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About the Author
Gina Barreca is a professor of English and feminist theory at the University of Connecticut. Her books include They Used to Call Me Snow White, but I Drifted; Perfect Husbands and Other Fairy Tales; Babes in Boyland; and, with Gene Weingarten of The Washington Post, I'm With Stupid. She's written or edited other books on vice, Victorians and sex, American humor, the erotics of instruction, The Sopranos, women's humor, and Italian-American literature. She will blog about teaching, sex, humor, money, publishing, ambition, books, marriage, envy (professional and personal), politics (professional and personal), aging, and cartoons.
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Featured Articles By the Author
Murder Mystery IV: Pig Heart
Hillborne College’s Satis library looks very much like the library at Brooklyn College although few people have commented on this striking similarity; certainly Hillborne alumni would disdain the comparison. But John Vincento thought of Brooklyn with an almost physical longing. Although he had to admit that the surroundings in Arborville were aesthetically superior to those around Avenue J, John longed at this moment for a subway rumble under his feet and for cheap good food, specifically sausage and peppers, pastrami on rye, or, to tell the truth, anything without the ubiquitous melted cheddar cheese that covered all warm food in New Hampshire.
John shuddered against the dry, hard cold and turned into the doorway of the library only to realize that it was closed for the homecoming weekend. Nobody could study if there was a home football game — this was a given, a fact of life as part of what was laughingly called the Hillborne community. The library closed on Friday evening at five and would open again on Monday morning at eight. Nobody could get in or out and only a few of the faculty could obtain passkeys. John considered the wasted effort of the afternoon this far and resolved to work diligently on TGBB until midnight. It would be a good night to stay indoors, anyway.
Tonight was bonfire night and the wood pile to be burnt in pagan glee by the freshman class would go up in smoke in an hour or so. John often wondered whether there now existed entire small towns on the Canadian border permanently cut off from intercourse with large urban centers because Hillborne freshman needed railroad ties to burn.
And there would be booting later on. All the way down the street, they would boot — this being one of the many words otherwise unadventurous Hillborne students coined to describe methods and forms of what simpler souls called vomiting. If it was a particularly good night, some of the real campus heroes might even power boot, the modified term indicating, as far as John could determine from a distance, an actual projectile event. The way Eskimos had thirty words for snow, frat boys had thirty words for throwing up. Years later, at Microsoft luncheons and SONY dinners, one Hillborne man would lean over to another and they would reminisce over the great times and great boots they had, leading companions from other less prestigious colleges to come up with far more interesting interpretations for the term.
John put an iPod over his ears and cursed Maria for her determination to go the Women’s History Conference in Oregon. He could have stayed in Maria’s apartment in Somerville, could have gone to visit his father in Queens, could have gone with Maria to Oregon for that matter, but instead he locked himself in his own place and typed.
Just before eleven, Cynthia Maxwell knocked loudly enough on John’s door to get him away from “Porphyria’s Lover” and a bootleg tape of The Band. When he saw Cynthia’s large frame taking up most of his doorway, John was slightly more than surprised although less than shocked. They were mildly companionable, having dinner together a few times every month, serving on many of the same committees, both working on 19th-century literature. What he couldn’t t understand was why she would walk even the three blocks from her house to his on such a night as this, as the poet said, with fire and shrieking all around her.
John, turn off your computer and give me a drink. Cynthia, who was never, ever called Cindy, removed her gloves. She accepted a large drink, faculty as well as students being known for their romance with alcohol, and with the strange grace peculiar to large women, she sat near the fireplace, taking a pillow from the sofa and placing it on John’s tiled floor.
Okay, Cynthia, what s up? Trouble with Harris? Harris was Cynthia s ex-husband who was given to drinking and writing 15-page letters that Cynthia invariably read and cried over. He was independently wealthy and ran a small literary journal out of Craig Rock, Maine, so in fact deserved very little pity. Harris had, in the mid-seventies, been a student of Cynthia’s at Hillborne.
Christ no. Who cares about him? No, this is about Mann. She raised her dark brown eyes to meet his and paused, lips slightly open.
What about him? John drank the concoction of Southern Comfort and Coke that he had been drinking since he was underage in Ozone Park. He waited for Cynthia to say what she had to say, as she always did, in her own time. Meanwhile he thought of the way her 40 years suited her, how she must have waited her whole life to reach this point of beauty, where her age and size and grace all came together.
It’s more or less about Mann, anyway. They found a heart on the bonfire pile tonight before they lit the fire. It was attached, she gulped and pursed her lips as she spoke, to one of the lower pieces of wood. One of my students told me. Mary Anne Hanley. She was one of the freshmen elected to start the fire. She won a contest.
What did she do? I mean with the heart?
She wrapped it in her Big Pine hat and brought it to the campus police station.
Was it a sheep heart or something? A gag. You know.
They think it s a pig’s heart but they weren’t t sure by the time I left. It wasn’t human. It wasn’t Mann’s actual heart. Well, maybe it was. No. Here’s the worst bit. It had a tag on it saying, “In the day, in the night, to all, to each, sooner or later, delicate death.” They didn’t t know what to make of it at the police station.
It’s from Whitman, offered John.
For Chissake, Johnny Boy, I know it is. I’m saying that at the campus police station they didn’t know that. Ben, you know Ben, Cynthia had dated Ben, who headed the local police station, once or twice. He was older and leaner than most of the men Cynthia dated. Well, he called to ask me to come help out. All of this took place about seven this evening. I’m a wreck. Whitman, a pig’s heart in this girl’s Big Pine hat, plus her crying over the fact that she wouldn’t get to light the fire now, it’s all too much for me.
OK, OK. What do you want me to do? John bit the nail of his thumb, hoping against hope that all Cynthia wanted to do was drink and talk. He didn’t t want to go out tonight. He had been enjoying himself. He had written a few words, but words of quality. He had daydreamed. He had been picturing himself as he was when he was first making The Band tape, hair down the middle of his back and one or two girls from Queens College or Adelphi, wherever, rubbing against him and his bell-bottom jeans as they danced in Nassau Coliseum. I want you to help me find out who is doing this and why, Cynthia said, and it was clear she wasn’t going to leave any time soon.
Posted at 07:49:00 PM on April 27, 2008 | All postings by Gina BarrecaComments
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“The way Eskimos had thirty words for snow, frat boys had thirty words for throwing up” is good.
— Dimitri · Apr 28, 07:34 AM · #
Fantastic. I’m hooked—
— lizzy · Apr 28, 08:35 AM · #
What’s wrong with being called Cindy?
— Dr. Cindy · Apr 28, 08:49 AM · #
I love large framed beautiful woman.
I like the building of faculty/graduate students and undergraduate students. I would build up this relationship. It would be interesting to see more of how both are handling it…indifferent, happy, taking up the detective roles etc. Is there a bid on who gets his office? A murder on campus the week before homecoming is a great place to build up some spooky tension (yet of course, laced with an undercurrent of humor). I liked the first part so much because there was this creepiness to it…I would play this up if I were the writer.
— Hannah · Apr 28, 09:56 AM · #
This is my favorite section – and I think mostly because I like seeing the interaction between the Cynthia and John.
— Tess · Apr 28, 10:06 AM · #
I agree with Tess—it was just the right time to open up a scene!
I love the line about melted cheddar (although I must say it made me miss New England)….
And what is it with “booting,” anyway? I’ve never altogether understood, although I associate it vaguely with booting up a computer—another phrase which has no literal meaning for me, and is therefore vulnerable to being confused with regurgitation….
— maggie · Apr 28, 12:16 PM · #
I tend to connect things wanting to find the punch line, so I put together the Pig Heart with the person named Mann and figured the story would have to be about a Pig-Hearted Man or Male chauvinist pig??? So in my woman’s brain the pig heart has to be that of Mann. Perhaps we will later discover that Mann was more of a pig than those around him realized.
All of that aside, my favorite scene is of the two main characters sitting in front of the fire talking about a fire. One fire is cozy and warm while the other is grizzly and cold. I like that kind of contrast. I like the idea of these two taking on the mystery together and ending up being way smarter than the cops about many things including literature as well as the colorful, creative and ever-evolving English language.Great fun!
— Marlana · Apr 28, 05:33 PM · #
Prof. Barreca’s (Dartmouth) roots are showing.
— john · Apr 29, 07:50 AM · #
What woman hasn’t had to deal with a heartless Mann? Rock on, Barreca!
— barbara · Apr 29, 10:25 AM · #
How to solve the mystery? Look for a pig without a heart!
Sorry…
— David in Darkest PA · Apr 29, 11:24 AM · #