Erasure Read Online Free

without literary talent, which was both irritating and, in a weird way, refreshing. Linda had published one volume of predictably strange and stereotypically
innovative
short fictions (as she liked to call them). She’d fallen into a circle of
innovative
writers who had survived the sixties by publishing each others’ stories in their periodicals and each others’ books collectively, thus amassing publications, so achieving tenure at their various universities, and establishing a semblance of credibility in the so-called real world. Sadly, these people made up a good portion of the membership of the
Nouveau Roman
Society. They all hated me. For a couple of reasons: One was that I had published and had moderate success with a realistic novel some years earlier, and two, I made no secret, in print or radio interviews, what I thought of their work. Finally, however, I was hated because the French, whom they so adored, seemed to hold my work in high regard. To me, a mere strange footnote to my obscure and very quiet literary career. To them, a slap in the face perhaps.

    Linda was already in the bar when I arrived. She wrapped me up in a hug and I remembered how much like a bicycle she had felt in bed.
    “So,” she said, in that way people use the word to introduce beating around the bush. “We had to come three thousand miles to see each other when we live in the same state.”
    “Funny how things work out.”
    We sat and I ordered a scotch. Linda asked for another Gibson. She played with the onion in her glass, stabbing it with the red plastic sword.
    “Are you on the program?” I asked. I hadn’t seen her name, but then I hadn’t looked.
    “I’m on a panel with Davis Gimbel, Willis Lloyd and Lewis Rosenthal.”
    “What’s the panel?” I asked.
    “‘The Place of Burroughs in American Fiction.’”
    I groaned. “Sounds pleasant enough.”
    “I saw the title of your paper. I don’t get it.” She ate the onion off her sword just as our drinks arrived. “What’s it about?”
    “You’ll hear it. I’m sick of the damn thing. It’s not going to make me any friends, I’ll tell you that.” I looked around the bar and saw no familiar faces. “I can just feel the creepiness here.”
    “Why did you come then?” she complained.
    “Because this way my trip is paid for.” I swallowed some scotch and was sorry I hadn’t requested a water back. “I’d rather admit to that than say I came here because I care about the proceedings of the NRS.”
    “You have a point.” Linda ate her second onion. “Would you like to go up to my room?”
    “Smooth,” I said. “What if we don’t have sex and say we did?” After an awkward spell, I said, “So, how’s Berkeley?”
    “It’s fine. I’m up for tenure this year.”
    “How does it look?” I asked, knowing full well it couldn’t look good for her.
    “Your family’s here,” she said.
    “My mother and sister.” I finished my scotch and became painfully aware that I had nothing to say to Linda. I didn’t know enough about her personal life to ask questions and I didn’t want to bring up her recent breakup, so I stared into my glass.
    The waitress came over and asked if I wanted another drink. I said no and gave her enough for the two Gibsons and my scotch. Linda watched my hands.
    “I’d better get some rest,” I said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
    “Probably.”

The center of the tree is the heartwood. It does little to feed the tree, but it is the structural support. The sapwood, which feeds everything, is weak and prone to fungi and insect damage. The two look the same. But you want the heartwood. You always want the heartwood.

    I grabbed breakfast alone in the cozy hotel dining room and then walked down Connecticut Avenue to the Mayflower. It was a chilly, gray morning and that shaded my mood, but also I simply felt lost, failing to understand why I had made the trip at all. I of course didn’t care about the meeting and I had already