Falconer+-+John+Cheever

Falconer 98
couldn’t remember where she lived. I couldn’t find the dress I
wanted, I couldn’t find my earrings. I couldn’t find my stockings
and I couldn’t find my glasses to look for my stockings.” He might
have killed her then had she not found an envelope on which his
name was written clumsily in lead pencil. She put this on the
counter. “I didn’t ask him to write the letter,” she said, “and I have
no idea of what it contains. I suppose I should have shown it to
the counselors, but I knew you would rather I didn’t.”
“Thank you,” said Farragut. He put the letter into his shirt, next to
his skin.
“Aren’t you going to open it?”
“I’ll save it.”
“Well, you’re lucky. So far as I know, it’s the first letter he’s ever
written in his life. So tell me how you are, Zeke. I can’t say that
you look well, but you look all right. You look very much like
yourself. Do you still dream about your blonde? You do, of course;
that I can easily see. Don’t you understand that she never existed,
Zeke, and that she never will? Oh, I can tell by the way you hold
your head that you still dream about that blonde who never
menstruated or shaved her legs or challenged anything you said or
did. I suppose you have boyfriends in here?”
“I’ve had one,” said Farragut, “but I didn’t take it up the ass.
When I die you can put on my headstone: ‘Here lies Ezekiel
Farragut, who never took it up the ass.’ ”
She seemed suddenly touched by this, suddenly she seemed to find
in herself some admiration for him; her smile and her presence
seemed accommodating and soft. “Your hair has turned white,
dear,” she said. “Did you know that? You haven’t been here a year
and yet your hair has turned snow white. It’s very becoming. Well,
I’ll have to go. I’ve left your groceries in the package room.” He
carried the letter until the lights and the television were
extinguished and read, in the glare from the yard, “I love you.”