“Don came home one day. He had a chance to become a foreman. The factory wanted to send him to school in Detroit.” She spoke as if by rote, as if she had gone over these words in her mind until they were bare of all emotion, all meaning. “He didn’t want to go unless I said it was all right. I let him go. A woman shouldn’t stand in her husband’s way. He left. Right after the Fourth. It was a very hot Fourth, Larry. Do you remember?”
He did not answer. He was hearing the pain in her voice, and he wanted to tell her to stop, but he could not.
“It was a very hot Fourth,” she repeated! “A hot summer, too. I can remember, just standing still I would sweat. I sweat very easily. I took a lot of baths. I like baths. I always...” She stopped and sighed again. “But that summer, in July...”
She had not really begun the story yet. She was back to the beginning again, back to the words “In July.” He glanced at the speedometer and had the strangest feeling that the sands were running out all at once, that this would be the last car ride, and the last words he ever heard from her.
“I was very lonely. I told you that the first time in your car. Before you asked me out, I told you that. After Don’d been gone only a week, I was lonely, Patrick was with my mother at Montauk Point. I was alone. Things hadn’t been going right with Don, there’d been a boat ride in June... and... and maybe they’ve never gone right between him and me, and maybe they never will. I don’t know, Larry, but I missed him. And... and it was a very hot summer. Larry, do I have to tell you this?”
“Not if you don’t want to.”
“I don’t want to.”
“All right.”
“But you have to know, don’t you? Men always have to know. You have to be certain the aroma isn’t on me.” A bitterness had crept into her voice. For a moment he had the odd feeling she was no longer addressing him but some unknown specter. “All right,” she said wearily. “I was sitting outside one day, on the front stoop.”
“You don’t have to tell me.”
“On the front stoop,” she said. “The streets were very quiet, even all the children seemed to have disappeared, and all the women. I don’t know. I had the feeling I was the last person alive on earth. I was wearing shorts and a halter, it was so hot, Larry, I wasn’t trying to show off my body or anything, honestly, I hate to wear a bathing suit, I detest hungry eyes on me, I abhor it! I wore shorts and a halter because it was so hot, that’s all, only because it was so hot. And I wouldn’t have been sitting on the front stoop if there’d been any shade in the back yard. Do you believe me?”
“Why shouldn’t I?”
“I don’t want you to think I was asking for anything. I never do, and I wasn’t then. I was sitting on my own front stoop, that’s all. I had my arms wrapped around my knees, and I had my hair back with a little ribbon to keep it off my face because it was so hot. The streets were empty and hot. And then a truck came around the corner.”
She caught her breath sharply.
“I don’t know if I can explain it. It was like feeling there was another survivor after an atom-bomb attack, another human being, do you know what I mean?”
“Yes.”
“The truck slowed down when it passed the house. There was a young boy behind the wheel.”
“Him?”
“Yes. Him.” She paused. “He smiled at me... and I smiled back. That was all. I swear to God, there was no more than that. He smiled, and it was a hot summer day, and I was lonely, and so I smiled back. That’s all, Larry, nothing more. He looked at me, and at the house, and then the truck went down the street, and that was the end of it. For then.”
“What happened?”
“He came back.”
“When?”
“The next night. I was ironing in the living room, and there was a knock on the door. I went to the door and opened it, and he was standing there. He said, ‘Hello. Can I have a drink of water?’ She shrugged slightly as if once again faced with the simple inevitability of the boy’s request. “I got him a glass of water.”
“Go ahead.”
Her voice was very low now. He had to strain to hear it, a whisper in the tight silence of the automobile.
“His name was Buck. Buck what, I don’t know. I never asked. I never want to know. Ever. I wish I didn’t even know his first name. I wish I’d never seen him, never smiled at him, never let him into my house.”
She stopped talking, and again he waited, and at last she sighed and went on.
“He stayed a while. We sat in the living room. I ironed, and he talked to me. He was driving the truck for his father. They carted top soil for developers. They...”
“Get to it, Maggie!”
“He kissed me.”
She glanced at Larry quickly. His eyes were on the road.
“Before he left. We were standing at the door, and I was saying good night, and suddenly he grabbed me. He was trembling all over, like a baby. He... he kissed me.”
“Did you kiss him back?”
“No. I didn’t know how to kiss before I met you. You know that.” She paused. “I didn’t want him to kiss me, but I couldn’t stop him. Finally, he left.”
The car went silent. Larry felt instant relief. He turned to her and said, “Is that what was so terri—”
“There’s more.”
His hands tightened on the wheel. The long silence before she spoke again seemed interminable.
“I... I got ready for bed after he was gone. I was in bed when the phone rang. It was him. He said he was coming over. I told him I was in bed. He said he was coming over. I told him he was crazy, that I’d call the police. He said he was coming over. I didn’t know what to do. It was late by this time, midnight at least, maybe later. I couldn’t disturb any of my neighbors, I was all alone in the house, Don in Detroit, Patrick with his grandmother. I didn’t know what to do.”
“Why didn’t you call the police?”
“And let it become the talk of the development? How could I? I locked all the doors instead. Every single one. Then I took some sleeping pills and I—”
“Sleeping pills! When you knew he was on his way? For Christ’s sake, why’d you—”
“I wanted to sleep! I couldn’t think of anything else to do, I was so frightened. Larry, I couldn’t think of anything else. I... I took two pills. I keep them. My doctor says it’s all right. Sometimes I can’t sleep.”
“Go ahead,” he said tightly, frowning.
“I was almost asleep when I heard his car pull up. The yellow Buick. He got out and came to the front door and rang, but I didn’t get out of bed. I was half drugged, anyway. I couldn’t have got up if I’d wanted to. He tried the front door and then he rang the bell again, and then I thought he went away. I didn’t know he was walking around to the back on the grass. I didn’t realize that. Until I heard him try the kitchen door. And then I heard the door open!
“I couldn’t understand it! I thought I’d locked every door, but he had got into the house. He called ‘Margaret’ from downstairs, and I lay in bed unable to move, half drugged. I was naked, Larry, it was so hot in the room, there was something wrong with the air conditioner. I tried to fight sleep. I don’t remember him coming upstairs, I don’t remember him getting into bed with me. I only remember him grabbing me and kissing my closed eyes and my breasts and—”
“For Christ’s sake, stop it!”
“... kissing me everywhere, everywhere, and then I began to wake up, began to come out of it a little, and I tried to fight him but it was too late by then, too late.”
Caustically, Larry said, “How was it?”