It haunted him all night, while he slept alone; it was still there in the morning, when he swallowed his coffee and backed down the driveway in the crumpled old Ford. And riding to work, one of the youngest and healthiest passengers on the train, he sat with the look of a man condemned to a very slow, painless death. He felt middle-aged.
Richard YatesKnow what we did, Lucy? You and me? We spent our whole lives yearning. Isn't that the God damndest thing?
Richard YatesYour cowardly self-delusions about โloveโ when you know as well as I do that thereโs never been anything between us but contempt and distrust and a terrible sickly dependence on each otherโs weakness- thatโs why. Thatโs why I couldnโt stop laughing about the Inability to Love, and thatโs why I canโt stand to let you touch me, and thatโs why Iโll never again believe in anything you think, let alone anything you say
Richard YatesSynchronize watches at oh six hundred' says the infantry captain, and each of his huddled lieutenants finds respite from fear in the act of bringing two tiny pointers into jeweled alignment while tons of heavy artillery go fluttering overhead: the prosaic, civilian-looking dial of the watch has restored, however briefly, an illusion of personal control. Good, it counsels, looking tidily up from the hairs and veins of each terribly vulnerable wrist; fine: so far, everything's happening right on time.
Richard Yates