— Yeah, it’s really keen, Mom. It’s got seven skill levels. There’s this computer-generated monster, see...
In these conversations, almost the only time Stevie became expansive was in describing his latest acquisitions: video games, hiking shoes, tapes, classic comics, a battery-operated pencil sharpener, an elaborate backpack with a frame, a sleeping bag, a new sort of tennis racket. His life seemed to Polly to be filling up with these things; she imagined him in the spare bedroom of Jim’s house in Denver (which she’d never seen) surrounded by more and more objects. Objects, most often, that she couldn’t have afforded to buy for Stevie and that he would have no use for in New York.
The idea of all these objects made Polly so angry that last week she had asked to speak to Jim and protested, complaining that he was spoiling Stevie and buying his affection. Jim had replied in the calm infuriating voice that she knew so well, the voice of someone dealing with a totally irrational person. Everyone in Stevie’s school had these things, he explained; all the kids played tennis and went hiking and camped out. If Stevie didn’t have the right equipment he couldn’t join in his friends’ activities; he’d be a kind of outcast.
What Stevie said most often on the phone was “Don’t worry. Mom. I’m having an okay time.” Naturally this made Polly worry. Maybe it meant that he was unhappy but wasn’t telling her because he didn’t want to hurt Jim’s feelings; maybe it meant that he was happy but didn’t want to hurt hers. If he was unhappy enough — or happy enough — he might return to New York psychologically damaged, or alternatively he might want to stay in Denver forever. And there was no way of knowing for sure until he got home.
— But you’re not telling me anything, pal! Polly often wanted to scream at him over the phone. Only she knew she mustn’t do that; it could turn Stevie off totally.
Polly had tried to talk about these worries to Jeanne, who was very sympathetic but not reassuring. Yes, maybe Stevie wasn’t communicating his real feelings, she had said. Of course that must make Polly feel bad. But that was how boys were once they began to mature — it was hard, but she’d probably have to get used to it.
Polly was at the kitchen counter that evening eating a slice of Jeanne’s lighter-than-air confetti angel food cake and idly paging through the New York Times travel section when she heard her friend come home from her meeting with Betsy. She knew something was wrong at once, because it was still so early, and then because for the first time in their acquaintance Jeanne looked completely disarranged, almost distracted. Her bouncy blonde hair hung in uncombed shreds, and her pale blue down coat was buttoned wrong.
“Would you like supper?” Polly asked. “There’s some tomato soup on the stove.”
“I couldn’t eat anything.” Jeanne started to walk about the kitchen aimlessly.
“What’s the matter, is something the matter?”
“Yes, it is.” Jeanne opened a cupboard door and slammed it shut. “She didn’t tell him.”
“Betsy still didn’t tell her husband about you?”
“That’s right.” Jeanne tried without energy or success to unbutton her puffy coat.
“Oh hell. I’m sorry.” Polly got up and went to put her arms around her friend. Because of the coat, it felt like embracing a half-inflated balloon.
“I can’t stand it, I just can’t!” Inside the balloon, Jeanne collapsed onto Polly, weeping. “It’s so unfair.”
“Yeah. ... There, there.”
“She says she can’t bear to hurt him. So I said, ‘I suppose you think it’s all right to hurt me,’ and she said, ‘No, but you’re stronger than he is.” Jeanne gave a choked sob.
“There, there,” Polly repeated, feeling helpless and indignant.
“She swears she’s going to tell him soon, but this wasn’t the right moment. So I said, ‘When is the right moment?’ ” Jeanne stood back on her own feet shakily, and wiped her wet powder-streaked face with the side of her hand, not improving its appearance.
“And what did Betsy say?”
“She said she just didn’t know. I think that’s a lot of C-R-A-P. I think she’s never going to tell him.” Jeanne tried again to unfasten her coat, but her hands were still shaking. “It was awful, Polly — I got so upset — I threw my plate on the floor, everybody was looking at me —” She choked on a sob. “Veal parmigiana.”
“What?”
“That was what I was eating. It went all over the restaurant floor.” Jeanne gave a miserable laugh. “It was so stupid and embarrassing, destroying innocent crockery.”
“I guess you have to, sometimes,” Polly said.
“No. It was awful; I was awful.” Jeanne finally succeeded in taking off her coat, and let it slump to the floor, something Polly had never seen her do. “The thing is, as long as Betsy’s husband doesn’t know what our relationship is, I’m in a completely false position.”
“Mm,” Polly agreed.
“I think he must know.” Jeanne bent to retrieve the coat, and dropped it on a stool from which it at once slid off. “Unconsciously, at least. Only he won’t admit it to himself.” She began to wander around the room again. “But maybe he’s too stupid. At least he knows Betsy doesn’t love him anymore. If she ever did.” She fell into a chair and looked around distractedly. “Is there any coffee left?”
“Sure.” Polly turned on the flame under the pot.
“I think maybe he knows, or suspects anyhow. Because whenever I come over he sulks and slams things around, and shouts for Betsy to hurry up and make lunch or something.”
“He sounds like a pig.” Polly set the coffee in front of her friend, together with a carton of the heavy cream she preferred.
“He is. A complete pig.” Jeanne nodded miserably. “She’s afraid of him, that’s what it is,” she added, dumping in sugar. “She says not, but I know she must be. After all, he’s already hit her once.”
“Betsy’s husband hit her?”
“Yes. He struck her in the face with a plastic flyswatter. He said afterward it was a mistake, he meant to swat a fly. I know those sorts of mistakes. My brother used to make them all the time.” Jeanne lifted her mug. “Thanks. That tastes good.”
“I’ll start another pot,” Polly said.
“I told Betsy, I can’t go on like this. I can’t. I mean as long as she doesn’t acknowledge me, I feel as if I’m some kind of dirty secret in her life. I told her that. I said, ‘Betsy, my darling, I can’t go on with this relationship any longer unless it’s out in the open.’ ”
“And what did Betsy say?”
“She started crying, and said she just didn’t know what to do.” Jeanne sighed heavily and was silent.
“So what’s going to happen?” Polly said finally.
“I don’t know. But I told Betsy I’m not going to see her again until she tells him the truth. I can’t stand it, that’s all there is to be said.”
As it turned out, though, that was not all. For nearly an hour Jeanne sat sipping cup after cup of coffee with cream and picking at the angel food cake and weeping a bit from time to time, while she rehearsed the history of her affair with Betsy, and drew parallels between it and other affairs in her past. This was not the first time, Polly learned, that she had been hurt or betrayed. Jeanne then broadened her scope to relate events of a similar sort that had happened to friends and acquaintances.
Eventually she yawned, sighed, thanked Polly for listening, and dragged herself off down the hall to bed. Polly sat on in front of the unread Sunday Times. What she mainly felt, besides a painful sympathy for Jeanne, was a wistful disillusion. If even two women couldn’t be happy together, what good was it all?
Maybe, if you had to be in love, with all the problems and craziness that involved, it was better to be in love with someone who was dead. A dead person couldn’t do you any harm emotionally; she or he couldn’t criticize you or betray you or leave you. And you couldn’t do her any harm either, so there was no guilt.