He worked on a particularly interesting case that morning. Big phony insurance-claim that would involve endless litigation. But, by eleven, he found his mind wandering unaccountably to his friend Brad Grogan. It had now been several weeks since they'd lunched together, and the mention of him at breakfast that morning had rather amused David. Calling him a "company-man" was an old joke between them, as Brad had quite often applied the term to him right there in the office. It occurred to David that Brad Grogan was now the only friend he had who wasn't married, who no longer lived the same kind of life he did. He had grown weary of talking and lunching with men who were nothing but carbon copies of himself, digging the same grave-routes every day of their lives-married and suburban and TV-trained and chained.
On impulse, he telephoned Brad at his auto showroom out on Van Ness Avenue, and asked if he was free for lunch.
"You mean you're gonna duck the old fraternity sit-in for one day?" Brad laughed on the phone. "Don't they give you three demerits if you step off their treadmill?"
"I'll risk it," said David.
"Okay, rebel. I'll see you at Paoli's at one."
Brad Grogan was a rangy-looking ex-half-back who still looked every inch the gridiron champion. He looked a lot more Greek than Irish, with a swarthy, olive complexion, full, generous features and flashing brown eyes. Lately he'd taken to wearing his jet-black hair a trifle longer than usual, and even went the Nehru love-beads route on occasion, to further convince his old buddies how completely he'd kicked over the traces of wedded bliss.
As usual, David was pleased to see his old friend. But curious too. Wasn't this man lonely and rootless, living all by himself in a bachelor apartment after all his years of marriage and solidarity?
After they'd ordered lunch and their cocktails arrived, David asked Brad this question aloud.
"Lonely, hell!" Brad grinned at him. "I'm even thinking of taking a cabin in the country, just to see what it's like to be by myself again."
Bravado, thought David, closely studying Brad's face. Still the same big rugged features, an undeniably handsome and healthy-looking face. Except for the dissipation about the eyes and a certain overall gauntness. Those were the signs David was searching for-world-weary-tiger signs.
"I was lonely living with Joyce and her kids," said Brad. "That's why I cut out, broke the pattern. And you'll notice I said her kids, because that's how she was about anything that either came out of her body or went into it. Ownership. That's she knows. Her house, her kids, her future, and man, believe me, whenever I banged her, it was her prick in there which she was using for her own private recreation… masturbating herself with my meat. How about that? The fact that I was also getting my kicks was purely incidental with Joyce…"
David gazed nervously about to make sure this colorful lingo was not being overheard. Satisfied that the lunch-hour throng was too noisy to notice them, he said: "And did you, Brad? Get your kicks with her I mean? Was it a good marriage in that department?"
Brad gave him a rueful grin and nodded. "Joyce has been a wild lay since her early teens, David. Don't tell me you're one of the few who didn't get in on it. Or did you?" Suddenly he burst out laughing. "Jesus Christ, I don't believe it. You're blushing!"
David took a drowning gulp of his vodka martini. "Sorry, Brad, I don't think I was ready to hear anything like that about Joyce. And if it's true, it's very ironic, because most of the gossip has been about your promiscuity, not hers."
"Gossip spread by whom, David? Joyce's dearest sorority-sisters, right? Even your pretty little wife testified for her."
"Don't remind me," said David.
"Goddamned finishing-school cunts, they're organized, the stinkin' bitches! They'll lie their asses off whenever there's a hunk of community-property at stake. They're ball-breakers from birth, every last one of them. And I'll tell you something, Dave: give me a grateful ghetto-broad any day!"
Unable to suppress a grin, David listened intently, taking special note of Brad's increased profanity. A telltale trace of the underworld, perhaps? But why? If his wife had been so highly sexed, where was the need?
"But… what the hell, I didn't want my kids' lives messed up by a lot of scandal about their mother, so I let everyone think I was at fault; but it was really Joyce who was playing dirty, not me. At least, not until I left her…"
David tried to absorb this abrupt switch in public opinion: Brad wanted to save Joyce's reputation to protect his kids. So he'd completely taken the rap, and was shelling out alimony besides. And now David tried to see the brittle but vivacious Joyce Grogan as a swinging nympho…
"Well then, functionally, at least, Joyce did fulfill a need for you, Brad… right?"
Brad chuckled and said nothing for a moment, as the waiter appeared with their food. They started to eat. "Look, Dave," Brad said between mouthfuls, "it's true that Joyce and I had a helluva lot of sex, but Christ!.. I could have been anyone. When you go back to the office, ask Clint Sheffield and Steve Morgan if they didn't get the same feeling when they screwed her. In fact, you can poll the whole fuckin' staff. They's why she gave so many parties for all my friends and business associates, in order to make contacts, and then meet them at some later date for a motel-quickie…"
"But how can you be so sure all that really happened?"
"Oh look, Dave, I knew she'd been playin' around for years; that's why I finally cut out. But I didn't know who she was playing with until she told me herself…" "She told you?"
"Yep, she always was a compulsive blabbermouth, but this time she waited until after the divorce was final and everything was in her name. Then she gave me all the details. She waited for my first scheduled visit to the kids, then read off the whole list to me. All of them were old buddies of mine, or co-workers. Hell, I'd been suspicious of every one of them, but dammit, I didn't know for sure, and I wanted to leave it that way! Of course, you weren't on that list, Buddy-Boy, because you happen to have the kind of wife I've been dreaming about all my life; a one-man monogamous broad! Better hang onto her, you lucky bastard!"
David thought better of embellishing this oversimplified image Brad had regarding Linda, even though he, David, was certainly learning some astounding facts about Joyce Grogan. "Well, now I know why you quit your job, Brad, and… dropped everybody you used to know."
"Oh yeah, man… everything changed for me after that. But I'll tell you something, when she read off those names to me that day, I wanted to kill her. Then I thought, what the hell. She's a good mother and the kids need her So I took a hike…"
David stared at him. "Then you had all the grounds and she filed the complaint!"
Brad laughed wearily at this. "Oh Davey, sometimes I think you really are as innocent as you look. Don't you know that in the State of California it's always husband-fleecing time? That's why my dear old buddies decided not to come to my rescue when she was shooting her mouth off and blaming me for breaking up our home. Sure, those guys knew the real facts in the case, but what the hell could they do about it… join up for a mass confession in order to save my hide, and then face the same catastrophe themselves? She never bothered with anyone single, you know; picked only married guys who wouldn't dare squeal…"
David thought about this, feeling very callow and unworldly at the moment. "Oh wow, Brad… you make me realize that nobody's life is what it seems on the surface. So… well, I'd like you to know that mine isn't either. Not lately." And that's all I'm telling you, he thought, determined not to rehash all the dread depravity of his nightmares. How could he face Brad with such grisly details?