STRUGGLE IN NINE

By Ben Greenman

Originally published in Superbad, 2001

I. 

Cautious, he picked up the magazine. Interested, he read it from cover to cover. Amused, he laughed. Transfixed, he gasped. Gratified, he wrote a letter to the editor commending the magazine. Eager, he picked up the next month’s issue. Surprised, he found that his letter was printed in the Letters to the Editor column. Emboldened, he wrote another one. Amazed, he saw that his second letter was printed as well. He took a long look in the mirror. The mirror had a flaw on the right hand side that always looked like a scar on his skin. He traced the scar with his right hand. Altered, he was. Altered, and changed. What he had been before, he no longer remained.

II.

The eagle of communism swooped down and grabbed the rabbit of capitalism. The general woke up sweating. He grabbed his gun and ran into the garden. Was there an Arab? Was there a killer? Was there a point to be made? The general sat down on a bench and hung his head. In movies he had seen, generals were always brave. They were often corrupt, but they were always brave. Their faces turned red when they were accused of cowardice. They pounded their fists on tables and stood ramrod-straight when they inspected the troops. The general felt an ant skirt the flannel edge of his pajamas and he began to shriek, for ants had killed his son and now they were coming for him. 

III.

Girl in bar: Are you a good writer?

Me: Yeah. I mean, I think so. I have good ideas and attach good words to them.

Girl in bar: I am a good dancer.

Me: Really?

Girl in bar: No. Not really. But when girls say they are dancers, boys tend to like it.

Me: That’s funny. That’s why I said I was a writer.

Girl in bar: You’re not?

Me: No, I am. But that’s why I said it. Sometimes there are happy coincidences.

IV. 

I have a friend. She writes miniatures. I love them. I love her. Her pieces are short. Ten words at most. But they sing. This piece, the piece I am writing, is already too long. Even Section IV is too long. “You are bloated and incontinent,” she said. “You don’t know how to control yourself. A story is about a flower that bends slightly under the breath of a dog. No more than that. ‘A flower bends slightly under the breath of a dog.’ Man, that’s long. I want to cut out some words. I will cut out ‘slightly.’ Now it has nine words. Now I am happier with it. Will you take me to dinner to celebrate?” We go to dinner. We drink too much wine. We end up at her place, on her couch. She takes my head in her hands. My lips rise to meet hers. 

V. 

Birds don’t write. They are God’s creatures, of course, and God’s chosen creatures, in some sense, for they fly more closely to His Divine Providence than any of us can hope to, but despite their privileged station they cannot write. When they see a rabbit on the ground, they can only choose whether or not to kill it. Is this a form of writing? It is certainly a plot. It most certainly reveals character. Time, someone once told me, is what keeps everything from happening all at once. History, I retorted, is what ensures that everything has happened. We each thought ourselves the cleverer.  

VI.

I have a friend. She writes miniatures. She tells me that my pieces have too much plot. I cannot understand what she means. To my eye, they have no plot. “You are always sending and receiving like a radio station or a radio,” she says. “You are always doing what should never be done. I am going to put on my pants and leave.” She leaves. I turn on the radio. There is a song on the radio about a girl who leaves. I turn off the radio. There is a bird flying outside. It banks in the air and heads right toward my window. I close my eyes, afraid of what I will see. 

VII. 

Me: Yes, I do love you. But not the way you need me to. I think that sometimes you’re too afraid.

Girl in bar: I was afraid of that.

Me: Not everything is a joke. That’s why I wish you wouldn’t talk. 

Girl in bar: Yes. I know. But when a girl decides not to talk, she disappears. And I’m afraid of disappearing.

Me: Really?

Girl in bar: That’s why I never finish anything I start, so that there’s a reason still to be here.

Me: No. I mean, I don’t understand. You leave things undone so that you will not vanish? You’re in a bad way.

Girl in bar: Are you in a good way?

VIII.

The third of March fell on the second of March. It wasn’t a very common occurrence, and as such it was noteworthy. The man on the telephone was eager to make a sale, and so he divulged the secrets of the calendar. Would the lady be interested in learning how one day became the next? Did she possess an understanding of midnight? The man on the telephone hung up and took a deep breath. Most of the women he called demonstrated no interest in the calendar. They asked him if he knew of a place they could buy shoes, or books. Occasionally they had a thing for carpets. The man felt the telephone looking at him and felt afraid. He pounded a fist on the table and felt even more afraid. He picked up a magazine and began to read.

IX. 

When he began to read, he knew that he would soon begin to write. But when he began to write, he knew he would not finish. Would not, and could not. He forced his mind ahead in time. He saw the seam where the day turned into the next day, and tried to imagine that his writing was a bridge across that seam, which was widening by the second. He saw the scar where one day was ripped away from the day that had preceded it. He went for a walk. He sat down, exhausted. He continued on again, rested. He searched for a place to stop and eat, famished. He spoke to an old man in uniform, lonely. He spoke to a pretty girl, attracted. He wandered, disoriented. He saw a bird, comforted. He thought it God, converted.