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I received my last paycheck
from the lawyer in the mail. It came with a letter folded around it. It
said, "I am so sorry for what happened between us. I have realized
what a terrible mistake I made with you. I can only hope that you will
understand, and that you will not worsen an already unfortunate situation
by discussing it with others. All the best." As a P.S. he assured
me that I could count on him for  excellent
references. He enclosed a check for three hundred and eighty dollars,
a little over two hundred dollars more than he owed me.
It occurred to me to tear up the check, or mail
it back to the lawyer. But I didn't do that. Two hundred dollars was worth
more then than it is now. Together with the money I had in the bank, it
was enough to put a down payment on an apartment and still have some left
over. I went upstairs and wrote "380" on the deposit side of
my checking account. I didn't feel like a whore or anything. I felt I was
doing the right thing. I looked at the total figure of my balance with
satisfaction. Then I went downstairs and asked my mother if she wanted
to go get some elephant ears.
For the next two weeks, I forgot about the idea of a job and moving out
of my parents' house. I slept through all of the morning noise until noon.
I got up and ate cold cereal and ran the dishwasher. I watched the gray
march of old sitcoms on TV. I worked on crossword puzzles. I lay on my
bed in a tangle of quilt and fuzzy blanket and masturbated two, three,
four times in a row, always thinking about the thing.
I was still in this phase when my father stuck
the newspaper under my nose and said, "Did you see what your old
boss is doing?" There was a small article on the upcoming mayoral
elections in Westland. He was running for mayor. I took the paper from
my father's offering hands. For the first time, I felt an uncomplicated
disgust for the lawyer. Westland was nothing but malls and doughnut stands
and a big ugly theater with an artificial volcano in front of it. What
kind of idiot would want to be mayor of Westland? Again, I left the room.
I got a phone call the next week. It was a man's
voice, a soft, probing, condoling voice. "Miss Roe?" he said.
"I hope you'll forgive this unexpected call. I'm Mark Charming of
Detroit magazine."
I didn't say anything. The voice continued more
uncertainly. "Are you free to talk, Miss
Roe?"
There was no one in the kitchen, and my mother
was running the vacuum in the next room. "Talk about what?"
I said.
"Your previous employer." The voice became slightly harsh as
he said these words, and then hurriedly rushed back to condolence. "Please
don't be startled or upset. I know this must be a disturbing phone call
for you, and it must certainly seem intrusive." He paused so I could
laugh or something. I didn't, and his voice became more cautious. "The
thing is, we're doing a story on your ex-employer in the context of his
running for mayor. To put it mildly, we think he has no business running
for public office. We think he would be very bad for the whole Detroit
area. He has an awful reputation, Miss Roe — which may not surprise
you." There was another careful pause that I did not fill.
"Miss Roe, are you still with me?"
"Yes."
"What all this is leading up to is that we
have reason to believe that you could reveal information about your ex-employer
that would be damaging to him. This information would never be connected
to your name. We would use a pseudonym. Your privacy would be protected
completely."
The vacuum cleaner shut off, and silence encircled me. My throat constricted.
"Do you want time to think about it, Miss
Roe?"
"I can't talk now," I said, and hung
up.
I couldn't go through the living room without
my mother asking me who had been on the phone, so I went downstairs to
the basement. I sat on the mildewed couch and curled up, unmindful of
centipedes. I rested my chin on my knee and stared at the boxes of my
father's old paperbacks and the jumble of plastic Barbie-doll cases full
of Barbie equipment that Donna and I used to play with on the front porch.
A stiff white foot and calf stuck out of a sky blue case, helpless and
pitifully rigid.
For some reason, I remembered the time, a few years before, when my mother
had taken me to see a psychiatrist. One of the more obvious questions
he had asked me was, "Debby, do you ever have the sensation of being
outside yourself, almost as if you can actually watch yourself from another
place?" I hadn't at the time, but I did now. And it wasn't such a
bad feeling at all. n°
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Excerpted from the story collection Bad Behavior, originally published by Poseidon Press, a division of Simon & Schuster. Reprinted by permission.
To buy this book, click here.
©1988 Mary
Gaitskill.
| ABOUT THE AUTHOR: |
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Mary Gaitskill grew up outside of Detroit. She is the author of two collections of short stories, Bad Behavior and Because They Wanted To, the novels Veronica and Two Girls, Fat and Thin, and numerous articles and stories. Her short story "Secretary" was adapted into the 2002 film of the same name.
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