Trauma Read Free Page A

And a man …
needs
that kind of reassurance, baby. Needs that kind of respect. And what happens to me? I’ll tell you what happens to me. I lose my job to some wetback. And then my wife—my dear devoted wife of seventeen years, mybaby, my queen—what does she do? She rubs … she rubs salt in the wound, man. That’s what she does.
Salt
. Not only does she cut off my nuts, she serves them up for dinner and calls them
cojones.
”
    He clenched his fist and began to pound the pillow. Spit was flying from his mouth, and Bonnie pulled up the sheet to protect her face. She wasn’t frightened. She just wanted him to stop shouting and let her get some sleep.
    â€œMexican chicken, for Christ’s sake! Mexican chicken! I mean, like, twist the knife or what? Don’t you think I feel—
nothing
enough already?”
    Bonnie turned over and put her arm around him. “Duke, you’re drunk. Try to get some sleep.”
    â€œYou think I’m drunk? I’m not even half drunk. I’m—I’m—
injured
.”
    Bonnie stroked the back of his neck. “Injured,” he told the pillow, with even greater vehemence. “I’m injured.”
    In the dark, Bonnie could still picture what he looked like when they first dated. Thin, almost effeminate, with a high black pompadour and such a cool way of walking and talking. He was funny, he was sharp, he was always’ the center of attention. He could blow twenty smoke rings, one after another. His friends always called him The Dook and mock-bowed whenever they met him. But even The Dook grew older and left school and had to find work; and that was when The Dook discovered that being able to blow smoke rings was no substitute for having vocational qualifications. The best job that he could find was rewiring automobiles—and then, when heasked for a fifty-cent raise, the company sacked him and brought in a Mexican electrician instead, for two dollars an hour less.
    He raised his head. In the dim light from the bedside alarm clock, his face was glistening with tears. “You’re not going to leave me, are you, Bonnie? You still love me, don’t you?”
    â€œWill you hush up and get some sleep? I have to be up by six.”
    â€œYou don’t have anybody else, do you, Bonnie? I’ve seen the way that Ralph Kosherick looks at you. Like his eyes are bulging out and his goddamned tongue’s dragging on the rug. You wouldn’t screw Ralph Kosherick, would you, Bonnie? Tell me you wouldn’t screw Ralph Kosherick!”
    â€œFor Christ’s sake, Duke, will you stop?”
    She closed her eyes and tried to think about something else. Every time Duke got drunk, he raged about Ralph, and the truth was that Ralph was smart and presentable and even attractive in a rather too brotherly kind of way, but there must have been something that Duke saw in Ralph that represented everything he hated to the point of incandescence. Education, and middle-class values, and pants that only just skimmed the tops of his shoes.
    â€œI’m telling you, Bonnie. I could take Ralph Kosherick by the neck and I could physically strangle him, I promise you.”
    â€œDuke, you’re drunk.”
    He sat up like a Polaris missile going off. “
Drunk
?” he roared. “
Drunk
?” He grabbed the pillows and threw them across the room. “I’m your husband and I’m trying to tell you how much I hurt inside, and I’m
drunk
? Well,
excuse
me! Maybe I should just forget about trying to talk to you and do what Ralph Kosherick does to you!”
    â€œDuke, sweetheart, will you please just stop shouting? I have to get up early tomorrow and Ray has school.”
    â€œWho
gives
a shit?” Duke screamed at her. “I don’t have to get up for anything! I could lie in bed all day and it wouldn’t make any difference!”
    â€œDuke—”
    Without warning, he dragged back the