In the room they got undressed and ready for bed and it was very funny to her. They undressed and they were not unaware of each other or embarrassed by each other. They were two human beings undressing and getting ready for bed and it was an extremely natural thing.
She turned out the light and they got into the little bed. It was a small bed and they were very close together and each was very conscious of the presence of the other. At first she lay down with her back toward him, but then she rolled over and let him take her in his arms. He kissed her and he did it very awkwardly because he did not know anything about kissing. It was the one thing she had not shown him that night, and he did it badly as a result, but she didn’t mind because she thought it was cute the way his nose pressed against hers and the way his hands on her back moved shakily and nervously.
Then she showed him how to kiss, how to make his mouth behave the way his mind wanted it to behave, and they lay very still holding each other and kissing each other, lips gentle and tongues explorative. His hands examined her body with a combination of wonder and admiration and he murmured “Honey, Honey, Honey!” into her chestnut hair.
She told him her name was really Honour Mercy, and after that he never called her Honey again but always called her Honour Mercy. He always used both names, but when he said it it never sounded funny the way it did when Terri said it.
They did not make love that night. That is, they did not take possession of one another. In a larger sense they made love much more certainly than two strangers who copulated. They held each other close all night through, and while both of them were far too tired for intercourse, then simple presence together was a full and satisfying act of love.
She had been the first woman for him and she was glad, glad that it had been she who taught him how to love. Other women are generally grateful for a man’s experience rather than for the lack of it, but for her it was the other way around. She had already decided that experience wasn’t particularly important, that one man was quite like another in bed, that the ones who had done the most and bragged the loudest were usually the most disappointing. Men seemed to think that their prowess hinged upon the length of time they could sustain intercourse, and the variations with which they were acquainted.
Other things were more important: the joy Richie took in her body and in his own, the happiness she was able to bring him, the shy smile on his young face and the mistiness in the corners of his eyes, the way he held her hand. Another man, while he knew seventeen variations on the old theme and could sustain the act almost indefinitely, never could make her feel the way Richie did.
And so she was glad she had been the first for him. In another way he was the first for her.
He was the first man she ever slept with.
When she went to work the next day at noon, he took her work for granted just as she took it for granted that he would be there when she returned. The two of them moved into another room on the same floor of the Casterbridge Hotel, a larger room with a double bed, and that night he unpacked his suitcase and hung his Air Force uniform on a hanger in the closet.
They never talked about her work. It was her job, a well-paying job and a job she enjoyed, and in his mind as well as hers it was completely divorced from their life together. He accepted it so completely that it was unnecessary to talk about it. In turn she accepted the fact that he had to stay in the hotel room as much of the time as possible, that he couldn’t get a job or spend much time out of doors because the Air Police might be looking for him. She put in eight hours a day at the house, and during those eight hours he read the paperback novels and detective magazines that she bought for him at the drugstore. She thought now that she would have to remember to get him some more magazines on her way home from work, and reminded herself that she ought to pick up a roll of scotch tape at the same time and put some pictures up to make the room nicer.
She ran her hand over his chest, stroked his stomach, felt him wake up ready for her and wanting her. His eyes never opened but he didn’t have to have his eyes open to reach for her, to hold her and whisper her name and move with her and against her, and love her.
It was over quickly but not too quickly. It was the way it should be, with him still drugged with sleep and her still not fully awake, and when it was over he kept his eyes closed and his heart was beating rapidly and his chest heaving. Then, his eyes still shut, he rolled free of her and lay on his own pillow, face downward this time. Seconds later he was asleep once more.
She looked at him for several minutes, her eyes filled with the love of him and the need for him, her body thoroughly satisfied and her mind happy. She was smiling now without realizing it and the smile remained on her face as she slipped out from under the thin blanket and tiptoed to the bathroom. She showered and stepped out of the shower and dried herself on one of the hotel’s towels, which were too small and not absorbent enough, and reminded herself that she really ought to buy some good towels on sale for 49¢ and it would be worth it to have a towel that really got you dry.
She dressed quickly but carefully. She put on a pair of panties and a bra and a frilly green dress that went well with her hair. The dress was cut low and the bra showed so she slipped out of the dress, shed the bra and put the dress on again. She checked herself in the mirror — her breasts showed a little but not too much and it made her sexy without looking cheap. Madge was very firm on that point. She said that when a man paid ten dollars or more he deserved a girl who looked classy.
When she was fully dressed she looked at the little alarm clock on the night-table. It was 11:45 and she had to hurry. It was time for her to go to work.
If Richie Parsons had one regret it was that he couldn’t sleep fifteen hours a day.
He slept with Honour Mercy. When she came back to the hotel room, at 4:30 in the morning if she was working nights, and at 8:30 in the evening if she was working the early shift, they were together talking and eating and just plain being together until it was time for her to sleep. If she worked the early shift, they went to sleep around three in the morning; when she worked nights, they went to sleep between five and six. When he was asleep it was good because she was in the bed with him, and when they were together it was good simply because it was always good when they were together. But for eight hours every day — and closer to nine hours, what with her leaving a little early and staying at the house a little late — he was alone by himself in the hotel room, alone with some paper-back novels and detective magazines.
Richie never cared too much for reading. The only reason he read the paperback novels and the detective magazines was that there was very little else to do when you were cooped up in a hotel room for eight hours. So he read the novels and magazines and played solitaire. Honour Mercy had brought him a deck of playing cards once, a fancy deck that one of her customers had given her for a joke with a different pornographic illustration on the back of each of the fifty-two cards, and for a time he played solitaire constantly when she was gone. He even made a running game out of it, keeping careful score of how many games he played and how many he won on a scrap of paper, but after a while it became far more monotonous than the paperback novels or the detective magazines. He only knew one game of solitaire and it wasn’t a particularly complex one, so after a week or so he stopped playing.
The pictures on the backs of the cards, which had been a source of interest and amusement for a time, were now too familiar to arouse his attention. The playing cards alone would have driven him insane with desire before he met Honour Mercy, but now that he had a completely satisfactory sexual relationship the pictures were not exciting in the least. He didn’t need pictures any more.