Crossroads
- Автор: Франзен Джонатан
- Год: 2021
- Язык: английский
- Год: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
- Жанр: Современная русская и зарубежная проза
Электронная книга - «Crossroads». Краткое содержание книги:
Universally recognized as the leading novelist of his generation, Jonathan Franzen is often described as a teller of family stories. Only now, though, in *Crossroads* , has he given us a novel in which a family, in all the intricacy of its...
He crouched at her feet. “Will you tell me what happened?”
“There’s no point in explaining—you won’t understand.”
“Try me.”
She shut her eyes. “Philip says I can’t go with you anymore. I know that sounds stupid, and if that’s all it was I wouldn’t—I might still go. But with everything else it’s just easier not to.”
The thought that the surgeon might be jealous of him—had reason to be jealous—only deepened Russ’s sense of defeat.
“He knew,” Frances said, “that I did volunteer work in the city. But when he found out where the church is, he said it was too dangerous. I tried to explain that it’s not so bad, but he wouldn’t listen, and—I hate being submissive. It’s not who I want to be, but in this case it’s just easier, because that really is who I am: I’m the person who does whatever’s easiest.”
“That’s not true at all. Have you talked to Kitty about this?”
“I can’t. Kitty won’t respect me, either. I mean—I know, I know, I know. I’m with another jerk—I know. Larry’s already barely speaking to me. I made him go to lunch with Philip, and Larry could see it—everyone can see it. I’m with a jerk again. A worse jerk, actually. Bobby at least wasn’t a racist.”
“No one should be allowed to tell you what you can and can’t do.”
“I know, and, like I said, if it was just Philip I might stand up to him. But the thing is, inside, I’m just like him. I still think I’m going to get raped or murdered every time I go down there.”
“These are deep patterns,” Russ said. “It takes time to develop new patterns.”
“I know, and I’ve been trying. I apologized to Theo, the way you told me to, and you were right—it made a difference. But I couldn’t stop thinking about Ronnie, how to help him, and so I talked to Theo again. According to him, the problem is that Ronnie’s mother is a heroin addict. I asked if he could get her into a treatment program—I offered to pay for it myself and let him say the money came from his congregation.”
“That is not the action of a person who isn’t good.”
“But he basically said it was impossible. He thinks Clarice would start using drugs again as soon as she gets out. I told Theo there has to be some okay foster family that would take a sweet little boy. I offered to talk to a social worker myself and make sure everything checked out. But Theo said, if I did that, the social worker would never let Clarice near Ronnie again. I said I thought that might be for the best. But Theo said Ronnie’s the only thing keeping Clarice alive, and that a social worker wouldn’t see that, because the state only cares about the boy’s welfare, not the mother’s. I tried to remember what you told me and not argue with him, but I pointed out that he’s okay with a situation no social worker would be okay with. I said that sooner or later something terrible is going to happen. And Theo just shrugs. He says, ‘That’s in God’s hands.’ And that shut me up. I didn’t argue with him.”
“None of this,” Russ said, “makes me think less of you. Quite the opposite.”
Frances didn’t seem to hear him. “I’m not like you,” she said. “I can’t accept that God creates a situation so terrible there’s no getting out of it. To me, it’s like there’s a door, and behind the door is the inner city, and everywhere you turn there’s a situation so terrible that no one can fix it, and I’ve reached the point where I just can’t open the door again. I just want to shut it and forget what’s behind it. When Philip said I couldn’t go with you again, I had this horrid sense of relief.”
“I wish you’d told me sooner,” Russ said. “No situation is so hopeless that nothing can be done. Maybe, next time we’re down there, you and Theo and I can do some brainstorming.”
“No. I’m not going there again—it’s just not for me. I wanted it to be for me. I looked at you and I said to myself, that’s the person I want to be like. It was exciting to be with you, but I think I mistook being with you for being like you. The reality is I’m a crap human being.”
“No, no, no.”
“Apparently I’m turned on by jerks. I’m turned on by money, by trips to Acapulco, nobody judging me, nobody forcing me to open doors I don’t feel like opening. The idea that I could be a different kind of person was just a fantasy.”
“There’s a difference between fantasy and aspiration.”
“You don’t know my fantasies. Actually, you did see one of them—I’m still ashamed of that.”
Russ sensed that she’d come to him wanting to be saved but not knowing how; was edging toward a breakthrough and needed a push. But saved from what? From loss of faith, or from the surgeon?
“What exactly—was it?” he said. “The fantasy.”
She blushed. “I imagined you were somebody who didn’t let being married get in the way of—I imagined you could be a jerk.” She shuddered at herself. “Do you see the kind of person I am? It’s like I needed to drag you down to my level. If you were at my level, I wouldn’t have to keep looking up to you and feeling like I was falling short.”
His dilemma had never been plainer. She liked him for his goodness, it was the best thing he had going for him, and by definition goodness meant not having her.
“I’m not so good,” he said. “I’m like you—I did the easy thing. I married, I had kids, I took a job in the suburbs, and it’s made me nothing but unhappy. My marriage is a disaster. Marion sleeps in a different room—we barely speak—and my children don’t respect me. I’m a failure as a father, worse than a failure as a husband. I’m more of a jerk than you may think.”
Frances shook her head. “That only makes me feel worse.”
“How so?”
She stood up and stepped around him. “I never should have flirted with you.”
“Just give me a chance,” he said, jumping to his feet. “At least come to Arizona. There’s a spirituality in the air, in the people. It changed my life—it could change yours, too.”
“Yeah, that was another mistake. Trying to make you go there with me.”
“Not at all. If it weren’t for you, I might never have patched things up with Rick. You did a great thing for me. You’ve been such a bright star in my life—I don’t know what’s happened to you.”
“Nothing’s happened. It was only dreading this conversation—having to disappoint you. I’ll be fine as soon as I can close the door again.”
By way of illustration, she moved toward the door, and Russ couldn’t stop her. He was utterly impotent. All at once, he was seized by a hatred so intense he could have strangled her. She was insensitive and self-adoring, a careless trampler of records, a casual crusher of hearts.
“That’s bullshit,” he said. “Everything you say is bullshit. You’re only running away because you’re too chicken to face the goodness in your heart, too chicken to take responsibility. I don’t believe that disengaging from the world is going to make you happy. But if that’s the miserable life you want, we don’t need you in the circle. We don’t need you in Arizona. If you don’t have the guts to honor your commitments, I say good riddance.”
His emotion was authentic, but to express it so directly was a Crossroads thing. He sounded like Rick Ambrose in confrontation mode.
“I mean it,” he said. “Get the hell out of here. I don’t want to see you again.”
“I guess I deserve that.”
“Fuck deserving. You’re a mess of phony self-reproach. It makes me sick.”
“Wow. Ouch.”
“Just leave. You really are a disappointment.”
He hardly knew what he was saying, but in sounding like Ambrose he felt some of the power that Ambrose must have felt all the time. As if, however momentarily, the Lord was with him. Frances looked at him with a new kind of interest.
“I like your honesty,” she said.