Wonder Boys - Michael Chabon [25]
Walter Gaskell’s grandfather had at one time owned most of Manatee County, Florida, as well as ten newspapers and a winner of the Preakness, but I didn’t tell that to James.
“They do all right,” I said. “Is your family well off?”
“Mine?” he said, poking himself in the sternum. “No way. My dad used to work in a mannequin factory. I’m serious. Seitz Plastics. They made mannequins for department stores, and display heads for hats, and those flattened-out sexy legs that they use to sell panty hose. He’s retired now, though. He’s old, my dad. Now he’s trying to raise trout in our backyard. No, we’re really poor. My mom was a fry cook before she died. Sometimes she worked in a gift shop.”
“Where was this?” I said, surprised, because despite his overcoat that stank of failure and the shabby thrift-shop suits he wore, he had the face and mannerisms of a rich boy, and sometimes he showed up for class wearing a gold Hamilton wristwatch with an alligator band. “I don’t think I ever knew where you’re from.”
He shook his head. “No place,” he said. “Near Scranton. You haven’t heard of it. It’s called Carvel.”
“I haven’t heard of it,” I said, though I thought it sounded vaguely familiar.
“It’s a hellhole,” he said. “It’s an armpit. Everybody hates me there.”
“But that’s good,” I said, wondering at how young he sounded, regretting that vanished time when I too had believed that I united in my fugitive soul all the greatest fears and petty hatreds of my neighbors in that little river town. How sweet it had felt, in those days, to be the bête noire of other people, and not only of myself! “Now you’ve got good reason to write about them.”
“Actually,” he said, “I already have.” He hefted the stained canvas knapsack on his shoulder and inclined his head toward it. It was one of those surplus Israeli paratrooper numbers that had caught on among my students about five years before, with the winged red insignia on the flap. “I just finished a novel that’s kind of about all that.”
“A novel,” I said. “God damn it, James, you’re amazing. You’ve already written five short stories this term! How long did that take you, a week?”
“Four months,” he said. “I started it at home, over Christmas break. It’s called The Love Parade. In the book I call the town Sylvania. Like in the movie.”
“What movie is that?”
“The Love Parade,” he said.
“I should have known. You ought to let me read it.”
He shook his head. “No. You’ll hate it. It really isn’t any good. It sucks, Prof— Grady. Tripp. I’d be too ashamed.”
“All right, then,” I said. As a matter of fact, the prospect of crawling across hundreds of pages of James Leer’s shards-of-glass style was less than appealing, and I was glad that he had let me off the hook of my automatic offer to read his book. “I’ll take your word for it. It sucks.” I smiled at him, but as I said it I saw something swim into his eyes, and I stopped smiling. “Hey, James, hey. I didn’t mean it. Buddy, I was just kidding.”
But James Leer had started to cry. He sat down on the Gaskells’ bed and let his knapsack slide to the floor. He cried silently, covering his face. A tear fell onto his old acetate necktie and spread in a slow ragged circle. I went over to stand beside him. It was now seven fifty-three, according to the clock on the night table, and downstairs I could hear the click of Sara’s heels as she rushed around, switching off lights, gathering up her purse, taking a last look at herself in the pier glass hanging in the foyer. After a moment the front door squealed on its hinges, then slammed, and the bolt turned in the lock. James and I were alone in the Gaskells’ house. I sat down on the bed beside him.
“I’d really like to take a look at your novel,” I said. “Really, James.”
“It isn’t that, Professor Tripp,” he said, his voice little more than a whisper. He wiped at his eyes with