The Failure (10 page)
I
n India, women of a certain caste whose husbands die are forced to remain in mourning for the rest of their lives. They’re no longer allowed to wear makeup or jewelry. They’re made to shave their heads and wear only white. Their shadows are considered bad luck. Eventually, many of them end up in a particular city—whose name I forget since having read the CNN article—where they can at least congregate and take comfort from their own accursed kind. This place is called the City of Widows.
Violet is a widow. True, she killed her husband, but it was an accident, and though she did not love him she was sorry for having caused his death. Most of her actions in the five years since can be seen as a kind of American version of the City of Widows. Call it the City of Windows: Violet became a flagrant and habitual exhibitionist, a willing slave to the erotic whimsies of the Nation of Men, not because she enjoyed it, but because she decided—whether consciously or subconsciously is not the issue—that if she were not to be paired with one man only she would be paired with all men generally. She decided that she would, in the words of one of her favorite pop songs, fuck the pain away.
You can’t fuck the pain away, of course. Like all successful pop songs, the central conceit is a beautiful lie. But you can try, and Violet tried. She had been married for five years, and unmarried now for the same, but in her mind still married, still unable to sleep in a shared bed unshared. Five years of practice had unprepared Violet for solitude.
Her old apartment too, impossible. Every inch imprinted with the presence of the dead man, corners of rooms and even cobwebs brushed with faint breath. It can all go to hell. The plants can die from neglect, now. Framed photos smothered under dust. Now. What energy’s left she summoned to wake, and walk, and fuck. All else is definition of useless. Scrape remains of food into crammed trashcan, pile dish onto pile of dishes in sink. She used to be tidy. Now she’s only ever tired. Any help sleep provides removed by the reeling void of waking up alone, without light or heat or right, in darkness made still darker by indifferent empty space. The void, of course, merely Violet’s stomach grumbling from hunger. Empty is as empty does.
Shame. What you feel when you’re not afraid. Rare’s the peace that preempts either, rarer still the feathery tickle of contentment (that is to say happiness, Violet, don’t be shy, a thing does not disappear from earth just because it disappears from your own little life). We ought to be better learned of the selfishness of gentlemen: the oblique glances, the question-mark eyebrows, appetites to sate, egos to salve: enervation itself.
The last thing dies in a woman is hope. Even unreasonable fancy, in place of hope. One jar in the back of the malodorous fridge, never opened. A token but of what. Symbolic but of what. The jar labeled
Jam
, the label handlettered, unspecified as to flavor or provenance or date of purchase. As long as she can remember, that jar has sat. Absorbed the passing of time as a process of refilling. Violet likes to think that sealed in the jar are the years. Time itself, gone bad.
B
illy stood for a few moments staring in disbelief at the top of the hillside where Guy had just gotten into his stolen Mini Cooper and sped off at an unsafe speed up the treacherous curves of Larkin Heights.
-Well, that’s just fine, he said to no one. -That’s just fucking fine.
He began scooping up the scattered bills Guy had flung willy-nilly into the brush. A small shower of rocks fell from an outcropping directly above Billy, hitting him on the head.
-Ow! he exclaimed, peering to the heavens. -Haven’t you done enough for one day?
Which is when he saw the mountain lion, standing on the outcropping not ten feet above, eyeing him with more than casual interest, and growling ominously.
-I guess not, murmured Billy.
The mountain lion crouched, then jumped, and landed directly on top of Billy. Snarls from the animal and high-pitched yelps from Billy ensued, along with a fair amount of desperate flailing of limbs.
At that moment, higher on the hill, a pair of backpackers paused in their climb to stare at the commotion below. One of them whipped out a camcorder.
-Shouldn’t we, you know, try to help? asked the nonfilming hiker.
-After I get this. We can throw rocks at him, scare him away. Looks like he’s just toying with the guy anyway.
Billy fought with the mountain lion for what seemed to him like an eternity. He could see blood dripping down one of his arms. Billy had always been scared at the sight of blood, but he was now past the point of phobia. He was fighting for his life. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of the rocks that had tumbled down from the outcropping as the mountain lion approached. He stretched his bloody arm to its limit, and grabbed hold of the rock. With all his remaining strength, he bashed the mountain lion on the nose with it. The mountain lion was neither fazed nor amused, and furthermore Billy’s balance had been affected by bashing the mountain lion with the rock. He fell backwards, and landed headfirst with a considerable thud.
-Huh, said Billy, still holding the rock, still dripping with blood, just before crumpling to the ground and losing consciousness.
The two backpackers came scrambling down the hill.
-Hey, man, are you okay? said the nonfilming one.
-You’re in the frame! said the one with the camcorder. -Move!
Billy stirred into consciousness. -What happened? he asked.
-I don’t know. The mountain lion just sort of pawed and sniffed at you and then went away. Maybe he figured you were dead.
-I think I need to go to a hospital, said Billy, now in a state of shock, covered in scratches, bruises, and bleeding from several open wounds.
-Can you walk? asked the nonfilming backpacker.
-I don’t know.
-We’ll help you. It’s not far to Larkin General.
-Sweet! said the backpacker with the camcorder. -Put your arm around him and help him up the hill. I’m gonna get the whole thing. Dude, you’re gonna be a YouTube star!
-Okay, said Billy.
Y
ou understand this is just a one-time thing, Charlie. -I understand.
-And that I’m not actually attracted to you or anything. Strictly speaking, this is a bargain. I fuck you, and you fuck Guy and Billy. The first fuck is meant literally, the second metaphorically.
-I understand.
-We’re not going to see each other ever again after this. Or probably not anyway. Life is strange.
-I understand.
-Don’t you even want to know why I want to screw up Guy’s plan to rob your store?
-No.
-And you don’t care about losing your share of the money?
-No.
Violet considered Charlie’s answers for a moment.
-Not good enough, she finally replied.
-What’s not good enough?
-Why don’t you want to know anything about my motivations? It suggests to me that you don’t have any intention of following through with Guy’s plan, and that for me to fuck you would just be … superfluous.
-I don’t know what that means.
-It means you’re a creep. But that’s not important. I figured you for a creep. I didn’t figure you for an untrustworthy creep.
-I’m trustworthy.
-So you intend to follow through with this ridiculous and almost-certain-to-fail plan to rob your check-cashing place?
-I do. Or I did. Until now. Why do you think it’s almost certain to fail? Guy’s got everything worked out.
-Yeah, he’s good at that. He’s also good at the
gang aft agley
part about best-laid schemes. I mean in the original Burns poem, not the Steinbeck version.
Charlie gave a look expressing puzzlement.
-Don’t even bother, she continued, before Charlie could protest. -I don’t know why I’m talking to you like this. I think I might actually be nervous. Which is odd. I’m almost never nervous.
-Maybe you actually care about him?
-Yeah, replied Violet softly, surprising herself at her own half-admission. -I … it’s just with Guy, he’s always got these grand projects, he’s so busy trying to make something out of nothing that he can’t see the something he already … Anyway, I want him to be happy. I want to try to make him happy. I don’t do this, as a rule. I don’t get involved. That’s how my husband got killed.
She reacted to Charlie’s shocked expression with an impatient toss of her head.
-If he goes through with the plan—which I did my best to talk him out of, but to be honest my best is not very good, so I kind of figured he wouldn’t listen—he will get caught, or worse, and from what I understand, your part in all this is central, so if you don’t do your part, he will still fail, but on a much smaller scale. Call it damage control.
-Damage control, repeated Charlie.
A moment of heavy silence passed between them. Violet sighed.
-Am I really that beautiful?
-Yes.
-Okay, then. Let’s get started. She began undressing.
-No, said Charlie.
Violet stopped. -No? You’re saying no?
-Yes.
Violet shrugged, began dressing again. -So much for Plan Violet.
-It wasn’t a very good plan.
-You’re probably right, said Violet, in a slow monotone.
W
hat time is it? asked Billy. -It’s thirty seconds later than the last time you asked me.
-I forget what time you told me it was then.
-That’s not my problem. I’ll let you know when it’s time.
-Are we close?
-We’re not far.
-Do you think Sven should be here by now?
-No, but I’m beginning to have doubts about you being here.
-I’d feel better going in if I knew our getaway driver had arrived.
-I told him to get here at 9:05. We’re going in at exactly nine. We’ve been over this, Billy, and over this and over this.
-I know. I guess you could say I’m skittish.
-Turns out.
-Can we go over procedure one last time?
-I’d prefer not to.
Guy turned to Billy, a wan smile on his face.
-William. Look around. There are dozens of cars here, same as us, engines idling, same as us. That’s why we picked this day. Everyone’s here waiting for the place to open, paychecks or Social Security checks in hand. There’s nothing suspicious in us being here as well. And, if you must know, although I haven’t said anything, Sven is already here. I’m not going to point him out until we’re on our way out of the store, because if I do you’ll be constantly looking over at him, which is the type of thing we really don’t need right now.
-He’s here? Where? Billy’s head spun around, looking.
-I was kidding. He’s not here.
-I’d feel better if he was here.
Guy looked at his watch, sighed. Glancing into the store, he could see Charlie at the front door, beginning the process of unlocking the series of deadbolts. People began to exit their cars and make their way to the door.
-Okay. It’s time.
-It’s time? Already?
-Yes, already. Let’s have the ski masks.
Billy unfurled the crumpled paper bag in his lap, put his hand in, extracted two knit ski caps, robin’s-egg blue in color.
-What the fuck? said Guy.
-What?
-Were they out of hot pink?
-You didn’t say what color. These were on clearance.
-Do you know why they were on clearance? Because they’re incredibly garish and ugly. Which is kind of beside the point, because I’m not criticizing your fashion sense, Billy, I’m criticizing your common sense.
-The security camera is black-and-white.
-Even if you know that to be true, and I don’t see how, unless you believe everything you see on TV, that’s not the point. The point is, we are now readily identifiable. We are the baby-blue bandits. All of the eyewitnesses to this crime will now remember one very specific detail: the color of our ski masks.
-Can I make a point?
-I think you’ve already made enough points for one lifetime.
-Here’s my thinking, for what it’s worth: yes, they’ll remember our ski masks. But that’s
all
they’ll remember. Because the masks are so memorable, they’ll fail to take note of any other salient characteristics, like height, skin tone, girth …
-Girth?
-I could stand to lose a little weight. Around the middle. Look, we ditch the ski masks first chance we get, and there’s nothing to tie us to the job. Everyone’s out looking for the … what you said, the baby-blue bandits, and we’re no longer any kind of blue.
-Are you just turning a negative into a positive, or did you actually think of this beforehand?
-Little bit of both, actually. I don’t favor analysis as much as you do.
-Right. Okay. You ready?
-I’m nervous as hell, frankly.
-Me too. Let’s go.
