First Love and Other Sorrows: Stories (16 page)

Martin looked at her, still angry.

“You oughtn’t to get mad at me so often,” Laura said, and her eyes filled with tears.

“Are you really crying?” he asked suspiciously.

“Oh!” Laura said. “Oh! You’re impossible!” She flung herself on the bed.

Martin drifted nearer to her. “Laura?” he asked delicately. Laura sniffled. “Laura, we have to save our money if you want another child next spring.”

“The money came out of my food budget.”

“But you could have put that money in a savings account. Even if it’s the food budget, it’s still money.”

“It only cost two dollars,” Laura said, sitting up. “Two measly, dirty dollars. And it’s real delft. You know what? You’re only mad at me because you got hot on the train. Well, I’ll tell you something,” she said, beginning to smile in spite of herself. “You’re not slaving your life away for me; I’m slaving my life away for you.” She thought that outrageously funny; she roared with laughter.

Martin stared down at her. “Yeah?” he said. “Women outlive men.” He stalked into the bathroom and turned on both taps in the basin.

Laura rose and trailed after him and leaned against the doorjamb. “We could practice suttee,” she said, “if you wanted.” Then she added slyly, “Your life isn’t so hard. I see you’re putting on weight.”

“God
damn
it!” Martin howled, bent over the washbasin. “Do you have to insult me?” But his back quivered. Laura saw he was on the verge of laughing.

Faith, at the foot of the stairs, called up, “Mommy, why do I have to stay in my sandbox?”

Laura thought for a moment, and said, “I’m coming,” and started down the hallway. Martin flicked his washcloth at her. Laura let out a squeal and ran down the stairs, her husband pursuing her as far as the landing. There he halted, leaned over the banister, and squeezed the last drops in the washcloth over her head.

“Not in front of the child!” Laura said.

“I’m infantile,” Martin said, looking at her in a funny way, confused and tender. “I’m too young to have a wife,” and he turned back up the stairs.

Laura had scooped up her daughter and started toward the kitchen. A horn honked—a little, wizened, foreign horn. “Stu’s here,” she called up to her husband, and hurried into the kitchen to take care of the dinner.

Martin rushed into the bedroom and resumed his search in the bureau for a comfortable shirt. “Ah!” he said, and hauled out of the bottom drawer an old red-and-white faded cotton shirt with slightly ravelled sleeves. He had bought it his second year in college, the year he and Stu became roommates. Stu had been tall, gangling, irretrievably gloomy then, whereas Martin had been cheerful, athletic, and, though he didn’t suspect it, almost deliriously happy. Martin played baseball for the college and basketball for the fraternity; he drank a little too much, because everyone did; every fall, he fell in love—in a way—and if that romance didn’t last through until summer, he fell in love again in the spring. Stu had looked up to him. Stu had daydreams in which he saved Martin from drowning. And he had other daydreams in which Martin drowned and he sent a telegram to Martin’s parents. Now Martin stood in front of the mirror, in a faded sport shirt that was a little tight under the arms.

The self he saw was six feet tall, with broad shoulders and a squarish, amiable face, and twenty-eight years old.

He broke away from the mirror still buttoning his shirt. He had two buttons to go as he burst out of the house onto the front stoop. Stu had turned around in the traffic circle at the end of the deadend street, and was trying to maneuver into a tiny parking place between two cars—this even though there were empty places all along the curb big enough to hold trucks.

Through the opening in the roof of the little foreign car Stu’s hand appeared, making a circle with thumb and forefinger, and there sounded a challenging whistle. Martin watched Stu whip his car backward, forward, throw the wheel back and forth, and make it on the third try. “No oversize American tub could do that,” Stu called out as he closed the panel in the roof.

Martin finished buttoning his shirt and stood with his hands in his pockets, smiling vaguely toward the street, remembering college, hardly conscious that he was doing so.

Two little boys about seven years old wandered up to the car and began to talk to Stu. Stu, trying to ignore them as he climbed out of the car, managed to wedge himself between the steering wheel and the seat. He turned pink. One of the little boys said, “But why do you drive such a little car, Mister?” Martin turned and went into the house; he didn’t want Stu to know he had seen the episode.

A minute later, Stu appeared at the front door, his face still pink with irritation. “Scrofulous bastards,” he muttered, and with Wagnerian rage stamped up the stairs to the bathroom.

Martin ambled out to the kitchen. Laura had set out two cans of beer on the top of the ice box. “Don’t we have any whiskey we can offer our guests?” he asked plaintively.

“We’re saving money.”

Faith sat in a chair at the table, eating spaghetti and cucumbers, her favorite meal. “Tony threw sand in my eyes,” she told her father.

“Again!” Martin exclaimed. He looked so large and concerned, so vague and helpless before the mystery of rearing a daughter, that Laura suddenly arched her back and felt quite passionate. Martin leaned over and kissed her.

“You might try
kissing
me sometime,” Laura said, enraged. “Peck, peck, peck, nothing but pecks. It’s a wonder I stay faithful.”

“You damn well better not talk like that!” Martin cried, his face turning dark.

Laura huddled against his chest. “You’re jealous,” she said. Placatingly, she added, “I’m glad you’re jealous.” Martin’s heart slowed its beating; Laura could hear it through the faded old sport shirt.

“I’m not jealous,” he said. “Is that lamb chops I smell? How wonderful.”

“They’re cheap,” Laura told him. “They’re probably stringy.”

Martin picked up the cans of beer and put them on a tray with two glasses and an opener; he walked into the living room carrying the tray, chanting “Poverty, poverty, poverty.”

Stu was halfway down the stairs. He was carrying his jacket and he had begun to loosen his tie. He looked bitterly at Martin. “If you tease me about my car, I’ll kill you.”

“My God!” Martin exclaimed. “Everyone’s so fierce. What for? What does it get you?”

“I don’t know,” Stu said. “It’s ego, I guess.” He sounded slightly ashamed of himself. He dropped his coat and tie on a chair and then looked questioningly at Martin. He was asking if Laura would mind the coat on the chair. Martin shrugged. Stu shrugged, too, and the two of them sat down. Stu selected a small modern chair with wooden arms. He groaned. “This is the world’s most uncomfortable chair, right here, under me, at this very minute.”

“It was cheap,” Martin informed him. “How’s the job going?”

“I went through hell today,” Stu said. “My boss’s secretary is a bloodsucker. She hates me.”

“I know, I know,” Martin said, feeling almost paternal. “Secretaries are sheer hell. My boss’s girl does a lot of work with the eyes, you know. And she has this fake accent, as if she just escaped from the daisy chain.”

“What daisy chain?” Stu asked.

“The one at Vassar, I think,” Martin said. “Hey, Laura!” he called out. “Where do they have the daisy chain?”

“The daisy chain?” said a voice filled with incredulity. “Oh, the daisy chain. I think it’s Bryn Mawr.”

Stu lowered his voice. “My secretary’s not a bad girl. She’s young,” he said deprecatingly. “She’s nice.”

“Pretty?” Martin asked, unconsciously lowering his voice, too.

“So-so,” Stu said. “She’s built, though. She’s really built.”

Laura appeared in the doorway. “I can’t hear what you’re saying. Please talk a little louder.”

Stu blushed and mumbled something about the hydrogen bomb.

“Yeah,” Martin said. “That was some blast. Did you see the photographs in the papers?” Laura disappeared into the kitchen.

“Sure,” Stu said. “The big boom-boom.”

Martin was slouching so much he was practically recumbent. He supported his glass of beer on his belt. “I guess we’re as good as done for,” he said gloomily. “All those crazy slobs in the Pentagon.”

“I know, I know,” Stu said. “But our National Honor is at stake. We’ll all be half rotten with radiation in a few months. Children with two heads—”

“Hey!” Laura called out. “Either you two talk louder or I’ll come in there and let the lamb chops burn.”

“Talk louder, Daddy,” Faith echoed.

“Let’s change the subject,” Martin whispered.

Stu nodded. “Sure.”

“Tell me,” Martin said, “why don’t you sell that car if it makes you so mad?”

“I can’t sell it,” Stu said. “It was too big a bargain.”

There was a sudden, nearly insane peal of laughter from the kitchen. Martin started to laugh, too.

“What is it?” Stu asked, baffled.

“Never mind,” Martin said. “If we explained it, you wouldn’t think it was funny.”

“You know who I saw in Best’s the other day?” Laura asked from the kitchen. “Mary Lou Glover. From Smith. You remember Mary Lou, don’t you?”

“You know what I wonder?” Stu said. “I wonder where all the shlunks come from. You at least have a family to come home to. I’ll tell you what,” he said, suddenly brightening. “Let’s go talk to your daughter….”

Faith was polishing off a bowl of pudding. She looked up somberly at Stu. “Hello, Stu,” she said.

“Uncle Stu,” her mother corrected her.

Stu cupped one hand to his mouth and the other to his ear.

“Brrring,”
he said.
“Brrring.
Your telephone is ringing.”

“Mommy, Uncle Stu is calling me on the telephone,” Faith said ecstatically.

“Hello,” Stu said. “Are you there?”

“Hello,” said Faith, with rapture. “I’m here.”

They were sitting around the dining-room table. It was eight o’clock, and Faith was getting sleepy. Two lighted candles stood on the table, and their flames swayed in the current of air that came through the open windows. The candlelight made Faith and Laura look exactly alike.

“Gee, that was a good dinner,” Stu said. “I can’t tell you how I enjoy being here. All week I’ve been nervous.”

“The chops were a little tough,” Laura remarked, “but they had a nice taste, I thought.” She clapped her hand to her mouth. “I’m not supposed to say that, am I?”

“Sure you are,” Stu said hurriedly. He thought she really was embarrassed, and his face was concerned. “You’re an awfully good cook.”

Laura smiled. She sighed. “Faith,” she said to her daughter, “you have bags under your eyes. I think we should start getting ready for bed.”

Faith pouted. “I don’t want to.” She was glassy-eyed with the long-drawn-out pleasures of the evening. She leaned forward and put her arms around her mother’s neck. “I don’t want to, Mommy.”

“It’s bedtime,” Laura said.

“It’s all right,” Martin said. “Let her stay up another minute or two. I couldn’t bear it if she started to cry just now.”

There was a sudden silence all around them. The candles flickered. Stu sighed.

“The fireflies will be out soon,” Laura said. “It always seems like summer to me then.”

“You put them in a jar,” Stu murmured. “Faith will chase them and catch them.”

“What in a jar?” Faith asked. One small hand rubbed at her eye.

“I used to collect beetles,” Martin said. “I wonder if the rosebush we put in is going to bloom.”

Faith yawned. The moment seemed to spread out around the four people and pause and hold them all.

“I have to put her in bed. She’ll be overtired in another minute.” Laura straightened up in her chair, placed her hands on the table edge, and blinked her eyes. “I have to let the maternal force build up,” she said. “All right, Pumpkin. Bedtime. Allez-oop.” And she stood up, lifting her daughter at the same time in her arms. Faith attempted to cry out, but she was too sleepy and made a tiny drawling sound instead. Her head spilled forward on her mother’s shoulder. Laura carried her upstairs.

The two men looked at each other, almost shyly. “You know,” Martin said, “I have some Scotch. I’ve been saving it.”

He went out to the kitchen and returned with two glasses, a bowl of ice cubes, and the Scotch. He and Stu moved to the couch and made themselves drinks. After a time, Laura tiptoed down the stairs. She cleared the table without looking at the men, and carried the dishes out and piled them in the sink, not bothering to turn on the kitchen light. She stood by the back window and looked out into the dark back yard. She could almost see the fireflies glowing among the leafy branches. Faith would chase them and cry, “Look, Mommy! Look!” Stu’s voice droned on. In a little while, he would get up and go, because he had to drive back to the city. Laura decided she would kiss Stu goodbye. She was filled with emotion; the emotion had haunted her all day. She peered into the darkness to distract herself. And then she would turn to Martin and say—But as she stood there, she realized there wasn’t anything she wanted to say. She just wanted this day to go on forever and ever, unending, with all its joys intact, and no one changing, nothing new happening, just these same things occurring over and over. Because how did you know happiness would come back? Or if it came back, that it would be as good as this? Laura sighed and wiped her eyes surreptitiously. The trouble with being happy was that it made you frightened.

L
AURA ANDREWS WAS ONE
of those tall, big-bodied young women who look so serene. Because of the way her eyes were set, deep, beneath sensible eyebrows, and because of the calm light in them, it was difficult to think of her as moody or frightened or as anything, as a matter of fact, except warm and wise. She also had a certain comic flair, which made people laugh at her even when she was upset, and when they laughed, she became frantic because she believed no one would ever understand her; and her eyes would narrow, and she would quite determinedly set out to prove just how upset she was. Not on purpose, of course, but driven, you might say, by the thought that no one was taking her suffering seriously.