“To Hell with print. Right after the war, when I wrote my guts into my novel, I thought I was made. Damn thing got fine reviews—and never even sold the lousy five hundred advance I received. Hell, any TV show reaches a million times as many people. I must let you have a copy of the book someday, Kay.”
“I read it,” Barbara said. “It was forced, shallow.”
Steve threw his cigar into the fireplace. “What can a high-school teacher possibly know about literature? I've had a rough day; let's all catch the hot combo they have at the Steam Room.”
“Wonderful,” Kay said. “I'd like a few more belts.”
“Why go out? We have plenty to drink here,” Barbara put in.
“More fun getting conked in a night club. Come on, Touie.”
“I have to be up early,” I began, wondering what the devil she'd meant by conked.
“Don't we all? We'll take in the midnight show and leave. Coming, Bobby?”
Barbara, who seemed to also be Bobby, said in a weary voice, “Oh... all right.”
Kay tossed a mink cape over her shoulders as if it were an old shawl while Barbara slipped into a plain fitted cloth coat and a beret. They painted their lips, then bit into tissues to remove the excess lipstick. When they dropped the tissues on a table, Steve picked them up, said, “Like red Rokeach tests. God, I hate sloppy females.” He threw the tissues into the fire.
As I was getting into my overcoat, Barbara took Kay aside, whispered something in her ear. I heard Kay say, “Don't be silly. And so damn touchy!” She was angry, almost slammed her pipe on the table. I felt real lousy— knew damn well what Barbara was “touchy” about. She didn't want to be seen in public with me.
The elevator was so small we had to make two trips. Kay squeezed in with me. She was wearing a faint perfume but I was too mad to pay it any mind. She smiled up at me, her fingers playing with my arm. I said, “Barbara sure cut a hog... with that detective crack.”
“She's in one of her moods. But you handled it beautifully.” Her fingers stroked my bicep. “Muscles fascinate me.”
“What did you mean by getting 'conked'?”
“Conked? Oh, drunk, looped.... What did you think I meant?”
“I was just curious.” We stepped out into the tiny lobby to wait for Steve and Barbara. An elderly couple came in, gave us both that look as they waited for the elevator.
Kay played with my arm again, whispered, “How do you keep in shape?”
“At the Y. Stop feeling me like I was a horse.”
“Don't you like it?”
“I don't mix business and pleasure, to coin a shiny cliche.”
“Are you working now?”
“Let's not complicate an employer-employee relationship.” I flashed my white teeth as though joking it up, wondering how I could politely tell her I didn't especially want to sleep with her.
Steve and Barbara joined us. As we hailed a cab, Kay asked where the Jag was and that started a car discussion until we reached the Steam Room. From the outside it seemed to be a large store with a fogged window. I had that tight nervous feeling as we entered, but it fell apart soon as I saw the coloured band, and a Negro couple at a table. Checking our coats I looked the place over. It was low ceilinged with cartoon murals on the walls, the lights dim, and the combo beating out a quiet jazz. I'd been to Birdland, Cafe Society, and some of the “posh” spots, as Sybil called them, in and out of Harlem. But this really had an intimate air, like a movie night spot. The tables surrounding the small dance floor weren't jammed together, and nobody stared at us as we were given one near the bandstand.
When the waiter handed us menus, I was the only one to glance at it. There wasn't any cover or minimum, but at three bucks a shot they didn't need one. They ordered gin and tonic; I took Irish whiskey neat. The girls decided they had to go to the ladies' room and Steve said, “Never saw it to fail; second a woman gets anyplace she has to leave.”
“I'll have library send you a biology book tomorrow,” Kay told him, walking away.
We listened to the music for a while. It was very smooth, like the old Nat King Cole combo. Steve slipped me a line about writing the jazz novel someday. I wanted to tell him he could find material for a book in what a brown musician runs up against on a one-night-stands tour of the South, but didn't. We sipped our drinks and watched a babe putting her “all” into her dancing. “My Lord, what a Diesel motor that bimbo has,” Steve said. “How do you like going stag?”
“Stag?”
He flashed his eyes as he smirked, “Man, I see you haven't known Kay long. She and Barbara—Lesbians for years,” he added, like a kid mouthing a dirty joke. “Didn't you see them arguing before we left? Bobby didn't want Kay to take her pipe.”
I laughed—at myself. Shrugged as I told him, “Democratic country, everybody to their own tastes.”
He rubbed his nose with a slim finger. “You're so right. Thanks for bringing me up short. Did you really play much football?” he asked, changing the subject.
The girls returned and I told myself Steve was kidding; they both looked very feminine. Kay asked, “Dance?”
I stood up. “Okay, but I'm not much of a dancer.”
I took her in my arms and we glided around smoothly enough to pass for dancing. She said, “Sorry to leave you alone with Steve.”
“What's he got, the measles?”
“Oh Lord! Can't you tell, Touie? He's as queer as a six-bit coin. What are you grinning about?”
“Your hair is tickling my chin.”
“By radar? I'm inches from you,” she said, putting her head on my shoulder. “Do you like this place?”
“Aha.”
“I trust you'll pad it into your swindle sheet.”
“Don't worry about it.”
After another round of drinks I danced with Barbara and noticed she was wearing a wedding ring like Kay's. She gave me a workout, although Steve was on the floor with Kay and Barbara kept following them with her eyes. He was a good dancer. When she saw me watching her she smiled up at me, said, “Sorry. But I can't stand that smug creature. Because he finally has a TV show, he acts as if he had the world by the tail. And the boyish act: the crew cut and the college clothes—the ass. I don't know why Kay lets him hang around. Ever have the misfortune to read his book?”
“Nope.”
“Trash. Naturalism at its worst.” She rubbed her gray head on my tie. “How tall are you?”
“About six-two.”
So she told me what an athlete she'd been in college; talked until we sat down. Steve was wiping his face with a napkin, said, “This is actually becoming a steam room. Are you a Turkish bath aficionado, Touie?”
“Never in one.”
“No, I suppose not,” he said, motioning for the waiter. Instead of a drink I ordered a club sandwich. The show came on. The “show” was a tall girl with a faraway look on a powdered death-mask face, her eyebrows painted in like two darts. She sang a torch song—off key. After the second song it got to me, or maybe I was getting a little high.
The sandwich was dressed in pants and had a crazy border of pickle chips and olives. It impressed me, seemed the most high-class sandwich I'd ever had. I paid more attention to it than to Kay's knee wearing my trouser thin.
I ate slowly, listening to the weird singing, glanced around the table. I couldn't fully make any of them: they were all a little phony. So was the Steam Room. Yet I'd long lost the blue mood Sybil had put me in. I'd forgotten the dumb fight in the coffeepot, even about blowing the whistle on Thomas. This was big time. I had to admit that, phony or not, I liked it.