"He stayed in the living room while I made dinner and I saw he left his briefcase in the kitchen with me, and-" She shrugged. "It had papers in it, you know, interesting stuff."
"You couldn't help yourself."
"I know it was wrong. But I sort of saw his date book in there, his schedule, and I opened it." She lifted the shot glass and knocked back the last half inch of whiskey. "I was just curious, hoping to kind of know him better, that's all. He never tells me anything."
"Unlike the other guys."
Allison nodded. "They tell me too much."
"Every human relationship has its power structure."
"Well, Jay has too much power."
"You like that?"
"It bugs me."
"And excites you."
"How did you know?"
"How could I not?"
Allison nodded. "Well, it bugs me mostly. Now, I mean."
"What does he want from you?"
This stopped her. She looked up. "I have no idea."
"Does Jay ask you questions? Does he want to know things about you?"
"Like what?"
"Well, Allison, if I were romantically involved with you-"
"Which would really not be in your best interests."
"— I'd ask why is it that you work so hard when you don't have to, and why you actually live in the same place where your father lived, and why is it that you never mention your mother, or where you grew up, or if your father remarried, or why you are so loyal to Lipper even though you pretend to be annoyed by him, and let's seethose are just the ones off my head- and all right, why are you so chronically dissatisfied when actually it might be that it's yourself you are hardest on, and-"
"Stop."
"— and then I'd ask isn't it true that you want to be known and yet are afraid as to what will happen if you are, afraid someone will reject you when they see the truth, so you fill your head with the exhausting swirl of people and work so that you never-"
"Stop! Please. Please, Bill!"
"Okay."
"That was a little bit cruel."
I couldn't disagree.
"But it shows something…" she mused, pouring another glass.
"It shows I interrupted your story."
"What was I- oh, the date book! I wasn't suspicious or anything. But okay, it was sneaky and wrong. He was watching the news, didn't notice at all. I spent five minutes looking at the thing. Shameless." Allison's eyes brightened wickedly. "Practically memorized it."
"Was it busy?"
"Well, it had all the usual stuff, like going to the dentist, take car to garage, that kind of thing, plus some other stuff…" Allison looked up, eyes brimming. "He's got another woman!"
"Nah, I don't believe that."
"He does! He's got dates with her, regular dates." She pressed a fingernail against her eyelashes. "Here I have to beg to see him and it's because- of course, hello! — he's got a regular girlfriend. He's got dates with her going back months! I flipped through every week, every single one this year!"
"What's her name?"
"I don't know! And that bothers me, too! It starts with O. He doesn't write her whole name down, just O to remind himself. Olivia or Olympia or Orgasmia or something, fuck. "
If Jay had a regular girlfriend, then his behavior at the basketball game, his interest in Sally Cowles, seemed even odder yet. A big, good-looking guy with a steady girlfriend plus a little action on the side with a woman like Allison didn't seem like the type of man who would then stalk a teenage girl. I couldn't put it together. "He sees her pretty often?"
"All the time!" Her bitterness sharpened. "Like I'm not going to figure that out, if I just happen to accidentally see his calendar. Come on, nobody is fooled." But then Allison's voice softened, as if she wished she'd been fooled, would even have preferred it.
"Any chance he left the briefcase there hoping you'd have a look?"
"Maybe. He seemed more distracted than anything else. Whatever. It's that O that bothers me, Bill. O is a very sexy letter, if you think about it, right?" She looked at me for commiseration. "It stands for orifice. It opens up and lets stuff in. It means she opens up and lets his stuff in."
"Guys do things like this," I said.
"I know they do, Bill! They just don't do it to me. So then I thought I'm going to ask him, I'm going to just be brave and go in there and turn off the TV and straight out ask him. I was making this nice paella. I wanted to throw it in his face!" She smiled now. "I got the hot pad and actually lifted up the dish to see how heavy it was, but then I realized it'd stain the rug."
"He didn't figure out you were mad?"
"No… I just took the dinner into the dining room. He wasn't even watching the television, just standing at the window, thinking about Ophelia or whatever her name is."
"You don't know that."
Allison didn't answer, and instead took another sizable sip of whiskey, and when she put down the glass something had changed in her face, her bitter disappointment replaced by the desire beneath it. I was struck by how quiet the room was; all the normal sounds of the restaurant, the vacuuming and chatter, were gone. "Oh, Bill," she whispered, pushing away her hair from her face. "I just don't know." She was, I saw, one of those women whose sexuality didn't embarrass her. That she had discussed one man with another didn't mean she preferred either, or anyone in particular. The man- whoever he waswas temporary, the desire permanent, the emptiness intolerable. The man was something that fit into things for a while- a night, a month, a changeable self-perception. This is a dangerous, attractive thing in a woman. As a man, you see that she is capable of forgetting the last guy quickly. Which is encouraging. She's able to launch into an obliterating passion, a passion capable of forgetting its own depthless nature. Of course this means that you yourself will be forgotten easily too, but that is later, and afterward. I wish I could say that in that moment I held all these things clearly in my head. But I didn't. Instead I watched as Allison cut her eyes back at me, almost daringly, her diffused desire turning to a kind of angry want, which itself might change into anything, her mouth twisted, a little cruel, a little ugly even, but then she closed her eyes and sighed. She opened her lips and breathed heavily. "Bill?" she whispered. Her eyebrows lifted in expectation. "Come here."
I went to her and she lifted a hand, which I took. She squeezed it softly, a smile on her lips. She rolled her head forward, her hair curtaining her face, and this was an invitation for me to touch her, which I did, with one hand, caressing her smooth, firm neck. I let my fingers slip behind her ear. She sighed, then looked up at me, and it was the same gaze she'd given Jay Rainey a few nights earlier, not a copy but the original, wanton and soft and wishing, and in her breath I smelled the whiskey, the sweetness of her intoxication. She did not want me particularly, I knew, she did not want anyone, not Jay, not even necessarily a man, she just wanted. Like all of us. She wanted and needed and I just happened to be there. She was willing to give in to whatever or whoever wanted her. The requirement was mutual oblivion. She had arrived at that moment of possibility. She had been there before and would certainly be there again, many times, and the true arc of her life was constructed of these points. She closed her eyes and opened her mouth, waiting, and despite myself, despite all that I knew and now worried about, I myself had been lonely a very long time, yes, it had been a sorrowfully long time since a woman had wanted my affection, and so I bent slowly and pressed my mouth to hers.
It was a long and good kiss, wet and whiskey-fumed, but I ended it, gently. Allison smiled and mouthed Thank you and then dropped her head and I could see that the moment was done.
"So, do you happen to remember what was on Jay's schedule for today?" I said as casually as possible.
"Yes, I do. He goes to a place called Red Hook cages, like once or twice a week."