Last Night - James Salter

#short-story for short story writing class, on plot

Notes

Summary (very spoilery)

An at first straightforward, but ultimately devious, story about a man, a woman, and the younger woman. The way I just said this has some connotation to it (oh, there that Y chromosome goes again). And yet, even though one might say that formally, Salter introduces us to the characters in just this way (there's "Susanna, sitting in a short skirt"), a few slights of hand make it actually an "aha" moment when the man calls the younger woman "darling."
How does Salter pull this off? He distracts us with what feels like the main story for all but the last few pages: a husband, a wife, and a "solemn promise to help when the time came." He shows us the wife's bony fingers, shows us the syringe in the fridge, the progression of the disease, the husband's genuine inner turmoil of the "fatal act" he's been tasked with.

Yet, all the while, Salter's leaving breadcrumbs for us #^wboglj. Hints that, after the reveal, we can look back at and hear Salter cackling in his grave.

But, after the reveal, and after the fatal act, it seems like at last we can have a resolution. That Salter might leave us in peace, burying us at sea as he buried the wife.

Hah! As if. Instead, Marit is back! Her husband has failed her (in more ways than one it seems). Was this all an elaborately designed plan by Marit to reveal the affair? I kind of wish it was. But that seems unlikely. Or perhaps up for interpretation, as Salter leaves us with acres of soil turned over, and seed pouches empty.

Questions remaining for me

• Q: Why did Walter stutter in his first line ("You look re-really nice") and never again?
  • Hypothesi(e)s:
    • He doesn't think she actually looks nice?
  • Why have a stutter in the first place?
    • Foreshadowing for him messing up his wife's injection? (a stutter as a redo)
• Q: Why is Walter a translator?
  • Hypothesi(e)s:
    • The first line, without the first word, says "Such was a translator." Is there some meta here about translators? It does feel like Walter is mostly a spectator through much of the story. Lacking agency (analogous to how translators perhaps lack some agency? although creativity and art in translation might suggest otherwise) until the scenes of his questionable and quite coercive seeming "my wife is dead, let's have sex" scene.
• Q: What holds people together? (Referring to "Whatever holds people together was gone." (132))

Little tidbits I liked

• Hints at the affair:

  • "Susanna's long hair and freshness meant something, though she was not sure what" (122)
  • "She didn't know a thing" (130) and "girls who knew nothing" (123)
  • Avoiding the Apthalls (the talkative neighbors) is what you'd do if you were having an affair
  • Marit talking about her mom wanting to tell her about people cheating on people on her death bed.

• Other nice connections:

  • "solemn promise to help when the time came" (123) and "I thought you were going to help me, she said" (132)

• The title Last Night could refer to:

  • Marit's last night
  • Walter and Susanna's last night
  • Or, referring "the night before"
  • I think it ultimately is meant to refer to the last night of the affair. But perhaps, it should also mean night before. Since otherwise, it maybe likely would've been called "The Last Night"

First read reactions

• I hadn't seen the affair thing coming... although in hindsight.... perhaps there were hints?
  • Marit doesn't actually seem to know Susanna well
• When Marit appeared at first, my first thought was, "woah, she designed this whole thing to out Walter and Susanna!"
  • that would've been an easy and satisfying resolution; clean and simple
  • but instead... it seems like it was actually just a mistake?
• We never find out what ultimately happens to Marit. Do they do the injection again?
• It seems like Walter was truly in despair about Marit leaving.
  • But that really is kind of brutal... your wife dies, and you immediately sleep with the person you're having an affair with...
• [?] Why is Walter a translator? Why is that relevant?
• [?] Why start the disease from the uterus?
  • Like a child?