He gave her tight, quick kisses up her neck, which sent chills down her spine.
“I’m not sure,” she mumbled, her head down.
“Do you want to go out, Elaine? Or do you just want to stay home and save your energy for whatever that place is called? The Moonlight … or whatever.”
She blushed. “It’s the Starlite.”
They were still in the doorway when Catherine sauntered in, still decked out in the previous night’s outfit.
Catherine threw down her purse and flailed her hands up and down. “Look at what that damn cat dragged in! Here I am!” She giggled at Tommy’s arms wrapped around her sister’s waist, and Elaine sidled away from him, embarrassed. “You don’t have to stop on account of me! I guess I’m just ruining the moment again, aren’t I?”
“Not at all, dear sister. In fact, we were just on our way out. We’re going to a show downtown. We’ll see you later.”
Elaine grabbed her coat and Tommy followed, close on her tail.
He chased her down the icy steps, and she couldn’t help but laugh. On the sidewalk, they doubled over with laughter and dashed to the bus stop in the cold, breathless.
“You’re loads of fun, babe!” His voice was husky behind her.
People swirled around them at the bus stop, the ones with regular jobs and schedules. Tommy came to life, talking up a storm. He could be like a different person sometimes, out and about. He pontificated about the meaning of modern theater and lighting—electricity as symbolism; the self-centered nature of the spotlight; the feeling of watching a character on stage leap into hubris. “You don’t have any hubris in you, Elaine. You’re all on the face of things—no willful pride. The theater is probably an entirely different experience for you.”
He slung his arm around her, and they gazed out over the Brooklyn Bridge and the East River as their bus moved toward the skyscrapers of Manhattan.
Somewhere in that concrete jungle, the Chronicle staff was busy at work. Elaine still hadn’t told him about her job, even as the copy of the paper rested under her arm. But after they arrived in Manhattan, more distractions awaited. They got off the bus a few blocks away from Sheridan Square, walked to a theater, and purchased tickets for a performance, a show called Call Me by My Rightful Name. Although the show was sparsely attended, the actors played their parts with palpable emotion.
“They’re good at pretending, aren’t they?” Tommy whispered to her.
Elaine nodded as she held her breath, almost forgetting to exhale.
Once the show was over, he led her in the direction of a pub.
“Let’s get a bite to eat.”
“All right, but we’re not drinking anything, dear. Just a nice early dinner.”
The pub was a warm tangle of beer steins and polka hits. Tommy ordered the large bratwurst platter and dug in, and the waitress filled his stein with more and more. His eyelids squinted as he got louder and louder with emotion.
Elaine darted glances around the pub as her face grew hot. She claimed that she had to go to the ladies’ room; instead, she went on the sneak, telling their waitress to cut off his drink. She gave the waitress a little extra to ensure it—some larger coins from her wallet.
Back at the table, Tommy was waving an empty stein in the air. “Some great service over here, huh? It’s like we’re not even here!” His cheeks flushed as he slurred and pounded the table with his fist.
The waitress played the part, ignoring him as she served the next table over. As he turned away, raging, Elaine slipped more money into the apron of the waitress.
The waitress turned around, startled, but Elaine gave her the eye and the waitress closed her mouth.
Somehow Elaine managed to drag Tommy out soon after.
“Damn poor service, that place!” he shouted, directly outside the door, and she put her hand over his mouth.
Outside, on the Manhattan streets, the sun was rapidly descending. Peddlers and beggars loitered at every street corner. Although Tommy was plastered, he was still imposing in height. Elaine took his arm and put it around her shoulders as he stumbled down the street. This created a barrier around her person, though he actually lacked the wherewithal to protect them from anything.
On the bus back to Brooklyn, he fell asleep on her shoulder. And back at the brownstone, he started round two—pouring shots and pacing, talking to himself. Catherine, sharing space with them again that evening, started in herself, and the two of them ascended in volume, voices escalating over the tinny laughs of Father Knows Best.
“How long are you planning on boarding with us rent-free, Catherine?” He had reached the point where his drunkenness turned into random snipes, as angry barbs that he pitched like daggers.
Catherine wasn’t yet drunk but haughty, ready for his volley. “How long are you planning to live—I mean drink—off your father’s money, Tommy?”
“Just as long as you’re planning on living and drinking on his money, sister-in-law.”
Catherine flicked her cigarette and dared him to dig further. “You want me out on the streets?”
The two of them were shrill. Elaine watched them, holding her head. She could leave and head out to the Starlite. But Catherine would try to tag along—and there would be the issue of Tommy, alone in this state. He might meet up with a bad-news buddy and drink to delirium at a pub. He might black out entirely, for hours, and she wouldn’t be there to help revive him.
Elaine looked at her watch as it neared nine o’clock.
Tommy was sneering. “What do you want me to do, huh, Catherine? Go be a slob for that radio station again? I’m better than that. They were treating me like a dunce. I could have been promoted to head engineer.”
The television blared a commercial for toothpaste—guaranteed to make your smile the center of attention.
“Well, maybe you should go back to school and actually get your engineering degree, if you’re so damn smart, Tommy.”
“Why don’t you just have some more to drink, Catherine? It seems like it’s fueling all your sensational ideas.” Tommy laughed, then stumbled over to yank Catherine’s shot glass, but she pulled back.
The glass dropped, and it shattered on the sharp edge of the coffee table. The liquor sank down into the red plush carpet, and the scent of pungent proof rose up to Elaine’s nostrils. She would be the one to clean it up, of course.
She plucked the shards from the alcohol-soaked carpet fibers, one by one.
She gritted her teeth.
There was a pencil in her purse. She would write a poem about this experience when she went to the Starlite.
She could be trapped in the brownstone for most of her days, cleaning up his messes.
Or she could allow him to clean up his own messes.
She had things that the world was inviting her to do—beyond the parlor of the brownstone.
Something was welling in Elaine’s chest, something too powerful not to release.
Before she could second-guess herself again, she spoke.
“I got a job, Tommy.”
It came out of her all at once.
He seemed to wince; she noticed him pulling a fragment of glass out of his hand. Some of his blood dripped down to the floor, red blood on red plush carpet.
“A bandage, please, Elaine.”
She went and found a piece of gauze. Catherine adjourned to the kitchen.
He took the gauze. “Thank you,” he said, and wrapped his hand. He had turned formal all of a sudden, papering over his inebriation with stolid, practiced speech. He reclined with his feet on the ottoman as she picked up each sharp sliver of glass, forming a pile on the table as the final credits for Father Knows Best rolled across the screen.
Elaine moved carelessly, getting the last of the shards, almost cutting herself, too—her physical movements suddenly wide and unthinking now that she had revealed her news.
Tommy talked in a strange, rehearsed tone as he switched off the telly. “Are you ready to retire for the eve
ning, Elaine? I feel rather tired tonight.” Then his eyes seemed to sink down low all at once, like a forlorn beagle’s.
“All right.” Through the lump in her throat, Elaine could barely speak.
Tommy’s steps on the wooden floors seemed to have more mass behind them than usual as the two of them went upstairs and he undressed in the dark.
She remained fully clothed, perched on a small wooden stool in the corner. “I’m going to the Starlite tomorrow night, Tommy. I told the girls I was coming.”
“Yeah. You know something, Elaine? I think that I should start going out, too. Now that you won’t be here during the days. Oh, and I wanted to let you know—Mr. Stephens called from the Chronicle a few days ago with your reporting instructions. He said that you’re to be there two Thursdays from now at nine AM sharp.”
In bed, he pinched his cigarette, not looking at her. A cloud of smoke loomed above his head.
“I’m sorry, Tommy.”
“I’m sorry as well.” He laughed, and she shivered.
He smashed the butt of his cigarette into an ashtray next to their bed, and its orange tip turned to the blackness of night.
16
Lisa
“It’s me.” Billy’s voice sounded boyish. Apologetic, even.
Lisa dragged the phone cord into her room. “Hello,” she answered quietly.
“Did you get my note? I left it in your mailbox. I wasn’t sure if your mom would throw it away. I know she doesn’t like me.”
“I got the note.”
“So, whaddya say? Wanna meet me for a soda this evening?”
“I can’t.”
“Why not, babe? I can’t tell you how much I’ve missed you. I can’t stop thinking about you. I’m so sorry. I really understand if you don’t want to meet me. I never should have stood you up like that. But listen, babe, things at work got really busy, and I could have been fired if I left early that day. I don’t want to go into the full thing right now. But maybe we could just meet for a little bit, grab a soda. I really, really want to see you again.”
Just a soda.
One soda.
“All right. But I can only stay for a little while.”
“Great. I’ll meet you at Woolworth’s tonight. Is seven all right?”
“Okay.” She went to her closet, found her deep-red skirt. The one that made her legs look long and pretty.
She slipped it on and admired herself in the mirror. She puckered her lips and put on a little rouge. She played a little music and danced around.
“Lisa!” her mother yelled from the other room. “I need you to run to the dry grocery. I have a doctor appointment.”
It was five o’clock, so she had a little time before Woolworth’s.
“Fine, Ma.”
“Bring enough to last the week,” her mother warned. “Last time, you were away on another one of your trips, and your father and I ran out! No money left, either.”
“Yes, Ma.”
* * *
At the dry-goods store, stacks of cans shone in colorful assembly. Lisa reached for the corn, green beans, spinach, and tuna and added some extras to her basket for the slowly building stockpile at home. With the tension with the Soviets always in the news, everyone had been warned to maintain a stash. It cost extra money, but her mother always reminded Lisa that the threat was real, and that just because they were poor didn’t mean they should have to starve after a nuclear attack. Bay Ridge was far enough from Manhattan to spare them certain annihilation but not distant enough to save them from starvation.
“Put those cans down.”
Lisa flared her ears at the command of a man’s voice, coming from behind the shelves in the next aisle.
“Donovan, please,” a woman pleaded with him; she was low toned, as if she was used to keeping herself that way.
“I told you, I don’t like it when you cook that shit. Last time you cooked me that shit, it tasted like dog food!”
The woman’s voice lilted. “Would you calm down?”
Lisa leaned over to peek through a gap in the shelves.
“You’re going to have to learn how to cook, Jackie!” The man slammed the cans down on the shelf.
A corner of the woman’s face was visible between the shelves. She had a delicately sloped nose and a petite incline to her shoulders. She held her body at an angle from his; one side seemed permanently tilted, as if stooped from daily battle. The man roughly grabbed her arm, and she pulled away with a quick tug of her sleeve. In the garish light of day, the woman hadn’t looked like herself. She was Jackie, the woman from the Starlite who had run with Lisa when Madeline told everyone to leave—the woman whose makeup had melted in a show of purple bruises.
The dry grocer busied himself behind his counter, pouring quantities of beans onto a sizable scale. He faced away from the ruckus, conveniently escalating his own noise as he emptied bags of dry beans.
Jackie gripped the handles of her hand basket with white knuckles, her load full of heavy cans.
“If I see you put that slop on my plate one more time,” her husband bullied, his stout chin set in fury. “One more time …” His face drew near Jackie’s and he stepped forward, placing the tips of his soles on the rounded toes of her shoe.
He stomped down on Jackie’s foot, hard. With a small yelp, Jackie lost her grip on the basket.
Cans rolled across the linoleum, across the aisle.
At that moment, she caught Lisa’s eye in a deadened flash of recognition, but she quickly looked away. With a small gasp, she ran to catch the cans as they spread across the floor.
Lisa went around the aisle with a wan smile. “Here, let me help.”
“Thank you.” Jackie returned a sad smile.
Then their communication was cut off.
“You’re as clumsy as hell,” Jackie’s husband announced as he stood bolt upright, inspecting a can from all sides.
Soon after, the two of them approached the checkout counter to pay for their groceries. Jackie avoided Lisa’s eyes.
* * *
At Woolworth’s later, Lisa inhaled the familiar scents of talcum powder and wooden music boxes. Near the soda fountain she got whiffs of frankfurters and sugar syrup.
Lisa waited for Billy on one of the high stools at the counter. Her legs dangled from the tall stool as the soda jerk made small talk about the weather. He was busy mixing ice cream sodas. “Haven’t seen you in a while!”
“I’ve been out of town a lot.”
“One of Brooklyn’s finest, overseas! Representing our borough well, I’m sure.”
A kind man—warm, with graying hair. Always up for a chat. Though she wasn’t up for a chat. She looked at her shoes as her heels went tap-tap-tap on the bars of her stool.
The clock behind the counter read 7:20. She got up, brushed off her coat, and left a dime on the counter for her soft pretzel. She put her arms through her coat sleeves and buttoned up, wending her way out through the aisles.
She would be gone this time.
Forget him.
“Lisa!”
Billy’s head popped over a huge arrangement of flowers—roses, baby’s breath, pink carnations. He was a walking garden above his construction overalls and heavy brown boots.
He smiled at her brightly beneath sparkling blue eyes. “I’m sorry I’m late.” He paused. “I understand if you can’t forgive me. It was a little tricky walking down the avenue with my hands full like this.” He set the flowers down on the floor. The floral arrangement likely cost the same price as a month’s worth of groceries. “What do you say, care for a soda?” he asked.
“Well … I am thirsty.” Her throat was dry from the salt of her pretzel.
They sat toward the edge of the counter on the high stools. He ordered them cream sodas—their usual.
Lisa’s coat was still zipped up, but her legs were sticking out from beneath her skirt.
“Relax, babe, and stay a while.” He smiled, with perfect dimples. She took off her coat
and watched as his eyes moved to her legs. “Nice gams,” he said.
She blushed. “I’ll have a water too,” she piped up to the soda jerk.
“I really appreciate you coming out tonight.” Billy grabbed her hand, and warmth radiated into her body. Then he whispered into her ear, “I’ll do anything to make this right.”
“Anything?”
“You want me to dance up on this damn counter? I’ll do it. You want me to shout your name through the aisles of Woolworth’s? I’ll do it, babe. Whatever I need to do to prove that I still care.” He looked her in the eye, earnest.
“Okay,” she said. She looked into the mirrored wall behind the counter, which reflected the two of them. It was almost as though she were watching a television program.
A couple—getting back together.
“You could ask me how I’ve been doing,” she heard herself saying.
“Sure, babe. What have you been doing?” He gave her a glorious grin. “I know what I’ve been doing. Thinking about you—nonstop.”
Now she had his full attention. “Well, I just went to Beirut, where I saw the Mediterranean.”
“Wow! That’s really something, babe. You’re really going all over.”
He was stroking her hand, over and over.
“I fly out again in two days. We’re going to Spain. My first time.”
“Aw, shucks.” He made a tsk-tsk with his tongue. “I was hoping we’d be able to go out in two days. I got us tickets to that big band you’ve been wanting to see. Remember, the one with the thirty-piece orchestra?”
“Johnny and the Trebles?” She kept her eagerness low.
Billy had frequently expressed how much he hated that band—he had always winced when they came on the radio.
“Absolutely. They’re playing at this club by Times Square. I got the tickets today. I know you always wanted to see them, right?” A faint smile played on his lips as his blue eyes danced over her face.
She turned away from him. “Yeah, I guess so.”
Those tickets would have cost her about a week’s paycheck, if she ever bought them.
“I want to take you to see them. If you’re still my girlfriend, I mean.” He waited for a response, no longer stroking her hand.
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