Quinn

by Sally Mandel

  Harvey Jackson was the first guest to be invited into their world. Today, he and Quinn would meet. Will sat up on the edge of his bed and tried to generate some enthusiasm for getting dressed. He would just as soon lie around and dream all day. Besides, he was beginning to feel some uneasiness about how Harvey and Quinn would get along. It would be nice if they could get acquainted without him; he wasn’t sure he wanted to watch.

  On the bus to the North End, Quinn itemized her plans for the afternoon. “We’ll take him to the movies. No, that’s not social enough. We can’t get to know each other. Let’s go bowling. That’s it. Perfect. Kids like bowling. Then we’ll take him for fish fry. It tastes good and it’s even got some vitamins.”

  Will looked out the window. Fat, wet snowflakes fell against the pavement and melted on impact. If he were outside, he would stick out his tongue and catch them.

  “Okay?” Quinn said.

  Will imagined the sweet bite of the crystals in his mouth.

  “Will!”

  He turned his head to look at her. His eyes were cloudy.

  “Anybody home?” she asked. Will blinked. “We’re taking him bowling. Okay?”

  “Fine.” His eyes began to drift toward the window again. Quinn put her hand on his chin and brought his face around. “Oh, no, you don’t.” She kissed him lightly, and then once again not so lightly. His mouth responded and finally his eyes. He initiated the next one.

  “Do you think it’s an obsession with us? Sex?” she asked.

  “No question about it.” With the bus window behind her, she was a blaze of colors against the snowy blur. Looking into her eyes was like leaning over the edge of his canoe—bright blue Clearwater River, deep pools among the rocks. He felt like diving in.

  “Maybe it’s just the physical thing,” she was saying.

  “Possible.” Absently, he took her fingers and blew on them, although they weren’t particularly cold.

  “Aren’t you worried about it?” she persisted.

  “Why?”

  “Well, what if we’re not compatible? I mean besides in bed.”

  “Could be.”

  “Will, you’re a pain in the ass.”

  He slid a hand between the legs of her blue jeans. Quinn shot a quick look at the hulking black man in the seat across the aisle. “My hand’s cold,” Will explained.

  “If we’re not compatible, we have to do something about it. Fix it. N’est-ce pas?”

  “Absolutely.” His fingers moved against the tight denim fabric. She leaned her head on his shoulder, making every effort not to squirm.

  “I know we’ll be okay, though. We have this basic thing in common.”

  “Is that so?” Will said.

  “Yeah, haven’t you noticed? Our pubic hair matches.”

  Will laughed and tugged on her ear with his free hand.

  They reached the North Side Elementary School in time to see Harvey explode from the doorway. He hopped down the steps with a quick and agile body and an expression lit with anticipation. When he caught sight of Quinn, however, his face fell. Almost instantaneously, disappointment darkened into hooded suspicion. He folded his arms and leaned back against the railing by the stairs. He kept his eyes averted.

  “Is that Harvey, over by the steps?” Quinn asked.

  Will nodded. He knew Harvey had spotted them as they rounded the corner from the bus stop.

  “Looks pretty tough,” she whispered.

  “Tough as chocolate mousse. Hey! Harvey!” Will beckoned to the boy. As if the effort were almost more than he could muster, Harvey straightened up and ambled slowly toward them, arms still crossed on his chest.

  “Uh-oh,” Quinn murmured.

  Will reached out a hand and drew Harvey close. “I think I mentioned I’d be bringing a friend today.”

  “I forgot,” Harvey said with eyes trained on a bottlecap beside his foot.

  “Harvey Jackson, this is Quinn Mallory.”

  Quinn extended her hand. “I’m pleased to meet you.”

  Harvey touched her fingers briefly and stuffed his fist back into his pocket. He shot Will a look of accusation.

  “Come on, we’re going to do something special.” Will draped an arm around each of them as they started toward the bus stop.

  “How’d you like to go bowling?” Quinn asked him.

  “What for?”

  “For fun,” Will said. “Don’t be such a curmudgeon, Harve.” He gave the frizzy hair a swipe.

  “Don’t use them fancy words with me, man,” Harvey muttered.

  Will held up his hand placatingly. “Okay, okay.”

  During the ride to the bowling alley Quinn chattered about fourth grade at St. Theresa’s. Her teacher, Sister Mary-Margaret, was so pious and soft-spoken that it was hard to remember she was even in the classroom. Quinn did forget one day, and during a whispered conversation with Margery at the next desk, took God’s name in vain. Miraculously the pale seraphic nun appeared at Quinn’s side, whipped a thick wooden ruler out of her habit, and rapped Quinn’s hand with a snap that could be heard all the way to Salem.

  “Wicked elbow action. She would have made a great tennis player.” Quinn looked hopefully at Harvey, but the boy continued to stare out the window in silence. She mouthed at Will, Your turn.

  The bowling alley was crowded. Quinn guessed that most of the white people were Italian, since the place straddled the border between the black ghetto and the Italian blue-collar neighborhood.

  “I been at one of these once,” Harvey said.

  “When was that?” Will asked.

  “I dunno. Last year maybe. With Leroy you know, Ma’s …” His voice trailed off.

  “I think I remember you telling me.”

  “It was bigger than this, lots more lanes. Cleaner, too.” He kicked at a paper cup that had missed the trash can.

  They rented shoes and bowling balls and set off for the far lane. Quinn was grateful at not having to share a scoring table; the other bowlers’ stares seemed openly hostile.

  Will went first. He took two long steps, sent the ball rolling smoothly down the alley, and picked off all but two pins. His next roll toppled them for a spare.

  “Yay!” Quinn yelled. She smiled at Harvey.

  “You go next,” he grumbled.

  Quinn approached the line with an erratic skipping motion and flung the ball onto the lane with a clunk. It teetered at the edge of the gutter, then rolled slowly down the alley in a slow curve and knocked over all the pins.

  “Holy shit! Did you see that?” she hooted.

  Will applauded, and Harvey said, “They don’t even have a soda machine around here.”

  Over hamburgers he asked Quinn if St. Theresa’s was a Catholic school.

  “Yes,” Quinn said. So he’d been listening after all.

  “Are you one?”

  “Well, yeah, I guess so. I don’t think you ever stop being one even if you never go to mass.”

  “Like Jews?”

  “Sort of.”

  “Can’t they throw you out if you do somethin’ the Pope don’t like?”

  She nodded. “Excommunication.”

  “That don’t sound like democracy to me.”

  “Most religions aren’t very democratic.”

  Harvey kept up a steady battery of kicks against the frame under his seat. “There ain’t no way I can see where the bill of rights, and all that America stuff, can mix with Catholics.”

  Will’s eyes were dancing. “Harvey’s into American history this year.”

  “I guess so,” Quinn said, impressed.

  On the way back to campus she sagged limply in her seat and moaned. “I felt like I just spent the afternoon trying to melt an iceberg by breathing on it.”

  “I didn’t think he’d be so tough. You were terrific.” He kissed her on the cheek.

  “I was a terrific failure.”

  “The iceberg will melt ev
entually.”

  “That’s what they told those good folks on the Titanic.”

  He laughed. “Christmas is coming. We’ll try again after vacation.”

  “I don’t know, Will. Maybe we’re being cruel. He gets so little of you as it is.”

  “You’re a bonus. He just doesn’t know it yet.”

  “Uh huh,” Quinn said dubiously. “Anyway, he sure as hell is a smart little monster.”

  Chapter 11

  Quinn took the evening train home for Christmas vacation, paying three dollars over the bus fare out of enthusiasm for the festive spirit she knew would prevail, particularly in those cars closest to the bar. Will hoisted her luggage onto the rack, then, after a quick kiss, stepped off the train to stand on the platform. She smiled at him through the window. There was sadness in her face, and he remembered her image captured in the light of the telephone booth, before he had written his sonnet. She had smiled then, too, for the benefit of the voice on the other end of the wire. The train sighed, sending a billow of steam around Will’s ankles. Quinn’s smile broadened, and she mouthed the words at him, You … look … like … an angel. He shook his head. She began flapping her arms, playing charades. “Bird?” he shouted, but the wheels began to move, and soon she disappeared into the train’s cloudy breath, grinning and shaking her head.

  Always leave ’em laughing, Will thought. He walked down the platform feeling as if Quinn had ridden off with the train station’s wattage allotment; the Christmas decorations were suddenly shabby and dim.

  As the train neared Springfield, Quinn’s thoughts fastened on that same telephone call. John had told her the tests showed that Ann had something called lupus erythematosus. Quinn detected the alarm in his voice, but when she suggested hopping the next bus home, he’d sounded positively dismayed. It wasn’t necessary. Ann would be upset about Quinn’s missing classes. And there was the money. Everything would be all right, she’d see.

  Quinn had spent the next morning in the medical school library. What she found under systemic lupus erythematosus was not reassuring. The definition resounded with obscure medical terminology. Tracking down any detailed clarification of the causes of renal failure proved futile. She knew what remission meant.

  During subsequent telephone conversations her parents stubbornly resisted further discussion of Ann’s condition. With God’s help, Ann would come through fine, John said.

  But what if…? Quinn thought. Christmas lights blurred into dazzling streaks against the darkness outside the window. The sight was mesmerizing. The rhythmic click of the wheels against the track said: what if she, what if she, what if she?

  “All right,” Quinn said aloud, startling her seat companion. The young man was burdened with a full-size cello case that he was trying to balance on his lap. He stared at her.

  “Talking to myself,” she explained.

  “Well, don’t let me interrupt,” he said.

  Quinn turned her face back to the window and came to terms with the immediate future. She would cross-examine her parents, she would talk to the doctors herself and ask all the questions that needed asking; she would be brave. And now, having plotted her course, she would reward herself and think about William Hamilton Ingraham. A wild adventure it had been, wild enough to fill Quinn’s days and nights and crowd out apprehensions about Ann. When Quinn wasn’t with Will, she was obsessed with images of him: the fierce look of his face while he studied; the way he pulled his shirt over his head in a graceful gesture that left his hair all tousled; the texture of his skin under her fingers; the smooth long muscles of his back. He had the body of a swimmer or a dancer, nothing bulky about it, just spare and beautiful. She loved to watch him move about the room when he was naked—bending, leaning, stretching to pull down the window shade.

  Now the clicking wheels were saying: want him, I want him, I want him. She pressed her knees together and glanced nervously at the cellist. The throbbing sensation had taken up permanent residence between her legs. She remembered Will’s response to her anxious suggestion that she was oversexed.

  “Probably,” he had said with a laugh. “Let’s take advantage of it before it goes away.”

  Half an hour outside of Boston, Quinn’s seatmate uncased his instrument and positioned it in the aisle where he could manipulate his bow without impaling anyone. Softly he began playing Christmas carols. Someone toward the front of the car began to sing along, and soon other voices joined in. They worked their way through The First Noel, Good King Wenceslas, and We Wish You a Merry Christmas. Oh Little Town of Bethlehem was a failure, drifting off into improvised lyrics and laughter, but Angels We Have Heard on High got regular repetition, with the glorias eliciting enthusiastic if inaccurate harmonizing. Will would have enjoyed all this, Quinn thought, particularly the cellist, who with his slight body and pale unkempt curls resembled a solemn, none too sanitary angel. As the train pulled into South Station he began to play Silent Night. The passengers sang, softly at first. Someone a few seats behind Quinn had a lovely baritone voice. With the swell of the music—Sleep in heavenly peace—Quinn felt her eyes sting. As she gazed around the car she saw that there were tears in several pairs of eyes besides her own.

  John met her at the platform. He took one of her suitcases and threw his other arm around her shoulders as they walked out of the station. There was a fine filtering of snow coming down.

  “Nine-oh-five, right on time,” John said. “How was the trip?”

  “Okay,” Quinn answered.

  John shoved aside the spare tire and miscellaneous tools to make room for Quinn’s luggage in the trunk. Then he tossed her the keys. As a passenger John was only comfortable with Quinn at the wheel. She drove just as he did—-aggressively, skillfully, and fast. She pulled out onto Boylston Street.

  “How’s Mom?”

  “Fine.”

  Quinn glanced sideways at him. “You bullshitting me, Jake?”

  “You’ll see for yourself. You don’t need to get all stirred up.”

  “Well, I am.”

  “Don’t be. You’ll worry your mother.”

  “I’ll bet she’s worried.”

  “She doesn’t complain.”

  “Of course she doesn’t. She’s a Goddamn saint. I’ll feel better about it once I’ve talked with her doctor.”

  “What for?”

  “For information.”

  “We’ll see.” His voice was curt.

  Quinn decided to lay off for the moment. Why start the vacation with a full-scale battle? “Where’d you get the tree this year?”

  “Finnegan’s.”

  Quinn smiled. Michael Finnegan sold the shapeliest, healthiest evergreens in Medham, which were removed in the dead of night from the estates and cemeteries of wealthy suburban communities. As a public service, Michael Finnegan explained, to thin out the overgrowth.

  When they pulled up in front of the house, Quinn could see holiday lights blinking through the living room window. Four inches of new snow coated the roof. She turned off the engine and sat looking down Gardner Street. At Christmastime, Medham lost its tawdriness and began to sparkle. Snow was necessary for the metamorphosis, but in Quinn’s memory there had been only one Christmas when the neighborhood wasn’t covered with white.

  She turned to tell John she couldn’t imagine spending Christmas in Arizona, but he had gotten out to fetch her suitcases. He tapped on the window.

  “Lock up and come on in. Your mother’s pining to see you.”

  On her way up the steps Quinn swallowed hard and tried to prepare herself for how her mother might look. But Ann really did seem all right. She was wearing her bright blue wool dress and her face had a healthy flush. Quinn hugged her with relief.

  Then they all sat in the kitchen drinking cocoa and eating Christmas cookies. As always, Quinn chose the star-shaped ones with the green icing first. She studied her mother.

  “You’ve lost a little weight, Mom.”


  Ann nodded. “About time, too.” Ann was forever trying out new diets, hoping to trim off ten or fifteen pounds, but it had always been difficult with Quinn and John around. They consumed enormous quantities of food and burned it all away while Ann despaired, nibbling on carrot sticks and holding steady at 142 pounds.

  “Chic, but I don’t know …” Her mother’s trim new figure would take some getting used to. Quinn popped another cookie into her mouth. “How do you feel?”

  “All my aches and pains have disappeared just in time for Christmas.”

  “Are you in remission?”

  Ann and John glanced at one another.

  “Listen, you two. I’m not seven years old. You brought me up to be tough. Tell me.”

  “Lupus is an inflammatory connective-tissue disorder,” Ann explained, “an autoimmune disease. It usually occurs in younger women.”

  “What’s an autoimmune disease?”

  “It’s when your body’s immunity system gets its signals crossed and begins to attack itself.”

  “Can they give you anything for it?” Quinn asked.

  “Cortisone.”

  “That’s pretty potent stuff. Are there side effects?”

  “Not that I’ve noticed.”

  “I’m grilling you, aren’t I?”

  Ann nodded. For the first time she looked tired.

  “I’m sorry. I’ll let you be. But I want to see Dr. Marshall this vacation.”

  “He sent us to a specialist, a fellow named Gunther at Mass General,” John said.

  “Okay, then I’ll see Gunther.”

  “All right,” Ann said. “You get your questions together, and maybe I’ll have a few to add to the list. And now let’s talk about something else.”

  “Fine,” Quinn said. “The latest bulletin from campus is … tadadaDA … your daughter’s got a boyfriend.”

  “Irish, I trust,” John said through a mouthful of gingerbread Santa Claus.

  “He’s very cute.”

  “What’s his name, dear?” Ann asked.

  “Will. William Ingraham.”