naomi williams
MFA Faculty
IN IRELAND
When people who aren’t writers meet a writer, they often say, “Oh, I’ve got a great story for you,” as if writers are technicians waiting for other people’s stuff to work on, like car mechanics. Sometimes they’ll bend your ear with some unsolicited personal anecdote, then say, “What do you think of that? Good story, right? You’re welcome.”
An ex-boyfriend did this to me once. We’d gone out for a few intense months as college freshmen but remained friendly enough afterward. The summer after graduation, he went to Ireland, and I married the nicer guy I’d started seeing sophomore year. Max sent us a set of table linens, white brocade subtly patterned with flowers. I still have them.
A year later, the phone rang and it was Max. It was early, too early to call, but he was about to board a flight for San Francisco and he’d be in town till tomorrow and could he stay with us? Sure, I said. We’ll be at work, so take a cab, let yourself in—I explained where we hid a spare key—we’ll be home around six.
When we came home, Max had already opened and consumed half a bottle of the Zinfandel we’d been planning to serve with dinner.
“I guess I should have bought another bottle of wine,” my husband said.
Max said nothing.
I said, “It’s fine,” although it wasn’t. I was already annoyed with both of them. Max for helping himself to our wine. My husband for the passive-aggressive way he called attention to Max’s drinking. The wild-mushroom risotto we made was delicious, but dinner felt strained.
My husband, a sensible, early-to-bed-early-to-rise type, said good night early. I found a six-pack in the back of the fridge and stayed up talking with Max in the living room. He seemed impervious to both jet lag and alcohol. I started telling him about a novel I was working on, an autobiographical thing about an artsy girl growing up among evangelicals. He looked bored.
“Well, it’ll probably come to nothing,” I said. I’d spent every minute of our few months as a couple afraid of losing his interest. And now I could feel the same old panic creeping in, starting with an electric buzz in my fingertips.
He leaned forward. “Here’s a better story for you,” he said, then described a day from his summer in Ireland. He’d been walking along an isolated stretch of coast and ended up at one point in a lush field whose only other occupant was a territorial bull that chased him till he leapt over what was probably a life-saving fence.
I laughed.
“Oh, it gets better,” he said, refilling his glass.
Shaken, he’d made his way to what looked like a well-trodden public path. Parts of it snaked along cliffsides that plunged hundreds of feet below to rocks and ocean. “You would’ve hated it,” he said, remembering my fear of heights.
“It’s not just fear of falling,” I said. “It’s like I’m afraid I’ll succumb to some primal urge to jump.”
“Exactly.” He told me he reached a point on the path where he could look straight down to a rocky cove and beach below, and while one part of his brain was trying to figure out a way down, another part was suggesting he just step off the edge. He stood there, struck by the beauty of the place and his own insignificance and the ease with which it could all end. But he saw a trail carved out of the hillside to the water, so instead of smashing to pieces on the rocks, he hiked down to the base of the cliff.
“And guess what I found there, right below the point where I’d been standing only a few minutes earlier contemplating my own demise?”
“You’re kidding,” I said.
“Why would I kid?” he said with easy belligerence.
“It’s just an expression of surprised interest, Max.” I wished his knee-jerk combativeness didn’t still bother me so much. I reached for my beer, but it was empty; Max had finished it. “So you found a body.”
It was a man, he said, thin, probably young, although it was hard to tell, as he was face-down. Back at the cliff-hugging trail, Max met a couple making their own way down; they went to alert the authorities while Max stayed on the beach. “The police showed up, and some coroner type, and they figured the accident or suicide had occurred less than an hour before.”
“Jesus,” I said. “What if you had happened by just a few minutes earlier?”
“I think about that a lot,” he said. “Maybe I could have saved a life.”
“Maybe you would have the additional trauma of witnessing someone falling—or jumping—off a cliff.”
He fixed his blue eyes on me. They had once mesmerized me but now looked glassy and unfocused. “I don’t feel traumatized,” he said.
“Okay, sure.”
“I just thought you might find it an interesting story.”
“It is an interesting story.”
“You should write it,” he said.
“You should write it.”
“I’m not the one claiming to be a writer,” he said.
I stood up to collect our empty cans and take them to the kitchen, then stood and pressed my fingers against my eyes to keep the sting from turning into tears. When I returned, he’d discovered our liquor cabinet and was examining an expensive bottle of port, a wedding present.
“I’m saving that for our anniversary,” I said.
“Why is it out where a guest might mistake it as available?”
“I’ve never had a guest before who drank our alcohol without even asking.”
He set the bottle down with a wince-inducing thunk, then crossed the room to the armchair where I was. He put his hands around my head, snaking his fingers into my hair, then pulled my face back to look up at him. “I didn’t know I had to stand on ceremony with you,” he said. I thought he was going to kiss me, and I knew I wouldn’t stop him if he did, but he let go and left the room.
“Good night, Max,” I managed to say after him, trying and failing to keep my voice light. Then I angrily, tearfully filled the dishwasher and turned it on. I hated crying in front of people; I still do. But crying in front of Max was never just embarrassing; it lost points in some game I’d never agreed to play but always found already in progress every time I saw him.
The next morning, I found an empty bottle of rum in the trash. The bottle had only been one-third full, but still. I moved it to the recycling bin before rapping on his door.
“I called you a cab for 8:30.”
The door opened after a series of grunts. “My plane isn’t till noon,” he said, squinting at me through one eye.
“We’re leaving for work.”
He sighed. “Okay. I get it.”
That was thirty years ago. I never saw him again and don’t know what became of him. I think of him on special occasions, when I pull out the Irish tablecloth and napkins. Then I remember his story about the day he was nearly gored by a bull and considered jumping from a cliff only a few minutes after someone else had. And I wonder about the younger me, why I’d once found a guy like him so compelling. I never did write that autobiographical novel. But now I’ve written his story, so I suppose he can chalk up another win.
NAOMI J. WILLIAMS IS THE AUTHOR OF THE NOVEL LANDFALLS (FSG, 2015), LONG-LISTED FOR THE CENTER FOR FICTION FIRST NOVEL PRIZE. HER SHORT FICTION HAS APPEARED IN NUMEROUS LITERARY JOURNALS, GARNERING FIVE PUSHCART PRIZE NOMINATIONS AND ONE WIN. DISTINCTIONS ALSO INCLUDE A SUSTAINABLE ARTS FOUNDATION GRANT AND RESIDENCIES AT HEDGEBROOK, DJERASSI, AND WILLAPA BAY AIR. EDUCATED AT PRINCETON, STANFORD, AND UC DAVIS, SHE LIVES IN SACRAMENTO, CA, AND TEACHES CREATIVE WRITING FOR THE ASHLAND UNIVERSITY LOW-RES MFA PROGRAM.