Sarah stole a cigarette and complained about Richard's friends-"Present company excluded."
Michael then brought up the subject Sarah and I had danced around once already: "What's in Boston for you? I mean, I know Richard has a great job, but what are you going to do?"
Sarah looked at the floor for a moment, took a drag and a drink and said, "That's just the thing, Michael."
I was eager to hear her explain to Michael just what that thing was-I thought I knew but I wanted her to say it-but instead she stared past Michael, back into the house. I turned and Michael turned and we all watched a very ugly man walk past the back patio door toward the bar.
"Who the hell was that?" I asked.
Sarah said, "I don't know, but-" then drifted past me into the hall. Michael and I looked at each other, then followed-I dropped my cigarette on the patio floor.
The ugly man wasn't at the bar by the time we stepped into the hall-no one was.
He was in the living room, behind the piano, playing the adagio from the
Moonlight Sonata on Richard's out-of-tune grand-the result was not lulling or melancholic, as the adagio is, but dissonant and eerie.
No one else seemed to share my evaluation of the music. Everyone-the whole party except Prudence and her men-were gathered around the piano watching the ugly man play, laughing when he made an exaggerated flourish over the keyboard, but rapt, totally caught up-so that they all jumped when he moved into the more upbeat allegretto. I wanted to jump too-each out-of-tune note grated on my nerves.
I stared at the ugly man as he played. He was bald. His head was long and boney, his eyes lost in shadow. His skin was a dark brown-not like Michael's, no, he didn't look African-the ugly man was black all right, but his skin was waxy and all over there was a patina of green-the green of rotten beef. I couldn't help but imagine what it would be like to touch his skin-my finger, I was sure, would sink in, as it would in a pool of congealed fat. His ears were large and pointed. His mouth was small-pursed as he played-and his teeth were too large for his tiny mouth. His two front teeth were the worst: jagged, yellow, buck-teeth.
I was greatly relieved to see that Sarah did not appear to be under his spell. She stood in the corner watching not the ugly man, but the crowd-and Richard, who stood with a stupid open-mouthed expression on his face, clapping like a little girl every time the ugly man crossed his hands over the keyboard. I could hear, barely audible, David Bowie's voice in the guest room.
The ugly man stopped playing the piano then, and it dawned on me that he must be the man I'd seen coming down from the peak. He waved his hands in the air, and this seemed to release everyone. There was some applause, and people returned to what they had been doing. I watched Kat and Carmilla walk back toward the guest room, Michael made a bee-line for the bar, and Sarah and Richard walked over to me. I noticed the pasty girl with the bad dye-job standing next to the ugly man, looking down at him as he caressed her hand. The perfect couple, I thought. I led Sarah and Richard to the bar and insisted that Michael open the whisky I'd brought-a far better whisky than what he'd served me when I'd arrived.
I asked who the ugly man was.
Sarah said she didn't know. Michael and Richard acted as if I hadn't asked the question. I put my hand on Richard's arm and asked again, and he said, "Which ugly man?"
I took Richard's response to be a joke and gave him a forced, weak chuckle. My whisky was a relief. I needed a moment alone with Sarah-I wanted her to have a chance to finish what she'd been saying earlier, I wanted her to tell me that there was nothing for her in Boston, that she had no intention of ever joining Richard in Boston and was only pretending so as not to break his heart before his big trip.
I felt a hand on my shoulder. I was certain it was the ugly man's; I was surprised-relieved-that the hand belonged to Prudence. "I'm out of the tub," she whispered.
Sarah and Richard were talking; I asked Prudence what she wanted to drink and she held up a beer. "I'm all set in that department. Did you know they're watching a movie in the guest room?"
"Yes," I said. I followed Prudence down the hall. She'd put on a dress over her wet suit-somehow, with the bands of wet, clingy material around her waist and her chest, she seemed more naked than she had before. I'd catch up with Sarah later, catch her when Richard was off chatting up one of his boring friends.
Prudence and I entered the room-
The Man Who Fell to Earth was still on-had Bowie yet revealed his alien identity? Kat and Carmilla were on the couch, and to my satisfaction, Kat shot Prudence a nasty look and beckoned me to a spot beside her. Prudence, first in the guest room, took that spot. Small as her hips were, there was no more room left on the couch. When she saw this, she slid off the couch, onto the floor, and offered me the spot Kat had already offered. Regardless of the outcome of my conversation with Sarah, I knew I would not leave the party alone; I considered, even, the possibility that Prudence and Kat's attentions would prove useful in gaining Sarah's attention.
Kat stroked my hair; Prudence my leg. The other men in the room couldn't help but glance away from the television to look first at the women, then at me, wishing themselves in my position.
Just before the movie ended-a sad, pale scene-I'd been lulled by all the petting-the ugly man, the man from the peak, walked past the guest room. I caught a glimpse of him, just as he walked out of sight. Except for Prudence, the people in the guest room left: the guys, Carmilla and Kat. Before I could dwell on this much, Prudence was on the couch beside me, hand on the inside of my thigh, mouth drifting toward my face. I knew that face, drifting sleepily, a drunk woman about to kiss me. I let her kiss me. We kissed. Her tongue darted in and out of my own mouth. Her open hand pressed against my erection. My hand on the damp cloth covering her right breast, my hand on the damp cloth at the small of her back.
I broke off our kissing. I said, "Let's get something more to drink." Though she gave me a petulant look, I knew she would do as I asked and I thought-for a moment-this woman actually knows what I'm doing, understands, would have ended the kiss herself, shortly, if I hadn't. In that moment I preferred Prudence to Sarah. The moment was fleeting.
The ugly man had been speaking-addressing the entire party, it seemed. When Prudence and I stepped into the living room, he waved his hand as he'd done before, and the crowd dispersed as it had before. Everyone left the room except for one person, one of the guys who'd been in the hot tub with Prudence-I watched her watch him talk to the ugly man and Prudence said, "I knew he was gay." I wasn't sure who she was referring to at first-I didn't think the ugly man was gay-and then I realized who she meant.
"Who is that man?" I asked.
"I don't know. I've been outside all night."
"Didn't you see him come down from the peak?"
"From the peak? There's nothing up there. I'm going to get another drink."
She left me. I lit a cigarette and went out onto the patio. Richard and Sarah were out there, though Richard was talking with one of his friends and Sarah was just standing around, looking bored. She brightened when she saw me. I gave her a cigarette.
"Why don't we go outside a while," Sarah said.
We left the enclosed patio. We heard voices, coming from the direction of the hot tub. We walked out into the dark yard, toward the woods.
"What was that guy talking about?" I asked.
"Which guy?"
"The ugly guy. They guy with the buck teeth."
Sarah turned up a confused expression. When she pulled on her cigarette, her face was illuminated. She had, I thought, the most perfect face. Between her eyebrows, just above the bridge of her nose was a circular patch of skin very smooth and brighter white than the rest of her face. I wanted to put my fingertip on that spot. I did. She scrunched her face up and giggled, brushing my finger away.