Post Office, Page 2

  I was sent off to Wently Station. “They said they need a good man,” the Stone called after me as I stepped out into a sheet of water.

  The door closed. If the old car started, and it did, I was off to Wently. But it didn’t matter—if the car didn’t run, they threw you on a bus. My feet were already wet.

  The Wently soup stood me in front of this case. It was already stuffed and I began stuffing more mail in with the help of another sub. I’d never seen such a case! It was a rotten joke of some sort. I counted 12 tie-outs on the case. That case must have covered half the city. I had yet to learn that the route was all steep hills. Whoever had conceived it was a madman.

  We got it up and out and just as I was about to leave the soup walked over and said, “I can’t give you any help on this.”

  “That’s all right,” I said.

  All right, hell. It wasn’t until later that I found out he was Jonstone’s best buddy.

  The route started at the station. The first of twelve swings, I stepped into a sheet of water and worked my way downhill. It was the poor part of town—small houses and courts with mailboxes full of spiders, mailboxes hanging by one nail, old women inside rolling cigarettes and chewing tobacco and humming to their canaries and watching you, an idiot lost in the rain.

  When your shorts get wet they slip down, down down they slip, down around the cheeks of your ass, a wet rim of a thing held up by the crotch of your pants. The rain ran the ink on some of the letters; a cigarette wouldn’t stay lit. You had to keep reaching into the pouch for magazines. It was the first swing and I was already tired. My shoes were caked with mud and felt like boots. Every now and then I’d hit a slippery spot and almost go down.

  A door opened and an old woman asked the question heard a hundred times a day:

  “Where’s the regular man, today?”

  “Lady, PLEASE, how would I know? How in the hell would I know? I’m here and he’s someplace else!”

  “Oh, you are a gooney fellow!”

  “A gooney fellow?”

  “Yes.”

  I laughed and put a fat water-soaked letter in her hand, then went on to the next. Maybe uphill will be better, I thought. Another Old Nelly, meaning to be nice, asked me, “Wouldn’t you like to come in and have a cup of tea and dry off?”

  “Lady, don’t you realize we don’t even have time to pull up our shorts?”

  “Pull up your shorts?”

  “YES, PULL UP OUR SHORTS!” I screamed at her and walked off into the wall of water.

  I finished the first swing. It took about an hour. Eleven more swings, that’s eleven more hours. Impossible, I thought. They must have hung the roughest one on me first.

  Uphill was worse because you had to pull your own weight.

  Noon came and went. Without lunch. I was on the 4th or 5th swing. Even on a dry day the route would have been impossible. This way it was so impossible you couldn’t even think about it.

  Finally I was so wet I thought I was drowning. I found a front porch that only leaked a little and stood there and managed to light a cigarette. I had about 3 quiet puffs when I heard a little old lady’s voice behind me:

  “Mailman! Mailman!”

  “Yes, mam?” I asked.

  “YOUR MAIL IS GETTING WET!”

  I looked down at my pouch and sure enough, I had left the leather flap open. A drop or two had fallen in from a hole in the porch roof.

  I walked off. That does it, I thought, only an idiot would go through what I am going through. I am going to find a telephone and tell them to come get their mail and jam their job. Jonstone wins.

  The moment I decided to quit, I felt much better. Through the rain I saw a building at the bottom of the hill that looked like it might have a telephone in it. I was halfway up the hill. When I got down I saw it was a small cafe. There was a heater going. Well, shit, I thought, I might as well get dry. I took off my raincoat and my cap, threw the mailpouch on the floor and ordered a cup of coffee.

  It was very black coffee. Remade from old coffeegrounds. The worst coffee I had ever tasted, but it was hot. I drank 3 cups and sat there an hour, until I was completely dry. Then I looked out: it had stopped raining! I went out and walked up the hill and began delivering mail again. I took my time and finished the route. On the 12th swing I was walking in twilight. By the time I returned to the station it was night.

  The carrier’s entrance was locked.

  I beat on the tin door.

  A little warm clerk appeared and opened the door.

  “What the hell took you so long?” he screamed at me.

  I walked over to the case and threw down the wet pouch full of go-backs, miscased mail and pickup mail. Then I took off my key and flipped it against the case. You were supposed to sign in and out for your key. I didn’t bother. He was standing there.

  I looked at him.

  “Kid, if you say one more word to me, if you so much as sneeze, so help me God, I am going to kill you!” The kid didn’t say anything. I punched out. The next morning I kept waiting for Jonstone to turn and say something. He acted as if nothing had happened. The rain stopped and all the regulars were no longer sick. The Stone sent 3 subs home without pay, one of them me. I almost loved him then.

  I went on in and got up against Betty’s warm ass.

  11

  But then it began raining again. The Stone had me out on a thing called Sunday Collection, and if you’re thinking of church, forget it. You picked up a truck at West Garage and a clipboard. The clipboard told you what streets, what time you were to be there, and how to get to the next pickup box. Like 2:32 p.m., Beecher and Avalon, L3 R2 (which meant left three blocks, right two) 2:35 p.m., and you wondered how you could pick up one box, then drive 5 blocks in 3 minutes and be finished cleaning out another box. Sometimes it took you over 3 minutes to clean out a Sunday box. And the boards weren’t accurate. Sometimes they counted an alley as a street and sometimes they counted a street as an alley. You never knew where you were.

  It was one of those continuous rains, not hard, but it never stopped. The territory I was driving was new to me but at least it was light enough to read the clipboard. But as it got darker it was harder to read (by the dashboard light) or locate the pickup boxes. Also the water was rising in the streets, and several times I had stepped into water up to my ankles.

  Then the dashboard light went out. I couldn’t read the clipboard. I had no idea where I was. Without the clipboard I was like a man lost in the desert. But the luck wasn’t all bad—yet. I had two boxes of matches and before I made for each new pickup box, I would light a match, memorize the directions and drive on. For once, I had outwitted Adversity, that Jonstone up there in the sky, looking down, watching me.

  Then I took a corner, leaped out to unload the box and when I got back the clipboard was GONE!

  Jonstone in the Sky, have Mercy! I was lost in the dark and the rain. Was I some kind of idiot, actually? Did I make things happen to myself? It was possible. It was possible that I was subnormal, that I was lucky just to be alive.

  The clipboard had been wired to the dashboard. I figured it must have flown out of the truck on the last sharp turn. I got out of the truck with my pants rolled up around my knees and started wading through a foot of water. It was dark. I’d never find the god damned thing! I walked along, lighting matches—but nothing, nothing. It had floated away. As I reached the corner I had sense enough to notice which way the current was moving and follow it. I saw an object floating along, lit a match, and there it WAS! The clipboard. Impossible! I could have kissed the thing. I waded back to the truck, got in, rolled my pantlegs down and really wired that board to the dash. Of course, I was way behind schedule by then but at least I’d found their dirty clipboard. I wasn’t lost in the backstreets of Nowhere. I wouldn’t have to ring a doorbell and ask somebody the way back to the post office garage.

  I could hear some fucker snarling from his warm frontroom: “Well, well. You’re a post office employee, are
n’t you? Don’t you know the way back to your own garage?”

  So I drove along, lighting matches, leaping into whirlpools of water and emptying collection boxes. I was tired and wet and hungover, but I was usually that way and I waded through the weariness like I did the water. I kept thinking of a hot bath, Betty’s fine legs, and—something to keep me going—a picture of myself in an easychair, drink in hand, the dog walking up, me patting his head.

  But that was a long way off. The stops on the clipboard seemed endless and when I reached the bottom it said “Over” and I flipped the board and sure enough, there on the backside was another list of stops.

  With the last match I made the last stop, deposited my mail at the station indicated, and it was a load, and then drove back toward the West Garage. It was in the west end of town and in the west the land was very flat, the drainage system couldn’t handle the water and anytime it rained any length of time at all, they had what was called a “flood.” The description was accurate.

  Driving on in, the water rose higher and higher. I noticed stalled and abandoned cars all around. Too bad. All I wanted was to get in that chair with that glass of scotch in my hand and watch Betty’s ass wobble around the room. Then at a signal I met Tom Moto, one of the other Jonstone subs.

  “Which way you going in?” Moto asked.

  “The shortest distance between 2 points, I was taught, is a straight line,” I answered him.

  “You better not,” he told me. “I know that area. It’s an ocean through there.”

  “Bullshit,” I said, “all it takes is a little guts. Got a match?”

  I lit up and left him at the signal.

  Betty, baby, I’m coming!

  Yeah.

  The water got higher and higher but mail trucks are built high off the ground. I took the shortcut through the residential neighborhood, full speed, and water flew up all around me. It continued to rain, hard. There weren’t any cars around. I was the only moving object.

  Betty baby. Yeah.

  Some guy standing on his front porch laughed at me and yelled, “THE MAIL MUST GO THROUGH!”

  I cursed him and gave him the finger.

  I noticed that the water was rising above the floorboards, whirling around my shoes, but I kept driving. Only 3 blocks to go!

  Then the truck stopped.

  Oh. Oh. Shit.

  I sat there and tried to kick it over. It started once, then stalled. Then it wouldn’t respond. I sat there looking at the water. It must have been 2 feet deep. What was I supposed to do? Sit there until they sent a rescue squad?

  What did the Postal Manual say? Where was it? I had never known anybody who had seen one.

  Balls.

  I locked the truck, put the ignition keys in my pocket and stepped into the water—nearly up to my waist—and began wading toward West Garage. It was still raining. Suddenly the water rose another 3 or 4 inches. I had been walking across a lawn and had stepped off the curbing. The truck was parked on somebody’s front lawn.

  For a moment I thought that swimming might be faster, then I thought, no, that would look ridiculous. I made it to the garage and walked up to the dispatcher. There I was, wet as wet could get and he looked at me.

  I threw him the truck keys and the ignition keys.

  Then I wrote on a piece of paper: 3435 Mountview Place.

  “Your truck’s at this address. Go get it.”

  “You mean you left it out there?”

  “I mean I left it out there.”

  I walked over, punched out, then stripped to my shorts and stood in front of a heater. I hung my clothes over the heater. Then I looked across the room and there by another heater stood Tom Moto in his shorts.

  We both laughed.

  “It’s hell, isn’t it?” he asked.

  “Unbelievable.”

  “Do you think The Stone planned it?”

  “Hell yes! He even made it rain!”

  “Did you get stalled out there?”

  “Sure,” I said.

  “I did too.”

  “Listen, baby,” I said, “my car is 12 years old. You’ve got a new one. I’m sure I’m stalled out there. How about a push to get me started?”

  “O.K.”

  We got dressed and went out. Moto had bought a new model car about 3 weeks before. I waited for his engine to start. Not a sound. Oh Christ, I thought.

  The rain was up to the floorboards.

  Moto got out.

  “No good. It’s dead.”

  I tried mine without any hope. There was some action from the battery, some spark, though feeble. I pumped the gas, hit it again. It started up. I really let it roar. VICTORY! I warmed it good. Then I backed up and began to push Moto’s new car. I pushed him for a mile. The thing wouldn’t even fart. I pushed him into a garage, left him there, and picking the highland and the drier streets, made it back to Betty’s ass.

  12

  The Stone’s favorite carrier was Matthew Battles. Battles never came in with a wrinkled shirt on. In fact, everything he wore was new, looked new. The shoes, the shirts, the pants, the cap. His shoes really shined and none of his clothing appeared to have ever been laundered even once. Once a shirt or a pair of pants became the least bit soiled he threw them away.

  The Stone often said to us as Matthew walked by:

  “Now, there goes a carrier!”

  And The Stone meant it. His eyes damn near shimmered with love.

  And Matthew would stand at his case, erect and clean, scrubbed and well-slept, shoes gleaming victoriously, and he would fan those letters into the case with joy.

  “You’re a real carrier, Matthew!”

  “Thank you, Mr. Jonstone!”

  One 5 a.m. I walked in and sat down to wait behind The Stone. He looked a bit slumped under that red shirt. Moto was next to me. He told me: “They picked up Matthew yesterday.”

  “Picked him up?”

  “Yeah, for stealing from the mails. He’d been opening letters for the Nekalayla Temple and taking money out. After 15 years on the job.”

  “How’d they get him, how’d they find out?”

  “The old ladies. The old ladies had been sending in letters to Nekalayla filled with money and they weren’t getting any thank-you notes or response. Nekalayla told the P.O. and the P.O. put the Eye on Matthew. They found him opening letters down at the soak-box, taking money out.”

  “No shit?”

  “No shit. They caught him in cold daylight.”

  I leaned back.

  Nekalayla had built this large temple and painted it a sickening green, I guess it reminded him of money, and he had an office staff of 30 or 40 people who did nothing but open envelopes, take out checks and money, record the amount, the sender, date received and so on. Others were busy mailing out books and pamphlets written by Nekalayla, and his photo was on the wall, a large one of N. in priestly robes and beard, and a painting of N., very large too, looked over the office, watching.

  Nekalayla claimed he had once been walking through the desert when he met Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ told him everything. They sat on a rock together and J.C. laid it on him. Now he was passing the secrets on to those who could afford it. He also held a service every Sunday. His help, who were also his followers, rang in and out on timeclocks.

  Imagine Matthew Battles trying to outwit Nekalayla who had met Christ in the desert!

  “Has anybody said anything to The Stone?” I asked.

  “Are you kidding?”

  We sat an hour or so. A sub was assigned to Matthew’s case. The other subs were given other jobs. I sat alone behind The Stone. Then I got up and walked to his desk.

  “Mr. Jonstone?”

  “Yes, Chinaski?”

  “Where’s Matthew today? Sick?”

  The Stone’s head dropped. He looked at the paper in his hand and pretended to continue reading it. I walked back and sat down.

  At 7 a.m. The Stone turned:

  “There’s nothing for you today,
Chinaski.”

  I stood up and walked to the doorway. I stood in the doorway. “Good morning, Mr. Jonstone. Have a good day.” He didn’t answer. I walked down to the liquor store and bought a half pint of Grandad for my breakfast.

  13

  The voices of the people were the same, no matter where you carried the mail you heard the same things over and over again.

  “You’re late, aren’t you?”

  “Where’s the regular carrier?”

  “Hello, Uncle Sam!”

  “Mailman! Mailman! This doesn’t go here!”

  The streets were full of insane and dull people. Most of them lived in nice houses and didn’t seem to work, and you wondered how they did it. There was one guy who wouldn’t let you put the mail in his box. He’d stand in the driveway and watch you coming for 2 or 3 blocks and he’d stand there and hold his hand out.

  I asked some of the others who had carried the route: “What’s wrong with that guy who stands there and holds his hand out?”

  “What guy who stands there and holds his hand out?” they asked.

  They all had the same voice too.

  One day when I had the route, the man-who-holds-his-hand-out was a half a block up the street. He was talking to a neighbor, looked back at me more than a block away and knew he had time to walk back and meet me. When he turned his back to me, I began running. I don’t believe I ever delivered mail that fast, all stride and motion, never stopping or pausing, I was going to kill him. I had the letter half in the slot of his box when he turned and saw me.

  “OH NO NO NO!” he screamed, “DON’T PUT IT IN THE BOX!” He ran down the street toward me. All I saw was the blur of his feet. He must have run a hundred yards in 9.2.

  I put the letter in his hand. I watched him open it, walk across the porch, open the door and go into his house. What it meant somebody else will have to tell me.

  14