Big Sur Page #6

for a marvelous supper.

Lenora, you get a salad ready,

whatever else we need,

or you can...

Oh, no, no.

Oh doh doh doh doh doh

Mm-hmm.

We're gonna leave the two

of you alone now, okay?

Why don't we go to Nepenthe

and private our grief tonight?

And drink Manhattans?

Or go see Henry Miller?

I'm so exhausted, I can't

do anything or see anybody.

Already feeling awful guilt

about Henry Miller anyway.

We've made an appointment

with him about a week ago,

and instead of showing up at his

friend's house in Santa Cruz at 7:00,

we're all drunk at 10:00,

calling long distance.

And poor Henry just said,

"Well, I'm sorry

"I don't get to meet you,

Jack, but I'm an old man,

"and at 10:
00, it's time

for me to go to bed.

You'd never make it here

till after midnight now. "

His voice on the phone

just like his records,

nasal, Brooklyn,

good-guy voice,

and him disappointed in a way,

because he's gone

to the trouble

of writing the preface

to one of my books.

Though I suddenly now think

in my remorseful paranoias,

"Ah, the hell with it.

"He was only

getting in the act,

"like all these guys

write prefaces

So you don't even get

to read the author first,"

as an example

of how really psychotically

suspicious and loco

I was getting.

I'd begun to realize

in my soberness

that this thing

had come too far,

that I don't love Billie,

that I'm leading her on,

that I made a mistake

dragging everyone here,

that I simply

want to go home now,

that I'm just plumb sick and

tired, just like Neal, I guess.

I suddenly wonder if she's going to

horrify the heavens and me, too,

with a sudden suicide walk

into those awful undertows.

I see her sad

blonde hair flying,

the sad, thin figure

alone by the sea,

the leaf-hastening sea.

"You are my last chance,"

she said,

but don't all women say that?

Can it be I'm withholding from her

something sacred just like she says?

Or am I just a fool

who will never learn

to have a decent,

eternally minded

deep-down relation

with a woman

and keep throwing that away

for a song and a bottle?

Ladies and gentlemen,

what we are having

is a sacrificial banquet

with all kinds of goodies

laid in a regal spread around

one little delicious fish,

so that we may pray to that fish

and take tiny, little bites.

Now, there's only about

four bites apiece, okay?

But there's all kinds of

different parts of the fish

where the bites are

even more significant

or substantial or beneficial.

But let me tell you, however,

the real way to properly

fry a fish...

Beautiful!

Lew.

That's fantastic.

Flipping the fish, now!

Oh!

Oh!

We're having fish, Jack.

Here you go, Jack.

You gotta eat, Jack.

I whispered love into

every orifice of that bite.

Oh, Lew, that looks beautiful.

Thank you.

It's beautiful.

Let us pray.

Jack?

This is the fish that

we're now gonna partake of

and feed us so that

we shall be stronger.

Thank you, fish people.

Thank you, fish god.

Thank you, moon,

for giving us

our light tonight.

This is the night

of the full moon fish...

which we are now going to consecrate

with our first delicate bite.

That

fish has all the death

of otters and mouses

right in it.

And that first bite

is for Jack.

It's just a tiny,

little bite, Jack.

Just chew it very slowly.

You just chew it really slowly.

Is he chewing?

Oh.

Yes, my drink.

I'll have that piece.

Okay.

If I try to turn over,

the whole universe

turns over with me.

It's no better on the other side

of the universe.

You got me all wrong.

I wouldn't be any good for you.

I know that now.

You're just tired of life,

and you want to sleep,

and in a way, that's

what I want to do, too.

Only, I've got Elliott

to worry about.

Could take both our lives

and solve that.

You, creepy talk.

You told me the first night

you loved me,

that I was

the most interesting,

that you hadn't met

anyone you liked so much,

and then you just

went on drinking.

I really can see now what

they say about you is true.

You keep groaning

about how sick you are,

and you really don't

think about others enough,

and I know you can't help it,

but you are

really ratty sometimes.

But even that,

I know you can't help.

Why can't you follow through

with what your heart knows

is good and best and true?

You give up so easy

to discouragement.

And I guess, too,

you don't really want me.

You want to go home

and resume your own life

with Louise.

No, I couldn't with her either.

I'm just bound up inside

like constipation!

I can't move emotionally,

like you'd say

emotionally as though

that were some big,

grand, magic mystery!

Everybody's saying, "Oh,

how wonderful life is!"

How miraculous! God's made

this, and God made that!"

How do you know he doesn't

hate what he did?

He might even be drunk and not

noticing what he went and done!

Though, of course,

that's not true.

Maybe God is dead.

No. God can't be dead,

because he's the unborn!

You have all these philosophies

and sutras

you keep talking about.

But don't you see?

They've all become empty words!

I realize I've been playing

like a happy child

all my life

with words, words, words

in a big, serious tragedy!

Look around!

I've never

screamed in my life.

It's the first time

I'm not confident

I can hold myself together,

no matter what happens.

The devils

come after me tonight.

The creek will give me water

that will clear away

everything.

Suddenly the water in the creek

tastes different...

as though somebody's thrown

gasoline or kerosene in it.

The unbearable

anguish of insanity.

There's a tightening

around the head that hurts.

There's a terror of the mind

that hurts even more.

I feel evil forces

gathering down all around me

from her,

the kid...

the very walls of the cabin...

and the trees.

Even the sudden thought of Lew

Welch and Lenora is evil.

They're all coming now.

Jack.

Jack?

Love me...

please.

Even... Even if we never

see each other again,

let this last night

be beautiful.

Please.

I'm carking in my canyon.

Can you just do that for me...

Everything is death.

For the both of us?

They all look dead.

I can't.

I'm with you, Jesus,

for always,

but there's a battle somewhere,

and the devils

keep coming back.

Why can't you?

Jack, please?

I see the cross.

It's silent.

It stays a long time.

My whole body fades away to it.

I don't want to scare Billie

or anybody

with my death scream.

So I swallow the scream

and just

let myself go into death.

I can't possibly

stay here another minute.

You gotta drive us

all back to town.

Okay, but I sure wish we could stay

another week like Lenora wants to do.

Well, you drive me

and come back.

Heh. I don't know if

Lawrence would like that.

We already dirtied up

the place aplenty.

In fact, we gotta dig a garbage

pit to get rid of all the junk.

I'll do it.

It's exactly the size

fit for putting

a little dead Elliott in it.

We've all

read Freud sufficiently

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