Moving On

by Larry McMurtry

  Davey looked at his bottle and popped the nipple back into his mouth. He looked up at his mother as he sucked, and Patsy smiled at him. She loved the way his jaws worked.

  “Well, I mean I probably drove you away.”

  He got up and left the room and Patsy sat where she was while Davey took the bottle. She felt tired and slightly sick; she felt immobile. It was an effort to move her fingers. Then, when Davey was finished, she had a moment of worry about Jim and went to the bedroom. He was dressed to go out.

  “I’ll take Flap some books,” he said.

  “Are you okay?” she said, coming closer. “I don’t want you imitating him, no matter how bad I’ve been.”

  “I wasn’t planning on it.”

  She sighed, very troubled. Jim puzzled her, but she didn’t feel she had any right to question him or criticize him. The room seemed unfamiliar. She was not sure she had any right in the room at all, or any right anywhere. There was a very long silence. It seemed to her that much ought to be being said, but she could not start it. She could only wait for whatever was going to be meted out to her. It was disturbing to think that nothing was going to be meted out to her, that nothing would be said and the terrible indefiniteness allowed to continue. Anything would be better than prolonged indefiniteness, it seemed to her.

  Jim was staring at the books in the bookcases. “I thought maybe you just went by to tell him about Flap,” he said. “I even got a taxi at two A.M. and dashed over to see if that was where you were. Maybe I should have come up and had a fight with him and drug you home. But it would have involved leaving Davey too long. As it was I was only gone about four minutes. Do you think I should have come up?”

  She tried to turn her mind to it but found the scene unimaginable. “No,” she said, “I would just have been mad at you for leaving Davey.”

  “Probably,” he said.

  “So what now?”

  “I don’t know,” he said.

  “Do you want a divorce?”

  “No.”

  She felt a quick relief. Davey had crawled over and was pulling himself up by clutching her clothes. The relief lasted only a minute and then was smothered by the stupor she felt.

  “Why aren’t you beating me?” she said. “You used to say you’d kill me if I ever slept with anyone else.”

  “That was when I didn’t believe it could happen,” Jim said. “That’s just the kind of thing you say. I don’t feel much like beating you. I feel more like holding on to you.

  “I guess I don’t even feel much like beating him, really,” Jim said. “I’d sleep with you if I were him and got the chance.

  “Of course you have to quit seeing him,” he added, looking at her.

  “Of course,” Patsy said automatically. But then it struck her how extremely complicated every day was going to be from then on, and she dropped her head dispiritedly.

  “Cheer up,” Jim said, attempting to look brisk. “We haven’t died. We’ll work it out. It’s not the end of everything.” When Patsy looked up he bent to kiss her. She took the kiss on her cheek and caught a glimpse of his eyes as he raised up. There was more hurt in them than in his words. He didn’t look like himself.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” she said.

  But Jim attempted to be light. He juggled Davey a bit and picked up the books to go.

  “When will you be back?” she asked. She wanted to have something to expect.

  “Oh, after lunch.”

  She stood up, suddenly distraught at the thought that he might meet Hank.

  “Are you going to see him?” she asked.

  “I’d just as soon not. I think I’ll cut the seminar today.”

  They were silent again, both of them pondering the new complications of ordinary academic intercourse.

  “I guess you’d better tell him to go away,” Jim said.

  Patsy nodded, again automatically. “Shit,” she said. “I’ve ruined everybody. He went away once on account of me. If you hadn’t gone away I don’t think he would ever have come back. Now he’ll never get a degree and it’s all because I couldn’t behave.”

  Suddenly she began to cry; the sense of the mess that she had made overwhelmed her. She sat down on the couch crying. Davey was distressed and Jim became impatient. Her tears seemed to annoy him more than her adultery.

  “Now hush, damn it,” he said. “He had as much to do with it as you did, probably more. If he has to go, too bad. He’s a lousy graduate student, anyway—he’ll never get a doctorate. I don’t like you crying about him.”

  “I’m not . . . just crying . . . about him,” she said. “I’m crying . . . about everything I’ve . . . ruined.”

  She went on crying and Jim got a raincoat and wrapped the books he was taking in a newspaper. “I’m going to take these books to Flap,” he said. “It’s better than watching you cry.”

  Patsy felt a moment of hatred for him after he had gone. She hoped he might have forgotten something and would have to come back, so she could tell him, while she felt it, that it was all his fault, that if he only wouldn’t run out on her at such times she wouldn’t have needed anyone else. But he didn’t come back and she couldn’t sustain the hatred. Why shouldn’t he go? Why should he stay to watch her cry? He was quite right. It was not his fault but hers for being weak, foolish, selfish, disloyal. And what she was going to do about it she had no idea, for she was still as weak, foolish, selfish, and disloyal as she had been before she was discovered.

  Davey got used to her crying and she got a pillow off the bed and lay on the floor, so as to be at his level, and cried and sniffed and blew her nose while he played with his blocks, babbling emphatically.

  While she was crying Emma called, asking if Jim had left with the books. Flap was better, she said, and she sounded better. She heard the tears in Patsy’s voice and asked what was wrong.

  “Oh, nothing. We just had a fight. It’s nothing.”

  “I guess the reason I feel so much better is because it’s not the sort of thing Flap would ever do twice,” Emma said. “What the hell. I can always live with him.”

  “I’m not sure I can always live with Jim,” Patsy said. “However. I’m not going to bore you with my troubles after the kind of night you’ve had.”

  “Your troubles don’t bore me. I don’t suppose you want the boys this afternoon. Momma seems to have a date.”

  “Sure,” Patsy said, though she didn’t at all want the boys. It turned out, though, that they were a godsend. She spent a bad morning, tired, sick with herself, irresolute. She tried to sleep but Davey wouldn’t let her. She couldn’t think, couldn’t decide anything, didn’t feel she had the right to decide anything. All she could do was wait for Jim to tell her what he wanted of her, so she could try to do it. She gave little thought to Hank, who had even fewer rights in the matter than she did.

  But when Jim returned, just before lunch, it was clear he had reached no important decisions. He looked tired and unhappy, but not desperate and not at all decisive. He couldn’t even decide what kind of sandwich he wanted. The kitchen was dirty and Patsy cleaned it up in silence. They had lunch in silence. Davey napped and Jim read Time magazine. The afternoon looked like a completely unbridgeable gap of time. There was nothing to do but sit and feel sick and apprehensive. It was hard to imagine anything good happening, that afternoon or any time.

  Thus the Horton boys were a welcome interruption. At Jim’s suggestion they all went to the zoo. Mrs. Greenway had bought the boys new red winter jackets and they were in the best of spirits and on their best behavior. The rain had blown away but the foliage and even the air were still wet. They gave the boys bags of popcorn, to Davey’s envy, and walked all over the zoo. For supper they got hamburgers and French fries and when Mrs. Greenway showed up, the boys were greasy and ketchupy and she looked somewhat disapproving.

  “I’ve never known what people see in hamburgers,” she said.

  But the afternoon had been passed, and during it Patsy and Jim achieve
d a state of complete politeness. It was so complete that she began to wonder if it might not last forever. They read all evening. Only at bedtime did Jim mention the problem again.

  “When are you going to tell him?” he asked.

  Patsy had given it no thought. “I don’t know,” she said. “When do you think I should?”

  “Why put it off?” he said.

  “Okay,” she said, shrugging. “I’ll tell him tomorrow.” The problem was less immediate than another. Jim was in bed and she was still at her dressing table. “Would you mind if I slept on the couch tonight?” she asked timidly.

  Jim looked surprised. “Why should you do that?” he asked.

  Patsy was at a loss. It seemed obvious to her, but she had no clear position on anything any more. She wanted to sleep on the couch but that scarcely seemed an important reason why she should; it was probably one more reason why she shouldn’t.

  She said no more; she got in bed. But asking had been a mistake.

  “Is there something wrong with me?” he asked angrily.

  “No,” Patsy said. “Don’t be that way. Just forget I asked.”

  “I’m not very good at forgetting the things you do,” he said. “Some night when we’re not so tired I want you to explain it all to me. There are a lot of things I’d really like to know.”

  “Maybe we should consult an oracle. I doubt I can be very helpful. I don’t understand it myself.”

  She knew from the way he looked at her that he was disgusted with that answer. He thought she knew exactly why she had done it and was merely too selfish to tell him. But it had been too long a day. She could not afford to take every disgusted look seriously. She turned off her light and went to sleep, and, through the night, kept as far as possible to her side of the bed.

  3

  SHE AWOKE not knowing what was going to happen—went through a day not knowing what was going to happen. Physically she felt worse than she had the day before. She had slept poorly and awoke with a knot in her stomach. It was raining again, and blowy, and she sat at the breakfast table wishing for some easy out, like the flu, that would give her an excuse to go to bed for a few days and hold all problems in abeyance. Jim and Davey were very cheerful at breakfast; she could not respond and was even a little annoyed by Jim’s cheerfulness. His resilience seemed to her a little too easy, and his cheerfulness either false or stupid. There was nothing to be cheerful about. He had pursued her across the bed during the night and had his arm across her body when she awoke. She had not liked it. It was that that had given her the knot. She didn’t want to be touched, and cheerful was nothing she was ever likely to be again.

  Jim went off to the library and she moped through the morning. Juanita came but Patsy did not go out. She felt no desire to see Hank, no eagerness at all to make him go away or not go away, no inclination to do anything about anything. She sat in the rocking chair most of the morning, trying to read a fat novel by Doris Lessing. Jim had lugged it home from the library, but she couldn’t read it. Doris Lessing’s problems were as dull as her own. When Jim came in at lunch and deduced from the fact that she was still in her bathrobe that she had not gone out to give Hank the gate, he was annoyed with her, though he suppressed it as best he could.

  After lunch she dressed and paid Flap a visit. Emma was not there. He was in a large ward mostly filled with Negroes. He was not very talkative and neither was Patsy. “You look hollow-eyed,” he said, appraising her. “Been sitting up all night reading Ginsberg?”

  “No, but I like his beard,” she said, yawning. They both felt like taking a nap. Finally Flap did and Patsy left. The day seemed quite pointless. She went to the drugstore and had a Coke, wondering if Hank would come in. He didn’t; she bought some magazines and went home. Jim was home. She kept her silence, washed her hair, and read magazines until it was time to cook dinner. She had not had the energy to go to the grocery store and fell back on soup and rather uninspired bacon and tomato sandwiches. After supper, while she sat on the bed admiring Davey in his brand new winter pajamas, Jim got tired of suppressing his annoyance.

  “You didn’t do it, did you?” he said.

  “No, he wasn’t home.”

  “It’s rather cruel of you not to look him up. He might be sick with worry.” There was an edge in his voice.

  “Okay,” she said, sighing. “I promise to look him up tomorrow if you’ll drop it right now. I don’t like to talk about it while I’m playing with Davey.”

  “Oh, shit,” he said. “You have a lot of refinement for someone who’s been sleeping around.”

  “Shut up,” she said. “I haven’t been sleeping around.”

  Jim shrugged. “Its just a phrase,” he said. “Anywhere that’s not here is around, as far as I’m concerned. But I apologize. I think it’s a little silly not to want to mention it in front of Davey. He doesn’t understand.”

  “So I’m silly,” she said. “I’m a silly overrefined adulteress. Are you sure you want to keep bothering with me? I may be too frivolous for the scholarly life.”

  Jim withdrew and let it drop. They spent the evening being strictly polite.

  The next morning Patsy awoke with the same knot in her stomach and decided that, inasmuch as she felt bad already, she would go get it over with with Hank. She found him barely up and when he reached for her she brushed his arm aside with a movement of her shoulders and sat on the couch, her coat on and her purse in her lap.

  “You look sick,” he said. “Where were you yesterday?”

  “I was sick yesterday. I’m sick today and I’ll probably be sick tomorrow and for years to come, and it serves me right. We’ve been discovered.”

  She watched him closely, hoping for some helpful reaction, but all he did was frown and sit down by her. “I guess that night was a mistake,” he said.

  He reached for her but she made herself unapproachable. “Don’t touch me,” she said. “It won’t do any good. Off you go again, back to your goddamn plains. Too bad for your career.”

  Hank shrugged and pushed her back on the couch. She didn’t fight but neither would she take off her coat or let go of her purse.

  “Jim said you were a lousy graduate student,” she said. “Is that right? I assumed you were brilliant. You’re so silent I had to assume it.”

  “I’m so-so,” he said. “My mind hasn’t been in the groove this year.”

  “I’m well aware of what groove your mind’s been in. I ought to be, since it’s ruined my life. If you’re not brilliant you ruined me under false pretenses, you bastard.” She smiled a little. For a moment it ceased to seem so awful.

  He made her let go of her purse, and caught her hands. “Quit,” she said. “I never meant to be ruined by a lousy graduate student. Boy, am I dumb. I could have been ruined by William Duffin if I’d wanted to. Why’d I pick you?”

  For a moment it all ceased to seem serious. It was just another morning. The change that had taken place had taken place in the other world. Their world was still the same. It might not be enough, but it was the same. He smoothed her hair and she felt comfortable and welcome. She had to tug hard at her mind to remember that there was another, sterner world, in which she had duties. Her husband, at that moment, was waiting for her to come home and tell him she had put an end to something. She had forgotten how she meant to do it.

  “I wish I felt as bleak here as I do at home,” she said. “Then it would all be easy. You could be shot down without impunity, you know. Or with impunity, whichever it is. Now your career is in ruins and you’re losing your true love. Why aren’t you bereft?”

  But, looking at his face, she knew why. He was thinking about sex. He didn’t really take what she was saying seriously. She didn’t like it. The look on his face, so familiar and so thoughtless, made it all seem serious again.

  “We could run away, I guess,” he said. “Ever consider that?”

  “No,” she said. “You never gave me any reason to consider it. You don’t want to marry me. You w
ouldn’t know what to do with me, married, no more than Jim does. Don’t go fantasizing any miraculous elopement. What do you think I am? We just bought a house. The contract is signed. We have a child. I’m not going to run away.”

  “I don’t like you living with him,” Hank said, as if it were something that had just occurred to him.

  Patsy felt cold. “Thanks,” she said. “This is a great time for you to turn purist. Suddenly you’re an absolutist. I leave my husband for you or you go away. What happens to me then is no concern of yours, I guess. You’ll have your purity.” She had quickly become very agitated.

  “We’re good for one another,” Hank said, as if that too had just occurred to him.

  “Good for one another!” she said. “What have we done for one another that was so good up to now? All we did was screw a lot!”

  “I love you,” he said, trying to kiss her.

  “I don’t want to talk about love,” she said, jerking back. “I don’t know anything about love. I don’t love you—I never said I loved you, not in a sane moment, anyway.”

  “You have too!” he said, his voice rising. Her agitation startled him, scared him. “Think of the other night. What about that?”

  “I don’t remember the other night,” she said bitterly. “I don’t want to, either. Think about what? So we screwed to our hearts’ content, so what. It’s nothing to bank on. I happen to have real obligations to live up to, thank you. Important ones. Just because you don’t, doesn’t mean I don’t. I don’t love you and that won’t ever happen again.”

  She looked at him coldly and contemptuously and Hank, unable to stand it, suddenly hit her in the mouth, knocking her off the couch. He immediately caught the lapels of her coat and helped her back on the couch. They were both surprised and silent, and both were shaking.

  “You do love me,” he said.

  “No I don’t,” she said, shaking her head. “No I don’t.” She began to cry. “I don’t love anybody.” She hadn’t felt the blow at all but her lips felt numb.