Get Home Free: A Novel by John Clellon Holmes

Author:John Clellon Holmes [Holmes, John Clellon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781504022309
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2015-10-20T07:00:00+00:00

NEW YORK: THE MIDDLE

“Look, I’m sorry, I know I woke you up, but I just got in, I’m at Grand Central, and—”

“What? … Oh, Danny … No, that’s all right.… What time is it?”

“Six-fifteen. But listen, I need to pick up those clothes, like I wrote you, so—”

“What? … But what time do you sail?”

“Twelve-thirty, but I’ve got to be there by ten or so, or I wouldn’t have called you so early.”

“You mean now? You mean twelve-thirty today? I thought it was tonight.”

“No, it’s noon. But look, if you’re busy, just put them outside the door.…”

“All right, but … No, listen, honey, you come in and I’ll fix you coffee.”

“Well … You must be beat, I don’t want to disturb you.”

“Oh, Danny, don’t be silly, for God’s sake! I’m alone, you’re not disturbing me. And I’m awake now anyway.”

“Okay. If you’re sure.”

New York at dawn seemed very fine to him. Bundles of newspapers stacked by shuttered stands, street lights changing automatically at empty corners, the fleeting aroma of fresh coffee from a steamy doorway: he realized that it had been months since he had seen the first white-gold glisten of the sun on wet pavements deserted all the way to the river, except through eyes distorted by drink or its aftermath. A yawning janitor, a dog straining the leash of his sleepy-eyed walker, cabs going in after the long shift: for a moment he had a sense of the urgent beauty of New York that he hadn’t felt in years, a sense of its island nature, its sheer physical audacity, and all the invisible millions slumbering fitfully behind the windows that caught the early light of that fresh day. It seemed to him that life was actually simple and thrilling; midnight and its confusions were a needless complexity; and a poignant joy came up in his throat, a joy intensified by the imminence of his going away from it all. He breathed up the damp smells of morning in the city, famished by awareness; his cigarette tasted rare and delicious; he was off on a great adventure.

She was tousled and sleepy in her flowered kimono, with that look of somnolent distraction that only the third cup of coffee would dissipate, a look which instantly brought back their time together in every graphic detail. But she had managed lipstick, the pot was a-drip, and his things were in two neat piles on the couch, folded up carefully.

“I’m really sorry about this. When I wrote you, I didn’t know I had to be there so early,” peeking around for clues to her life, expecting signs of Streik. But there was nothing. Not a shirt cardboard, not a shoelace.

“No, it’s all right,” clattering the cups. “And I hope you intended to at least phone to say good-by,” she added pettishly, as she checked the pot for the third time. “Will you switch on the radio, honey, while I—?” and then she looked at him with a bleak little smile that acknowledged a dispute of months before.

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