Group Sex

by Ann Arensberg

  “That’s the ticket,” said Gloria. “Spare no one. Don’t spare yourself either.”

  “Will I change if I write?” Frances asked. “Could it be I’m a monster?”

  “Feed the monster,” said Gloria. “It’s your friend. It’s your true inspiration. You should see the inside of my head if you’re partial to monsters.”

  Frances went home. She had hoped to get answers, not prodding. She had hoped to hear Gloria lampoon the male sex, Paul included, making Paul very small, as she did with the men in her novels, like an impotent troll who attempted to hoodwink a witch. Frances counted the votes in her poll of Paul’s actions and morals. One against; one abstaining. She wanted a clear-cut consensus. She groaned at the prospect of telling her story again. Perhaps she should write it and pass it around in a leaflet, or record it on tape, or wear it in sandwich-board fashion. When she collared Ruthanne, who was known for her vehement judgments, she mangled the narrative and had to repeat certain sections. “How old is the baby?” “No, no,” Frances said. “It’s not born yet.” “You said it was black.” “Not the baby; her previous lover.” Ruthanne rubbed her eyes. She looked sullen as well as bewildered, as if her big sister had told her the crude facts of life. “This is over my head,” said Ruthanne. “I’m too young. I don’t get it.

  One against; one abstaining; one psychically underaged voter. Since all else had failed, Frances stated the case to her mother. Eleanor Basinger, formerly Nelly Girard, was expecting her bridge club, which met every week on a Wednesday. “I can’t chat for long,” said her mother. “I’m ironing napkins.” Frances gave her a shortened rendition, since Paul had once met Mrs. Basinger. She remembered him well, because Paul ate four helpings of capon, leaving nothing for lunch the next day but the wings and the carcass. As she spoke, Frances heard bursts of mist and the thunk of the iron. She heard a loud creaking: the ironing board being folded. Over the wires came more noises, a rattling and clinking. “Go on,” said her mother. “I’m listening. I’m filling the nut cups.” “I’ll call back.” Frances sighed. “You’re distracted. I need your opinion.” “I’m too old and too tired,” said her mother. “I have no opinion.”

  In spite of the adage, confession is bad for the soul. It weakens the will and gives rise to undignified gossip. Frances might live to be ninety and rise to great heights: her confessors would never forget her involvement with scandal. Even now, there were signs she was tainted by the tale she had broadcast. Did people stop talking abruptly when Frances approached them? Why had Hammy walked right by her door without turning to hail her? Had Arlene, the receptionist, covered a laugh with her hand? There was only one person who saw Frances whole and unsullied. In the hour of her shame, only Gus was her aid and her comfort. His affection for Frances was balm to her dishonored spirit, and his feelings seemed warmer with each editorial session. Gus had no knowledge of Paul and his pact with the Devil; he did not look at Frances and see a discredited woman. The proofs for The Sisterhood Murders had come from the printer. Frances liked an excuse to flee Harwood and bold, prying glances, so she carried the galleys in person to Gus’s apartment. Gus lived in a garden apartment, or, rather, a basement. The garden in question was paved with concrete cracked by frost heaves. The odd blade of grass struggled up through the breaks in the paving. A pile of old bricks and a birdbath were grouped in one corner. Artists often prefer to inhabit lugubrious dwellings, since cheerful surroundings distract them from higher endeavors. Gus’s lodgings were Spartan and lacked any touches of color; the walls and the fabrics had aged to a mean shade of brown. The housekeeping habits of artists may also be careless; Gus’s color scheme owed its appearance to layers of grime.

  Gus welcomed Frances and pulled up two chairs to the table. She feared for the galleys as well as her sleeves and her cuffs. The top of the table bore traces of butter and egg yolk, a coating of cake crumbs and dust, and some splashes of tallow. Gus brought Frances hot tea in a mug that had once had a handle. As he gave her the cup, she observed that his neck was not clean. Outside his home, when he wore a starched shirt and a tie, she had never had reason to question his standards of grooming. Gus hovered near her, offering her sugar and milk. His shoulder brushed hers as he opened the package of galleys. As he studied the pages, she felt his hot breath on her cheek. His breath, to her boundless relief, was innocuous and sweet. If he pounced, she might yield to his kisses in spite of his neck. It was surely ungracious to fret about mere sanitation. Who was she, in her abject condition, to shun dirt and scurf?

  If Gus had considered impinging on Frances’s anatomy, he was quickly distracted by the sight of his work in cold print. He handled the pages as if they were made of blown glass, lip-reading certain fine phrases, or quoting aloud. Finding very few errors, he finished the proofs in short order. He thanked Frances profusely, and made her a fresh cup of tea. With his usual tact, he diverted the subject to Frances, showing earnest concern for his editor’s health and well-being. Was she sleeping enough? he inquired. Was she working too late? Her pallor became her, but he feared it betokened fatigue. Gus’s sympathy had the effect of a potent emetic. She could feel her sad squalid narration rise up in her gorge. She debated an instant before she released her confession, but Gus was her friend and she needed the male point of view.

  Gus was her friend, but his face wore a queasy expression, as if she had made an unmentionable mess on the floor. Should she offer to fetch a wet mop and a bottle of ammonia? Should she open the windows to let out the stench of her story? Gus averted his eyes. Would he shrink if she tried to come near him? Writers ought to have stomachs for life with its grit and its cankers. Nothing human should alienate writers, nor priests, nor physicians.

  “You must leave him,” said Gus.

  “We are living apart,” answered Frances.

  “You are tied to this man,” Gus intoned. “You would like to excuse him.”

  “His work is important,” said Frances.

  “Bad men make bad art.”

  “He’s not bad. He’s intrepid.”

  “I can see that I’ve lost you,” Gus said.

  Gus turned aside, so that half of his face was in shadow. The look she had read as distaste was, in fact, one of sadness. There was no way to make reparation for wounding his feelings. She could hardly insult him by thanking him for his assistance. She could hardly explain that he, Gus, next to Paul, was a groundling; that Gus played it safe, whereas Paul battled life on the ramparts. She went to the door, but he made no attempt to detain her. She had lost a good friend and an author, as well as a suitor. Gus would take his next book to a house where he got a male editor, never knowing what part he had played in resolving her crisis.

  Out on the street, Frances blinked and held on to the railing. The basement was dark and the impact of daylight was blinding. When her vision adapted, she saw things anew, in clear outline. Her interior vision had sharpened, as well as her eyesight. Like a patient whose fever has broken, she knew she was mending. She had won back the use of her mind, which was sick from wrong thinking. She had tried to fit Paul into frames that were cut for mere humans. She had judged him by standards established by average people. Worse than that, she had shrunk to their level by heeding their counsel. It was she, and not Paul, who was guilty of every betrayal.

  Instead of returning to Harwood, she set out for home. Crowds gave way as she passed; lights turned green as she stepped off the curb. She hiked fifty-odd blocks at the rate of a mile in ten minutes. Her thoughts ran ahead of her feet, spanning years in short spaces. She prayed for occasions to prove her allegiance to Paul, such as lying on the witness stand or paying him visits in prison. With luck on her side, she could take any raps meant for Paul. She would serve out his sentence or swing from the noose as his proxy. If Paul predeceased her (by natural means, not juridical), she would keep the flame burning, as relics of Genius are bound to. She would spend her last years keeping would-be biographers guessing, and searching his papers to excise all trace of Kip Hillyer.


  Instead of fatiguing her, walking made Frances feel stronger. This flush of new energy altered her view of the future. She had once met a Keeper of the Flame, a philosopher’s widow, who spent every day cutting clippings from journals and newspapers. When an article mentioned her husband in critical terms, she wrote to its author, upbraiding him for his bad judgment. When a scholar applied for permission to quote her late husband, she denied it unless the book showered the great man with praise. As time passed and her husband was mentioned or quoted less often, the widow developed the symptoms of terminal illness. When his last book had gone out of print, she declined and died quickly. Such a prospect did not attract Frances. In fact, it repelled her. Certain men asked their mates to surrender their lives, but in general their wives volunteered. Paul demanded hard work and attention and depths of forbearance; he did not require meek acquiescence or blind immolation. No question that Paul took advantage; he needed close watching. She needed more watching than he did. She was apt to give in without fighting. A new contract with Paul would involve constant jockeying and haggling. They would barter and deal at a clamorous decibel level. Frances looked forward to the opening round of the contest. Had she wanted a placid romance, she would not have picked Paul.

  The stairs to Paul’s loft were lit dimly, like Gus Stafford’s basement. As she climbed, she looked upward, in case there were suspect intruders. On the next-to-last landing the light bulb was flickering and dying, casting patterns of shadows, tall shapes that looked restless and sinister. She peered through the glimmer and walked with her back to the wall. The optics were tricky. One shadow was wearing a trench coat. Frances stopped in her tracks. This illusion was denser than shadow. It moved on long legs and it reached out long arms to restrain her. It was bearded but faceless. Its grasp was assured and familiar. Clutched to its bosom, she heard it address and enjoin her.

  “Give me my keys,” said the voice of her fate and her future.

  “Never,” vowed Frances. “I may not be big, but I’m fearless.”

  “We’re going to get married,” said Paul.

  “Go ahead!” shouted Frances.

  “Stop punching,” he begged her. “We have to. It squares our accounts.”

  “I’ll punch you,” said Frances. “I like it. I’d like to punch her.”

  “Cut it out,” ordered Paul. “There’s no her. She’s adopting a baby.”

  “When I’m finished with you,” Frances warned, “I’ll raise welts on the baby.”

  “We are going to get married,” Paul said, “if I have to use chloroform.”

  She gave Paul a look like a dog with a stick in his jaws who is torn between two strong desires that are taxing his brain: holding on and maintaining control of his cherished possession, or releasing the stick in order to play with his master.

  “You might be unfaithful,” said Frances. “I’d never live through it.”

  “I won’t be,” Paul answered. “I promise. It makes too much trouble.”

  “I haven’t agreed,” Frances stalled. “There are certain conditions.”

  “Can’t we settle this later?” asked Paul.

  “Not so fast,” answered Frances. “I need two more drawers in the bureau. And a shelf in the bookcase. And a desk of my own. And I want to retrieve my cat Lewis.”

  “Yes to everything!” Paul started growling.

  “Your oath signed in blood,” she continued. “No more improvs, ordeals, or experiments. No more Rudolf and Mary.”

  Paul was smiling, or baring his teeth, like a soreheaded lion.

  “Watch your step,” he advised, moving toward her. “Or I’ll make you play Christians and Romans.”

  As a rule, brides-to-be who have just received marriage proposals do not pepper their probable lifemates with blows to the shoulders. The bridegroom-to-be, according to widespread tradition, does not pinion his fiancée’s elbows and threaten to bite her. In most stories the outlaws are punished and rue their misdeeds. When the suicide play was performed for a live, paying audience, Paul was hailed as the boldest director of his generation. Many love stories end with a promise of ceaseless felicity. The prospects of Frances and Paul may inspire speculation. What mutations would each undergo in the course of their union? Would Paul ever learn to share milk products? Would Nip take possession of Frances? She hoped that he would: better Nip than the old wormy Frances. The new Frances would cause some dismay in the ranks of her colleagues. Her family might never adjust to her picturesque habits. Paul himself would be forced to make frequent unselfish concessions, clearing space for her humors as well as her books, cat, and clothing. Someday Frances, not Paul, might need nursing through moods and obsessions. She might utter unnatural sounds when the fit was upon her, and assume twisted animal postures portraying frustration. How would Frances and Paul dwell in peace in the same legal household, unless their establishment boasted three floors and an annex? It is hard to imagine them eating their breakfast in silence, so attuned to each other that words rarely need to be spoken. Frances and Paul are not scheduled for marital concord. Two eccentrics who marry must live in a comradely uproar.

  About the Author

  Ann Arensberg was born in Pittsburgh and grew up in Havana, Cuba. She worked as an editor at the Viking Press and E. P. Dutton. She is the author of Sister Wolf, which won the National Book Award for Best First Novel in 1981; Group Sex; and Incubus. Her short fiction has been included in the O. Henry Awards Prize Stories anthologies. She is currently finishing her fourth novel. She and her husband, Richard Grossman, are residents of Salisbury, Connecticut.

  All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 1986 by Ann Eveleth Arensberg

  Cover design by Tammy Seidick

  978-1-4804-7077-4

  This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

  345 Hudson Street

  New York, NY 10014

  www.openroadmedia.com

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