Making Love

by Norman Bogner

  He came into the bar and joined the Mexican, a waiting, compliant object. She had discovered some pot at the bottom of her bag, and remembered that Alan had laid it on her after his lecture on Schopenhauer. Jim took a corner table, looked splendid in his white trousers, red shirt, and double breasted blazer. At forty-six, he seemed no older than thirty-five, behaved like seventeen. Jane adjusted her dark glasses and came to the conclusion that reality, high or not, would ostensibly be the same, and that she'd be better off not getting hung up on subjects which would be of only peripheral interest to her father. Along with golf, his only other known field of expertise was, she had learned from a maid, the debatable method of contraception known in French as se retirer, and somewhat more piquantly in English as “coming out before the servant.” He had perfected this technique during his pre-twenty sorties.

  Jane moved to a table opposite, then smiled coquettishly at him. She received a satanic glare from the lynx-eyed girl. He didn't notice her. Boldly Jane rose, removed her glasses, and got a real nervous-breakdown look from him.

  “Jane ... Janey?” he said, squirming from his seat. Father and daughter embraced, Jim a bit emotional about it all.

  “What in God's name are you doing out here?” he inquired nervously, a seventy-nine looming on the horizon.

  “I wanted to see you.”

  This seemed reasonable but unconvincing to Jim, who looked from one girl to the other and made the appropriate introductions.

  “Francesca, this is my daughter, Jane. Darling, you look a little tired around the eyes,” he noted solicitiously. “Are you all right?”

  “I've never been better.”

  A gentle shark-bite grip was applied to Francesca's kneecap and the young lady swallowed her Margarita a bit hastily, salt adhering to her chin.

  “I'll see you later, Jimmy,” she said, then nodded to Jane.

  “I hope there's nothing serious.” Shocks at a time like this could tense him up, freeze his normally intrepid putter, he'd be a guest in bunkers. “Your mother's fine. I spoke to her a few days ago,” he insisted. Nancy's moods were as frequent as hijackings in Cuba. He could live with them. Her weather report, never varied—Romeos, binges, occasionally at the same time. A Farmer's Almanac of psychological regularity.

  “I spoke to her, too,” Jane said. She wasn't being helpful, Jim thought, motioning a waiter for another round.

  “How'd she sound to you?”

  “Loaded,” Jane said.

  “She's only been out a few weeks. Her liver'll just give out one of these days.”

  “It won't be a pretty sight,” Jane agreed.

  He waited silently, refusing to give her a lead. Nancy's liver wasn't really stimulating conversation between father and daughter. A drink arrived. Jim shakily downed it, clasped the waiter's wrist for another before he made departure plans.

  “You're nervous, Dad. I thought you had a good round.”

  “I'm a little unsettled. Seeing you, I suppose.”

  “I thought it'd be pleasant for you.”

  “Rabbits jumping out of hats,” he muttered.

  “I missed you.”

  “Aren't you supposed to be at school? This isn't some midsemester break, is it?”

  “I've made it one.”

  “I was coming home for Thanksgiving,” he said, thrusting out his chin, but it didn't scare her.

  “You'll be in Palm Beach for Thanksgiving.”

  He looked for someone to wave to, found a face at the bar, but the man simply waved back and shook off Jim's invitation.

  “Terrific little player. He's the pro up at Saxon Vale. Nifty course. I went around in sixty-six.”

  “That must've been nice for you.”

  “Well, it wasn't a tournament or anything. Just a friendly foursome.”

  Away from her father, she could secretly indulge in contempt for him. But in the flesh he was such a gorgeous, pleasant weakling that only the present had any reality. He'd made a career out of charm, check-grabbing, casual sex with nameless women. Incapable of cruelty, he inspired the affection normally reserved for small mischievous boys. In spite of his long-distance indifference, Jane adored him. Loving him brought with it the melancholy of perfect misunderstanding.

  Jane toyed with the ice in her glass, and Jim shoved over her fresh round. Three drinks were waiting, quiet soldiers of forgetfulness.

  “It's sort of nice sitting here having a drink and chat with you,” Jim said. “When I woke up this morning and checked the greens, I thought of a great many things, but it never crossed my mind that I'd be seeing you.”

  “How were the greens?”

  “Fast. Just the way I like them. You can't play like a coward or else you're leaving three-footers.”

  “I saw your eagle,” Jane said, bringing a ruby-red smile to his face.

  “Thought I might as well gamble, especially after my double bogie on fifteen.”

  “Can we have dinner tonight?” Jane asked.

  The question erased Jim's smile and brought him as close to anguish as he'd ever been.

  “Tonight,” he repeated, then stopped. “I've got the AGA dinner. Oh, the hell with it. Always works itself up to a stag show.” He smiled warmly. “Hey, Jane, it's great seeing you. We can have some dinner at The Shadows in San Francisco.”

  “I'm not upsetting your plans?” she asked, tilting her eyes at the place previously occupied by Francesca.

  “Oh, come on now, that doesn't belong to me,” be said a bit uncomfortably.

  “Thousands wouldn't believe you but I do, because I know you can do better.”

  He told the manager to call the restaurant to make a reservation. Simply mention his name, table near the window with a view. Booked to capacity or not, they would look after Jim Siddley for he carried with him the authority of the dollar; immigrant headwaiters from Spokane to Utica had known his largesse. At Holiday Inns he was greeted with open arms; Marriot Motor Lodge managers sent fruit to his room, turned a discreet eye to the ceiling when he marched in drunk with local hustlers. If you wanted curry in Minneapolis, frogs’ legs in Birmingham, or moo goo gai pan in Butte, Jim Siddley could tell you where to get it. As the custodian of such special knowledge he was more than popular with his fellow players on the tour; he was the incarnation of the good-guy amateur sportsman, America at a time of national innocence. Someday he'd have his own tournament. The James Harmon Siddley Cup would be awarded. You didn't have to be Bob Hope, you just had to work a little harder.

  “We can go the way we're dressed. It's a very casual kind of place,” he said as they walked to the parking lot.

  His looks always gave her a shock, made her uncomfortable, because they satisfied her physically. He was big-boned and sinewy, and despite eating and drinking everything, he'd never gone to flab, possessing that supernatural luck that often went with carelessness. Maybe everyone was wrong and it never caught up with you. He wore his hair longer now with a flair of sideburns over his ears. Ever stylish, weak, attractive, forgivable, she decided.

  “Jane, this surprise visit ... ?” he asked as they drove along the same anonymous freeway she'd taken from the airport. “What's it about?”

  “Who ever said you were just a pretty face?”

  “Come on, no messing about.”

  “Let's talk about it later. I just want to enjoy the traffic now.”

  “Is it painful?” he asked.

  “Just when they cut you open.”

  “That's some sense of humor you've developed.”

  She leaned her head on his shoulder and wondered dimly if he found her attractive, or if she could excite him. Arriving late at night in some godforsaken spot, he'd have been unlikely to turn her down. A handy piece was just that, a room with TV, and Jim had never been favored with a critical, selective eye. Toying with such ideas, she concluded, belonged to the lost world of childhood, but every now and then she speculated about the possibility.

  Off Telegraph Hill in a cul-de-sac, a boy took the c
ar, gunned it onto an incline, and they walked up some steps into a crowd of people.

  “Bar's at the top of the house,” Jim said, expertly threading his way through. “I think you'll enjoy the view.”

  A woman waved at him and indicated a free seat, but then turned away, catching sight of Jane.

  “Old friend?” she asked.

  “Not particularly. Just somebody I met passing through.”

  “Remember her name?”

  “Not if my life depended on it. Cocktail party or something at the Fairmont last week.”

  “Was it any good?”

  He caught the drift but refused to be drawn any further. The barman shifted some people to make room for him.

  “Two sherries,” Jim said. “Bristol Cream.”

  “God, isn't this innocent and lovely, the two of us drinking sherry before dinner. You always make me feel so incredibly sentimental.”

  “Is that good or bad?”

  “Daddy's little girl.”

  “I'm finding it a little hard to tell sarcasm from sentiment.”

  “Unadulterated sentiment. I'm really enjoying myself.”

  He held her hand and apologized. He couldn't bear scenes and always capitulated when an argument threatened to intrude on his serenity, running for the nearest cover, the Neville Chamberlain of domestic strife. He had made irresponsibility into a virtue, never correcting, complaining. He didn't have to, he simply disappeared, everybody's favorite rabbit on the golf tour, one of the few that Arnold Palmer could tolerate. Ageless, a loser with a fat purse, he moaned only to himself after a bad drop.

  “What're you going to do in Palm Beach?”

  “Rest up, then raise a little hell.”

  “Are you staying with anyone?”

  “No, I've got everything I need at the Everglades.”

  She remembered it well, an exclusive fortress where promiscuous millionaires dodged their wives. He chinked glasses with her, called her attention to the view, a master of the innocuous comment—but, she thought, badly concealing his growing apprehension. She didn't want to drop a bomb, but knew sooner or later she had to confront him with the facts of her life. Basically insensitive, he was vulnerable to pain, although this susceptibility seldom appeared. Oddly enough, he relaxed her, for he played the date and not the parent waiting to hear confession. For a moment she had a wild sense of elation; he was a perfect stranger, familiar but unknown. Who better to talk to?

  When not playing golf he traveled, escaping the confines of his marriage with a manner so wondrously patrician that she always felt like a fool whenever she wanted to remind him that he had a daughter. Absence drew them closer together, for Jane could create her father in any image she chose. Nancy's habitual drunkenness provided the perfect excuse for his travels. Communication was so infrequent that he never realized that Jane sympathized with him, gave credence to his flimsy excuses.

  Strangled tug horns below her in the Bay sounded in the bar.

  “You look a little lost,” Jim said, touching her hand.

  He might have been a married boyfriend out with his teeny-bopper girl, she thought.

  “Are you good in bed?” she asked.

  “That's a funny question.” He assumed that such questions were standard with kids today, and that she wondered if an Indian-summer relationship was still possible in his life. “Nobody's ever lived to complain.”

  “Do you ever go out with girls my age?”

  “Hey, Jane, you're not doing one of those sex studies, are you?” He laughed innocently. “I suppose you're old enough for me to be frank with you. I don't go out with young girls. They remind me too much of you. I steer clear of them. I have the odd harmless evening with a few divorcées I know. It's more for company than passion.” She listened attentively and he squirmed uneasily, worried that he'd gone too far. “You don't hold it against me, do you? For telling the truth?”

  “I like you better than I thought I did.”

  “That's a consolation, but I'm not sure how to take it.”

  They had a bottle of Bernkastler with the sauerbraten. Jane studied him: a mouse trying to find his way out of a maze.

  “I blame myself for not keeping closer to you. But I've got a way of life. I eased into it twenty years ago and it's hell getting out. I've missed a lot.”

  “Dad, you don't have to keep apologizing for what you are.”

  “I appreciate that, Jane.”

  He'd missed the point of her remark; not a very bright man, really, she noted. He'd been raised as an underachiever and he remained one, threatening no one. Making money, a test of a kind, wasn't despicable, only superfluous. He had grown up as a strong child, emerging a weak man who, even playing, was naturally languid. The word ambition was as esoteric as astrology in his life. He reminded her of an elderly racehorse; it should have won everything on paper, but ran consistently out of the money until finding its true vocation as a stud to lean mares, finally earning a purse on a day-to-day basis.

  They'd owned a horse together, a gelding which he bought for her at an auction in Dublin. But J.J. turned out to be a nonstarter with weak ankles, a slick bay color with all of the infinite charm of a professional animal that knows how to kiss asses. Beautiful to look at, it proved to be deft with exercise boys, a sound sleeper, and as easy as a pimp to get along with. She rode it once, fell, but without injury. The horse was too smart to put out and risk being shot. They got bored with it, all of the Siddley's. Three lame ducks, they needed a winner, not another freeloader, and it was traded off for two hundred shares of IBM to a broker anxious to tell his clients he owned racehorses and didn't need the business.

  She ate with appetite for the first time in weeks—no nausea. The sweet-and-sour gravy worked in her favor. He watched his drinking, complaining of an early starting time, but fell in love with the strudel, which was too sweet for her to touch. She studied him and liked him enormously, for he was just an old boy in the apple pie.

  They walked through an assortment of tit exhibitions in North Beach. Jim pretended to be amused at the topless shoeshine parlor, but she could see he was interested. He retained his presence of mind, fearful of embarrassing his daughter and a case of clap.

  “What do you think about all the time?” she asked, passing a coffee-bar terrace where she was given long looks and jerk-off signs behind her father's back.

  “How do you mean that?”

  Attempting to be careful with her, he appeared dense; but after all, impressions were his life, and she never had the spite to judge him unkindly.

  “Well, you've always traveled, moved around with the occasional divorcée?”

  “I just don't think. It's a waste of time.”

  “I respect you for saying that.”

  “We've always had very special problems.”

  “How to spend our money?”

  “Right. Odd we never talked about it. You're a very interesting person,” he added, and she believed he meant it. Strangers always made naïve remarks to each other.

  “What kind of girls do you like?”

  He held her arm at the curb, his attention arrested by a shill offering instant perversion in a hailstorm of profanity:

  “Pussies like pinchers. They'll grab a dollar bill from your hand....”

  “Seeing's believing,” she said.

  He ignored the remark; very good at that kind of thing, she thought.

  “Have you got any preference about girls?”

  “Educated,” he said.

  “God, I'm out with a professional ladies’ man and you're so low-key, so cool. I'll bet you've laid everything walking.”

  He stared into the window of the City Lights bookshop, squinting at titles and jackets that were incomprehensible. She spun him around.

  “Don't cop out now.”

  “Okay, Jane.” He smiled impishly. “Almost everything. But I failed where it counted. At home. You know something, I'm so shocked by our discussion that I'm enjoying it.”

  �
�Well, I'm a human being. I can ask anything I want. You don't have to answer.”

  “It's like a CBS newscast without Walter Cronkite's voice.”

  “He makes it a better world.”

  They were at the car. He tore up the parking ticket in front of a million passersby and she kissed him on the cheek.

  “Let Hertz worry about it. Get in”—he noticed a couple of boys offering themselves to his daughter—“I don't want to defend your honor.”

  “You won't have to fight that battle. It was lost with the West.”

  “Jane”—he fondled her neck and she liked his clean lime smell—“stop smart-assing me. I did it to my father. The language's changed a little, but the technique's the same.”

  She switched on a Top Forty station and said: “Okay, I'll stop putting you on. And since we haven't seen each other for almost a year”—he was about to contradict her—“okay, eight months, point for you ... I'm very pleasantly surprised. Because I hated your guts in Europe last summer.”

  He slipped on a pair of glasses and explained he used them for driving at night.

  “You've got me over a barrel,” he said pleasantly.

  “You'll pay the fine, won't you?”

  “Of course.” It was the Rolling Stones and he lowered the volume. “In cash.”

  “That's unworthy of you. Don't you want to hear the truth?”

  He had a nervous twitch. She'd never noticed it before. In the freeway light his skin had a green hue and a pattern of wrinkles at the eye profile. Flourishing in sunlight, his face was as bleak and tired as the moon's in darkness.