Hellgoing Read Free Page B

the crooks across town — from the Tim Hortons or wherever — Yeah, we hear you; now just stay put .   He hears them too — the desperate man in the street. The door-banging stops all at once. Seconds before the cop car arrives. Feet against pavement, hurrying. Jane breathes relief for him.
    Ned isn’t around. She ditched Ned this evening, for Ned became a downer. She did some work on the piece after the hike, took a shower, and they met at the bar around eight. It was Friday night and she wanted to meet people. She mentioned Ned’s band, how great it would be to see them play, maybe she could plug them in the magazine. Ned responded it wouldn’t be possible — they had recently gotten back from a tour, he said, and none of them could stand to look at each other for weeks after a tour. She later learned by “tour” Ned meant a weekend stint in Cape Breton.
    But publicity, enticed Jane.
    â€œWe’re not really into that sort of thing,” replied Ned.
    She waited for more but he just looked around the bar, scratching, sweat-moons in the armpits of his shirt.
    Jane wanted a Guinness, stood up to get it, but Ned motioned for her to sit, waving a waitress over simultaneously. Jane felt thwarted, her butt was sore from sitting. They were alone at their table, a cramped table for two, crowd roiling on either side of them. Where were all Ned’s friends?
    â€œMy legs are killing me,” he groused.
    â€œWhat?” said Jane. “From the walk?”
    â€œYeah.”
    She picked up one of his cigarettes and pointed at him with it. “You should be doing that sort of thing every day, Ned.”
    He smiled and looked away from her again. Jane felt bored. “Where does all that Guinness enter into your fitness routine?” he asked after a moment.
    Jane stretched. “The whole point of the routine is to be able to drink the Guinness. That’s the whole point of everything, at the end of the day. This is how we orchestrate our lives.”
    â€œYou talk about ‘everything’ a lot,” Ned said.
    â€œBreadth of vision,” replied Jane, thinking of Marconi. “As alcoholics, we have a responsibility to see the big picture. We have to be unflinching. We can’t afford to lie to ourselves about what it is we’re engaged in exactly.”
    Ned looked worried. His eyebrows, already joined, bunched up in the middle.
    â€œI mean we’re engaged in drinking, yes, on the surface.” She leaned forward. “Over-drinking. Self-medication. But we have to be precise about why that is, don’t you think? If we’re going to withdraw from the world, we’d better have damn good reasons why — if, if you accept that’s what it is we’re doing. We’d better be able to rhyme off those reasons if called upon to do so. If people accuse us of being afraid, we can explain that fear is a perfectly reasonable response to the world in which we live. The trick is, we can’t be afraid of being afraid. We can’t cower behind locked doors with our gin bottles and our arms across our eyes, if you know what I mean.”
    Jane waited for Ned to say something and stop looking worried. She added, “I think about this stuff a lot,” almost by way of apology. “I’m thinking of writing a book or doing a blog or something.”
    â€œWho would wanna read a book like that?” Ned asked in a naked sort of way.
    â€œYou know, Ned,” said Jane, stretching again. “I think I’ll get going.”
    He nodded, pinched his eyebrows together some more, and stood up to walk her to the hotel. Jane waved him back down. Had to use both hands, stand there pushing air for five minutes at least.
    â€œI THOUGHT,” HE says, “you’d like to see an iceberg.”
    She sits up, adrift in the king-size bed, says nothing, then forces a yawn into the receiver just to let him know it’s kind of early to