`I'll be…'

He was chuckling too, in slow motion. `I'll be . . . the Savior . . . of the world . . . and do nothing, and you .. .'ll kill … me.'

`And I . .' Goddam it, it was funny! How beautiful it was `… I'll kill you.'

The room was a beautiful blur bouncing up and down on the bubbles of our laughter. Tears were in my eyes and I took of my glasses and put my face in my folded arms and laughed, my big body rumbling from cheeks to belly to knees, laughing, tears wetting my jacket, the soft cotton material caressing my wet face like bear's bristle, and crying with an ecstasy that I hadn't known before that moment, and looking up because I couldn't believe I was crying and Eric's face blurred, blurred bright but blurred and I looked for my glasses - such terror that I might never see again - and after groping for forty days I found them and put them on and looked at the blurred brightness and it was Eric's holy face flowing tears like mine and he wasn't laughing.

Chapter Twenty-one

[Being an edited tape from one of the early analytic sessions given by Dr. Jacob Ecstein to Dr. Lucius Rhinehart, neurotic. We are cutting into the tape about half way through the analytic hour. The first voice is that of Dr. Rhinehart.]

- I'm not sure why I entered into this affair but I think it may partially be aggression against the husband. How have your relations with Lillian been? - Fine. Or rather, about as usual, which means up and down but essentially

happy. I don't think it was or is aggression against Lil. At least I don't think it is.

But against the husband.

Yes. I won't use names or go into details because you know the people involved, but I find the husband too ambitious

and conceited. I experience him as a rival.

You don't need to hide the names. You know it would make no difference outside this office how I treated them.

Well, maybe. I suppose you're right, but I don't think the names should be necessary if I can present everything else

honestly. - The details.

Yes. Although I suppose you will know then immediately the people I'm talking about. But still, I'll omit the names. How did the affair start? - I followed . . . a whim one night and went to her place, found her alone, and raped her. Raped her?

Well, there was a good deal of cooperation. Actually, she enjoyed it more than I did. But the original idea was mine.

Mmm.

We've been seeing each other off and on now for about half a year.

Mmmm. I go to her place when her husband's away, or occasionally we meet in a room I rent in a Puerto Rican neighborhood.

Ahhh.

Sexually it's been rewarding. The woman seems totally without inhibitions. I've tried just about everything my

imagination can cook up and she seems to have more recipes than me.

I see. The husband doesn't seem to suspect a thing. He doesn't suspect a thing.

No. He seems completely wrapped up in his work. His wife says he pulls off a quick one about once every two weeks but with about as much passion or pleasure as when making an extended bowel movement. Mmmm. I once finished an orgasm in her while she was handing a towel in to her husband in the bathtub.

You what? I was pumping away from behind while she leaned into the bathroom and talked to her husband and handed him a towel.

Look here, Rhinehart, do you know what you're saying?

I thought I did.

How could you … How could you possibly…

What's the matter?

How could you possibly miss the significance of this affair?

I don't know. It seems just…

Free associate.

What?

I'll feed you words and you free associate.

Oh, okay.

Black.

White.

Moon.

Sun.

Father.

Mother.

Water. Ah. . . bathtub.

Road.

Roadway.

Green.

Yellow.

Fucking from rear.

- Ar . . . ah . . . ah . . . artificial.

Artificial?

Artificial.

How so? -How should I know? I'm just free associating.

Let's go on. Father.

Figure.

Lake.

Tahoe.

Thirst.

Water.

Love.

Women.

Mother.

Women.

Father.

Women.

White.

Women.

Black.

Negresses.

Well. That's enough. It was just as I expected.

What do you mean?

That was your father in the bathtub.

It was?

Obviously. Item number one: you associate father figure. You may consciously explain this as a result of the psychoanalytic phrase and it does refer to this, but the association also implies you associate a `figure' - naturally a female figure - with father.

Wow.

Item number two. You associate `fucking from rear' with artificial and you can blurt it out only after a significant

delay. I challenge you to tell me what first flashed through your mind.

Well …

Go ahead.

To be frank with you, I thought that the fucking was artificial, unnecessary, irrelevant. I was aiming to hurt someone

… someone bigger.

Precisely. Item number three: from the rear is obviously the position of sodomy, or male making love to male.

But Item number four: you associate lake with Tahoe. Tahoe, even if your conscious mind denies it, means in Cherokee `Big Father Chief.' Lake obviously means water and you associated water with bathtub. Ergo: Big Father Chief was in the bathtub.

Wow. Finally, although these are but trivial confirmations of what now is obvious to you, you associate with `thirst', `water.' You thirst not for women but for water, for bathtub, for your father. At the end, the free association seems to break

down as you associate both your mother and father with women, but in fact it is further confirmation of the whole significance of your extramarital affair and of this free association your incestuous, homosexual love for your father. That's incredible. That's absolutely … wham … [Long pause] . . But what… what does it all mean?

How so? I've told you.

I mean . . . what should I do about it? 'Ah so. Details. Your urge for this woman will probably evaporate now that you know the truth.

My father died when I was two.

Precisely. I need say no more.

He was six foot and blond. The husband is five feet eight and dark.

Displacement.

My father never took baths, only showers, or so my mother tells me.

Irrelevant.

When a woman is handing a towel in to her husband and chatting with him, it's inconvenient to penetrate her from the

front.

Nonsense.

I didn't know Tahoe meant Big Father Chief.

Repression.

I think I'm still going to enjoy making love to this woman.

I challenge you to examine your fantasies when you do.

I usually fantasize I'm doing it with my wife. ,

The hour's up.

Chapter Twenty-two

Days pass, Reader. So do weeks. Since I have a poor memory and kept no journal during these now-to-be-recorded days, the precise sequence of events is no clearer in my mind than it is in these pages. The dice didn't order me to write my autobiography until almost three years after my discovery, and the historic value of everything I did was not apparent to me at the time.

On the other hand, my selective defective memory presumably is hitting only the high points. Perhaps it is giving to my random life a pattern which total recall would blur. Let us assume, then, that what I forget is on a priori grounds insignificant, and what I remember is, in the same way, of great moment. It may not seem that way to either of us, but it makes a convenient theory of autobiography. Also, if the transitions from chapter to chapter or scene to scene seem particularly illogical, attribute it to either my arbitrary memory or the random fall of a die: it makes the trip more psychedelic.

In the evolution of the totally random man the next event worth noting is that on January 2, 1969 at 1 A.M. I determined to begin the new year (I'm a slow starter) by letting the dice determine my long-term fate.