Read Online Things as They Are by Guy Vanderhaeghe - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Guy Vanderhaeghe
Tags: Literary, Literature & Fiction, Short Stories, Literary Fiction, Short Stories & Anthologies, Single Authors
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Norman had the more remarkable imagination. The movies were partly responsible. Norman was always crazy about the movies. Our town had just one theatre, the Empire, and Hiller was alwaysin it. Sometimes he would see the same movie, three, four, even five times. In the theatre he kept strictly to himself, was always alone. If any of us tried to sit with him, he’d tell us to piss off, he didn’t need anybody yapping and yammering next to him, ruining the show. Twenty years after the fact I can still see him slouching down the aisle to his seat floppy-limbed, a tall boy with huge feet and hands and long, restless fingers constantly twitching in his pockets; a narrow, nervous face with hot, black eyes, which turned lukewarm and bored whenever the conversation slid off into anything he wasn’t interested in, which meant practically everything except money, sports, and the movies. It was that look which made people, teachers in particular, think he was stupid. They never stopped to consider why, if he was so stupid, he was always managing to get the better of them.
There was a ritual he performed at the movies. Before draping his gangly legs over the seat in front of him, he loosened his laces so his feet could breathe. Next his baseball cap came off and was hung on the toe of one of his shoes. The cap coming off was like the Pope making a public appearance in shorts. The Empire was the only place anybody ever saw Norman Hiller without his baseball cap on his head; he even wore it in school. Every teacher who had tried to threaten him out from underneath it had failed. The baseball cap was non-negotiable. The only reason it came off was because it interfered with Norman’s line of sight to the big screen. It says something about his self-possession when you remember the year was 1968, and, despite The Beatles and everything they meant, eighteen-year-old Norman Hiller could still wear a baseball cap winter and summer without risk of being laughed at.
When the screen lit up, retrieving the faces of the waiting audience from that fleeting, profound moment of darkness before the projector began to whir, Hiller was utterly changed. The scurry abandoned his eyes and the fidget was wiped from his face, leaving it pale, smooth, and shining.
What were Hiller’s favourite movies? He had a list of them.Norman was famous for his lists. “Okay,” he’d propose, “name me the Top Policemen in the NHL , one to ten.” Or rank the National League third basemen. It only followed that he had an All Time Greatest Movies list. By summer 1968 this list included
The Magnificent Seven, The Guns of Navarone, The Dirty Dozen, The Devil’s Brigade
, and, in his opinion, the world’s ultimo primo flick,
Cool Hand Luke
. These were the films from which Hiller absorbed the arts of scripting and direction which put Murph and Dooey and Hop Jump and Deke and me under his spell, a cast of misfits who could be persuaded to identify themselves with the screwballs who populated the movies Hiller loved. We were all reborn in Norman’s imagination. He turned Dooey, an edgy little shoplifter, into James Garner. What was Garner famous for in
The Great Escape?
Scrounging. He could rustle up whatever you required, even in a Nazi prison camp. Norman constructed Dooey into a legend in Dooey’s own mind, until he became the consummate booster, the guy who could steal anything. “Fucking Dooey,” Norman would say, “nothing the guy can’t lift. Dooey could steal Christ off the cross and not disturb the nails. Couldn’t you, Dooey? Fucking right. Because he’s the best. Dooey is
it.”
If Cool Hand Luke gained undying fame just by swallowing forty hard boiled eggs, then wasn’t glory in the cards for Hop Jump Benyuk? Because Hop Jump could stuff a whole baseball in his mouth. Encouraged by Norman, he even started carrying one around in his jacket pocket so he was always equipped to perform. “He ought to be on television,” Hiller would exclaim. “How
There was a ritual he performed at the movies. Before draping his gangly legs over the seat in front of him, he loosened his laces so his feet could breathe. Next his baseball cap came off and was hung on the toe of one of his shoes. The cap coming off was like the Pope making a public appearance in shorts. The Empire was the only place anybody ever saw Norman Hiller without his baseball cap on his head; he even wore it in school. Every teacher who had tried to threaten him out from underneath it had failed. The baseball cap was non-negotiable. The only reason it came off was because it interfered with Norman’s line of sight to the big screen. It says something about his self-possession when you remember the year was 1968, and, despite The Beatles and everything they meant, eighteen-year-old Norman Hiller could still wear a baseball cap winter and summer without risk of being laughed at.
When the screen lit up, retrieving the faces of the waiting audience from that fleeting, profound moment of darkness before the projector began to whir, Hiller was utterly changed. The scurry abandoned his eyes and the fidget was wiped from his face, leaving it pale, smooth, and shining.
What were Hiller’s favourite movies? He had a list of them.Norman was famous for his lists. “Okay,” he’d propose, “name me the Top Policemen in the NHL , one to ten.” Or rank the National League third basemen. It only followed that he had an All Time Greatest Movies list. By summer 1968 this list included
The Magnificent Seven, The Guns of Navarone, The Dirty Dozen, The Devil’s Brigade
, and, in his opinion, the world’s ultimo primo flick,
Cool Hand Luke
. These were the films from which Hiller absorbed the arts of scripting and direction which put Murph and Dooey and Hop Jump and Deke and me under his spell, a cast of misfits who could be persuaded to identify themselves with the screwballs who populated the movies Hiller loved. We were all reborn in Norman’s imagination. He turned Dooey, an edgy little shoplifter, into James Garner. What was Garner famous for in
The Great Escape?
Scrounging. He could rustle up whatever you required, even in a Nazi prison camp. Norman constructed Dooey into a legend in Dooey’s own mind, until he became the consummate booster, the guy who could steal anything. “Fucking Dooey,” Norman would say, “nothing the guy can’t lift. Dooey could steal Christ off the cross and not disturb the nails. Couldn’t you, Dooey? Fucking right. Because he’s the best. Dooey is
it.”
If Cool Hand Luke gained undying fame just by swallowing forty hard boiled eggs, then wasn’t glory in the cards for Hop Jump Benyuk? Because Hop Jump could stuff a whole baseball in his mouth. Encouraged by Norman, he even started carrying one around in his jacket pocket so he was always equipped to perform. “He ought to be on television,” Hiller would exclaim. “How
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