Read Online The Body Of Jonah Boyd by David Leavitt - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: David Leavitt
Tags: Fiction
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“Well, it’ obvious: Even though it was the
husband you were having the affair with, the one you were in love with was the wife,” the patient, though she might agree
or disagree, would hardly be shocked. And yet at the time, such an idea wouldn’t even have occurred to Ernest, not because
he rejected lesbianism as a category, but because he had yet to conceive of a universe in which men didn’t always stand at
the very center. Thus he would never have guessed that as I had sat next to Nancy on Daphne’ bed that afternoon, a longing
had swept through me which I could hardly articulate but which I now recognize to have been something akin to desire. Of course,
it never would have occurred to me to try to kiss Nancy, or even embrace her. Nor, I suspect, would she have tolerated such
advances. Still, the feeling was there, mixed up strangely with my daughterly adoration. This was what drove me back to that
house every Saturday, despite the abuse I had to endure. Since then, of course, I have known my own fair share of amorous
adventure, I have been loved by several good men (Ernest among them) and in at least one case experienced a love far deeper
than anything I ever felt for Nancy. So why is it that today I keep dreaming about that afternoon on Daphne’ bed? What is
it that I wanted to happen? Why is her voice—of which I have only a memory—so sharp and distinct in my head, and why, when
I wake up in the middle of the night, am I tormented by her particular and peculiar smell of cigarettes and cooking and the
perfume she wore only on special occasions, such as Thanksgiving, with notes of cassia and anise and bearing a name that would
forever after connote, for me, that remote and lacquered world of womanhood in which she and Anne had spent such easy days,
and which I could never penetrate— Apres I’Ondee?
The day before Thanksgiving Nancy called and asked if I could stop by after work to help her get the house ready for the Boyds.
I readily agreed. The pleasure of holidays, it has often seemed to me, is mostly anticipatory, which is perhaps why, today,
I recall those hours that I spent cleaning and cooking with Nancy, scrubbing the bathtub while she ironed the “Vera” sheets
and made the bed, with a far greater fondness than I do the dinner itself. She was in a euphoria of planning. Already she
had hounded Daphne into putting away everything that gave her room a sense of identity. Gone were the books, the frog figurines,
the posters. Two drawers had been emptied and part of the closet cleared. Her mother’ orders Daphne obeyed flatly and without
protest, since they fed a resentment the cultivation of which, at this stage in her life, was one of her principal occupations.
With the pitiless dispassion of adolescence, of the child who believes that she will never make the mistakes that dog her elders, Daphne observed her mother as she went about the onerous routine of constructing
a Active guest room, a stage set to last only two nights. Ben watched too, though with greater empathy: Although he would
not be leaving home for two years, already he had begun composing a poem of farewell, in which the protagonist, from the vantage
point of his Wellspring dorm room, regards with smug compassion the spectacle of his mother at the supermarket, buying his
favorite treats and then bursting into tears upon the realization that he will no longer be home to eat them. I know this
because, several weeks later, he read the poem aloud to us. “Isn’t he gifted?” Nancy asked, her eyes on the music desk.
As the afternoon wore away, Nancy grew more nervous. What would Anne look like? she wondered. Would she have quit smoking,
gained weight, lost weight? “I wonder why she decided to come,” Nancy said at the piano. “I mean, why she really decided to come. What do you think, Denny?”
“To see you, of course.”
“Is that it, though? Is that all?”
We retreated
husband you were having the affair with, the one you were in love with was the wife,” the patient, though she might agree
or disagree, would hardly be shocked. And yet at the time, such an idea wouldn’t even have occurred to Ernest, not because
he rejected lesbianism as a category, but because he had yet to conceive of a universe in which men didn’t always stand at
the very center. Thus he would never have guessed that as I had sat next to Nancy on Daphne’ bed that afternoon, a longing
had swept through me which I could hardly articulate but which I now recognize to have been something akin to desire. Of course,
it never would have occurred to me to try to kiss Nancy, or even embrace her. Nor, I suspect, would she have tolerated such
advances. Still, the feeling was there, mixed up strangely with my daughterly adoration. This was what drove me back to that
house every Saturday, despite the abuse I had to endure. Since then, of course, I have known my own fair share of amorous
adventure, I have been loved by several good men (Ernest among them) and in at least one case experienced a love far deeper
than anything I ever felt for Nancy. So why is it that today I keep dreaming about that afternoon on Daphne’ bed? What is
it that I wanted to happen? Why is her voice—of which I have only a memory—so sharp and distinct in my head, and why, when
I wake up in the middle of the night, am I tormented by her particular and peculiar smell of cigarettes and cooking and the
perfume she wore only on special occasions, such as Thanksgiving, with notes of cassia and anise and bearing a name that would
forever after connote, for me, that remote and lacquered world of womanhood in which she and Anne had spent such easy days,
and which I could never penetrate— Apres I’Ondee?
The day before Thanksgiving Nancy called and asked if I could stop by after work to help her get the house ready for the Boyds.
I readily agreed. The pleasure of holidays, it has often seemed to me, is mostly anticipatory, which is perhaps why, today,
I recall those hours that I spent cleaning and cooking with Nancy, scrubbing the bathtub while she ironed the “Vera” sheets
and made the bed, with a far greater fondness than I do the dinner itself. She was in a euphoria of planning. Already she
had hounded Daphne into putting away everything that gave her room a sense of identity. Gone were the books, the frog figurines,
the posters. Two drawers had been emptied and part of the closet cleared. Her mother’ orders Daphne obeyed flatly and without
protest, since they fed a resentment the cultivation of which, at this stage in her life, was one of her principal occupations.
With the pitiless dispassion of adolescence, of the child who believes that she will never make the mistakes that dog her elders, Daphne observed her mother as she went about the onerous routine of constructing
a Active guest room, a stage set to last only two nights. Ben watched too, though with greater empathy: Although he would
not be leaving home for two years, already he had begun composing a poem of farewell, in which the protagonist, from the vantage
point of his Wellspring dorm room, regards with smug compassion the spectacle of his mother at the supermarket, buying his
favorite treats and then bursting into tears upon the realization that he will no longer be home to eat them. I know this
because, several weeks later, he read the poem aloud to us. “Isn’t he gifted?” Nancy asked, her eyes on the music desk.
As the afternoon wore away, Nancy grew more nervous. What would Anne look like? she wondered. Would she have quit smoking,
gained weight, lost weight? “I wonder why she decided to come,” Nancy said at the piano. “I mean, why she really decided to come. What do you think, Denny?”
“To see you, of course.”
“Is that it, though? Is that all?”
We retreated
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