White Noise - Don Delillo [129]
“Did the article say what happened to him?”
“The reporter tracked him down. He is living in the same motel where all the controversy took place.”
“Where is the motel?”
“In Germantown.”
“Where’s that?” I said.
“Iron City. It’s the old German section. Behind the foundry.”
“I didn’t know there was a section in Iron City called Germantown.”
“The Germans are gone, of course.”
I went straight home. Denise was making check marks in a paperback book called Directory of Toll-Free Numbers. I found Babette sitting by Wilder’s bed, reading him a story.
“I don’t mind running clothes as such,” I said. “A sweatsuit is a practical thing to wear at times. But I wish you wouldn’t wear it when you read bedtime stories to Wilder or braid Steffie’s hair. There’s something touching about such moments that is jeopardized by running clothes.”
“Maybe I’m wearing running clothes for a reason.”
“Like what?”
“I’m going running,” she said.
“Is that a good idea? At night?”
“What is night? It happens seven times a week. Where is the uniqueness in this?”
“It’s dark, it’s wet.”
“Do we live in a blinding desert glare? What is wet? We live with wet.”
“Babette doesn’t speak like this.”
“Does life have to stop because our half of the earth is dark? Is there something about the night that physically resists a runner? I need to pant and gasp. What is dark? It’s just another name for light.”
“No one will convince me that the person I know as Babette actually wants to run up the stadium steps at ten o’clock at night.”
“It’s not what I want, it’s what I need. My life is no longer in the realm of want. I do what I have to do. I pant, I gasp. Every runner understands the need for this.”
“Why do you have to run up steps? You’re not a professional athlete trying to rebuild a shattered knee. Run on plain land. Don’t make a major involvement out of it. Everything is a major involvement today.”
“It’s my life. I tend to be involved.”
“It’s not your life. It’s only exercise.”
“A runner needs,” she said.
“I also need and tonight I need the car. Don’t wait up for me. Who knows when I’ll be back.”
I waited for her to ask what mysterious mission would require me to get in the car and drive through the rain-streaked night, time of return unknown.
She said, “I can’t walk to the stadium, run up the steps five or six times and then walk all the way back home. You can drive me there, wait for me, drive me back. The car is then yours.”
“I don’t want it. What do you think of that? You want the car, you take it. The streets are slippery. You know what that means, don’t you?”
“What does it mean?”
“Fasten your seat belt. There’s also a chill in the air. You know what a chill in the air means.”
“What does it mean?”
“Wear your ski mask,” I told her.
The thermostat began to buzz.
I put on a jacket and went outside. Ever since the airborne toxic event, our neighbors, the Stovers, had been keeping their car in the driveway instead of the garage, keeping it facing the street, keeping the key in the ignition. I walked up the driveway and got in the car. There were trash caddies fixed to the dashboard and seat-backs, dangling plastic bags full of gum wrappers, ticket stubs, lipstick-smeared tissues, crumpled soda cans, crumpled circulars and receipts, ashtray debris, popsicle sticks and french fries, crumpled coupons and paper napkins, pocket combs with missing teeth. Thus familiarized, I started up the engine, turned on the lights and drove off.
I ran a red light when I crossed Middlebrook. Reaching the end of the expressway ramp, I did not yield. All the way to Iron City, I felt a sense of dreaminess, release, unreality. I slowed down at the toll gate but did not bother tossing a quarter into the basket. An alarm went off but no one pursued. What’s another quarter to a state that is billions in debt? What’s twenty-five cents