I knocked and walked into David’s apartment. Shirtless, he stood at the kitchen counter munching aggressively on some leafy stalks of lettuce that filled a metal bowl.
“Hey,” I said. “What are you doing?”
“Eatin’ lettuce,” he said. “Audrey told me to eat green stuff. So--” he held up a half-eaten piece and chomped it down to the crisp bottom demonstratively. “And orange stuff.” I nodded.
I stepped over books scattered across the floor and moved some over on the couch making room to sit. I liked his apartment because it had high ceilings. David was moving through the lettuce fast.
“This ain’t so bad,” he said. “Just munch it. Before you know it you’re full and you don’t even know know what you ate.”
“Green and orange stuff?”
“Yeah-- broccoli, kale... Know any orange stuff?”
“Peppers?”
“Those are red.”
“They come in a variety of colors.”
“Yeah. Yellow--”
“--green, orange, red.”
“I said that. Purple.”
“Really?”
“No shit. Purple Peter.”
I thought. “Black.”
“White.” David ate more lettuce in skyward consideration. He rolled it like a taco. “Damn. So the only question is, do they have blue pepper?”
“Do you have any cold coffee?” I asked.
“David nodded pointing to the fridge.
“Do you have any whiskey?”
He nodded again finishing a lettuce piece in crunches. “Seagram’s.”
“That is whiskey.” I went in the kitchen, trying a small bit of lettuce as I passed him, and opened the fridge. The coffee was in a big glass French press. It was steaming around the seams at the top in the cold fridge air. “Well not quite cold.”
“Just made it,” said David. He sounded proud.
“”Do you have any Kahlua?”
His arm raised toward the door. “Get out.”
“Aight, aight,” I said, hands held up, and went over to the cupboard and pulled out the plastic handle of Seagram’s. I gave one of the mugs in the sink a cursory wash and filled it with ice cubes. The coffee melted them instantly to mite kernels and I added some whiskey and milk.
“Tepid,” I frowned.
“Good morning to you,” David shrugged, rolling up lettuce like cigars and eating it. He had a generous swath of dark hair on his chest sprouting from some not unimpressive cleavage; some dark swirlies round his nipples. On his chin and cheekbones was the light shadow of a recent shave. I was more the beardless youth between us, if just for the lightness of my hair. With his eyes and his hair-- eyebrows, shadowed chin-- he had the sharp darkness of features that brought off an immediately mannish impression.
Cradling coffee cup in both hands I sniffed deeply of it walking back to the couch. I wanted to settle into something; the day, a book. Coffee was ritual; ritual inured over long history (from the ancient days of early High school), and one whiskey had been butting its way into. With it I take my time and pleasure, sparing no appreciation, and when I’m at my last two dollars they’ll buy a coffee (may the day never come).
I looked at some of the books on the couch next to me. One called Europe Central, boy, was it a fatty. Vollman huh? What gave him so much to say? And who gave him so much room to say it? I mean, who are all these guys, writing all these big old books? Some of ‘em it’s just ‘bang, bang, thousand pages here ya go’, every time. It’s a tad presuming wouldn’t you say? I mean, what am I supposed to do, read only you my whole life? Oh it’s not just ‘guys’ either, of course. Ever heard of Diana Gabaldon? Well, I had a girlfriend once. And she had a girlfriend too, and this girlfriend gave that girlfriend Gabaldon, and, well, you must get your money’s worth, at least. Those women-- they sure can go wild with their imaginations! Oh, they’re good for more than fantasy, of course, don’t hear me say that, and even some of those yarns have won their place. Think Mary Shelley. She whipped the monster genre right into shape. Without a thousand pages too. Now that’s something I can respect-- a curtly worded woman! So many just go on, don’t you find? And her mother was another vindicator of la escrit femme. But I digress, which, by the way, I do. That is OK.
Anyway I tossed aside old Vollman’s beast. For all I knew it was his life’s work. Well he could have done it in installments, I should think. I mean, to make your whole statement all at once, that’s a bit risky don’t you think? And itty bitty print to top it off. Well, I just wasn’t in the mood, not today. I hadn’t even read ‘Karamazov’ yet so who does this guy think he is? Besides, I’d disavowed any heavy lifting since I’d strained a forearm muscle during an incident of greedy, insomniacal masturbation (third outing, if you follow). Vollman would probably strain my neural cortex, my basal ganglia or whatnot. You’ve really got to watch out for some of these thinkers coming out of the innavigable woodwork of modernity. I’ve heard cases of disappearance between the lines of Deleuze & Guittari. At any rate, and this is the point, I must remember in general to not over-extend myself, and in masturbation particularly.
David had cleaned out the bowl of lettuce and was placing it in the sink. “Mmm,” he smacked, “all gone.” He was looking proud again. “I’ve gone green!” I threw a stray pencil at him he dodged unnoticingly. “Call me a lettuce head!” Prouder still. “Mom I-I-I I won! Call me head of lettuce!”
“Romaine lettuce doesn’t come in heads.”
“Hey, wow, you know your lettuce. Do they have orange lettuce?” He turned and washed out one of the mugs in the sink, took out the coffee and filled it. Bringing the French press with him over to his little art desk, he sat down reverentially, eyes closed, hands plied together in symmetry. His eyes fluttered open as if in surprise. “So, whaddya thinking about?” he asked.
“Ohh-- tits. Maria Golbach.”
“Who?”
“I woke up this morning with that name in my head. Maria Golbach. Or Goldbach, but I think it was Golbach. I woke up and, without thought, in seconds, I googled that name.” I picked up some of the books on the couch. Hunger. Down & Out in Paris & London. Come on, I needed something (today) more chipper sounding, something breezy. Adventures of a Simpleton. What’s this, German huh? In fact Simplicius Simplicissimus; the inside cover revealed its original name. Not a breeze pronouncing, I suppose, but it sounds like fun.
“So? What did it come up with?”
“Oh. Well, from what I saw, she’s either one of a number with gravestones in Deutschland, an Oxford professor of Romance languages, or the daughter of a leading Salinger scholar.”
