Dozens of Books

“First there was the Kafka book,” Trace said.

“Kafka is cool. What was that story where the guy turned into a giant bug?”

“That was ‘Metamorphosis’. Anyway, we’re having lunch a few days later and she brings up some Chester Himes book I’ve never heard of and – boom! – next thing you know she drops it off for me at the front desk on her way to work the next morning.”

Trace was enjoying a Manhattan in the hotel bar and talking to his new friend, the Meth Head. That’s the only name Trace had for him. He was certain that the fidgety, dark-haired meth addict had provided him with a name at some point in their reckless acquaintance but Trace couldn’t remember and he was always too embarrassed to ask.

“I don’t get where you’re going with this, Trace. Hey, man, if I pay you back tomorrow can you buy me a beer?”

Trace popped a handful of peanuts in his mouth and chewed slow and thoughtfully. He motioned for the bartender to set the meth head up with a beer and continued with his story.

“The Chester Himes book was really appealing. I mean, I devoured this thing in one day. One sitting. Blew off work to read the goddamn thing.”

“Wait a minute, Hoss. You’re a writer but you take a day off to read? Isn’t that like a lifeguard going swimming on his day off?”

“Well, getting ahead of myself a little bit here but, yes, the point is that I did take time off to read the book. And not just that one but the next one that came in.”

“What is this chick? Like chairman of the Book Of The Month Club?”

The meth head laughed long and loud, regurgitating tiny bubbles of beer onto the front of his filthy gray Mickey Mouse T-shirt.

“Book Of The Month? Try book of the week, book of the day. I mean, I’m dating this broad for weeks on end and we’re going along okay. Alright? I mean, no immediate sheets action because she takes thing slow in that department.”

Trace took a sip of his Manhattan and then slipped his index finger into the martini glass to fish out the cherry.

“But the books,” he said. “If I expressed an interest in any subject in the world, she owned a book on it. And obscure shit, too. I thought I had her beat with my Fitzgerald collection. Not just Fitzgerald’s stuff but I have a shit load of critical anthologies and essays and lost stories and – well, Goddamnit, wouldn’t you know she owned a book I didn’t have and she sends it to me. So, after a few months we’re nowhere near any kind of commitment and –”

“This is making me dizzy.”

“What is? The beer or the story?”

“Both.”

“I’m almost done. The point is I had dozens of dozens of her books in my place. I had to stop reading because I had so many to choose from I was getting all OCD just trying to figure out what to read.”

“Come on, Trace. Is there a punch line to this story?”

“You have somewhere to go? I just bought you a beer. The punch line is this: I’m dating her for a few months, thinking that we’re not moving toward anything in a committed sense of the word and then one night I finally get her back to my place –”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, Hoss. You finally get her back to your place? After months? What is this chick, a nun? Were you dating a nun, Trace?”

Trace laughed with the meth head.

“No, but she was chaste in her own way. Anyway, I get her back to my place and she takes a look around and sees all of these books everywhere and she says ‘My, all of my books are here. It’s like I live here already.’”

“Oh man. That’s some evil shit, Trace.”

“Well, it just shows that women move in subtle ways.”

“So what happened?”

Trace finished his drink and hiked his shoulders.

“I let her move in, of course.”

“And?”

“She moved out six months later. And she took every fucking one of her books with her.”

(In Honor of the 2006 Los Angeles Times Festival of Books)