The Beauty of Men Never Dies: An Autobiographical Novel

The Story That Comes to You

56 The Story That Comes to You The following poem came to me complete in the night except for the second line, which I improvised: The Whore’s Song I’m forty-two years old. Can’t you tell? I have a fur coat and rough edges. Go to hell. Today, while re-hanging the hammock in the garden, I had a strong flash of once having dreamed doing it. Are there layers of life going on that we are slipping back and forward to? There is a Chinese quotation about the man dreaming of being a butterfly. Or was he a butterfly dreaming of being a man? I am quite tired these days from over-entertaining. Fatigue either causes these thoughts or reveals them. Here is a short story that also came to me in a dream, and I think you should read it. I think when these stories come to you in these intact ways, they are a kind of parable about you. Perhaps not a parable with a neat conclusion one can express in a clear-cut sentence. The general mood of this story about Mrs. Parry may be about a kind of atmosphere you may live in one day. Or a kind of atmosphere that others are living in, although their exterior life may be much more chockablock with 57 The Story That Comes to You things and activities than Mrs. Parry’s world. Or, yet again, perhaps Mrs. Parry is telling me about a way to live. Mrs. Parry “Mrs. Parry isn’t here,” the woman said. Behind her I could see unpainted gray-weathered buildings straggling away across the dunes. They were encircled with a high fence of wooden slats and wire, the kind used to keep sand from drifting and beaches from eroding. It was bleached gray also. As were the hair and features of the woman standing at the long board gate. “But she must be here. Her daughter said she sends monthly payments to this address.” I pointed to the address on the gate. It was 25 Dune Road. A long, sandy pair of tracks ran across the dunes. My car had navigated it without too much difficulty. There hadn’t been any indication of the twenty-four preceding residences on Dune Road. “Are you her daughter?” the woman asked. “I think you can see rather easily that I’m a man,” I said. “Humph. You can’t tell anything these days with all these operations and everything,” she said. “That’s awfully modern of you,” I said. “Sorry. I’m a real authentic man, and my name is Mark Lamos.” “Are you family?” she said. “No. Just a very good friend. I’ve come a long way to see her.” I couldn’t tell if this belligerent woman was really being hostile and insulting or if she was a resident here in some kind of seaside mental institution. “Only family are allowed to see residents.” “But surely that can’t be true. You’re very isolated here. Your ‘residents ’ must welcome guests.” “Nope, they don’t,” she said. “I’m afraid I’ll have to insist on speaking to the supervisor here.” “I am the supervisor.” “Well, I’m sure Mrs. Parry’s daughter is going to want to come and 58 The Story That Comes to You take her mother to some other residence if she’s not allowed to see old friends. Are you going to want that to happen?” “Are you some kind of wise guy?” “No. I’m from Boston. I’ve driven a long way. I’ve come across on the boat, and I don’t fancy going back to Boston and telling Mrs. Parry’s daughter I wasn’t allowed to see her mother.” “Come,” she said abruptly. “You can talk to the office.” Inside the fence there were no sidewalks or paths. Just footprints in the sand from building to building. No one was in evidence. I could see perhaps a half-dozen buildings, most of them resembling old one-room schoolhouses that had been dragged here and put down with no plan or organization. The office was one of the buildings. The gray-haired woman opened the door and let me in, closing the door behind me. A short, fattish, youngish woman sat behind what seemed to be a red marble counter. Red and black. I couldn’t tell if...