He booked an appointment with an ear, nose and throat specialist.<\/p>\n
He couldn\u2019t recall if the hissing in his ears began before his wife left or immediately after. A chicken and egg dilemma. All he remembered is that the interference in his ears came on quickly. One morning, he told Dr. Gros the ENT, he awoke early and wondered why the television test pattern was making that monotonous hiss. Which was strange. Because the television wasn\u2019t on.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo it\u2019s not a ringing<\/em>, per se?\u201d the doctor asked. Gable thought ringing sounded more dangerous than hissing. He was convinced he had a sinister tumor bearing down on a crucial nerve or on one of those little bones that look like stirrups or hardware. (Gable Massey was not a hypochondriac, but when things didn\u2019t go away on their own, he started to worry. And of course, he knew that fears come naturally with age.)\u00a0 Dr. Gros wore a little round mirror on the center of his forehead, attached by a wide headband decorated with several characters from Winnie the Pooh. The only hair on his head was a renegade tuft of orange fuzz that waved behind the mirror as if a breeze blew across the room.<\/p>\n \u201cHissing only. Like when you put a shell to your ear at the beach.\u201d In the past few weeks, Gable had concocted a half dozen ways of describing the sound in his ears. It was definitely not ringing.<\/p>\n \u201cI have conch shells like that in the garage at home. I do that ear thing sometimes just so I can get a vacation feeling. Strange, isn\u2019t it? Both ears, correct?\u201d He paused, clearly enjoying his unexpected recollection. \u201cAh, well, what you have is tinnitus.\u201d This is the same diagnosis Gable\u2019s neighbor had offered. He was an accountant. Tinnitus. Ringing in the ears\u2014even though this wasn\u2019t ringing.<\/p>\n \u201cTinnitis.\u201d Gable repeated it aloud to let the doctor know that he could still hear.<\/p>\n \u201cGarden variety tinnitis. There are support groups and things for people who have it. Tinnitus really drives some people up the wall. They go mad. I suppose that\u2019s not something you want to hear right now, eh? Is the hissing keeping you awake at night?\u201d<\/p>\n No, Gable told him. And that was the truth. Gable had been sleeping like a baby since Hollis left, which surprised and even delighted him a little. He would have predicted he\u2019d lose sleep over her.<\/p>\n \u201cCould it be the humidity?\u201d Gable asked the doctor. In Lake City, the humidity got blamed for everything from business failure to still births. This summer had been particularly thick. \u00a0Gable told someone just the other day that it was so humid, you could all but scoop up air in a Mason jar. At some point, probably that one, Gable began to associate humidity with ear pressure and blamed the hissing on heavy air.<\/p>\n \u201cIt could be anything because no one knows what causes it. That\u2019s why they have support groups. Fear of the unknown.\u201d At the angle Dr. Gros stood above him, Gable could see himself in the doctor\u2019s tiny mirror. He thought, I don\u2019t look tired. I look scared<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cTinnitus is usually a clue that you are starting to lose your hearing. Slowly lose it, I should say. Now, you seem a little young for all that to start, so we\u2019ll just test your hearing every six months or so. You can find those support groups on the web, I think.\u201d The way he said it, Gable could tell that Dr. Gros\u2019s hearing was fine and he had no intention of ever having to deal with hissing in his ears.<\/p>\n Dr. Gros asked one last question as he reached for the door. \u201cBy the by, experienced any head trauma lately?\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He went to a hooker.<\/p>\n Gable was surprised that he knew where to go. That place between the post office and the train station, where the street made a hard, unnatural left, sharp enough to slow any of the sporadic traffic that made the trip after dark. I\u2019ve become a clich\u00e9, Gable thought. A lonely white man with three twenties in his wallet. And he hated clich\u00e9s. When he graded student papers, he reserved his most violent, artistic circles for the trite language in their essays. One time, when one of his young writers asked, \u201cWhy is it so awful to use something that everybody knows the meaning of?\u201d Gable didn\u2019t have an answer. But he didn\u2019t retreat from his war on clich\u00e9s. Even his. Every separated man eventually sees a hooker, right?<\/p>\n He knew one thing for certain. He would not seek the benevolent prostitute. The hooker with a soft spot. The woman of ill repute with a heart of gold who could ferry Gable to the shores of salvation through the mere act of cuddling and listening to his story. A fifty-dollar hug. That is not what Gable Massey needed. What he needed, he thought, is an out-and-out skank, a woman who dared you to flirt with death when she peeled off her thong. He wanted there to be the slim possibility that somewhere down the road, his penis would ultimately drop off like the nubby remnant of a baby\u2019s umbilical cord. This was Gable\u2019s street-walker death wish.<\/p>\n Gable saw a woman leaning against the Amtrak sign, rubbing a stick of deodorant under one armpit. He wondered if this was proper prostitute etiquette. He slowed to make the sharp turn, lingering long enough to let the half dozen other ladies in slick boots and Salvation Army halter tops covey around his car. Deodorant Girl scratched her ass up and down on the sign. Gable wouldn\u2019t roll down his window until she looked his way. He waved at her to come to the car, a wave that was more like a plea. The other women leaned in toward every window of the car. Gable saw the sweat beads between their breasts. The humidity, he thought.<\/p>\n Her name was LaCharme, and she smelled like a cosmetics counter. Six or seven scents covered and masked each other, in turn masking and covering something musky at her skin\u2019s surface. When she slid into the front seat of Gable\u2019s Volvo, she immediately reached for his crotch. \u201cDrive under the bridge, okay?\u201d she said. He told her he wanted to go to a hotel, and her price immediately jumped. Gable didn\u2019t flinch.<\/p>\n In the Econo Lodge, LaCharme unzipped her boots and kicked them away. She wriggled out of a too-tight jean skirt and let Gable stare at the fact that she wore no panties.<\/p>\n \u201cDo you have a heart of gold?\u201d he asked her.<\/p>\n \u201cSay what?\u201d she called from the bathroom. She walked back in on her toes, tapping little dollops of hotel hand lotion into her palm, then spreading it on her bare shoulders.<\/p>\n \u201cAre you the benevolent hooker?\u201d Gable asked. He was seated on the bed, his palms resting on the tops of his thighs, which were still inside his pants.<\/p>\n \u201cI got a pussy like thunder if that what you mean.\u201d She started to turn back the velour spread on the mattress. Gable stopped her. \u201cListen, my ears are hissing. I want you to do something for me.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cEars?\u201d she repeated.<\/p>\n He told her exactly what he wanted her to do. He asked her to whisper things into his ear, whisper so low that he almost couldn\u2019t hear. \u201cTry to make me miss what you say,\u201d he said to LaCharme.<\/p>\n \u201cWhisper?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n \u201cKneel down here beside the bed. I\u2019ll lean my head over, then you whisper. We\u2019ll change to the other ear after a while.\u201d Gable lay on his back, his hands crossed on his chest. LaCharme needed to be completely clear about the instructions. \u201cWhisper something dirty?\u201d she whispered.<\/p>\n \u201cNo, nothing dirty,\u201d he told her. Gable was enjoying making up the rules as he went along.<\/p>\n LaCharme went to her knees and put her lips so close to Gable\u2019s ear, she thought she felt some of the tiny hairs around its edge. It took Gable by surprise when he recognized what she was doing. He knew the tune right away. She was singing her ABCs in a tiny, thin voice. She stumbled a bit early on and mangled the l-m-n-o-p section as well. When she finished her zee, she paused for moment, then reached across the bed and cupped Gable\u2019s crotch. He waited to feel something, a flutter, a rush, anything. The thought flickered across his mind that he had, indeed, paid for this woman, that he should try to get something memorable out of it. LaCharme moved her hand slightly upward and Gable realized that he was utterly useless. He shut his eyes and shook his head. LaCharme saw him, took her hand away and whispered something so quietly, Gable imagined she could have been in another room. \u201cYou one fucked up white man.\u201d<\/p>\n I heard that, Gable thought. I heard that.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He gave his wife a hint.<\/p>\n Gable Massey thought that if he evolved into a subconscious, constant presence in Hollis\u2019s life, she would remember why she loved him once. Mere asking wouldn\u2019t bring her back. He had tried that. It needed to be subtle to the point of mysterious. It needed to be osmosis. He didn\u2019t want to be seen so much as be sensed. He didn\u2019t want to be an annoyance so much as a strange, sudden itch that comes out of nowhere.<\/p>\n He began his nightly walks to Hollis\u2019s apartment after midnight. (It wasn\u2019t far, maybe ten or twelve blocks.)\u00a0 Without knowing it, Hollis had left an extra key to her Saturn station wagon in the garage at the old house, hanging on a finishing nail. Gable would hold the key in his hand the whole way to her house. In the parking lot of her apartment complex, he\u2019d find the Saturn, unlock it and crawl in the backseat where he\u2019d spend the entire night wrapped in the one blanket he brought with him.<\/p>\n Hollis and Gable used to take long trips during the first couple years of their marriage, trips that had no plan and no real purpose. They would leave in the car, in the middle of the night, picking a direction as they meandered to the edge of town. They would take turns driving. He loved the feeling of falling asleep in the back seat while Hollis drove through the dark, wondering which state they\u2019d be in when he woke up. And he loved watching Hollis sleep when it was his turn to drive. He would angle the rearview mirror at her, catching shimmers of her reflection as they passed oncoming cars. He loved the quiet on those trips, the sounds of sleep.<\/p>\n Gable set the alarm on his wristwatch so he\u2019d be sure and leave before daylight or before another tenant appeared in the parking lot. He thought about leaving her things, little remnants of their years. A photograph maybe, or a hair clip. Just something to slip into the crack in the seat. But Gable decided against it. That would violate his desire to be nothing more than a suggestion. The last thing Gable wanted to be at this point was overt when he wasn\u2019t around.<\/p>\n Gable smiled when he imagined Hollis climbing behind the wheel in the mornings, looping her seatbelt across her chest and wondering why her Saturn always seemed to smell like her former husband. Smelled like Gable who is losing his hearing. Like Gable who is sleeping in cars. Like Gable who is helping hookers with the ABCs.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n He went to therapy.<\/p>\n Correction. Gable only told Hollis he went to therapy. During one of their sad, awkward talks in the days just after she\u2019d left, Hollis told Gable she thought he should see someone.<\/p>\n \u201cSee someone,\u201d Gable echoed.<\/p>\n \u201cA therapist. Someone that you can talk to, who can help you figure yourself out. I sure don\u2019t know who you are any more. I have this feeling you don\u2019t know either.\u201d Hollis was seeing a therapist. She had refused Gable\u2019s request to attend a counselor as a couple. I need to work on myself<\/em>, she\u2019d told him. I don\u2019t have the energy to work on the both of us. <\/em>She\u2019d put it in terms of a favor. Do this favor. For me. See someone.<\/p>\n Gable went to the phone book and looked under Counselors and Therapists. There were thirty-seven names. He knew Hollis was seeing a female therapist, so he decided on a male. An Asian male. Dr. Albert Lo Chin.<\/p>\n Gable didn\u2019t have the money or the desire to actually call Dr. Lo Chin and make an appointment. He just needed his name. He just needed a ghost doctor. This was his favor to Hollis. She didn\u2019t need to know that he never actually attended a session. And there was no way for her to find out. She couldn\u2019t check behind him. Confidentiality and all that.<\/p>\n \u201cThank you,\u201d she said when Gable told her about securing the therapeutic services of one Dr. Lo Chin. \u201cDid he help?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe was wonderful. A very quiet man. He sort of made me do all the talking. Getting my money\u2019s worth, I guess. Ha, ha.\u201d Gable was surprised how much he enjoyed tampering with the truth. \u201cHe wanted to know the whole situation. He said he can understand how things got the way they were. The way they are, I mean.\u201d<\/p>\n Hollis stared at Gable and cocked her head slightly. \u201cHe said that?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYes. He\u2019s very insightful. I told him how you felt you didn\u2019t belong in our house any more, you know, that day at the sink with the crying and everything, and he said that maybe there was a coming together of things, timing he guessed, or actually bad timing that pushed us around a little, but \u2013 and here\u2019s what I thought was so smart of him\u2014he said that those sorts of things can be overcome if both people are willing to try, you know, give it a shot together and of course, if the two people involved aren\u2019t arguing about anything in particular, if it\u2019s, well, like too abstract to figure out.\u201d Gable paused, realizing that he was talking faster and longer than normal. Hollis continued to stare at him like he was speaking in tongues.<\/p>\n \u201cI really liked him,\u201d Gable offered up into the silence.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, where\u2019s his office?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n \u201cThat medical mall. Over by the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n Hollis nodded. \u201cReally? Did you make another appointment?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh yeah. Next week. Early on.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThank you. I really appreciate you taking the time to find a therapist.\u201d Hollis smiled at him for the first time in weeks.<\/p>\n \u201cDr. Lo Chin thinks I\u2019ll make progress. He said to be sure and tell you that.\u201d<\/p>\n Hollis\u2019s brow furrowed. \u201cHe said to tell me?\u201d<\/p>\n Careful,<\/em> Gable thought. Careful.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cActually, he said I should feel free to discuss any of our session with you. Whatever I thought might help things, I should mention it. That\u2019s what he said.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cGable, therapy is for your benefit. It\u2019s not going to bring me back.\u201d When Hollis said things she had rehearsed, she had a habit of biting her lower lip. \u201cWe are a little beyond that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cDr. Lo Chin told me you might say something like that,\u201d Gable answered. Hollis was still biting her lip when she turned away.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He read his mail in the sunroom.<\/p>\n When Gable came home from school in the afternoons, he liked to drink a beer and go through his mail in the small room at the side of the house. Each day, he still received a great deal of Hollis\u2019s stuff, both the important things and the junk. He made quick decisions which things were important enough to pass onto her. It didn\u2019t bother him to sort her mail. It felt useful, like he was helping.<\/p>\n One afternoon, the largest envelope came from Dwyer, Mann, Helm and Welch. Inside, a handwritten note on formal Dwyer, Mann, Helm and Welch letterhead said:<\/p>\n Per Mrs. Massey\u2019s request, we are forwarding a copy of this document for your review. Please have your attorney make any corrections or suggestions and return to us immediately.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Gable couldn\u2019t make out the signature.<\/p>\n It was the first time he\u2019d seen his life on paper, his possessions divided and subdivided, his history with Hollis broken into neat, formal paragraphs. He finished his beer and got another, read the document again. Hollis had mentioned days ago \u2013 actually on the same day that he reported on his therapy session with Dr. Lo Chin \u2013 that she was moving ahead with things. And this was one of the things<\/em>.<\/p>\n In the document, Hollis\u2019s lawyer listed several specific objects in the house that should be considered hers and not marital property to be divided. Those were the things that Gable brought into the sunroom and destroyed. A pot thrown by an artist in North Carolina. Crystal champagne flutes from her grandmother. An etching from an art gallery in Atlanta. Et cetera.<\/p>\n Each time he broke something or ripped something, Gable tried to come up with some clever line or witty send-off, the kind of thing he imagined Cary Grant might say as he smashed his estranged wife\u2019s requests, if there were a Cary Grant movie like that. When he slung the pot on the floor, he said, \u201cNot quite the vessel it used to be, eh?\u201d When the champagne flutes exploded on the tiles, he said, \u201cAh, well, not a very good year for champagne anyway.\u201d It was Gable\u2019s way of avoiding melodrama.<\/p>\n He brought the broom from the laundry room, swept up the pieces he could find and poured them into a large cardboard box. Then, he washed out the empty beer cans and tossed them in the box as well, just to hear the sound they made.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He slowed down on the curve.<\/p>\n Even though it was after midnight, LaCharme was still out, holding up her Amtrak sign again, digging through her pocketbook when he waved to her. She must have told the other girls about Gable; none of them tried to approach the car.<\/p>\n She climbed in and leaned over, bit his earlobe and said, \u201cHey, Whispering Man.\u201d Then, she noticed the cloth wrapped around his hand. \u201cWhat?\u00a0You bleeding?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI cut myself this evening. On a champagne glass. It\u2019s nothing.\u201d He pulled a u-turn and drove toward the other side of town.<\/p>\n \u201cYou bring me any?\u201d LaCharme said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He found the Saturn in her parking lot.<\/p>\n Gable spread the blanket in the back seat as neatly as he could manage in the dark and motioned for LaCharme to get in. \u201cI take it we ain\u2019t just whispering tonight,\u201d she said as she rolled her hips into the air and slid the jean skirt down her legs.<\/p>\n Gable closed the car door quietly and took a deep, deep breath. He smelled LaCharme\u2019s fresh deodorant and the several different cheap perfumes and colognes that were fighting to do their mutual masking and covering. Tonight, she was chewing gum, too. One of those happy smells. Spearmint, he thought.<\/p>\n LaCharme asked him to open a window and let some air in, said it was too hot to be fucking in a car with the windows up. He didn\u2019t answer and didn\u2019t reach for the buttons for the window, just pushed himself inside her when she wasn\u2019t expecting it. LaCharme began to recite her ABCs slowly, then began to moan in rhythm with Gable\u2019s movements, growing louder with each beat until she was screaming. He didn\u2019t notice the noise, didn\u2019t pick up a thing. Gable had closed his eyes and was busy imagining what Hollis would think the next morning when she slid in behind the wheel. He wished he could be there to see the way her nose crinkled, to see the confusion on her face as she wondered what that smell was. She would try to pinpoint the odor, the smell of two bodies, wondering if it was actually her. Is it me? <\/em>He wished he could hear what she had to say.<\/p>\n Gable opened his eyes and looked down at LaCharme. He realized he was dripping sweat onto her from his forehead and the tip of his nose. Her mouth was open but he couldn\u2019t make out what she was yelling.<\/p>\n LaCharme reached up and pushed Gable\u2019s chin toward his shoulder. She pointed at the window that was slightly fogged. Gable began to turn as the beam from the flashlight hit his face, as he suddenly heard all of the voices filling the space around the car.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Gable smiled when he imagined Hollis climbing behind the wheel in the mornings, looping her seatbelt across her chest and wondering why her Saturn always seemed to smell like her former husband.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14186,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1386,1385,91],"class_list":["post-14012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fiction","tag-divorce","tag-hookers","tag-revenge","writer-scott-gould"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14012"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14012\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14187,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14012\/revisions\/14187"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}