Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Why I saw Jordan Baker before I left
After Gatsby's death the East was haunted for me like that, distorted beyond my eyes' power of correction. So when the blue smoke of brittle leaves was in the air and the wind blew the wet laundry stiff on the line I decided to come back home. There was one thing to be done before I left, and awkward, unpleasant thing that perhaps had better have been let alone. But I wanted to leave things in order and not just trust that obliging and indifferent sea to sweep my refuse away. I saw Jordan Baker and talked over and around what had happened to us together, and what had happened afterward to me, and she lay perfectly still, listening, in a big chair. She was dressed to play golf, and I remember thinking she looked like a good illustration, her chin raised a little jauntily, her hair the color of an autumn leave, her face the same brown tint as the fingerless gloves on her knee. When I had finished she told me without comment that she was engaged to another man. I doubted that, though there were several she could have married at a nod of her head, but I pretended to be surprised. For just a minute I wondered if I wasn't making a mistake, then I thought it all over again quickly and for up to say good-by. Before I left, she said that she did not give a damn about me now and brought up the conversation we had about her driving. She claimed that I was not who she thought I was; therefore making me a bad driver too. Angry, and half in love with her, and tremendously sorry, I turned away.
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Why I saw Jordan Baker before I left
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