Read Online The Rescuer by Joyce Carol Oates - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Joyce Carol Oates
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midst of great chaos: earthquake, flood.
At Harvey’s nose, a perpetual glisten of moisture.
He is a junkie. You know of course. A junkie has no shame.
In a bemused voice Harvey said, as if thinking aloud: “Montaigne discovered at the age of thirty-eight that death is light and airy—he’d been thrown from his horse, trampled. He experienced no ‘other world’—no God, no Savior. He’d been Catholic of course—everyone was Catholic at that time and in that place, in sixteenth-century France. Montaigne saw that life is the long haul. Dying is the easy way.”
“And how did Montaigne know this?” I asked, exasperated. “Had he died, and returned to write about the experience?”
“He almost died. It was near -death. His ‘soul’ slipped from his body, according to his account. For some time, he floated outside his broken body.”
“We all do,” I said. “It’s called dreaming.”
* * *
“Lyd’ja! You gon drive us to ’Lantic City, yes?”
Somehow it was— yes.
Couldn’t say no to Maralena. Basking in Maralena’s hectic warmth and when Maralena spoke of Lyd’ja as my girlfriend I felt such happiness, no poetry could begin to express.
With Maralena was her girlfriend Salaman. And another girlfriend Mercedes.
It was upsetting to me, when Maralena came to our apartment with her cousin Leander. Made me sick with jealousy when Maralena joked with flat-faced Tin.
And sometimes, I had reason to think that Maralena and girlfriends of hers came into the apartment with other men, individuals whose faces were becoming almost familiar to me, though I had no idea of their names or who they were—shadowy figures at the periphery of my brother’s life. It wasn’t clear to me whether Harvey was being exploited by these individuals or whether in some mysterious way Harvey was exploiting them.
Those nights when Harvey hastily shoved me into the back room—“For your own safety, Lydia.”
Somehow it happened, I was to drive Maralena, Salaman, and Mercedes to Atlantic City. Leaving in the early afternoon from Trenton and returning that night late.
Maralena, Salaman, Mercedes—these were dazzling young women with faces of the kind you see on billboards beckoning you to the casinos of Atlantic City.
I felt privileged to be driving them. To be their white-skinned girlfriend .
Harvey smiled a pinched smile. Harvey might’ve been jealous.
Saying, meanly, “They will bleed you dry, little sister. Be forewarned.”
I didn’t think so. Maralena was my girlfriend .
Hadn’t Maralena given me her cell phone number with the admonition to call her any time day, night if I needed help.
Let myself be cajoled into driving Maralena and her friends to Atlantic City and to “lending” them money—most of what remained of what I’d withdrawn from my University account.
Of the Atlantic City casino-hotels—among them Trump Taj Mahal, Bally’s, Harrah’s, Tropicana, Borgata—it was the faux -luxurious Borgata my friends preferred; Showboat and Rio they scorned as “low-roller” casinos—“For old folks, that come in buses. And some in wheelchairs, in buses.”
We started off at the slots. Here was low-stakes gambling, a kind of bargain-basement gambling that carried with it nonetheless a certain amount of drama and suspense. At least for those who expected they might win.
Pulling a lever to start into motion cartoon-fruit symbols spinning past my face seemed to me a gesture of such extreme futility, there was a childish abandon to it. Or maybe it was just the nearness of Maralena, Salaman, Mercedes who were dressed like giant tropical birds in tight-fitting sparkly clothes, high heels, dark-lace stockings. Maralena had silver piercings in her ears and left eyebrow; Salaman had dark-red-streaked hair and piercings in her face and elsewhere, she hinted, inside her clothes; Mercedes, the youngest of the three, had both piercings and tattoos, visible and hidden, and the loudest shrieking parrot-laugh.
At Harvey’s nose, a perpetual glisten of moisture.
He is a junkie. You know of course. A junkie has no shame.
In a bemused voice Harvey said, as if thinking aloud: “Montaigne discovered at the age of thirty-eight that death is light and airy—he’d been thrown from his horse, trampled. He experienced no ‘other world’—no God, no Savior. He’d been Catholic of course—everyone was Catholic at that time and in that place, in sixteenth-century France. Montaigne saw that life is the long haul. Dying is the easy way.”
“And how did Montaigne know this?” I asked, exasperated. “Had he died, and returned to write about the experience?”
“He almost died. It was near -death. His ‘soul’ slipped from his body, according to his account. For some time, he floated outside his broken body.”
“We all do,” I said. “It’s called dreaming.”
* * *
“Lyd’ja! You gon drive us to ’Lantic City, yes?”
Somehow it was— yes.
Couldn’t say no to Maralena. Basking in Maralena’s hectic warmth and when Maralena spoke of Lyd’ja as my girlfriend I felt such happiness, no poetry could begin to express.
With Maralena was her girlfriend Salaman. And another girlfriend Mercedes.
It was upsetting to me, when Maralena came to our apartment with her cousin Leander. Made me sick with jealousy when Maralena joked with flat-faced Tin.
And sometimes, I had reason to think that Maralena and girlfriends of hers came into the apartment with other men, individuals whose faces were becoming almost familiar to me, though I had no idea of their names or who they were—shadowy figures at the periphery of my brother’s life. It wasn’t clear to me whether Harvey was being exploited by these individuals or whether in some mysterious way Harvey was exploiting them.
Those nights when Harvey hastily shoved me into the back room—“For your own safety, Lydia.”
Somehow it happened, I was to drive Maralena, Salaman, and Mercedes to Atlantic City. Leaving in the early afternoon from Trenton and returning that night late.
Maralena, Salaman, Mercedes—these were dazzling young women with faces of the kind you see on billboards beckoning you to the casinos of Atlantic City.
I felt privileged to be driving them. To be their white-skinned girlfriend .
Harvey smiled a pinched smile. Harvey might’ve been jealous.
Saying, meanly, “They will bleed you dry, little sister. Be forewarned.”
I didn’t think so. Maralena was my girlfriend .
Hadn’t Maralena given me her cell phone number with the admonition to call her any time day, night if I needed help.
Let myself be cajoled into driving Maralena and her friends to Atlantic City and to “lending” them money—most of what remained of what I’d withdrawn from my University account.
Of the Atlantic City casino-hotels—among them Trump Taj Mahal, Bally’s, Harrah’s, Tropicana, Borgata—it was the faux -luxurious Borgata my friends preferred; Showboat and Rio they scorned as “low-roller” casinos—“For old folks, that come in buses. And some in wheelchairs, in buses.”
We started off at the slots. Here was low-stakes gambling, a kind of bargain-basement gambling that carried with it nonetheless a certain amount of drama and suspense. At least for those who expected they might win.
Pulling a lever to start into motion cartoon-fruit symbols spinning past my face seemed to me a gesture of such extreme futility, there was a childish abandon to it. Or maybe it was just the nearness of Maralena, Salaman, Mercedes who were dressed like giant tropical birds in tight-fitting sparkly clothes, high heels, dark-lace stockings. Maralena had silver piercings in her ears and left eyebrow; Salaman had dark-red-streaked hair and piercings in her face and elsewhere, she hinted, inside her clothes; Mercedes, the youngest of the three, had both piercings and tattoos, visible and hidden, and the loudest shrieking parrot-laugh.
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