Post Office

A Novel

Charles Bukowski

• Publisher: Ecco
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9780061844041
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Classics
• Index: Literature

Charles Bukowski's classic roman à clef, Post Office, captures the despair, drudgery, and happy dissolution of his alter ego, Henry Chinaski, as he enters middle age.

Post Office is an account of Bukowski alter-ego Henry Chinaski. It covers the period of Chinaski's life from the mid-1950s to his resignation from the United States Postal Service in 1969, interrupted only by a brief hiatus during which he supported himself by gambling at horse races.

"The Walt Whitman of Los Angeles."—Joyce Carol Oates

"He brought everybody down to earth, even the angels."—Leonard Cohen, songwriter

THREE

1

I didn’t contest the divorce, didn’t go to court. Joyce gave me the car. She didn’t drive. All I had lost was three or four million. But I still had the post office.

I met Betty on the street.

“I saw you with that bitch a while back. She’s not your kind of woman.”

“None of them are.”

I told her it was over. We went for a beer. Betty had gotten old, fast. Heavier. The lines had come in. Flesh hung under the throat. It was sad. But I had gotten old too.

Betty had lost her job. The dog had been run over and killed. She got a job as a waitress, then lost that when they tore down the cafe to erect an office building. Now she lived in a small room in a loser’s hotel. She changed the sheets there and cleaned the bathrooms. She was on wine. She suggested that we might get together again. I suggested that we might wait awhile. I was just getting over a bad one.

She went back to her room and put on her best dress, high heels, tried to fix up. But there was a terrible sadness about her.

We got a fifth of whiskey and some beer, went up to my place on the fourth floor of an old apartment house. I picked up the phone and called in sick. I sat across from Betty. She crossed her legs, kicked her heels, laughed a little. It was like old times. Almost. Something was missing.

At that time, when you called in sick the post office sent out a nurse to spot check, to make sure you weren’t night-clubbing or sitting in a poker parlor. My place was close to the central office, so it was convenient for them to check up on me. Betty and I had been there about two hours when there was a knock on the door.

“What’s that?”

“All right,” I whispered, “shut up! Take off those high heels, go into the kitchen and don’t make a sound.”

“JUST A MOMENT!” I answered the knocker.

I lit a cigarette to kill my breath, then went to the door and opened it a notch. It was the nurse. The same one. She knew me.

“Now what’s your trouble?” she asked. I blew out a little roll of smoke. “Upset stomach.”

“Are you sure?”

“It’s my stomach.”

“Will you sign this form to show that I called here and that you were at home?”

“Surely.”

The nurse slipped the form in sideways. I signed it. Slipped it back out.

“Will you be in to work tomorrow?”

“I have no way of knowing. If I’m well, I’ll come in. If not, I’ll stay out.”

She gave me a dirty look and walked off. I knew she had smelled whiskey on my breath. Proof enough? Probably not, too many technicalities, or maybe she was laughing as she got into her car with her little black bag.

“All right,” I said, “get on your shoes and come on out.”

“Who was it?”

“A post office nurse.”

“Is she gone?”

“Yeh.”

“Do they do that all the time?”

“They haven’t missed yet. Now let’s each have a good tall drink to celebrate!”

I walked into the kitchen and poured two good ones. I came out and handed Betty her drink.

“Salud!” I said.

We raised our glasses high, clicked them.

Then the alarm clock went off and it was a loud one.

I jerked as if I had been shot in the back. Betty leaped a foot into the air, straight up. I ran over to the clock and shut off the alarm.

“Jesus,” she said, “I almost shit myself!”

We both started laughing. Then we sat down. Had the good drink.

“I had a boyfriend who worked for the county,” she said. “They used to send out an inspector, a guy, but not everytime, maybe one time in five. So this night I am drinking with Harry—that was his name: Harry. This night I am drinking with Harry and there’s a knock on the door. Harry’s sitting on the couch with all his clothes on. ‘Oh Jesus Christ!’ he says, and he leaps into bed with all his clothes on and pulls the covers up. I put the bottles and glasses under the bed and open the door. This guy comes in and sits on the couch. Harry even has his shoes and stockings on but he is completely under the covers. The guy says, ‘How you feeling, Harry?’ And Harry says, ‘Not so good. She’s over to take care of me.’ He points at me. I was sitting there drunk. ‘Well, I hope you get well, Harry,’ the guy says, and then he leaves. I’m sure he saw those bottles and glasses under the bed, and I’m sure he knew that Harry’s feet weren’t that big. It was a jumpy time.”

“Damn, they won’t let a man live at all, will they? They always want him at the wheel.”

“Of course.”

We drank a little longer and then we went to bed, but it wasn’t the same, it never is—there was space between us, things had happened. I watched her walk to the bathroom, saw the wrinkles and folds under the cheeks of her ass. Poor thing. Poor poor thing. Joyce had been firm and hard—you grabbed a handful and it felt good. Betty didn’t feel so good. It was sad, it was sad, it was sad. When Betty came back we didn’t sing or laugh, or even argue. We sat drinking in the dark, smoking cigarettes, and when we went to sleep, I didn’t put my feet on her body or she on mine like we used to. We slept without touching.

We had both been robbed.

2

I phoned Joyce.

“How’s it working with Purple Stickpin?”

“I can’t understand it,” she said. “What did he do when you told him you were divorced?”

“We were sitting across from each other in the employees’ cafeteria when I told him.”

“What happened?”

“He dropped his fork. His mouth fell open. He said, ‘What?’ “

“He knew you meant business then.”

“I can’t understand it. He’s been avoiding me ever since. When I see him in the hall he runs away. He doesn’t sit across from me anymore when we eat. He seems … well, almost … cold.”

“Baby, there are other men. Forget that guy. Set your sails for a new one.”

“It’s hard to forget him. I mean, the way he was.”

“Does he know that you have money?”

“No, I have never told him, he doesn’t know.”

“Well, if you want him …”

“No, no! I don’t want him that way!”

“All right, then. Goodbye Joyce.”

“Goodbye, Hank.”

It wasn’t long after that, I got a letter from her. She was back in Texas. Grandma was very sick, she wasn’t expected to live long. People were asking about me. So forth. Love, Joyce.

I put the letter down and I could see that midget wondering how I had missed out. Little shaking freak, thinking I was such a clever bastard. It was hard to let him down like that.

3

Then I was called down to personnel at the old Federal Building. They let me sit the usual 45 minutes or hour and one half.

Then. “Mr. Chinaski?” this voice said. “Yeh,” I said. “Step in.”

The man walked me back to a desk. There sat this woman. She looked a bit sexy, melting into 38 or 39, but she looked as if her sexual ambition had either been laid aside for other things or as if it had been ignored. “Sit down, Mr. Chinaski.” I sat down.

Baby, I thought, I could really give you a ride. “Mr. Chinaski,” she said, “we have been wondering if you have filled out this application properly.”

“Uh?”

“We mean, the arrest record.”

She handed me the sheet. There wasn’t any sex in her eyes.

I had listed eight or ten common drunk raps. It was only an estimate. I had no idea of the dates.

“Now, have you listed everything?” she asked me.

“Hmmm, hmmm, let me think …”

I knew what she wanted. She wanted me to say “yes” and then she had me.

“Let me see … Hmmm. Hmmm.”

“Yes?” she said.

“Oh oh! My god!”

“What is it?”

“It’s either drunk in auto or drunk driving. About four years ago or so. I don’t know the exact date.”

“And this was a slip of the mind?”

“Yes, really, I meant to put it down.”

“All right. Put it down.” I wrote it down.

“Mr. Chinaski. This is a terrible record. I want you to explain these charges and if possible justify your present employment with us.”

“All right.”

“You have 10 days to reply.”

I didn’t want the job that badly. But she irritated me. I phoned in sick that night after buying some ruled and numbered legal paper and a blue, very official-looking folder. I got a fifth of whiskey and a six-pack, then sat down and typed it out. I had the dictionary at my elbow. Every now and then I would flip a page, find a large incomprehensible word and build a sentence or a paragraph out of the idea. It ran 42 pages. I finished up with, “Copies of this statement have been retained for distribution to the press, television, and other mass communication media.”

I was full of shit.

She got up from her desk and got it personally. “Mr. Chinaski?”

“Yes?”

It was 9 a.m. One day after her request to answer charges. “Just a moment.”

She took the 42 pages back to her desk. She read and read and read. There was somebody reading over her shoulder. Then th...

Table of contents

• Dedication
• Contents
• One
• Two
• Three
• Four
• Five
• SIX
• About the Author
• By Charles Bukowski
• Copyright
• About the Publisher