Cathedral

After separating from his wife Inez, Lloyd moves into a tiny apartment in the top floor of a house. The apartment has a tiny kitchenette, but Lloyd doesn’t keep much food. One morning, he eats a doughnut and champagne for breakfast, only realizing later that he would have once found this odd. Lloyd’s alcohol abuse was an issue in his marriage, and he rationalizes continuing to drink by only drinking champagne. Two weeks after he moves in, Lloyd is extremely frustrated because he has a blockage in his ear that he cannot clear. Upon hearing Inez’s voice, he quickly hides the champagne in the bathroom. Inez, who is not happy to see him, says they need to talk about some things, including money.

Lloyd tells her about his ear, a problem that once necessitated a visit to the doctor, but he can’t afford a doctor. With no Q-tips or cooking oil in the house, Inez attempts to fashion a makeshift cotton swab out of a nail file and toilet paper. This worries Lloyd, but Inez replies, “We’ll try this first. If it doesn’t work, we’ll try something else. That’s life, isn’t it?” (109) When Lloyd asks if that statement has multiple meanings, Inez denies that it does. After failing in her attempts to clean his ear, Inez goes downstairs to borrow a pan and cooking oil from Lloyd’s elderly landlady. Meanwhile, Lloyd escapes to the bathroom where he drinks the rest of the champagne. As Inez heats the oil, she says she saw the champagne in the bathroom. Lloyd swears he tries to drink less, and Inez tells him that they can discuss things later. She waits for the oil to cool and then pours it in his ear, rubbing around the blockage. After ten minutes, the blockage is clear.

Cheerfully, Lloyd offers Inez coffee, but Inez tells him she is late for an appointment. Lloyd begs her to stay, but she repeats that she is late for an appointment and refuses to elaborate further. As she leaves, Lloyd hears her talking to the landlady, who compares Lloyd to her dead husband and asks for Inez’s number so she can call if anything happens to Lloyd. Alone, he pours a glass of champagne, but it tastes odd and he realizes that it’s the same glass Inez filled with oil. He pours the glass into the sink and drinks from the bottle, rationalizing that it isn’t any different from drinking from the glass. Nor, he concludes, does it make any difference if he passes out on the couch or sleeps in his bed at night.