“Can I trust you?” Jimmy asked her.
“Of course.”
“Do you trust me?”
“Yes. Why wouldn’t I?”
“I’m trying to understand what is meant by trust.”
“I think with trust you don’t ask questions.”
“But that might be naive. How do you know you can trust in someone or something? And how does a person earn trust?”
“You’re full of questions.”
She brought him a peach and a paring knife on a saucer.
“Do I dare to eat a peach?”
“Unless you’d rather not disturb the universe.”
He sat in her reading chair, with the saucer set on the wide arm.
“Wouldn’t just touching this peach be a disturbance of its own?” He held the peach up to the light. “Say there’s another universe that’s identical to ours except for one small detail—this peach. There’s a universe where this peach is not ripe, another one where there is no peach, one where you eat the peach, and one where I eat it. And it’s true for everything right on down to variation at the atomic level. The mind can’t hold this!”
He laid the peach on the saucer and ran his hands through his hair.
“There! That loosened up my brain. Now, where was I? Infinite peaches, infinite universes. And maybe each universe is only a mote—”
“I know—in God’s eye. How many peaches could you fit on the head of a pin?”
“With or without dancing angels?”
“Try it both ways.”
“Infinite. Infinite would be the same number, regardless of peaches or angels. If the angels ate the peaches, would they still count?”
Ann gave Jimmy an affectionate bop on the head.
“Isn’t this the stuff you think of when you’re ten?” she asked. “Don’t tell me this is the nitty-gritty of Nietzsche.”
“Is this a true peach or only an illusion?” he asked. He bit into the peach. “I’m baffled. That old question makes me really uncomfortable.”
“You’re eating the peeling! It’s fuzzy!”
“Its delicate beard delights my lips.” He chomped again. “Oh, I think there’s a worm in it! Is that a worm?”
“Don’t worry, the cut worm forgives the gnashing molars.”
“What about the canines?”
She patted him on the head. “Nice doggie.”
Jimmy had been tantalized by the concept of the multiverse, she remembers. In one alternate universe, she never met him. In another, they strolled easily down an entirely different path towards the sunset. The road not taken could well lead to California.
“YOU’RE WIGGLY,” HE said.
“I can’t keep still. My back is killing me.”
She was thinking about the baby-doll-pajamas photographer and how different this was. Not for money but for art. And private, for Jimmy. She still shuddered whenever she remembered changing in that rooming-house bathroom, stepping forth in high heels and little Dacron shorties with elastic hems, the frilly chemise like a maternity top. It was the pastel colors that seemed so indecent, she thought now.
But she was surprised by how boring it was to stand nude before someone she was intimate with. Sitting fully clothed, Jimmy was being thoughtful, even meditative, as he sketched meticulously, filling in tiny details of her body. She was reminded of her mother examining a bolt of material at a fabric store—feeling its texture, searching for flaws in the weave. Mama would hold out a length of material from her fingertips to her nose. That made a yard. Ann felt Jimmy’s eyes exploring her body, measuring it. He kept saying this or that line of her body was beautiful.
She told Jimmy about the photographer, how she was attracted by the offer of ten dollars an hour and thought she would be fashion modeling.
“He was a creep,” she said.
“Were you in danger?” Jimmy asked, laying down his pad.
“No, I think he was just somebody trying to make money. But so was I. I don’t know why I did that. I jump into things.”
“Sometimes that’s good. I like that in you—mostly.”
Maybe she shouldn’t have blurted out the baby-doll-pajamas incident. But Jimmy did like her impulsiveness, he said.
Jimmy smudged his sketch with a thin piece of charcoal, then lifted his drawing pencil again. He said, “If you knew you were going to die, what book would you want to read first?”
“Ulysses,” she said.
“I’d read War and Peace if there was time.”
“It’s not on the exam,” she said. “Aren’t you going to take it?”
“I won’t have to take it if I’m going to die!” he said. “What a relief! What would you miss most—if you knew you were going to die?”
“I’d miss you. What would you miss?”
“Riding the cable cars.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
She would miss home, of course.
She said, “How could you miss anything before it’s gone? And if you were dead, you wouldn’t miss anything.”
Jimmy said, “The question is how do we value an experience? What is important?” He held his pencil aloft and stared at it, as if it might provide the answer.
She said, “There’s too much that’s important. I can’t hold it all.”
Jimmy worked on his drawing, as if in deep thought. Then, raising his head, he gazed directly at her. “Is Ulysses something you really want to read or something you feel you should read?”
“It’s hard to tell the difference.”
“You can’t go through life on should,” he said. “Sometimes you just have to grab a moment. And sometimes you just have to leave it. Otherwise, you’re only a consumer, taking in everything indiscriminately. Ingest, regurgitate.” Nibbling the end of his pencil, he stared at his drawing and then closed the sketchbook.
She pulled on the long blue plaid shirt he had given her.
SHE LIKED JIMMY’S patience, his dedication to doing something well, but he said he felt most alive when he was roaming around with no particular purpose. Riding the cable cars made him feel receptive, open to possibility. Ann began thinking that she might devalue the wrong things. Cable cars—too many people, too much time, unpleasant sensations. But Jimmy said he liked the sounds and gravity-defying movements of the cars. He liked watching the people. She’d rather read a book than be in any kind of uncomfortable situation.
At the Laundromat, waiting for her clothes, she attempted to sit and watch, leaving her Shelley text in her purse. A woman and a little girl came in, pushing a cartload of laundry. The woman had light brown skin and wore a bandana twisted around her dark, wavy hair. The child began banging on the vending machines. The woman tossed laundry into the washer indifferently, mixing colors and whites. She poured detergent from a box without measuring. She called to the child in Spanish and then sat her down. They sat, side by side, the child swinging her feet against the chair rung. Opening a magazine, the woman fingered a glossy picture and showed it to the child. Ann retrieved her Shelley book and began to read “Ode to the West Wind” for the hundredth time.
SHE WAS AT Jimmy’s place. He had been swimming, and his hair was still wet. Chip was there, unloading some new ideas. He had brought a stock of stiff white textured cloth on a roll like her window shade.