A semiconversion? Why not? I may, in giving up my journal, rejoin my fellow men. If I act and look like a “nice guy,” will I not be one? Quite as much as you, hypocrite lecteur, mon semblable, mon frère! Oh, yes, for if there should ever be a reader of this page, it would be such a one. It would have to be such a one, for there are no others—except perhaps Mr. Hawkins and, in her best moments, Alice.
Will there be anything left of Robert Service if I do, in the end, become what Alice would like me to be? Ah, but will there be anything left of Alice? I shall have had my revenge or my redemption. Perhaps there is no difference.
Well, it’s over now. Douglas has left and Alice has gone to change her dress. We are going out once again to an expensive restaurant, but not to celebrate the merger. We have something quite different to celebrate.
Not that Alice was easy with me. After she had closed the door behind Doug, she came back and took a rather formal stand before the fireplace. It was not the first time she had done this.
“Last year I might have reconsidered the whole question of our reconciliation after hearing what Doug has just told me. But now I think I have reached the point where I may be able to accept you for what you are. As Margaret Fuller accepted the universe. Do you remember what Carlyle said when he heard that? ‘By Gad, she’d better!’”
I looked at her in silent consternation. Who was this new grave, sarcastic Alice?
“Anyway,” she continued, “could I ever have reasonably expected you to be other than you are?”
“Is that so bad a thing?”
“No. And, anyway, perhaps your thesis is correct. Perhaps you are like everyone else. And I’m the one who’s all along been crazy.”
“Not crazy. I never called you that, Alice.”
“You only thought it. But that’s all right. I never minded your thinking it. And now I’m going to have something else to think about besides you and me and the girls.”
I jumped to my feet in excitement as I took in the meaning of her smile. “You couldn’t know that already, could you?”
“It’s been more than a month, you know. I’m pretty sure.” She allowed me to embrace her. “Oh, Bob,” she murmured in a more feeling tone as she suddenly clasped my head and stared into my eyes, “it’s just what we need to keep us from thinking too closely about each other for a while. Have we been becoming morbid?”
A son at last! For, of course, it will have to be a son after what I have gone through. I am very happy, and don’t I deserve to be? The gods are with me, after all.
Diary of a Yuppie Page 16