Names

The girl came up to his door on a hot day that was like all the other hot days that had come before it and damn it he liked his days, hot or not, to be all the same.

She knocked on his door.

"What the hell do you want?"

She knocked again.

"I said what the hell do you want?"

He peered out the hot glass at her form, smeared outline against the whitewashed desert. He looked for a car but didn't see one. That's how you crept up on me, he thought. No car. No engine. How in hell did she manage to get through all this blast-furnace waste without a car?

She knocked.

"What the hell do you want?"

"Why does one knock?"

"What?" He bellowed through the door. "What?"

"I said, why does one knock?"

He opened it. She stood there and smiled through the screen. "Yes. That's why."

"You want to come in."

"Yes." A hot wind blew dust in his face. The sun was so white and his eyes so squinted he could barely discern her face. "I want to come in."

"I'm not going to let you in."

"Where else am I going to go?"

He thought about the miles. At least five of them, those had been the specifications when he built the house all those years ago: a minimum of five miles in every direction and gimme a stack of those thorny hills between myself and civilization. No roads either. Clear a space that I can find with a pickup truck and don't you worry about the state of it. I'll take care of it myself. Long miles of nothing but scrub and white hot sand.

"It's not my affair. Where you're going nor how you came here."

She wore sunglasses. They turned her visage into that of a giant insect. "If you don't let me in I'll get sick at the very least. I could die trying. As you have no road I don't even have that to follow back to the highway. The cell reception out here is not so good. It's better closer to the road but I have no way of reckoning myself back to the road. And you won't allow someone to come here. Getting rid of me entails at the very least you climbing into your truck and driving me through the desert and back to the road. I imagine you'd want to blindfold me first."

He just looked at her.

"To keep the secret. I might tell others. I might lead all the crazies to you."

"How did you get here?"

"I walked."

"What?"

"You heard me."

"If you walked all the way in here you can walk right back out. I won't begrudge you some water if you want to hand me your jug."

"How kind of you. Considering it's a hundred and four degrees out here and approaching noon. The killing hours. Do you want to watch my bones bleach in this desert?"

"Right now, yes, that is what I want. That is what I want most sincerely. Nothing would please me more than to see your bones lying on the desert floor."

She grinned. "That answer doesn't shock me at all. Was it intended to?"

"How did you find your way here?"

"My price is to walk through this door."

"I won't allow that."

"Then you'll never know."

White salt stains encrusted the fine hairs on her upper lip. The big black glasses covered her eyes.

"Supposing I made it out on my own," she said. "Supposing a trucker passed by just as I stumbled out into the highway. Say there was someone on the highway to catch me and take me back to a hospital somewhere and plump me back up full of water and feed me full of painkillers to numb my horrid sunburn and if it wasn't a Statie who picked me up off the highway there would soon be policemen in that room. All of them would want to know the story. How did a young woman such as myself come stumbling half-cooked out of the Mojave? Where did she come from? How indeed. I know the police must know you're here. I know someone knows. Someone has to. If I found myself in this situation…well, you're a brilliant man, aren't you?"

"I don't believe you walked all the way here."

"You don't have to."

"Prove it."

"I can't and you know it." She lifted her foot and hooked a finger into the back of her sneaker. She pulled it away from her heel. "Here's a blister. Is it bloody enough for you?"

"God damn you. Damn you straight to hell. You're all crazy, do you know it? Crazy. Ever last one of you."

"Your Appalachia is showing."

He itched to smack her. "I'll get you your water. And then you can walk your pert little ass right back out to the highway killin hours be damned. Maybe a little heatstroke will teach you to stay away from a man's door. Be good for you, that's what I think. Could be you'll have a little vision in the desert. It's what all you crazies want, after all."

She handed him the jug. It was empty.

"I got no answers. You hear me? I got no answers. Everthing I had to say was in that damn book. I've got nothin to say to you."

Her sunglasses were inscrutable.

"It would please me to see you gone when I get back here to this door. It would please me very much."

She stood there.

"All right, all right. I'll go get your damn water."

She sat down on the stairs, edged into a bit of shade, and waited. She pondered the passing moment, and the moments that had come before it, all of them unbroken in a line. She wondered how many moments had passed since the trucker left her on the highway, how many moments since she'd climbed into the truck, how many still since leaving her home. How many moments measured in footfalls? How many moments stretched between this one and the moment she'd decided to be here? Did the moments make a line or was there some loop happening outside her comprehension, a big cosmic stitch? She remembered the feeling. The certainty.

The door opened.

She stood up and turned around. He stood with the jug in his hand, now dripping water. She couldn't look away from the drips. The white plastic tainted with the weight of the water inside. Light passed through it in a different fashion. She imagined its temperature, how it would feel in her throat, and she was amazed to realize that she could no longer conceptualize cold. She knew it, knew it as a thing, but the heat killed her memory. It was so hot out here she felt shimmers building in her brain. The darkness behind him, the cool shade of the house, looked Stygian and welcoming. She could not see the furnishings.

"Here's your water," he said. "Now get out of here."

He wore a T-shirt and a pair of old shorts and some flip-flop sandals. His hair was mussed. The long journey made it hard to think. She wanted to talk but her mouth was filled with the sensation of his unshaved face. Her words had nestled in her fingertips. She felt the visuals on her tongue and her skin longed to speak and she thirsted somewhere in her navel and her confusion hammered out of the bright light, stretched on the ground and pounded by the string of moments to a malleable thickness. She felt it folding around her. This was part of how he wrote; the strangeness of time in the desert.

"I can no longer conceptualize cold," she said. "I have no memory of it."

He blinked and squinted.

"How's that for outrageous? I grew up in the cold but I can't remember it. It's all words like numb and crystal and ice and snow and they mean nothing. It's like sand. Sand falling through my fingers. I want to conjure the memory of cold and I can't. I can't do it."

He started to open the door.

"My senses have all swapped places. How's that for fucked? I see your face with my fingers. I taste the color of your eyes. I smell your voice." She started to laugh. "This heat is stewing my brain. Cook, cook. Steam. Whew! I've gone synesthetic. Whew!"

"You're crazy." He handed her the jug. "You're a crazy stupid little girl and I want you off my land."

"Please let me in."

"No."

"I'm going to faint."

"Go right ahead."

"No, really. I am."

"Is this some sort of threat?"

She took a drink of the water. The first touch of it on her tongue drove back the shimmers. She drank too quickly. The sensation of cold filled her thoughts along with a floating, and she drank more thinking the weight of the water would be enough to hold her down, to keep her conscious. Water spilled down the sides of her face. Water dripped on her chest. She drank until her stomach felt like a stone. She closed her eyes for a moment and took deep breaths.

"No," she said. "Tell me about my bones."

"Huh?"

"My bones lying in the desert. Tell me about my bones."

"Your bones aren't in the desert. They're inside your skin."

"Not yet. They aren't yet. Are you thinking about my bones? I'm dead. My bones are stewing in the waste. I'm dead and I just don't know it yet."

"I'm not thinkin about your bones. I'm thinkin about your insanity."

"Tell me about them. Say something pretty."

"The sun has taken your crazy brain and turned it inside out."

She swayed on her feet. Her eyes rolled back in her head.

"Oh shit."

She fainted.

* * *

He was dragging her into the living room when she came awake. "Let go of me, goddammit!"

"You're the one who fainted."

He let go of her. She sat up and her eyes went all swimmy.

"Go on and faint again. Go on. Just this time stay unconscious."

"Fuck you." She slapped him away. She took hold of a table and pulled herself up with deliberation. Her legs shook. She looked around, eyes squinting against the absent sun. She took a step and paused. She took another step and paused.

"Are you all right?"

"I'm fine. I told you I can walk." She made it to the couch and slumped into it. "I can't believe I fainted."

"What else do you expect hiking all the way out here in high summer. I'm going to get you a cold cloth. Lie down."

"Screw off. Don't tell me what to do. I'll be all right. Just give me a minute."

"Lie down. I'm not going to argue the point."

She made a face.

"If you don't you'll be sorry."

"I'm going to puke."

He fetched a big bowl and got it to her just in time. She barfed up the water and what looked like a long-digested bowl of cereal. He fetched her a paper towel. She wiped her mouth with it.

"This is embarrassing."

"I've got no sympathy for you. None at all. Now are you going to listen to me?"

"I doubt it."

"Lie down, sit up, its no never mind to me. Keep that barf-bowl close. I don't want you baptizin my couch with what's left of your lunch."

He went out into the kitchen and made up a bowl of ice water. He put a couple of washcloths in it and brought the whole thing out into the living room. "Put one of these on your forehead and put the other on your neck. If you come over all funny again put your hands in the ice water."

She groaned.

"I'm not gonna nursemaid you. Put them on you or don't, it's up to you. If you want to feel better the stuff's right here. If you don't I'll leave you to your misery."

She took the cloths out of the water, wrung them out, removed her sunglasses, and laid down. She put them on her face.

"That's good," he said. "Now you mind telling me just what in the hell you're doing?"

"What do you mean?"

"Don't you come over all dumb on me. It's unflattering to you and it annoys the hell out of me. You managed to get in the door and I've got a spot of grudging admiration for that though you better savor the words because I'm not gonna say em again. Now what are you doing? Why'd you put yourself at such risk? Why'd you come here?"

"A friend dared me."

"A friend dared you."

"No, not really. This is a spiritual thing for me. It's embarrassing but I can admit the truth. It's just you and me out in the middle of the desert, right? Who's going to hear it but you and me? You know, it's like a vision quest but without the visions. I came all the way out here to look upon the great man and know the wisdom of his existence. Tell me something wise."

"That's some grade-A bullshit."

"Yeah, you got me." She cracked a smile. "It is bullshit. Pretty good for spur-of-the-moment, huh?"

"So what are you doing here?"

"Tell me something wise. I need to report it back to the friend. You know, the one who dared me."

"Are you ever gonna answer my question?"

"Depends."

"On what?"

"How you ask."

"What kind of circling is that?"

"The kind that works. Are you tied up in knots yet?"

"This is the question: what do you want?"

"I'm in love with you. I wanted to tell you face-to-face. It's not the sort of thing you say in a letter."

A moment of stunned silence.

She giggled. "I'm just kidding."

He sighed. "I'm gonna try this one more time. What are you doin here?"

"The question is what do you want, unless you're now asking a different question. They aren't one and the same. A learned and lettered man such as yourself ought to know the difference."

"Were you like this before?"

"Before what?"

"Before the sun roasted your mind."

"I'm afraid so. I might've been worse."

"Can you remember cold?"

She moved the washcloths. "What?"

He fished an ice cube out of the bowl. "Cold." He put it in her hand. "Can you remember it now?"

She put the ice cube on her forehead. "Yes. I remember."

"Tell me about it."

"It's still just words. Ice and snow and cold. And goosebumps. And that feeling of air, when it blows against something wet and drops a degree or two. Like the wind is shaving those degrees off one at a time."

"What is your name?"

"Anna. My name is Anna. Except when it's Laura. And then it's only Laura in the morning. By moonlight I'm Estelle. In the springtime I'm Robin and in the winter I'm Olivia. Sometimes, only sometimes, when the meteors fall, I'm Sarah."

"You won't give me a straight answer."

"I know," she said. "You don't like it much, do you?"

"No. I don't."

"Pick it apart. The truth is woven in through all the lies. Woven in tight. You're smart. You're brilliant. Figure it out."

He picked up the barf bowl and carried it into the bathroom. He dumped it, rinsed it out, carried it into the kitchen. He filled it with water and soap.

She raised her voice. "What shall I call you?"

"By my name."

"It's the name you write under, but that doesn't mean it's the name you were born with."

"Tell me yours and I'll tell you mine."

"Names don't mean anything. The protagonist of the Great Desert Bone Novel didn't have a name. He never had a name, only a gender. I could ask you why. I know you expect me to. I don't have to ask the question because I already know the answer: it doesn't matter."

He scrubbed the sides of the bowl.

"You could refer to me as 'the woman'. The woman is lying on my couch. The woman melted an ice cube on her forehead. The woman won't shut up. I could refer to you as 'the man'. The man is washing out the bowl. The man is standing in a dark kitchen. The man looks ridiculous in those shorts. The man is nothing like the woman thought he would be. The woman took a lot of trouble to imagine the man and he is nothing like his pictures. The man is short. The man doesn't shave. The man doesn't comb his hair. The man threatened to leave the woman out in the desert."

"The woman asked the man about her bones."

She freshened the washcloths and draped them around her neck. Water soaked into the couch.

"The woman asked the man to say something pretty. She said I am dead and my bones are wasting and tell me about my bones. The bones living in her skin. Her bones are living inside her skin but they are dead inside her mind. She has sacrificed them to an ideal. It is ideal to no one but the woman. The desert altar is a crowded one. Her bones are one set of bones among many."

"The woman said there are those who gather bones and there are those who do not gather."

"The man has left the ossuary."

"Has the ossuary left him?"

He dried the bowl and put it away. She was stretched out upon the couch with one arm flung over her head. He came out into the living room and squatted beside her. "I don't talk about my work."

She didn't look at him. "I know."

"You aren't going to be the first."

"The woman has had too much sun."

"It's her own fault."

"The best thing for heat exhaustion is sleep."

"So sleep."

"Will you let me?"

"I'll let you."

"Go on then. Sleep."

"Okay."

* * *

She woke up thirsty and he brought her fruit juice. She tried to take the glass out of his hand but he held it out of her reach.

"Promise to sip."

She growled.

"Promise. Say I will not gulp."

She sulked. "I will not gulp. I will sip it like a damned lady. Are you satisfied?"

"I don't want to dump out any more of your recyclin. I don't want to mop it up either. Purely selfish motivations."

She sipped the juice. He sat down on the floor. When it was gone he gave her a glass of ice water. When that was gone he poured another glass of juice.

"My stomach's turning."

"Then don't drink any more. Let what you've got settle."

"My head aches."

"I'm sure it does. It's like a hangover, isn't it?"

"Yes. Just like."

"It'll pass just as soon as some of this water soaks back into your dehydrated crazy brain. You want some aspirin?"

"What brought out the nice?"

"I don't want you pukin all over the inside of my house. I don't want any damn paramedics out here either."

She looked into the glass. "I feel like a cement truck took a dump on my head. Is there a crater in my skull?"

"Nope."

"Are you sure?"

"Sure as can be."

She sipped the juice and put the glass down on the floor. She swung her legs over the side. She rubbed her temples. "Owch. I'll take the aspirin."

He went into the bathroom.

"You changed your clothes."

"What of it?"

"You scare me a little less. And you shaved too. And took a goddamned comb to your head. Imagine that."

"I know my way around a razor." He dropped a pair of aspirin into her hand. "And a comb too."

"Oh that's funny."

"Had I known a strange girl was going to turn up on my doorstep I might've taken a razor to this ugly old mug though like as not I wouldn't have. I don't care what you think of me. Maybe I would've made some mud out back and rolled around in it and come to the door that way. Might've scared the pants off you. Would have done my heart good to see your screaming naked ass running off into the cacti."

She giggled. "All the better to scare you with."

"Once the sun's down you can move on. I'm thinking about driving you but like as not I won't. Part of me hasn't decided yet whether or not you've learned your lesson. I'm thinkin you haven't. Maybe some midnight walkin will pound it further into you. I believe it will."

"Tell me something first."

"I have nothin to say to you."

"What'll it cost you? A breath? You have to take one of those anyway."

"You're going to nag me. I see it in you."

"Your eyes are sharp. What else do you see in me?"

"Bones."

She smiled. "You're quick and you're good."

"What do you want me to say?"

"What do you want to say?"

"I don't want to say anything."

She got up from the couch. She went to the window and pushed aside the heavy curtains. "The sun is setting. Look at that."

"It goes down ever night."

"How can you be blasé about this? I mean look at it. Really look at it. Do you look at it anymore? How can you look at this and not get your eyes knocked out of your head? It's fucking beautiful."

"So are a lot of things. A man's eyes get used to anything. After awhile you just don't see it anymore."

"Come over here and look out this window. You look at that and tell me you don't see it."

"It's a desert sunset, honey. I've seen a bunch of em."

"But you haven't seen this one. This one isn't like all the other ones. This one is special."

"It's not special. It's the same as any other. It's the dust. The dust and the light combine make all those colors. There's no magic in that."

"I know it's science. But look at all this pink light. Come here." She waved to him. "Bring your one breath and come over here. I'll show it to you."