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I thought about starting at the beginning.
But that's not how I remember it.
It's all a series of... fragments.
Repetitions.
Pattern formations.
When there are no words for the pain...
...let your imagination change what you know.
Conglomerates. Conglomerates.
Movement of land in the freedom of water.
A ring around a rock is luck. Smoothed...
Smoothed into a small thing.
Sandstone is soothing and lucid. Shale, of course, is rational.
Red rock is earth blood.
You believe in blue.
I'm sorry.
Memories...
...are stories.
So you better come up with one you can live with.
Smiley face.
Flower.
Christmas tree.
Stop.
Claudia, go upstairs.
Go!
Move!
You just let me know when you're finished.
We can do this all night.
Ah, fuck it!
I think it'll feel nice, Claudia. I really think it will.
Fix you right up.
Fix you right up!
Sing with me, Belle.
♪ Oh, my darlin'
♪ Oh, my darlin' Clementine ♪
Come on, Lidia Belle. Sing with me.
You know all the lyrics.
♪ You're lost and gone forever
♪ Dreadful sorrow... ♪
It was my voice that left.
Sometimes I think it arrived on paper.
I wrote... Pictures and true things.
...lies interchangeably. It made me feel like...
- Made me feel like someone else. - Oh, for Christ's sake!
- I wrote words to belong to. - That is your daughter!
Not daughter.
To swimmer.
To safety.
To girls.
Make my skin hot. My head hurt, my...
Mother. Her hair.
Her scar.
Her stories.
I won a prize for that story, Belle.
And your daddy...
...won an art prize for this drawing.
How gone she was.
And my sister. My adoration.
My sister. My awe.
You look like a bum in that dumpy sack shirt.
It does nothing for you.
Look at me.
You trying to look like a man?
My sister. Taking everything.
Before you were even born.
In the house.
Alone in my room.
My arms ache.
My sister is gone.
My mother is...
...gone.
My father designs houses in the room next to mine.
He's smoking.
Hey, honey.
Hey.
I wait for 5 am.
I pray...
...to swim.
My baby girl.
Growing up so fast.
A teenager.
In high school. I can't believe it.
All right. Line up.
Ladies, weigh in. You know the drill.
One lick for every pound you're over.
Torres.
Atta girl.
That's right.
There you go.
Reimer. Three pounds.
Faster.
Come on, baby.
Harder.
Yuknavitch. One for you, freshman.
So we'll make it count.
Go!
How many miles does it take...
...to swim...
...to a self?
How...
...many...
...fucking...
...miles?
We set a record!
- We set a fucking record! - Yes!
We are proud to announce that our 200-yard medley relay
gold-medal winners from the Florida Aquatic Swim Team
have achieved the best time in the entire nation.
Congratulations.
Scouts are watching, seniors.
So, you really want this, huh?
OK.
You only got a three-quarter ride.
Hey, if they wanted you,
they would have offered the whole nine yards, huh?
"We are delighted to offer a partial scholarship."
Half. You're better than that.
Last one.
In my head, I swam laps.
Didn't even get one full ride.
Hey. Don't blame me.
If they don't want you, you don't belong there.
I could taste blood.
The answer is no.
Why?
Because he could.
What?
And I was his.
Hey. Look at me.
Look at me.
I only want the best for you.
You know that.
I knew he could feel it.
That pink muscle.
Pushing.
And pushing.
You should be warming up.
For all of its worth.
Hey, Lidia.
Do you need a hand? I'm a coach from Texas Tech.
I'm excited to meet you. Let's talk.
We'd like to have you on our team.
Yes.
I almost loved her.
Let's go, Belle.
Cos I know you! I know what you do!
And it is disgusting! You hear me?
It's fucking disgusting, Lidia!
You should be ashamed of your...
Lidia!
This is control.
I am controlling myself.
You don't know how far I can go.
My bedroom holds the wet and the dark of my body.
It smells like my sweat...
...and chlorine.
Hey. Can't sleep, huh?
Yeah. Me neither.
Come here. I want to talk to you.
Listen. I'm sorry I've been so hard on you lately.
I guess I just...
...really worry about you out there.
Things are gonna be different when you go to college.
I want you to listen to me.
He narrated what boys would do to me.
How they would put their dirty hands up my skirt and fingerfuck me.
Fondle my tits.
Suck them.
How disgusting boys would be.
Their hands, their hips wanting in and up.
And their dicks.
And his.
Me sitting next to him.
Feeling the heat of him without even looking.
What you doing out here?
What's the matter with you, huh?
I want you to know that, um...
...that I love you.
Huh.
You're a fucking whore.
You have something to say to me?
Huh?
Fuck you, motherfucker.
What did you...? What did you just say?
Fuck you...
...motherfucker.
Get the fuck OUT OF MY WAY!
All I thought...
...was my own wide-open cunt.
As open as a mouth...
...screaming...
Mother... Mother... Mother...
...fucker.
Motherfucker.
I didn't know a girl body could do that.
Shoot cum.
My own thoughts. Mine. My own space.
My own booze. My own days. My own nights.
Mine. My own sex. My own booze.
My own food. My own thoughts. My own friends. Mine.
Mine.
Mine, mine, mine, mine.
My own freedom.
My, my, my, my, mine.
Like something pressed so far down in a body...
...it had to explode.
Yuk!
Where do you think you're going?
I know you.
You're going nowhere.
♪ Oh, my darlin'
♪ Oh, my darlin'... ♪
♪ Oh, my darlin' Clementine... ♪
♪ You were lost and gone forever
♪ Oh, my darlin' Clementine... ♪
So far from my father. So far from...
So far from my father. So far from my father. My father.
So far from my father.
I just want...
I love your hands.
I love your voice.
It's my father and my brother who have the real voices.
I always hear them in my head.
Really?
What are they saying?
They're singing "Amazing Grace...
Voices of God.
Fuck me.
Yeah.
No. Really.
Fuck me.
Poor Phillip.
I wish I could go back and apologise.
♪ The way it's been going
♪ And I know that peace will come... ♪
Fuck all y'all!
Eat me!
♪ I've been a-searchin'
♪ For the dolphins... ♪
Just a regular James Taylor,
singin' his heart out here in Texas!
♪ And sometimes I wonder
♪ Do you ever think of me?
♪ This world may never change
♪ The way it's been going
♪ And I know that peace will come ♪
Lidia... why do you always do that?
It's funny. Come on. It's funny. You know it.
- You're such... - ...such a pussy!
Come on. Learn how to take a...
...joke. You're so fucking sensitive.
This is probably one of the most pathetic things I've ever seen.
This is what I'm... This is what I'm talking about.
It's like... It's like talking to a fucking doorknob.
Why don't you say something?
Will you say anything?
I'm being a fucking bitch,
so why don't you do something about it?
You're...
You're not a bitch.
Fuck you, Phillip!
You don't even fucking know me, Phillip!
Phillip...
...means "lover of horses".
Goddamn.
Or "brotherhood".
Wake up, motherfucker!
Hey, Lids. Want to get out of here?
She's good, man. I'll take her back.
Hey, man. Shut that door.
Just shut the goddamn door!
Haven't seen you at practice.
Yeah. I flunked out.
That's cool.
I can still feel my face.
Addiction is in me for sure.
But I want to describe something else to you, something smaller.
It's a smaller word.
Mama?
So small it could travel a bloodstream.
Go away, Belle.
Hm.
Go away, Belle!
Stay away.
This isn't anything for you.
I'm not talking 'bout anything.
I'm not talking about anything.
Dorothy?
Get up. Get up. Get up.
I'm sorry!
I'm sorry.
Yeah. Lidia...
...you can talk to us.
It helps.
Trust me.
- I'm not talking about anything. - Mm.
You know, I always like to say, uh...
...find meaning in life's traffic...
...through clearing spiritual barriers.
Uh...
I'm proud of you.
You know?
Yeah.
Hey.
Would you marry me?
OK.
♪ And children have their dreams
♪ To hold on to
♪ And how they fly
♪ Take us to the moon
♪ Yes, they flow
♪ From you
♪ They flow from you
♪ And they flow
♪ From you
♪ And women have themselves
♪ To hold on to
♪ And how they fly
♪ Take me by surprise
♪ They float from me
♪ And they float from me... ♪
Aah!
Fuck.
Aw!
Oh!
Jesus.
Sweetheart.
You did so good.
You did so good!
I made you some tea.
I don't want any tea. What are we gonna do?
Lidia... I love you.
And whatever you want to do, I'll support it.
That's it?
I need more than nothing
from the most passive man on the fucking planet!
Sorry. I've been kind of sick.
You don't want anything.
And you are killing me with your not wanting anything!
- What were you thinking? - I don't know.
I don't know. I don't know. It's fucking impossible.
I can't stand how nice he...
I can't stand how nice he is, but...
...I couldn't have killed it either.
I was thinking...
...maybe there's a world in which I...
...I come and... live with you in Eugene
and take some classes where you're teaching and...
I don't know. Maybe we could start, like, a little...
...family.
- Yes. - Cos I think my life with him
is gonna be, like, some sad, sad fucking country song.
- And this is the only thing... - Lidia. Lidia.
I said yes.
Come home.
OK.
Cool.
Because she left me once...
...to save her own life.
What are you two doing back there, playing with yourselves?
What? I bring them to the most beautiful scenery in the world,
and they're just playing grab-ass?
Look out the goddamn window!
Claudia, grab the hacksaw from under your mother's seat.
Come on! Let's go.
Here you go, sweetheart.
For sustenance.
You don't want it?
Come on, honey. Just have a little sip. It'll warm you up.
Mmm.
♪ Blowin' bubbles soft and fine... ♪
Well, thank God.
Where's the tree?
Just...
Hm.
There.
That's the picture.
Welcome home.
Oh!
Come on in. I'll get that.
- Why? Cos I'm pregnant? - Yeah.
- Here. - Thanks.
Mm.
Fuck.
Argh!
Thank you, Claudia.
Do you remember when you used to make me do things?
Like...
"Here. Bite this apple."
Sock it in my mouth.
"Here. Smell this ashtray."
"Just blow it. One, two..."
Ashes all over my fucking face.
I would have done anything.
You were mythic to me.
I remember when I went downstairs after you moved into the basement.
I didn't realise how smart that was then, but...
I used to look at all of your stuff and used to touch it.
One time I found a razor blade in your purse.
Cut myself on it.
Made the fact that I had to pee hurt.
I, um...
I know that this is a...
...sacrifice.
No.
It's just...
...you were so little...
Yeah.
Well...
...this is one way to Frankenstein your life.
Maybe... I've been waiting for this.
Yes. Breathe.
I know.
Come on. Come on.
You... can... do it.
Where is she?
Can I hold her?
Uh, yeah.
Just one second. We're just cleaning her up.
Her lips are pink.
They're pink.
Just...
...throw it as far as you can.
It's not funny.
Get it.
Gah!
Sorry.
I know.
Look. She's all over you.
You're fucking laughing.
What lived and died between us...
...haunts me.
Still.
Goddamn, girl.
What are you, some kind of mermaid?
Yep.
You got something to say?
No way.
Come on.
You deserve this. You don't want to come with me?
This is crazy. I'm not even a grad student.
I'm just trolling the English department.
You think Kesey gives a rat's ass about U of O rules?
- You will regret not doing this. - They won't even let me enrol.
Bullshit. I already told him about you.
The...
These...
He's gonna love you.
You don't want to write a novel with Ken Kesey?
Hey, everyone. Um... Hey, everybody. Hey.
You're an idiot.
Hi. Um, this is Lidia.
- Say hi. - Hi.
Well, hello. What do we have here?
A triple-A tootsie?
I know what happened to you.
Death is a motherfucker.
Shit.
- Jeff. - Yes?
You think you can roll one? I hate sitting in a room full of writers.
Sure.
The chair will be fine.
I want you all...
I want you all to be winners.
I want you to be warriors.
Warriors.
I'll give you the warrior test.
Uh... Shit floats. Cream rises.
Shit floats. Jerry Rubin.
Cream rises.
Ferlinghetti.
Lord Buckley.
Lenny Bruce.
The greats.
I want you to be great.
Shit, somebody...
...has got to create our culture for the next 50 years.
And I want it to be you.
All right. There are only two rules. One:
Do not talk the plot of our novel to anyone outside this class.
Two: I comprise 50% of the class,
so we only write together...
...because we will publish or perish together.
Nelson Algren said,
"The job of the writer...
...is to pull the judge down onto the dock.
To make the Almighty feel
what it's like to be down low."
He'll be all right.
Grass never killed anybody.
So, go.
Right now.
Write some bizarre sentences.
Hey! Where are you?
You can't take Quaaludes before the class.
Now disappear into your imagination.
Come on! Disappear into your imagination.
Nobody's in the room but you and that pen.
Better.
Here you are.
This is the shit.
I wrote Demon Box in here.
This room here is a creative room here.
It's a creative space.
Hey, Bennett. You didn't bring any ludes with you, did you?
You know, those kind of drugs put you into your body, not into your mind.
Stick with the acid, psilocybin, San Pedro...
Something that'll disintegrate your ego
so you can hear your inner voice.
And you write from that voice.
You want your voice to come through.
Oh, Jesus.
That's not supposed to happen.
I got wrestler's knees.
All right!
Let's get outside before the sun sets.
I want you...
...to meet someone.
Come on!
Fuck you, God!
God got the commandments wrong. I think there's 11 commandments.
And it should be the first commandment: Have mercy.
- Hey. - Lord, have mercy!
Just think, if everybody had mercy for each other,
where we'd be today.
You see a man in the street who needs a few dollars, give it to him.
Have mercy. He needs it.
He wouldn't ask for it if he didn't need it.
Mercy.
Hire me to rewrite the... Bible.
What are you, some kind of mermaid?
Yep.
You know, when Jed died, my boy...
...I wanted to cease to exist.
And everybody that talked to me said something asinine.
Or didn't say anything at all.
Nobody understands death anymore.
It used to be sacred. So sacred.
Shit.
No one's big enough to hold what happens to us.
No one is big enough to hold what happens to us.
You got something to say?
It's in your hands.
Everything about my father was in his hands.
It's all about coordination.
A perfectly-balanced dance of shadow and light.
Before my father was my father,
he was an artist.
Your daddy won a prize
for this drawing.
Before my father was an artist,
he was an athlete.
Before my father was my father...
...he was beautiful.
And she was.
Before my father was my father,
he was a boy.
Just a boy
whose own mother...
...cut his tongue.
Before I hated him...
...I loved him.
Look up. If you don't look where you're going, you're gonna crash.
When you get to the bottom of the hill, brake enough to make a turn.
OK?
Go. Keep your eyes on the road!
Keep going.
Keep your head up!
Keep those eyes on the road! You gotta brake!
Mike.
Mike!
- Get a flashlight. - What for?
- She's hurt down there. - What?
- What happened? - Shut the goddamn door!
- Yeah. - You done with that chapter?
Hey.
Hi.
Hello.
I'm a writer.
Thank you.
We are gathered because, uh, we want to see the results.
We want to witness the results of this experiment.
A collaborative novel written by us.
Please, let's welcome the first of the not-so-merry pranksters
to the stage to present...
...Caverns.
Lidia! Come on up!
You're gonna kill it.
Hello.
- My thigh, behind my knee... - There you go.
- You too? - My asscrack.
Back of my knees, and they're just like...
Lidia's father.
What can I say? I'm a great admirer of yours.
- Mike. Is that right? - That's right.
Glad you could make it.
Lidia and I, we saw Cuckoo's Nest
and Sometimes a Great Notion together,
and it's just great.
I mean, great books.
You know, Mike...
...Lidia here...
...she can knock it out of the park.
Do you want me to sign that?
Thanks for coming, Dad.
OK.
To... Mike?
Please.
"To Mike.
Be...
...brave."
There you go, Mike.
- There you go, baby. - Yep.
I've seen a lot of writers come and go.
You got the stuff.
Got something for you. Here.
Here.
It comes from the most spiritual beach on Earth.
Hold that.
You can hold it all.
You're gonna hold it all, girl.
So...
So, what's next?
- Next? - Next. What is next? Next.
I want to write The Sound and the Fury.
Of course you do, honey.
Oh, boy.
Here. Throw it and see if I can catch it.
- Ready? - Yeah.
Ah, shit!
Ah.
A lot riding on that going in.
It has no metaphor.
- OK. - Fuck metaphors.
- OK. - It's just a rock that fell.
I'm gonna get the rock and I'm gonna go pee.
All right.
Oh, yeah! There we go! You got it!
That was the last time I saw him.
You can write, girl!
I'm of the opinion that he drowned.
Caddy wants to fuck. She's insatiable.
And because her neighbour boy man has a giant pants bulge
and a sound that comes out of him instead of language,
she goes over to his house and she removes all of her clothes,
so he finally fucks her.
And crushes her.
He fucks her to death, and she loves it!
And she laughs until she cries, and an ambulance has to come.
But it's too late.
That is The Sound and the Fury.
Trite.
Look, I've already read The Sound and the Fury.
Reworking Faulkner is some college shit.
Maybe try something original.
God, I hate them.
Hey. What the hell does he know?
It is original. It's a fucking pastiche.
- Hey! - Ha! Hey.
You want to go to the coast? I got us a room.
- Hi, Hannah. - We're gonna work on these this weekend.
- Right. - Come on. Your fly's undone.
Lids.
What is that?
Oh!
I fucking dare you.
Anything. Anytime. Anything. Anytime.
Come on.
Anything. Anytime.
Anything.
Anytime.
Whoa!
Anywhere. Anything. Anytime.
- Please be careful. - To feel absolutely... nothing.
I'm gonna go grab some firewood. Don't do anything I wouldn't do.
Is this like a...?
A fuck trip?
What?
I've never... I've never licked pussy.
Oh!
I wanted to stay like that.
Outside of any word.
Inside the unnamed wet.
You OK?
I love you, Lids.
I really love you.
Yeah.
I'll see you later.
In water...
...like in books...
...you can leave your life.
- I got it. I got it. - No!
I remember a happy childhood.
- Ah! - Come on, come on.
We dive, we swim, we race. We...
Ooh, Lidia went fast that time.
We laugh like other people's children.
I remember first and last names
like Evie Kosenkranius and Lynn Collella Belle.
Lynn Collella Belle.
Making song loops in my skull.
♪ Lynn Collella Lynn Collella Belle, Belle ♪
Mono?
Isn't that the kissing disease?
No. Don't be silly.
Everything's gonna be OK, Belle. You'll see.
You're gonna feel better.
And your daddy's gonna take real good care of you.
- Aren't ya? - We'll be all right.
OK. Mama's gonna go sell some houses.
Hey, honey.
My baby girl.
You just give it a couple of days.
Shh.
It is language letting me say...
- There you go. - ...how four weeks can be years.
It is the yielding expanse
of a white page.
Have you shown these to anyone?
No.
Skin. Scars.
People always ask me why my work is so dark.
What do you know about pain, Lidia?
Um...
I know that...
...it matters to me.
I'm gonna take care of you.
Do you understand?
Now ask me for what you want.
Um...
That's not right, angel.
Um...
I...
...want you to...
Hm?
Knock it out of me.
To whip me.
Where would you like to be whipped... angel?
Everywhere.
Take it somewhere.
Take the pain somewhere.
Mama.
Yeah.
I am proud of you.
I'm not trying to creep you out.
I'm trying to be precise.
"...my mother was whining,
Daddy was smelling my cunt.
'I've reached my best moment now', he explained.
Now I was sure what he was referring to. 'This is the moment of truth.
I'm going off, off, off, jacking it off.
My hands are gonna be broken. I don't even recognise my own body.
It doesn't matter. I know you're mine.
I made you, I'm making you. I swore I'd live for pleasure.
My tongue is fucking enormous. Feel it. It's reaching down to my waist.
You're seeing your actual father in his moment of truth.
God Almighty, nothing matters. You're my God, my daughter, I worship you.
I beg you to do it, show I can please you.
Now look at it. It's big in my corkscrewing hand.
Kiss it.'
My father explained again, 'I am fucking God.
And I made God. Holy shit. All I have to do is look at God,
and God is happy cos I've made God cum.
God is in heaven. I'm in heaven and I've died.
The whole world in heaven. I'm cumming all over your face.'
- I licked up his sperm." - This is making me sick.
Who in the hell do you think you are?
My father's daughter.
Goddammit.
Year one.
Vodka!
I drink vodka, mostly all the time.
One shot in the eye, shot in the eye.
I felt nothing about myself.
- We drink, we laugh, we... - Fuck.
We make fuck-body paint shadows.
We make performance art. We perform ourselves.
Fuck you, God!
Open the door!
We carved each other's names into our arms.
I did it for you!
Fuck!
We fuck septic.
It was right in front of me. I could see what was happening.
- You don't even realise. - Realise what?
Realise I'm gonna fucking marry you.
Whoa! Oh!
To Mike and Dorothy!
I'm so happy they fucked.
To skip to year six.
- Hey! - When underwater stories start itching.
And yelling begins a rhythm where drinking gets louder...
Go back to kissing women I know and kissing women I don't know!
And what is a couple over time but a line?
I'll show you a fucking line.
Your fucking bullshit is taking over the house!
It was taking over the house.
Oh, no.
Fuck.
I don't wanna fuck.
I want to read.
Fuck you.
I didn't want to drink.
I wanted to write.
What is a couple over time but a line?
Year seven, I finish my dissertation.
Year eight, I get a PhD.
Year ten.
We pretend.
You said that...
...you would love me until I die.
You said we would die together in love.
You said that to me.
Where are you?
Where is the man?
Who would love a woman like me?
Don't you dare.
Ha.
"The date of your reading."
What?
Please welcome...
...reading an excerpt from her first collection
of short stories, Her Other Mouths,
Lidia Yuknavitch.
Lidia, please. Welcome.
"The day my daughter was born.
After I held the future.
Stillborn.
And pink.
And rose-lipped.
And rose-lipped in my shivering arms.
Little tragedies are difficult to keep straight."
"Chronology convinces us we are moving toward a real place.
'Swimmers, to your marks. "'
"A gunshot.
A gunshot released our tense flesh.
Fathers were often uncontainable
while the little women swam for their lives.
Swim.
'Swim!"'
"'Hurry!"'
"'Come on, baby.
Harder."'
' "Harder! Faster!'"
"A cacophony of men swelling
and pressing down on the wet motion."
"How many times did I slip into the chlorinated depths,
secretly hoping to shed this useless skin
and emerge something..."
"...amphibious...
...and without gender?
The thing is...
...this letting everything in...
...and waiting to see what comes out...
...is creepy...
...and idiotic.
And it's starting to piss me off
that I have to even think about that hole."
"What I am saying is...
...there is a woman in a room who is tired of looking down...
...and bleeding...
...and bearing and itching
and aching...
...and tired of remaining open
with no hope of suturing herself up.
It isn't that I want it gone.
It's that...
...I want wanting...
...to come from somewhere else."
"There are moments between years that surface with great force."
Remind me why we're here.
I thought this was your idea.
I came here with you.
Delusion.
Grown women are idiots.
I don't know.
She begged.
I changed my name.
Mike!
Lidia! Lidia!
Mike! Lidia!
- Lidia! - Turn him over!
Help me!
"Kill.
Or suck the killing back.
And pump it...
...into the story of someone else."
"My father lost his memory from hypoxia that day."
"I did not kill him.
I did not save him.
I am learning to live on land."
Um...
Thanks. Oh, that's... That's...
- Have your parents read this story? - Mm-hm.
Enjoy New York. You're gonna get an agent.
Lidia, it's so nice to meet you. Thank you for being here.
Excuse me.
Do you have anything, um...
...a little stronger?
Thanks.
Carol Houck Smith, Norton Publishing.
It's pretty impressive what you did up there.
Thank you.
No, really.
It didn't look easy.
Tell me, is there any more where that came from?
Something a little longer?
You should send me something.
It's just that...
...something in me had been born...
...still.
♪ And there you got me That's how you got me
♪ You taught me to be mean
♪ But I ran
♪ Out of
♪ White doves'
♪ Feathers
♪ To soak up the hot piss
♪ That comes from your mouth... ♪
It's a small stone I carry.
The shame of wanting something good.
♪ White doves' feathers... ♪
I hate my life!
Fucking trash.
Hey, what are you doing? Keep it moving.
Hi.
Chopping block.
Peer review.
Who wants to go first?
Really helpful.
You know, you can't live the wrong life.
You really can't. It's a story you were told.
Your one is just as important, it's your own.
It has to hurt. But I'm excited for you.
I don't give a shit!
Now what?
Something small and specific caught my eye.
An important detail. A bruise on the bridge of her nose
letting me know her eyes were blue, like mine.
Hey!
How much?
I pay her pimp $100. I ask her in.
I tell her to sit down.
In the story, I say...
This is what it feels like to be me.
A woman who teaches English,
looking down at a woman who sucks dicks all day
as she sits on my couch, smoking.
When I look at her, I think she looks like Mary.
Whenever I see an image of Christ,
I picture Mary so drawn and gaunt and tired
and angry to the point of emaciation
that she can barely wear her own face.
In the story, I say...
"What am I gonna do?
Teach her?"
This is what me, an addict, upwardly mobile,
given something as infinitesimally small
as words to believe in, thinks.
I'm looking at her.
Offer words.
People say to me all the time...
"Did the things in your short stories actually happen?"
Isn't that the...
...the question...
...when it comes to life?
Like...
Did this really happen to me?
Andy.
I don't know.
The things that happen to us are true.
But writing is a whole other body.
I was hoping we could discuss my manuscript.
Oh. Of course. Yeah.
I also want to loan you my car.
Saw you were taking the bus, and...
...I happen to have two cars.
Hey.
You can tell a lot about a person from seeing them in the water.
Thank you.
- For what? - For letting me swim with you.
I read a couple of your stories. I know that swimming's a big deal.
I always let my students choose the venue.
I wanted to say I've seen you a couple of times before.
I read about Ken Kesey teaching at U of O when I was abroad,
and I applied to the programme, but it already happened.
No shit. That's funny.
Yeah, I know.
Then I'd seen you stomping around the creative writing department.
I was in the reading you gave at Gerlinger.
Wow. That's...
That's weird. Weird.
That was a weird day for me.
Why?
My father...
...was... My f...
My father...
Your father?
...was abusive.
Your father.
How so?
Sexual.
Oh.
That sucks.
I hope something karmically fucked happened to him.
Yeah.
It kind of actually did.
Excellent, then.
Blah. It was a long time ago. I was a totally different person then.
So, who are you now?
I'm your teacher.
So, Teach, are you gonna take my car?
I don't quite know how to tell you what it feels like...
...watching the little woman swim for her life.
I mean...
Are you fucking insane?
No.
You think I'm someone else.
Mm-mm.
I can see the mother in you.
There's more to your story than you think.
Yeah!
Mm-hm.
Oh!
- Oh, it's very nice. - This is it.
Very nice.
We're gonna go this way, sir, on the left.
Oh, yeah.
What about the room?
They said it would be ready tomorrow for sure.
OK.
That must have been a very weird ride.
Thank you.
You don't ever have to say thank you to me.
- I'm good. - Yeah?
Yeah.
- Hi, Dad. - Marilou?
No. It's me. It's Lidia.
I know that, kiddo.
Huh...
Oh!
I read that book.
- Oh, yeah? - Yeah.
Do you know who wrote it?
Um...
You.
That's right.
- Did you read all of the stories? - I, uh...
There was one about swimming.
I liked that.
Thank you.
Not very flattering of me, though.
That's fair enough.
Huh...
You know, I won a prize for that story.
I got to go to New York.
Huh.
Well, isn't that something, huh?
It's beautiful here.
It's a...
It's a real home you have here.
Well done.
Well done, you.
The safest memories are locked away in the brains
of people who can't remember.
Oh! Oh! Get her, Mike! Get her, Mike!
You know I don't swim! Claudia, go get your sister!
Underwater forever.
There you go, pal.
Look, I'm doing 'wimming.
Wow!
What's wrong?
The water will go in my nose and ears
and into my brain.
Uh, Miles?
How many times have you seen
Mama swimming and swimming laps?
Lots of times, right?
- Yeah. - Have you ever noticed
that I've never got water in my brain?
Water's never gone into my brain.
- You want to see? - Hm.
Watch this. Tell me how much water goes in my brain.
- OK? - OK.
See?
OK, pull.
I have a very important game.
I'm gonna put my whole head underwater.
OK.
And we look at each other underwater.
- What game is this? - I made it up.
The key is...
...make up shit.
I'm not speaking out of my asshole when I say this.
Come in.
The water will hold you.
Anything.
Anything. Anywhere.
Anything. Anywhere. Anything.
Anywhere. Anything. Anywhere. Anything. Anywhere.
Anything.
Subtitling by MPS