The Broken Teaglass (4 page)

Mona paused.

“So …,” I said. “What about you? What did you study before you came here?”

“Classics. Greek and Latin. I went to Middlebrook.”

“Oh?”

Hmm. Middlebrook. The expensive women’s college about thirty minutes outside of Claxton, where rich girls went in wearing cashmere and emerged months later with short haircuts and septum rings and T-shirts that said
Subvert the Dominant Paradigm
. I tried not to wonder if Mona had ever kissed another girl. It just didn’t seem like the right thought for a young wordsmith to be having.

“You from around here originally?” I asked.

“No. Ohio. But I’m keeping you from your letter. I should stop talking your ear off and let you get back to it.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“Do you want any advice for answering that thing?”

“Yes,” I admitted.

“First of all, you should explain to him that in general both are accepted plural forms of ‘-trix’ words. But you might want to just tell him a little about what kind of evidence we have in the file for ‘editrix’ and ‘dominatrix,’ too. Just to shut him up. Just look in the file at ‘dominatrix’ and ‘editrix’ if you need something to beef up the letter. Have you had a chance to poke around in the cit file on your own yet?”

“No … I’ve only seen the citations that Dan’s given me to look at.”

Mona pushed her chair back and stood up.

“Come on, then. You know you can look in there and take stuff out whenever you want, right?”

She led me into one of the rows of little wooden file drawers, pulled out one of the narrow drawers, and heaved it onto the top of the cabinet. Then she started flipping through the tightly packed citations.

“You know, correspondence is the one task that really gives you an excuse to fool around in the cit file. So often, with other stuff, you can just use the database. Dan told you that they’ve got the most recent cits all computerized, right?”

“Yeah … since 1994, right?”

“Yeah. Maybe someday they’ll get around to computerizing all the millions of old cits too. Seems like that’d be a smart idea, don’t you think? What if the place goes up in flames someday, you know?”

“Yeah.”

“Here.” She held up a thin pile of citations. “That’s what we have for ‘editrix.’ Not much. That might actually be why both plurals are listed. Both are standard plurals for that ending. But it’s not really widespread enough to even have established a more commonly used plural. You know what I mean?”

“I think so,” I said.

She started flipping through the cits. “You’ll probably find at least a couple varied plurals for ‘editrix’ in the cits…. Let’s see now … If it’s in the dictionary, some editors at some point had cits to back it up. Everything’s in the dictionary for a reason. Jared Houston just doesn’t ever quite believe that…. Here we are … here’s a plural.”

She held one out to me. I took it and read it.

It was from a news magazine.

“I guess I could quote that one,” I said.

“And another.” Mona handed me another slip. “The other plural form. Perfect.”

I read the slip.

The citation was from a book called
The Broken Teaglass
, written by someone named Dolores Beekmim, and published in 1985.

“This one’s kind of … weird, though,” I said slowly. “Should I be quoting something like this? There’s something a little off here.”

“Whadya mean?” Mona took it and read it.

“Kind of sounds like …” I looked at Mona, hoping she would say what I was thinking, so I wouldn’t have to risk sounding stupid. “But maybe not. I mean, a citation can be a lot of things, you know? There are officers’ citations, in police departments, and—”

Mona was silent for a moment. “‘No spilling on the citations’?” she said, wrinkling her nose. She read it again.

“I think this takes place … here,” she said.

“Yeah … that’s kind of what it sounded like.”

“Or maybe at some other dictionary company office. But there’s, like, only one or two other dictionary companies in the country.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“I didn’t know there was a book like this.” Mona seemed tickled. For the first time since I’d approached her desk, her smile seemed real. “A novel about Samuelson. Isn’t that amazing? Can I hold on to this for now?”

“Sure. Doesn’t seem like a very objective thing to be quoting, so I’ll look for something else.”

“Right.” Mona looked distracted. She was watching Dan make his way to the men’s room. “Look through the rest of those cits. Then look through the ones for ‘dominatrix.’”

“Yeah. All right. Sounds like fun.”

“Don’t spend too much time on it.” Mona lowered her voice. “Dan probably just gave it to you so the guy doesn’t get any funny ideas about us being friends. The content of the answer probably won’t matter so much as the fact that a different editor’s name is signed on the bottom.”

“Dan didn’t quite say it like that.”

“Of course he didn’t. But that’s what he meant.”

Dan finally started my “research reading”
training on the following morning. I’d been looking forward to it since Dan told me that all editors—even lowly editorial assistants like myself—got to choose most of their own newspapers and magazines for the task. The idea that I could get paid to read
Rolling Stone
and
Time
really jazzed me. He started me off with a little packet of photocopied articles to practice on. I peeked at the titles of his selections while he spoke:
“Reality TV? Not!” “Learning to Say No.” “Lesbian Celluloid: Classic Screen Dykes.” “Uncle Sam Goody Wants YOU: Materialism as the New Patriotism?”

“As you can see, I’ve tried to give you a good variety. Nothing too heavy for your first few times around. You’re likely to find some pretty informal writing in some of these. But remember that you’re not just looking for new words. The easiest thing to spot is new words, especially slang words. But we also read for slight variations in how older words are being used. Or general usage issues. Or abbreviations.
Anything that looks like it could be useful. You’ll find more to underline as time goes on. You’ll become more free to underline whatever strikes you.”

“Should I look things up as I go?” I asked.

“To begin, you can do that, if you wish. It might give you a feel for what we’ve already got in our books. But typically, you won’t be doing that. It goes too slow that way, and it’s unnecessary. Citations are there to help us to determine if our definitions are still accurate and up-to-date, not just to determine what we’re missing.”

Dan cleared his throat.

“It’s really one of the more fun parts of the job,” he continued. “Aside from defining, of course. You ought to know, though. It’s addictive behavior. We’ve got this one retired editor who still marks everything he reads. A pretty sad case. He comes in every once in a while to drop off his handwritten cits. Takes them off the TV and radio too. Half of his cits are quoted from late-night talk radio.”

“Are you serious?”

“I don’t think I could make that up.” Dan shook his head. “I shouldn’t speak of it so lightly, actually. That could easily be my own fate, I suppose.”

I glanced down at his hands as he handed me a stapled list. No wedding ring. I don’t know why I’d assumed he was married.

“Take a look at this list of periodicals,” he told me. “We subscribe to all of these, and you should feel free to add something if there’s a magazine you think would make a good addition. Some periodicals are read by a few editors, some only by one. People tend to catch different things. You have any idea what you’d like to read?”

“Rolling Stone?”
I said.

“Sure,” he said, circling it. “Two other editors read that, but I’ll put you on the list.”

“Time?”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to get in line for that. Three people already read it. I just kicked someone else off it and put Mona on for a while. She asked for that about six months ago.”

I noticed that
Motorcyclist
didn’t have any initials next to it.

“Anyone read that?” I said, pointing.

“No, actually. The editor who read that retired a few months ago. His subscriptions have been piling up. I’d be quite happy to give you that one.”

“Sure, put me down for
Motorcyclist
, then.”

“And can I start sending motorcycle terms to you? Are you a motorcyclist?”

“Um. No, I’m not. It just caught my eye. I’m just interested in it as a, uh, layman.”

“I see,” Dan murmured. “Well. We’ll start with those. You can think about what other magazines you’d like and tell me over the next few weeks.”

I suppressed a groan when I
saw Tom sitting on the porch as I drove up. Almost every day when I came home, he was there. He’d blow smoke rings and nod as he questioned me about the secrets of the dictionary trade. When he was satisfied with my answers, he usually offered me a drink.

“There he is,” he said as I climbed the porch steps. “Billy the Kid.”

“I don’t feel like a kid. Not after a day at that office.”

“Mmm.” Tom nodded. “You know, you’ve got circles under your eyes. You worn out?”

“Yeah. A little tired.”

“What did they have you do today?”

“I read a bunch of magazines.”

He snorted. “Yeah, right. Sounds like a tough day. Did I tell you yet that I applied to work there once?”

“No.”

“Yeah. Well, I did. But they didn’t want anything to do with me. Didn’t even call me for an interview.”

“I wouldn’t take it personally,” I said. “They probably were just being sticklers. Probably didn’t call you because you don’t have your degree.”

“I don’t need to be consoled, man. It’s all shit.”

“It is,” I agreed.

Tom was staring out into the street.

“Shit,” he said again, slowly.

“What’s the matter?” I asked.

“It’s shit,” he said. “What superficial things separate an educated man from an ignorant one. In the eyes of conventional society, anyway.”

He closed his eyes.

“Shit,” he said again, apparently relishing the word. Then he started reciting, “‘For some time he has been aware of shit, elaborately crusted along the sides of this ceramic tunnel he’s in: shit nothing can flush away, mixed with hardwater minerals into a deliberate brown barnacling of his route, patterns thick with meaning…. ’ You know Thomas Pynchon?
Gravity’s Rainbow?”

“No, not really. Heard of Pynchon, but I never read any of his books.”

“That’s a part that really hits home. Some days don’t you just feel like you’ve gone headfirst into the crapper?”

“I’ve had a few of those, yeah.”

“Ah.” Tom opened his eyes briefly, and smiled. “‘Patterns thick with meaning, Burma-Shave signs of the toilet world, icky and sticky, cryptic and glyptic … ’ Billy. You really should read him…. Hey. You know what ‘glyptic’ means?”

I looked at the ground. I couldn’t quite place what the root
glyp
might mean.

“I have a lot to learn,” I admitted.

“Don’t sweat it. No one expects you to be Daniel Samuelson. They don’t make ’em like Daniel Samuelson anymore. I hope they’re teaching you a little company history at the office.”

The city bus pulled up to the corner and Barbara struggled out of its doors, carrying about four white plastic grocery bags on each arm. She rearranged her bags and tugged at her skirt before heading toward the house. Tom kept talking as she approached.

“People don’t generally appreciate what a hardworking man Daniel Samuelson actually was,” he went on. “Imagine writing a whole dictionary in just a few years. Now they’ve got a full staff doing the same thing. The same thing
one man
did back then. Hey, Barb.”

“Hello.” Barbara stopped in front of the steps and tried to blow a wisp of hair out of her eyes.

“You want help with those bags?” I asked. She smiled, then handed me a bulging plastic sack full of cans.

“Either of you know when Daniel Samuelson started his illustrious company?” Tom asked.

Barbara rolled her eyes. I opened my mouth to answer, but Tom interrupted.

“Eighteen seventy-eight. See that?” He shook his head. “Barb here’s lived in Claxton her whole life and she doesn’t know a hell of a lot about Mr. Samuelson. It’s a shame. That
company was here before most of our families even got off the boat. But see, many Claxtonites don’t even know about Samuelson. It’s actually a little-known fact that some of the country’s finest dictionaries are produced right here in our fair shithole of a city.”

Tom looked at Barbara and then at me. “You want a shot of something?”

“Please, Tom,” said Barbara, opening the screen door. “Not on the porch.”

“Tequila okay? That’s all I got,” Tom said, getting up.

“I’m good,” I said.

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

As soon as I closed my
front door, however, I was sorry I had turned down the tequila shot. The pouring, drinking, and subsequent light-headed conversation would’ve filled up a good thirty minutes far better than I could on my own.

I threw down my junk mail.

“What the hell do I do now?” I whispered.

On my kitchen table,
101 Damn Good Jokes
lay facedown, open, with its spine cracked. When I saw the book, I felt chastened. What was wrong with me lately—treating time as if it were something that simply needed to be filled?