Shivering Mind

Chapter 8

think she really goes for me the way she always laughs a little

when she talks to me and says I’m such a card. A card she calls

me, which sounds ridiculous coming out of the mouth of an

old-maid English teacher who’s practically fifty years old. I really

hate it when a teacher has to show that she isn’t behind the times

by using some expression which sounds so up-to-date you know for sure she’s behind the times. Besides, card really isn’t

up-to-date anymore, which makes it even more annoying. In fact,

the thing Lorraine and I liked best about the Max was that he

didn’t go around saying we were cards or jazzy or cool or hip. He

said we were delightful, and if there’s one way to show how much

you’re not trying to make believe you’re not behind the times, it’s

to go around saying people are delightful.

I had forgotten that stuff about paranoia in that magazine Lorraine

gave me to read about seven months ago. She’s always reading

about eyes exploding and nutty people and beehives and things.

The only part that impressed me out of the whole article was

about the crazy lady in the sanitarium who hoarded food and

sheets and towels and bathrobes—the one that used to wear all the

bathrobes at one time. They said at one point she had hoarded 39

sheets, 42 towels, 93 English muffins—and she was wearing 8

bathrobes. Her big problem was she didn’t feel secure. So they let

her pick out as much as she wanted, and she ended up with 320

towels, 2,633 sheets, and 9,000 English muffins. Nine thousand

English muffins!

But that’s how it always is. Lorraine remembers the big words,

and I remember the action. Which sort of makes sense when you

stop to think that Lorraine is going to be a famous writer and I’m

going to be a great actor. Lorraine thinks she could be an actress,

but I keep telling her she’d have to be a character actress, which

means playing washwomen on TV detective shows all the time. And I don’t mean that as a distortion, like she always says I do. If

anyone distorts, it’s that mother of hers. The way her old lady

talks you’d think Lorraine needed internal plastic surgery and

seventeen body braces, but if you ask me, all she needs is a little

confidence. She’s got very interesting green eyes that scan like

nervous radar—that is they used to until the Max died. Ever

since then her eyes have become absolutely still, except when we

work on this memorial epic. Her eyes come to life the second we

talk about it. Her wanting to be a writer is part of it, I guess, but I

think we’re both a little anxious to get all that happened in place

and try to understand why we did the crazy things we did.

I suppose it all started when Lorraine and I and these two

amoebae called Dennis Kobin and Norton Kelly were hot on

those phone gags last September. We did the usual ones like

dialing any number out of the book and asking “Is your

refrigerator running?”

“Yes.”

“Go catch it then.”

And we called every drugstore.

“Do you have Prince Albert in a can?”

“Yes.”

“Then let him out.”

But then we made up a new game in which the object was to keep

a stranger talking on the phone as long as possible. At least twice

a week we’d meet for a telephone marathon. Wednesday

afternoons we’d have it at Dennis’ house because his mother goes

shopping at the supermarket and his father doesn’t get home from

work until after six P.M., even when he’s sober. And on Sundays

we’d do it at Norton’s because his father plays golf and his mother

is so retarded she doesn’t know what’s coming off anyway, but at

least they didn’t mind if their kids used the house. Mine and

Lorraine’s we can’t even go to. We couldn’t use the phone at

Lorraine’s anyway because her mother doesn’t have unlimited

service, and at my house my mother is a disinfectant fanatic. She

would have gotten too nervous over all of us using her purified

instrument. Another difficulty there is that my father, whom I

warmly refer to as Bore, put a lock on our phone—one of those

round locks you put in the first dialhole so you can’t dial. He put

it on because of a little exchange we had when he called from

work.

“Do you realize I’ve been trying to get your mother for an hour and a half and the line’s been busy?” Bore bellowed.

“Those things happen. I was talking to a friend.”

“If you don’t use the phone properly, I’m going to put a lock on

it.”

“Yeah? No kidding?”

Now it was just the way I said yeah that set him off, and that night

when he got home, he just put the lock on the phone and didn’t

say a word. But I’m used to it. Bore and I have been having a lot

of trouble communicating lately as it is, and sometimes I go a

little crazy when I feel I’m being picked on or not being trusted.

That’s why I finally put airplane glue in the keyhole of the lock so

nobody could use the telephone, key or no key.

Anyway, the idea of the telephone marathon was you had to close

your eyes and stick your finger on a number in the directory and

then call it up to see how long you could keep whoever answered

talking on the phone. I wasn’t too good at this because I used to

burst out laughing. The only thing I could do that kept them

talking awhile before they hung up was to tell them I was calling

from TV Quiz and that they had won a prize. That was always

good for three and a half minutes before they caught on.

The longest anyone ever lasted was Dennis, because he picked

out this old woman who lived alone and was desperate to talk to

anyone. Dennis is really not very bright. In fact, he talks so

slowly some people think he has brain damage. But he told this

woman he had called her number because he had heard she gave

good advice and his problem was that he was about to die from a

hideous skin disease because a rat had bitten off his nose when he

was a baby and the skin grafts didn’t take. He kept her on the

phone for two hours and twenty-six minutes. That was the record!

Now Lorraine can blame all the other things on me, but she was

the one who picked out the Max’s phone number. If you ask

me, I think he would have died anyway. Maybe we speeded

things up a little, but you really can’t say we murdered him.

Not murdered him.

Derek told you about Dennis and Norton, but I don’t think he got

across how really disturbed those two boys are. Norton has eyes

like a mean mouse, and he’s the type of kid who thinks everyone’s

trying to throw rusty beer cans at him. And he’s pretty big, even

bigger than Derek, and the two of them hate each other.

Actually, Norton is a social outcast. He’s been a social outcast since his freshman year in high school when he got caught

stealing a bag of marshmallows from the supermarket. He never

recovered from that because they put his name in the newspaper

and mentioned that the entire loot was a bag of marshmallows,

and ever since then everybody calls him The Marshmallow Kid.

“How’s The Marshmallow Kid today?”

Anyway, he’s the one who started cheating in the telephone

marathons we were having. After Dennis had rung up that

staggering record about having his nose bitten off, Norton started

getting smart, and when it was his turn to pick out a phone

number, he’d peek a little and try to make his finger land on a

woman’s number rather than a man’s. You could always make a

woman talk twice as long as a man. I used to ignore it because in

his case it didn’t matter whom he spoke to on the phone. They all

hung up.

But this one time I decided to peek myself. When it was my turn,

I made believe I had covered my eyes with my left hand, then

thumbed through the pages, and as I moved my finger down a

column I happened to spot the words “Howard Avenue.” Now,

Howard Avenue is just a few blocks from where I live, so I could

pretend I belonged to the Howard Avenue Civic League or some

other fictitious philanthropy.

When this man answered, my voice was rather quivery because

Derek was watching with his X-ray eyes and I think he knew I had

cheated a bit. When he is an actor, I know he’ll be able to project

those glaring eyes clear up to the second balcony.

“Hello,” this jolly voice said as I cleared my throat.

“Hello. Is this Mr. Angelo Pignati?”

“It sure is,” came the bubbling voice again.

“This is Miss Truman of the Howard Avenue Charities. Perhaps

you’ve heard of us and our good work?”

“My wife isn’t home just now.”

“I didn’t call to speak with your wife, Mr. Pignati,” I assured him.

I changed to a very British accent. “I distinctly called to speak to

you and summon you to our cause. You see, my organization is

interested in receiving small donations from people just like

you—good-hearted people, Mr. Pignati—we depend on lovely

people just like you and your wife—”

“What did you say the name of your charity was?” the voice

asked.

Suddenly I couldn’t control myself anymore, and I burst into

laughter right into the phone.

“Is something funny?”

“No… there’s nothing funny, Mr. Pignati… it’s just that one of

the girls… here at the office has just told me a joke, and it was very funny.” I bit my tongue. “But back to serious business, Mr.

Pignati. You asked the name of our charity—the name of it is—”

“The Lorraine and Derek Fund!”

“The name of it is—”

“The Lorraine and Derek Fund,” Derek repeated.

“Shut up,” I said, covering the mouthpiece and then uncovering it.

“The name of our charity is the L & J Fund, Mr. Pignati, and we’d

like to know if you’d care to contribute to it? It would really be a

very nice gesture, Mr. Pignati.”

There was a pause.

“What was the joke the girl told you?” he finally said. “I know a

lot of jokes, but my wife’s the only one who laughs at them. Ha,

ha.”

“Is that so?”

“She really did laugh at them. She liked a good joke, she did, and

I miss her. She’s taken a little trip.”

“Oh, did she?”

“Yep. She’s out in California with my sister.”

“Isn’t that marvelous!”

“Her favorite was the one about the best get-well cards to get. Did

you ever hear that one—what’d you say your name was?”

“Miss Truman.” “Well, Miss Truman, did you ever hear that one, the one about

what the best get-well cards you can get are?”

“No, Mr. Pignati—”

“It was my wife’s favorite joke, that one was. She’d make me tell

it a lot of times….”

There was something about his voice that made me feel sorry for

him, and I began to wish I had never bothered him. He just went

on talking and talking, and the receiver started to hurt my ear. By

this time Dennis and Norton had gone into the living room and

started to watch TV, but right where they could keep an eye on

timing the phone call. Derek stayed next to me, pushing his ear

close to the receiver every once in awhile, and I could see the

wheels in his head spinning.

“Yes, Miss Truman, the best get-well cards to get are four aces!

Ha, ha, ha! Isn’t that funny?”

He let out this wild laugh, as though he hadn’t known the end of

his own joke.

“Do you get it, Miss Truman? Four aces… the best get-well cards

you can get—”

“Yes, Mr. Pignati—”

“You know, in poker?”

“Yes, Mr. Pignati.”

He sounded like such a nice old man, but terribly lonely. He was