The Writer was boggled. "That's... wonderful." Ken Doll? "I've got to run now, Nancy. But I'm sure I'll see you tomorrow—"
"Oh! Oh!" she interjected. "Wanna know somethin', Mr. Writer?"
The Writer hoped his frown could not be detected through the phone line. "Sure, Nancy."
Her voice turned rich and warm, like a delectable broth. "I'se had a dream 'bout you last night... "
Was that... a portent? "Really? Well, I'd love to hear all about it but I've got to—"
"I dreamed you was fuckin' me fierce, and, like my Daddy used ta say, I come like a cement truck with no brakes! And then... then... You'n me, we had a baby!"
"Oh, wow," the Writer babbled, disturbed now. "But I've got to—"
More precocious giggling that was somehow unpleasant and erotic simultaneously. "But'cha knows what? The baby didn't have a baby-type head. It hadda li'l bull's head."
"Yes—oh. Talk to you soon—‘bye!" and then he slammed the phone down. Bull's head? Jesus! My existence is definitely preceding my essence right now. He dropped in more coins and this time dialed the right number.
"Hello?"
A man's voice.
The Writer held the phone to his ear, eyes wide as if propped open by toothpicks. "Is this... "
"Room Six?" the voice snapped testily. "Your room? Yeah. You dialed it, didn't you?"
The Writer gulped. "Who... are you?"
"For Christ's sake. If you don't know who this is, why are you calling me?"
The Writer, of course, recognized the voice as his own.
But I do not believe in doppelgangers, he told himself at once. "I called... because... well, it was an exercise in abstraction, I suppose."
He heard his own voice laugh at him.
"What a load of shit! Buddy? I wrote the haiku on the shade last night, not you."
The Writer gulped a rock.
"And I'm glad you called. I'm working on the novel. I'm shaping it up pretty well, if I might say so."
This is impossible...
"One thing, though. The title sucks. I'll change it to something more serviceable."
Impossible or not, the Writer was outraged. "You'll do no such thing! The title's great! It's better than Grapes of Wrath!"
"Oh, man. You really are fucked up with all that literary ballyhoo. White Trash Gothic? It's pretentious shit. You need something that's symbolic and enlightening at the same time."
"You leave my title alone, you!" the Writer bellowed.
"Don't worry about it. When you get back this morning... you'll see."
The Writer stared. "This morning... What, the motel? I'm coming back tonight, not this morning."
"Negative."
The Writer took deep breaths now, and counted ten. "I'm hanging up because this is impossible."
"It's existentially impossible, you're damn right. But I hate to tell you this, pal, existentialism is a no-dick philosophy."
Anger locked the Writer up in rigor.
"It's just an excuse for smarter than average losers to justify their existence. Social basket cases like Sartre and Kierkegaard and Heidegger and fuckin' Camus—"
"I would never say fuckin' Camus!" the Writer almost bellowed.
"—and all those other socially paralyzed misfits."
The Writer steeled himself. "I'll ask you again... Who are you?"
"Jesus, man. You're a published novelist, aren't you?"
"Of course!"
"And didn't you graduate from Yale's English Lit Department with a 4.0?"
The Writer bristled. "Harvard," the word ground out of his breath.
"Did you every really read Conrad, or did you just skim the Cliff Notes?"
This was mortifying. "You're impossible, so I'm hanging up," he informed the phantom voice but now—
The line was dead.
The Writer was left to stand, phone to ear. He could see his own reflection, however scratched, in the chrome box-face. Calm down, he told himself. This is just an alcohol-induced hallucination, nothing more. I'm simply going to go back to my room and go to bed. There's no doppelganger there, no "double," no metaphorical twin. This is just job-stress and too much drinking...
But he did decide to have one more beer before he left. His ruminations, however, stalled him before he could go back inside. Nancy having a sexual dream about him last night was disturbing, of course, because he'd had one about her as well. But that was coincidental, and, as good-looking as she was? Who WOULDN'T have sexual dreams about her? The bull's head on the baby? Now that duped him; the Writer hated Greek Mythology. But it was the hallucinotic phone-voice that puzzled him more. It came from MY subconscious so... how come I don't get it? It was clearly a reference to Joseph Conrad, the acclaimed English writer whose Heart of Darkness proved perhaps the greatest fictional work of applicable modern nihilism ever written, not just the dark heart of Africa but the dark heart of Man.
What could that... have to do with...
Then the Writer recalled his own personal favorite of Conrad's: "The Secret-Sharer."
The story of a merchant sailor, and the man sleeping in the bunk above him... is himself...
His better half...
THUNK-THUNK-THUNK-THUNK-THUNK! he heard next, and jumped at the start.
It sounded like someone kicking a metal door, and beside him, indeed, was a metal door which appeared to be a walk-in refrigerator room for beer. But—
THUNK-THUNK-THUNK-THUNK-THUNK!
It wasn't coming from there. It's coming from... , and the Writer turned his head toward the back lot.
That U-Haul?
Gravel crunched as he walked over, measuring careful steps to off-set his drunkenness. Probably another hallucination, he deduced, but he almost shrieked right after he tapped on the U-Haul's door and was immediately answered by:
THUNK-THUNK-THUNK-THUNK-THUNK! and also a muffled squeal.
Someone gagged, kicking and screaming...
He jerked around at the sound of more crunching footsteps. It was Lud, carrying a shuck-and-jive smile.
"There ya are. I was wonderin' where ya got to, son. And can ya believe it? My carry-out burger still ain't ready! Thought I'd come out fer some fresh air whiles I wait—"