Frank's booming laughter momentarily drowned out the dinner music and conversation around them. "You're built, all right, short stuff."
Marge felt like sliding down under the table.
The waitress smiled politely: "Would you like to order now, sir?"
"Yeah, give us each a T-bone with all the trimmings. The best you got."
"I can give you a child's plate for the boy," the waitress said, her pencil poised above her pad.
"Nah, don't shortchange my buddy there. Give him the works. If he don't eat it all, we can take the leavings home to Bozo in a doggy bag, right, Kenny boy?"
Kenny nodded. "His name's Bobo," he corrected.
"Bozo fits him better," Frank grinned. "He's a clown like short stuff here."
The waitress was no longer smiling. "How would you like your steak, sir?"
"Medium rare, all three of 'em. That's the only way to eat good steak."
The waitress looked questioningly at Marge, who nodded agreement although she would've preferred hers and Kenny's steaks to be cooked well done.
"Would you like to order cocktails or wine now?"
"I'll have a dry martini," Marge said. She was mortified by Frank's lack of manners in such a posh place as this. "On second thought," she added, "please make that a double."
"Hey, that's the spirit, baby," Frank said, much too loudly. "Live it up."
"A double for you, too, sir?"
"Hell, no, I don't go for that fancy stuff. Bring me a cold bottle of Coors, and a Coke for the kid. That suit you, Kenny, old buddy?"
Kenny looked at his mother. She usually made him drink milk with his meals. "Is that okay, Mama? Can I have a Coke this time? Or do I have to drink milk?"
"Sure it's okay," Frank told him without waiting for Marge to answer. "I said it was, didn't I?"
The boy got his Coke with no objections from his mother. Marge wasn't about to cross Frank for fear he would make a scene in public. Actually, Frank's behavior was true to his character. It was just that here, in the midst of elegant surroundings and well-mannered people, Marge noticed it more. She felt as if they were stuck out like a sore thumb, and that everyone was secretly laughing at them.
When their food came, Frank attacked his steak like a starved savage, actually picking up the bone toward the end to uncouthly tear off the remaining meat with his teeth. His atrocious table manners embarrassed Marge to the point where she ordered another double martini.
Thank goodness he didn't tuck his napkin into his shirt collar for a bib, she thought. It was a mistake, coming here to eat. I'll never let him bring me to another nice place like this, until after we're married and I've taught him some dining etiquette.
When they left the supper club, Marge was well on her way to becoming potted.
"What'a'ya say we park the kid at the apartment and come back here to dance for a while?" Frank suggested as he started the truck's engine.
There's no way you're going to get me back in there, Marge felt like saying, but instead she begged off, explaining that she was pooped from job hunting all day. "All I want to do is collapse on the couch and kick off these shoes, and go to bed soon as the late news is over."
"Sure, baby, whatever you say," Frank agreed, grinning to himself.
He stopped at a liquor store on the way home, bought another fifth of on-sale whiskey and a bottle of chilled wine.
"Take Bobo down to the alley so he can go to the bathroom, Kenny, and feed him the steak down there," Marge said as they entered the apartment, and just as she'd said she wanted to do, she plopped down on the couch and kicked off her shoes, sighing with relief as she rubbed one stockinged foot with the other.
Glasses rattled in the kitchen. Marge supposed Frank was making them a nightcap. Good, she thought fuzzily, I can use another drink. God, I'm tired! She lit a cigarette and took a deep, lung-biting drag.
There was a nagging, troublesome question in the back of her mind. How could she love the handsome redhead and yet be ashamed of the big lug in public? It hadn't occurred to her that the trauma of being deserted by her husband had caused her to latch onto the first seemingly strong man who appealed to her, or that her attraction to Frank might be nothing more than animal magnetism due to her sex-starved condition when they'd first met.
Kenny and Bobo were reentering the apartment when Frank returned to the living room carrying three water glasses. He had rotgut on the rocks for Marge and himself, and a mild, sweet red wine for Kenny. He told Marge it was strawberry soda pop but winked conspiratorially at the boy as he handed him the glass.
Although he didn't know what his glass contained, one sip was enough to convince Kenny that he liked it. He grinned and winked back at Frank. First a Coke with his supper and now this, whatever it was, that Frank wanted him to have but hinted that his mother mustn't know what it really was because if she knew she wouldn't let him have it. They were putting something over on her, him and Frank, and Kenny was beginning to like the big man. Frank had called him his buddy, and the way he was treating him now made the boy feel big and important.
In no time the wine had Kenny feeling all warm and funny-like on the inside. After he gave a couple of inappropriate giggles, Marge smelled a rat and took a sip from his glass.
"Why, that's wine!" she cried. "Frank, how could you? He's only nine!"
With a burst of laughter, Frank told her, "Don't get your bowels in an uproar, baby. It's just Strawberry Hill. Only nine percent alcohol. Now can that hurt him? Hell no, so pipe down and let my buddy have a little fun, too. We're celebrating, remember?"
"But I don't want Kenny drinking!" she wailed, and started to get up with Kenny's half-full glass and her nearly empty one in her hands.
"You know what your problem is, Marge?" Frank drawled, holding her down on the couch between himself and Kenny. "You're too damned sober."
"I'm half drunk and you know it," Marge protested. "Let me up, Frank. It's time for the news. I want to turn on the TV."
"Piss on the news," he said. "What you need is another drink." He wrenched the glasses from her hands, gave Kenny back his wine, and instead of refilling Marge's glass, he picked up the fifth of whiskey and held it to her mouth. "Come on now. Open up and take a drink for Daddy. You're all uptight, baby. It'll help you relax."
Marge took a swallow to humor him.
But Frank wasn't letting her off that easy. He cupped the back of her head, the way he'd done in the bathroom earlier, and kept the bottle, perhaps a third full, tilted against her lips, his resonant voice droning, "That'a girl. Take another swallow. Another. Don't stop now, baby. A little more. You know you need it. Just one more swallow. Come on, it'll make you feel better."
"Unn… glub, glub… noom… glub, glub… unn-nnnn… glub, glub… huh-uhhhhh… glub, glub… UNN, UNN… glub, glub, glub." She struggled and whimpered, thrashing about desperately, but it did her no good.
His hamlike hand held her head securely as he eased the neck of the bottle into her mouth and poured the fiery liquid down the throat of the piteously protesting woman, forcing her to choke or swallow.
The burning sensation in her rapidly working throat brought tears to Marge's eyes. Frantically she dug her fingernails into the wrist of his bottle-wielding arm, causing him to wince and mutter a curse, but he didn't let up on her. When at last he pulled the bottle from her mouth, it was empty.
"My God!" she croaked, and plunged her face into her hands, coughing and sputtering, fighting to catch her breath. "You made… me drink… it all!"
"Wasn't much left anyway," he chuckled. "Don't worry about it, sugar. Got another full one right here beside the couch. Want a slug out of it?"
"Goddamn it, Frank! No!" she husked, her hands shaking as she angrily fired up a cigarette. The room was spinning around her. Her throat felt raw. There was a bonfire in her stomach. She feared she was going to be sloppy drunk before she even finished her smoke. "Why the hell did you have to pour all that booze down me?!" she wailed, batting her eyelids in an attempt to clear her tear-misted vision.