“Well, here it comes,” she said. “Stop me when you can’t stand it any more. I know that you expected me to come back. You did not feel I had the courage to carry out my scheme. I still expect to work it out. But not yet. I am more than ever convinced that my salvation lies in solitude, and coming back to the garage before I have even reached Massachusetts would be a major defeat for me, as I’m sure you must realize, even though you pretend not to know what I’m talking about most of the time. I am convinced that you do know what I’m talking about and if you pretend ignorance of my dilemma so you can increase efficiency at the garage you are going to defeat yourself. I can’t actually save you, but I can point little things out to you constantly. I refer to your soul, naturally, and not to any success you’ve had or to your determination. In any case it came to me on the bus that it was not time for me to leave you, and that although going to Massachusetts required more courage and strength than I seemed able to muster, I was at the same time being very selfish in going. Selfish because I was thinking in terms of my salvation and not yours. I’m glad I thought of this. It is why I stopped crying and got off the bus. Naturally you would disapprove, because I had paid for my ticket which is now wasted, if for no other reason. That’s the kind of thing you like me to think about, isn’t it? It makes you feel that I’m more human. I have never admired being human, I must say. I want to be like God. But I haven’t begun yet. First I have to go to Massachusetts and be alone. But I got off the bus. And I’ve wasted the fare. I can hear you stressing that above all else, as I say. But I want you to understand that it was not cowardice alone that stopped me from going to Massachusetts. I don’t feel that I can allow you to sink into the mire of contentment and happy ambitious enterprise. It is my duty to prevent you from it as much as I do for myself. It is not fair of me to go away until you completely understand how I feel about God and my destiny. Surely we have been brought together for some purpose, even if that purpose ends by our being separate again. But not until the time is ripe. Naturally, the psychiatrists would at once declare that I was laboring under a compulsion. I am violently against psychiatry, and, in fact, against happiness. Though of course I love it. I love happiness, I mean. Of course you would not believe this. Naturally darling I love you, and I’m afraid that if you don’t start suffering soon God will take some terrible vengeance. It is better for you to offer yourself. Don’t accept social or financial security as your final aim. Or fame in the garage. Fame is unworthy of you; that is, the desire for it. Janet, my beloved, I do not expect you to be gloomy or fanatical as I am. I do not believe that God intended you for quite as harrowing a destiny as He did for me. I don’t mean this as an insult. I believe you should actually thank your stars. I would really like to be fulfilling humble daily chores myself and listening to a concert at night or television or playing a card game. But I can find no rest, and I don’t think you should either. At least not until you have fully understood my dilemma on earth. That means that you must no longer turn a deaf ear to me and pretend that your preoccupation with the garage is in a sense a holier absorption than trying to understand and fully realize the importance and meaning of my dilemma. I think that you hear more than you admit, too. There is a stubborn streak in your nature working against you, most likely unknown to yourself. An insistence on being shallow rather than profound. I repeat: I do not expect you to be as profound as I am. But to insist on exploiting the most shallow side of one’s nature, out of stubbornness and merely because it is more pleasant to be shallow, is certainly a sin. Sis McEvoy will help you to express the shallow side of your nature, by the way. Like a toboggan slide.”
Janet stopped abruptly, appalled at having read this last part aloud. She had not expected Bozoe to mention Sis at all. “Gee,” she said. “Gosh! She’s messing everything up together. I’m awfully sorry.”
Sis McEvoy stood up and walked unsteadily to the television set. Some of her drink slopped onto the rug as she went. She faced Janet with fierce eyes. “There’s nobody in the world who can talk to me like that, and there’s not going to be. Never!” She was leaning on the set and steadying herself against it with both hands. “I’ll keep on building double-decker sandwiches all my life first. It’s five flights to the top of the building where I live. It’s an insurance building, life insurance, and I’m the only woman who lives there. I have boy friends come when they want to. I don’t have to worry, either. I’m crooked so I don’t have to bother with abortions or any other kind of mess. The hell with television anyway.”
She likes the set, Janet said to herself. She felt more secure. “Bozoe and I don’t have the same opinions at all,” she said. “We don’t agree on anything.”
“Who cares? You live in the same apartment, don’t you? You’ve lived in the same apartment for ten years. Isn’t that all anybody’s got to know?” She rapped with her fist on the wood panelling of the television set. “Whose is it, anyhow?” She was growing increasingly aggressive.
“It’s mine,” Janet said. “It’s my television set.” She spoke loud so that Sis would be sure to catch her words.
“What the hell do I care?” cried Sis. “I live on top of a life-insurance building and I work in a combination soda-fountain lunch-room. Now read me the rest of the letter.”
“I don’t think you really want to hear any more of Bozoe’s nonsense,” Janet said smoothly. “She’s spoiling our evening together. There’s no reason for us to put up with it all. Why should we? Why don’t I make something to eat? Not a sandwich. You must be sick of sandwiches.”
“What I eat is my own business,” Sis snapped.
“Naturally,” said Janet. “I thought you might like something hot like bacon and eggs. Nice crisp bacon and eggs.” She hoped to persuade her so that she might forget about the letter.
“I don’t like food,” said Sis. “I don’t even like millionaires’ food, so don’t waste your time.”
“I’m a small eater myself.” She had to put off reading Bozoe’s letter until Sis had forgotten about it. “My work at the garage requires some sustenance, of course. But it’s brainwork now more than manual labor. Being a manager’s hard on the brain.”
Sis looked at Janet and said: “Your brain doesn’t impress me. Or that garage. I like newspaper men. Men who are champions. Like champion boxers. I’ve known lots of champions. They take to me. Champions all fall for me, but I’d never want any of them to find out that I knew someone like your Bozoe. They’d lose their respect.”
“I wouldn’t introduce Bozoe to a boxer either, or anybody else who was interested in sports. I know they’d be bored. I know.” She waited. “You’re very nice. Very intelligent. You know people. That’s an asset.”
“Stay with Bozoe and her television set,” Sis growled.
“It’s not her television set. It’s mine, Sis. Why don’t you sit down? Sit on the couch over there.”
“The apartment belongs to both of you, and so does the set. I know what kind of a couple you are. The whole world knows it. I could put you in jail if I wanted to. I could put you and Bozoe both in jail.”
In spite of these words she stumbled over to the couch and sat down. “Whiskey,” she demanded. “The world loves drunks but it despises perverts. Athletes and boxers drink when they’re not in training. All the time.”
Janet went over to her and served her a glass of whiskey with very little ice. Let’s hope she’ll pass out, she said to herself. She couldn’t see Sis managing the steps up to her room in the insurance building, and in any case she didn’t want her to leave. She’s such a relief after Bozoe, she thought. Alive and full of fighting spirit. She’s much more my type, coming down to facts. She thought it unwise to go near Sis, and was careful to pour the fresh drink quickly and return to her own seat. She would have preferred to sit next to Sis, in spite of her mention of jail, but she did not relish being punched or smacked in the face. It’s all Bozoe’s fault, she said to herself. That’s what she gets for thinking she’s God. Her holy words can fill a happy peaceful room with poison from twenty-five miles away.