissed her, right there in the goddamn bar. I could feel her arms sliding inside the lining of her suit while I held her, and you know what?”
“No. What?”
Ender leaned forward, knees on his thighs. “I felt like I wanted to cry. Is that crazy, or what? I mean, I’m kissing this terrific woman, but I … I don’t know what.”
He sat back, letting his hands drop.
“Please go on.”
Ender shrugged. “I would have thought, you know, all I’d want to do is get her into bed. And I do, but … I mean, where does that come from?”
“What happened next?”
“I stopped kissing her, finally, and looked for a long time into her eyes. She was frightened. We were both frightened. We hurried out through the crowded tables, bumping into people, and made it to the street.”
The therapist waited.
“We stood outside, catching our breath. The wind was off the lake, it was cold, and her cheeks were flushed. She wore a little box-like plum-colored hat that matched her suit, and her eyes were bright in the lights of the passing traffic.”
“What did you do?”
“I told her I had to see her again.”
“And she said …?”
“Yes. Yes, oh yes.”
He stopped.
“And?”
“And — nothing. I hailed a taxi and sent her home. I watched it drive away, then hailed another.
“As we drove onto the Drive, something got triggered, I don’t know what. Maybe it was the way the snow fences’ shadows striped the beach like the bars of a cage. I don’t know. I felt this raw pain and then I was crying.”
Ender sat stiffly in his chair.
“What the hell is going on? Am I nuts?”
“No,” Leopold said. “You’re not nuts.”
“What, then? What’s going on?”
“What do you think?”
“Me? I think I’m a train on the wrong track, waiting for a crash.”
The doctor waited, then said, “There was something else. You said you did that twice this week?”
Ender looked away while he thought. “Twice . . . oh,” he smiled, “yeah, the other thing was, I told Louise I was deeply committed to her and our marriage forever.”
“How did that come about?”
“We were in bed. Louise had just closed her book. She loves reading these popular novels, and when she stops, she closes her book so the fringe of the bookmark just sticks out. Then sets it down on the table and thinks for a minute, thinking it over, before reaching over to turn out the light. I love the way she looks in the lamplight, the thin straps of her nightgown on her bare shoulders. I pressed against her from behind, she likes that, she likes that she still turns me on after all these years. She pressed back, and that’s when I said I was deeply committed to her and our marriage forever. And you know what? I wasn’t kidding. I was telling the truth. I meant it as much as I ever meant anything in my life.”
Ender shivered.
“Two days later I asked Mickey to go with me to California on a business trip.”
“I see.”
The therapist waited.
“Well?” Ender said.
“Well what?”
“What should I do?”
“What do you want to do?”
“Christ, if I knew that, you think I’d be here?”
“I can’t tell you what to do, Tom. You know that. I can help clarify options but you have to make the choice.”
Ender said nothing.
Leopold looked at the clock. “I’m afraid time’s up for today. Want to schedule another appointment?”
“I don’t know.” Ender shrugged. “We didn’t get very far, did we?”
Leopold rose and Ender rose too.
“We got as far as we could, Tom. You have to trust the process.”
Ender left the office. The hallway was empty and he walked past the doors of doctors and dentists, letters stenciled on panels of frosted glass. He waited at the elevator, listening to nothing. Nothing was settled; nothing was clear. The elevator opened and he floated to the ground in a bubble and walked through the lobby past the uniformed guard to the door, buttoning his overcoat and turning up his collar. The cold wind stung and his eyes teared.
Distorted by his tears, the windows across the avenue framed the world like a blurred cubist construction, planes of glass caging him in a grid of three dimensions. The fourth dimension was time, which was ticking ticking ticking. The fifth was a trajectory plotted by the points of his ambivalence and confusion, intersecting spacetime as a stick intersects the surface of a pond, its image displaced.
He hailed a taxi and went home.
# # # #
The dried flowers Louise had arranged on the piano were like the last notes of a fading song. Twin crystal lamps lighted the dried leaves and the dried flowers. Dust lay on the leaves and on the flowers, and as Ender came in, he heard the opening notes of a Schumann String Quartet. The air of their apartment was desert dry. He smelled the dinner in the oven as he hung his overcoat carefully in the closet and listened for Louise.
She came out of the bedroom, almost bumping into him.
“Oh!” she said. “I didn’t hear you come in.”
“I just got home.” He hugged her and when she tried to release him, he didn’t let go. So she held him again, a little less intensely, then stepped back, searching his face. Her eyes moved back and forth as if she were watching a tennis match.
“How was your day?”
“Long,” he said. “Have you eaten?”
“No. Are you hungry?”
“Yes. Let’s eat.”
She muted the lights in the crystal chandelier. She served marinated chicken breasts with vegetables and salad. Ender unfolded a cloth napkin in the basket and realigned the slices of bread, then folded the edges of the napkin on top. The first sip of dry white wine flashed him back to a time when life had been lived on the edge of the future instead of in the future looking back at the fact of the past. He ate in silence, half-listening as Louise described her day. Then told her he had gone to that therapist he mentioned.
“Oh? How was it? Was he helpful?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “How do you tell?”
“Well, what did he say?”
“He said I wasn’t crazy.”
“Did you think you were?”
“I don’t know.” He smiled. “How do you tell?”
“I think I’d know how I’d go crazy.”
“Really? How?”
She put down her fork. “I’d withdraw, become more and more passive. Then shut down. Go on automatic, go through the motions. I’d lie to myself about what was happening, I’d be in denial so long I would die inside.”
“That’s cheerful. That’s not how I’d do it.”
“What would you do?”
“Everything I wanted to. My life would be completely unpredictable. I wouldn’t know in the morning what I’d be doing that afternoon.”
She touched his forearm. “Tom, I don’t think that sounds so crazy.”
“That’s what Leopold said. I should have asked you and saved the money.”
“Tom–” her voice suddenly broke. “Tom . . . I do want this to work, Tom. Whatever it is, whatever’s going on, I want you to know that I can’t live without you.”
He was concentrating on chicken. “Louise, you’d be amazed what you could do. Think of prisoners of war. Auschwitz. People can tap incredible resources.”
Louise just sat there, slowly absorbing the impact of his seeming indifference. The candlelight reflected in the polished depths of the surface of the table. The depths of their lives, she realized with ferocious clarity, were inaccessible to their wills or best intentions. They skated on the surface of their lives, etching complicated figures which would disappear with the spring thaw.
# # # #
Ender liked first class. He liked the free drinks, the good food, the attention. He liked the way the stewardess plumped his pillow. And he liked the feeling of being someone, having arrived.
Since he was a child, airplanes meant freedom. When he pressed back into the seat at takeoff, he always felt a rush. The everyday landscape disappeared beneath the clouds and all the constraints of his life slipped away like the heavy overcoat he left with Louise at the airport. Giving himself permission to drink too much on the flight was the first step toward breaking rules that bound him on the ground. As they climbed, he became elated, feeling both wildly out of control and safely contained at the same time.
Mickey sat back in coach. It took considerable effort to avoid turning toward her, and when he went to the bathroom, he practiced the art of deliberate inattention to the powerful magnet of her presence. It was all he could do not to stare at the hint of her hair above the seats.
They left the plane separately and stood apart at the baggage claim. Then Mickey waited with her bags while Ender went to the rental counter. He had asked for something sporty but had to settle for an LTD. He didn’t complain, however, his heart was expansive and forgiving, he was whistling, almost bouncing as he boarded a van and picked up the car, then circled back to collect Mickey. He chortled with delight as they raced for the freeway.
“I can’t believe we’re here,” Mickey said, lowering her window. The air was heavy with the odors of flowers and aviation fuel. “Even the smog smells good.”
He turned onto the freeway. “I’m sorry the hotel’s so far from the beach.”
“Oh Tom, I don’t care where it is!” she leaned across the seat and kissed his cheek loudly. “Tom Ender, I am so much in love with you!”
He turned on the radio and punched buttons until he found a golden oldie to flavor the day. He wanted to enclose the moment in plastic and keep it forever.
While he attended meetings, Mickey explored. She gave him a full report each night of shopping in malls and window-shopping in Beverly Hills. She drove along the ocean, strolled through beach towns, climbed into canyons among green and gold hills. She loved bougainvillea. She loved eating real Mexican, real Chinese. And each night she went to her room and waited for his call. Ender intentionally stayed late, chatting over drinks, returning to his room too late to arouse suspicion. Then he called and she walked past his door and if no one was watching, she slipped in, slamming the door behind her and throwing herself into his arms.
“Oh, Tom!” she cried night after night. “Tom, I love you so much!”
After three days, Ender was tired. Meetings all day and Mickey at night had worn him down. After the conference, he told colleagues he was going to stay for a day of R-and-R. Then he moved in with Mickey.
Laughing like children, they changed into beachwear and headed for the water. They had one glorious day to themselves, a day ablaze with sunlight. The mountains were sharp against the sky, the colors of the flowers and trees intense. The morning was a radiant promise of boundless joy.
They stopped in Santa Monica and picked up a picnic lunch at a trendy deli. While Mickey waited for the order, Ender went next door and returned with swim gear. “I’ve always wanted to snorkel,” he explained.
They drove toward Palos Verdes to look for the perfect beach he had read about in the Travel Section. A sign on the highway and a dirt lot on the edge of a cliff marked the spot, just as the article said it would. Ender carried their gear while Michelle held his arm, carefully stepping in thongs down a steep dirt path. The trail wound down among cactus, nettles, high grass. It was dry and hot in the sun. The ocean was brilliant with mist in the distance. Whitecaps ranged along the cliffs away along the blue water.
Carefully they made their way slowly down the hillside. Michelle yelped when stung by prickles and limped a little, scuffling clouds of dust. She stopped at the bottom of the cliff to look at her foot, holding his arm and bending her leg behind as Ender looked at the beach.
“Damn!” he said. “I thought it was sand.”
It was all stones, dark and white stones blinding in the light of sun and sea. The tide had heaped the stones into rough terraces which slid and slipped underfoot as they walked along the water. In the flowing foam of the breaking waves, deflated bulbs and thick seaweed rotted in the hot sun. Flies rose and settled on refuse among the seaweed from which crabs scuttled sideways into the water. Ender bent down toward a small brown mound, which he saw, leaning down, was the decomposing body of a dead seal.
The stones under their feet slid as they made their way toward a spine of sharp rocks rising in the breaking waves like the armor of a prehistoric beast.
Mickey flapped open a large yellow beachtowel billowing over the hot rocks. He held the towel down while she weighted the corners with rocks. They opened their picnic basket and took out the food.
“This isn’t what I pictured.”
“Oh, it’s fine, Tom. It’s beautiful. Look.”
They looked back at the cliff down which they had climbed. Wildflowers like daisies shone in the midday sun. The scalloped cliffs curved along the blue water, disappearing in the distance. A strong wind blew off the ocean, blowing spray from the foaming whitecaps.
They ate a good meal, waving away flies and growing warm. Ender packed their trash and dumped their masks and snorkels onto the towel. He stood up to look out over the ocean.
“I’ve always wanted to do this. Want to come?”
Mickey shook her head, hair blowing in the seabreeze. He smiled, looking at her sitting on the yellow towel in her green one-piece swimsuit, her arms around her bent knees. “You go ahead.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes. I’ll watch.”
He stripped to his trunks and kicked off his shoes. He fit the small mask onto his face, feeling the tight strap binding behind. The mask clouded like a greenhouse. He couldn’t see, so he pulled it off, looking out at the water. He walked out into the foaming surf until it covered his ankles. Then walked slowly carefully on wet slippery rocks until he stood knee-deep.
The wind was strong, the waves breaking against his body nearly knocking him down. He spit in the mask and dipped it in the water, swirling inside the glass until it was clear. He arranged it over his face and took the snorkel in his mouth.
The waves were breaking in some kind of complex pattern he didn’t take time to figure out. He waited for a small wave, then hurried out, going thighdeep. He leaned forward until his mask was just under the water when a wave knocked him down. He laughed, sitting in the water, feeling the shock of the cold ocean. The sea tasted of salt and seaweed. He spat and turned and floated on his stomach, lowering his face until he could see the bottom of the ocean like a picture in the clear glass when a wave broke over him from behind. It pushed him into the rocky bottom, the surf surging back and forth over his head. He had to get away from the shallows and the breaking waves. He staggered to his feet and coughed, catching his breath, the water flowing out around him, making him stumble.
“Tom? Are you all right?”
He waved at her. I’m fine. Then turned and walked into the water until it was waist high. He looked up as a wave was about to break over him, gulped a deep breath, and plunged under the breaking wave. He felt it pull at his back as he kicked, swimming down. He paddled out in the cold water, opening his eyes. Through the glass he saw rocks on the ocean bottom and seaweed. He stroked again, slow and steady, going out. He inhaled through the snorkel, surprised at how easy it was to breathe. After a while he was in a rhythm, breathing slowly in and out, the sound of his breathing echoing like a respirator. Patches of fog clouded the glass of his mask but he could still see the rocky bottom and seaweed flowing in the surging currents. He kept the spine of rocks to his left, swimming toward them with a steady breaststroke. The rocks and seaweed were alive, small dark fish darting among the waving fronds. He thought he saw a crab or lobster. Closer to the rock spine, in the vague water, he saw pale anemone waving their short tentacles, swaying with the surging of the sea.
He jerked his head up, trying to see Mickey. He let the snorkel drop from his mouth and shouted, “Michelle! This is incredible!” but she was too far away to hear. In the glass of his mask, her image moved up and down, a pale distant blur. He dropped down again into the water, letting the current carry him out along the rocks. More fish, small and fast, flashed among the seaweed, anemone profuse among the rocks. He moved loose rocks, watching crabs scurry into crevices, and could see in holes and in cracks the dark spines of small urchins. He lay flat on the water, using his arms like fins to stay steady in the strong current, kicking along the rocks.
Sunlight patterned the sand and rocks on the bottom like a webbing of fire. The surge of the sea carried him in and out, relaxing him with its rhythm. He grew accustomed to the salt taste of the water pouring down his snorkel when the sea surged, waiting until his mouth filled and blowing it back out the spout like a whale. The pattern of sunlight on the swaying fronds of seaweed and the living creatures was magical. The rocks were encrusted with shells. He saw a starfish and reached for it, feeling its rough form, watching his fingers stroke it in the water. He pulled it free, turning it all around in both hands, then let it fall. The starfish floated slowly to the bottom, landing on the rocks, jellying with the stir of the current on the bottom. He kicked hard, swimming out on his side, pausing to move loose rocks and watch fish flicker and disappear in seaweed and gusts of sand.
He moved through a change of temperature, the water suddenly cold. He dove down and was warmer again. He learned he could take a deep breath and dive down ten, fifteen, twenty feet to see what was on the bottom. The water was alive with clicks, cracks, and static. On the bottom he could swim more easily away from the shore, under the turbulent surface. He could see only a few feet in the cloudy water. He did not know the spine of rocks was about to end until he came around the edge and could see nothing but deep blue water shading into deeper blue. He came up, treading water, and turned to look at the beach.
He was surprised how far he had come. He paddled about in the deeper water, watching the waves breaking inside and surging onto the rocky shelf. He could just make out Michelle, a smudge on the yellow blanket, and the cliffs behind. He noticed with surprise, watching the spiny rocks moving past, that he was floating in a current across the outside of the spine, parallel to the beach. He let it carry him a little and moved to swim back in. He turned onto his stomach and stroked toward shore. He swam hard for a few minutes and raised his face to see where he was. The rocks were still between him and the beach; in fact, they were further away. He kept his face up and used a strong breaststroke, discovering he was moving slowly away from the spine despite his vigorous swimming. His heart chilled and his throat closed.
Don’t panic, he told himself.
The current carried him along the shore. He drifted a little more, then swam at an angle to the current toward the beach. He could feel crosscurrents in the water now, streams of colder and warmer water. Suddenly a wave crashed onto him from behind, driving him down into the water. Sharp edges of rocks scratched his chest and stomach. He saw murky rocks and seaweed in the too shallow water. Beyond the rocks it was deeper again; he twisted in the water, afraid he had gotten turned around. He thrashed in a circle, looking for the cliffs. There they are. Settle down. It’s just the bottom, the bottom is uneven this side of the spine. He swam again toward shore, trying to avoid the rocks, but they jabbed him again and again. He ignored them, swimming hard. He was well on the other side of the spine, swimming toward a different beach. The waves worked with him, bringing him in. When he felt a surge coming under him, he swam with all his strength, then relaxed and let the backwash carry him out.
Ender made his way slowly steadily toward the beach.
Near shore another current drew him closer to the rocks. At first he was grateful for the strong current, then noticed it was getting too shallow. He turned at a sharp angle to kick away from the spine. The breaking waves dragged him onto rocks he couldn’t see. With each surge he felt the edges of rocks or sharp shells rake his sides. He had to kick hard to escape. He no longer feared being carried out to sea, but he was getting tired, and he had to rest from time to time in the buoyant swell of the water. Then he started shivering. He felt his lips with his cold fingers, feeling nothing. His fingertips and lips were numb. He thrashed in the water, swimming toward shore for all he was worth, head down, watching sand and rocks on the bottom surging with every stroke. The shallow water was rougher and bounced him around, making him feel seasick, but he swam until he could stand up. Shivering all over now, wading in against the drag of the cold sea, he was knocked down twice from behind by waves.
He staggered at last onto the rocky shore. He walked up the beach and climbed over the spine to reach Michelle, bruising his feet on rocks. The wind chilled. As he came down over the spine, he saw a sign facing the beach where Mickey was waiting: Dangerous Currents. No Swimming.
Mickey heard the rocks sliding under his feet and sat up, turning toward him.
“Tom, my God! You’re bleeding all over!”
She jumped up and rushed to wipe him with a towel. He stood shivering and let her. His skin was streaked with dozens of thin cuts. Blood ran in thin rivulets down his chest and stomach and thighs. Then she held him in her arms, guiding him back to the yellow towel. She settled him down on the warm towel and wrapped him in it, getting on top of him, covering his body with her own.
He lay on his back, wrapped in Michelle and a yellow towel. She kissed his cold lips, licking them warm. She moved her hands up and down his body. The sky was blinding through her wispy hair. He could hardly catch his breath. He slowly regained composure and eased her off. He sat up and toweled dry.
Sitting in the sun, he felt better, but still shivered. Michelle helped him into his shorts and shirt and packed everything else in the basket.
“I need some hot coffee,” he said. “I need a hot bath.”
They crossed the stones, making for the trail. They climbed the switchbacks, pausing often to catch their breath. Nettles pricked their ankles, flies buzzed around their heads. At the top they stopped, breathing deeply, slapping at insects. He gave her the keys to the LTD. The car was furnace hot from the sun.
“Hey! You guys didn’t pay!”
Ender sat on the edge of the seat. A young man was coming toward them.
“Didn’t you see that sign? It’s three bucks to park here.”
Ender looked over at a handlettered sign and shook his head.
“I’ll get it,” Mickey said, going through her purse. Ender looked closely at the attendant. He was deeply tanned, lean, his long blowing hair bleached by the sun. He wore laceless sneakers, gaudy shorts, and mirrorshades. In the curved surface of the blue lenses, Ender saw himself small on the edge of his seat. The top of his head had less hair than he thought, his skin shining through. His white shirt was blotched here and there with pale stains of blood, and his stomach bulged against the waistband of his shorts.
Mickey started the car as Ender lifted his legs inside.
“Let’s get back to the room. If I see somewhere I’ll stop for coffee.”
Ender nodded, too tired to reply. He sat wrapped in towels, barely aware of the traffic on the freeway, his mind a blur as the car stopped, started, stopped, over and over again, all the way home.
# # # #
Dr. Leopold waited. Ender tried to get comfortable in the barrel chair, waiting for the therapist to ask what was wrong. Instead he folded his hands on his lap and waited with a practiced smile.
“Let’s see,” said Leopold. “It’s been two weeks, hasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
The doctor nodded. “How are things?”
Ender shrugged. “Not too hot.”
Ender was aware of the dry heat of the room. Behind the closed mini-blinds, snow was falling among the tall buildings as snow had been falling all afternoon. He had walked down Michigan Avenue from his office in the storm, enjoying the consolation of the soft falling snow. It was dry snow, blowing across the headlights of crawling autos, his boots crunching as he walked.
Leopold said, “What’s going on?”
Ender unbuttoned his jacket and scratched vigorously the tops of his thighs.
“Staph infection,” he said. “I got cut in the water. Got infected.”
“You have to be careful in the ocean.”
“Yes.” Ender rose and went to the window, pulling aside the mini-blinds. The blowing snow filled the canyon.
“The snow is so beautiful.”
Then he was crying, his face in his hands. He cried for a while, and when he looked up, he tried to smile. The doctor set a box of tissues on the marble table. Ender took one and blew his nose.
“God,” he said. “I am making such an incredible mess.”
“What happened, Tom?”
He wiped his eyes. “I came back from California completely wiped out.
“I don’t know what to do. What gets me, see, Louise isn’t doing anything wrong. She’s the same as always. But I try to feel the way we were and I can’t.
“Maybe Mickey is the answer, I don’t know. She was sure great at the beach, the whole trip, really. She could have bitched, but she was terrific.”
“The answer to what, Tom?”
He thought. “The answer to what I’m talking about. I go to work and I go home, but it just gets worse. It feels like one of those Indian things where they wrap you in rawhide and wet it. First it’s comfortable, then it’s snug, then it’s suffocating.
“I don’t understand what’s happening. There’s this huge thing in my life, but I don’t know what it is. It feels like the surging of the ocean except it’s inside, lifting me with it.
“I can still feel the surging of the ocean. Every night I dream that I’m drifting further and further out to sea. The cliffs grow smaller. The water gets colder. I reach for something but there’s nothing there. Nothing.”
Ender aligned the box of tissues on the table so its edges were parallel to the edges of the marble. Then moved the plant so it balanced better.
“I feel so alone. It’s not all bad, that’s a funny thing, I feel more like myself than ever. But I never felt so alone in my whole life.”
“So it feels like . . . there’s nothing under you? No firm ground? Not your wife or marriage, not your work, not even Mickey?”
“No. I mean yes. That’s right. There’s nothing there. Nothing. I’m dancing in thin air.”
The doctor crossed his legs at the ankles, looking at the tops of his shoes. His laces were tied neatly, the ends of the laces equal to the length of the loops of the bows. Then he looked up into Ender’s eyes.
“I know what you mean.”
“You do?” Ender waited. “Then what should I do?
“Tom, it’s not that kind of question. It’s not about doing something.”
Ender stared. “Then what the hell kind of question is it?” He gesticulated wildly, turning in his chair. “Will you tell me, please? What the hell kind of question is it?”
# # # #
The snow had diminished by the time Ender left the office. He went to a restaurant and ate alone, sitting at the window, watching the snow whiten the windows of stores across the street. Plows roared by on both sides, scraping out lanes and banking snow against the curb. Cars and buses moved slowly, iced with snow, splashing the sidewalks.
After he ate, Ender took off for home on foot, going along the lake and through the park. The park was a shapeless mass of blurs and drifts. The low sky was illuminated by light reflected from the snow. The city was silent, cold and bright and still. The snow had stopped by the time he arrived at the lighted lobby of his high-rise. It was warm and bright inside, and he stomped the snow from his boots on the wet black mat inside the door.
Louise was on the telephone so he went straight into a hot bath. Then he lay in bed, watching shadows on the ceiling until he fell asleep. Louise came to bed later, turning out the lights. She was sound asleep when something woke her. She sat up in the dark, feeling for Tom’s body, but the bed was empty. She turned on her lamp. The door of the bedroom was open.
“Tom? Tom, are you all right?”
She threw back the covers and hurried down the hallway, her nightgown flowing like a ghost. Ender was in the livingroom, pushing a heavy table across the floor, grunting as he shoved it against the deep pile of the carpet. He had moved all the chairs to one wall. He had aligned the four curved sections of the sofa, one after the other, like radar waves coming out of the far corner. The floorlamps were on either side of the coffee table, the end tables on the south wall. The square of glass which had balanced perfectly on a white cube in front of the white sofa was on its edge, leaning against the piano.
The cube was in the middle of the room.
“Tom . . . Tom, what are you doing?”
He looked around the room.
“It isn’t working. This might help.”
He lifted a heavy cabinet and frogwalked it across the room. Then he stood back, measuring with his gaze the distance from the window to the wall. “The sofa can go along that wall, there. We can move the piano. The coffee table would look better on that side anyway, don’t you think?”
He stood with his hands on his hips, barefoot in pajama pants and his bare stomach, looking at the room.
“Louise? What do you think?”
Louise was thinking . . . she understood much less than she had once thought. She was thinking . . . Tom could hurt himself moving furniture like that. She was thinking … yes, the sofa might look better over there, but … so what?
She stood in the hallway, hands at her sides, her eyes half closed with sleep. She knew he was waiting for something, but her brain just didn’t want to work.
He said again, “Well? What do you think?”
She shook her head and shrugged. She looked around the room and shrugged again. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to help; it wasn’t that she wouldn’t be the first to get down on her knees and pick up the pieces of a broken glass if she could only see the pieces. It was just that . . . well, there was nothing to say. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
