Free Colum McCann - Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann Page A

it. I got up and stormed out of the place. Stumbled out into the van.
“I think I drove all night. I just kept going. Following the white lines. I got snared up on bridges. Had no idea where I was going. Soon enough the lights of the city were fading. I figured I was out somewhere way upstate, but it was the island, man, Long Island. I thought I was going west, across some great open land, where I’d work everything out, but I wasn’t, I was actually heading east along this big highway. And I just kept going. Driving and driving. Cars zipping by me. I had to keep muttering to myself and lighting matches, smelling the sulfur, to keep awake. Trying to pray. To make two plus two equal five. And then the highway ended, middle of nowhere, it seemed like, and I just followed a smaller road. Out through farmland and past these isolated houses, little pinpoints of light. Montauk. I’d never been there before. The dark got thicker, no lights at all. And it turned into this little one- laner. That’s what takes you to the end of this country, man, a tiny little potholed road that ends up at a lighthouse. And I thought: ‘This is right, this is where I’ll find Him.’
“I got out and stepped in among the dunes, along the beach. I walked about and screamed at Him, under the clouds. Not a star shining anywhere. No response. You’d expect a bit of moon at least. Something. Anything. Not even a boat. It was like everything had deserted me. And I could still feel her touch there, on the inside of my arm. Like it was deep and there was something growing there. And I’m out in the middle of an endless beach with a lighthouse twirling behind me. Thinking stupid things. The way you do. I’ll move away. I’ll give it all up. I’ll leave the Order, I’ll go back to Ireland, find a different poverty. But nothing made sense. The end of the country, man, but there was no revelation.
“After a while I gathered myself into that silence and finally I sat down in the sand and said to myself, ‘Well, maybe it will only make me better for Him in the long run, I have to fight this, battle it, use it for my own advantage, it’s a sign.’ I resigned myself to it. That which doesn’t break you, blah blah blah. I was running a fever but I left the beach, got back in the van and calmed myself down, and said good- bye to the lighthouse, the water, the east, and said it will be fine, nothing holy is free, and I drove all the way back to the flat, parked the van, fell into the lift, and closed the door. I actually fell asleep in the lift. Only woke up when it started moving. Found myself staring at the face of some frightened black woman. I scared her. I locked myself in for two days. Waiting for the bandages to blacken, y’know, that sort of thing. Waiting for it to blow over. And I bolted the chain. Can you believe that? I bolted the door shut. So much for the crap I gave you, brother, about the locks.”
He chuckled a little and a spray of headlight went across his face from the far side of the boulevard.
“The girls thought I was dead. They were banging on the door, wanting to use the facilities. And I didn’t reply. I just lay there, trying to pray for some sign of gentle mercy. But I kept seeing Adelita in my mind. Eyes closed, eyes open, it didn’t matter. Things I shouldn’t have been thinking of. Her neck. The back of her neck. Her clavicle. The side of her face in a slice of light. There she was, taking me in. And I wanted to scream at her, No, no, no, you’re just pure lust, and I’ve made a pact with God to fight lust, please just let me be, please just go. But she’s still standing there, smiling, understanding. And I’d whisper to her again: Please go. But I knew it wasn’t lust, it was so much more than lust. I was looking for a simple answer, the sort we give to children, you know. And I kept thinking that we were all children once, maybe I could return. That’s what echoed in my head. Go back to being a child. Sprint