Closets, Stones, Dust
by Jeanette Tyron
Alice went into the closet and she pulled the door shut behind her. She settled into the furthest corner, burrowing her head through the hanging clothes, pushing rags and old shoes out of her path with her hands. She sneezed once, and then let the dust settle on her. The dust felt good on her skin, gentle and indifferent. She went to sleep. It was the first time she had slept in a week.
She awoke several hours later. Her husband was pacing around the house calling her. "Alice! Alice!" he called. She didn't answer.
"Alice!" he called again. "The phone is for you!"
"Who is it?" she asked, sleepily.
"Alice!" he yelled. "The phone!"
"Who is it?"
"Where are you?"
"I'm in the closet."
She heard his footsteps grow louder as he approached the closet. The door swung open, and her husband's shadow fell across her.
"Uh, what are you doing in here?"
"I was sleeping."
"Sleeping?"
"Who's on the phone?" she asked.
"Why are you sleeping in the closet?"
"Who's on the phone?"
"Someone named Sylvester."
"What does he want?"
"Jesus, I don't know. Why are you in the closet?"
"I told you. I was sleeping."
Her husband sighed. His name was Lance, and he often sighed.
"Well, are you going to talk to him?" Lance asked.
"I don't want to."
"Well, I certainly don't want to talk to him. You go tell him you don't want to talk."
"Just tell him I'm not here."
"I'm not telling him anything."
"Fine."
"Fine."
Her husband walked away, leaving the closet door open. She reached over and pulled it shut.
She closed her eyes and tried to recapture her dream. It had been a good dream. The closet door suddenly flew open.
"Who is Sylvester, anyway?" Lance asked.
"Is he still on the phone?"
"No. I hung it up. How do you know him?"
"I met him at a flea market. He thinks he loves me."
"Jesus -"
"It's not my fault. I didn't do anything -"
"Why does he love you, then?"
"Do we have to talk about this now?"
"But this is the third one in a year -
"The third what?"
"LOVER!"
"I haven't HAD any lovers! I don't sleep with them. They just come around."
"But, WHY do they come around?"
"I don't KNOW. Please, can't you just let me sleep for a while?"
"Alice, please come out of the closet. I think we should talk. I can't talk to you this way. I can't even see you."
"Not yet, Lance. It feels good in here. I can sleep in here."
Lance sighed and stared into the darkness of the closet for a moment. Then he shut the door, slowly and carefully, and Alice heard him walk away.
The business with the young men started after her miscarriage 18 months earlier. She was forty at the time. The pregnancy had been unplanned and unexpected. Lance's face had turned blank and white when she gave him the news.
"How did this happen?" he had asked.
She had looked away, through the kitchen window, and focused her eyes on a fat robin that looked old and tired. "The usual way, I suppose," she answered.
"But -"
"My diaphragm must have failed. Nothing is foolproof, you know. Except abstinence."
"But -"
"I didn't do it on purpose. Don't even try suggesting that."
"I wasn't going to -"
"Good."
"But we can't have another baby. We're too old."
"I'm not getting rid of it."
"I didn't say you should -"
"Good. Because I'm not."
"But -"
"Can we talk about this some other time?"
"But Alice - You just told me we're having a baby. We have to talk!"
"We'll talk. Not right now, though, okay?"
Lance sighed. Then he went into the living room and read the paper. She followed him, silently, sat down, and watched television. She caught him a few times looking up from his book and examining her stomach.
Two months later she lost the baby. They still hadn't talked about it.
Now, a year and a half after losing the baby and ten days after meeting Sylvester, she was in the closet looking for sleep. Sylvester had been calling her every day. She was tired of it. His sad voice and his waif-like face were keeping her awake at nights.
Nothing like Sylvester had ever happened to her during the early years of her marriage, when she had been pretty and hopeful. But now that she was middle-aged, with dulled looks and an indifferent outlook, three young men, in the space of a year-and-a-half, had decided they loved her. The first two had bored and annoyed her. They were frightfully lonely, misplaced, and hopeful. She felt too tired to be needed and she had barely been able to be kind to them. But Sylvester was different. He was infused with a subdued, nervous, twittering energy, like a wounded bird with a preternatural intelligence. Sylvester frightened her.
She sensed that it was late. Her bladder was full. She crawled out of the closet and went to the bathroom. She could see her husband's feet as she passed the bedroom on her way to and from the bathroom. The feet stirred during her return trip.
"Alice?" her husband called, softly.
She didn't answer. She quietly crawled back into the closet.
She had met Sylvester on a humid, bleary spring day. She went to the flea market to look for spoons. It was an impulse. She was in a bad mood, and she left the house to perform an absurd, useless errand because she was in a bad mood. She wore an old sweat suit, and she muttered to herself. She hated everybody she looked at. She found a table full of old silverware. She almost laughed. She had not really expected to find someone selling silver ware. She reached across the table for some spoons and her hand collided with another. She looked up. A young man was reaching across the table towards a pile of forks. He looked at her, and instead of jerking his hand away, he touched her arm, gently and deliberately. He had a fine, faint tremor. It was like being touched by a caterpillar, and at first she wanted to brush the touch away. The touch made her angry. But then she suddenly felt sad, completely and irresistibly sad. Her eyes glazed over with tears. Sylvester took her hand in his, and he led her away from the table full of old silver ware, and he bought her a soda. He stood by her silently as she drank the cold soda. She wiped the tears from her eyes with her hands. "Why are you crying?" he asked after a few minutes.
"I don't know. No, I do know, but this is ridiculous."
"What is ridiculous?"
"Me standing here crying is ridiculous. I really don't want to talk about it, okay?"
"Sure," Sylvester said, and he shrugged his shoulder with a quick, jerky movement.
She finished her drink and she looked at him. He had the look of some one who belonged to no one, or who had deserted his belongings. He had black, indifferently cut hair, pale, soft skin on his face and arms, and the eyes of a small, caught animal.
"What is your name?" she asked.
"Sylvester."
"Sylvester? Really?"
He raised his eyebrows. "That's it," he said "That's my name."
"Okay," she said. "That's your name. Where are you from?"
"Pittsburgh. I left on a bus three days ago."
"Why?"
Sylvester shrugged again. "No reason. Nothing held me there."
"How old are you?"
"22."
"What are you doing here? At the flea market? You don't look like a flea market sort of person."
"I just rented a little room. I needed some things."
"Things?"
"The room is empty. It needs some things."
Alice looked away from his face at that point. She looked past his ear and she saw rows upon rows of tables with things on them. "I'm 42," she said, as she stared at the things.
Sylvester gave her a puzzled look. He tilted his chin up. "So?" he asked.
"Why are you talking to me? I have a son almost your age."
"So?"
"What do you want from me?"
"I just want to talk," he said. His eyes darted across the field of tables holding people's things for sale. "Can we walk around?" he asked. "I want to look at things."
Alice shrugged her shoulder and smiled. "Okay," she said. "Let's walk around."
"I can't believe you're still in there," Lance said. It was morning. Alice had spent the night in the closet. Lance was standing at the closet door. He had nothing on but his boxer shorts. His skin was damp from his shower, and he held a limp towel in his hand. His question had awakened Alice.
"What time is it?" Alice asked.
"It's six thirty. Aren't you going to work?"
Alice rubbed her face. "What day is it?" she asked.
"It's Tuesday. Alice, come on. You have to come out of there. Why don't you come out and call in sick? You'll never be ready in time for work, anyway."
"Just go to work, Lance. I'll come out later on, okay?"
Lance sighed and walked away, but then he walked back and Alice heard him breathing by the closet door. Alice reached over and pulled the door shut.
The baby would have been a boy. Alice was sure of that. She had had dreams about a boy before she learned she was pregnant. The boy in her dreams had been about four years old, and he had been in love with her. His giggles as she whirled him in the air had been intoxicated with romance. Her grown son, who was studying engineering, had never giggled like that when he was four years old. And her daughter, who was studying accounting at a junior college, had always treated her like an annoyance. Her son and daughter hadn't been terribly hard to raise. They had always known what they wanted, and they had been hard and matter-of-fact about it. She had spent most of their childhood bargaining with them.
But the boy in the dream was different. He would have been difficult to raise. He would have been moody, intelligent, and sensitive. He would have had trouble sleeping and asked her difficult questions about dying. He would have written poems and hid them under his mattress. He never would have bargained with her because he would have continually changed or re-invented what was important to him. He would have driven her crazy and she would have loved it.
He had pulsed in her body for a few short months, and then he had given up. Alice felt like he had refused to hold onto the hair-like villi of her womb, to the web of her life-giving center, that he had preternaturally seen the electric pain of his over-charged soul and chosen to exit in a warm, silent flow of blood that had doubled her over with an excruciating, twisting pain.
And now she was giving up. A preternatural soul had been created in her womb, a soul who would have charged her being with energy and lightness. She had named him Paul, and he had given up, but he had left his energy behind, at least, that was what she felt. At first the energy had settled on the two hapless souls who bored her, but then it had settled on the young man with the unlikely name and the tremor. The one she liked.
But she was too angry with Paul to accept the gift. His gift was inconsiderate. She had wanted her baby, not a nervous young man with the eyes of a frightened animal.
Sylvester called while she was in the closet, after Lance had left for work. She heard the call as a dull vibration that rattled dimly through the closet door and floor and into her womb. The vibration felt like a muffled dental drill. She decided to ignore it.
But Sylvester wouldn't give up. The phone kept ringing, about every fifteen minutes, and she couldn't sleep anymore. Her answering machine picked up the calls, and she could vaguely hear Sylvester's voice calling "Alice, Alice, please pick up..." Finally, after about three hours, she crawled out of the closet. Her legs were stiff and her back was sore as she slowly walked over to the phone. She picked up the receiver as Sylvester was once again calling "Alice, Alice," into her machine.
"Sylvester," she said. "You're being ridiculous."
"Alice, is that you?"
"Yes, of course it is. What do you want?"
"I want to see you."
"You can't see me. I told Lance about you."
"But I just want to see you."
"I'm too old for this. You have to leave me alone."
"Let me come over, please."
"I can't let you come over here."
"I let you into my place."
"Yes, I know. Your room. Your room with the things. It was like a closet. But we didn't do anything there."
"It doesn't matter."
"Of course it matters."
"Please let me come over."
Alice fell silent for a moment. She could hear Sylvester breathing into the phone - small, quivering breaths. Childlike gasps.
"I'll be in a closet," she said.
"What?"
"Come over. Look for me in a closet," she said, and then she hung up.
She called Lance at work.
"Alice?" he said. "Alice? Are you feeling better?"
"Does it matter?"
"Please, Alice. I'm worried about you."
"Okay. I'm sorry. I'm not feeling better. I feel like my heart is made out of stone."
"I'll come home."
"No, don't do that. Sylvester is coming over."
"Sylvester is coming over?"
"Yeah. He keeps calling me. I have to see him."
"I don't like this, Alice. I really don't like this. I'm coming home."
"Please don't. He's just a kid. He trembles. I think there's something wrong with him."
"I don't care. I don't want him alone there with you."
"Lance?"
"What?!"
"Did you ever see a picture of a fetus that had turned to stone?" Alice asked. "You know, when the dead fetus is retained in the mother's body? I saw a picture once where the fetus turned to stone -"
"I'm coming home," Lance said, and then he hung up.
Alice unlocked her front door, and then she went back into the closet. She knew it would take Lance at least forty-five minutes to get home because of the noon traffic. She didn't care that he was coming home. She didn't care that he sounded upset.
Sylvester would arrive, and then Lance. She would be in the closet.
After about fifteen minutes, she heard Sylvester's knock on the front door as a dull, insistent thud. He knocked several times before he tried opening the front door. Then she heard him walking carefully around the house. "Alice," he called, softly. "Alice?"
She didn't answer. She heard him opening doors. Her whole being became alert to the sound of doors opening, and she realized suddenly that she was shaking, not like Sylvester's gentle, fine tremor, but a deep, cold quaking from within her gut. She wrapped her arms around her legs, which were drawn up to her chest. Then the door to her closet opened slowly, and Sylvester's shadow fell across her.
"Come in," she said.
Sylvester stood for another moment at the door. Then he got down on his knees, and he crawled into the closet. As he inched his way to her spot, she unclasped her arms from around her legs, and she reached for him, placing her hands solidly on his upper arms and pulling him towards her. His arms felt bony and frail in her hands, and as cool as stone. She was shaking violently now, and as Sylvester was pulled next to her body, she wrapped her arms around him and cradled his head under her neck.
"Alice," Sylvester said.
"What?"
"I have to tell you something."
"Please don't tell me anything."
"I have to go back to Pittsburgh. I shouldn't have left. I called my parents."
"I thought you said you had no one."
"They're scared and angry. I'm supposed to be in the hospital - "
"The hospital?"
"I'm supposed to be getting ready for a bone marrow transplant - "
"Shit," Alice said. She stiffened, and she started to push Sylvester away. "I should have known. Shit."
"Please don't get mad."
Alice pulled herself up into a sitting position. The hanging clothes settled on her head in folds. "You should have said something to me. You shouldn't even be here."
"I didn't know what I was doing. I was scared."
Alice pushed the heels of her hands against her eyes, and she held her breath for a moment. Then she let the breath out with a quick burst of air. "I bet you hide poems under your bed," Alice said quickly. "I bet you've always have had trouble sleeping at night. I bet you've never been able to figure out whether you should be a writer or a carpenter."
"What are you talking about?"
"Why did you come here? Why?"
"I was scared. I just got on a bus and left."
"Shit, Sylvester. Shit. Are you dying?" she asked.
"I don't know. Maybe."
"You should have told me."
Alice sat stiffly, hugging her knees. Sylvester was still curled on the floor. She didn't know what to do. She kept thinking, I should have known, I should have known, and the thought became like an incantation, like a train crashing noisily and rhythmically through her mind, breaking up stones into pebbles that flew wildly into the air. Sylvester was a dying baby. That was why Paul's energy had settled on him and why she had felt drawn to him. She started shaking again. She eased herself back onto the floor and she put her arms around Sylvester.
"I have to go back home," he said.
"I know. Just let me hold you for a while."
Alice held him. She stopped shaking, and she stroked his hair. She felt his fine tremor through her whole being, and she absorbed the tremor, and she felt him grow calm and peaceful. And then his breathing became deep and even, and Alice knew he had fallen asleep. She held him, sleeping, until she heard the front door open and Lance's heavy footsteps approaching the closet. The closet door flew open, sucking out a gust of wind.
"Alice!"
"Be quiet, Lance! Damn it, be quiet!" Alice whispered desperately.
"What the hell is going on? Jesus, is that kid in there with you? Oh, God, Alice - What is WRONG with you?"
"I'm okay, Lance. I'm okay. Just be quiet, Okay?"
Alice heard Lance take a deep breath. He walked away from the closet door and paced around the room. She knew he was trying to collect himself, trying to figure out how to handle her, and she suddenly felt sorry for him. He had never known how to handle her. She had never given him the chance to know. She had let him watch her slowly grow miserable and crazy, especially since she had lost the baby, and she had never tried to explain to him, never fought with him, never fought for his understanding.
She held onto Sylvester. His sleep was deep, almost stuporous, the exhausted sleep of quieted terror. She turned her eyes to the closet door and waited for Lance to return. He returned quietly, on his hands and knees, thrusting his head into the closet.
"Alice, please," he said quietly. "You're acting so crazy. I don't know what to do for you. Did you sleep with this boy? What's wrong with him? Why doesn't he wake up?"
"He's exhausted, Lance. He's sick - maybe dying. I just found out. We have to get him back to his parents."
"Should I call an ambulance?"
"No. No. It's not like that."
"What's wrong with him?"
"I don't know - he said something about a bone marrow transplant. That's all I know."
Lance shifted his position on the floor, slowly and awkwardly. Trousers and dresses in the closet brushed against his face. Sylvester stirred, and Alice and Lance both waited silently to see if he was going to awaken. They watched his chest rising and falling, the way they had watched their children sleep when they were young. Sylvester's breaths became deep and even again.
"I'm going to wake him," Alice said. "Help us get out of here, okay? I feel so stiff and tired."
"What should I do?"
"Just give me your arm," Alice said as she shook Sylvester. "Help me pull him out of here."
Jeanette Tyron worked for many years as a nurse before taking up
writing in earnest. She is a graduate of Temple University's creative writing program. She
also studied music at Temple as a piano major.
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