Free Samedi the Deafness by Jesse Ball

save when three are within, but the pair must speak in turn, and each finish the other's sentences. A pair opening a door onto a room of three must bow their heads in shame and one must speak for the other for three days, during which they mayn't be parted. Groups of more than three traveling in tandem through the halls, entering rooms willy-nilly, should consult the appendix for further rules of behavior, as this ought not to be a matter of course and therefore will not be approved of by situational mention here.

 

    Grieve found James where he sat reading a book in the library. He was on a sort of balcony that ran both lengths of the library, and connected across every now and then with a little bridge. She walked up behind him.

    —Hello, said James.

    She smiled.

    James rolled over to look up at her, and put his arms behind his head.

    —What have you been doing all day? he asked.

    —I shouldn't say, said Grieve. You wouldn't like me anymore.

    —No? asked James.

    —No, said Grieve. I go on Thursdays to a hospital and sew people's arms and legs back on. I'm not a doctor or anything. I just discovered one day how good I was at sewing on arms and legs. I'd done it often enough with puppets and stuffed animals, and so, I thought, well, a person can't be much different. To be honest I tried it first with a dog, but the human arm was much too big and the dog just kind of dragged it around.

    —What are you talking about? asked James.

    —Nothing, said Grieve. I was just thinking out loud.

    She was wearing a short pleated skirt with a cream-colored blouse. From where James was lying, he could see most of her legs.

    He told her about this fact.

    —Well, she said, what do you think about that?

    and lay down beside him.

    They looked up then at the ceiling. Words had been painted across the entire ceiling of the library.

    —What does it say? asked James.

    —It's in a cipher, said Grieve. My father painted it himself. It's an entire book, in a cipher, a book he wrote. No one has ever read it.

    —Oh, said James.

    He looked back and forth across the ceiling. Back and forth he looked. When he had looked back and forth five times he knew he had memorized this strange book. He would write it out, he thought, he would write it out and decipher the code at his leisure.

    This looking and thinking, though sudden, had taken perhaps ten, perhaps fifteen minutes. Grieve had fallen asleep. Her head was on his shoulder. He shifted his arm beneath her neck. She moved in her sleep and put her arm on his chest. Her leg slid up and across him, and she settled comfortably. Her breathing became regular again.

    James ran his hand lightly over her back and listened to her breathe.

    What next? he asked himself.

 

    James stood near the front door. Grieve had woken up and gone off. He had gone off too. When someone wakes up and goes off, it never feels right to stay in the place where you were with them. One should always go off and find something new if one is to keep oneself perennially young and happy.

    What's next? he asked himself.

    If, he thought to himself, the whole thing is a dream, then it would all work out properly. How could he know if it was a dream? He could ask someone, certainly.

    He approached a woman who was folding towels on a long wooden table. Her hair smelled like trees in the out-of-doors.

    —Is this a dream? he asked.

    —Please don't talk to me, she said, and smiled in a really fabulous way.

    He began to try all the ordinary ways of getting out of dreams, pinching, etc. These did not work.

    There was a phone in the hall next to the long table.

    I will call someone on the telephone, said James to himself, someone who knows me, and I will ask them whether or not I am asleep right now.

    James went to the telephone. He called the house of his wife, and asked her if he was in bed at that moment asleep.

    —I'll go and check, she said.

    After a minute, she came back. Her voice sounded so warm and