by Chip Cheek
“Still can’t sleep?” Max said.
“Not well.”
“I can make you an egg if you want,” Effie said. “There’s some bacon over there.”
“I’m fine for now.”
She seemed slightly cold. He scrambled to think what might be the matter—what she might know. But then she brightened, looking past him, and said, “Hey, honey.”
Alma had come into the kitchen, looking refreshed, wearing her brown dress with the white polka dots. She laughed. “I love when you call me honey.” She took a piece of bacon and leaned on her elbows at the island counter, obviously in a good mood. “What are you all up to today? Let me guess: sitting around, drinking, going sailing.”
“And what are you going to do?” Max said.
“I think I’ll take my leave today,” she said.
“What’s that, dear?” Clara said.
“I’m going back to New York.”
Henry went cold. They hadn’t discussed this. She didn’t look at him.
“Oh, no,” Effie said, and made a pouting face. “That’s too sad.”
“You’re just going—by yourself?” Max said.
“Why not? I don’t want to break up all the fun. You all keep on frolicking.”
“Alma…”
“Max,” she said, standing up straight, holding her hands out, “everything is fine here. I just want to go home, that’s all. I’m okay. You don’t have to worry about me.”
“But what about the city being miserable, everyone’s mean and ugly, you’ll never have a home and all that jazz?”
Her face hardened for a moment. “I feel differently now. Honest, Max, this trip, I think it’s been good for me. I’ve had a lot of time to think. I want to go back and maybe apply for some jobs. Magazines. Fashion houses. You were right.”
“That sounds wonderful, dear,” Clara said.
“What’s going on?” Max said. “When did all this happen?”
“This week,” Alma said, and pointed to her temple. “Up here.”
He still seemed confused. He made to say something, then stopped. “Well, if you’re set on it,” he said.
“I am. I’ll just go up and pack my things. I can stay for lunch.”
“I’m not sure when the last train leaves,” Clara said. “You might want to get to the station before then.”
Alma gave her an even look.
“I’ll drive you,” Max said.
“It’s not a long walk,” Alma said.
“Alma. I’m not going to let you drag your suitcase across town. I’ll drive you.”
“I hate to see you go,” Henry said.
So she was doing it. She was setting it in motion already. Max would take her to the station, and she’d make the walk back to the Victorian house, where she would wait for him, her valise all packed. It was happening too fast, and he felt disoriented and outside of himself. He was already trembling with nerves. But it would take nothing to set off this cataclysm—the simplest of actions. All he’d have to do is go outside and walk, meet her, and keep on walking. Under cover of night. They’d go back to the station and wait. She’d know the timetable. The train would arrive, they’d get onto it, and then they’d be on their way to New York.
She came downstairs with her little valise. Under her arm she held her drawing pad with his picture in it. She set them both down at the bottom of the stairs. For travel she’d put on heels and stockings, she’d put her makeup on, and from her neck hung a small pendant with a blue gem in it. She looked pretty and respectable. Like someone he could bring home to his mother.
They said their farewells. A cursory hug from Clara, a warm embrace from Effie. She hugged Henry last, a quick, friendly goodbye.
“I hope we’ll meet again sometime,” she said to them both.
“We’ll look you up—you and your brother—if we’re ever in New York,” Effie said.
“Yes, please.”
She took up her valise and drawing pad and followed Max out the door.
“Sweet relief!” Clara cried when they were gone. “I feel like the clouds have parted.”
“You’re terrible,” Effie said. “I like her. She’s … cool.”
“Right.” Clara started for the bar. “We’re out of Champagne, but you’re a good Christian, maybe you can tell me: where in the Bible does it say you can’t have a gin and tonic before lunch?”
Henry said he’d love one too. Effie said to make it three, she didn’t want to feel left out.
They made ham sandwiches with pimento cheese and ate them out by the pool. The sun was bright but the temperature had dropped over the course of the morning, and by noon, for the first time in days, it felt like fall. Like it was supposed to feel in the middle of October. They finished their sandwiches and went back inside. Clara closed the patio doors. Max had been gone for over an hour, and Henry began to worry what was taking him so long. Maybe she’d decided to tell him everything, to ask him for money before she left, and they were fighting now, and soon he’d come to beat Henry to a bloody pulp. Or maybe he’d caught a peek at the drawing somehow, and the same scene was playing out. The gin helped calm his nerves. He made himself another drink, and Clara joined him. Effie put on a Johnny Mercer record. He was a good Georgia boy, she said. Was he, really? Clara said. Effie said Henry should build a fire—yes, a fire would be nice, Clara said—and as he began stacking the wood, Max returned at last. Alone. Henry watched him closely. But there seemed to be no change in his manner.
“Ah, good, a fire. It’s getting nippy out there.”
“You were gone an eternity,” Clara said.
“I wanted to see her off.”
“Really, Maxie, you didn’t have to sit with her. She’s a grown woman.”
“I think it’s precious how you worry over her,” Effie said.
Before he could stop himself, Henry said, “She got on the train?”
It was stupid of him. But he was confused. Max smiled at him, a smile he couldn’t read. “Does that surprise you?”
Effie was looking at him too, sweetly blank, registering only that he’d spoken.
“I mean,” he said, “you waited with her until she got on the train.”
“Because,” Clara cut in, “he thinks she’ll run off with the circus or something if he isn’t watching her. Honestly, Maxie.”
The moment passed. Max rubbed his hands together and said how about that fire. Like a dummy he’d driven with the top down. Clara said he should have a drink too, and join the party.
* * *
Gradually the day turned dusky and windy outside, but inside they were warm. The fire was strong. There was no question of sailing. They made more drinks, and the gin made Henry feel nicely cocooned. Effie manned the record player. She was on a kick of elegant crooners—Frank Sinatra, Johnny Mathis, more Johnny Mercer. Max teased her for her taste, but she didn’t care, she was a romantic, she said. They settled into their usual places, listening to music, talking, drinking, passing the time until dinner.
The more hours separated him from Alma, the more the whole thing seemed unreal. Like a fever dream. Effie put her feet up on Henry’s lap and he massaged them, and she smiled and closed her eyes. He lifted her foot and kissed it, and she squirmed and said it tickled.
Alma had gotten on the train. Which meant she was either on her way to New York without him, or she was trying to make her way back. Maybe she’d gotten out at the first stop—Egg Harbor? Atlantic City?—and was now waiting on a platform for the next train back, intent, whatever it took, on making it to the Victorian house tonight. Max had insisted on seeing her off, so she’d had to get on the train or else tell him everything, which might have led to disaster. But would it really have been so hard to make him leave? She could have said, Max, Jesus, I just want to be alone—and he’d have shaken his head, eventually, and left her. Fine, whatever you want. But she’d gotten on the train. And maybe, he thought now, maybe it was because she’d had the same misgivings he was having—t
hat had been roiling in him all along, that in fact had made the idea of running away with her so exciting—and as soon as they’d parted, she’d come to her senses and understood they were being foolish, that they’d been drunk on each other, and determined that the only way to put an end to it was to go away, as soon as possible. That was why she’d seemed so determined when she told them she was leaving. It had not been a ruse: she was going home.
By six they were hungry but fairly tipsy already, and no one felt like cooking. As a group they went back into the kitchen and scoured the refrigerator for leftovers. A bowl of rice and beans. The baked chicken from Sunday, a couple of hamburger patties from Tuesday. Bread and butter and garlic. Smoked gouda and soda crackers. Clara put the chicken and hamburgers onto a baking sheet to warm in the oven, and they carried everything back out to the coffee table. Max opened a new bottle of gin. Effie put on a Bing Crosby record. They settled around the table and ate.
She was on her way to New York—away from him, out of his life forever. It was clear to him now. Of course they were never going to run away with each other. He had known it all along, and so had she. It had been a wild game, intensely lifelike. He wished they could have said a proper goodbye. But what would a proper goodbye have looked like? He respected the way she’d gone. Simple and clean, no words. She was gone, but he would have the vivid memory of her for the rest of his life. He felt as if he’d escaped with a precious gem, something he’d hold close and take with him to his grave, and no one would ever know, only the two of them. He’d be loyal to her in his dreams. He would always love her.
But now, he had to admit, he felt safe. As if he’d arrived home out of a frightening storm.
* * *
Clara lay down on the rug by the coffee table, having finished her plate, and stretched her arms and legs out long like a cat. She was wearing a white-and-green flowered dress, and when she stretched, her bosom swelled and the top edge of her bra peeked out. She sat up and leaned back on her hands. “I’m so, so very glad it’s just the four of us,” she said. “I felt like we couldn’t be ourselves,” she added, to Max. “No offense to her.”
“I know,” Max said from the armchair. “Let’s not talk about it anymore.”
“I hope we aren’t inhibiting you too,” Effie said. She was down on the rug too, with Henry, leaning back against the sofa, her warm hand on his leg. They were full. It felt good. He hadn’t had much of an appetite all week.
“Are you kidding?” Clara said. “You make everything more interesting. I wish it weren’t so chilly out. We could go skinny-dipping in the pool.”
Henry’s senses quickened, but she was looking at Effie, who shrugged and answered coolly: “I told you, I’d do it if it was warmer.”
“Really?” Henry said, and she smiled at him.
“If you approved,” she said. “If you did it too.”
Clara held up her glass. “Henry would approve. He’s no stick in the mud.”
He laughed uncertainly. “I hope not.”
“There’s always Kings Cup,” Max said.
“That was fun,” Clara put in. “I’d play that again.”
“We could make it a dare. Pull the ace of spades and you have to strip and jump into the pool.”
“Not in this world,” Effie said. “I would refuse.”
“There would be a penalty.”
“I don’t care.” She shook the ice in her glass. “Could you replenish me, boo?” she asked, and he said of course and struggled to his feet—he’d better slow down, he told himself—and took their glasses over to the bar.
Clara got up too, and joined him, and as she waited for him to pour the gin she stood close to him, close enough that he could smell her Chanel perfume and feel the warmth of her skin. “I hope it rains the rest of the week,” she said. “I just want to nest in here and forget the rest of the world.”
“That sounds nice.”
“Do you know the world could be ending right now, there could be war with Russia, and none of us would know it?” She took the gin from him. “I suppose we’ll have to go home someday,” she said. “Assuming it’s still there. But not just yet.”
It occurred to him, as he handed Clara the tonic, that he wasn’t quite sure what day it was—Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday—nor how long it had been since he and Effie had called their parents. “Is there a phone here?” he asked.
“Do you need to make a call?”
“I just realized we never gave our folks a number or address. Nobody’s got a way to reach us.”
Clara laughed, and put her hand on his arm. “Oh, baby, you’re lost in the woods, aren’t you? Don’t worry, you’re safe here.”
“I just mean they might be worried.”
“We’ll call them tomorrow.”
They settled back around the coffee table to play Kings Cup again. Skinny-dipping was out—the wind outside was rattling the windowpanes. Clara suggested an alternative, to keep things exciting: if you drew an ace, you had to play the rest of the game in your underwear, like she had done the other night. What if you drew a second ace? Effie asked. Then you got to choose someone else to do it, Max suggested. Effie laughed. “We might as well get down to our undies right now.”
“No,” Clara said. “It has to happen naturally.”
“I think this game’s rigged,” Effie said to Henry.
“It’s good, clean fun,” Clara said. “We’re all adults here.”
“I’m game,” Henry said. He was feeling expansive and excited. Thrilled and relieved from his escape, the wild memory of Alma locked safely away, the comfort of his wife beside him, the unspeakable possibilities that were upon them now, which they could share. And anyway, it wasn’t a big deal, it was like being in trunks and bikinis.
Max set the deck of cards at the center of the table and they started. Henry’s reflexes were terrible. If someone drew a four, they all had to put their thumbs to the edge of the table, and the last one had to drink. Henry took tiny sips, but the gin went down so easily. Fives were high—everyone raised their hands—and this time it was Clara who was distracted. “Fuck,” she said, and drank. Max drew a joker, which meant he could make up a rule on the spot. Until the next joker was drawn, he said, they all had to speak with a British accent, and anyone who slipped had to drink. For Henry this was easy, he’d always been good with voices, but Effie’s entire understanding of the English way of speaking seemed to rest on beginning every sentence with the words “I say”—“I say, dear Max, could you spare a girl a cigarette?”—and the rest of them, Henry included, could barely contain themselves. Max ordered Effie to drink, and drink again. “I’m just going to shut my mouth, dammit,” she said, which forced another drink.
Henry drew the first ace—“Bingo!” Clara cried (in a British accent, impressively)—and groaning, as though he dreaded it, he removed his oxford shirt and trousers, tossed the bundle behind him, and sat Indian-style in his thin, baby-blue boxers. Effie laughed, leaned into him, and kissed him. He was in no danger of an erection, his nerves kept it down, but no matter what he did with it, the slit at the front of his boxers gaped open in Clara’s direction. She wasn’t looking, she was concentrating on the rounds. He missed the five-up-high and had to drink.
He drew the second ace as well, and was forced to choose. They all looked at him. “Who’s it gonna be?” Clara said. Effie to his left, Clara to his right, but both were fraught, and so he chose Max across from him.
“Hank,” he said. “I had no idea.” He pulled his T-shirt and khaki shorts off, complained jokingly of a draft, and got up to put another log on the fire. He wore tight white briefs, and his bulge was indecent. Henry saw anew his thick athlete’s build, which didn’t square with all the loafing and gorging they’d been doing the past two weeks, and supposed he lived a different life in New York. While he stoked the fire Effie stared openly at him and laughed, her cheeks bright pink, but Henry didn’t care. The gin made everything fluid. He leaned back on his hands and stretche
d his legs out in front of him, let anyone who cared see the open gap in his boxers.
Effie drew the third one. She was wearing one of the modest dresses he knew from church, and he helped her with the zipper in the back. She shimmied it up over her waist and with effort pulled it up over her head and off. “Huzzah,” Clara said. She wore a pointy tan bra and matching panties, open lace at the hips. She hugged her knees to her chest and said, “Don’t look at me, I’m a whale”—“Drink,” Max said—and Clara said, “You’re an angel, my little belle”—“You drink too.”
For the rest of the game, Clara was the only one dressed. Henry drew the other joker, and said they all had to speak like Southerners now. “Not fair,” Max said, and Henry ordered him to drink. But there were only a few cards left. Max picked up the last one—the final ace—and without having to be told, Clara reached back to unzip her dress, pushed the shoulder straps off, and worked it down past her hips, down her legs, and kicked it away. She wore mismatched underwear—white bra, blue panties. “Free at last,” she said, and Henry admired her without restraint, the soft, broad expanse of her. She smiled at him. “Should we play again?”
“No!” Effie cried. “I won’t be able to stand up anymore.”
Nevertheless, she asked Henry to refresh her drink, and he went back to the bar with both of their glasses. Max put on another log. He’d been right, there was a draft in the room—Henry could feel it by the bar—but instead of putting their clothes back on they huddled closer to the fire, which Max had stoked up high. Clara took a few pillows down from the couch. The music had stopped long ago, and Effie got up to put another record on. She read the back of a record, holding her left leg out en tendu, and put on Vic Damone, “On the Street Where You Live.” She sang la-di-da to the melody, swept back to them, and by the couch spread her arms out and spun around a few times, until she stumbled, laughed at herself, and plopped down on the floor beside Henry. She lay back and stretched her legs over his lap, and he ran his hands over her bare skin. A few strands of hair peeked out from the edge of her underwear, and he tucked them back in. He wasn’t bothered. It excited him that they might see. She smiled at him. “I’m sure I’ll be embarrassed about this in the morning,” she said.