CLINTON ST. QUARTERLY opening of each eye. “ Yes. My parents are divorced. My mother still lives in Florida where we came from.” She seemed to be trying to allay my curiosity, to satisfy me. I plunged on. “ And do you eat here at the counter? And do you use paper plates all the time?” “We both hate doing dishes. I’m sorry I can’t ask you to stay for supper. My father gets home late and I wait for him.” “ Oh, that’s all right,” I said. The refrigerator had held only a bunch of celery and some carrots other than the steaks in the freezer. There was a drip coffee pot on the stove, but I saw no other cooking utensils. “ You know, my mother has pots and pans piling up through the attic. She’d loan you some until you got your own.” Amanda prodded the white frosted meat with a long forefinger and shook her head. “ No. Thank you. All we ever use is the broiler or the oven. So many foods come in their own pans now. It’s very convenient.” She was on her way out of the kitchen and I followed like a befuddled pup. “ We should work now, I suppose,” she said. We sat down on the carpet in the alcove and I displayed my little collection of cards with their statistics and quotations. I forget whether the debate topic that year was Federal Aid to Education, or World Peace Through World Law, but it did not intrigue Amanda Hubert. Her courtesy was constant, but I could sense in every posture an indifference to the subject and a growing fatigue. At last I sat with the last set of cards in my hand and watched her covering a yawn. “ I’m sorry. I usually sleep at this time of day. I have a kind of anemia that keeps me very tired.” She offered this in what seemed a genuine effort not to injure me. “ That’s too bad,” I yelped, clumsily jamming my cards back into their box. “ Are you taking something for it?” I put the lid on the box and stood up. “ Yes. But we can go on with the cards some other time if that’s all right.” She nerved herself to rise with me. I could see her drawing strength and forcing it to lift her up so that she could walk me to the door. I was suddenly convinced that she was quite ill in a long drawn way and that her strange fragility as well as her restraint, silence, and shy courtesy were all products of this secret devouring disease. I slid into my shoes, patted her on a shoulder that threatened to snap beneath my weighty paw, and hurried away. It was disappointing. I had pictured this encounter as the beginning of a confiding friendship in which I discovered the source of her distance and overcame it, plumbed the darkness of her looks and shared in their effects. She had answered my questions with the dutiful clarity required by a bureaucratic form. She had no interest in me. I was an intrusion on whatever unfathomable privacy it was that she sheltered in. Yet it was impossible to resent her. She had made strenuous attempts not to hurt me and I felt sure that whatever her internal life might be it had no room nor use for the likes of me. As I entered my own thickly furnished and richly mothered house, and was drawn into the smells and warmth of dinner preparation, I felt a bleak pity for her beauty in the empty house with its bare walls. But something interfered with the pathos of the thing. Some sneaking inclination of my own hinted that it might be a relief to live with nothing but two blankets and a stack of paper plates. I thought of the two figures on the stools in the Huberts’ kitchen, thin, each of them, eating side by side in identical slow enjoyment. Then maybe they would light the fire and lie on the gray carpet watching the big empty room people itself with shadows and the flicker of light There wasn ’t a lady who d id not considerJim Hubert a ‘‘True Gentleman ’’nor a man who didn 't acknowledge him as a ‘'smartfellow. ’ glancing from the windows. I knew that I did not really understand, and yet felt pride in identifying her alien impulses by their symptoms. Amanda never did do any research for debate. We nodded when we passed and I took a sort of satisfaction from the recognition in her eyes, but nothing else was accomplished. She went on among us, moving softly, speaking rarely, seemingly untouched by our constant attention. Her father had also created a great deal of interest in town. I heard his name mentioned often at the diner where the local business people vied with high school students for stool space. In this forum James Hubert inspired an unprecedented admiration. My father said there had not been such general agreement on an individual’s character in that diner since World War II when, toward the end, every habitue had come round to thinking of Adolph Hitler as thoroughly unpleasant. James Hubert had sparked the other end of that rare unity. There wasn’t a lady who did not consider him a “ True Gentleman” nor a man who didn’t acknowledge him as a “ smart fellow.” Minor Hanson was heard to say that he’d give his teeth to get into Hubert’s big money deal because he knew a winner when he saw one. Mr. Hubert’s interest was real estate and he spent a fair amount of time in Portland, driving in nearly every day. But he managed to impress the locals with his concern for small town affairs. The year was coming to a close. Graduation gowns had been ordered and the valedictorian was heard declaiming to himself in the back room of the library. A crisis approached in the matter of Amanda and the speech class. We began to wonder openly if she was to receive a year’s credit for the class without ever having made a speech. Our worry was not based on resentment but on unsolicited and uncomprehending sympathy. Our anxieties were given a massive jolt one day, two weeks before the end of school when Mrs. Olsen asked Amanda whether she would be ready to deliver her oratory the following day. Amanda nodded gravely and replied that she would. This must have been the compromise agreed upon for Amanda’s successful graduation, but a formal oratory seemed an imposing assignment for a novice. The prospect gave me a nervous stomach and there was not a student in the class who would not have dragged himself in with two hip casts and the chicken pox to hear her. She had never stood up before us. We're not just a health food store.. . We carry a complete line of groceries — from lettuce to Haagen-Dazs, from pintos to paprika, from toothpaste to pet food. . . .and we're not just a grocery. We select our products for purity, nutritional value and ecological impact. You won 't find sugar. You won 't find preservatives. But you will find a stunning variety of wholesomely delicious food. Jams of just berries. Milk with cream at the top. Freshly ground flours. Organically grown fruits and vegetables. Luscious desserts. A Literary Magazine in Portland? THIS SUMMER FROM MISSISSIPPI MUD: MAY CALENDAR July 18-19 The Balloons 20 Malchicks 21 Face Ditch 24 The Balloons & Casey Nova 25-26 The Odds 27 Malchicks 28 Face Ditch 31 Last Chance We're something else. Corbett store: 5909 S.W. Corbett near Johns Landing, Bus 40, 244-3934 Fremont store: 3437 N.E. 24th near Fremont, Bus 9, 288-3414 Between Fire and Love: Contemporary Peruvian Writing Edited by Lynn Darroch Due out August 15,1980 $5 ($4 if ordered in advance) To order in advance, use the coupon below and send your check to Lynn Darroch, 2533 N.E. 40th, Portland 97212. Mississippi Mud #22 Edited by Joel Weinstein Due out August 30,1980 You can subscribe to Mississippi Mud. Five dollars brings you four issues of the magazine plus Mississippi Mud special editions such as Between Fire and Love. Send your check with the coupon below to Joel Weinstein, 3125 S.E. Van Water, Portland 97222. Both Between Fire and Love and Mississippi Mud will be available through Catbird Seat Books, Rich's Cigar Store, Lookinglass Books, the Fifth Avenue Smoke Shop and better bookstores throughout the city. Name________________________________________________________ Address______________________________________________________ C i t y S t a t e Zip August 1-2 TBA 7 The Balloons 8-9 The Odds & Malchicks 11 Grown Men 14 Sleacy Pieces & The Odds 15-16 Sleazy Pieces & Malchicks 17 Sleazy Pieces & The Balloons 21 Last Chance 22-23 The Balloons 29-30 The Odds Mondays — Band Review Tuesdays — Poetry Night July & August Wednesdays — Shiela & the Boogiemen Long Goodbye 3 0 0 NW lOth 228-1008 37
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