“Christ,” Jim Briskin said. “Anyhow—” He glanced into the kitchen. “You don’t know when Rachael will be back? How did she seem to be? Was she angry? Was she upset?”
“She’s okay,” he said.
“What are you going to do next?” Jim said. Then he said, “It doesn’t matter. When Rachael comes in, tell her I was by. If I don’t hear from her, I’ll be around again.”
“You’re pretty sore,” Art said. “Aren’t you?”
“I’m not sore,” he said. “I’m just trying to keep something worse from happening.” Now he felt embarrassed. “She wanted to go there,” he said.
“Where? To her place?” Jim nodded. “I know. I saw her afterwards; I got the whole story. She must have had a hell of a hangover this morning.”
“I saw her around four,” Art said. “She seemed okay then; she acted like she felt okay.”
“You went by the station?” Opening the door, Jim started up the stairs. “She’s real cool-looking,” Art said.
“Yes.” He halted. “She’s at least that. What are your plans? You going to give up your wife and baby and start hanging around her?”
“I don’t know,” Art muttered. “I’m supposed to call her, she said for me to.”
“She was pretty damn drunk, last night.”
“I know.”
Jim said, “Let me tell you something. Not for your own good; for mine. I was married to her three years. I’m still in love with her. All you know is that she’s attractive and last night she was available. I doubt if she’ll be available again very soon. Either to you or me or anybody else. That was once in a million. You were handy; It’s your good, fortune.”
He saw the torment on the boy’s face. Coming back into the room, he closed the door after him. It was Rachael that he wanted to talk to, but now he was here and talking to Art. So he said, “Don’t press your luck. Just write it off as a break and be glad. I was walking around the Park today thinking how much I would have given when I was your age for something like that to happen to me. But if you expect it to happen again, you’re just tormenting yourself. Believe me; I’m not kidding you. She can cause you a lot of suffering.”
“Yeah,” Art said, and the expression remained on his face. The acute suffering, more acute than any other kind of pain.
“Be glad,” Jim said.
“S-s-sure,” Art said violently.
“Wait’ll you’re in love with her,” he said, his own pain rising. “You think you’re bad-off now; wait until you’ve known her and lived with her. What do you know about her? All you know is the way she dresses and how she looks, something you saw when she walked in here.”
“I saw her before,” the boy said.
Jim said, “I know everything about her. And I’d do anything for her. So for my sake keep your hands off her. The next time she’s drunk and wants to go to bed with somebody, you turn around and go back to your wife; let her sober up and she’ll forget about it. I’ll tell you one more thing. You try and talk her into it again—you’ll find out what I mean. Nobody ever talked her into anything, and especially that. You’ll wear yourself out, and when you’re finished you’ll feel like the goddamnedest fool that ever lived. She can make you look sillier than any woman you ever met. Get out of it now while you have something good to think about.” Again he opened the door; he had not meant to talk in that direction. “And the next time you think you’ve accomplished something like this, don’t go around with that silly smirk on your face.”
Slamming the door, he went up the steps and along the path to the sidewalk. Getting into his car, he backed out onto Fillmore Street and drove off.
Several blocks away from the house, he saw a figure toiling along the sidewalk. She carried a package and she walked slowly; at a discount clothing store she wandered in to study the window displays. How sad she looked, he thought. How woebegone. Signaling that he was stopping, he double-parked and watched her. When she went on to the next store, he drove ahead, keeping up with her.
Compared with Pat, he thought to himself, she did not dress well. Her coat was brown, without particular color; it dragged shapelessly, a cloth coat whose pockets sagged. Her hair was cut in no fashion whatsoever. She wore no makeup; in fact he had never seen her with makeup. Now, as she wandered along, her eyes were dulled. And the bulge of her middle was gradually distorting her figure; the lines were starting to flow and waver. Under certain conditions, he thought, she might be quite plain. But she was not plain. She had a critical, intent expression; even now she was drawn tight by some attitude, some careful holding of herself. The energy was there. The source of strength that he admired so much. Probably as she walked, she was mulling over everything that had happened. She was not going to do anything until she was certain of what was right.
As yet she had not noticed him.
Holding her package in both arms, she walked step by step, making little progress; she was deflected by each store and each passing thing. Her outward attention wavered and fixed itself on first this and that, without order or sequence. If he had not known her, he would have said that at this point she could be led anywhere; she had no direction. But he knew better. She was out by herself, making her decision. She was still very hard and firm, still rigid.
At a grocery store she disappeared from sight. Behind him a car, honked and he was forced to pull out into traffic. He made a U-turn at the corner, drove back, came around again searching for her. Now there was no sign of her; he had lost her.
He saw a parking slot and quickly drove into it.
On foot he hurried along the sidewalk to the grocery, store. It was a small store, with nothing to offer but vegetables and fruits; he could see at once that she had departed. Two middle-aged women were inspecting potatoes. The proprietor, in the rear, was seated on a stool with his hands folded.
Going on, he peered into a shoe store and then a café, a drugstore, a dry-cleaning shop. She was not in any of them and she was not ahead of him.
“Goddamn,” he said.
The late-afternoon sunlight was white and glaring; it made his head hurt. The drugstore had a soda fountain, and he went in and sat down, his head in his hands. When the waitress appeared, he ordered coffee.
Well, he thought, she had certainly gone on home. He could catch her there.
Resting his elbows on the counter, he drank his coffee; it was weak, hot, tasteless. His run-in with Art had left him in no shape to plan, to cope. A downgrade, he thought, the argument with Art. No point to it, no purpose or hope of improvement. What did he expect? What was he after?
Paying for his coffee, he left the drugstore. Now he did not feel able to go back to the house, to the Emmanuals’ place. Some other time, he thought.
Across the street Rachael was standing before a magazine rack, reading the covers of the pocket books.
He crossed the street. “Rachael,” he said.
Her head turned. “Oh,” she said.
Taking her package he said, “Let me carry it.”
“Did you find them last night?” She fell in beside him and they walked together. “Art came home. He didn’t say anything about seeing you.”
“I got there,” he said, “but Art had gone.”
She nodded.
“Do you care?” he said. “Do you want to hear about it? Or are you tired of hearing about it?”
“I’m tired,” she said. “You know, I hate to talk. I hate to listen to talk.”
“I do know,” he said. “So let’s just walk,” she said.
They went on, across another street, onto another block of small shops and stores and bars. Rachael gazed up at a display of television sets; the display seemed to absorb her.