Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

hundred twenty-nine nails!” I asked him why, which I thought was another nice question, because it would let him tell me about how much he loved her. He said, “I don't know!” I said, “But if you don't know, then why do you do it?” “I suppose it helps! Keeps me going! I know it's nonsense!” “I don't think it's nonsense.” “Nails aren't light! One is! A handful are! But they add up!” I told him, “The average human body contains enough iron to make a one-inch nail.” He said, “The bed got heavy! I could hear the floor straining, like it was in pain! Sometimes I'd wake up in the middle of the night afraid that everything would go crashing to the apartment below!” “You couldn't sleep because of me.” “So I built that column downstairs! Do you know about the library at Indiana University!” “No,” I said, but I was still thinking about the column. “It's sinking a little more than an inch a year, because when they built it, they didn't take into account the weight of all of the books! I wrote a piece about it! I didn't make the connection then, but now I'm thinking of Debussy's Sunken Cathedral, one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever written! I haven't heard it in years and years! Do you want to feel something!” “OK,” I said, because even though I didn't know him, I felt like I knew him. “Open your hand!” he said, so I did. He reached into his pocket and took out a paper clip. He pressed it into my hand and said, “Make a fist around it!” So I did. “Now extend your hand!” I extended my hand. “Now open your hand!” The paper clip flew to the bed.
    It was only then that I observed that the key was reaching toward the bed. Because it was relatively heavy, the effect was small. The string pulled incredibly gently at the back of my neck, while the key floated just a tiny bit off my chest. I thought about all the metal buried in Central Park. Was it being pulled, even if just a little, to the bed? Mr. Black closed his hand around the floating key and said, “I haven't left the apartment in twenty-four years!” “What do you mean?” “Sadly, my boy, I mean exactly what I said! I haven't left the apartment in twenty-four years! My feet haven't touched the ground!” “Why not?” “There hasn't been any reason to!” “What about stuff you need?” “What does someone like me need that he can still get!” “Food. Books. Stuff.” “I call in an order for food, and they bring it to me! I call the bookstore for books, the video store for movies! Pens, stationery, cleaning supplies, medicine! I even order my clothes over the phone! See this!” he said, and he showed me his muscle, which went down instead of up. “I was flyweight champion for nine days!” I asked, “Which nine days?” He said, “Don't you believe me!” I said, “Of course I do.” “The world is a big place,” he said, “but so is the inside of an apartment! So's this!” he said, pointing at his head. “But you used to travel so much. You had so many experiences. Don't you miss the world?” “I do! Very much!”
    My boots were so heavy that I was glad there was a column underneath us. How could such a lonely person have been living so close to me my whole life? If I had known, I would have gone up to keep him company. Or I would have made some jewelry for him. Or told him hilarious jokes. Or given him a private tambourine concert.
    It made me start to wonder if there were other people so lonely so close. I thought about “Eleanor Rigby.” It's true, where do they all come from? And where do they all belong?
    What if the water that came out of the shower was treated with a chemical that responded to a combination of things, like your heartbeat, and your body temperature, and your brain waves, so that your skin changed color according to your mood? If you were extremely excited your skin would turn green, and if you were angry you'd turn red, obviously, and if you felt like shiitake you'd turn brown, and if you were blue you'd turn blue.
    Everyone could know what everyone else felt, and we could be more careful with each other, because you'd never want to tell a person whose skin was purple that you're angry at her for being late, just like you would want to pat a pink person on the back and tell him, “Congratulations!”
    Another reason it would be a good invention is that there are so many times when you know you're feeling a lot of something, but you don't know what the