The Times Are Never So Bad

by Andre Dubus

  She took new magazines from the rack: one at a time, keeping it under the counter near her tall three-legged stool, until she finished it; then she put it back and took another. So by the time the girls from the bank glanced through the magazine, she knew what they were seeing. For they always chose the ones she did: People, Vogue, Glamour. She looked at Play girl, and in Penthouse she looked at the women and read the letters, this when she worked at night, not because there were fewer customers then but because it was night, not day. At first she had looked at them during the day, and felt strange raising her eyes from the pictures to blink at the parking lot, whose presence of cars and people and space she always felt because the storefront was glass, her counter stopping just short of it. The tellers never picked up those magazines, but Anna was certain they had them at home. She imagined that too: where they lived after work; before work. She gave them large, pretty apartments with thick walls so they only heard themselves; stereos and color television, and soft carpets and soft furniture and large brass beds; sometimes she imagined them living with men who made a lot of money, and she saw a swimming pool, a Jacuzzi.

  Near the end of her workday, in its seventh and eighth hours, her fatigue was the sort that comes from confining the body while giving neither it nor the mind anything to do. She was restless, impatient, and distracted, and while talking politely to customers and warmly to the regular ones, she wanted to be home. The apartment was in an old building she could nearly see from behind the counter; she could see the grey house with red shutters next to it. As soon as she left the store, she felt as if she had not been tired at all; only her feet still were. Sometimes she felt something else too, as she stepped outside and crossed that line between fatigue and energy: a touch of dread and defeat. She walked past the bank, the last place in the long building of bank Sunnycorner drugstore department store and pizza house, cleared the corner of the building, passed the dumpster on whose lee side teenagers on summer nights smoked dope and drank beer, down the sloping parking lot and across the street to the old near-yardless green wooden apartment house; up three flights of voices and television voices and the smell that reminded her of the weariness she had just left. It was not a bad smell. It bothered her because it was a daily smell, even when old Mrs. Battistini on the first floor cooked with garlic: a smell of all the days of this wood: up to the third floor, the top of the building, and into the apartment whose smells she noticed only because they were not the scent of contained age she had breathed as she climbed. Then she went to the kitchen table or the bed or shower or couch, either talking to Wayne or waiting for him to come home from Wendy’s, where he cooked hamburgers.

  At those times she liked her home. She rarely liked it when she woke in it: a northwest apartment, so she opened her eyes to a twilit room and, as she moved about, she saw the place clearly, with its few pieces of furniture, cluttered only with leavings: tossed clothes, beer bottles, potato chip bags, as if her night’s sleep had tricked her so she would see only what last night she had not. And sometimes later, during the day or night, while she was simply crossing a room, she would suddenly see herself juxtaposed with the old maroon couch which had been left, along with everything else, by whoever lived there before she and Wayne: the yellow wooden table and two chairs in the kitchen, the blue easy chair in the living room, and in the bedroom the chest of drawers, the straight wooden chair, and the mattress on the floor, and she felt older than she knew she ought to. The wrong car: a 1964 Mercury Comet that Wayne had bought for one hundred and sixty dollars two years ago, before she knew him, when the car was already eleven years old, and now it vibrated at sixty miles an hour, and had holes in the floorboard; and the wrong weapon: a Buck hunting knife under Wayne’s leather jacket, unsheathed and held against his body by his left arm. She had not thought of the car and knife until he put the knife under his jacket and left her in the car, smoking so fast that between drags she kept the cigarette near her face and chewed the thumb of the hand holding it; looking through the wiper-swept windshield and the snow blowing between her and the closed bakery next to the lighted drugstore, at tall Wayne walking slowly with his face turned and lowered away from the snow. She softly kept her foot on the accelerator so the engine would not stall. The headlights were off. She could not see into the drugstore. When she drove slowly past it, there were two customers, one at the cash register and counter at the rear, one looking at display shelves at a side wall. She had parked and turned off the lights. One customer left, a man bareheaded in the snow. He did not look at their car. Then the other one left, a man in a watch cap. He did not look either, and when he had driven out of the parking lot to the highway it joined, Wayne said Okay, and went in.

  She looked in the rearview mirror, but snow had covered the window; she looked to both sides. To her right, at the far end of the shopping center, the doughnut shop was open, and in front of it three cars were topped with snow. All the other stores were closed. She would be able to see headlights through the snow on the rear window, and if a cruiser came she was to go into the store, and if Wayne had not already started, she would buy cigarettes, then go out again, and if the cruiser was gone she would wait in the car; if the cruiser had stopped, she would go back into the store for matches and they would both leave. Now in the dark and heater-warmth she believed all of their plan was no longer risky, but doomed, as if by leaving the car and walking across the short space through soft angling snow, Wayne had become puny, his knife a toy. So it was the wrong girl too, and the wrong man. She could not imagine him coming out with money, and she could not imagine tomorrow or later tonight or even the next minute. Stripped of history and dreams, she knew only her breathing and smoking and heartbeat and the falling snow. She stared at the long window of the drugstore, and she was startled when he came out: he was running, he was alone, he was inside, closing the door. He said Jesus Christ three times as she crossed the parking lot. She turned on the headlights and slowed as she neared the highway. She did not have to stop. She moved into the right lane, and cars in the middle and left passed her.

  ‘A lot,’ he said.

  She reached to him, and he pressed bills against her palm, folded her fingers around them.

  ‘Can you see out back?’ she said.

  ‘No. Nobody’s coming. Just go slow: no skidding, no wrecks. Jesus.’

  She heard the knife blade sliding into the sheath, watched yellowed snow in the headlights and glanced at passing cars on her left; she held the wheel with two hands. He said when he went in he was about to walk around like he was looking for something because he was so scared, but then he decided to do it right away or else he might have just walked around the store till the druggist asked what he wanted and he’d end up buying toothpaste or something, so he went down along the side wall to the back of the store—he lit a cigarette and she said Me too; she watched the road and taillights of a distant car in her lane as he placed it between her fingers,—and he went around the counter and took out the knife and held it at the druggist’s stomach: a little man with grey hair watching the knife and punching open the register.

  She left the highway and drove on a two-lane road through woods and small towns.

  ‘Tequila,’ he said.

  In their town all but one package store closed at ten-thirty; she drove to the one that stayed open until eleven, a corner store on a street of tenement houses where Puerto Ricans lived; on warm nights they were on the stoops and sidewalks and corners. She did not like going there, even on winter nights when no one was out. She stopped in front of it, looked at the windows, and said: ‘I think it’s closed.’

  ‘It’s quarter to.’

  He went out and tried the door, then peered in, then knocked and called and tried the door again. He came back and struck the dashboard.

  ‘I can’t fucking believe it. I got so much money in my pockets I got no room for my hands, and we got one beer at home. Can you believe it?’

  ‘He must’ve closed early—’

  ‘N
o shit.’

  ‘—because of the snotv.’

  She turned a corner around a used car lot and got onto the main street going downhill through town to the river.

  ‘I could use some tequila,’ she said.

  ‘Stop at Timmy’s.’

  The traffic lights were blinking yellow so people would not have to stop on the hill in the snow; she shifted down and coasted with her foot touching the brake pedal, drove over the bridge, and parked two blocks from it at Timmy’s. When she got out of the car, her legs were weak and eager for motion, and she realized they had been taut all the way home; and, standing at the corner of the bar, watching Johnny McCarthy pour two shots beside the drafts, she knew she was going to get drunk. She licked salt from her hand and drank the shot, then a long swallow of beer that met the tequila’s burn as it rose, and held the shot glass toward grinning McCarthy and asked how law school was going; he poured tequila and said Long but good, and she drank that and finished her beer, and he poured two more shots and brought them drafts. She looped her arm around Wayne’s and nuzzled the soft leather and hard bicep, then tongue-kissed him, and looked down the bar at the regulars, most of them men talking in pairs, standing at the bar that had no stools; two girls stood shoulder to shoulder and talked to men on their flanks. The room was long and narrow, separated from the dining room by a wall with a half-door behind the bar. Anna waved at people who looked at her, and they raised a glass or waved and some called her name, and old Lou, who was drinking beer alone at the other end of the bar, motioned to McCarthy and sent her and Wayne a round. Wayne’s hand came out of his jacket and she looked at the bill in it: a twenty.

  ‘Set up Lou,’ he said to McCarthy. ‘Lou. Can I buy you a shot?’

  Lou nodded and smiled, and she watched McCarthy pour the Fleischmann’s and bring it and a draft to Lou, and she wondered if she could tend bar, could remember all the drinks. It was a wonderful place to be, this bar, with her back to the door so she got some of the chill, not all stuffy air and smoke, and able to look down the length of the bar, and at the young men crowded into four tables at the end of the room, watching a television set on a shelf on the wall: a hockey game. It was the only place outside of her home where she always felt the comfort of affection. Shivering with a gulp of tequila, she watched Wayne arm-wrestling with Curt: knuckles white and hand and face red, veins showing at his temple and throat. She had never seen either win, but Wayne had told her that till a year ago he had always won.

  ‘Pull,’ she said.

  His strength and effort seemed to move into the air around her, making her restless; she slapped his back, lit a cigarette, wanted to dance. She called McCarthy and pointed to the draft glasses, then Curt’s highball glass, and when he came with the drinks, told him Wayne would pay after he beat Curt. She was humming to herself, and she liked the sound of her voice. She wondered if she could tend bar. People didn’t fight here. People were good to her. They wouldn’t—A color television. They shouldn’t buy it too soon; but when? Who would care? Nobody watched what they bought. She wanted to count the money, but did not want to leave until closing. Wayne and Curt were panting and grunting; their arms were nearly straight up again; they had been going slowly back and forth. She slipped a hand into Wayne’s jacket pocket, squeezed the folded wad. She had just finished a cigarette but now she was holding another and wondering if she wanted it, then she lit it and did. There was only a men’s room in the bar. ‘Draw?’ Curt said; ‘Draw,’ Wayne said, and she hugged his waist and rubbed his right bicep and said: ‘I ordered us and Curt a round. I didn’t pay. I’m going piss.’

  He smiled down at her. The light in his eyes made her want to stay holding him. She walked toward the end of the bar, past the backs of leaning drinkers; some noticed her and spoke; she patted backs, said Hi How you doing Hey what’s happening; big curly-haired Mitch stopped her: Yes, she was still at Sunnycorner; where had he been? Working in New Hampshire. He told her what he did, and she heard, but seconds later she could not remember; she was smiling at him. He called to Wayne and waved. She said I’ll see you in a minute, and moved on. At the bar’s end was Lou. He reached for her, raised the other arm at McCarthy. He held her shoulder and pulled her to him.

  ‘Let me buy you a drink.’

  ‘I have to go to the ladies’.’

  ‘Well, go to the ladies’ and come back.’

  ‘Okay.’

  She did not go. Her shot and their drafts were there and she was talking to Lou. She did not know what he did either. She used to know. He looked sixty. He came every night. His grey hair was short and he laughed often and she liked his wrinkles.

  ‘I wish I could tend bar here.’

  ‘You’d be good at it.’

  ‘I don’t think I could remember all the drinks.’

  ‘It’s a shot and beer place.’

  His arm was around her, her fingers pressing his ribs. She drank. The tequila was smooth now. She finished the beer, said she’d be back, next round was hers; she kissed his cheek: his skin was cool and tough, and his whiskers scraped her chin. She moved past the tables crowded with the hockey watchers; Henry coming out of the men’s room moved around her, walking carefully. She went through the door under the television set, into a short hall, glanced down it into the doorless, silent kitchen, and stepped left into the rear of the dining room: empty and darkened. Some nights she and Wayne brought their drinks in here after the kitchen closed and sat in a booth in the dark. The ladies’ room was empty. ‘Ah.’ Wayne was right: when you really had to piss, it was better than sex. She listened to the voices from the bar, wanted to hurry back to them. She jerked the paper, tore it.

  Lou was gone. She stood where he had been, but his beer glass was gone, the ashtray emptied. He was like that. He came and went quietly. You’d look around and see him for the first time and he already had a beer; sometime later you’d look around and he was gone. Behind Wayne the front door opened and a blue cap and jacket and badge came in: it was Ryan from the beat. She made herself think in sentences and tried to focus on them, as if she were reading: He’s coming in to get warm. He’s just cold. She waved at him. He did not see her. She could not remember the sentences. She could not be afraid either. She knew that she ought to be afraid so she would not make any mistakes but she was not, and when she tried to feel afraid or even serious she felt drunker. Ryan was standing next to Curt, one down from Wayne, and had his gloves off and was blowing on his hands. He and McCarthy talked, then he left; at the door he waved at the bar, and Anna waved. She went toward Wayne, then stopped at the two girls: one was Laurie or Linda, she couldn’t remember which; one was Jessie. They were still flanked by Bobby and Mark. They all turned their backs to the bar, pressed her hands, touched her shoulders, bought her a drink. She said tequila, and drank it and talked about Sunny-corner. She went to Wayne, told McCarthy to set up Bobby and Mark and Jessie—leaning forward: ‘Johnny, what is it? Laurie or Linda?’ ‘Laurie.’ She slipped a hand into Wayne’s pocket. Then her hand was captive there, fingers on money, his forearm pressing hers against his side.

  ‘I’ll get it. Did you see Ryan?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She tried to think in sentences again. She looked up at Wayne; he was grinning down at her. She could see the grin, or his eyes, but not both at once. She gazed at his lips.

  ‘You’re cocked,’ he said. He was not angry. He said it softly, and took her wrist and withdrew it from his pocket.

  ‘I’ll do it in the John.’

  She wanted to be as serious and careful as he was, but looking at him and trying to see all of his face at once weakened her legs; she tried again to think in sentences but they jumped away from her like a cat her mind chased; when she turned away from him, looked at faces farther away and held the bar, her mind stopped struggling and she smiled and put her hand in his back pocket and said: ‘Okay.’

  He started to walk to the men’s room, stopping to talk to someone, being stopped by another; watching him, she wa
s smiling. When she became aware of it, she kept the smile; she liked standing at the corner of the bar smiling with love at her man’s back and profile as he gestured and talked; then he was in the men’s room. Midway down the bar McCarthy finished washing glasses and dried his hands, stepped back and folded his arms, and looked up and down the bar, and when he saw nothing in front of her he said: ‘Anna? Another round?’

  ‘Just a draft, okay?’

  She looked in her wallet; she knew it was empty but she looked to be sure it was still empty; she opened the coin pouch and looked at lint and three pennies. She counted the pennies. Johnny put the beer in front of her.

  ‘Wayne’s got—’

  ‘On me,’ he said. ‘Want a shot too?’

  ‘Why not.’

  She decided to sip this one or at least drink it slowly, but while she was thinking, the glass was at her lips and her head tilted back and she swallowed it all and licked her lips, then turned to the door behind her and, without coat, stepped outside: the sudden cold emptied her lungs, then she deeply drew in the air tasting of night and snow. ‘Wow.’ She lifted her face to the light snow and breathed again. Had she smoked a Camel? Yes. From Lou. Jesus. Snow melted on her cheeks. She began to shiver. She crossed the sidewalk, touched the frosted parking meter. One of her brothers did that to her when she was little. Which one? Frank. Told her to lick the bottom of the ice tray. In the cold she stood happy and clear-headed until she wanted to drink, and she went smiling into the warmth and voices and smoke.

  ‘Where’d you go?’ Wayne said.

  ‘Outside to get straight,’ rubbing her hands together, drinking beer, its head gone, shaking a cigarette from her pack, her flesh recalling its alertness outside as, breathing smoke and swallowing beer and leaning on Wayne, it was lulled again. She wondered if athletes felt all the time the way she had felt outside.