by Peter Rabe
She stopped laughing immediately.
“Jimmy, come up here and sit down.”
“Before I fall?”
“Don’t quarrel, Jimmy, please. Not all the time.”
“I lost my drink on the way. That’ll make any drunk quarrelsome.”
“Get him a drink, will you?” she said to somebody and when he was gone she said to me, “You’re not a drunk, Jimmy.”
“I may not look like one, Jessie, but the spirit’s there.”
“You look like one all right I meant it the other way around.”
“Aren’t you drinking?”
She said no, she wasn’t, and I didn’t see a glass in her hand, either.
“If you’re trying to make everybody feel cheap and evil, sitting there with no drink in your hand, you have succeeded,” I told her.
“Please, Jimmy.”
“You wanted to see me?”
“Well, I asked for you,” she said, and in my state it felt like a slap in the face. “I thought you might like it.”
“Don’t say ‘it’ like that, Jessie. At this party the word ‘it’ is not neuter.”
“I thought since you didn’t know anybody here, you might like to sit with me.”
“You said sit because you think I’m drunk, don’t you.”
“You want to dance?”
“No. You’re dressed.”
“You’re difficult, Gallivan.”
“Complex, honey. Not a complex, though, because everything I imagine always turns out to be true.”
“You’re a very lucky fellow,” she said.
Somebody had come back with my drink and Jessie put it into my hand.
“You should have my imagination,” I said. “You wouldn’t say lucky.”
“Rand should have left you in jail,” she said. “That’s it, isn’t it?”
It hadn’t been nasty and she hadn’t been cold about it Besides, she was right. I took a cool swallow from my glass and nodded.
“You want to go out on the porch, for some air?” she asked.
I nodded again and we went out to the porch. There was nobody else. It was too cold.
A shiny icicle hung from the porch roof, two old fashioned fenders lay in the yard, and the wreath on the door was swinging a little. I had to think of an ice pick hanging from the roof, of two big ears lying in the dark yard, and that wreath got me.
Her dress had short sleeves and I put my hand where I could feel her skin.
“I don’t want you to be cold, Jessie.”
I pulled her closer and she came. The feel of her against me reminded me of the time at the hotel, when she had lain in bed. I hadn’t felt a thing then, and I don’t think she had either.
“Maybe,” I said, “we could get along better.”
“Maybe, Gallivan.”
“Why don’t we?”
“Why haven’t we?”
“Yes.”
“We never tried. I think we’ve tried not to.”
“As if meeting at the wrong time,” I said. “It’s felt like that.”
“I know. Or for the wrong reasons.”
I said nothing to that because something nudged me, not anything physical, though it felt that way. It was a slight catch in the pit of my stomach, but my stomach was all right. It felt like the ugly quirks which had happened all day.
“Jimmy?”
“Yes.”
“I just want you to look at me. You’re staring away.”
I looked at her, and it struck me that I had never seen her this close, and this well, and how good she looked to me. I could feel the warmth through my shirt where she leaned against me, and the bare arm under my hand, warm too. I wanted to say something to her but only the stupidest things came into my head.
“From this angle,” I said, “your eyes are slitty.”
“From this angle,” she said, “you should see your nose. I don’t know what it looks like, except large and funny.”
“If I hold it right, it’s not in the way at all.”
She closed her eyes and said, “Show me.”
I kissed her cheek first, which felt cold like an apple, and then I kissed her on the mouth. It went through and through both of us, because of the way we held on to each other and didn’t let go for a long time.
Afterwards we didn’t say anything. Perhaps we should have. Perhaps the tight, small knot inside would have stayed away.
“I like you, Gallivan,” she said softly.
Then I said, “Is that what he meant when he said for you to throw it a little?”
I think I let go of her before she drew back because the shock hit me sooner. I had a crazy moment where it went through my head, “You didn’t say it, you didn’t really — she didn’t hear it, she never heard it — ” But that didn’t last.
She had stepped back to the railing, touching it with her hands, and still looked at me. She kept looking at me while her face did the most terrible thing, it stayed tilted up, looking at me, and started to cry.
Then she put her hands up. She did it fast and stamped her foot and when she looked up again all I saw was the cold.
“You know,” she said, “all I told you before was that I liked you. What sort of things do you do if somebody says, ‘I love you’?”
I wasn’t able to answer.
“Or don’t you know? I bet you could make it a dilly, if you tried, Gallivan. I bet you could really throw it.”
“Jessie, listen. When I said that …”
“Careful. You know what the word ‘it’ means around here, don’t you?”
“Jessie …”
“Where’s your drink, Gallivan? You look sober.”
“Wait, it wasn’t …”
“Don’t say ‘it’, Gallivan,” and then she went back inside.
The Christmas wreath jumped around and I waited for it to stop. I finished my drink and threw the glass away. Then I went to the door, ripped the wreath off and threw that into the yard, too. After that, I went inside for a new glass, with liquor.
CHAPTER 16
There wasn’t any more dancing, not the kind like before, though a few couples were pushing around on the floor like at the end of a prom — slow, close, tired. It looked fairly romantic. A record was going and also a piano in the next room but that didn’t bother anyone. It didn’t bother me because I was for noise.
“You don’t look drunk any more,” said Micky.
“I had a sobering experience,” I said, and took a long drink. Then I went back to the kitchen because my glass was empty.
But Micky came along because he hadn’t understood what I had said.
“What did you say?”
“She said no.”
“Who, Jessie? I don’t believe it!”
“Ask her.”
“Me? I wouldn’t ask her.”
“Not your type?”
“She’s strange, is all. I like ‘em simple.”
As usual, it was more crowded in the kitchen than anywhere else and Micky reached out with his hand. He wasn’t even looking where.
“More like this, maybe,” he said and somebody squealed.
At first I thought it was Betty, the one from before, because this one had made the same kind of sound, but then Micky had probably done the same kind of thing. She whirled around very fast but didn’t know who had done it, Micky or me, so she leaned over and gave both of us a kiss, one after the other.
“You adventurer,” she said.
I thought that was better than ‘fuh-nee’ and took her arm to pull her closer. She pulled easily.
“It wasn’t me,” I told her, “because that’s too backhanded for my taste.”
“You adventurer.”
Yessir, I thought, wrong again. At least the other one knew more than one word.
Then she said, “What’s your name?” and I said, “Jimmy.” She asked, “Who are you?” I said, “An adventurer.”
But I didn’t care how it sounded because I wasn’t going to conv
erse with this one anyway. Betty had been awfully young, built small and unfinished, where this one was much more mature. I wasn’t thinking of her mind, which no longer interested me.
She said, “Why you standing at the sink, Jimmy?”
“Because I’m a drinker and got sloppy feet After a while I might not be able to make it to the source of supply.”
“Oh. Then what you want me for?”
I liked that. She had pride in her assets and no second fiddle for her.
“The drink for the cool and you for the heat.”
“Adventurer.”
“Listen, Baby, I wish you’d say something else.”
“Like what, Jimmy?”
“Fuh-nee, for instance.”
“Ooh, you’ve been smooching with Betty.”
“Smooching, for chrissake — ”
“I’m old-fashioned.”
“Well, I wasn’t Somebody goosed her and she ran away.”
“You wouldn’t let that happen to me, would you, Jimmy?”
I told her no, took a big, scratchy swallow from the glass, and when I looked at her again she was beautiful. Of course, she had been sexy all along.
I had never known a blonde like her. The hair was almost white. It was short and white and, in contrast, her skin seemed to have a cast like a light, shiny tan. Her arms were bare, and her shoulders. The straps didn’t count, being thin like strings. They made sexy little dents in her soft skin.
“You from Florida, Baby?”
“Yes. What you doing, Jimmy, looking for the tan-line?”
“I was.”
“There isn’t any,” and she pulled her neckline away, so I could check.
She was good and round in front She let go of the neckline again and leaned against me, so that I thought she was going to pop out on top.
“It’s never happened yet,” she said, “unless I wanted it to.”
I put the glass down, turned her the right way, and we had a fearful kiss. It was so technical I could hear gears clanking and rattling.
“My,” she said, “why don’t we sit down?”
“That’s why I did this, little Baby. Because I want to sit down with you.”
We only found one seat though. We were right next to the piano where an easy chair stood by the wall and I sat down first, while she held both our drinks. I sat down and my head started going around on the inside. Then, with the soft pillows under me, I felt that I wanted to sleep.
“Jimmy!”
I could understand that tone of voice. I could do nothing about it, but I knew what she meant.
She put the two glasses on the floor and sat down in the same chair with me. It put us very close.
“You’re tired, aren’t you, Jimmy?”
It surprised me, because I had been sure she was going to be nasty.
“You just rest a while,” she said, and put her arm around me. She kept her hand on the back of my head and we were awfully close.
“You wanna talk to me?” she said close to my ear.
“You’re going to make me bawl any minute,” I told her and meant every word of it.
“Go ahead,” she said.
I didn’t I took a drink instead. She settled herself in a different way so that kissing wouldn’t be so difficult and we sat like that.
“Comfortable?”
I was reeling, though I didn’t know with what. The girl was built to do it, the bad break on the porch was built for it, and everything else. I put my hand on her and she said now I wouldn’t have to answer her.
“Want me to take the glass, Jimmy?”
I gave it to her and she reached back to put it on the floor. When she did that her strap broke.
“It always does that,” she said, but did nothing else about it.
The piano was pounding a rhythm into my head and stopped the reeling in there. It just pounded now, but I could see much better. I looked at the girl and she winked at me and I played with the strap which had broken. She was leaning back in the chair and I thought she had a very comfortable smile.
“You’re feeling better, aren’t you, Jimmy. I can tell.”
She reached over and tore the other strap, because it was cutting her too much.
There were an awful lot of people milling around and I envied the girl for the simple smile she had and for not caring about anyone else in the room.
“Do that again,” she said.
I didn’t know what I had done.
We did what I suppose she would have called smooching though she didn’t use the word again. We were hardly talking.
I could look across the room from our corner and when I did I saw Jessie there.
“What happened?” said the girl.
I don’t know what I had done, but she knew right away.
“You like her?”
“Who?”
“Jessie. You’re looking at Jessie, aren’t you?”
Jessie was across the room, talking to somebody or other, but not laughing this time. That was the only thing I liked about the sight. She was drinking this time. But it was coffee. When she finished the cup the guy who was with her took a pot off the window sill and poured into her cup.
“Is that really coffee?” I asked.
“Sure that’s coffee. She drinks that and smokes.”
I had noticed how Jessie smoked. She smoked at least as much as I did, if not more.
“You don’t want to play with her,” said the girl. “She doesn’t look playful, does she, Baby?”
“Naw. Not Jessie.”
“How does a playful girl like you know a — know one like Jessie?”
“She’s around. You know.”
“Who is she?”
“Jessie? What do you mean, who is she?”
“I mean I don’t know who she is.”
“You don’t want to know her, Jimmy.”
“You didn’t answer.”
“She’s in with Rand and those guys — I mean, those people.”
“My. How polite.”
“You know. They’re big. She works with them, direct.”
“Like you?”
“Naw I just play, you know.”
“Like this.”
“That’s right. Like this. You don’t want to know her, Jimmy.”
“Jealous of Jessie?”
“Of Jessie? Why, of course not, silly!” Then she leaned close to my ear and said, “Don’t you know about her?”
“Tell me, Baby.”
“She used to be a junky.”
I stared across the room at Jessie but couldn’t see her clearly any more. All I saw was cigarette smoke and black coffee, lots of black coffee, and a cold, cold face. But I was making that up. I didn’t see anything across the room because of the many people.
“Reach back there and give me that glass, will you, Baby?”
“Not now, Jimmy!”
“Give it to me.”
She frowned at me, but as soon as I looked at her full face she smiled. I think she really was trying to be nice. She even took a cigarette out of my pocket and sat there smoking it as if she were waiting for me.
Then somebody came up to the chair, stood a moment, and when nothing happened, he leaned a little closer and said, “Honey? Can you spare the time?”
“You mean now?”
“They want you in back. If you got the time.”
She looked at me and I held the glass up to her and said, “Mud.”
She shrugged and said, “I guess I got time.” She wiggled around till she was free and stood up. “See you later?” she asked.
“You gotta go?”
“I’d rather stay.”
“Mud.”
She walked away holding the dress so it wouldn’t slide all the way down to her hips. Before she went through the curtain she winked.
I didn’t want to get out of the chair because I was sure somebody would grab it, so when Rand came by I asked him to go to the kitchen for me and get me a fresh glassful.
“Not if you bring me that blinking glassful, Rand.”
“Where’s Jessie?”
“Why don’t you shut up, you lousy sonofabitch,” I said to him, but I’m not clear whether he took that up in any way.
I know I had a glass in a while, and for another while somebody sat down in the chair with me, and then she brought me another glass, who I don’t know, and after that I played the piano. I hadn’t played for the usual seven years, which seemed my measure for everything, and the liquor kept slopping back and forth inside somewhere, but I kept playing. Somebody yelled in my ear, attaboy, attaboy, which made me think I was playing all right, but I don’t know.
And the party wasn’t over by any means, though it seemed unusually long to me. There was more of this and that, and once I ate a herring. Once I woke up freezing on the porch. The party still wasn’t over. So more of this and that I even found the backroom, not that there was a trick to it, since there were no doors anywhere. There even was something like a line, which reminded me of the usual seven years and I had a fight with somebody about it. He was drunker than I, because I was standing and he was on the floor.
I heard somebody say “fuh-nee” once and got reacquainted with Betty. There was a bed, I remember, and the girl was squealing a lot.
I don’t think she and I had sex, because that was later. The girl was built differently and her round breasts lay on top of her like soft puddings. I think she was the one I had called Baby.
CHAPTER 17
I remembered something else. I came to, clear and shivering, in the back seat of the car and the gray light outside came into focus with a snap. Rand was driving and it was very cold in the car, so we hadn’t been driving long, but the cold air was full of smoke. Jessie sat next to him with her overcoat wrapped tight around her.
“You going to Yorkdam tomorrow?” she asked. She talked low, sounding tired, but her voice wasn’t relaxed.
“Today, you mean.”
“Yes.”
“He’ll be all right,” said Rand.
She didn’t answer. She was lighting a cigarette, one from the other. Then she threw the old butt out of the window and said, “Yes. Sure.”
Rand looked at her, then watched the road again.
“But you turned out punk,” he said.
“Yes. Sure.”
Rand kept driving. He mumbled something, but said nothing else for the moment. I think he didn’t want to talk to Jessie.