Braided Lives (20 page)

“You have to know how to flirt, Jill. Didn’t you learn anything from me?”

“I believe in being honest with men,” I snap, roused finally. She always gets through in the end and I start to talk. “I’m not going to pretend I’m somebody else with him. I think if you’re straight with men, they’ll be straight with you.”

“You poor idiot. Stick with that line and you’ll end up raped and dead in a ditch with your throat slit.”

The doorbell sounds with its three chimes, the middle one cracked, ding thunk dong. I run for the door.

“Now you hurry.” She nudges past me in the turn, patting her hair. Dad is already shaking Mike’s hand, both looking grim as captains going down with the ship, when Mother bounces up rosy with curiosity. “This must be Michael! Jill’s talked so much about you.”

“How do you do?” Mike could not look stiffer if he were nailed to the wall. His face frozen with blind formality, he stares straight ahead, sitting in a chair by the television. He is closed against this house, judging it. I ache for the wheel-shaped antimacassars on the bony arms of the sagging couch, for the gilt peacocks strutting on the high sills, the gaudy china chaos of the knickknack shelves, the souvenirs of the Blue Hole and Wisconsin Dells. He does not know how to read the meaning of this sacred battleground, this stuffed palace. Bedecked with flounces and gadgets, this house floats like a bubble on my parents’ pride. Never have they seemed as vulnerable, Mother forward on the couch, Dad well back behind a cloud of smoke, wondering why I could not remain ten and at least pretend to be a boy. Dad clears his throat. “What are you studying in school?” His voice implies that any answer carries shame.

“Literature, sir. I’m an English major.”

Mother pouts. “Your mother, what does she do?”

“She’s a social worker.”

My protectiveness flops over as I read the strain incised around his mouth and eyes. “We’ll be late for the show.” I grab my coat, colliding with Mike as he jumps nervously to help.

“Jill!” Mother clucks her tongue. “Now, Michael, I know we don’t have to tell you not to keep Jillie out too late. I’m sure you’re a nice boy and you understand we’ll be worrying. You won’t drive too fast.”

I can feel us turning into cartoon teenagers under her bright glance. Finally we are out, with Mike trotting me to his mother’s aging Dodge. “Oh, isn’t it good to be out of there?” He does not answer. “What have you been doing?” Still no answer. He must be angry because my parents asked too many questions. He drives as if shaking off a pursuer, turning down random side streets in erratic but widening circles north and west, past my high school, up Wyoming, over Plymouth to Schaefer. Nervousness sits like a third person between us. This is not our good silence. I can think of nothing to say that might unfreeze his face. He does not love me. His family has stolen him back.

He says finally, “Say something!”

“What do you want me to say?”

“You don’t know? Think.” He jabs his butt at the ashtray and a shower of red sparks streams down. “We’re lost.”

“We’re near Fenkell.” Actually it is not possible to get lost in this whole quadrant of Detroit. Everything is laid out in a grid, the numbers going up hugely but rationally. The main drags are lined with shops and factories and the streets between are set with little or bigger houses.

He drives more slowly, slumped forward. He looks straight ahead and I press against the window. “What have I done?” I ask.

“Maybe that’s it—the whole business of expectation and reality. Imagination
wilts
into fact….”

A train crosses before us, lights flashing and bells clanging on the grade crossing. A ball of cold slick quicksilver forms in my stomach. It is over. He does not want me.

“Suppose we dare suicide now, before we’ve tested the reality? Who knows how disappointed we’ll be.”

The train clatters past, empty cars. As the gates rise and we bump over the crossing, the street darkens ahead, small factories and warehouses with blank dismal facades. All I understand is that he does not want me.

“Answer me! Are you here? Are you bored?”

“I’m miserable. What do you want? I’m here, I’m willing. Why are you punishing me?” I lean my cheek on the glass. Vista of an empty parking lot.

“Why don’t you say it? Or don’t you?”

“Say what?”

“What would I want? Except that you love me. If you do.”

I stare at him in his hostile slouch over the wheel. “Of course I love you. What else am I doing here?”

Beside the loading ramp of a dark building he parks. “Why didn’t you say it?”

“When? You never gave me a chance.”

“You climb in the car and sit as far away as you can—”

“But you … Let’s begin again. Good evening, Mike.”

“God, I’ve missed you these three days. From the time I get up in the morning, and it’s not your voice waking me over the telephone …”

Dark, but for the faint bluish streetlight, the glow of the watch he takes off and stows on the dash. A metallic silence around the drumming of his fingers on the wheel. He reaches over to touch my shoulder, and shyly we kiss. Slow undersea caresses as we act out our lack of haste. My breath feels heavy. He kisses my throat, his silky hair against my lips. Under his hands the pulse thickens in my breasts. The buttons of his shirt are small and meek to my fingers, self-effacing. Underneath he is nude, with ticklish brass hairs. “Why do you have a hollow in the center of your chest?”

“Why …” he teases. “Why don’t you?”

To free each of us is different. He pushes my dress up, we pull his trousers down, unpeeling like the skin from an orange. His underwear is surprisingly familiar, for it’s like what Mother buys on sale for me, cotton, white, childish. I tug clumsily and he springs free. Almost comical: Francis gave me a jack-in-the-box once. You slid the top off and a hammer sprang up and tapped your fingers.

Gently he strokes my belly. “You’re made of moon.”

I do not know what to do with my panties hanging at my ankles, for he is drawing me down and they hobble me. I scrunch them in a ball and put them in my purse. Gravely he fixes himself in position, the bones of his spare hips pinning me. I can feel his penis pushed tight against me, but somehow it will not go in. He bumps and butts against me, till the excitement dies and I begin to hurt.

“Is that hurting you?”

“A little.”

“Look, am I in the right spot?”

I am scared that he is forcing the wrong opening. “I don’t know. Can’t you tell?”

“Maybe you should guide me in.”

“But, Mike, I don’t know how!”

“What did you do with all those little chippies?”

I cannot explain that I know perfectly well where my clitoris is, although I never had a name for it till recently; but none of our pleasures involved penetration and I have never poked anything into me. I have never yet used a tampon, for my mother would not have them in the house and the rudimentary diagrams in the manuals for teenagers do not seem to correlate with my body. How can he speak so harshly to me? “You’re the one supposed to know how.”

He groans, “I can’t believe it. Okay, brace yourself.” He tries a quick lunge and bangs his back against the wheel. The horn toots. I can’t hold back an outcry as he knocks against me bruisingly.

“Merde!”
He sits up, rubbing his back. “The damn wheel’s sticking in my spine. Let’s get in back.”

Holding his trousers, he opens the door and I stumble after him into the back, there to begin all over again from the first kiss, as if rehearsing. But it does hurt. It hurts like hot hell, and still he pounds away and still my flesh denies him entrance.

“Oh, I do want to. I don’t know what’s wrong, Mike. Maybe I’m misshapen.” Then trying to joke because tears are dripping down my cheeks, and my flesh stings and shrinks from him, “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

He wilts between my thighs. “If you wanted an expert, you should have picked one.”

“What’s happened?”

He draws back with a deflating sigh. “I’ve lost it.” We lean together, my head on his shoulder, hot and weary with vexation. He strokes my hair. I reach for my cigarettes and light one that we pass back and forth.

“Mike, am I different from other women physically?”

“How do I know?”

“Haven’t you—”

“I’ve had just as much experience as you’ve had.” He turns his head away.

“Please, look at me. I’m glad. Because we’re even, then.”

“You’re trying to make the best of it.”

“You should be glad too, dear. If you had a past, I’d drive you crazy with questions.”

He hugs me. “Still, like all new objects you should come with a set of instructions.” Drawing me closer, “The old man’s raised his bruised and bloody head again, but let’s try another position. Sit on me. Then you can exert as much pressure as you can take, and when it hurts too much, you can stop and rest.”

At least this way we can smile at each other. I dig my knees into the upholstery and brace myself. He slips down and we fumble him back. The sweat breaks out in the small of my back. “Damn it. Damn it. Damn it. Do you suppose I have a cast-iron hymen?”

Braced too, he strains against me. “Close to it. I don’t think I’ll be able to piss for a week.”

Even the laughter hurts and with pain ragged and hot I can feel myself tearing, while the blood spreads wet along my thigh.

“Ah, dearest,” he says, “don’t bite clean through my neck. My head will fall off.”

“Sorry … Mike, I can’t, I’m no good. I can’t!”

“Hey, are you bleeding? We must have done it!”

“Either that, or we drilled a hole.” Then because I feel ripped and sore and the hot drip of blood scares me, “Mike, I’m sorry. I’ve got to draw back.”

“I’m half limp anyhow. And to think taking maidenheads has been the great sport of the Western world. Makes you wonder what some people call fun.”

I slide off his lap, seating myself gingerly. “Oy, it hurts to sit. Do you have a handkerchief?”

“Look! We’ve gone clear through the seat.”

We stare at the dark stain. “What can we do? At least I’m wearing black.”

“I think there’s cleaning fluid in the garage. I’ll try to get it out tonight so she won’t see it.”

“Suppose you can’t?”

He shrugs. “Tough. It’ll stay there, then.”

We dab at the stain, but it only sinks into the upholstery. “There I am all over your mother’s backseat.”

“Well, at least we got through, old friend.” He grips my shoulder. “You’re a good soldier. Want to call it quits for tonight? I’m for a hot pastrami sandwich.”

“I think I’ve had it, if you don’t mind.” I follow him around to the front seat, and we put ourselves together. “What time is it?”

“Only eleven.” He smiles crookedly. “We’ll get you back by twelve thirty. That’s within the rules, isn’t it?”

Howie zips up his jacket as we walk under the cobblestone arch. His parents go to bed early and for the last half hour his mother has been yawning around fiddling with window shades. But now that we’re outside I can no longer put off telling him. I cannot walk beside him under false pretenses. “Howie, I don’t know how you’ll feel—we’ve never talked about it. I hope you won’t be shocked. I’m not a virgin any longer.”

He slows down, his chin doubled against his throat. “You …” I can feel him searching for the right phrase. “… had sex with him? That Mike Loesser?”

“Well, does that bother you?” A tough disinterested voice I’m trying to squeeze from my throat.

“Theoretically I have no objections. The double standard sucks.”

“Theoretically?”

He kicks a pebble tracked out from the drive. “He sounds sold on himself. Like that guy Beck at Great Books you used to have a crush on.”

“I never did! Besides you haven’t met Mike.”

“Well, you talk about him all the time.” He nudges his pebble from a lawn back to the sidewalk to kick it again. “Be
careful,
anyhow.” He turns and with his fist hits me in the upper arm.

Startled I rub my arm and stare at him. He breaks from me, running to leap and smack his hand against the suspended bus-stop sign. Then he swings around the pole and comes jogging back to boom at me, “‘If I were tickled by the rub of love …’ who knows how I’d act? Maybe it’s good. Anyhow, I got Dylan Thomas, like you said. First he seemed weird. But Sandy had a record of him reading and it turned my head around—”

“Sandy?”

“This cat I know. He’s twenty, he goes to Harlem all the time to hear jazz. He blows saxophone. Anyhow, once I heard Thomas perform, I began to dig the stuff.”

That argot annoys me, fake from him. He grew up in a Black neighborhood and now’s he’s going to Harlem as a tourist and imitating the speech of Black musicians. “Thomas is fine at his best, in six or seven poems,” I announce in my crispest CBC accent. “But Eliot’s really major. This is the age of Eliot, and you can’t understand it without him.” I lean against the pole. “Thomas is awfully uneven.”

“Since when are you crazy for what’s fashionable?”