A: Stabs me in the ear with the scissors in an excess of rage?

"Youre dumb. Youre just dumb, Simon."

"Thats what I hear too."

A: Not a note.

ONCE when he had come home with Carol early from a concert a police car was parked outside the house, so they hurried. Inside on the couch with the babysitter there was a half-naked policeman. He had retained his uniform trousers. His gunbelt was on the coffee table and the babysitters blouse on the coffee table, a bottle of Dewars there as well, "This is Rob," the babysitter said, and they said, "Hi, Rob." What breasts, Simon thought. He went into the kitchen and mixed himself a Gelusil and Carol went searching for a faraway closet to hang her black-beaded jacket in.

"Potentially arousing scenes."

In bed, he was almost asleep. She came in and threw four quarts of icewater at him.

"Youre too wrapped up in your own stuff even to try. To know someone."

"I dont think Ive ever said that to anybody. I know you. "

"Thats not so. Anyhow, I dont want to screw the babysitter."

"I just think weve gotten ourselves into a funda?mentally false position here, I dont blame the poor bastard its just more than the male mechanism is equipped to do."

"I dont think so I read about this guy who was ninety-three and still was fathering children when he was ninety-three."

"Right now. Two hundred, if you have it."

"Where does this word jump come from?"

A: Yes. Sleeping with people although legally bound to someone else.

Q: These were women.

He switches on the bedside lamp.

"They say that vitamin E is good for that."

Simon gets out of bed and opens a book, On Adams House in Paradise. He takes out a stack of bills and counts out two hundred in twenties.

Q: Let me play this track here for you, its by Echo and the Bunnymen --

"As well he should hes in hog heaven, objectively speaking."

A: No.

"They have these special guys they use for those movies theyre not whatｈｔｔps://reaｄ.９9ｃsw.ｃom you usually run into. Theyre specialists."

"Its my bad brother," Dore says. "Hes downstairs. He always arrives without warning. One of his endear?ing traits. Thanks. Ill pay you back."

"See what Im saying?"

"She was highly recommended."

"Maybe we could feed him nourishing broths."

"He shows no signs of going mad."

He attempts generalizations. Dore is crusty, Veron?ica is volatile, Anne is a worrier. The generalizations are banal but comforting, like others hes been faithful to over many years, architecture is frozen music and art is a source of life.

"Oh misery me."

"Beats me I wouldnt take it if he did."

"Do you have any money?"

"Its me. Dore."

"Carol."

"I use Lubriderm on him sometimes, that helps."

"He says hes fifty-three."

"Not a perfect deal hes an animate wreck."

"You want to jump the babysitter."

"Hes doing the best he can."

"You mean cash? In the house?"

"Right now?"

"Oh, come on."

"Thats what I mean."

"The phrase is a bit total. As in, I totaled the Buick. "

"I just think that means he doesnt have very good clothes. His clothes have a lot of loose ends and its nat?ural, I think, when you see a loose end to pluck at it."

Q: And so thats what you did, in the evenings or on weekends. . .

"Hes raveling his clothes. Plucking at threads."

"Whats your wifes name, Simon?"

"Thats an evil thought, has he anything to will?"

"Maybe in a state of nature. Philadelphia is not a state of nature."

"Where are we?"

"Well I dont know how their minds work."

"Whats my wifes name?"

A: In the dream, my father was playing the piano, a Beethoven something, in a large concert hall which was filled with people. I was in the audience and I was reading a book. I suddenly realized that this was the wrong thing to do when my 九*九*藏*書father was per?forming, so I sat up and paid attention. He was playing very well, I thought. Suddenly the conductor stopped the performance and began to sing a passage for my fa?ther, a passage that my father had evidently botched. My father listened attentively, smiling at the conduc?tor.

A: I was very interested in bow-hunting. These new bows they have now, what they call a compound bow -- Also, Im a member of the Galapagos Society, we work for the environment, its really a very effective --

"HES not potent more than forty-two per?cent of the time."

A: Ill pass.

"Has he made a will?"

"I havent heard that expression since I was a child. Het up."

A: Nonsense. The prudent man guards his eardrums. The prudent man avoids anomalous circumstances.

In the middle of the night he senses someone stand?ing over his bed.

Shes wearing a white lace peignoir with long filigree sleeves.

"You dont have to tell me."

"You mean like real life."

"What is she, fifteen?"

Q: And what else?

"I didnt hire the babysitter."

"Sure you would."

"It needs changing."

"He does appreciate what hes given."

Q: You regard yourself as prudent.

"Perhaps at long intervals after he had been carefully fed with vitamin E and nourishing broths."

"Consisting of what?"

A: What if she stabs me in the ear with the scissors?

"No, took it."

"See what Im saying?"

SIMON is amazed by what he doesnt care about. Hes bought nothing but a couple of new shirts and a few books. Hes thought of no new projects. He reads Progressive Architecture and critiques what he sees there in a mood of amiable colleagueship. Hed done a building in 1981 that had pleased him, a Cath?olic church in a not-good area near Temple University, where the liquor stores gave you your bottle by request over a formidable counter, no browsing in the stacks. The parish was so poor that hed cut his fee to almost nothing; the other partners were not happy about it buthttps://read.99csw.com had accommodated him. The church was a bare-bones steel building with insets of glass block as its only de?sign flourish, these however stacked eighteen feet high in twelve bays on either side of the sanctuary -- the glass block was the light-giving element, and resisted thiev?ery, too. It had been popular in the 30s, considered a design cliche in the 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s, and pre?sented itself again in the 80s, fresh as new dung. Some?thing to be said for being fifty-three, you could enjoy the turning of the wheel. He feels every additional day a great boon. He doesnt understand people who have futures, palpable futures. He takes an interest in the obituary pages of the newspapers, the summations, tidy packages, So-and-so gets three inches whereas Tra-la-la got seven. He has a pain where his liver is presumed to be and is vomiting rather too much. Hes paid $35,107 in Federal taxes for last year and has before him a re?quest from the IRS for an additional $41.09. These people are wonderful, he thinks, they want the last forty-one bucks and nine cents. Youd think with the thirty-five thou theyd say lets have a beer and forget about it.

A: Just ordinary things.

"Ive noticed youve been buying a lot of Lubri?derm."

"Its because hes so old."

"Yes," Simon said. "Did you say anything to her?"

"I think he works quite hard at it, spends hours and hours."

"You worry about the way I say things but you dont worry about what I mean."

Q: What did you do, after work, in the evenings or on weekends, in Philadelphia?

Q: Your guilt. I recognize it. Clearly, guilt.

"He could be more tan his red color is from drinking Ill bet a nickel."

"Maybe we should offer him potentially arousing scenes that are not photographs."

"How old is he actually?"

Rob removed himself into the felon-thick night, Carol gave the babysitter twelve dollars, and Simon looked in on the sleeping Sarah. She had kicked the covers off and he replaced them. "Do you thinkhttps://read.99csw.com he was on duty?" Carol asked, re-doing the covers.

"Well were mature women we should be able to cope with this."

"I didnt think it was necessary. She was blushing all over. Never seen a stomach blush like that."

"Were in some sort of waiting room. Waiting."

Q: Unlikely, I would think.

"A ripe fifteen."

Q: No special interests?

Dore is brusque upon awakening, Anne cheerful as a zinnia. Veronica frequently comes to the breakfast table (hardly a table, a slab of butcher block on top of some cabinets with four stools around it) pale with de?spair, then is overtaken with great gusts of enthusiasm, for Lohengrin or oyster mushrooms or Pierre Trudeau. Theyre so lovely that his head whips around when one of them enters the room, exactly in the way one notices a strange woman in a crowd and cant avoid, cant phys?ically avoid, loud and outrageous staring. My senses are being systematically dérégled, he thinks, forgive me, Rimbaud. Dore is relatively tall, Anne not so tall (but they are all tall), Veronica again the middle term. Breasts waver and dip and sway from side to side under t-shirts with messages so much of the moment that Simon doesnt understand a tenth of them: ALLY SHEEDY LIVES! Who is Ally Sheedy? In what sense does she live, and why is the fact worthy of comment? They know, he doesnt. Simon has actually met Pierre Tru?deau (at a three-day city-planning conference in Ot?tawa) and found him a charming and thoughtful man. This earns him about a crayons worth of credit with his guests.

A: I had this strange experience. Today is Saturday, right? I called up this haircutter I go to, her name is Ruth, and asked her for an appointment. I needed a haircut. So she said she had openings at ten, ten-thirty, eleven, eleven-thirty, twelve, twelve-thirty -- on a Satur?day. Do you think the world knows something I dont know?

She gives him a quick kiss and starts to leave, then pauses.

"Well if you want simple frottage."

"Pretty name."

"Did he leave the bottle?"

九-九-藏-書"I need a couple of hundred."

Q: You mean regular adultery.

"Had this guy today tell me he was the fourth gen?eration of his family to lose money in the cattle busi?ness. A client. What he was really saying was that he was cattle aristocracy and he made enough from his oil leases so that he could run two thousand head of cattle as a hobby. Thats known as self-deprecating humor."

"Maybe we should offer stimulating photographs."

"Whats up?"

Q: Its possible.

"See what Im saying?"

A: Well, adultery. I would say thats how I spent most of my free time. In adultery.

"I think Ill call the chief. Fill him in on this matter."

Q: Did the conductor resemble anyone you know?

"I saw this guy in a movie once I couldnt believe it."

"You would if you could."

"I dont know Id have to look in some books."

"You mean the photographs would be more arousing than we are?"

A: I regard myself as asleep. I go along, things hap?pen to me, there are disturbances, one copes, thinking of the golden pillow, I dont mean literally golden but golden in my esteem --

"Let me look."

"Well Ill tell you Ive never had that many orgasms with anybody else to give the devil his due."

"Thats your opinion."

Q: I also have a video of the Tet offensive with Walter Cronkite. . .

"What if we give him too much vitamin E and it poisons him?"

"I share it what are you getting so het up about?"

"Youre changing the subject."

"I dont think you can give somebody too much of any particular vitamin. The body takes what it needs and rejects the rest I read about it."

A: Invariably.

They say, repeatedly:

"Whos that?"

Q: Does your father play? In actuality?

"I know you."

"I saw." She led the way to the kitchen. "I guess thats Sarah eleven years from now."

"Fully fifteen."

"We dont want to stress him beyond his capacity or have him go mad or something."

"Of what?"