The Moviegoer

by Walker Percy

When she was a child and her mother was alive, she said, it used to seem to her that people laughed and talked in an easy and familiar way and stood on solid ground, but now it seemed that they (not just she but everybody) had become aware of the abyss that yawned at their feet even on the most ordinary occasions—especially on the most ordinary occasions. Thus, she would a thousand times rather find herself in the middle of no man’s land than at a family party or luncheon club.

The wind veers around to the north and blows away the storm until the moon swims high, moored like a kite and darting against the fleeing shreds and ragtags of cloud.

Her eyes are pools of darkness. There is about her face the rapt almost ugly look of solitary people. When I call out to her, she comes directly over with a lack of surprise, with a dizzy dutiful obedience, which is disquieting.

These exalted moments, when she is absolutely certain what course to take for the rest of her life, are often followed by spells of the blackest depression.

We sit drenched in the smell of upcountry Mississippi, the smell of warm white skins under boiled cotton underwear.