“Tony, why are you screaming? You always scream when you’re drunk.”
“I am not drunk!”
He turned away from her savagely, and concentrated all of his attention on stirring his skimpy batch of martinis. He wasn’t drunk, and he didn’t appreciate her claiming that he was. He’d had a few, but he hadn’t lost control.
He was standing with his back to her, but he heard her cross the room going toward the kitchen. Then there were other noises from that direction. She’d be checking the dinner, trying to keep it warm without burning it. Finally she was behind him again, speaking to him from the kitchen door.
“I turned off the stove,” she said.
He didn’t look at her, only shrugged his shoulders. “So?”
“It’s foolish for me to try to cook. You’re not interested in food. You live on alcohol.”
He snickered. “It tastes a lot better than your cooking,” he told her.
“Let’s face it, Tony. You’re an alcoholic.”
He whirled on her. He started to speak, had trouble with his tongue. She stood there in the doorway, contemptuous, accusing. He hated her self-righteousness, her assumption of superiority. Finally he managed to come out with the words. “Now there’s an understanding wife for you. A guy has a couple of drinks before dinner, and all of a sudden he’s an alcoholic.”
But she stood her ground. “Not all of a sudden, Tony. This has been going on for months. You sneak out of the office in the middle of the day to have a drink. You come home every night smelling of it. And then you spend the whole evening drinking. It’s got to stop, Tony.”
“Look who’s giving orders,” he sneered.
She shook her head. “I’m just making it a condition, Tony. You can take your choice. Either you stop, or I’m leaving you.”
In the first minute he just didn’t believe it. This was a trick, a pose. She was trying to scare him. Then quickly his incredulity became anger. He took a step toward her, a red haze beginning to color his vision.
“Look,” he said thickly, “you took me for better or worse. Remember? I’ve given you five years of my life, Alison. I’ve worked hard, made a little money, and you’ve had it all. I work hard, you understand? For you, nobody but you. But I’ve got to unwind a little after a tough day. That’s something that goes with the bargain. You made a bargain. And you’re not walking out.”
And to prove his point, mainly that he was still the boss, he tipped up his martini glass and drained every drop out of it. The taste was strong, burning, the amount of liquid choked him, and the room heaved before his eyes, like the deck of a ship.
Alison understood his gesture. “I’ve had it, Tony,” she shouted. “I’m leaving!”
He hurled the empty glass in the direction of her face. He wasn’t quite sure whether she ducked successfully or his aim was poor. But he was aware that the glass hadn’t hit her. Enraged, desperate to do her harm, to stop her from going, he lunged toward her, his hands reaching for her shoulders... or possibly her throat.
Everything grew hazy and uncertain then. His clawing fingers grasped something. But he couldn’t seem to keep his footing. His eyes played tricks on him. His fogged brain groped for reality in the same way that his hands groped for Alison. And then he ceased to remember.
He awoke, as it were, in a bar. He had gotten there somehow under his own power. Sound came to his consciousness first. Raucous, tinny music from a jukebox, and under it a steady babble of voices, punctuated by harsh laughter. Later, it seemed, his eyes began to focus, and he saw the girl.
“You poor guy,” she said to him.
Why did she think he was a poor guy? He blinked, stared at her, trying to identify, to recall. But he was sure he had never seen her before. She was a blonde, the real bright yellow kind, with her hair frizzy all around her head. Her face was almost perfectly round, possibly wouldn’t even have been pretty without the thick red on her mouth and the heavy mascara. Her bare shoulders weren’t exactly fat, but they were kind of extra soft and full looking, and she was bosomy, as her tight black dress showed.
“Why should a wife make a fuss just ’cause her husband takes a drink or two? Some of these babes got their nerve, if you ask me.”
So he’d been talking to this woman. Maybe he’d been here a long time, in this strange bar that he’d never been in before. And he’d met this woman and had been spilling his soul to her.
But where was Alison? He searched his memory, but that whole function of his brain was operating uncertainly. He could remember only vague shadows of things — his drinking, the argument, Alison’s threat, the throwing of the glass, and his attempt to take hold of Alison, to keep her from leaving. What then?
He shook his head, but the effort failed to dislodge any cobwebs. He had a suspicion though, of what must have happened. He’d lunged at Alison and missed, slipped, fallen, konked out. When he’d awakened, he’d recalled dimly there was no more gin in the house, so he’d headed for a bar. In his drunken confusion he’d found this dump.
“I am not drunk,” he said belligerently.
“ ’Course you’re not drunk,” the blonde assured him.
“I don’t get drunk. Never. My wife says I’m an alcoholic, but I’m not. Never been drunk in my life.”
To comfort him further, the blonde put a hand on his. It was a pudgy hand, not a bony hand like Alison’s. This was the sort of hand he liked. It was warm, and the pressure of it meant sympathy, understanding.
The blonde nodded toward the bar, and a waitress sauntered up. “What are you drinking, honey?” the blonde asked him.
“Double martini,” he said. He patted the friendly, pudgy hand. “What’ll you have?” he asked her.
“Scotch.”
The waitress went away and he looked across at his companion. Her eyes were blue, wide, and had a strange innocence about them. “What’s your name?”
“Marva. What’s yours?”
“Tony. Tony Courtner.”
“You’re okay, Tony.”
They drank together, and talked, but mostly about Alison. “I make good money,” he said, “and I bring her practically every cent of it. I work hard. I don’t go out with women. What does she expect? When a guy works hard, the tensions build up. He’s got to get rid of them some way. So I take a drink now and then. Helps a lot. Relaxes me. But Alison doesn’t like it.”
“She doesn’t appreciate you, Tony.”
“It’s nothing more than that, you understand. Just a little drink to calm my nerves.” And then somehow, he found himself telling about the argument, the fight. And the ending of it, unremembered.
“Where’s your wife now?” Marva wondered.
“Gone, I guess.”
“Gone where?”
“Who knows? Who cares?”
He had another double martini, maybe two. He lost count. Things were getting hazy again. He babbled on about Alison. He’d tried to grab her to stop her from leaving. Matter of pride. No, it wasn’t that. He hated her. He’d wanted to kill her. Yeah, that was it. One of those real quick things that comes over a guy when he’s mad. Wanted to kill her. But his foot had slipped or something. Of course, he really wouldn’t have killed her. Maybe just hit her. He wasn’t a murderer. Just a guy who had a right to be mad. Couldn’t remember though, whether he had actually hit her.
“That wife of yours, Tony, she didn’t know what a good deal she had. She deserved to be slapped around.”
The haze before his eyes was getting thicker, more impenetrable. But the world was all right, because he had a friend. Marva was a good friend.
“Let’s take you home, honey,” she said.