“I don’t like boxing anyway,” Marie said, “It’s boring.”
Erick looked at her, almost turning his general hate toward her. Then he relaxed. “Amen,” he said.
“And so much for Hemingway,” said Lynn. Then he looked at Erick for a moment with the old interest, with the look that was almost always there at college.
“If you’d write something like that,” he said, “You’d sell it.”
Erick felt suddenly embarrassed, peeved at Lynn for bringing it up. He thought it made him appear ridiculous; like a stubborn jackass who wouldn’t do what he was best at.
“Yeah,” he said.
And saw the look fade quickly from Lynn’s eyes and knew that college days were over. And wished they weren’t because he wanted to be back in the past, even knowing that it was absurd to desire such a thing.
“I like it here,” Leo said, changing the subject, “Who discovered it?”
“Columbus,” he said.
“No,” she said, “Who?”
“Lynn.”
“No, I did,” Marie said, “I used to come here long ago. When they first opened and nobody used to come here during those days.”
“That was during the Harding administration wasn’t it?” Erick asked. Lynn smiled. Marie simpered.
“Ha ha ha,” she said but she wasn’t laughing.
“You know,” Erick said, “If it wasn’t for sex, I don’t think men and women would stand for each other.”
“Have you two had sex together yet?” Marie asked casually.
“Not yet,” Leo said.
Erick felt himself start and he almost spilled his wine. It happened so fast, so unexpectedly. It was spoken so simply that the shock kept growing.
Not yet. The words haunted him all the rest of the evening. As if she had said—Well, really, we just met but as soon as things get a little settled we’ll pop into bed together and have at it. The thought made his throat dry and he felt weak.
But he kept talking all night and no one noticed at all because he had spent twenty-four years keeping all revelation from his face.
“Thumb me a woman,” Lynn said soon after that and Marie groaned, “Oh no, not again!”
“Her arms reached the floor,” Erick said quickly and the rest of the night he forced himself to be light. At least on the surface. Before the evening ended Marie impulsively insisted that they all have dinner at Lynn’s place the following Saturday night, Lynn was forced into it and they all accepted.
* * * *
“Yes, I think you should have her,” Lynn said the next Tuesday evening when Erick dropped in. Lynn was lying on the couch with a copy of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason on his shallow chest. A glass of wine rested on the coffee table.
Erick slouched in the big armchair next to the television set.
“Why the hell are you so anxious?” he asked.
“You know why,” Lynn said coldly, “Because you still aren’t sure, that’s why.”
Erick swallowed. He looked away from Lynn, feeling very uneasy at the candid way Lynn approached it.
“I guess she wants it,” he said vaguely.
“You bet she wants it,” Lynn said sharply, “There’s nothing of the vestal virgin in that bitch.”
“You’re drunk,” Erick said, “She’ll probably say no.”
“Ridiculous,” Lynn said, “No girl will say no indefinitely. Not if your sense of direction doesn’t fail you. A girl’s objections to laying are like a wall you come up against. When you reach it, you climb over it. If you can’t, you drill a hole through it. If you can’t, you burrow under it. If you can’t, you go around it. And if you can’t, you prove to the girl that there never was a wall there in the first place.”
Erick sat there quietly. “Yeah, yeah,” he said.
“Your time has come,” Lynn said, “You could have gotten this crap out of your system with Sally if you’d had any sense.”
“What the hell makes you think I didn’t?” Erick said, trying to sound bland.
“Did you?”
“None of your business.”
Lynn shrugged, blew out a snickering breath. “From this,” he said, “I take the assumption that you never did.” He snickered again. “She would have been just the one to disgust you good and properly.”
Erick stared bleakly at the rug.
“I should have married Sally,” he said.
“Nonsense!” Lynn snapped, “You should have married the past. You’re living with it all the time anyway.”
“Goodnight,” Erick said, rising.
Lynn picked up his book and affected the look of pure boredom that no one else Erick ever knew could manage so well.
“Good night,” he said, “Go home and write yourself a best seller.”
* * * *
When he called for Leo on Saturday night, she told him to wait for her in the bar and order two sidecars. He hung up the phone, feeling uncomfortable again. He couldn’t have managed the first date if Lynn hadn’t paid for the wine. Yet how could he say—I’m sorry, I’m broke, I can’t afford to buy you a drink. It was a feeling of utmost humiliation. It made the inside of his stomach feel hot and uncomfortable.
He sat in the bar, in the booth of cool, green leather waiting for her. He kept thinking about their first date. About how when they got back to the hotel she looked into her mailbox when it was obvious to both of them that there could be no mail that late at night. But it gave them the chance to stand out of sight of the night clerk and the night porter. And he’d held her arms and kissed her forehead and then she’d tilted her head back because he was so much taller. And her warm lips yielded fully. It was the way she kissed. As if she were taking it all, frantically absorbing every bit of it for fear that it was the last one in her life. Her hands caught at his elbows and her breath was quick.
Then she pressed her cheek against his. He felt awkward bent over like that, hoping that no one saw him.
“Thanks a lot,” she said, “I had a swell time.”
“Quartet and all?”
“Quartet and all,” she repeated softly as though it were a sort of declaration of love.
“Shall I call you before next Saturday?” he asked.
“I wish you would.”
“All right,” he told her. Then he’d kissed her again and she had pressed against him, smiled at him as he straightened up.
“Good night, baby,” she said.
He thought of it as he sat there in the bar, staring down into the untouched sidecars, the delicate frothy surface breaking down. He felt a severe need to have her alone somewhere, to try and seduce her. It was a compulsion, he knew, almost a sense of duty. The duty of a full-blooded American male. But the way she kissed him, the way she spoke glibly and freely of sex, her shadowy past at school; all seemed to indicate that the idea was more than feasible.
After a while she came down. She had on a tweed skirt and a light brown blouse. She was carrying a waist-length tan jacket in her arms. She came up and slid in beside him with a smile. She pressed his hand as she kissed him.
“Hi baby,” she said. Then she picked up the drink and took a sip.
“Mmmm, that’s good,” she said, “I go for sidecars.”
* * * *
Lynn let them in.
“Hi!” Leo said to him.
“Hello,” Lynn answered. They all went into the living room.
“Where’s Marie?” Erick asked, glancing around.
“She’s ill,” Lynn said casually.
“Oh, that’s too bad,” Leo said. Lynn looked stage sad.
“What’s wrong with her?” Erick asked suspiciously.
Lynn sort of half shrugged. Then he moved into the kitchen. Leo looked at Erick.
“That spoils it for him,” she said.
“I wonder,” Erick said, “Give me your jacket.” They went into the bedroom and she looked around.
“Oh, I like this,” she said, “I wish I had an apartment like this.”
“Do you?” he asked.
“What’s the matter, baby?” she asked.
“Don’t …,” he started, then said, “Nothing.”
Dinner was a somber affair.
Erick sat morosely while Lynn acted out the role of perfect host bringing in the well done roast lamb and potatoes, lighting candles, moving from kitchen to dining room with his quick sure motions, a smile always half written on his face.
“More lamb?” he would ask, “Potatoes? Broccoli?” Sitting and eating only a little himself, his gaze on Leo always that of scientist on microscope, Erick saw. Or procurer on client. He wondered how Lynn had managed to keep away Marie.
“Thumb me a woman, Mr. Linstrom,” Lynn said once, so irritatingly that Erick wanted to heave his plate at him.
“She was a man,” he said nastily, glaring at Lynn. Lynn pursed his lips. “What do you think?” he asked Leo. Leo was mystified. Lynn moved back into the kitchen, looking interested and pleased.
There was a bottle of wine, two glasses on the shiny topped coffee table before the couch. The bottle rested in a bowl of cracked ice.
Erick twitched uncomfortably when he saw the bowl. It reminded him of something. He almost expected Lynn to start lecturing him casually on the need of concentrating on black whales floating by icebergs.
One thing was certain. He’d made up his mind not to touch Leo. It was too obvious that Lynn was just hovering, waiting like a blood-faced pimp for the commencement of activities.
He sat beside Leo on the couch, sipping red wine. Lynn sat in an armchair, chatting politely. From Magnavox steamed Wagner’s Love Death Music. Lynn let his words stop and watched Leo as she lay her head back and listened. She moved against Erick and Lynn’s face registered slightly.
Erick glanced at him. Lynn’s features committed nothing to sight. Erick waited. But couldn’t catch Lynn’s eye. He turned back with a heavy breath and felt his arm tighten as Leo touched it idly with her white fingers.
His mind spoke to her.
Blind fool, it said.
* * * *
Promptly at ten, Lynn got up and said, “I believe I’ll do some reading.” He grabbed a book, got another bottle of wine and went into the bedroom with an, “If you’ll excuse me.” The door shut behind him. Erick wondered what sort of expression was on Lynn’s face now that he was hidden away. Elation? Or shaking rage?
“He feels bad,” Leo said.
“God only knows what Lynn feels,” he answered, “If anything.”
“Are you angry with him?”
“I don’t know,” he said.
They were silent a moment.
“What does he do?” she asked.
“He needles,” Erick said.
“No, I mean his job.”
“He’s a public relations man.”
“He does all right for himself,” she said, unable to keep the sound of envy from her voice. Erick was silent. Then he said suddenly,
“Would you like to go out with him,” at once disgusted with her and amused by the idea of Lynn dating her.
She turned quickly and looked at him. “Baby, don’t look like that,” she said. She leaned over and kissed him.
“Would you?”
“Stop it,” she said and her voice was angry. He looked at her coldly. She smiled a little. “Stop it,” she said again, quietly.
He pulled her against his body and kissed her. She pressed tightly on him and moved her hips a little to rub her stomach against his. Her breath came quickly again. He reached up almost intuitively and closed one hand over her left breast. She shuddered and her breath caught. Excitement began fluttering through him and, suddenly, he realized that the idea of Lynn being in the next room excited him even more. Brief rage at knowing that Lynn had planned it all, had gotten Marie not to come somehow. Then a feeling of—who the hell cares? And amusement at the idea that Lynn’s plan would backfire slightly since he was going to enjoy it.
She pulled her lips away suddenly.
“Oh, no,” she muttered.
He almost laughed in her face. He got a vision of the great game it was. Replete with ohs and ahs and refusals and eventual grants. Strange how obvious and blatant and unromantic it seemed then. All that remained was the vicious demanding lust in him.
To him there seemed no question about it. And he was sure she felt the same way. They were going to have each other. They might talk of something else. They might laugh and joke and pretend it was something else. She might look desperate and say, “Oh, no.” But every path of activity led to the same highway. And that highway led straight and true to the bedroom. To flesh. To love? That was doubtful. Lynn didn’t have to tell him that.
They lay there a long time making love. Every once in a while she’d get too excited and pull away and turn a little away, breathing torturously and staring at the ceiling with a bleak expression of self-disgust on her face. Then she’d come back, she kept coming back. Like a machine he pulled her on, all elements in his fingers, pulled and woven together.
Then Lynn staggered out. He can’t stand it, Erick thought as soon as he heard the door open.
“By God, I’m drunk,” Lynn said.
He blinked at them.
“I sat in there reading,” he said, “I couldn’t seem to focus my eyes. I kept reading and drinking and reading. The book started to fade. I couldn’t see what I was reading anymore. I thought the lamp was burning down. I thought my eyes were going bad. Then I knew—I was drunk and it was too late for reading.”
Leo was laughing quietly as Lynn stood there wavering, then leaned against the far wall. Erick looked at him coldly.
Suddenly Lynn slipped down slowly and sat on the rug.
“My good God,” he muttered in a hollow voice.
“Good book, Lynn?” Erick asked in deceptive tones.
“I don’t remember,” Lynn said as if he didn’t notice, “All I remember is the room getting darker and darker. And I thought that maybe my eyes …”
“Were going bad,” Erick finished.
“Were going bad,” echoed Lynn. He stared dizzily at the rug. Then he said abruptly, seeming to gather intent.
“It’s a secret. Marie isn’t ill. That was just a deception. She’s really out with another man. Probably in the reclining position with him by now.”
“Who broke the date Lynn?” Erick asked, “Marie? Or you?”
That brought Lynn around a little. He snapped up his head and looked at Erick, then at Leo.
“Don’t you listen to me and don’t you believe anything I say,” he said, “I’m drunk. I’m a monkey. Where is my cap and my cup? Here is my simian appurtenance thereunto.”
“Unquote,” said Erick, “By Erick Linstrom.”
Lynn’s mouth twitched.
Then he looked around brightly. “Well, here we are,” he said, “Why don’t you spend the night here?” he said to Leo. Erick’s teeth clenched together.
“Why, Lynn,” Leo said.
Oh, you can do better than that, Erick’s mind teed off viciously.
“I mean with the big Swede there,” Lynn amended. He threw out his arms in a gesture of artificial gratuitousness. “As my guest,” he said.
“Couch isn’t big enough,” Leo joked, cutely, and Erick found his mind racing ahead through all impending conversation. His heart started to beat violently at the thought of how close he was to going to bed with her. He didn’t know whether to sit there quietly or join the ruse or get up and kick in Lynn’s face.
“I mean in the bedroom,” Lynn said, “I’ll sleep on the couch.” He was getting a little obvious now, Erick thought.
“I don’t think so, Lynn,” she said.
Lynn lurched to his feet and started for the bathroom. “Think I’ll bladder out,” he said with calculated coarseness. The door slammed behind him.
“Why don’t you stay?” Erick asked, feeling the words come out by themselves, beginning to feel a sense of being trapped without a struggle.
She looked
at him with an expression he took for pain. She ran a rubbing hand over his chest.
“Oh God, I want to, Erick,” she said heavily.
“Then do,” he said casually, suddenly imagining that Lynn was on his knees at the bathroom door listening. He almost wanted to get up and check.
“I can’t,” he heard her say, “I can’t get involved again.”
“Involved?”
“It’s a long sad story,” she said, “You wouldn’t be interested.”
“Maybe I would.” He didn’t care about anything. He wanted to go back to his room and go to sleep.
“No,” she said.
Lynn came back and fell down into the armchair. “Why don’t you stay over tonight?” he said to Leo as if were the first time he’d suggested it.
She shook her head.
“I’m a discreet madame,” Lynn said.
“Shut up Lynn,” Erick said, “You’re drunk.”
“I’m drunk, I’m engaged, I’m …”
Lynn flung out a melodramatic arm.
“God!” he cried suddenly, “Stop the world, I’m getting off!”
Leo laughed. “Oh, God, where am I?” she asked Lynn.
“Not I,” he said, then turned to Erick. “Give us your lecture on Man as Animal,” he said.
“I don’t remember it,” Erick said.
“Sure. Come on. Man as Animal.”
“What’s that?” Leo asked.
“Work of art,” Lynn slurred, “If our boy would write stuff like that he’d sell and not live in a hovel all his life.”
“Why don’t you go blow your brains out?” Erick asked.
“Man as Animal,” Lynn persisted. He applauded and grinned. I’d like to squash you, Erick thought. Like a bug, a big fat bug.
He leaned back and closed his eyes. And saw himself the first time he’d read it to Lynn and a few other fellows at the Golden Campus at college while, out on the floor, Sally danced with another man.
“The title of my speech is Man as Animal,” he had said, “This is not so incredible as I will, at minor length, prove to your skeptical minds. So list.”
He was back there. He didn’t care about the present. The only thing he knew about the present was that he was talking again, repeating his paper.