I Think You're Totally Wrong (29 page)

Returning on a forest service dirt road
.

DAVID:
I was staying in Mexico one summer, many years ago, writing
Dead Languages
. People at the hotel would ask me what I was doing and what the book was about, but I didn't have sufficiently good Spanish to explain this “literary” novel, so I made up this other book:
La casa del fuego
.

CALEB:
Your Spanish was decent enough to communicate that?

DAVID:
Each morning one of the waiters would ask me how my novel was coming along:
“¿Qué pasa con tu romance?”
And I'd say,
“¡Mi dios!”
Off I'd go on this fake novel. It was very basic—a melodramatic soap opera in which a house winds up burning down—but it was fun to “write.”

CALEB:
I'm surprised you don't spend more time in Mexico.
¿Balbuceas en español?

DAVID:
My Spanish was so faulty that if I stuttered, people thought I was simply having trouble with a foreign language, so it wasn't that evident. The moment I turned back to English, they'd notice that I spoke much faster in English.

CALEB:
Speak English and you can teach and see the world.

DAVID:
We're both lucky and unlucky we speak English.

CALEB:
Shit!

DAVID:
Uh-oh. That sounded bad. A puncture? Is that the main worry?

CALEB:
I almost hope there's a flat. Jeez, David Shields can't change a flat.

DAVID:
I don't keep picking up transvestites.

CALEB:
The park service must have decided to throw a bunch of jagged stones in a ravine every hundred yards. Slowly but surely we made it. Hot tub?

DAVID:
Sounds great. The Husky game is on, too.

CALEB:
What time?

DAVID:
They started at four. I wouldn't mind watching the last half, especially if they're in it. What time does the café close?

CALEB:
The bar's open past midnight, but the kitchen closes at around nine. You might meet Billy, town drunk, single father who bitches about his ex-wife and how he never sees his kids.

DAVID:
Fun!

RADIO:
(static)

CALEB:
What station, 950?

RADIO ANNOUNCER ONE:
Washington has scored on their first possession of the third quarter. 12:13 to go, 17–7, Dawgs, on the Washington Husky Sports Network.

CALEB:
That's a surprise.

DAVID:
That they're winning?

CALEB:
That. And we get reception. Two years ago, radio and cell phone were real bad in these parts.

ANNOUNCER ONE:
Joe Kruger, a much-heralded sophomore, six-seven, 270. His older brother, Dave, played for the Baltimore Ravens. This Kruger family—outstanding defensive linemen.

ANNOUNCER TWO:
And his brother Freddy, with all those movies. Figures as a slasher kind of guy. Freddy, yeah, he's over on Elm Street.

ANNOUNCER ONE:
Ha ha ha. Second and ten. Huskies at their forty-eight yardline, hash on the right. Handoff to Polk: midfield, forty-five, forty, first down and then some.

CALEB:
How often do you bump into David Downing?

DAVID:
Because he's so tall and we live near each other, I see him a lot, and he always says, “Are you still writing?” I say, “Yeah.” And he always says, “Well, when are you going to write another novel?” I'm like, Dude.

Caleb laughs
.

DAVID:
Is he just out of the loop?

CALEB:
He's written four novels.

DAVID:
Children's books, I think.

CALEB:
Maybe, but he told me he's got four unpublished novels and is working on another. These days he's a father, edits for Amazon, likes it, gets paid well, and has time to write.

DAVID:
We'll get readers nicely confused. They'll think they're in the middle of a Faulkner novel with six people all having the same novel. I mean, the same name.

CALEB:
I've tried all sorts of bio notes. I like the simple ones: “Caleb Powell likes hanging out with friends and family. He's always up for a beer.”

DAVID:
Those are good: “Anne Carson lives in Canada.”

CALEB:
Your bio mentions five awards you've won and that you've published eleven books and then goes on to list fifteen magazines you've written for. It's longer than the essay it's attached to. Why not just say, “David Shields can't change a flat”? Link to your blog and let that be that?

DAVID:
Well.

CALEB:
You up for shooting some hoops? Then hot tub.

David picks up the ball and takes a shot, which rims out
.

CALEB:
You wrote about Charles Barkley and how, wherever he goes, he'd get challenged. “You work at 7-Eleven and I'm in the NBA. What makes you think I want to hoop with you?” You made him seem cool: able to hang out with the regular guy.

DAVID:
(shooting ball)
He's complicated.

CALEB:
A little gimpy, but not too bad.

DAVID:
I haven't shot hoops in a long time. I swim, but basketball's not good on the back.

CALEB:
Okay. We'll just shoot around.

DAVID:
On my way to the pool, I always walk by the Green Lake courts so I can watch a few plays, hear some funny lines. One time, I could see the ball was going to bounce directly to me, so I moved my swim bag from one side to the other and stutter-stepped in order to catch the ball in
stride. I zoomed the rock behind my back to Ed Jones forty feet away. In that stentorian voice of his he just kept saying, “John Stockton! On the money! John Stockton! Dead on the money!” Highlight of my basketball life.

Caleb laughs
.

DAVID:
Key thing was I never looked back. Just kept walking.

CALEB:
Classy flesh-colored shorts.

DAVID:
I know. You probably thought I was naked.

CALEB:
I turn around and … eek!

DAVID:
They started out black, and I swim so much they've become brown over time.

CALEB:
They went from black to brown to flesh? I'll leave the DVR right here. No splashing.

DAVID:
This feels pretty damn good.

CALEB:
Really nice. Check out them thar mountains.

DAVID:
Don't turn it up any higher.

CALEB:
It's at 104. It doesn't go any higher.

Sound of water jets turning on
.

DAVID:
Jets?

CALEB:
We'll probably not be able to hear much. Let's take a break.