Late in the Season

by Felice Picano

  “I’m sorry, Matt,” and she meant that. He’d taken his hand off his crotch; both of them hung, large and potentially dangerous, next to his sides. He seemed so young now. Stevie felt so strong with him, strong in a way she’d never really felt before, not even with Jonathan.

  “Do you want to relax and talk awhile?” she asked. “I’m a little tired. My foot is hurting again. Why don’t we sit here and talk?”

  She sat on the boardwalk, making certain to place the bag of groceries next to herself, between them, then gestured for him to join her. They were out in the open, on the main walk, surely the most public spot around, although she hadn’t seen any passersby since she’d left the harbor. He slowly joined her, moving a bit closer than she would have liked, pressing up against the groceries. She put out her feet, so they dangled over the sand. Longer, lankier, Matt sat next to her, looking at her, then down at the sand, still embarrassed. She hoped she was doing the right thing. But it must be right: he seemed relaxed, and her panic had subsided to an occasional shiver around her heart.

  “You have very nice eyes,” she said. They were blue-gray like bay waters on a stormy day. Uncertain eyes.

  He looked down at his feet, silent. Evidently he wasn’t comfortable.

  “So! You’re a ferry hauler. I always wondered what that was called.”

  “That’s what they call us. You know, in the businesses here and on the other side.” His voice was still sulky.

  “Do you live with your family on the other side?”

  “Just my dad and my brother. He’s a mechanic for the Long Island Railroad. My dad worked for the railroad too. He’s retired now. Paralyzed. My mom’s dead…” His voice trailed away.

  She asked another question; then another. Little by little, Matt began telling her about himself and his family. She heard about his hard, bleak childhood, a life without luxuries, without promise, a life of hand-me-downs and pride in just managing to get by. He’d had little schooling, had gone to work early on and was still working hard. She got the impression it wasn’t very different from Barbara’s life. No wonder they hated and envied the summer people—who had money, who vacationed here three or four months a year without suffering because of that, and who provided them with work, food, clothing, infrequently a new bike for their children or a new boat for their livelihood. Stevie found she had to draw Matt’s words out of him, he was so reticent. It was clear that he was bitter. Only when he’d begun work as a ferry hauler three years before and come to see the summer people’s lives—their yachts, their limousines picking them up on the mainland, their houses here, their expensive purchases, had he suddenly realized how much he was lacking—and would probably always lack. It was easy for her to be attentive to him—now that she’d gotten over her initial terror she was fascinated. He was a boy who not only lacked material things, he seemed most to lack love: whereas her life was drenched in love, cushioned by it, burdened with it even, on all sides. Yes, that was what her dream this morning had reminded her, how many obligations of affection she had—to her family, to Bill, to her friends at school, and now to Jonathan. It was too much, not too little she suffered from. And now she was starting to make them suffer for giving it to her. Only Jonathan was exempt; theirs was such a new, and special kind of love: with no attachments, no debts. But the others! Rose and the girls at Smith missed her; Bill missed her; she knew her mother must be sorry by now she’d given her the keys to the summer house. Stevie hadn’t meant for any of this to happen.

  Matt was winding down, finishing his narration. His words came more slowly, he paused more between sentences. He told her about a boat he wanted to buy—to become an independent ferry hauler. He mentioned how he sometimes thought of just picking up and leaving, going west, to the Rockies, to Seattle, perhaps to become a logger. He heard there was a good living in that, constant work, and beautiful women.

  “In California,” she said, “the women are very beautiful. Maybe you ought to do that, Matt. Move out west. You like the sun and the outdoors and the water. Why not go where you have those all year round. Who knows, maybe your woman is waiting for you out there.”

  “My woman?”

  “Your intended,” she said firmly. “As I’m intended for someone else.” Calmly enough said, but in the middle of saying it, the question within it had almost silenced her: Who was her intended? Bill? Jonathan? Someone else?

  “You really think so?” he asked. He evidently liked the idea.

  “Why not? And how are you going to find out, unless you try, right?”

  “Maybe,” hesitantly. Then, “They really do get me down here. My dad and brother. Especially in the winter.”

  “No winter in California,” she said.

  “I think I ought to apologize for everything I said before.” He looked down at his feet again.

  “You don’t have to, Matt.”

  “Just talking here with you makes me feel better,” and he cracked a little smile. His lips seemed parched, his teeth yellowish, bad for someone so young. “Even dreams…”

  “If you have a dream, you should follow it,” she said. “If you don’t follow it, you’ll never know if you can really have it or not.”

  His whole face opened up at that.

  Stevie was surprised at her own words, which had just slipped out of her. She was wondering where they’d come from. Did she really believe what she said? And if not, why had she said it? Merely to comfort him? Then what was her own dream? Was it this, being strong, being independent, not relying on others, being able to sit down and talk to someone like Matt, someone disturbed, in need of another person, and even help him?

  It did make her feel good. She wasn’t tired by it, wasn’t at all bored, she was fascinated by the glimpses into his life she’d received—touched by his revelation of a possible future for himself—as though it were a gift to her. Maybe this was what she wanted. And all she would have to do was to follow her ideal, and the rest would follow in time, a man, or a family, or something else—friends, a career, doing something useful.

  It rang through her body like a gong suddenly struck. She felt so elated, she thought she might be hyperventilating.

  Matt chose that moment to stand up on the boardwalk and offer to help her up. He thanked her, apologized again, backed off, thanked her again, then turned and began to walk away, back toward the harbor. Was it her imagination, or was he walking with a lighter, springier step, as though he’d dropped a load off his shoulders?

  Still stunned by what this odd meeting had told her about herself, Stevie walked home slowly, and turned onto the ramp to her family’s house. She was halfway up it, before she realized her mistake.

  “Damn!” she said, stopped on the walkway. “That’s the second time today about my parents. I’m going to have to do something about that.”

  When she entered the lovers’ house a few minutes later—how apt, how prescient her bestowal of the name had been!—Jonathan was at his desk. He looked up from his composing.

  “You sure had a good walk,” he said.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “You look as though you’re glowing.”

  She restrained her excitement, and said, “Something wonderful happened to me. Terrifying at first. Even a little terrifying right now. But wonderful!”

  His kind dark eyes looked at her without surprise.

  “Would you like to share it with me?” he asked. Who but Jonathan would ask such a heavenly question, she asked herself; certainly not Bill Tierney, who would mutter, “That’s nice,” or something else equally inane.

  “Yes! But…” How could she share it with him? A part of it—the most unknowable part of it, the X-factor, was Jonathan himself. “I don’t know,” she faltered. “I don’t know where to begin. Do you mind if I don’t share it with you?”

  “If it’s that private, no problem.” He got up and took the grocery bag from her, bringing it into the kitchen where he began laying her purchases out on the counter. “How about
a cup of tea and a game of Scrabble?” he asked.

  “You really don’t mind?” she asked. She had to know.

  “You’ll tell me when you’re ready.” Then, looking at the groceries, “God, what a huge container of milk. And you mean to say you really drink it like that? Straight? Without coffee or brandy or anything in it?” He shuddered in mock disgust, and she had to laugh.

  “I have to warn you,” she said, as he got out the Scrabble board, “I cheat.”

  “Oh! Not another one!” he said, then seemed to have been struck by a thought. He became suddenly silent, even clouded over.

  He’d thought of Daniel, Stevie knew: Daniel cheated at Scrabble too. Hell! The lovely filigree of their being together was coming apart for him too.

  Chapter Fifteen

  He was walking down the street in a foreign city, an old city. It was daylight, but he was unsure of the hour. The light was so strange—so bright and yet without glare—he couldn’t tell whether it was late morning or just before sunset. Whatever time it was, it bathed the surrounding buildings in an odd light, as though they were being illuminated for a film to be shot. Colonnades to his left seemed endlessly repetitive. A tall building of some sort with a crenellated roof visible loomed on his other side. The paving stones under his feet were unusually large, lightly pitted, pale gray; gutters—like half pipes set into their surface—ran along them: real gutters. It was a very old city. When he finally reached the end of the two long buildings, he was in a large, empty plaza. He realized he must be in some Italian city—Florence or Siena. There was a lovely little Romanesque-style church to one side; and in the middle of the plaza, a statue on a tall pedestal. Perseus? Suddenly he heard a telephone ringing. He looked all around him in the plaza, thinking he was near a phone kiosk, but there was none—no other structures but the apse of the church and the statue—David?—on the pedestal. Could it be ringing from where he’d emerged? From behind those colonnades? Or, perhaps, ahead of him, inside the church? It was somehow extremely important that he reach the phone and answer it, desperately important. But there was no one on the street to ask where it was. He began running, first through the colonnades, then, when these only showed him an endless gray brick wall, across the street to the tall building, which had many doors. All of them were locked. Finally he dashed back into the plaza, and toward the church. He flung open the huge, cast bronze, carefully balanced doors, and rushed inside. Except for a flock of geese waddling across the dark, musty, tiled floor, and the distorted light filtering down through oddly colored high windows, he could see nothing inside. He edged back out again, into the plaza. The phone had suddenly stopped ringing, and he cursed himself for being unable to reach it. Then he heard her voice—and he knew it was Fiammetta calling him. There she was, at the other end of the plaza; she’d just come over a curved footbridge—were they in Venice suddenly?—running toward him. She wore a Nile green gown, embroidered with pearls at her throat and wrists, the sleeves slashed to explode out bunches of white satin. Her hair was the gold of an antique coin, fashionably plucked so her wide, lovely brow was higher than it ought to be. She charged right into his arms, shaking him…shaking him…

  He woke up. Stevie was on the bed, almost astride him, shaking him awake.

  “It’s Dan,” she said. “He’s on the phone. From London.”

  “Dan?” He sat up suddenly, awakened totally. “What time is it?”

  It was barely midnight. He’d only been asleep a half hour.

  “I had to get it,” she said apologetically. “Even out there it was keeping me awake. It just rang and rang, then started ringing again. I’m sorry, Jonathan. If I’d thought it was Dan… I thought it must be someone else. Some emergency or something.”

  He held her close.

  “It’s all right. I’ll take it. Try to get some sleep.”

  He’d awakened as thoroughly as though there were a burglar in the house, or a murdering intruder. He jumped out of bed, rolling her over him, and pulled on a pair of shorts. Daniel hadn’t called this morning: hadn’t called since Jonathan had hung up on him. Well, he would have to be dealt with sometime. Why not now?

  “Try to go to sleep,” he said, closing the bedroom door behind him.

  “Jonathan?” she called.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” Then: “I was going to ask you not to fight. Please?”

  “I won’t,” he said.

  “Liar!”

  “Am I that transparent to you?”

  She had to think about that. “Not really,” she admitted.

  “Go to sleep!”

  “I’ll try,” she said, unconvinced.

  He went to the phone in the living room, picked it up, heard nothing on the other end, and wondered if they’d lost the connection. He extracted a cigarette from the package on the table and lighted it.

  “Jonathan? You there?” Daniel’s voice sounded odd.

  Here goes, Jonathan thought. “Hi, Dan.” Breezily. “What’s with the phone call? Trouble?”

  “Who was that who answered the phone?” Dan asked, equally airily. So that was how it was going to be played.

  “The Locke girl. Stevie. You remember her. From across the way. Lady Bracknell’s ward.” Said as easily as though they were talking about someone not seen in months.

  “So…?” Dan inquired, as though over a Campari cocktail on the Via Veneto.

  “She came out here to be away from her parents. She’s going through a few crises. Undergoing pressures.”

  “I see. Crises. Pressures.”

  “That’s right. You know the usual postadolescent stuff. Whether to finish college or go to work. Whether to become independent or not. Kid stuff.” He puffed on the cigarette theatrically.

  Without missing a beat, or changing an inflection in his voice, Dan asked, “How long have you been sleeping with her?”

  A nice turn. Bravo! Jonathan thought.

  “About a week. No. Not quite.” Let’s be civilized, his tone said.

  “Not quite a week?” Slightly surprised—so the crumpets don’t come with the tea today. Only scones. That kind of question. “Well, that must have made her forget her little crises. Unless,” urbanely added, “it created a new one.”

  “I don’t think so,” Jonathan said, letting the smoke drift out of his mouth, à la Ronald Colman in God knew what awful movie. “Of course, I can’t really claim to have helped her any.”

  “I’m certain you did. You’re always so good with the little human touches.”

  This farce of cynicism and hypocrisy was beginning to pall on Jonathan. It wasn’t getting them anywhere. They knew they could play it for hours if they chose: they were well enough matched for it. Why bother? He’d leave the phone for a minute on some pretext. Dan would naturally assume he was going to Stevie, and reporting their talk to her. When he picked up the receiver again, Daniel would be furious. Then it would really begin.

  “Hold on a second, will you, Dan?” he said, left the phone without waiting for an answer, and went to the window wall, one panel of which he moved aside so only the screen remained.

  Dew spangled the screen’s mesh already. Farther away a green meteorite dove through the night sky toward the horizon, exploding in a tiny emerald and white puff. It was chilly out. He’d better put on a shirt.

  When he got back to the phone it was silent. He thought he heard a sob. Oh, no! That wasn’t what he wanted on a transatlantic call. Concerned, he asked. “Daniel? You there? What’s going on?”

  Daniel’s answer was calm, collected, showing Jonathan he’d been wrong about the sob. “Here? Nothing wrong. A little postadolescent crisis, perhaps. Perhaps a little realization that I’ve been awake until five thirty in the morning, Greenwich time, worrying about my lover in New York who’s been acting a little bit unlike himself, while he’s busily screwing some young girl. Aside from that, nothing. Nothing important, certainly.”

  ‘‘I’m not going to say I’m sorry.’’

&nb
sp; “Heaven forbid!” The first outburst. Then, calmer, “Sorry, babe. The strain, you know. The distance and all.” Then, “Are you in love with her?”

  Jonathan’s answer was a long pause that Daniel himself interrupted.

  “Let me rephrase the question to make it easier for you to answer. Are you leaving me for her?”

  “Look, Daniel…”

  “Are you?”

  “I don’t know. It’s not like that.”

  “What’s it like then?”

  “Not what you think.”

  “I’m thinking nothing at all. I’m completely without prejudice or precedents. I’m just hearing it for the first time, remember?”

  “Your imagination is running wild,” Jonathan said calmly.

  “Well, perhaps that’s so. So why don’t you tell me.”

  “I don’t know,” was all he could come up with after a long pause.

  “You don’t know? Well, I know,” Daniel said. “And I know that you’re not leaving me without a fight. Face-to-face. Hand-to-hand combat, baby. So you’d better get working on those weights you’ve been neglecting—fast. Because you’re going to be needing all the strength you can muster up by nightfall.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about how I’m going to come shit in your little love nest.”

  “You’re crazy. You’d leave London, the film, the BBC?”

  “The film? Fuck the film. How important can a film be when I have the opportunity to play Bette Davis and Clint Eastwood all in one in my own little drama?”

  He was raving now, getting out of hand.

  “Dan, you’re upset.”

  “You’d better believe it.”

  “You’ll feel better in the morning,” Jonathan said.

  “It is the morning here. A damp, dirty, rainy morning. I’ve been awake all night over you, wondering what terrible thing I’ve done to make you so testy, so unhappy, and now you sock me the news that I have some adolescent cooze for a replacement, and I’m the one that’s crazy? The solitude must have gotten to you, just as I thought it would. You’re acting like three-quarters of the fag-psycho ward at Payne-Whitney. Get her out of the house by the time I arrive or I swear, I’ll put her through the blender, limb by limb!”