Jane Delynn Leash

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What is my name?
What do I do?
Where do I live?
My position was returned to the upright, and it was discov-
ered that indeed, my ears had not been covered.
Oh dear! Then perhaps....
Not the first time.
But this is very bad!
She s too far gone to care, my owner assured them.
In any case, no help for it now.
Shit happens.
My ears were finally plastered, so I heard no more. Save
what sounded like a drumbeat (though perhaps it could have
187 / LEASH
been the rumbling of cars by the building, or even the beating
of my heart), and a high-pitched hum perhaps also music but
maybe the circulation of my blood, or fear.
72
Later, much later, when the plaster has been removed, when my
body is cleaned up, when I have been permitted to sleep, when
I have remembered who I am, when I have emerged, uncertain
of date or time, into the street, hunger overwhelms me. To my
shock, the restaurant is open. Either I have lost an entire day, or
much less time has passed than I thought. As if in a dream, I
walk towards it. As if in a dream, I pick up the menu. The dream
is my own, I have been here before, in what is called the real
world. But it is when the real world is at its realest that it seems
most like a dream, or a movie. The lights are on my face, is it a
movie? Yes, the one I have been starring in my whole life. I shift
on the enameled metal seat, and because I am so thoroughly in
my body I feel through my shorts (or think I feel) my skin slightly
falling through the little holes in the seat where the pattern (kind
of an abstract round flower) has been stamped. I don t have to
look at it to know what it looks like, though I am not conscious
of ever having consciously thought about it. Wouldn t it be ironic
if later, at home, these little creases in the shape of flowers were
the sole objective correlatives of this night?
I order my Standard Meal: fish, plantains, flan. I am conscious,
again, of my swallowing.
The breadbasket is empty. I must have eaten everything.
I think about what I was thinking about that I could not
188 / JANE DELYNN
remember whether the breadbasket was on the table or not
when I sat down. I cannot remember.
The silverware is slimy and cold. My sweat or the waiter s
sweat or grease from the dishwater? I wipe the fork off with
my napkin, embarrassed to let the waiter see me, as if I must
conceal from him my knowledge of the restaurant s faulty
hygiene practices, as if to excuse myself for not running away
in disgust.
We who are about to die do not care about microbes.
But in fact, I cannot eat. I raise and lower the fork, which is
so clammy, to my lips, which has a moustache of sweat which
drips salt in my mouth. The piece of fish with the fried skin
travels up and down through the air, its eye so close to my
eye that it begins to hypnotize me. Does it care that it is dead?
Does it remember the net, or being scooped out of the water, or
the feel of a cleaver down its middle? or is its last memory that
of other fish pressing tighter and tighter as the water drains out
and the net rises skyward in sickening motion....?
73
Before taking a cab I stop at the deli. I buy what I have never
bought before. They sit there, in my kitchen, little cans of baby
food. Peas and carrots, chicken, peaches, remarkably like the
Cuisinart pureed veggies nouvelle cuisine restaurants began to
serve years ago, but far, far cheaper.
I am not frightened when I eat this food.
189 / LEASH
74
Home, I turn on the tv. This is what s real, these little dots of
color flickering many times a second, and the noise these little
dots make. I am a toy. I do not exist. I am nothing.
This is not depressing, but relaxing.
Ever since I can remember I have thought about the best
time to die. Whether it is better when one is happy, knowing life
can only go downhill, or when one is so unhappy that the pre-
sumed alleviation of misery exceeds the terrible poignancy of
death.
I still don t know.
190 / JANE DELYNN
191 / LEASH
5.
Freedom
75
One day, after I had arrived and undressed as was my custom,
she said: Our relationship has become tedious to me. I m tired
of your complaints, your groveling, your protestations of love.
It s all so predictable: my commands, your disobediences, the
punishments. No doubt you feel this way yourself?
Not at all, I said, astonished. I ve never been less bored in
my life.
I believe you, but frankly, I m surprised you seem to con-
sider yourself a person of such discrimination. Perhaps it is
merely that what transpires between us is more unique for you
than it is for me. But whether it comes from varying experience
or a lower tolerance of boredom, surely you can understand my
ennui? I didn t, but of course I nodded my assent. Good. For
I d like you to assent to a slight change in our contract. It s a
small one, but of course you must agree.... She paused, and
I wondered what it could be extending its length? breaking up
with the Current? a branding of my torso? It involves wearing
a device that prevents you from speaking.
A gag, you mean? I asked, feeling some disappointment at
the triviality of the request.
Not exactly, though the effect will be the same. But even
when you re not wearing such a device such as when I tele-
phone you with an order you re still not to talk to me.
But what if I need to tell you something? Or I don t under-
stand some command?
Infants and animals can t talk, but they manage to convey
their needs very well. One consequence, of course, is that you ll
no longer be able to use the code words. But you might as well
195 / LEASH
know, physical pain will no longer be a major component of our
relationship. It takes too long, and I have to work too hard, to
begin to approach the threshold of pain at which further punish-
ment becomes efficacious. It s as if you decided to demonstrate
that, of all human beings in the world, you re the one most willing
to undergo any sort of agony or torment as if such perversity
and stubbornness were something to be proud rather than
ashamed of! No! No longer will I cater to your vanity by using
your body like a pincushion, or a carcass to be carved, or a
sewer into which the world pours its bodily effluvia. I am, how-
ever, willing to assign a new role and tasks to you.
Naturally I was confused and upset, less by the elimination of
the code words than being unable to communicate my thoughts
and feelings. What, after all, could be more distressing for a
writer? And it was the memory of the words I said to her, as
much as any act, that filled my fantasies when I was not with her. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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