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Before I tell you this story, you have to promise me you won't believe it. You have to promise you won't believe a word.
What happens in this story is that Gawain dies.
It's not the first thing that happens. I have to tell you before I tell anything else, though, because it's not fair otherwise.
The first thing that happens is that Gawain cuts someone's head off. You know who it is, and you know why. I'm not going to tell you things you already know. This isn't that kind of story.
What you don't know is that his blood was red, red like berries, and it spurted from his neck and splattered onto the ground and the dried apples laid in their platters and the dead pig on hers and the white linen of Gawain's tunic. That's why this is a Christmas story: because the knight's blood was red, but his eyes were green, and his clothes were green, and his skin was green, too, and because he had tracked snow into the hall, and because even after he put his head back on and got on his horse and left - even after they couldn't hear his hoofbeats, out on the stone path the Romans had built - the snow stayed, and stayed. Because the fire was roaring, and the snow was in the rushes, and later the children picked it up and smeared it on their faces and let it melt in their hands, like soap bubbles, or old paper.
As if it could be fair, anyway.
What happens in this story is that Gawain is on his horse, and he's wearing a green sash. He's as handsome and noble as the day is long, because you can be that kind of thing, when you're a knight. The rest of us more or less struggle along on our own.
The sun is shining, probably. They didn't write this down - they always write down the unimportant things, like what was on his shield, and did he meet any maidens on the way, and what did the king say, when he found his body. They never write down things like: how hot was the sun, and what time was it? Was his horse tired? Was she happy? Did his head itch? Did his clothes itch? What were the birds singing about?
What happens next is that somebody stabs him through the throat with a sword.
It ought to be an axe, but it isn't; it's a sword, somebody's cousin's son's sword, which was lent to Mordred because he'd left his own at home and because somebody's cousin's son is back at the war camp throwing up the rotten meat he ate last night. (What they do is they cover the scent of the rot up with spices. What spices? Anything they can get; it all costs more than you or I could make in a lifetime, and it ends with millions of corpses and wars and gold, and knights sitting over a privy shitting their guts out because they don't know the difference between a good apple and an evil one, amen.)
So blood comes out of Gawain's throat, and his mouth, too, because he's trying to breathe and he can't. It might hurt less if he didn't try; but lungs are stupid things, they don't know what swords are, they don't know that his mouth has his blood coming out of it, they just want to live. So they keep pumping, like a bellows, and Gawain's heart keeps thumping, too, and so blood keeps coming out of him. He's fallen off his horse already.
His heart is a stupid thing, too. But you knew that.
He tries to talk, for a while, and then he dies on the ground. Then the king finds his body. You know how that part of the story goes.
I should mention here: he's next to a lot of other dead people. This is a war. You can decide for yourself whether or not this is a war story.
Galahad would have stared at the lady of the castle until she left his bedroom in shame. This isn't a Galahad story, though.
Lancelot wouldn't have even noticed she wanted to kiss him. But this isn't a Lancelot story, either - and besides, it's not like Lancelot stories are any happier, by the time you're finished telling them.
This is a Gawain story. So he does kiss her, or she kisses him; it doesn't matter, because either way one of them kisses back.
Gawain doesn't get to see the Holy Grail. He doesn't even get to look for it. I told you this story wasn't going to be fair, and I wasn't lying, not that time, though I've lied to you already, and I'll lie to you more before we're done. It's not fair that no one tells Percival he has to ask the Fisher King the right questions, or that no one tells Tristan not to drink the wine. It's not fair that only the deserving and pure of heart get to see the Grail, and it's not fair that only the best knight of the court gets to ascend into Heaven. It's not fair that Jackie Kennedy has to listen to his favorite record until she can get the words out right. It's not fair that you and I only get the tired parts of the story, the sinew and bones and none of the fat, where the best knights have died and the party is over and the fairies have gone beneath the hill and the stars are falling towards the horizon, pale and faded, ready to rest.
She's soft and heavy in his lap, and she presses herself between his legs, and he can feel her eyelashes against his cheek and her fingernails in his hair, surprisingly sharp. He reaches under her skirt; she's already wet, and he thumbs her clit and watches her head fall back with a sort of awe. Her eyes open. The whites are gone, the pupil gone, nothing but green and green and green, and she opens her mouth and bares her teeth and she reaches for him.
You know why Lancelot stories don't end happily.
I lied, earlier: I'm going to tell you.
Gawain is at Guinevere's bedroom door, is the first reason. The second reason is that they're not allowed to.
He's not the only one at Guinevere's door, because Mordred is almost as clever as his mother, but he is the one who shoves at it first. When it's broken down, he's first inside.
You have to understand: he doesn't want to be. It's not the kind of thing he has a say in. You can call him a hypocrite, if you like; but after all it isn't fair that he doesn't see the Grail, no matter what the saints have to say about it. It isn't fair that he doesn't see the Grail, and it isn't fair that he dies, and it isn't fair that Guinevere is human, one breast a little larger than the other, pink face and freckled arms and spots on her forehead where she hasn't washed. It isn't fair that anybody human has to be queen, too. I did say, about his favorite record.
Lancelot's there, too. He looks sweaty, and his penis is hanging in between his legs. Gawain hasn't seen it before. He tries not to look at it, then he tries to look at it like he's very outraged.
The thing about this part of the story is that it sounded dignified when Mordred explained it. It's going to sound dignified again, when the poets explain it, in a tragic sort of way, but Gawain doesn't get to hear that part. Gawain gets to hear this part, and then he doesn't get any more stories. I keep telling you.
The other knights are crowding in behind Gawain now. He wonders if they're looking at Lancelot's penis, and then he tries to stop wondering things. The kingdom has fallen apart, which is important. It's Gawain's fault, which is important, too. Guinevere's face is all pushed up around her nose, like she's trying not to cry.
One of the knights clears his throat. Gawain realizes he should probably say something, something dramatic or accusatory, maybe in Latin. He tries to think of anything to say.
Later, when they're all eating the hart in front of the fire, the old woman - they told him she was the lady of the castle's aunt - comes and sits next to Gawain. Her skirts are purple, and her hair is white and uncovered and bound at the nape of her neck, and there's gold at her throat and her wrists and in her eyes. Gawain can see that she was very beautiful, once. She's letting him see it. All vanity, that woman; vanity and cleverness, just like her son.
There's something she's sewing. It's in her lap, shadowed by the folds of her skirt. Gawain keeps trying to look directly at it, but it always seems to be at the corner of his eye.
"You've enjoyed the feast, young man," she says to him. She's looking at him, but it seems to Gawain as if she's not meeting his eyes. He can't quite put his finger on it.
It wasn't a question, but he says "Yes, my lady," anyway, and also, "Thank you," in case he needs to.
She huffs through her nose. "No one ever told you about eating food in a strange land."
He says, "No, my lady." The feast was good. The lord of the castle had eaten his venison rare, nearly raw; Gawain had seen red on his teeth, after, and red on the lips of his lady.
"They wouldn't have," she says, and, "It's not fair," and then she laughs. She's still looking at him, but not quite at him; at his lips, Gawain realizes, at his hands, at his throat.
She's produced a pair of scissors - he doesn't know where from - and holds them to her thread. Then she pauses, looks at Gawain, holds them out to him.
He cuts it for her. Of course no one told him what questions to ask; of course no one told him not to cut the thread a strange woman is sewing, or to eat the food you find in dreams. Of course it's not fair. I told him so.
The lord of the castle tells Gawain this, in the green chapel, when he doesn't cut his head off: it's not such a sin, to want to live.
He leaves, after that. Gawain rides after him, and looks at the spider-bare trees growing wild and strong and thick as blood through the ruins of the castle where he slept the night before, and he looks at the sky the color of breath and says, My lord, my lord, why have you forsaken me?
I told you that Gawain dies in this story.
Promise me you won't believe that, not for a second, not for all the gold in the world. Promise me you won't believe in rotten meat, or spots on Guinevere's forehead, or bones at Glastonbury. Promise me you won't believe a word.
Let's try this story again. Let's tell something fair.
What happens is this: the feast ends, and the lady goes back to her room with blood on her lips still, and her aunt disappears with her sewing into a corner. The hart is gone, and the tables are gone, and the rushes are clean. There's snow in them, and the snow hasn't melted.
The lord takes Gawain by the hand and leads him out of the castle, down the hill, into the woods. It's a fine night, and there are lanterns strung in the trees, and the stars are blazing above them, as if they mean to do it forever. The wind is from the west, and it smells like the sea, and underneath that, like apples.
There's an oak tree. The lord pulls Gawain down under it, into the grass.
"It was winter," Gawain says. "I was due at the chapel at the new year."
"You'll be there," the lord says, and, "You were there," and he pulls a green sash out of the tree and winds it around Gawain's waist and pushes him to the sweet-smelling earth and leans over him. Says into his mouth, "Stay here." Says, "Have this."
"I have to leave tomorrow," says Gawain.
"You always do," says the lord, and then he says, "Not yet," and Gawain closes his eyes, lets himself be kissed as if he deserves kissing, lets the world beyond his eyelids grow warm and golden, like the lanterns in the oak trees, like ripe apples, like the sun.