He gasped dementedly, and came.
When his breathing eased, he said, “Now I’ll do you.”
“Here?”
“Get on the table,” he commanded roughly.
Throwing off his tie, he began his lingual exploration, soon climbing atop her. Love concluded with a crescendo of rasping breaths and cries.
Afterward, they heard the neighbor’s back door slam.
“Jesus,” Malcolm said. “She was listening.”
“Oh, let the old bag eat her heart out,” Joscelyn said, her orgasmic flush deeper. “The other mothers at the clinic were swooning over you.”
“No kidding?”
“I could make my fortune, raffling you off—but I’m not about to.”
Chuckling, they went inside to shower together in the pink bathroom. They had never been more in tune.
* * *
Joscelyn could tell from the tension in Malcolm’s face, the sound of his cracking knuckles, that the Paloverde Oil people were on his back, so she went out of her way to please him, to run the house perfectly, not to let her incessant oral training extend into the hours he was at home, to hide herself and be all that he expected of a woman. Yet the following Saturday night, when they were having two tables of bridge—the men were on Malcolm’s project—his temper resurfaced, once again focusing on Lissie.
He was playing out a three no-trump hand when the child edged into the living room. Everyone exclaimed at her beauty, and Joscelyn jumped to her feet.
Malcolm forestalled her by dropping his cards facedown at her place. “It’s my turn with her.” He grinned. “You play out the hand.”
Joscelyn went down one, barely hearing the idiot advice on how she could have made it, so intent was she on trying to hear sounds from the bedroom. Finally she mumbled, “Better go see what’s keeping my partner.”
The night-light was attached to an outlet at the baseboard, shining upward, casting black, iniquitous shadows of Malcolm as, using both hands, he forced Lissie’s stomach to the youth bed. The small, bare feet thrashed in impotent helplessness.
Rage coagulated with Joscelyn: for a moment she was too furious to speak, then she hissed, “Let her go!”
Sensing her presence, Lissie turned and raised her head. “Mah-mah,” she bawled.
“Shut the damn door,” Malcolm muttered.
Joscelyn slammed it, coming into the dim room. “You shit!”
“That’s the thanks I get for doing your job.”
“What job? Breaking her spirit?”
“If you were one damn bit of a mother, she wouldn’t come barging in every time we have company.”
“That’s what really fries you, isn’t it? That they’ll know that Mr. Perfect Project Manager has a deaf baby.”
“Shout a little louder, why don’t you?” he hissed, letting go of Lissie. Lissie sat up. “Now you’ve done it! All my time in here’s shot to hell!”
“Should I weep?” Joscelyn asked. “Or start a fund for you?”
The night-light caught the shine of his clenched knuckles. His arm shot out, catching on the bone between her inadequate breasts.
As his clouts went, the blow was strictly minor league. This, however, was the first time he had hit her in front of Lissie. Gazing from one parent to the other, she cowered back against the headboard of the youth bed.
Joscelyn swept her up, rocking her to and fro. “I warn you. If you ever, ever hurt my baby, I’m telling Curt.”
Malcolm drew a shuddering breath as he backed from the beruffled little room.
“Sorry, gang,” she heard him say. “The kid must’ve had a nightmare. Joscelyn’ll be right out.”
Ten minutes later, when a snuffling Lissie had dropped off abruptly into sleep, Joscelyn emerged. The Pecks smiled at one another across the Samsonite card table as if they were the happiest couple in all southern California.
* * *
That night proved to be a watershed dividing Malcolm’s paternal attitudes. The next few days he treated Lissie as if she were a guest in the house, friendly enough, but with a hint of reserve.
By the following week, he pretty much ignored her, refusing to look when she tried to attract his attention, not taking her small hand when she extended it.
“Malcolm, she’s just a baby. She doesn’t understand our fights.”
“Your idea, Joscelyn—you told me to lay off the kid. And it’s just as well. I’m up to my eyeballs earning a living.”
“Working and being a father aren’t mutually exclusive.”
“You go all-out when you entertain, but you haven’t noticed who’s bringing in the bucks, have you?” (Is this him or his father speaking? Joscelyn thought.) “All you can do is whine about needing help with her. I warned you before she’d be a damn sight easier if you laid down a few guidelines.”
“She’s good, Malcolm, so very good.”
“Then you don’t need me to play nursemaid, do you?”
Lissie had become their battleground.
The child picked at her food, sucked her thumb, reverted to bedwetting. She often awoke sobbing.
The child psychologist on the John Tracy Clinic staff invited Joscelyn for a talk. A disarming warmth deepening the wrinkles of her tanned face, she said, “Mrs. Peck, I thought maybe you’d like to talk about any problems you might be having at home.”
“Problems?”
“You certainly know by now the strain of having a deaf child puts on family relationships.”
Joscelyn was consumed with the urge to unburden herself. But wouldn’t her psychological salvation come at the price of exposing Malcolm?
“No problems at all,” she said brightly. “Why? Is Lissie going through a phase?”
“She’s always been so outgoing, and the last month she’s pulled into herself. On your days you must have noticed. She doesn’t join in with the others.”
Oh, my poor Lissie. “She’s always hovered when I work.”
“Mrs. Peck, please, I’m not accusing you. But I feel it might be a good idea if you and Mr. Peck came in for a visit together.”
Fat chance. “He’s tremendously tied up at work.”
“Yes, we see so little of him.”
“He was here not long ago, and Lissie clung to him, too. We were all laughing.” Ho, ho, ho.
The psychologist sighed and said, “You know where I am if you need me, Mrs. Peck. And thank you for dropping by.”
44
On the last Sunday in July the Pecks were invited to early dinner at Honora and Curt’s. The only other guest was Senator George Murphy. Malcolm—never before in heady proximity to a star of this magnitude either from the film world or the political scene—was at his best, his conversation light, respectful, yet without the least hint of brown-nose.
While Curt barbecued the thick porterhouses, Lissie sidled up to the stranger, staring at him. The one-time actor was conceded by all who knew him, whatever their views on his talent and/or political persuasion, to be a kindly man.
“Hi, little honey. Ever been told you’re very pretty?”
Lissie, before her recent bad times, would have moved closer, but now her thumb migrated to her mouth, and she backed against Joscelyn’s knees.
Honora was handing around the pizza that she’d heated in the terrace’s little kitchen. “Lissie’s hard of hearing, but she’s a fabulous lipreader.”
The Senator popped his hors d’oeuvre in his mouth, swallowing as he came across the flagstones to bend his knees in front of Lissie. Her thumb slipped from her mouth and she glanced shyly at him.
He smiled. When she didn’t withdraw, he scooped her up. For an instant she stiffened, but then relaxed and let him carry her to his deep patio chair.
“I’ll tell you a story,” he said. “You feel and watch.”
Soon Lissie was her old self, laughing, touching his famous throat, mouth, chest, while he slowly acted out the drama of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.
Joscelyn, Honora and Curt smiled at th
e twosome. Malcolm did, too, but Joscelyn saw something bereft, mournful, in his smile.
When we’re alone, she thought, I’ll make it up to him.
By the time they left the house, though, his mood had changed and he was spoiling for a fight. “Can’t we ever get out alone?” he asked.
“We were at the Binchows’ Saturday night.” Joscelyn gazed straight ahead lest Lissie, in her car seat behind them, be watching. “But if you’re talking about Curt and Honora, no. Lissie’s included in the invitation. They’re her uncle and aunt, remember?”
“Something you ought to know, Joscelyn. As far as I’m concerned this marriage is going to hell in a bucket.”
His low rumble pierced her with sudden doubts. Had she been misinterpreting his foul mood the past weeks? Maybe he wasn’t having difficulties with the Paloverde job. Maybe he’d found some nineteen-year-old with enormous boobs like Crystal’s and a yoyo brain who acted as if he were Prince Charles.
Her jaw clenched. “I don’t find it any bed of roses lately, either,” she said.
“You better get on the ball, then. Figure out some way for us to have a life of our own.”
She hid her new suspicions and lashed out. “I agree, it’s a crying shame that Senator Murphy quit paying attention to you and told Lissie a story. Tell you what. We’ll buy one of those records like they have in the new dolls. We’ll have it transplanted into Lissie, and the next time we meet a big-time movie star he’ll never guess she’s deaf.”
He grabbed for her breast, driving one handed, twisting and pinching. During their recent fights it was a point of honor with Joscelyn never to let him know the anguish—mental or physical—that he caused. She could not prevent her harsh groan.
A car with its brights on came toward them, and in the blinding glare, he released her. “That’s only a taste of what you’ll get if you don’t shut up.”
At home she carried Lissie, a limp, sleepy weight, into her bedroom. Honora kept a painted wood Surprise Box at her house, and every time Lissie came over there was a present in it, a small toy, a book, something to wear. Tonight Lissie had fished out a new pink nightie. By the time Joscelyn had undressed the drowsy child and put on the new garment, Lissie was asleep. Joscelyn turned on the night-light and left the door open. Malcolm was sitting on the couch, a bottle of scotch in front of him, his head hunched low between his slumped shoulders. Portrait of dejection.
She sat next to him. “Malcolm, let’s not tear at each other. I love you so much.”
He drained his glass. “Some way you show it.”
“It kills me when we fight.”
“Oh, Christ, first you get me thoroughly pussy whipped, then you don’t want me around my kid. And now it’s a crime to want to take you out swinging occasionally.”
“We could swing right here,” she said. Since the afternoon of the outsider, they had made love only once. (Another sign he has somebody else?)
“You’re sure it won’t kill you to stay in your own bed one night?” he growled.
“I only go in to Lissie when she has nightmares.”
“How you manage to sleep with all the lights on is beyond me.”
Lissie’s night-light had become their Vietnam. Joscelyn couldn’t for the life of her comprehend her husband’s vicious guerrilla warfare on the small glow: the closest she could figure was that he saw it as proof that his daughter lacked not only hearing but also courage.
“The light’s a necessity. If you’d ever come on a Tuesday night you’d learn a bit about deaf kids—”
“That’s a subject I know more than enough about, thanks.”
“Lissie has no hearing. If it’s all black in her room and she can’t see, she’s completely cut off.”
“The way you swarm over that kid you’re turning her into an emotional cripple.”
“She’s three and a half. And though I know this pains you to hear it, she’s profoundly deaf. When she wakes up in the night she needs some sensory input.”
“Ahh, what’s the use?” Broodingly he poured himself another drink. “You never could listen to a constructive suggestion. You’re spoiling her rotten.”
She stalked into their bedroom, jabbing on the small television. At this hour, ten, network News wasn’t available, so she watched Channel 5. After a few minutes of watching their routine reports of murderous activities in south-central Los Angeles, she turned off the set. Removing her blouse, she went into Malcolm’s precious pink bathroom. The mirror reflected a fresh bruise rising like a red-purple sun above her left bra cup.
She was slathering her face with Neutrogena when, over the running water she heard Lissie’s sudden shriek of animal panic. Soap on her face, she darted to the other bedroom.
The door had been shut. Flinging it open, she blinked in the darkness. The night-light had been turned off.
She picked up Lissie, cuddling the convulsing little body. Lissie’s arms clutched at her neck. “Mah-mah.”
“I didn’t think she’d wake up before morning.” Malcolm, behind her in the hall, spoke in peculiar, high voice: it was as if he were ventriloquizing the tones of a frightened pre-adolescent.
“You prick, you unspeakable prick!”
“It’s time she learned bed means sleep.”
Lissie’s wails rang unhappily, yet minus that shrill hacksaw of panic.
“Quit dumping whatever’s wrong between us on the poor baby,” Joscelyn said, pressing her cheek into her daughter’s damp hair. “I don’t give a shit if you’re humping some secretary.”
“Secretary?”
“Lissie tries so hard. She was doing really great until you started in on her. How could you do a remake of your own rotten father?”
“Bitch, shut your mouth about my dad. You’re not worthy to say his name. And maybe I ought to put it to some other woman. Be a pleasure after you. Go take a look at yourself, titless wonder. Soap all over your face like you’re going to shave—what are you, a guy in drag?”
Joscelyn rushed with Lissie into the big pink bathroom. One arm holding the child, whose sobs had lessened to desolate little snuffles, she rinsed her face with the washcloth.
Malcolm burst in. “Tonight, dammit, she’s going to bed like every other kid does!”
He reached for Lissie. Joscelyn, feeling the small body tremble, clasped the child more tightly. With her left hand slippery and wet, she couldn’t maintain her hold.
Malcolm wrenched Lissie away.
“For God’s sake, Malcolm, haven’t you terrified her enough? Give her back.” She wrapped both hands around Lissie’s waist.
“Fuck off!” Malcolm growled.
Seizing his daughter in a demon grip, he stamped across the bathroom. Joscelyn followed, tugging at the child’s soft, boneless-feeling hips.
She could see their mirrored reflection, father, mother, child, united in a swaying, tormented dance across the bathroom. The Unholy Trinity.
“Let her go!” Joscelyn screamed. Strengthened by the tiger’s milk of maternal protectiveness, she was aware of only one imperative—to get her child away from Malcolm and take her to a safe place, a place where she couldn’t be battered as he had been, couldn’t have her fragile child’s bones broken as his had been.
Malcolm hammered a blow at Joscelyn’s bare chest. She staggered back, and a scrap of Lissie’s nightgown came away in her hands.
“Bastard, give her to me!” she screamed.
Over the rasping of her breath, she could hear Lissie’s wailing, but faintly, as if her child were a long way away. Regaining her balance, she charged at her husband.
He struck out at her chest again. This time he missed her. The back of his clenched hand caught Lissie’s flailing arm.
The child’s mouth opened wide and her body went into a paroxysm as she stored up breath for an onslaught of sound.
At the blow to her daughter’s soft flesh, Joscelyn reacted as if a match had been touched to her gasoline-drenched brain. All that lay within the curve of her skull ignite
d. Redness jumped behind her eyes. An immense roaring drummed against her ears.
Her maddened gaze was attracted by the candy stripes of the useless jar from Venice.
She reached for it. With complete lack of rational thought, she lifted the oversize ornament with both hands, one dry, one wet, raising the heaviness high over her head.
In that instant—it was less time than a heartbeat—Malcolm stared at her. His eyes flickered with something she would never understand. Maybe she momentarily brushed his funny bone, standing without her blouse—titless wonder—the heavy, useless ornament above her head, a female Moses set to hurl down the commandments. Maybe he was regretting his cruelty about the night-light. Maybe he was thinking of his punitive, war-hero father. For the rest of her life Joscelyn would attempt to comprehend the thoughts that his deep-set gray eyes reflected.
In a loud, strangled voice, she cried, “I’ll teach you to victimize my baby.”
The jar seemed to descend mechanically, through no volition of hers, yet her hands remained clasped around the smooth, cool weight.
The blow vibrated through her body. A deep, hollow thump reverberated through the remodeled bathroom. A fraction of a second later the jar slipped from her hands to shatter on pink marble.
Malcolm reeled two small steps. She snatched Lissie from his limp grasp. Then he plunged forward.
He fell amid the still skittering shards. As his forehead hit the marble, another thump sounded, less portentously than the first.
Clutching her daughter, whose body remained tensed in that seemingly eternal paroxysm, Joscelyn stood panting.
Malcolm stretched across the pink floor. Time was infinitely slowed, and in this eternal moment she was able to view him dispassionately. One arm flung forward, the other at his side, his legs slightly apart, she decided that he looked as if he were practicing his Australian crawl. He’s terrific on the first lap, she thought dizzily. When he challenged Curt he always touched the pool edge first, but after that initial length Curt was the inevitable victor.
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