DOUG WESTENDORP - STILL LIFE

Doug Westendorp, at sixty-five years of age, is a retired professor of visual art. He lives and works in Minneapolis, Minnesota with his wife of forty-five years, and blessedly close to their three children, two sons-in-law, and four granddaughters. More of his life and work can be seen at dougwestendorp.com. 

STILL LIFE 
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1. TRANSCRIPT

 
Um. OK. My name is Bill Sanders. I am the caretaker/manager of a small hotel up on Forth Street, downtown, the Third Arm Hotel. Strange name for a hotel in my opinion, but it’s been there a long time and no one knows who named it anymore or why. I sure don’t know anyway, and I’m not thinking about it anymore.
 
I probably think too much. But most days it’s just the two of us who work there, you know, Maria and myself, and Maria doesn’t speak much English. I see all the comings and goings in the building on account of I live on the premises, in a little room just behind the office. Some of the things I see, if I told you about them, you probably wouldn’t believe me. Other things would probably make you sick. Mostly though, it’s just pretty boring. One day follows the next and that’s about it. I just try to keep an eye on things as best I can, and sometimes I think about what’s going on.
 
So I’ve been thinking about this woman who stayed there for a little while last winter. That’s her, I think, on all the missing person posters. Good looking woman, young, thirty years old, tops. Different from the usual guest. She stayed for about a week, I think, but I never saw anyone with her, never heard her say much, quiet like. If Maria hadn’t found these papers in her room the day she left maybe I wouldn’t even remember her at all anymore. Who knows? I couldn’t even swear that these were hers, you know? Maria didn’t say. But who else around there would’ve written them? Like I said, she was different from our usual clientele.
 
But you’re going to want to know how I happen to have these. Well, it’s like this, Maria is the maid, and she cleans out the rooms, of course, whenever anyone leaves. Puts everything in a garbage bag or two and sets it by the back door. But she doesn’t take them to the dumpster. For some reason, that’s my job. The outdoor stuff, I guess. I’m the one who takes them out to the alley and tosses them. That’s how we work it, and there isn’t any discussion about it. It’s the same routine every day.
 
But one day last winter, when I came to pick up the bag by the door, what do I find but Maria standing there next to it, and she’s got these papers in her hand that she’s looking at. What do you have there, Maria, I say. “¿Qué pasa?” That’s about all the Spanish I know. So I say qué pasa to her quite often. What’s up, you know? And she says she found these. At least that’s what I think she says, and she shows them to me. I kind of look at them and they don’t mean a thing to me, of course, so I look back at her and she says, “throw?” and makes like they should be in the garbage. And then I understand that she found them in somebody’s room, but didn’t know if she should really toss them out. They were all in a nice bundle and everything, so I suppose it made her wonder. It’s not as if she could read them or anything. They’re in English.
 
I shrugged my shoulders. I don’t know, I said. What are they? “No se,” she says, and hands them to me. She doesn’t know either. So I figure what the hell, and I take them in one hand and the trash bag in the other and head out the door. I don’t see any reason not to toss them, but, in the end, I don’t throw them away. I don’t know why, exactly. I didn’t know what the hell I had in my hand any more than Maria did, but it didn’t seem like trash to me either, I guess. So I took the little bundle back in and put it down somewhere, and that night I got to reading it all. It was some kind of journal, I guess, you’d say, written all tiny in pencil on notebook paper. I stuck it on a shelf under the desk in case she came back for it, and just pulled it out again this morning after I saw her picture on TV. I couldn’t swear to it, but I’m pretty sure it’s her. Anyway, here it is.
 

1. JOURNAL

 
TUESDAY, I THINK
 
I’m tired. And it hurts to breathe. I don’t even care to sit up, if you want to know the truth, but I had to get up and go downstairs to the pay phone and call in to work. I was supposed to work today, but I told them I was sick and wouldn’t be in all week. They didn’t sound happy, but honestly I’m in no shape to go in. Then I called Annette, just to let her know I’m ok. I mean, I’m not dead anyway, right? I didn’t tell her where I am though, just in case Rob calls her and gives her any grief. That’s why I didn’t go to her house in the first place. He would track me down there in no time, you can count on it.
 
And now I found some paper in the desk drawer, along with this pencil, so I’m going to try to write a couple of things down. It’s something to do, right? And maybe I can sort some things out that way, try to make a little sense of this stupid screwed up life of mine. I don’t know. Maybe not either. I mean, where would I start? There’s not really much to talk about these days. After all, if it’s really Tuesday, that means I’ve been here two whole days already and I haven’t done anything but sleep. God, I must have been tired. But I think I should try to think about stuff. I can’t sleep forever. It’ll be good for me, right?
 
I don’t really want to think about anything yet though, to tell you the truth.  I just want to sit here. God, I’m tired. And sore. I think he must have broken a couple of ribs this time.
 
WEDNESDAY
 
OK. I’m up. I don’t know what time it is but I’m awake anyway, so I’m going to try again to write something down.
 
It’s really quiet here. I love the silence of this room. That’s weird, isn’t it? I mean, what with everything that’s been going on, I would think that, coming to a room with no radio and no TV and no one to talk to, that it would be driving me crazy. Like I’d be sitting around and worrying all day. But it hasn’t been that way at all. I mean, mostly I’ve been sleeping and feeling pretty lousy, it’s true, but I’m not thinking about anything too much, really. I’ve been soaking up this silence – almost like it’s a protection of some sort.
 
If I listen I can hear some sounds around the hotel. Voices, a TV or radio somewhere. But it’s all way in the distance. Someone else’s room, someone else’s world. In this room it’s about as quiet as a tomb. And the quiet has become a part of me somehow. It’s inside me. Does this make sense? I don’t know. But when I think about it now I think maybe I brought this quietness, this calm, with me. In fact, I think I can tell you exactly when it began, to the moment.
 
It sounds funny, I know, but it was when he hit me that last time that everything changed. You see, I knew it was coming. As sure as I live and breathe, I knew his fist would be finding me. I could almost see it before it happened. I tried to pull away, of course, even though I knew I couldn’t avoid it. I knew as I watched it come toward me – I can still see it now, like a slow motion train – that it would land right where he wanted it to, where no one but me would see the bruises. And I knew it would hurt as much as it did. But the funny thing is, I also knew – right then during that brief moment of struggle – that this would be the last time.
 
I kind of quit struggling then and this peace just came over me. Or some kind of calmness anyway. I just knew we were done. Finished. I knew I could just walk away – and I did. I just turned and grabbed my purse and my coat, pulled on my boots and walked out the door, real calm and steady like. I kind of wish now that I could have grabbed a couple of more things, packed a bag at least or something, but then he would have known that I wasn’t coming back – in which case he probably would have killed me. But the whole time I’m pulling on my boots (which wasn’t too easy with the way my ribs were feeling) he’s still yelling at me, saying, Don’t you dare walk out that door, and, If you leave now don’t expect to ever come back. – Ha! That’s pretty funny when I think about it now. Pretty rich, isn’t it? I mean, what kind of threat is that? But he wasn’t making any kind of sense. He was hollering a lot of other bullshit too, calling me names. He might have even said something about how he still loves me, all in the same breath with his insults, if you can believe that. That’s even funnier isn’t it? Or sadder, I suppose.
 
God. I don’t know. I wasn’t really listening even, you know? And I sure wasn’t saying anything back to him. But I knew, and maybe he did too, that he had gone too far this time, that I was already gone in a way. He couldn’t reach me, couldn’t hurt me ever again. And now I’m here and everything is changed. At least I think it is. I hope it is.
 
Everything even looks different today – more real or something. Why is that? Why, for instance, is the red of that old battered door somehow redder than it would have been last week? And how is it that that crusty old sink over there in the corner looks so beautiful to me? Ha! I know that, by any ordinary standard, that it is not at all beautiful. Anyone can see it’s just a mess, all chipped and stained, and the pipes are all sticking out underneath, all nasty and old looking. But I love it. In this silence it’s somehow just right, like it should be exactly there, just the way it is.
 
Maybe it’s because this is where I know I need to be. I need this quiet. It almost feels safe. I just need a little more sleep now.
 
THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT
 
I just had the craziest dream. I woke up crying. The first tears I’ve shed in I don’t know how long. (I never cried when he hit me, dammit. Never.) He was in the dream though, Rob. That’s a good name for him, I think, now that I look at it there on the paper. Rob. He stole so much from me. All my happiness, for one thing. Now he’s stealing my dreams. It pisses me off to think about it. But it seemed perfectly normal in my sleep, as if I had never left him. He was there on that nasty old couch of his with two of his buddies, drinking their beer and watching TV. But somehow they weren’t really looking at it. I mean, they were staring straight ahead at the spot where the TV is, and they had that spooky glazed-over look in their eyes that you’d expect, only there was nothing there. It was weird. No TV. I found myself wishing it was back where it belongs, even if all it had on was a stupid football game or something. But the guys didn’t even seem to notice. They just sat there like zombies, passing a bag of chips or something back and forth, staring at nothing.
 
And then I noticed that they were too staring at something. They were staring at me. That is, they were still staring at the place where the TV is suppose to be, but I was there now in that spot. It was the creepiest thing. Because they didn’t seem to see me at all. It was like they still had that blank look on all their faces. I thought I was going to scream. I didn’t though. I started to cry instead. It must have been the tears that woke me up. But it’s funny, it felt good to be crying. I didn’t even stop when I woke up. I just lay there for a while on my back, not moving, even when I felt the tears run down off my face and into my ears.
 
I don’t know what time it is now, but it’s still dark and I don’t feel like going back to sleep. I’ve stopped crying and I’m sitting by the window. It’s snowing outside and I’m just looking out at the big white snowflakes float down into the city lights. I’m up here on the fifth floor of an old hotel and I can really see quite a lot from this window. Mostly all I’m looking at though is the snow. It all looks so orderly, as if each snowflake has a private purpose, a personal destination. Like they know just where to go to, just where they belong down there.
 
I wonder if the snow is what makes it so quiet. – Or if the silence is what makes the snow look so white.
 
TH. PM
 
I must have slept until around noon. I would’ve slept longer I think if I wasn’t so hungry. My stomach woke me up. I haven’t had a meal since I came here. What is that, three days? Or four? It seems like ten. But I’ve just been holed up here in this room and I really haven’t felt much like eating so far. Anyway, I got up and looked in the little mirror over the sink for the first time since I got here. I couldn’t see much, but what I saw looked like hell. I hadn’t washed, or even brushed, my hair since some time Sunday. God, what a mess. But there wasn’t much I could do about it. I hadn’t taken anything when I left – not even my toothbrush. So I just wrapped myself up in my coat and stuck my hair up under the hood and headed down the stairs and out into the snow to see if I could find something cheap to eat.
 
Fortunately I didn’t have far to go. There was a little place just about a block and a half down the street where I think I managed to blend in OK with the décor, and it looked like the food might be decent. The man behind the counter said they usually stop serving breakfast at noon but that today he would make an exception. I don’t know why. I suppose he was just being nice. I kind of wished he hadn’t gone to all that trouble though once he brought it to me, because I couldn’t hardly eat much of it. I just felt full almost right away. But he was nice about that too when I apologized, and I gave him a good tip. Which was stupid of me, of course, I know, because I don’t have that much money. Only what I had in my purse when I ran out the door. Fortunately I had just gotten paid on Saturday so I had a little money, and he was the first person to do anything nice for me in a long time. I felt bad for not eating his food.
 
It was snowing again when I came out of the diner, and the wind had picked up a little bit. It was cold. Still, I didn’t feel much like heading back to my room already. And anyway, I thought I could maybe find a drugstore or something where I could at least pick up a hairbrush and soap and a few things like that. So I set out down the street. I must not have realized how weak I was though. I didn’t get too far before I decided to turn back.
 
It was probably a good thing I did too. I almost didn’t even make it as it was. Coming around a corner, the wind suddenly took my breath away and nearly knocked me over. Maybe I’m being overly dramatic, I don’t know, but I was pretty tired and my ribs hurt. So I kind of fluttered like a lost sparrow, I thought, into the corner shop, relieved to be out of the wind and in a warm place. It smelled like perfume in there. I looked around and saw I was in a flower shop. It was a beautiful place – flowers everywhere you looked. I spent as long as I dared, looking at everything and getting warm, but finally I thought I’d better buy something. She had such a nice little shop and I was the only person in there. So I picked out the cheapest flowers I saw, some red and pink ones, along with a little blue plastic vase to put them in. I know I probably shouldn’t have spent the money. I know what Rob would say – just more money out the window. But I didn’t want to just walk out of there without buying anything. And anyway, he’s not here, and I thought they would look nice in my room. My room.
 
I am sitting here now at this little desk between the bed and the window and I am struck by how there’s just one of everything here. One desk with one little chair, just my size. One sink with a mirror, one shelf in a small closet with one hanger, one lamp on the desk, a single bed, and a tall south-facing window. I think one is my new favorite number. I am one person sitting here looking at one bouquet of red and pink flowers in a pretty little blue vase.
 
I study my purchase now for the first time. It would make a good still life subject for a painter, I think. There are eight blossoms on the three stems I bought, with four buds that might still bloom. They are wonderfully light and airy looking, yet they stand up so straight and tall out of their little vase, like they are confident of their own beauty. And they should, you know? They should. They are beautiful. The blossoms are a deep red color that fades to pink, with just a touch of yellow edging to them. These colors, supported and framed by the green of the stems and leaves, look almost perfect with the delicate blue of their vase. After a while I stop feeling guilty for spending so much money on them. They weren’t that expensive, and anyway they dress up the room.
 
Sitting here writing now my ribs hurt more than ever. I’ve had a big day, even though I’ve only been up and around for a few hours. For the first time since coming here I take off the clothes I’ve been living in all week and climb back into the warm womb of my bed, naked as the day I was born. I feel safe now, it seems, for the first time in years.
 
LATE (DARK)
 
I don’t know what day it is anymore, much less what time it is. I know when I woke up this morning the sun was coming in my window. My ribs hurt so bad I could hardly get out of bed, but I made myself get up. I wanted to see the sun on the snow, for one thing. I also wanted to try once more to eat something and see again if I could find a place where I can pick up a few things I need. I made it over to the window and sat down in the sunlight on the carpet. (The narrow window comes almost to the floor.) I put my coat down under me and just looked outside for a long time. The sun was warm and it felt good on my skin. Looking out over the city, I thought I’d never seen it all so white and clean looking. It must have snowed all night. After awhile I began to feel something like real energy in me for the first time all week and I was eager to get outside. I couldn’t see anything moving anywhere down there, but I figured I could probably make it through the snow to the diner anyway.
 
By the time I pulled on my clothes and eased myself down the stairs, I was already exhausted, and there was a lot of snow everywhere. I didn’t feel much like fighting my way through it, but I caught my breath and climbed over a snow bank out to the street where they had plowed a little bit. It wasn’t too bad walking there and no cars at all, hardly. It was pretty eerie, to tell you the truth. I started to wonder if anything would be open.
 
Well, the diner was open, but the funny thing was, once I made it through all the snow and everything I didn’t feel much like going inside. I kind of stopped in front of the door and stood there for a minute, just holding my ribs and wondering what I should do. But I was cold and I knew I had to eat something, plus I didn’t know any other place to go, so I finally went in.
 
I was immediately sorry I did though. As soon as I smelled the cooking food I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat anything. In fact I thought I might be sick. There were just about two customers, two guys, sitting alone in there, plus a guy in an apron standing behind the counter with his back to me, and the customers were staring at me like I was trespassing or something. I never know how to deal with stuff like that. Even when I was a little kid and I had to walk into a room full of people, like a classroom for instance, it always made me pretty nervous. I didn’t feel like sitting down so I just said the first thing that popped into my head: I asked if there was a payphone I could use. The guys both pointed to the hallway that led back to the bathrooms, so I headed back there. I started feeling around in my coat pocket like I was looking for change, but I didn’t really want to use the phone, of course. Who the hell was I going to call? So what I did was, I kept walking right past the phone and straight out the back door. Stupid, I know, because there was no place to go out there, but I just felt rotten.
 
The door opened onto a small stoop above a narrow little alley. The snow covered just about everything, but there was a little cleared space for the door to swing open, so I stepped outside. I could see I probably couldn’t even get down the alley, the snow was so deep, so I just stood there with no idea in the world what to do next. I had come to a dead end. I felt like hell, kind of dizzy all of a sudden. Plus I was sick to my stomach and shivering, and my side hurt worse than ever. I was praying I wouldn’t throw up because I didn’t think my ribs could take it. I just stood there thinking about everything. I was even beginning to think about going back to my old life. God. All my calmness and certainty about being at this hotel were gone. All that stuff I wrote about the silence and everything and the safety of my little room. Ha! I thought, what a load of crap. What did I think, that I could stay there forever? That’s not the real world. The real world is back with the man who hits me. It was pretty much a low point, to tell you the truth. Part of me wanted to just climb down from that step and sink under the snow and go to sleep until someone shoveled out my body next spring.
 
I wouldn’t have been surprised to find myself doing something really stupid about then if the door hadn’t suddenly opened behind me. There wasn’t much room out there, what with the snow and everything, so I was forced to kind of move to one side and face whoever it was that was coming out. It seemed like a sad, comical little dance, and right away I started apologizing, but he smiled and said it was ok. It was the guy with the apron from behind the counter. Face to face with him like that I suddenly realized he was the man who made my late breakfast the other day, the one I didn’t eat. I felt like an idiot for not recognizing him before now. He was an older guy with short gray hair and kind of a meaty looking face. He reminded me a little of my dad, God rest his soul. He looked kind, and he didn’t ask me what the hell I thought I was doing or tell me to get off his damn stoop, like I thought he might do. I even flinched a little bit, I think, when the door opened, half expecting him to hit me. But when he let the door go closed behind him and looked at me from about two feet away I kind of had a sort of vision or something. I mean, I can’t really explain it, because I know Jesus has a beard and everything, but the thing is, just at that moment he kind of looked like Jesus to me. It’s weird, I know, especially since I’m not the most religious person in the world, but that’s what I thought. Just for a minute there I thought he was Jesus.
 
Then, when he asked me how I was doing, in this sweet gentle voice, I just burst into tears. I mean I really started to cry hard. I couldn’t stop either. It seemed like everything from the last week – the last year, maybe – was pouring uncontrollably out of me. All the pain and the grief and the anger, all the hatred and guilt and the fear – all of it seemed to come gushing out of me right there on the back step of that old diner. In fact, I can’t really explain why, but I kind of threw my arms around him then and started crying even harder. That poor man. I couldn’t have answered his question to save my life – “how am I?” Ha! God knows – I just cried all the harder. But he didn’t seem to mind. He put his arm around me and patted my shoulder in a comforting kind of way until I could calm down a little bit. Which I finally did, thank God.
 
It took awhile though, I have to admit it. I didn’t stop completely until I was sitting in a booth back inside the diner and he was putting a big plate of bacon and eggs and toast down on the table in front of me and telling me it was going to be alright. I’m sure I looked pretty horrible because he was looking at me in this really worried sort of way, in spite of everything he was saying. Of course I know I must have looked awful. I still had my hood on to hide my horrible hair and my face must have been a blotchy wreck, but to tell the truth I didn’t much care at that point. I just felt better. I was listening to him telling me I was going to be alright, and believing him. It sounded true.
 
I felt shaky as hell, and I was having trouble getting my breath, but I was warming up, and for some reason I didn’t feel too sick anymore. So when he put the food down in front of me just then it really looked pretty good for a change. He had even remembered how I liked my eggs. I didn’t have any trouble clearing my plate. It all tasted so good all of a sudden.
 
But then, when I was all through eating and just savoring my coffee a little bit he slid into the booth across from me. We were the only two in there by now, I think. I right away started thanking him and apologizing for breaking down on his shoulder, but he wouldn’t hear of it. He said he was glad to help. He really was a nice guy. Then he asked if I felt better and was there anything else he could do for me, and I almost started crying again. I said, No, no, you’ve done enough already. – And then, for no earthly reason I can think of, I just started getting really nervous. I suddenly had the urge to just get the hell out of there, like right away. What the hell is wrong with me? I swear I’m losing my mind. I just got pretty scared all of a sudden for some reason. Don’t ask me why.
 
I felt like a fool. I told him I had to go and asked him how much I owed him. He said he wasn’t taking any more of my money, after that tip I gave him yesterday, and that really freaked me out for some reason. Like he was being too nice or something. Did he think I was homeless? I don’t know. I was standing up by then and fumbling for my cash, but he put out his hand to stop me. It was then that I kind of started running, I think. I told him that I knew it was really rude of me to go, and I would pay him next time, but I had to be somewhere. God, I felt like an ass. Where did I have to go? Nowhere. I didn’t even know what day it was. But I couldn’t have sat there for another minute to save my life. I just thanked him about fifty more times and apologized again for everything and practically bolted out the door.
 
As soon as I was outside and out in the street I thought I should have at least asked him where I could find a drugstore or something. Or if there would even be one open today. I didn’t know what the hell was going on with the snow and everything and no one around. It was freaky. I just wanted to find somewhere where I could at least pick up a few things, but I didn’t think to ask him. I knew I could’ve gone back yet and he would have told me, but I really didn’t feel like it. I figured I felt like enough of a fool at that point, so I just kept walking.
 
DAYLIGHT
 
I wrote that in the middle of the night sometime, but I stopped before I got to the part about the drugstore. I did finally find a drugstore yesterday afternoon, and it was open, thank God. But I didn’t think I’d better buy too much. Just a few essentials. Then I made it back here, just beat. I got back to my room and went straight to bed and slept for I don’t know how long. When I woke up it was dark, but I turned on my lamp and decided to write it all down, all that business at the diner. But it seemed to take an awful long time and it tired me out so I went back to sleep for awhile.
 
Now the sun is shining again. I’ve cleaned myself up finally, and washed my clothes, so I’m feeling a little better again. It’s getting late in the day, but there’s still some sun coming in the window and I’m sitting here soaking it up with my bare skin, trying to sit up straight so my ribs don’t hurt so much. My clothes are drying over the radiator, and I’m in no hurry to get them back on again. The sun feels even better today than it did yesterday, now that I’m clean again for a change.
 
I still don’t know what to make of everything that happened at the diner, with me going into that collapse and then that guy I hardly even know giving me all that good food. He was so nice. Why did I run out of there like that? I don’t know what to make of anything, if you want to know the truth. I don’t have much money and I can’t think of anywhere to go. But I’m not going to think about it right now.
 
I just took my little still life arrangement off the desk and set it here in the windowsill. The flowers still look great. With the sun shining on them all the colors look even brighter. Down in the street I can see it’s not snowing anymore, and people are beginning to move around a little bit again.
 
It’s still pretty quiet though.
 
3. TRANSCRIPT (CONT.)
 
So, anyway, that’s all there is to the journal, if that’s the right term for it. It ends there. At least that’s all that Maria handed me. After seeing the picture on TV I dug out these papers and read it all again and thought, yeah, I bet that’s her. Just putting two and two together, you know? So I thought maybe I should bring these to you. I figured maybe it’ll help you find her.
 
That is, if you really think you should find her. I thought that after seeing this maybe you don’t want to be looking for her so hard, if you know what I mean. You maybe want to think about who’s looking for her. I don’t know. She seemed like a good kid to me is all.
 
Anyway. That’s all I’ve got, officer, I hope it helps.