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Something Happened :: Хеллер Джозеф
Страница: 368 из 398When one does come for me, she'll wait until I've been talking for thirty seconds and then pick up the extension breathlessly to shout: "Hello?" We run out of light bulbs.) There is face to be saved in this tug-of-war, and I want to save mine. This is one victory she cannot pluck away from me. I have the advantage, because I don't care if she never says it to me (although I might begin to care if I felt she didn't).
She wants me to say it precisely that way:
"I love you."
I prefer to sidle into it through methods of my own.
"Oh, Mom!" my daughter exclaimed in the car, pulling close to her in a hug. "I just love her when she kids around this way."
"So do I," I said, edging it in.
There it was. But that isn't good enough. It doesn't do the trick.
(I meant it when I did.)
I've said it to her also the way she wants me to and will again; but I refuse to say it when she is trying to make me. I balk. I have my masculinity and self-esteem to protect against this indecent attack. I resist.
Call it spite. Call it petty spite. But call it highly sensual and gratifying spite.
"Would I be here with you if I didn't?" I have answered.
"Then why don't you ever say so?"
"I love you — there! I did."
"You never tell me."
"I just did."
"But I had to ask you — no, don't smile, don't say anything, don't make a joke out of it," she laments (just as I am about to make a joke out of it). "I guess I expect too much."
My wife not only wants me to say:
"I love you."
She wants me to want to say it!
"I love you."
"Do you?"
"I just said so, didn't I?"
"I had to ask you. I always have to make you say it."
And I might consent to let her make me, out of the hospitable goodness of my heart, if I did not know there was this contest between us that I don't want to lose. I might make a deal with her on it anyway if she'd get me the pillows I want and stop snoring or breathing away indifferently in such slumbering, nasal contentment while I'm still lying awake trying to sleep.
"Get more pillows, for God sakes. We've got more cars and television sets than we have pillows."
We've got four pillows for our king-size bed (which is something of a mocking joke. We could move around it for years and never come in contact with each other if we didn't want to. We do not sleep entwined). And I want her to get at least four more, maybe five. She forgets. I want there to be enough for me, which means at least one or two more than there are for her. (When we do buy light bulbs, we put them in places we can't find when we need one. We run out of toilet paper.
She wants me to say it precisely that way:
"I love you."
I prefer to sidle into it through methods of my own.
"Oh, Mom!" my daughter exclaimed in the car, pulling close to her in a hug. "I just love her when she kids around this way."
"So do I," I said, edging it in.
There it was. But that isn't good enough. It doesn't do the trick.
(I meant it when I did.)
I've said it to her also the way she wants me to and will again; but I refuse to say it when she is trying to make me. I balk. I have my masculinity and self-esteem to protect against this indecent attack. I resist.
Call it spite. Call it petty spite. But call it highly sensual and gratifying spite.
"Would I be here with you if I didn't?" I have answered.
"Then why don't you ever say so?"
"I love you — there! I did."
"You never tell me."
"I just did."
"But I had to ask you — no, don't smile, don't say anything, don't make a joke out of it," she laments (just as I am about to make a joke out of it). "I guess I expect too much."
My wife not only wants me to say:
"I love you."
She wants me to want to say it!
"I love you."
"Do you?"
"I just said so, didn't I?"
"I had to ask you. I always have to make you say it."
And I might consent to let her make me, out of the hospitable goodness of my heart, if I did not know there was this contest between us that I don't want to lose. I might make a deal with her on it anyway if she'd get me the pillows I want and stop snoring or breathing away indifferently in such slumbering, nasal contentment while I'm still lying awake trying to sleep.
"Get more pillows, for God sakes. We've got more cars and television sets than we have pillows."
We've got four pillows for our king-size bed (which is something of a mocking joke. We could move around it for years and never come in contact with each other if we didn't want to. We do not sleep entwined). And I want her to get at least four more, maybe five. She forgets. I want there to be enough for me, which means at least one or two more than there are for her. (When we do buy light bulbs, we put them in places we can't find when we need one. We run out of toilet paper.