A prayer for Owen Meany (57 page)

"Go on, tell him," Larry Lish said to his mother.

"My son says you doubt that the president fools around,"
Mrs. Lish said to Owen. When she said "fools around," she opened her
fur-her perfume rushed out at us, and we breathed her in. "Well, let me
tell you," said Mitzy Lish, "he fools around-plenty."

"WITH MARILYN MONROE?" Owen asked Mrs. Lish.

"With her-and with countless others," Mrs. Lish said;
she wore a little too much lipstick-even for -and when she smiled at Owen
Meany, we could see a smear of lipstick on one of her big, upper-front teeth.

"DOES JACKIE KNOW?" Owen asked Mrs. Lish.

"She must be used to it," Mrs. Lish said; she appeared
to relish Owen's distress. "What do you think of that!" she asked
Owen; Mitzy Lish was the kind of woman who bullied young men, too.

"I THINK IT'S WRONG," said Owen Meany.

"Is he for real?" Mrs. Lish asked her son. Remember
that? Remember when people used to ask if you were "for real"?

"Isn't he a classic!" Larry Lish asked his mother.

"This is the editor-in-chief of your school
newspaper?" Mrs. Lish asked her son; he was laughing.

"That's right," Larry Lish said; his mother really
cracked him up.

"This is the valedictorian of your class!" Mitzy Lish
asked Larry.

"Yes!" Larry said; he couldn't stop laughing. Owen was
so serious about being the valedictorian of our class that he was already
writing his commencement speech-and it was only January. In many schools, they
don't even know who the class valedictorian is until the spring term; but Owen
Meany's grade-point average was perfect-no other student was even close.

"Let me ask you something," Mrs. Lish said to Owen.
"If Marilyn Monroe wanted to sleep with you, would you let her?'' I
thought that Larry Lish was going to fall down-he was laughing so hard. Owen
looked fairly calm. He offered Mrs. Lish a cigarette, but she preferred her own
brand; he lit her cigarette for her, and then he lit one for himself. He
appeared to be thinking over the question very carefully.

"Well? Come on," Mrs. Lish said seductively.
"We're talking Marilyn Monroe-we're talking the most perfect piece of ass
you can imagine \ Or don't you like Marilyn Monroe?" She took off her
sunglasses; she had very pretty eyes, and she knew it. "Would you or
wouldn't you?" she asked Owen Meany. She winked at him; and then, with the
painted nail of her long index finger, she touched him on the tip of his nose.

"NOT IF I WERE THE PRESIDENT," Owen said. "AND
CERTAINLY NOT IF I WERE MARRIED!"

Mrs. Lish laughed; it was something between a hyena and the
sounds Hester made in her sleep when she'd been drinking.

"This is the/Htare?" Mitzy Lish asked. "This is
the head of the class of the country's most prestigious fucking school- and
this is what we can expect of our future leaders!"

No, Mrs. Lish-I can answer you now. This was not what we could
expect of our future leaders. This was not where our future would lead us; our
future would lead us elsewhere-and to leaders who bear little resemblance to
Owen Meany. But, at the trine, I was not bold enough to answer her. Owen,
however, was no one anyone could bully-Owen Meany accepted what he thought was
his fate, but he would not tolerate being treated lightly.

"OF COURSE, I'M NOT THE PRESIDENT," Owen said shyly.
"AND I'M NOT MARRIED, EITHER. I DON'T EVEN KNOW MARILYN MONROE, OF
COURSE," he said. "AND SHE PROBABLY WOULDN'T EVER WANT TO SLEEP WITH
ME. BUT-YOU KNOW WHAT?" he asked Mrs. Lish, who was-with her son-overcome
with laughter. "IF YOU WANTED TO SLEEP WITH ME-I MEAN NOW, WHEN I'M NOT
THE PRESIDENT, AND I'M NOT MARRIED-WHAT THE HELL," Owen said to Mitzy Lish,
"I SUPPOSE I'D TRY IT."

Have you ever seen dogs choke on their food? Dogs inhale their
food-they're quite dramatic chokers. I never saw anyone stop laughing as
quickly as Mrs. Lish and her son-they stopped cold.

"What did you say to me?" Mrs. Lish asked Owen.

"WELL? COME ON," said Owen Meany. "WOULD YOU OR
WOULDN'T YOU?" He didn't wait for an answer; he shrugged. We were standing
in the dry, dusty stink of

        
 
cigarettes that was the commonplace air in
the editorial offices of The Grave, and Owen simply walked over to the coat
tree and removed his red-and-black-checkered hunter's cap and his jacket of the
same well-worn material; then he walked out in the cold, which so ill-affected
Mrs. Lish's troublesome complexion. Larry Lish was such a coward, he never said
a word to Owen-nor did he jump on Owen's back and pound Owen's head into the
nearest snowbank. Either Larry was a coward or he knew that his mother's
"honor" was not worth such a robust defense; in my opinion, Mitzy
Lish was not worth a defense of any kind. But our headmaster, Randy White, was
a chivalrous man- he was a gallant of the old school, when it came to defending
the weaker sex. Naturally, he was outraged to hear of Owen's insulting remarks
to Mrs. Lish; naturally, he was grateful for the Lishes' support of the Capital
Fund Drive, too. "Naturally," Randy White assured Mrs. Lish, he would
"do something" about the indignity she had suffered. When Owen and I
were summoned to the headmaster's office, we did not know everything that Mitzy
Lish had said about the "incident"-that was how Randy White referred
to it.

"I intend to get to the bottom of this disgraceful
incident," the headmaster told Owen and me. "Did you or did you not
proposition Missus Lish in the editorial offices of The Grave T' Randy White
asked Owen.

"IT WAS A JOKE," said Owen Meany. "SHE WAS
LAUGHING AT ME, AT THE TIME-SHE MADE IT CLEAR THAT SHE THOUGHT / WAS A
JOKE," he said, "AND SO I SAID SOMETHING THAT I THOUGHT WAS
APPROPRIATE."

"How could you ever think it was 'appropriate' to
proposition a fellow student's mother!" Randy White asked him. "On
school property!" the headmaster added. Owen and I found out, later, that
the business about the proposition occurring "on school property" had
especially incensed Mrs. Lish; she'd told the headmaster that this was surely
"grounds for dismissal." It was Larry Lish who told us that; he
didn't like us, but Larry was a trifle ashamed that his mother was so intent on
having Owen Meany thrown out of school.

"How could you think it 'appropriate' to proposition a
fellow student's mother!" Randy White repeated to Owen.

"I MEANT THAT MY REMARKS WERE 'APPROPRIATE' TO HER
BEHAVIOR," Owen said.

"She was rude to him," I pointed out to the
headmaster.

"SHE MADE FUN OF ME BEING THE CLASS VALEDICTORIAN,"
said Owen Meany.

"She laughed out loud at Owen," I said to Randy White.
"She laughed in his face-she bullied him," I added.

"SHE WAS SEXY WITH ME!" Owen said. At the time,
neither Owen nor I were capable of putting into words the correct description
of the kind of sexual bully Mrs. Lish was; maybe even Randy White would have
understood our animosity toward a woman who lorded her sexual sophistication
over us so cruelly-over Owen, in particular. She had flirted with him, she had
taunted him, she had humiliated him-or she had tried to. What right did she
have to be insulted by his rudeness to her, in return? But I couldn't
articulate this when I was nineteen and fidgeting in the headmaster's office.

"You asked another student's mother if she would sleep with
you-in the presence of her own son!'' said Randy White.

"YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THE CONTEXT," said Owen Meany.

"Tell me the 'context,' " said Randy White. Owen
looked stricken.

"MISSUS LISH REVEALED TO US SOME PARTICULARLY DAMNING AND
UNPLEASANT GOSSIP," Owen said. "SHE SEEMED PLEASED AT HOW THE NATURE
OF THE GOSSIP UPSET ME."

"That's true, sir," I said.

"What was the gossip?" asked Randy White. Owen was
silent.

"Owen-in your own defense, for God's sake!" I said.

"SHUT UP!" he told me.

"Tell me what she said to you, Owen," the headmaster
said.

"IT WAS VERY UGLY," said Owen Meany, who actually
thought he was protecting the president of the United States! Owen Meany was
protecting the reputation of his commander-in-chief!

"Tell him, Owen!" I said.

"IT IS CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION," Owen said.

"YOU'LL JUST HAVE TO BELIEVE ME-SHE WAS UGLY. SHE DESERVED
A JOKE-AT HER OWN EXPENSE," Owen said.

"Missus Lish says that you crudely propositioned her in
front of her son-I repeat, 'crudely,' " said Randy White. "She says
you were insulting, you were lewd, you were obscene-and you were
anti-Semitic," the headmaster said.

"IS MISSUS LISH JEW/SH?" Owen asked me. "I DIDN'T
EVEN KNOW SHE WAS JEWISH!"

"She says you were anti-Semitic," the headmaster said.

"BECAUSE I PROPOSmONED HER?" Owen asked.

"Then you admit that you 'propositioned' her?" Randy
White asked him. "Suppose she'd said 'Yes'?"

Owen Meany shrugged. "I DON'T KNOW," he said
thoughtfully. "I SUPPOSE I WOULD HAVE-WOULDN'T YOUT' he asked me. I
nodded. "I KNOW YOU WOULDN'T!" Owen said to the
headmaster-"BECAUSE YOU'RE MARRIED," he added. "THAT WAS SORT OF
THE POINT I WAS MAKING-WHEN SHE BEGAN TO MAKE FUN OF ME," he told Randy
White. "SHE ASKED ME IF I'D 'DO IT' WITH MARILYN MONROE," Owen
explained, "AND I SAID, 'NOT IF I WERE MARRIED,' AND SHE STARTED LAUGHING
AT ME."

"Marilyn Monroe?" the headmaster said. "How did
Marilyn Monroe get involved in this?"

But Owen would say no more. Later, he told me, "THINK OF
THE SCANDAL! THINK OF SUCH A RUMOR LEAKING TO THE NEWSPAPERS!"

Did he think that the downfall of President Kennedy might come
from an editorial in The Gravel

"Do you want to get kicked out of school for protecting the
president?" I asked him.

"HE'S MORE IMPORTANT THAN I AM," said Owen Meany.
Nowadays, I'm not sure that Owen was right about that; he was right about most
things-but I'm inclined to think that Owen Meany was as worthy of protection as
JFK. Look at what assholes are trying to protect the president these days! But
Owen Meany could not be persuaded to protect himself; he told Dan Needham that
the nature of Mrs. Lish's incitement constituted "A THREAT TO NATIONAL
SECURITY"; not even to save himself from Randy White's wrath would Owen
Meany repeat what a slanderous rumor he had heard. In faculty meeting, the
headmaster argued that this kind of disrespect to adults-to school
parents!-could not be tolerated. Mr. Early argued that there was no school rule
against propositioning mothers; Owen, Mr. Early argued, had not broken a rule.
The headmaster attempted to have the matter turned over to the Executive
Committee; but Dan Needham knew that Owen's chances of survival would be poor
among that group of (largely) the headmaster's henchmen-at least, they
comprised the majority in any vote, as had pointed out. It was not a matter for
the Executive Committee, Dan argued; Owen had not committed an offense in any
category that the school considered "grounds for dismissal."

Not so! said the headmaster. What about "reprehensible
conduct with girls"? Several faculty members hastened to point out that
Mitzy Lish was "no girl." The headmaster then read a telegram that
had been sent to him from Mrs. Lish's ex-husband, Herb. The Hollywood producer
said that he hoped the insult suffered by his ex-wife-and the embarrassment
caused his son-would not go unpunished.

"So put Owen on disciplinary probation," Dan Needham
said. "That's punishment; that's more than enough."

But Randy White said there was a more serious charge against
Owen than the mere propositioning of someone's mother; did the faculty not
consider anti-Semitism "serious"? Could a school of such a broadly
based ethnic population tolerate this kind of "discrimination"? But
Mrs. Lish had never substantiated the charge that Owen had been anti-Semitic.
Even Larry Lish, when questioned, couldn't remember anything in Owen's remarks
that could be construed as anti-Semitic; Larry, in fact, admitted that his
mother had a habit of labeling everyone who treated her with less than complete
reverence as an anti-Semite-as if, in Mrs. Lish's view, the only possible
reason to dislike her was that she was Jewish. Owen, Dan Needham pointed out,
hadn't even known that the Lishes were Jewish.

"How could he not knowT" Headmaster White cried. Dan
suggested that the headmaster's remark was more anti-Semitic than any remark
attributed to Owen Meany. And so he was spared; he was put on disciplinary pro-

        
 
bation-for the remainder of the winter
term-with the warning, understood by all, that any offense of any kind would be
considered "grounds for dismissal"; in such a case, he would be
judged by the Executive Committee and nor - of his friends on the faculty could
save him. The headmaster proposed-in addition to Owen's probation-that he be
removed from his position as editor-in-chief of The Grave, or that should be
silenced until the end of the winter term; or both. But this was not approved
by the faculty. In truth, Mrs. Lish's charge of anti-Semitism had backfired
with a number of the faculty, who were quite belligerently anti-Semitic
themselves. As for Randy White: Dan and Owen and I suspected that the
headmaster was about as anti-Semitic as anyone we knew. And so the incident
rested with Owen Meany receiving the punishment of disciplinary probation for
the duration of the winter term; aside from the jeopardy this put him in-in
regard to any other trouble he might get into- disciplinary probation was no
great imposition, especially for a day boy. Basically, he lost the senior
privilege to go to Boston on Wednesday and Saturday afternoons; if he'd been a
boarder, he would have lost the right to spend any weekend away from school,
but since he was a day boy, he spent every weekend at home-or with me-anyway.
Yet Owen was not grateful for the leniency shown to him by the school; he was outraged
that he had been punished at all. His hostility, in turn, was not appreciated
by the faculty- including many of his supporters. They wanted to be
congratulated for their generosity, and for standing up to the headmaster;
instead, Owen cut them dead on the quadrangle paths. He greeted no one; he
wouldn't even look up. He wouldn't speak-not even in class!-unless spoken to;
and when forced to speak, his responses were uncharacteristically brief. As for
his duties as editor-in-chief of The Grave, he simply stopped contributing the
column that had given his name and his fame.