Ally Hughes Has Sex Sometimes

by Jules Moulin

“French Brie? That sounds so funny coming from you.”

  Jake smiled. “You know what I mean.”

  Ally did. They locked eyes. Once she’d had Jake, every man had paled in comparison. A moment passed. “Why did you find me? What do you want?”

  He stared at her and thought about it. He looked at his hands and said, “Well, to start with . . . I wanted to see if you remembered me.”

  She shook her head. “Of course I did.”

  “I wanted to see if you ever thought . . . you made a mistake.”

  Ally nodded. “It wasn’t. No. Maybe it was.” She tried to explain. “You would’ve been stuck, and if I got fired . . . I’m sorry, Jake.”

  Jake considered her words. “I know there’s no whining on the yacht, and I won’t. Whine on the yacht. But . . . all this stuff . . . money, fame . . . it’s nothing if you don’t love someone.” He gathered his courage. “So here it is: I was in love with you back at school. And here I am now—and I haven’t seen you in ten years—and I’m still in love with you.”

  Ally was stunned. She stood there blinking.

  “That’s a fact. And it’s why—the dinner. To see if I was, and it turns out I am, and I want to know if you feel the same way.”

  Ally stood there, silent and still, for a long moment.

  And then her phone rang.

  She looked down, slipped it out of her pocket, and looked at the number. “Jake,” she said and looked at him. “I know we’re having a moment here . . .”

  Jake smiled.

  “I have to get this. It’s my friend. We have a thing. An emergency thing. Three calls. This is her third.”

  “Sure,” he said. “Go.” He turned to the desk and picked up a script.

  —

  “TMZ!” Anna yelled after Ally picked up and said hi. “I saw you in a fight! A bar fight!”

  “What?”

  “A fight!”

  “How?”

  “On TV!”

  “That was— Listen, I can’t talk.”

  “Are you with him?”

  “Yes,” Ally said and glanced at Jake.

  “Let me say hi!”

  “No!”

  “Please!”

  “Anna, no. It’s not a good time.”

  “Please!” Anna begged.

  Ally paused and rolled her eyes. She turned around and looked at Jake. “My best friend—wants to say hi.”

  Jake rose and put down his script. “Sure.”

  She handed him the phone and whispered, “I’m sorry. Her name is Anna. With a short A. Like ‘ant.’ Not long. Not like ‘ah-choo.’ It makes her nuts.”

  Jake put the phone to his ear. “Anna?”

  Ally, mortified, slipped from her Tretorns.

  “Noah Bean?” Anna cried.

  “Hi.”

  Barefoot, Ally headed toward the bathroom. She needed a minute. She needed a towel. A clean towel.

  “I’m a huge fan! Huge! Huge!”

  Jake turned and looked out the window. “Thanks.”

  “So is my husband. We love you. We absolutely love you. Love you.”

  “Thank you so much,” he said again.

  “But more important. Listen to me. Are you listening, Noah?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Ally loves you.”

  Jake drew still and looked across the suite. Ally was gone.

  “She might not show it. She might not admit it. Even to herself. But don’t give up. She has—issues. I know this because I’m her best friend and an MD shrink. Do you know what that means? MD shrink? It means I’m smart.”

  “Okay.”

  “She will come around.”

  Jake looked down at the carpet and blinked.

  “Noah? You there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you hear me?”

  “You sure?” he asked, looking back up as Ally entered, shaking her head. She was embarrassed.

  “She loved you. She still does.”

  “Thank you, Anna.” Jake gazed at Ally. “That means a lot.”

  “Good,” she said. “Good.”

  “Bye,” he said, handing the phone back to Ally.

  Ally took it. “There. Are you happy?”

  “Yes,” said Anna. “Elated. Thanks.”

  “I’ll call you back.”

  “Bye, Als.”

  Jake sank slowly onto the sofa, looking refreshed. His eyes brightened.

  “Sorry about that,” Ally said.

  He looked at her and smiled. That arresting smile. Sheepish and flushing, Ally stared at him, captivated. In her hand, the phone rang again. She looked at the number. “Lizzie’s friend.” She looked at him.

  “Get it,” he said. “I’ve got all night.”

  —

  “I’m worried, Mrs. Hughes,” Weather started. “She said she would be at my place at five. It’s not like her to not show up. Do you know if her super’s back?”

  “I’m confused.” Ally had moved to the window again. The fog was lifting. She saw the treetops of Central Park.

  “She hasn’t called me all day. She won’t pick up. Nobody’s seen her. Not from class. Not from Del’s. Mrs. Hughes!”

  “Weather, if we don’t find her tonight—you have to—we have to go back to this place. Tomorrow, first thing.”

  “Okay, Mrs. Hughes, I can lead you from the train—where we got off—but I don’t have the exact address.”

  “Tomorrow morning.”

  The doorbell rang. Ally looked up.

  “Room service. Still want tea?” Jake got up and answered the door.

  SHE ROLLED OVER AND Jake met her ear. “It’s eight,” he whispered.

  “No!” Ally whined and bolted upright. Her head throbbed. She closed her eyes and thought about Meer. Meer’s message. Meer’s threat. Sober reality set in. “Jake?”

  “Yeah?”

  She opened her eyes. “There’s no kind way to say this. I’m sorry . . .”

  “I have to go.”

  “You have to go.” She leaned in and kissed him, then rolled to get up. “I have to clean this whole house . . . in four hours.”

  “I’ll help.” He picked up a pillow and stripped off its case.

  “She can’t find a trace of us . . . I have to leave for the station at noon.” She stood up slowly and held her head.

  “Ally?” he said, looking at her as she swept back her hair. “If I were—if I were thirty-five, would you be rushing me out of here?”

  “If you were fifty,” Ally explained. “I decided—a long time ago—not to drag her into my dating.”

  “What dating?”

  “Yes, that’s right. There’s a reason for that.”

  “How will you ever meet anyone?”

  “I won’t,” she said and walked away, into the bathroom.

  “I would marry you if you want,” Jake called.

  Ally caught herself on the sink. She took a deep breath and stood up straight. “You don’t mean that,” she called back, then looked at herself in the sink mirror. She looked afraid.

  “I do,” he said and appeared in the doorway, folding the blanket.

  She turned on the water and splashed her face. She reached for a towel and wiped herself dry. Through the mirror, she looked at Jake.

  “I would marry you if you want,” he said again.

  “And that would be a mistake for you.” She put the towel back on the bar.

  “Why?” he said.

  She picked up her toothbrush. “Because,” she said and grabbed the toothpaste. She squeezed a snake of it onto her brush and started to brush on the left as she spoke. “You’re twenty-one . . . You’re quitting school . . .” She brushed and brushed and then stopped and spit and started again on the
right. “You don’t know what kind of job you want . . . You’re in debt . . . You’re too young to be a dad.” She spit again and returned the brush to the cup on the sink. “And we don’t really know each other. Not from two days.” She grabbed the cup and rinsed.

  Jake watched her. “I know you.”

  She put the cup down, wiped her mouth, and turned to face him. “Jake, look. I have—inexplicable feelings—”

  “Inexplicable?”

  “Unexplainable.”

  “I know what it means. I just don’t agree that your feelings are unexplainable.”

  “I’m totally delighted and overwhelmed by what happened here over the weekend, but—”

  “But?”

  “We don’t know each other. Not truly.”

  “Ally,” he said. “I’ve sat in your class and listened to you yammer—ninety minutes, twice a week—for three years. Six semesters. Two hundred sixteen total hours.”

  She looked at him. “Yammer?”

  Jake smiled. “Did I say yammer? I meant lecture. I’ve read your papers, both your books, and you’ve read six hundred pages of me . . .”

  Ally nodded and bit her lip.

  “We’ve been talking, you and me—talking and flirting—for a while.”

  Ally turned. “It was your idea. And I thought we were— And now I sound like some old man with a beard and a hard-on, and that is—that is not what this was.”

  “What was it, then?”

  “I make mistakes.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “I make decisions, and—”

  “No, I told you, it wasn’t a fling. If I were a girl and you were a guy—”

  “Jake. Please. If someone found out?” She turned, stepped toward him, and kissed him on the lips. “I’m sorry. Okay? Marry you?”

  Tired, she thought, she must be tired. She sidestepped him and went into the bedroom and swallowed the knob of grief in her throat. Her knees felt weak and she started to tremble. She was hungover. She never drank. That’s what this was.

  In the doorway, Jake turned around and searched for his clothes. They were scattered across the bedroom floor.

  —

  In the kitchen, Ally made coffee.

  “Thank you,” he said as she gave him the mug. He was washing down the table. He stopped for a moment, put the sponge down, then crossed to the sink, where Ally was rinsing the last Stella bottle.

  He leaned against the counter, studying her sadly, then turned his head and gazed out the window.

  Ally turned off the water and watched him lift the mug to his lips. Like pillows, she thought, Jake’s lips.

  He hadn’t shaved, and the dark wash of bristle, of five-o’clock shadow, the lack of sleep, and a certain sadness made him look ten years older that morning.

  Ally studied him and thought of how beautifully he would age. Some men grow more handsome year after year, and Jake would be one of them. Lucky the lady who . . .

  “Holy shit,” Jake said and straightened up, startled. He focused out the window. “They’re here.” He placed his coffee mug down on the counter.

  “Who?” Ally said and stepped toward him to see what he saw.

  Beyond the front yard, beyond the front gate and across the street, an extremely animated ten-year-old girl climbed from a cab, holding a toy gun in her hand.

  “What are they doing?” Ally cried, panicked.

  The driver helped Claire pull two tiny rollers from the trunk.

  “Back, out the back!” Ally yelled.

  “Good,” Jake agreed, grabbing his duffel and his toolbox.

  She took him by the arm and led him through the dining room toward the screened porch at the back of the house.

  As they fled, she glanced through the window and saw Lizzie in the side yard, running toward the back, wielding her gun.

  “I’m home! I’m home!” Lizzie yelled, her long blond braids bouncing off her back, gun in her hand.

  “Where is she going? Shoot! Shoot!” Ally abandoned her route and doubled back, grabbing Jake and taking him with her. “The basement,” she said. “It leads to the yard on the other side.”

  “Hello! We’re home!” Claire called from the front hall. She had let herself in.

  Ally opened the basement door and shoved Jake inside.

  “Wait!” he said as she closed it.

  “Ally?” called Claire. “We’re home! Surprise!”

  “Hello!” Ally yelled toward the kitchen. “I’ll call you,” she whispered to Jake through the door.

  “You will?” he said. “Do you have my number?”

  “No, I don’t know. Sorry. I’m really sorry. I can’t call you.” She shut the door, turned, and ran down the hall. “Mom? Is that you?”

  Claire was placing her purse on the counter, staring at two mugs of coffee. Two. “Surprise!” she said and looked up as Ally walked in.

  “No kidding,” Ally said.

  “We took an early—”

  “Where is she?” Ally pretended to look around.

  —

  In the sunny backyard, Lizzie climbed up onto her tire swing, happy to be home. She kicked off her shoes and pointed the toy gun high in the air at a bird flying by.

  In the dark basement, Jake found the doors that led outside through a steep cellar egress. He unhitched the lock and tried to lift them, but they were stuck. Like a linebacker, he pounded on the steel with his shoulder and his back.

  From the corner of the yard, Lizzie had a view of the red cellar doors. She grew still when she heard the noise, the thud-thud-thud, from the basement.

  Her eyes grew wide as the doors began to give, and when one flew open and Jake popped out, she clutched the tire swing, pointed the gun at him, and let loose a terrified, ear-piercing scream.

  Ally and Claire looked at each other and ran from the kitchen toward Lizzie’s scream.

  Through the porch, Ally could see her, clutching the swing rope, pointing the gun, mouth in an oval, eyes wide in horror, letting loose horrified scream after scream. “A man! A man!”

  “What? What? What’s in your hand?” Ally cried as she flew from the porch and down the steps.

  “A man! A man!” Lizzie screamed, pointing at Jake.

  Ally and Claire turned and saw Jake standing in the egress, half-in, half-out, covered in cobwebs.

  Claire screamed and Lizzie screamed again and Ally bellowed over them, “Stop! Stop! Put down that toy! He’s the handyman! Stop!”

  “What?” Claire said, looking at Ally.

  “He is the handyman!”

  Lizzie fell silent, dropped the toy gun, threw her head back, and laughed. Claire inhaled and smiled tightly.

  “You bought the gun?” Ally cried, looking at Claire.

  “It’s what she wanted!”

  Ally, fuming, turned to Jake. “Come, Jake! Come meet my mother and Lizzie. Come.”

  IN RED HOOK, THEY walked for about a mile, block to block, before Weather saw it. “There! That!” She pointed to the warehouse two blocks down. “That one there. Under the bridge.”

  “The one on the left?” Ally asked. “Across the street?”

  “The far corner there!”

  “Wait,” said Jake. “Is that on Bushman? Bushman and Court?” He had insisted on joining them. Weather insisted they walk all the way from Borough Hall so she could retrace Lizzie’s route.

  They stopped on the corner as traffic sped past, blowing exhaust and kicking up dirt. “I think I know this building. I do. From all my research—1909—the Sugar Mill Fire!” Over their heads, the expressway roared.

  “What?” Ally said.

  “Ten girls died. Bushman and Court. Oh, man. This is perfect. See the relevance? This is—incredible. I can’t believe it.”

  “Why?” Weather said.
/>   “Can you?” said Jake. “Can you believe it?”

  “I—I don’t know. Yes,” Ally said, looking around. “Maybe. I guess.” She was distracted. Next to the building, a crew from Con Ed ripped through the pavement.

  “Two years before the Triangle fire. Or was it cotton? Vaseline? No. No, it was sugar. Sugar. It was. This was the building. Nothing has changed but the product! Man! Marty will love this!”

  “Why is he freaking?”

  “He has—a passion,” Ally explained and stepped off the curb to cross the street.

  “The irony, wow.” Jake followed. “This guy runs a sugar mill, too . . .”

  In secret, thought Ally. They’re all tucked in. Hidden behind the grit and the noise.

  “So what’s the plan?” Jake stopped walking.

  Ally turned to him. “I’m going in.”

  “Why? Are you sure? Who are these people? They could be armed. They could be dangerous.”

  “Were they? Weather?”

  “No. He was tan. Polo, no socks.”

  “Really?” said Jake. “My sources said—”

  “But I’m not a threat,” Ally insisted. “I’ll say—I’ll say—it’s an emergency. They’ll understand.”

  “No. No.” Jake shook his head. “If anyone goes, I go. I go inside.”

  “Yeah, Mrs. Hughes. Noah should go. They won’t kill a star.”

  “No, Jake, thanks. I’m thrilled you’re here. You make us feel safe. But, A, she’s my child. And, B, I’m armed.”

  “Armed?” said Jake.

  She crossed the street toward the construction.

  “Armed with what?” Jake followed Ally. Weather followed Jake.

  “Pepper spray,” she said and patted her purse.

  “What? Why?”

  “Where did you get it?” Weather caught up. “Please, let me see!”

  Keeping her stride, Ally took the canister out of her purse and gave it to Weather. “Careful. It can stop bears.”

  Weather brandished it. “‘Hurry up, woman!’”

  “It’s not a toy.” Ally reached out and took it back as they all heard a series of screeches and peels.

  Four white vans, unmarked, raced by. One van, two, a third, and a fourth pulled up in front of Fishman’s doors.

  “What . . . what is this?” Two marked police cars followed behind, sirens swirling.