Never Too Late for Love (22 page)

He watched as Rachel smoothed her gray hair and wrapped it
in a kerchief. Her profile was still sharply etched, though flesh had
acccumulated under her chins and her jowls had fallen. As he studied her, she
moved away to the kitchen and began making lunch.

"You want a tuna-fish sandwich?" she called from the
kitchen.

"Again?"

"What about bologna?"

"Not too much mustard," he answered.

He put on his cabana jacket, slipped into his sandals and
went into the kitchen. When she had finished making the sandwiches, he cut them
lengthwise, put them on plates, and filled their glasses with ice cubes. Rachel
poured the soda, and they sat down at the table.

"They say its kosher, but it tastes like goyishe
bologna," Rachel said, through a mouthful of sandwich.

"It's not that bad," he shrugged, chewing slowly
and washing it down with a gulp of soda.

"I'll tell you what was really odd about my
relationship with Judy Farber," Arnold broke in headlong. "She didn't
like sex that much either. Can you believe that? I would meet her every
morning--nearly every day but Sunday--and two out of three times, she
complained of cramps, or headaches, or feminine problems." He laughed, not
looking at Rachel but knowing that her lips were fixed tightly again, the
corners drooping. He wondered if her eyes had misted but dared not look into her
eyes.

"'Maybe it's because I feel so guilty,' she would tell
me. 'Well, how do you think I feel?' I would ask her. Me with a family, a wife,
responsibilities. Actually, I hated being involved with her--emotionally, that
is. You didn't know it, Rachel, and I doubt if you could possibly understand,
but I thought I was going to go crazy. Besides, I was exhausted--holding down
two jobs, getting up early every morning, fighting the subway crowds at night,
and working all day Saturday. Not to mention that I was on my feet all day. I
felt like hell. I looked like hell. To make matters worse, if that was
possible, she wanted me to leave you and marry her. The pressure was
unbearable, especially since I had convinced myself that I was madly in love
with her. I know this is all confusing to you, Rachel. Actually, we came that
close," he said, holding up two fingers sideways, with just an air of
space between them. "That close."

He shook his head and the image of Judy Farber's face rose
clearly to the surface of his mind for the first time in more than thirty-five
years. Actually, he had seen her again a few years after their affair ended;
she was married and had two kids in tow. And she had started to get fat. She
gave him a big hello, with a wet smacking kiss on his cheek, as if he was some
long-lost uncle.

Arnold and Rachel got back into the car and drove to the
pool, finding that someone was occupying their usual place. Disappointed, they
moved to the other end of the pool.

"So, we'll go home earlier" Rachel said,
apathetically.

"Might be a good idea. There's a new movie at the
seven-plex, with Jack Nicholson."

"We'll see," she said, smearing oil on her skin.
He turned his back and she splattered some oil on him. Then she turned her back
and he rubbed some on her. When she sat down, she pulled out her knitting and
began to twirl wool through her fingers. He put a paperback book on his lap, a
mystery novel. He liked mysteries, so much so that one side of his bedroom was
literally piled high with a collection. But today, he kept the book closed on
his lap.

"I vowed, Rachel," he went on. "I swear, I
vowed that never again would I get involved with another woman. My family meant
more to me than anything. You meant more to me. That might be hard to believe
right now, but you did." He listened to the clickety click of knitting
needles. Occasionally, someone they knew would walk by and they would nod the
requisite greeting. They weren't part of any particular group. Neither of them
played cards. And Rachel wasn't much of a joiner. Besides, the yentas were too
gossipy.

"I don't want to be in their pot," Rachel had
said.

Arnold hadn't made any friends. But
then he had never made any friends. Actually, he thought now, the only friends
he had ever had outside of his wife and kids were women.

"Yet I didn't feel like a philanderer. It was as if
your lack of enthusiasm about me, at least sexually, was a kind of permission.
Only a man could understand that. Anyway, I vowed I would never again get
messed up with any women, and I actually didn't for maybe ten years. Not that I
didn't occasionally have a little nosh. There was always something around.
Sometimes I even went with prostitutes. Look, I might as well tell you
everything. Why should I leave anything out? But it used to scare the hell out
of me that I might be picking up a disease. You would have killed me if I
brought home a disease. You can't imagine how I worried. I was always worried
about something. With Judy, I worried I would be making her pregnant. With the
other women, I worried about bringing home a disease. Sometimes I worried that
someone would tell you, and I don't think I could have taken the pressure in
those days. I was very proud that I never once brought you home a problem,
never once gave you cause to doubt my faithfulness as a good husband and a good
father."

He wanted to reach out and touch her arm, but he held back.
She continued to concentrate on her knitting, the needles clicking, her fingers
working swiftly. He knew that she was listening, that she was agitated, by the
extraordinary speed of her work.

"I can't even remember some of the names. Then, when I
went to work for Gimbels, I met this woman, Dolly Schwartz. She worked in toys,
and I met her when I went to buy a toy for Alan. There's poetic justice! I go
to buy a toy for our first grandchild, and I meet Dolly Schwartz. She was
good-looking, big and tall, with a full figure." He checked himself. Was
it necessary to be so graphic, he wondered, remembering how much he had enjoyed
the sight and feel of Dolly Schwartz's tits. They were so big and full, with
huge red nipples, like little statues in a pond. He had buried his head in
them, kissed them, sucked them. God, how could any man on earth ever forget
Dolly Schwartz's tits? And how she loved to have them touched and looked at,
how proud she was of them. He felt a rare surge in his loins. It had been a
long time since he had thought of Dolly Schwartz.

"She was married." he continued. "But her
husband was a traveling salesman and was away a great deal of the time. Her
kids were all grown up and, to make matters more convenient, she lived only a
few blocks from us in Sunnyside. And you were busy with Millie and the new
grandchild. Remember, you were at Millie's house more than you were at home.
All you could talk about, think about, was Alan. Not that I don't love Alan.
But he and Millie were your whole life then. You used to make dinner and leave
it for me under a piece of plastic with a little note, 'Went to Millie's.
Baby-sitting for Millie and Bob.' That's all right. I didn't care. Really I
didn't. Nor am I blaming you. Frankly, I think you were tickled to death to get
rid of me in those days. Remember all those executive meetings I said I was
going to. We never had one. Our executive meetings usually were held before the
store opened. Anyway, you didn't complain. You didn't have to worry about my
dinner and you could spend more time with Millie and Bob and Alan. I really
liked Dolly Schwartz, and she really liked me. We had a good time together. She
was all woman. We even considered giving up our marriages."

"You think I'm terrible, don't you?" he said,
pausing and, for the first time since they had been at the pool, drawing her
eyes toward him. But they were quickly deflected when someone they knew
approached her.

"You still on the sweater?" the woman asked.

"It's a cardigan. It's always harder to make a
cardigan."

"Who is it for?"

"For Arnold," she said, pointing at him.

"That's one thing we got plenty of in this
family," Arnold said. "Sweaters." When the woman left, Rachel
began knitting furiously again. He picked up his paperback mystery, opened it,
then closed it again.

"The thing with Dolly Schwartz actually lasted three
years. It might have gone on longer but Millie and Bob were getting upset with
your being overly possessive. Look, let's face it. That was the real truth. Why
do you think they moved so far out on the Island? Bob told me. It wasn't that
they didn't love you. You know how much they love you. But every night, Rachel?
They had no privacy. Also, Sammy was already in med school, so that was that.
Not that I didn't have those 'executive meetings' maybe once or twice a month,
but, frankly, I didn't like the idea of leaving you alone at night. So I began
coming home nearly every night, and Dolly wasn't too happy about that. So that
was the end of Dolly Schwartz."

The sun sank behind the clubhouse, throwing their end of
the pool into the shade. A few minutes later, they got their things together
and drove back to their apartment. Rachel had defrosted some chopped meat and,
while she took a shower, Arnold made the salad and formed the meat into
patties. He made a good salad, sliding the garlic around the bottom and sides
of the wooden bowl like he had seen the waiters do at expensive restaurants. By
the time he finished the salad and mixed in the dressing, she had come out of
the shower, so he went in for his. There was always just enough hot water for
two showers. When he had dressed, the hamburgers were ready and the table was
set, complete with little glasses of tomato juice on each plate. They always
ate dinner at the dining-room table.

"Too rare?" Rachel asked, as he bit into his
hamburger. He chewed it for a few moments, then held up two fingers in a sign
of approval.

"That new broiler was a good choice," he said.
They ate in silence for a while.

"You like the salad? That's the one thing about Florida. You can get the ingredients for a good salad."

When they finished their main dish, Rachel scooped out two
balls of chocolate ice cream and served it.

"Dolly Schwartz wasn't the last of it," Arnold began again. "But she was the last where there was any danger attached to it.
You know, as far as us breaking up. I don't think I really considered breaking
up our marriage, Rachel. Not in my heart. I mean that. You were you and I was
me. Sex isn't everything, although it seemed pretty important to me at the
time. But people are different, and you can't expect to get everything in one
package. Not that I was such a bargain myself. You used to tell me, 'Arnold, you're not so good in bed yourself.' Maybe you were right. I was no big deal.

After awhile, it became too much of a hassle and, by the
time I was sixty, I finally figured out that it was ridiculous. Oh, there were
one or two little knishes on those retailers conventions, but it wasn't the
same. It wasn't that I felt old. Frankly, I felt that I was really being
unfaithful. We were married nearly forty years and I was just beginning to feel
unfaithful."

They finished the ice cream and did the dishes together. He
washed and she dried. When all the dishes were put away and the apartment was
swept, they drove to the movie theater. He showed the cashier his
senior-citizen's discount card, paid for the tickets, waited in line for some
popcorn, and they got into the theater just before the film rolled. They liked
to sit up front, right in the middle of the big screen, where they could watch
the huge characters parade before them, a hundred times bigger than life. They
always held hands in the movies, but this time he was afraid to touch her. He
had taken his pills before dinner but felt the pains begin as the picture
progressed and he had to take another nitro during the movie. The pain then
went away quickly.

"Did you like it?" he asked as they walked back
to the car.

"Not as good as that other one we saw him in."

"Definitely not as good as that."

"Nothing he has ever done has been as good as
that."

It was very dark now and he drove slowly, knowing that
Rachel got particularly nervous on the road at night. She sat beside him tense
and watchful. Concentrating fully on his driving, he didn't think about what he
had confessed to her until they got back to their apartment. He sat alone in
the living room while she undressed for bed. Had he told her everything? Had he
left something out? He did not feel any special elation in the unburdening,
except that he had, at last, wiped the slate clean, and that was worth the
effort. Maybe he did censor things a bit, he thought. He had come very close to
breaking up his marriage over Judy Farber and Dolly Schwartz, but he could not
remember in any detail the reasons why he had rejected the idea. Surely, he
could not have conveyed to Rachel the intensity of his feelings, the wrenching
crisis of decision, the agonizing. It had all occurred internally, far from her
field of consciousness, as if they had lived on different planets.

He got up and went to the bedroom. She was already in bed
reading the newspaper. It was her habit to save the morning paper to read
before she went to sleep. She had put a single curler in her hair and had
lightly creamed her face. He put on his pajamas, picked up the paperback
mystery that he had with him at the swimming pool and slipped in beside her.

He wondered what might have happened if he had told her
about his escapades at the time they happened. Surely, that would have meant
the end of his marriage. He wanted to ask her but didn't dare right now. It had
never occurred to him that she might have known about these things all along,
but that was another question he thought best to postpone.

For some reason, their marriage had survived it all. That
was the enigma.

He couldn't concentrate on his book, so he closed it and
put it on the night table beside him. There were other unanswered questions, he
thought. Perhaps, she too, had a confession to make. He doubted if it would be
as extensive as his own, nor could he imagine that she could ever have been
unfaithful to him. He would forgive her, he pledged secretly, knowing that she
had forgiven him.