The Cave Painter & The Woodcutter Read Online Free

if he hadn’t fallen in love with…
    I mean Elaine, Elaine is so…
    She’s…
    Well, on one level, I suppose, she’s goodness itself, she’s…
    You know, I say that but I can’t think of a single, fucking, good thin—
    (
thinks of one
) She has a very lovely figure. She has beautiful arms. And she’d be attractive if she…
    She wears these…
    Her hair is…
    Oh, she’s just so… (
bundles up and throws the kaftan away
) that.
    She reads the Bible every day. She reads it from start to finish every year, starting on New Year’s, and she has been doing this since she was thirteen. When she found out my birthday she said, “Oh, Lamentations, Chapter Three.” And does she even think about the fact that she’s reading something that’s been translated from Hebrew and Greek? No. She’s one of those “if English was good enough for Jesus it’s good enough for me” people.
    She does have one hobby that isn’t totally Christian. She collects cookbooks, but only to look at; she never uses them to cook, because she’s suspicious of anything new. She makes the same dreary meals her mother cooked. They’re all like, “If shepherd’s pie was good enough for Jesus, it’s good enough for me.”
    She has all the self-awareness of my left tit!
    She never seems to have any fun. Never even been tipsy in her life—not an ounce of liquor to be found at the wedding anywhere. Except in my sister’s purse. That wedding. Oh, that terrifying wedding.
    At the end of that very long day, with a half-dozen bridesmaids all done up like hooker starlets, and blank beefy boys in rented tuxes, and a cake the size of a temple, when Ryan and Elaine left in a white stretch limo, we were exhausted by the sheer waste and tackiness of it all. The moment we got back at the hotel, Mom goes, “Oh, Pete, please, break out the booze for the love of God!”
    I understood it when Ryan told me that he wanted stability. He wanted a steady income. He wanted to be part of a big family. I do understand that it hasn’t been easy being my son.
    â€œI want to be normal !”
    (
rants
) Nobody’s fucking normal ! Some people are just uninteresting! Some people are just dull because they think that shepherd’s pie was good enough for Jesus!
    I knew it would be a traditional wedding but I asked if there could be a time, a place, maybe not during the service, but afterwards, the reception maybe, where I could mention Simon’s name, where I could talk a bit about Ryan’s family.
    I just wanted to say, “Ryan’s father was the most interesting person in the room, and the smartest, and the liveliest. Simon was crazy over our son, and we had such fun, the three of us.”
    I wanted to say…
    The lighting slowly becomes romantic, pink and soft.
    Oh, Simon!
    My God but you were fun.
    How can you not love a man who loved dressing up?
    Never looked so butch before or after that Halloween. Wool skirt and blouse, sleeveless wool vest. Hair cut so short. “You look like George C. Scott in drag,” I said, and he said, “I’m supposed to! I’m Gertrude Stein!”
    I’d gone the whole route with gum arabic and tweezers and hair I’d cut from my bangs and had a dark little Alice B. Toklas moustache.
    We were so silly all night. I carried both our purses, like the photo by Carl Van Vechten.
    And we kept running into people who didn’t know who Gertrude and Alice were, and that seemed so funny.
    â€œTell’m who I am, Alice,” he’d roar.
    And I’d go, “Miss Stein is America’s greatest living writer.” I’d go, “Gertrude Stein is a genius!”
    We kept quoting them both all night—God, they cracked us up!
    â€œWhat is the use of being a little boy if you grow up to be a man?”
    â€œGertrude has said things tonight it will take her ten years to