“I’m sorry. I slipped on a wet spot on the floor.”
“Get your hands off me, pal!” said the woman.
When Mel kept wiping, the woman gave him a solid one to the jaw, and he stumbled backward onto an adjacent table, where a couple had deposited a tray overstocked with dessert delicacies, all topped with globs of soft ice cream.
“Oh my goodness!” gasped the lady. “You asshole,” shouted the man.
At which point two security guards appeared, one tall and spectrally thin, the other short with a massive overhang above his belt. Each took one of Mel’s arms, securing him, and the tall guard, addressing the woman with the bespattered blouse, asked, “Is this man annoying you, Mrs. Redd?”
“Nah. He tripped in a puddle on the floor. Let ‘im go.” Then to Mel: “Come on. I’ll buy you a drink.”
From: [email protected]
Nov. 7, 2000. I just voted for George W. Bush. The last debate convinced me. Gore is one of those left-wing big spenders. Bush might have his faults, but at least he won’t pick our pockets to pay for half-baked socialist projects.
Memorable day. The department just voted to give tenure to Faustino Ajaia on the basis of a first novel: The Gents in Pink. Of course, I had to read this junk about cross-dressers. In our day, Jesse, you didn’t get tenure on the basis of one novel. Of course, Ajaia is a PC shoo in: Hispanic author, sexually liberated subject. Frankly, I don’t think writing of any kind has a place in an English department.
Bobby and I are thinking about coming East over Christmas break. If we do travel, we look forward to seeing you. Those years of grad school at Wisconsin were great, weren’t they?
From: [email protected]
I can’t believe that you voted for Bush. God, the man can’t even express his ideas (if he really has any). “Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream.” Wow! If he would say nuclear rather than nucular, there’d be some hope. I’ve always told my students that muddled language is a sure sign of muddled thought. Well, we’ll see what happens. Frankly, I think that Bush is an irresponsible jerk.
I’m sorry to tell you that Martha and I will be in France over the Christmas break. Another time maybe.
2. Peppermint; or Heart of Darkness
Late afternoon. Professor J. Melongaster Druse sat at his desk, killing time before leaving to attend the annual departmental cocktail party, looking forward to a few minutes of inert solitude, but on this Friday surcease from the storm and stress of a professor’s duties was not to be.
A knock on the door of his office. His response. Mr. Garth Timmins entered and took a seat, forcing Druse to pull himself together and refocus. Timmins, in his snowy white cheerleader uniform, a large purple C in chenille on his chest, apparently found it as difficult to leave his rah-rah attitude and bearing behind on the playing field as it was for Druse to rally the expected professional courtesy and attention. The clash in moods—Garth’s sunlamp cheerfulness and Druse’s twilit dourness—created emotional smog that hung between the student and his professor.
“What can I do for you?” asked the professor, anxious to get the meeting over with.
“You going to the game tomorrow, Professor Druse?” In his Speech 101 class, Garth had learned that conversations begin most productively with any point of common interest between the parties involved. This bit of wisdom, filed away in both his memory and his class notes, was perhaps the most useful and exciting learning experience in his three years at the university.
“I must confess, Mr. Timmins, the only thing that interests me less than football is baseball. Once the groundskeepers have mowed the lawn and painted the white stripes, the excitement’s over for me.”
Timmins laughed his professional cheerleader’s laugh and said, “Gee, that’s a good one, Professor Druse. I’ll remember that one to tell the team,” and he glanced at his Rolex wristwatch, his smile—the model specially designed for English profs, those strange birds who were for some inexplicable reason necessary for a well-rounded education, which, of course, Timmins wanted to get since that was what he had been told his father was paying for, and if nothing else, the son believed in value received—his smile was frozen on his tanned visage, and his golden hair was tousled just enough to look completely natural, an effect that was a constant preoccupation for the young man.
Druse assessed Timmins. He was a perfect representative of the university’s student body, those golden youths whose destiny was a home in Beverly Hills, a Mexican or black cleaning lady (“almost one of the family”), a Mercedes or Jaguar, a ski trip to Utah or even Switzerland in February—two children attending private school, season tickets for one “culture” series (the symphony, the theater), membership in a tennis club, and the deep-felt security that the proper values and accomplishments confer.
“Say, Professor, you know you told us to talk to you about term papers, and I have this idea I’d like to bounce off you. You know, the fops in Restoration comedy—I mean you’ve talked a lot about them—and, you know, I was thinking: they’re all gay.”
“Indeed? And what led you, Mr. Timmins, to that conclusion?”
“Well, you know, they dress in lace and all that stuff—and the way they talk, you know.”
“Aren’t you, Mr. Timmins, simply projecting modern attitudes and your own repugnance for homosexuality onto works of literature from an age in which norms of behavior were quite different from ours? Aren’t you, after all, reading too much into the comedies?”
“Well, I’ll tell you, Professor Druse, I don’t know about Congreve or any of those dudes, but I know that us gays aren’t ashamed of ourselves anymore.”
“You say ‘we gays.’ What might you mean by that?”
“I mean I’m gay.”
“Well, I don’t suppose that’s anything to be ashamed of,” responded Druse, after a significant pause during which he formed a new conception of Garth Timmins, the old image—home in the right neighborhood, two children in private school, the proper kind of wife—having been shattered. Now Garth was dancing with another man in a disco and going to bath houses. Druse was even a bit revolted by the possibility that Garth was already infected with herpes or AIDS.
“I’m not ashamed. I’m proud. Danny McLatchy, the tailback, he’s gay too. And several fellows on the team are switch hitters. And let me tell you, I happen to know that two of song girls are lesbians.”
“Enough! Quite enough!” Druse was genuinely peeved. “I have no desire to discuss the sexual aberrations of our students. If you feel a need to talk about such matters, you should go to the counseling service or the chaplain.”
Timmins’ smile vanished. He leaned forward, glaring at Druse. “I guess you don’t like queers, do you, Prof? We’re either crazy or sinners—or both—so we should go to the school shrink or the chaplain and get ourselves straightened out. I’ll bet you think blacks should be kept in their place, too.”
Druse chose his well-rehearsed role as the icily aloof scholar-mentor. “Mr. Timmins, I haven’t the slightest interest in any of my students’ sexual preferences or habits. What you do in your own bedroom is your business. However, I don’t allow sex either in my office or in my classrooms.”
Timmins leaped at the opportunity. “Oh, I don’t want to have sex in your office, let alone in your classroom, Professor. All I want is freedom and equality.”
“You’re not funny at all, Mr. Timmins. In fact, you’re downright impertinent. Perhaps you’d better come back at a later time, after you have thought about your manners, to discuss your term paper.”
“Look, Prof, tuition at this place is astronomical. Us students pay your salary.”