He told her everything. And nothing. She listened. But more than listened. She was attuned to his moods and his needs, needs he did not admit to anyone else, and her touch was deft and expert. He could also talk to her. Up to a point, of course. Ordinarily, he talked to her in riddles, and somehow she understood. Not the riddles, but the necessity for him to talk in riddles. Morton was fine. She sometimes got on his nerves, but most of the time she was just fine.
Like now, in his car, hushed in the darkness, Morton and her willingness to please and her knowing ways, and Archie relaxed, drifting, giving himself over to the pleasures of her touch.
"Do you like that, Archie?" Morton asked, her tone indicating that she already knew the answer.
Archie murmured indistinctly, no need for words, his reactions to her ministrations easily decipherable.
"You haven't been around for a while," Morton said, breathing the words into his ear, her breath warm.
"Busy," he said, touching her hair, caressing her cheek. He inhaled the subtle cologne she wore, a hint of lilac, but would have preferred a. complete absence of scent.
"How busy?" Morton asked. Keeping busy herself, letting Archie know what came first.
He wondered what he could or should tell her, missing Obie, missing the way he could bounce ideas off Obie, gauging his future actions by Obie's reactions. Obie was the only person who knew how Archie's mind worked, had seen him come up with dozens of assignments, pulling the rabbit out of the hat at the last moment, walking the high wire, taking the risks, and never failing. Meanwhile, he had Morton. She gave him what Obie could never give him and he responded now to her touch. And to her question.
"There's this guy on the campus," Archie said, relieved to be talking about Carter, his thoughts always clearer when he verbalized them. "Football hero. Macho man. Lots of trophies. Tall, dark, and handsome. ."
"Can I meet him?" Morton asked throatily. She was least sexy when she tried to be sexy, and Archie ignored the question, recognizing Morton's automatic response for what it was: automatic.
"This guy has a sense of honor, too. A social conscience," Archie said, thinking of the letter Brother Leon had waved in his face. "Respects his elders, the authorities. Willing to risk a lot to stick by his principles." His voice as dry as wood crackling in the cold.
"Sounds like the last perfect guy left in America," Morton said.
"That's where you're wrong, Morton," Archie said. "Nobody's perfect." Remembering Carter's shaky voice on the telephone.
"Jill," she said. "People call me Jill. Only teachers call me Morton. And then it's Mizz Morton."
"Okay, Jill," he said, giving her name such a, twist of his tongue that she should be glad to be called Morton again. "But back to the point. And the point is nobody's perfect. There's always a flaw. A secret. Something rotten. Everybody has something to cover up. The nice man next door is probably a child molester. The choir singer a rapist. Look at all the unsolved murders. Which means the man standing in line next to you could be a murderer. Nobody's innocent."
She withdrew her hand. "God, Archie, you're really something, know that? You always make a person feel like a piece of shit. . "
"Don't blame me," he said, surprised at her reaction. "Blame human nature. I didn't make the world."
Morton pulled away from Archie and he let her go, immersed in his own thoughts and the pursuit of Carter's personality, probing for weaknesses. Some of Carter's weaknesses were not hidden at all. For instance, the pride he took in his athletic accomplishments, the way he checked the trophy case fifty times a day, the way he strutted around the school, his swinging shoulders and athletic gait an advertisement for his jock image. Honor and pride, the twin facets of Carter's personality, and also the chinks in his armor. The problem, of course, was to exploit those chinks.
He reached out and touched Morton, who was staring into the 'darkness, watching the car headlights splashing and clashing down on the highway. She hated the part of herself that always responded to Archie Costello. She was pretty and popular and intelligent. Had not missed a prom or Saturday-night dance since the seventh grade. Independent and self-possessed. But had this weakness for Archie, this response to his demands, a certain excitement springing to life when she heard his voice on the telephone. So maybe he was right, after all, when he said everybody had a touch of something rotten in their lives. Archie Costello was hers. She would never accompany him to a prom {but then, he had never asked her to one) and yet could not deny the pleasure, however guilty, she kept discovering and rediscovering whenever they were together. She did not let herself go like that with anyone else. And now she responded again as he caressed her.
She yielded. . and for the next few moments Archie Costello and Jill Morton knew only the small sensual world of an ancient Chevy until the quick spurt, the sweet seizure, and an eruption of beauty and fury that left both of them shaken with delight, a moment they abandoned so swiftly that they barely had a memory of its existence a minute later.
They sat awhile in a drifting lassitude, all spent. Archie let himself go in the drift, enjoying these few moments of silence because he knew that eventually Morton would begin to talk. She always began to talk afterward. And lie hid his irritation and impatience, knowing that she had a need for talking that was as strong as her need for something else had been a few moments earlier.
"What's bothering you about this all-American hero?" she asked lazily.
Archie recoiled, drawing away. "Nothing's bothering me," he said.
"Then why all that talk about him?"
Archie realized anew why he always kept himself distant from people. Let them approach a bit and they come too close, take too many liberties.
"Forget it," he said, turning the key in the ignition, the engine leaping to life.
"Hey, don't get mad," she said. "You brought up the subject, not me." She reached for the key and turned off the engine.
Archie did not answer, knew that Morton was right. Carter was bothering him. And he knew why. He needed to take special action against Carter, not some minor assignment that would be temporary or fleeting. Carter was a special case. He would begin by attacking that special honor of his, but must end elsewhere, something longer lasting.
Morton intruded on his thoughts again, Morton and her knowing, expert touch, hands busy, mouth open, tongue like a small, sweet, darting snake. And Archie let himself be drawn into her orbit, forgetting Carter and everything else, giving himself over to Morton, carried on waves of sensuality that he knew would erupt into a deep dark flower of ecstasy that was almost, almost but never, never quite happiness.
He completed dialing the Goober's number on the third try, having missed the first two times, his finger slipping from the rounded slot — a Freudian slip of the finger? he wondered, smiling grimly, but glad that he could make a bit of a joke at a moment like this — and then heard the phone ringing at the other end.
Bracing himself, planting his feet solidly on the floor, he felt as though he were about to face hurricane winds that would sweep him across the room. Crazy. He was merely making a phone call to his old buddy.
Three rings, four, the sound like an invisible strand of rope between this room where he stood and the living room at Goober's house. Where, apparently, no one was present to answer the phone.
Seven. . eight.
Good, he thought, nobody home, I've done my part; some other time. Relieved, about to hang up, he heard someone say "Hello." Out of breath, exhaling the word. And again: "Hello."
Jerry gulped Where do I begin?
"Hello?" The voice again, still out of breath, a question mark at the end of the word and a hint now of annoyance.