blinding white light. I
heard the angels' sight, saw their music as a sound like the
roar of the sea in a shell. In knowing their movements I
looked into the painful light for so long that I thought my
own eyes might melt, but I couldn't turn away.
"They figure it's what we'd expect," he said. "I'm sure it's
different in reality. Sometimes you'll hear music, too. They
like Wagner."
I let go his hand; the vision faded as it came. The street's
chiaroscuro reappeared beneath New York's sky, free once
more of angels as it was forever free of oxygen, or stars.
Others passing along their nightly circuits appeared to have
seen no more than the sidewalk lying before their shoes;
New Yorkers looked up only to see what might be falling
toward them. Looking at Macaffrey, I thought I'd never felt
so secure in my fear. "Call me Lester, Joanna," he said. "I
don't hold much with labels."
FOUR
"You'll see me home?" I asked, knowing he'd agree. A
million words raced around our silence as we sailed uptown
between Broadway's palisades. In our day the thumbrule
was that bony lies became truth rich and strange if the need
for belief was great enough. A child might rub her stuffed
animals bald, trying to wish them into life; what if she
started with a sleeping pet? Reality was never so flexible in
fact as in theory. Angels, I told myself: there could have
been nothing to see; all was but a blend of sky and delusion.
Closing my eyes, I still saw angels. Why was I chosen to
receive revelation? It made as little sense as those stories of
flying saucers landing on lonely Nebraska prairies, desiring
that farm girls alone should know the secrets between stars.
That I liked being with Lester held nothing of heaven.
"That fellow you came to the school with," he said. "You
were lovers once?" From distant Brooklyn came the sound of bundled papers being thrown onto a newstand's curb,
the nightly cannonade. No doubt I'd opened my mind wide
enough that Lester might now easily slip himself in.
"You couldn't know that-"
"It's in the way you stood next to him," he said. "The tilt
of your pelvis. It's all in the details. Let's go this way."
We headed west down Rector Street; Trinity Church's
encircling boneyard was on our right, bright beneath
floodlamp glare; arcs hung from the trees, appearing as fruit
passed over at harvest time. The yard's retaining wall rose
higher as the street sloped toward the unseeable Hudson
River. Turning north again we passed beneath a slender
wrought-iron bridge arching above the street, running from
the cemetery to an office building, as if the sextons,
foreseeing Doomsday, provided for the dead a short walk
between grave and Workfare office.
"You broke up with him awhile back?" Lester asked.
"It was a work relationship. We got overinvolved. Not
long after we started there. Our jobs got in the way. His
job."
"What happened?"
"We had this awful conversation one night," I said. "I
called him a golem. Worse than that. We kept talking and
stayed friends, but the moment passed." Midtown's distant
lights enflamed Manhattan's sky until it appeared no less
bloody than Long Island's. The breath of the underworld
rose through cracks in the pavement. The Trade Towers
stood on our left beyond a low wall of outbuildings.
Soldiers guarding the plaza searched and taunted a man
delivering pizzas; a lateworker's dinner always arrived cold.
"Why am I telling you this?"
"I asked," he said. "Seems so quiet down here at night.
Like the old days. Army's really necessary still?"
"Seen as necessary," I said. "Thatcher gets nervous
unless he's surrounded."
"Except when he's with you?" Lester asked, no trace of malice in his question. By moving farther from him, I
thought, I could keep him from driving deeper into my
mind, deliberately forgetting that I walked with one who
showed me God's lack of face.
"Please stop," I said.
"I read people well," he said. "I wish I was
heard the angels' sight, saw their music as a sound like the
roar of the sea in a shell. In knowing their movements I
looked into the painful light for so long that I thought my
own eyes might melt, but I couldn't turn away.
"They figure it's what we'd expect," he said. "I'm sure it's
different in reality. Sometimes you'll hear music, too. They
like Wagner."
I let go his hand; the vision faded as it came. The street's
chiaroscuro reappeared beneath New York's sky, free once
more of angels as it was forever free of oxygen, or stars.
Others passing along their nightly circuits appeared to have
seen no more than the sidewalk lying before their shoes;
New Yorkers looked up only to see what might be falling
toward them. Looking at Macaffrey, I thought I'd never felt
so secure in my fear. "Call me Lester, Joanna," he said. "I
don't hold much with labels."
FOUR
"You'll see me home?" I asked, knowing he'd agree. A
million words raced around our silence as we sailed uptown
between Broadway's palisades. In our day the thumbrule
was that bony lies became truth rich and strange if the need
for belief was great enough. A child might rub her stuffed
animals bald, trying to wish them into life; what if she
started with a sleeping pet? Reality was never so flexible in
fact as in theory. Angels, I told myself: there could have
been nothing to see; all was but a blend of sky and delusion.
Closing my eyes, I still saw angels. Why was I chosen to
receive revelation? It made as little sense as those stories of
flying saucers landing on lonely Nebraska prairies, desiring
that farm girls alone should know the secrets between stars.
That I liked being with Lester held nothing of heaven.
"That fellow you came to the school with," he said. "You
were lovers once?" From distant Brooklyn came the sound of bundled papers being thrown onto a newstand's curb,
the nightly cannonade. No doubt I'd opened my mind wide
enough that Lester might now easily slip himself in.
"You couldn't know that-"
"It's in the way you stood next to him," he said. "The tilt
of your pelvis. It's all in the details. Let's go this way."
We headed west down Rector Street; Trinity Church's
encircling boneyard was on our right, bright beneath
floodlamp glare; arcs hung from the trees, appearing as fruit
passed over at harvest time. The yard's retaining wall rose
higher as the street sloped toward the unseeable Hudson
River. Turning north again we passed beneath a slender
wrought-iron bridge arching above the street, running from
the cemetery to an office building, as if the sextons,
foreseeing Doomsday, provided for the dead a short walk
between grave and Workfare office.
"You broke up with him awhile back?" Lester asked.
"It was a work relationship. We got overinvolved. Not
long after we started there. Our jobs got in the way. His
job."
"What happened?"
"We had this awful conversation one night," I said. "I
called him a golem. Worse than that. We kept talking and
stayed friends, but the moment passed." Midtown's distant
lights enflamed Manhattan's sky until it appeared no less
bloody than Long Island's. The breath of the underworld
rose through cracks in the pavement. The Trade Towers
stood on our left beyond a low wall of outbuildings.
Soldiers guarding the plaza searched and taunted a man
delivering pizzas; a lateworker's dinner always arrived cold.
"Why am I telling you this?"
"I asked," he said. "Seems so quiet down here at night.
Like the old days. Army's really necessary still?"
"Seen as necessary," I said. "Thatcher gets nervous
unless he's surrounded."
"Except when he's with you?" Lester asked, no trace of malice in his question. By moving farther from him, I
thought, I could keep him from driving deeper into my
mind, deliberately forgetting that I walked with one who
showed me God's lack of face.
"Please stop," I said.
"I read people well," he said. "I wish I was
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