The Purse Snatcher Letters Read online

Bernard,

  I’m going to be artful with this letter, it’ll be all out of sync, but I think the effect will be better. I wrote this next bit while sitting in a public library, a random book taken off the shelf – a volume of some encyclopedia – and a sheet of paper, pen. I wrote this on a scrap, it was directly to you:

  “Hi Bernard. I don’t mind it’s come down to it in a library, I just wish that it somehow could have spun around that I’d wound up back in the old library where we grew up, still my favorite library ever, even though it’s probably changed a lot, that place imprinted on me, it’s what a library will always be to me. Remember we’d obsess over taking out Tintin books, always hope they’d have one of the ones shown on the back with a cool cover? We’d just get stuck with the boring ones, though, Destination Moon and Red Sea Sharks. I think we had great times there – I had great times there – it’s funny how it off and on became a hang out spot, totally forgotten when it wasn’t and I hadn’t even thought about it again until I had to duck in here to hide.”

  Suspenseful, evocative is that not? It gets better - there’s one more bit, written separate so I wanted to create the effect of space and pause by this – now to it:

  “I’m actually really terrified. I’m really nuts terrified, because I secretly hoped they wouldn’t even come here, but four of them, four of them, uniformed, big brutes have just stepped through and one of them is already talking to a librarian, explaining that they are looking for someone, for me.”

  Well, they didn’t catch me. It was the most eerie thing ever. Four policemen - I’d bungled up a snatch awful, two good Samaritans got at me long enough to have a good look and the only place to dash was the library so I dashed into the library. The original hope was that they police, by way of a canvas, would skip the library – why would I just stay in the library? – but they are a crafty lot, decided to actually follow the trail in a sensible way. I was scribbling that second bit when they were roaming – obviously - but I guess I wasn’t described so good by the witnesses and it was clever of me to have ditched the purse on a shelf – they found that, I watched them find it and almost had a seizure, though I had expected them to find it, of course. No, no, they went right past me then they split, then I split - I even walked past one of them who was still talking to a librarian.

  I don’t have enough to just stay in a hotel every night and it’s made me realize that living in a hotel is actually much more expensive than not – doesn’t that seem bizarre? It seems bizarre to me. And a little bit tilted against the life of crime, in general – it’s easier and more sensible in every way to not live as a criminal, a little job would pay for an apartment, lickity-split, but a job wouldn’t pay for a hotel, a motel, right? Why does that make any sense? I’d think people would charge more to let out an apartment or a room, the hotel should be cheaper – though that would make it a haven for flea bag varmits I suppose, the homeless can’t be allowed to afford hotels or motels, it would defeat the purpose of their being homeless.

  So – don’t worry when I tell you this, I didn’t have to, I just was testing it out – I did stay a week in a shelter, just to see what was it like - and it was odd. I mean, it was just like hanging out at a library or a crumby gym all day and then you sleep in a big room with everyone and it’s a lot of sad people using the toilet all night - pretty awful. I met a guy there who had been trying to make it as a stand-up comedian – he was, surprise, actually quite funny. So I went to an open-mic thing he did - or not an open-mic, he was paid twenty bucks, something, thirty bucks, we got drunk on it together, bottle of poison the comedy club sells to the performers on the cheap – but he wasn’t as funny, on stage, because he had a routine and some of it was about living at the shelter, so it seemed perversely socio-political, it put a squirm in everyone. He’s a funny guy to talk to though, really funny, and I was ready to be his agent by the time we were well into the bottle, but I explained how he’d have to change his act and then I realized what a drag it would be because why would I want to babysit a guy who lives in a shelter, who actually is funny but he doesn’t know what to do about it except tell jokes about being homeless? Not even jokes. It was like listening to a homeless person, is what it was – when he was on stage, it was like listening to a homeless man, then when he was just on the street drinking with me he was funny till the cows come home.

  I thought those cops were gonna nab me, absolutely - I have no run left in me, I’m surprised I ran to the library but I think that was more deep rooted instinct – I probably would’ve gotten beaten down if I hadn’t run, the police it’s another thing. Catch me, catch me, it’s fair and square - not that I want to get caught, it’s just on my mind more and more and I find it spooks me more each time, the inevitable, anticipation, knowing the lungs are gonna fill up with sand and what an awful way to go.

  All of this has put me in a reflective mood, I guess. I may have told you before how I’d maintained a relationship with this girl for like five months at one point – a year ago, I don’t know, nine months ago – I didn’t stop doing my thing, it’s how I supported myself and she had no idea, still has no idea. Try to imagine such a life - me and her, Sara, we see each other every day, we stay the night at her apartment a lot - I practically move in, except I’m wary to do that officially, of course - and I get to know her friends, I get to know her mom a bit, it’s a whole thing, a whole real thing. When we broke up, it was over a conversation that I wasn’t in love with her – the sort of thing I could see coming a mile off, because I wasn’t in love with her, but I knew she was in love with me and I’d say “I love you” all day long, a lot, even unprompted - “I love you, I love you, I love you” - I wouldn’t shut up about it, but I didn’t love her. Just some one of those conversations darts up all of a sudden and cornered me, but the whole thing was way too heavy and she puts it to me honest and straight, that she wants to know what it means, then and there, that I tell her I love her – she layers in that I “made her believe it, too” that she loves me and every day has been going around thinking she loves the man who loves her - what a jolly thing, what a lucky thing - but then I didn’t want to be full on with her or something, I didn’t want to plan out how our money would work out if we ever did live together and some random things, so she didn’t understand from how I responded what I meant that I loved her.

  I said it like pouring bad milk - it’s there, nothing to be done - “I don’t love you.” And even before I did any sort of elaborating, her face tore itself up - it was so hideous to go through - but I didn’t love her and at the time I was really mad because I didn’t know how it’d got to that point - I loved her like someone loves someone they’ve known a bit, for only a few months, and I said this at one point and she actually buried her face all up in her hands and hiccupped she started crying so hard.

  I felt awful about that for a long time, man - I felt subhuman. But now I don’t feel bad. I mean, it isn’t anyone’s fault they don’t love someone and the very fact that she had no idea about me - and if she knew the first thing about me the split would’ve gone the other way and she wouldn’t think twice about it, right? Or, no, I’m being kind – had the split gone the other way, had I said “Oh, I do love you” and we’d got on and then I tried to tell her one thing about myself, then I’d be a terrible liar - I’d be a slug, she’d still be mad and I’d be the villain. But I’m not bad, not a villain – what do I do? I don’t hurt anyone, and I get exhausted thinking about it like I do. Who do I hurt? Events put side-to-side, right, who did I do more harm to: some lady I swipe her handbag and she takes a spill, maybe, or some girl I didn’t fall in love with? Which horror is the more lasting? “A man once robbed me” or “Someone didn’t love me who I loved”? If I had to choose between one or the other, I’d chose taking the money for the telephone bill and electric, the groceries, whatever, I’d take that any day. This is just the way I live - it’s a lifestyle and I’ve never done anyone violence, I’ve never done
anything so horrific as to it doesn’t just become a disturbing story, no more so than anything else – then this thing with this girl, I don’t love her - something not up to me at all - and I become a goblin. I just didn’t love her - and not because of anything, not because I couldn’t tell her about purse snatching, not because I was worried or anxious, just because I didn’t. And if she were honest, she’d know she didn’t love me either - like I’m guilty for bandying those words around thoughtlessly when - come on, face it - she was doing the same, she didn’t sit there and deeply ponder with immense consideration did she or didn’t she love me, she felt it and what she felt wasn’t what she labeled it, so she prefers the label to the feeling and that’s the same as anyone.

  I told her I was an artist – but I think I am an artist, I think the way I live is how an artist lives, I think purse snatching, what I do, living this way, living this way is an art, an old art, a sad old art, the kind of which have disappeared. If I were robbing banks, people would be hard pressed to dislike me, but I nab a handbag or something and just live off the spoils - or don’t live off of them when they aren’t enough to live off - I’m a wretch, what an ugly little ugly animal.

  Well, well – what a rant that was, eh? It’s enough to make me think I feel ashamed of myself. But I do feel ashamed of myself. There doesn’t need to be something worthy of shame to feel ashamed about, after all - in fact I’d say that when there is something to be ashamed of, most people don’t feel ashamed - it’s a peculiar and sensitive lot who are the shameful, they react with shame where anyone else would react with indifference or even pride. That’s wisdom there, fancy pants, that’s something you’ll take to heart as time marches on.

  Here’s a story about how I met another girl – how I met Sara isn’t so interesting, we just kind of met, absolutely nothing intriguing about that, right? – this other story is a bit more recent, something the last few months.

  I went out to treat myself to an enjoyable time – I was momentarily flush from selling three stolen mini DVD players, still in the packaging, these in a woman’s small suitcase – so I went to a bar that turned out to be karaoke bar. I haven’t ever done karaoke, and though it might seem hard to believe, I’d never been in a karaoke bar, either. This one was busy, kind of packed, the singers not being paid attention to so much, or at least that’s how it seemed from where I was sitting, by myself in the corner booth of the bar area, I’d lucked in to it just coming clear when I turned around with my first vodka – I was just ordering “glasses of vodka” which I had to order as three shots of vodka and then I’d pour them all into a water glass because they wouldn’t serve anything more than double shots - one of those bizarre alcohol transactions, they didn’t care I was pouring all the shots into a glass, they just had to sell it to me a certain way, I don’t try to figure stuff like that out. I ate a crumby hamburger - but some really good, thick steak fries came with it - and once I was soused enough, singing seemed just a fine thing to do. I like singing – I know you’re the singer, mister punk rock and roller, but I’ve always thought I could sing alright, nothing flashy, just sing. I sang Waltzing Matilda – the Rod Stewart version, I don’t know if it’s a Rod Stewart song, so I’m clarifying in this way – I sang all six, seven minutes of it, just lost in my own little landscape of it – such a marvelous song, whoever wrote it deserves a prize, though I’m sure they got one and that the song is immortal – and it was a grand time. There was some clapping and the MC guy was effusively nice about it - probably just because it was an odd choice and I’d eaten up ten minutes of the evening with it, right? I had to go to the bathroom right away and then I decided why not just leave - I’d paid for my food, go out on a high note, reminisce my singing experience, a little bit buzzed from it but more from the vodka – two glasses total, which in case you’re no good at math is six shots. So, I’m a few blocks up and this girl – more your type than mine, too cutesy for me and way, way too impressed by karaoke bar singers, as you will see – she comes hurrying after me. Wasn’t I the guy who’d sang that long song at the bar? Yes, I was. Oh, she thought it was beautiful – like I’d written it, right? come on – and she just had never heard anything so lovely and I’d sang it so nice and I just seemed different and she’d never forgive herself if she didn’t introduce herself, she never came across different sort of people like me. Then – cutesy, you can have this girl, man – she struck out her hand and stood up high and straight and said “Well hi, I’m Doris” and I shook her hand and said I was some name or another. Did I want to come back for a drink or could she maybe just walk with me, awhile?

  I just told her No, straight off, didn’t want to be bothered with her version of events - it was kind of a pestering thing of her to have done, followed me down. She took it like a quiet punch to the stomach, like I should feel bad I didn’t want to be bothered with someone following me three blocks to compliment my Waltzing Matilda. She looked like she’d pre-fallen-in-love, like it would have been one of those endlessly bogged down times if I’d even wanted to take advantage for one night.

  So, that’s more of a story – I’m sure she thinks of it even now and uses it as a mournful narrative, some excuse about herself, some reason to think poorly of herself - but that’s none of my business. I think it makes me a nice guy, a good guy. I cannot stand things like that – I like that Sara and I just met, that we just met and then had this thing. Another time, there was this girl – this was when I was younger, way younger, just out of high school – and we were seeing each other – you know this girl, Rene, the redheaded Rene – and she at one point wanted us to “come up with a better how-we-met-and-fell-in-love story” something pointlessly phony, some intricate thing - I couldn’t stand it, she was always on about stuff like that. Let’s say it went like this, let’s say it went like that – let’s just not, let’s say it went how it went.

  Well, I shouldn’t be so mad about Rene – at the time I was all for that, too. We made up a great story together, it’s only now I cannot stand it - I only retroactively dislike Rene, I thought she was holy, back then.

  I’ve checked into this hotel: the old guy working the counter greeted me by name – I hadn’t thought I’d ever been here, hadn’t thought I’d ever been in this town. It was pretty unnerving, I didn’t believe him until he was actually able to pull my old registration card – I was going to use a different name, it was kind of funny to see one of my alias’, I had half a mind to argue with him about it. So, now I’m in the same room I apparently was once in before and the funny thing is that even though it’s a hotel room and so therefore pretty universal “recognizable” I don’t remember having been here, I honestly feel like I “don’t recognize” the room – like, there’s the bed, no I’ve never seen that bed; there’s the night stand, no I’ve never ever seen that night stand; there’s the toilet, the desk, the hangers, the ironing board, no no no no I’ve never seen any of this in my life. Now I’m sure I’ll have this weirdness in my head the whole time I go around tomorrow - and tomorrow I need to make some money, I need to be relentless about it, immoral about it, if there were rules I’d break them. There aren’t rule, but there is method - but of course I cannot break method, method is there for a reason, but works independently of rules.

  You once talked about how if someone was willing to set aside all sense of decency, to behave utterly criminally, then they would be literally unstoppably – we were talking about movies or something, so I don’t think this was philosophy applicable to real world situations – you said that, for example, if life and death meant nothing to someone, if they were willing to just shoot people dead, then robbing a gas station would be simple. But you said that psychology works in stages, that someone who wanted to rob a gas station didn’t want to kill - they never would - and that somebody who wanted to kill, they wouldn’t even think about money, robbing gas stations, nothing like that. I hope that’s true. You always had such a sense of propriety to your logic, you
felt that certain checkpoints were hit and that is where things remained until they completely regressed or complete progressed. It’s like you never got past Socrates in your philosophy and I like that about you – things could be proven, things were how they were because that is how words seemed to indicate them to be, all cards on the table – if I logic someone into admitting that something cannot be a certain way - poof! - they don’t think of it that way, anymore. You’d make a great quack psychologist, one of those old timers who wanted to cure insanity with logic.

  Okay: full disclosure – I just re-read how this letter started, sorry this one is more spotty than most – I actually wrote one more little thing on a scrap while I was waiting for the police to cuff me up.

  “If I go to jail, I promise I really will write you. But in case I don’t feel like actually doing that, I just want to tell you that it’s not going to jail worries me, it isn’t even having to be in front of all those people who know exactly what I am, it’s knowing that you’ll know exactly what I am. I guess I think I’m only still your brother the way I want to be your brother if I don’t get caught - if I can disavow everything, if I know you’ll read something and only take the parts you like out and that’s me. I don’t want to write you from jail - I don’t want to be in jail, if I have to be away from you, I want you to have to wonder where I am.”

  I’m a ridiculously sentimental slob when I think the deal is done, aren’t I? Not that that scrap of paper isn’t true - it’s more true than I think I thought, now that I’m reading it. Before, I just wrote it, I guess I wasn’t so concerned with what I was writing, exactly. Kind of sweet that it turned out to be that, wouldn’t you say?

  Another person remembered me – at the restaurant. This is getting peculiar. It could’ve been a coincidence, though – all that happened was I asked for a coffee, she looked at me, paused, then nodded and said “Black, black, just black for you, hon” and then she walked away without confirming. I suppose a zillion people make a point of only ordering black coffee - it’s probably the old hotel man has me on guard for this. If it happens again, I’m getting out of here.

  Something on television about an old woman froze to death in a car while her husband was at a doctor’s appointment. Jesus.

  Still thinking about that. I can’t write anymore. Sorry to be abrupt.

  Alligator,

  (signed Hugo Cambridge)

  two, May 2006