“Go ahead and say it.”
“Oh, Sam.” She looked at me with sudden tears in her eyes. The booze. “You just sort of drift along. I saw you on the street the other day—and I almost cried. You’re starting to show your age a little bit. That boyishness is starting to go. You seem—harder, I guess. I can hear that in your voice now. You’re a lot more cynical and angry than you used to be. And lonelier, too. I always used to think of us—you and me—as innocents. Not like other people. That’s why I always loved you. But we’re different now. Both of us, I mean. You’re still a lot of fun and you’re so bright and everything. But I see a kind of meanness in you now, just every once in a while. But it’s there.” She reached over and took my hand. The touch shocked me in the literal sense. I think the hairs on my arms stood up. I know they did at the nape of my neck. “I’m sorry I said that. That’s why I shouldn’t drink. I always say such stupid stuff.”
I didn’t want to look at her the way I was looking at her but in that moment of melancholy and raw carnality it was the only way I could look at her. If you’re following me.
She must have felt the same way, or sort of the same way, or at least a smidge, a bit, an iota of the same way because when I stood up, she stood up, too, and then she was in my arms and I remembered in that instant how good a kisser she was. She had been talking about how things could turn out so strange sometimes and right now I couldn’t think of anything stranger than the former love of my life sleeping in my bed in her bra and panties while I was making out with the second love of my life in the middle of the floor.
But we weren’t in the middle of the floor for long. Soon enough we were on the couch and firing our clothes every which direction. No chance Pamela was going to wake up and interrupt us.
The first time was quick and explosive. We found out just how lonely we really were. We had to grab it before it got away. Like those first times back in high school when, in the middle of it, all you thought was McCain, you dipshit; you’re actually having sex. Real live sex with a real live girl. No more brief visits to the john with a sheet torn from Mr. Hefner’s magazine jammed in your back pocket. Yes, McCain. Real live sex. The second time was gentler and slower. And then we lay naked under a blanket on the couch and watched part of an old movie—something with Jean Arthur—and she said, “I should feel terrible about this.”
“Why?”
“I’m married, Sam. I’m the faithful type.”
“He has another woman.”
“Yes, but still—”
“Catholic school. It never lets you go. There’s no reason to feel guilty.”
“I s’pose you’re right.” Then, “You think I could come back sometime?”
“I’m sorry. We’re closed for the summer.”
“You’re joking but you’re not joking. Do you really want me to come back?”
“Sure.” But I knew I sounded unsure.
“Don’t worry, Sam. I don’t have any—you know, expectations. I’m lonely and you’re lonely and that’s all it has to mean.”
“I care about you.”
“I know you do. And maybe some day—”
But she didn’t get a chance to finish the sentence because somebody was coming up the back stairs. And then pounding on the door frame. If he’d have pounded on the glass, he would have smashed it.
“Who’s that?” Mary said, as alarmed as I was.
I quickly rolled off the couch and started throwing her clothes at her. I jerked my clothes on, doing a one-legged job so I could get my trousers on faster.
The thunderous knocking.
So thunderous that the cats were jumping off the table and heading for cover.
Mary rushing to the bathroom.
Me grabbing my .38 and jamming it into my back pocket.
Him getting in one more rock-crushing knock before I reached the door.
He was bigger than I remembered. And he was angry. Jealous-angry. No man, however meek, is more dangerous than when he’s jealous of his woman and suspecting she’s with another man. He’d never been meek. And even now in his gray topcoat and blue suit and white shirt and blue-striped tie, he looked as if he could get twenty yards from scrimmage with the Bears.
“Where’s Pamela?”
I raised my hand and pointed. Moses couldn’t have done it more dramatically when he pointed out the promised land.
“You sonofabitch!” he said.
At this point, Pamela had pushed off the covers and was lying in her skimpies in a position that would drive subscribers to Mr. Hefner’s magazine insane.
He took a swing at me, which was a mistake because I pulled my .38 and stuck it in his face. “Good thing you didn’t connect, Stu, because I could mess you up pretty bad without firing a shot. And I sure as hell wouldn’t mind doing it. Now get hold of yourself and shut up while I tell you what’s going on here.”
Mary opened the bathroom door and peeked out. “Sam and Pamela didn’t do anything, Stu, if that’s what you were thinking.”
“What the hell’re you doing here, Mary? You’re a married woman.”
She came out of the bathroom. She had combed her hair, put on fresh lipstick. She looked pretty damned wonderful. “He left me for somebody else.”
“Wes? Wes Lindstrom?” he said. “My God, he was one of the most upstanding people in the whole town. What’s gone wrong with this place? Has everybody lost his sense of decency? My wife lying there in her underwear. And you Mary up here with—with McCain.” He made “McCain” sound very dirty. Stu was another local Brahmin. I was not fit for local society.
“Stu, before you get all set up in the pulpit up there,” I said, “let me remind you that you left your wife and kids and ran off with Pamela. That means you don’t get to judge people the way you’re judging Mary and me. Or anybody else, for that matter.”
“You didn’t sleep with Pamela?”
“I didn’t sleep with her.”
“It still pisses me off that she came running back to you.”
“She’s confused.”
He touched his hand to his head. I figured he either had a headache or was fighting back tears. “I never should’ve left my wife and kids like that. My kids haven’t forgiven me yet, I’m not sure they ever will. Of course their mother poisons their minds against me every day.”
“How do you know that?”
“I talk to them on the phone all the time. They tell me some of the things their mother tells them. Man, I’m Hitler and Stalin rolled into one.”
He gaped at the bed again. “You really didn’t sleep with her?”
“I really didn’t sleep with her.”
“But I’ll bet you wanted to.”
“Oh, Lord, Stu,” Mary said. “You practically break in here and start accusing Sam of all sorts of things when he tells you over and over that he and Pamela didn’t do anything. He’s telling you the truth. I was here the whole time.”
He walked over to her and put his hand on her shoulder. “You’re one of the nicest people in this town, Mary. Why McCain here didn’t marry you is beyond me.”
She laughed. “It’s beyond me, too.”
He saw the bottle on the table. “Mind if I have a snort?”
“Be my guest,” Mary said.
He had two snorts. Once, he sobbed. A single sob. It just sort of escaped. And then you could see him force himself to stop. He made a fist, he made a face, he said, “Shit, this is great, isn’t it?”
“Just calm down, Stu.”
“Calm down? I’m back in this town where everybody hates me. My wife wants to leave me. And I’m making an ass out of myself in front of Mary and you.”