Chapters (60)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Personae
- I: Early Days
- One. Control
- Two. Doubt
- Three. Fate
- Four. Same
- Five. Fine Arts
- Six. In Loco Parentis
- Seven. Settling
- Eight. Neighbors
- Nine. Prospects
- Ten. The Lucky
- Eleven. Instruction
- Twelve. Same
- Thirteen. This Is a Pipe
- Fourteen. This Is Not a Pipe
- Fifteen. The Reason
- Sixteen. That Person
- Seventeen. Predictably
- II: Writing Teacher
- Eighteen. Early Poems
- Nineteen. Motivation
- Twenty. Allegory
- Twenty-One. Grief
- Twenty-Two. A Portrait
- Twenty-Three. Veils
- Twenty-Four. Soft Power
- Twenty-Five. Lists
- Twenty-Six. A Break
- Twenty-Seven. Elsewhere
- Twenty-Eight. Custom
- Twenty-Nine. Parity
- Thirty. Fortune
- III: Volta
- Thirty-One. Images
- Thirty-Two. A Very Interesting Young Man
- Thirty-Three. Letters
- Thirty-Four. We Prefer to See Ourselves Living
- Thirty-Five. Love
- Thirty-Six. The Iceberg
- IV: Your Best Reader
- Thirty-Seven. A Novelist
- Thirty-Eight. In Advance of the Broken Arm
- Thirty-Nine. Their Penultimate Encounter
- Forty. Détente
- Forty-One. Worlds
- Forty-Two. Recognition
- Forty-Three. Persistence
- Forty-Four. And Then
- Forty-Five. Mingling
- Forty-Six. You
- Forty-Seven. Persona
- Forty-Eight. Est et Non
- Forty-Nine. The Author
- Epilogue
- Afterword: The Libertine
- Acknowledgments
- About the Authors
The next thing that there is in front of Harry’s face is the face of Bill Clinton. The forty-second president is, with astonishing gentleness, lifting Harry’s head away from the wall just enough to slide a bag of cold substance behind it. Harry is not able to see much inside the mask’s eyeholes. The Bill Clinton appears to smile.
Harry swallows.
“You should say something. That would be my recommendation.” The Bill Clinton reassumes its earlier position to Harry’s left.
Harry nods.
“How do you feel?”
“OK,” he whispers. It is like someone else has uttered the two letters. Harry waits.
The Bill Clinton is speaking. “I’m glad you’re OK. Anyway. Not to dwell.”
“No.” It’s like there’s someone completely normal saying these things, someone with an unremarkable, working voice, someone Harry doesn’t know, someone Harry can control.
“I’m not condoning this party, by the way.” The Bill Clinton laughs. Its hair is painted white. “I’m just here.”
“Cool,” says Harry. This comes out perfectly noncommittal, just a word anyone would have heard a million times.
“I thought it was more normal than staying home. Anyway, I have this.” The Bill Clinton points at its/her head. “I was thinking, you know, it’s difficult, kind of, to find a use for this kind of thing?”
Harry knows there is something called for here, some quip or whatever, something to let her know he’s hearing what she’s saying, what she, specifically is saying, that he has some idea who she is, but now he’s, more characteristically, mute.
“You a writer?” She makes an effort.
“Am I?” There’s a squeak at the end, some of the old, true Harry. He presses his lips together.
She laughs again. “I mean, it’s totally possible that you could be a writer, right?”
“Anything is.”
The Bill Clinton nods. She folds her arms across her chest. “So, uh, what do you write?”
“Whatever they tell me to.”
“Really? That’s too bad.”
“Not really.” Harry is starting to enjoy himself. “I pretend.” His head hurts less, almost not at all. There’s just this infinitesimal, dull worry.
“You do fiction? Poetry?”
“Poetry.”
“What kind?”
“I don’t really know.”
“Oh, yeah. Of course.” The Bill Clinton seems to be looking around the room.
“I’m Troy,” Harry for some reason volunteers.
“Cool. Hi, Troy,” the Bill Clinton is telling him. Her tone suggests a frown. “Hey, it was nice talking.” She pushes herself off the wall and fixes him with what would probably be a human smile if there were not a smiling mask obscuring it. She slips back into the crush of bodies just as House of Pain’s mammoth single, “Jump Around,” begins working its nostalgic enticement upon the well-lubricated crowd.
Twenty-Five. Lists
Twenty-Five
Lists