(Pause)
It’s an impossible situation! I don’t even know what I want from Dick anymore. Nothing good can come of this. The only thing I’m thankful for is that it’s not the ’70s and I didn’t already fuck him. You know that anguish? Waiting by the phone until the burn and torment finally goes away? Our only hope is for some resumption of our normal lives. What seemed so daring just looks juvenile and pathetic.
S: Chris, I already told you he wouldn’t call. He has a tendency to pull away. We’ve taken the decision for him. Deciding on his thoughts. Remember the introduction that we wrote for him? In a sense Dick isn’t necessary. He has more to say by not saying anything and maybe he’s aware of it. We’ve been treating Dick like a dumb cunt. Why should he like it? By not calling he’s playing right into his role.
C: You’re wrong. Dick’s response has nothing to do with character. It’s the situation. This reminds me of something that happened when I was 11 years old. There was this man at the local radio station who’d been very nice to me. He let me talk over the air. Then one day a cloud came over me, I started throwing rocks into the windshield of his car. It made sense while I was doing it but later I felt crazy and ashamed.
S: Do you want to throw a rock through Dick’s Thunderbird?
C: I already have. Though mostly I’ve debased myself.
S: No.
C: Of course. I’ve projected a total fantasy onto an unsuspecting person and then actually asked him to respond!
S: But Chris, I think his embarrassment isn’t in relation to you or me but to himself. What can he do?
C: I hate being thrown into such a physical state. When the phone rang during dinner my face flushed, my heart was pounding. Laura and Elizabeth drove all this way to visit us and I like them but I couldn’t wait for them to leave.
S: Isn’t that experiencing life to the hilt?
C: No, it’s just a dumb infatuation. I’m so ashamed.
S: But even if his silence hurts you, isn’t that what attracted you to him? The fact that he was inaccessible. So, I think there is a contradiction there, at least nothing to feel ashamed of—
C: I took terrible liberties with another person. He has every right to laugh at me.
S: I doubt he’s laughing. Perhaps biting his fingers.
C: I feel so teenage. When you’re living so intensely in your head you actually believe when something happens you’ve imagined, that you caused it. When Leonora OD’d on bad acid from my boyfriend Donald, he and Paul and I sat up all night in the park and made a pact that if Leonora wasn’t out of Ward 16 tomorrow we’d kill ourselves. When you’re living so intensely in your head there isn’t any difference between what you imagine and what actually takes place. Therefore, you’re both omnipotent and powerless.
S: You’re saying teenagers aren’t in their heads?
C: No, they’re so far in that there’s no difference between the inside of their heads and the world.
S: So what’s happening in Dick’s head now?
C: Oh Sylvère, he’s not a teenager. He’s not experiencing any feeling of infatuation for me. He’s in a normal state, well, whatever’s normal for him, wondering how to deal with this horrible mawkish situation.
S: If he’s thinking about it, he’ll call tonight. If not, he’ll call on Tuesday morning. But he will definitely call.
C: Sylvère, this is like the Institute of Emotional Research.
S: It’s funny how what we’re after is so fleeting and so easily lost. The only way we can recapture any feeling is by evoking Dick.
C: He’s our Imaginary Friend.
S: Do we need that? It’s so mixed up. At times we reach these peaks of real possession at his expense, but through it we’re able to see him more clearly than he ever would himself.
C: Don’t be so presumptuous! You keep talking about Dick as if he was your little brother. You think you have his number—
S: Well, I don’t have the same take on him as you do.
C: I don’t have a take. I’m in love with him.
S: It’s so unfair. What has he done to deserve this?
C: Do you think we’re doing this because we’re anxious and confused about leaving California?
S: No, leaving’s our routine. But what would’ve happened if he’d been involved and willing?
C: I would’ve fucked him once and then he’d never call.
S: But what makes all this legitimate is that you didn’t. What thinking about it’s brought up is the essential thing. You know, I was picturing Dick before as a wicked, manipulative creature. But perhaps he’s keeping silent just to give us time…
C: To get over him. He wants us to get over him.
S: Chris, what sort of strange zone are we entering? To write to him is one thing but now we’re writing to each other. Has Dick been a means of getting us to talk, not to each other but to someTHING?
C: You mean that Dick is God.
S: No, maybe Dick never existed.
C: Sylvère, I think we’re entering the post-mortem elegiac form right now.
S: No. We’re just waiting for his call.
8:45 p.m.
S: It’s so unfair. I guess these silent types make you work twice as hard and then you can’t escape because you yourself create the cage. Maybe that’s why you feel so bad. It’s like he’s watching, watching you do this to yourself.
C: Misery and self-loathing is the essence of rock & roll. When stuff like this happens you just want to turn the music up really loud.
TWO HOURS LATER—
(Dick hasn’t called. Chris writes another letter and proudly reads it to Sylvère.)
C:
Crestline, California
December 11, 1994
Hey Dick—
It’s Sunday night, we’ve been through hell and not quite back, but now that you’ve been semi-informed about “the project” I guess it’s only fair to bring you up to date: we’re ready to call it off. We’ve travelled galaxies since Sylvère talked to you last night about shooting video at your place… Well, the video was not the point, we just wanted to find a mechanism for involving you in the process. Since then I’ve embraced/discarded several other art ideas but all we really have’re these letters. Sylvère and I are wondering if we should submit them to Amy and Ira at High Risk or publish them ourselves in Semiotext(e)? In three days, we’ve written 80 pages. But I’m miserable and confused and judging by your silence you’re not into any of this at all. Let’s let it rest.
S: Chris you can’t send that. It makes no sense at all. You’re supposed to be intelligent.
C: Okay, I’ll try again.
Sunday night
Dear Dick,
Well the “tempest in a teapot” seems to’ve passed without your entering it, which’s fine with me. What is it we’ve been doing here over the last few days? I’ve been in limbo since disengaging emotionally from the movie and when this THING—the “crush”—came up, it seemed interesting to try and deal with dumb infatuation in a self-reflexive way. The result: 80 pages of unreadable correspondence in about 2 days.