Come Pour the Wine (8 page)

“You’re still in love with him, aren’t you, Kit?”

“Yes … I suppose I am … but he’s not in love with me. And it takes two, baby … two.”

“Is that why you see Nat the way you do?”

“Right … he gives me what Bill never could. Or would. And let me tell you, honey, it’s nice to be
loved …
nice. And the thing is, Nat loves me a whole lot. Now what else do you want to know about just plain Bill McNeil?”

“Nothing.”

“You don’t lie very convincingly, Janet.”

“Well, I was just—”

“You just fell for him. Why not say it?”

Was she so transparent? Of course she was …

“Well,
say
it, for God’s sake.”

She ran her tongue around her dry lips. “Well, now that I know how you feel, it changes things.”

“How so?”

“Well you just told me you loved Bill and I’m your best friend—”

“Don’t let
that
bother you, dear. I also told you he
doesn’t
love me, and nothing’s going to change that.”

Janet had tears in her eyes. She didn’t know if they were for Kit or herself or both of them.

“What the hell are you crying for? It’s not an Italian opera.”

“Because—”

“Because you fell, hard and heavy. Right?”

“Yes. And you’re not upset?”

“That question is so stupid I’m not even going to answer it.”

“You mean you’re really not upset, Kit?”

“That’s right, I’m
not.
Now let’s hear your saga.”

For a long moment Janet sat looking down at her uneaten salad. Finally she started to tell how she had bumped into Bill at the party, how embarrassed and tongue-tied she had been over spilling champagne on his new suit, then how they had accidentally met downstairs and how apparent Bill’s annoyance had been over the awkward meeting. She repeated every detail and every event from that moment until now and ended with, “Can you imagine anything so stupid as going to the park and actually thinking I might meet him by chance? My God, how crazy can you get?”

“It’s not stupid and it’s not new. Every woman who falls for a man discovers things in herself she didn’t know she possessed … and that happens to be a good word for it too. She gets possessed, does all kinds of crazy things. After which, of course, she regrets them, hates herself for her weakness and proceeds to think of all the ways to attract him, catch him … For whatever consolation it may be for you, I hear tell that some men get it pretty bad too when they take the fall … I just haven’t happened to come across any …”

“But Kit, I’ve never ever felt like this about anyone before. Believe me. I thought I’d die yesterday, I wanted to see him so badly—”

“I know that feeling all too well. Don’t look so surprised, Janet. I might have a tough line and front but down deep is an old marshmallow heart. I can cry when hurt too … Okay, enough philosophy. You say he didn’t look at you, much less ask you out, right? Well, we’ll just take care of that.”

“How?”

“Simple. I’m having a small dinner party for my birthday anyway, so I’ll sit you next to Romeo. The rest, of course, is up to you.”

“Oh, Kit …” She felt guilty for the thoughts she’d had this morning. “Kit, are you sure you want to do this? I can understand inviting Bill to a large party but to an intimate small one, won’t it be … sort of awkward for you?”

“Why, because I laid him once? Darling, let mama clue you in on a few facts of life. When a man doesn’t love a woman he zips up his pants and loses his memory fast. That’s how sensitive and sentimental most of them are. Besides, it happened a long time ago and I doubt Bill even thought about it after he apologized. And I might not be doing you such a big favor, you know. Even if Bill decides to carry you off to his bed, I’m not so sure you’ll thank me for it.”

“Why?”

“Billy is what’s called a one-nighter. A roll in the hay and that’s it. But one thing I’ll say for him, he’s damn particular who he rolls with. He’s very selective that way.”

“You’re really bitter, Kit. Why don’t you say it?”

“Bitter?” She laughed a bit too loudly. “Okay, I’m going to give it to you straight. Mama McNeil had a lot to do with his not wanting to get close or involved with
any
woman. She hasn’t let him breathe since the day he was born.”

“Is she that difficult?”

“Not at all. She’s simply adorable except for one thing. She smothered him rather than mothered him, and even though he’s a big boy of twenty-five she still considers him her baby. So there you are. I wouldn’t fantasize about a big church wedding and all the trimmings. I seriously doubt he’s ever going to take that plunge. Knowing him, I just can’t see that happening.”

Janet sat silent, eyes cast down, beginning to water …

“Oh, God, again? Listen, Janet, and carefully. You’ve got the hots for Bill McNeil. Right? So be prepared for a trip to the moon. Maybe it’s about time. On the other hand this very well might not be what you think …
LOVE
. It might be nothing more than a little girl from Kansas who’s ready for her first step into something called life, and sex is part of it. Since you never tried it, let it be with someone like Bill McNeil. If it goes no further, at least he’s a gentleman. Mama, though, isn’t easy to exorcize. Don’t underestimate her.”

Kit wasted no time. Bill said he wasn’t sure he’d be able to make it, but she didn’t give up easily. Besides, she’d been around Bill’s mother Violet long enough to know which guilt buttons to push.

“You’re one crumb-bum friend,” Kit said. “I’d have thought you of all people would have remembered my birthday. Now, don’t get carried away and send me a Rolls-Royce. Just bring your sweet adorable miserable self—”

“Hey, I’m sorry I forgot. Kit. Congratulations. If you’re having the immediate world I’ll bring a—”

Kit quickly interrupted. “No, this year it’s going to be very small and very private and I’m only inviting close friends, so forget a date. I’m getting sentimental when it comes to sharing the most important day in my life. You want the guest list? Brother Charlie and wife Carol, and—”

“It’s okay, surprise me, see you Saturday.”

For the next five days Janet could think of nothing but meeting Bill again, and by Saturday night her fantasies had become so real that she sat nervously next to him at Kit’s dining table and wondered if her feelings for him were written all over her face, or if he could read her mind. She looked at Kit, who was laughing at a joke Nat had just told. Bill seemed to think it was hilarious, as did Charles and his wife Carol.

Janet forced herself to join in the laughter, though she had hardly heard a word. Her mind was distinctly someplace else. She was remembering that Kit had advised her to come late, wearing the white matte jersey. “Let him eat his heart out, it fits like a second skin …”

Whether he was eating his heart out or not, she had no idea. When Kit made the introductions he’d merely said, “We’ve met.”

She had turned to jello on the spot, relieved that he remembered her but worried that it might only be with annoyance.

Now, sitting next to him, she was uncomfortably aware of the effect of him, not only in her stomach but between her thighs … She wanted to be so exciting, exotic, a brilliant conversationalist. But on the few occasions that he spoke to her, she sat there with a fixed smile, with such snappy ripostes as … “New York? Just wonderful …” In fact, the answer to almost every inquiry he made was “wonderful, just wonderful.” She knew what he must have thought of her conversation … pure boring.

When the cake … thank God … was finally brought in, Kit blew out the candles and Nat took up his glass of champagne in a toast. “To Kit, long live the queen.”

They all raised their glasses and joined in the toast.

Then came the final disaster of the evening for Janet. As she was putting her glass down, it became detached from her hand—and landed in the middle of Bill’s lap. Jolted by the cold and wet, he stood up immediately and grabbed a napkin.

Janet merely wanted to die. Clearly God had decreed the end of this affair with Mr. Bill McNeil before it even began … “I’m so sorry, I’m really so, so—”

“It’s
okay …
” But his tone implied otherwise. His pants were soaked and when he went to Kit to kiss her and say “Happy Birthday,” he added that he hadn’t been in wet pants since he was three and thought maybe he should be excused to go home and change his diapers. Janet was destroyed….

Charles and Carol had taken her home. It wasn’t until five in the morning, as she lay in the dark staring up at the ceiling, that she gave way to the tears, telling herself, over and over, that she had lost him.

Nathan Weiss had been born into a wealthy family that had run a well-respected brokerage firm for over two generations now. He had cut his eyeteeth on stocks and bonds, and within a year after finishing Harvard Business School—three years younger than his classmates—Nathan Weiss was considered the boy wonder of Wall Street. If he didn’t take this status seriously, he was well aware of the enormous responsibility of handling and investing millions of dollars for other people. That had been drummed into his head from day one by his father. So, much as he adored Kit, he always left her by four o’clock on Sunday afternoons to go to his club’s steam room and have a massage to revitalize himself. He didn’t enjoy having to leave, but he needed to be in top shape for Monday morning when the market opened.

In the beginning of their romance Kit was exasperated with him. “You’re a coward—a 6-foot, 170-pound weakling.” He would nibble on her ear lobe, smile, kiss her and leave. She would lie back and smile like a Cheshire cat. Nat left her feeling more fulfilled than if she’d slept with a half dozen men. Who needed them? It was the quality that kept her happy. Foolish smart-ass she might be, Kit told herself, but she at least knew a good thing, so to speak, when she saw it …

When he left the day after her birthday party, she lay in bed thinking that if she wasn’t careful she just might let down her guard one day and find she had fallen in love all over again. No, not this girl, not Kit Barstow. Falling in love was too painful. She’d tried it once, hadn’t she? Once was enough and she liked things just the way they were. Keep it light. Look at poor Janet. She’d almost died last night when that sonofabitch split without saying goodnight to her. Mama McNeil certainly hadn’t taught her Billy how to be gracious. And military school and M.I.T. hadn’t taught him anything more than how to be an uptight engineer. Big deal, so Janet accidentally spilled the wine. So what if the front of his pants were wet. The truth was that Bill was a spoiled, egocentric child at times. Also a louse. And poor Janet. She might have become a hugely successful model in the big tough city, but somehow she’d never acquired the thick skin that went along with it. Janet was just too vulnerable …

She picked up the phone and called her. “Hi, cookie, what’re you doing?” As though she didn’t know … drowning in her tears. Well, Kit knew what tears felt like too, though the world rarely was allowed in on it.

A long silence. “Nothing. Just … just sort of taking it easy …”

“Okay, so you’ve had enough of that … now, where would you like to go for dinner?”

“Kit, I’m really not hungry, but thanks all the same—”

“Listen, Madame Butterfly, dry your wings and get your little ass out of bed—”

“Thanks for being such a good friend, Kit, but I honestly
don’t
think I’m up to it—”

“In that case I’ll pick up some goodies from Chang Lee’s kosher kitchen and bring it on down to your room. We’ll read fortune cookies. Who knows what the future will …”

I already know my future, Janet thought. I ruined it for good last night over a glass of wine … “Kit, please don’t think I’m being ungrateful but I just have to be alone to sort things out. Okay? You do understand?”

Of course she understood. The rats. Men were a flawed species—except for Nat, of course. Whoever invented the word
love
was probably some sadistic character.

“Okay, Janet. I’m against it, but if that’s the way you feel, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Thank you, Kit. I’m sorry if I ruined your party.”

“You
didn’t ruin anything. It was that fool stalking off like someone had stolen his teddy bear.”

“I really can’t blame him. I mean, after all, it was the
second
time I spilled a glass on him, and I feel such a fool.”

“So he should be happy it wasn’t hot coffee, he could have wound up with a scorched pecker. Now get something to eat.”

“I will, and Kit … thanks for everything.”

A
FTER A SLEEPLESS NIGHT,
Janet was too exhausted to go to work so she called and said her throat was sore and that she was coming down with a cold. From the sound of her voice no one would have suspected it was less than the truth. For two days she stayed at home and brooded, not even answering the phone, although she knew it was probably Kit. What good was all the so-called glamor of her career if she was so inept that she had driven Bill away before she’d even had a chance to get to know him? She was out of her element in this city, just another pretty face that should have stayed put in Kansas. The loneliness and depression she had felt when she first came to New York plunged in on her with even greater impact now, and by Wednesday she didn’t even get out of bed. There were no more romantic fantasies about Bill. Just a sense of loss …

At five o’clock on Wednesday there was a knock on her door. It was Kit, and she entered the room with all the fury of Madame Defarge.

Janet slipped weakly back into bed while Kit stood facing her.
“What
do you think you’re doing and
why
didn’t you answer the phone? Now you listen to me and listen carefully. For the first time in your life you didn’t get to be pom-pom girl of the year. So you lost the contest. Grow up, Janet, throw away your shovel and pail. Bill McNeil’s not worth having a nervous breakdown over. Neither is any other mother’s son, for that matter.” With that, Kit threw back the bedcovers and continued, “Now you get out of that bed. You look terrible and a few more days of this nonsense will make you look like the girl who came out of Shangri-la to find out that she was ninety. Out, and now.”