Page 245 - Demo

%u00a9Jack Fritscher, Ph.D., All Rights ReservedHOW TO LEGALLY QUOTE FROM THIS BOOKWhat They Did to the Kid 233applause, heady as Chanel and cigars, sumptuous cheeses carved on old wood with a silver knife, warm breads washed down with fine wine. What had happened to that world with Jack dead and Jackie in mourning? Hard work could move me through the world. Whetted appetite grew to craving necessity. For all the sports at Misery, I felt weak, enervated by Misery itself. I had been a priestling. I joined the most forbidden Protestant gym in town, the Peoria YMCA. I did sit-ups and pull-ups and push-ups and watched the other men lift weights until I could lift them myself. I read the pamphlet in the lobby that explained that masturbation was recommended for students and workers to help them keep studying and working. I was shocked to see in print in a public lobby, another word, one of the very words I had been punished for writing from translation. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was made flesh. I never even had to think how fast I must move.I had been kidnapped.I screamed.I had been in real danger.I%u2019d been circling the drain.Time so lost had passed with no trace of me in the world. Streets and movies and people rushed into my senses. Who needs salvation when you need rescue? Jack had his brains shot out in a car. I panted for life%u2019s embrace. I sat crying in the movies. Where was my wife? Where were my children? Had they gone speeding by in a car? I had been robbed of any head start in life. What now? Is now enough? And Jack dead. Dear Jack. Gone, taken lost from us. Seeing double: his death, my death. Death should end the past, not the future. I escaped one world to find another. Adrift, untied. Without him. Where? Barbarians reared up in the uncivilized street. His brain blown away. Zap. Zap! Zapruder! The wind, the blowing wind, Dylan, blowing in the wind. Jackie climbed across the car. Dropped the yellow roses of Texas on the blood-spattered black upholstery. She didn%u2019t remember crawling across the trunk of the car. I love you, Jack: she placed her ring on his finger. Parkland. Bethesda. Oh Love Field. Women in leopard-skin coats like to make love. Arlington and crepe. Jack and Jackie. The curtain descends. Everything ends. Too soon. A simple matter of a bullet through the head. Ich bin Berliner. Auch Ich. A fear more than grief folds its black wings hovering over everyone crying from Thanksgiving through Christmas and into the new year. Happy Birthday, Mr. President. I should have held things closer when I had them. Shalom, shalom! Oh not like other men. Kaddish. I am worn from weeping, the psalmist cries. Night after night my pillow is drenched with tears. I