Pamela met the caretakers, fat cigar-smoking men who had no time for questions. They kept their eyes on the loading doors, greeted movers whom they had come to know during the course of their mutual interest in other peoples things, scolded do-it-yourselfers who stared dumbfounded at the freight elevator doors. No one rushed her when she said shed have to think about it and get back to them; they understood the traffic of their enterprise and knew there were others after her, just as there were others before her. Men in brown uniforms obligingly gave her tours of the spaces, asked her if she wanted nine-by-eleven or seven-by-five and directed her down dark corridors, switching on hanging bulbs at every turn. They brushed aside the lights strings as if they were cobwebs. The men illuminated storage rooms that resembled the interiors of ancient ovens. Some rooms had doors that slid up and down, others had walls of metal grating that allowed her to see the other bins, the stuff of other people, bicycles of dead children, histories of upholstery, lamps from bolder decades, dartboards and family portraits. She couldnt judge spaces. They asked her if she was storing a studio or a one-bedroom or a two-bedroom, and she told them she was storing a museum.
Pamela met the caretakers, fat cigar-smoking men who had no time for questions. They kept their eyes on the loading doors, greeted movers whom they had come to know during the course of their mutual interest in other peoples things, scolded do-it-yourselfers who stared dumbfounded at the freight elevator doors. No one rushed her when she said shed have to think about it and get back to them; they understood the traffic of their enterprise and knew there were others after her, just as there were others before her. Men in brown uniforms obligingly gave her tours of the spaces, asked her if she wanted nine-by-eleven or seven-by-five and directed her down dark corridors, switching on hanging bulbs at every turn. They brushed aside the lights strings as if they were cobwebs. The men illuminated storage rooms that resembled the interiors of ancient ovens. Some rooms had doors that slid up and down, others had walls of metal grating that allowed her to see the other bins, the stuff of other people, bicycles of dead children, histories of upholstery, lamps from bolder decades, dartboards and family portraits. She couldnt judge spaces. They asked her if she was storing a studio or a one-bedroom or a two-bedroom, and she told them she was storing a museum.
After visiting a dozen storage places, Pamela decided on Dalmon, which is only two blocks from her house. Only two blocks away her neighborhood changes; Tenth Avenue broods near the river, where the city has different priorities. Dalmon has reasonable rates and even offered to move the material for her, at a small cost. It is very convenient. She met the movers the following Saturday at her fathers apartment in Harlem. The movers were two young Dominican men who smiled a lot at her throughout the job, nice guys. She showed them the boxes that contained her fathers John Henry museum and they urged dollies up the brownstone steps, coaxed carts through door frames, gouged walls. Pamela left the furniture, the plates, the rest of her fathers things for the landlord to clean up, fuck him. The movers drove their van downtown and banished the boxes from her immediate responsibility.
No one wanted it. She made a few inquiries, called universities. Tuskeegee, Howard. She got lost in voice mail, mailed letters that did not receive responses.
She stalled out that spring. Pamela temped aimlessly, a migrant worker harvesting words per minute. The agency called her early in the morning if they had anything for her; otherwise she watched television in her pajamas and contemplated the bills from the storage facility, which distilled her hatred for John Henry into a convenient monthly statement.
Haunted by stuff. Hunched over ramen, in the same clothes shed worn for days, she felt dazed. She was on the patch. She was off the patch. She was on the gum and smoking in between. She didnt go out that much, partly because she couldnt afford to, partly because going out did nothing for her mood. Her friends understood, her friends told her it was natural. It was part of the grieving process. Therapy diffuses: everyone knew the cant, the correct diagnosis. It was natural. It had nothing to do with her father, however, it had to do with John Henry, the original sheet music of ballads, railroad hammers, spikes and bits, playbills from the Broadway production, statues of the man and speculative paintings.
She thought about not paying the bills. When Dalmon finally unloaded the stuff (there must be auctions for such things, an entire culture based on the commerce of the dead or bankrupt, what did they do with what they bought), it would be like they were selling John Henry, not her father. This argument never got very far in her head. It was her father. She paid the bills on time and stopped eating out as much.