“Sure,” he said, not thinking her serious. Then, just in case she was: “But you can’t take your Rolodex, you know. Company policy.”
A month later, he was called for a reference on Sylvia and he gave her the good one she deserved, then took her out to lunch to wish her well. She put her hand on his arm.
“So can we now?”
“Can we what?”
“Fuck?”
“Oh.” He still wasn’t comfortable with that word. “Well, no. I mean, as of this moment, you’re still my employee. Technically. So, no.”
“What about next week?”
“Well, my calendar is pretty full-”
“You don’t have anything on Thursday.” Sylvia did know his calendar.
“That’s true.”
“We can go to my apartment. It’s not far.”
“You know, Sylvia, when you’re starting a new job, you really shouldn’t take long lunches. Not at first.”
“So it’s going to be a long lunch.” She all but growled these words at him, confusing Charlie. He was pretty sure that he hadn’t committed himself to anything, yet somehow Sylvia thought he had. He had used the company’s sexual harassment policy as a polite way to rebuff her, and now it turned out she had taken his excuse at face value. The thing was, he did not find Sylvia particularly attractive. She had thick legs, far too thick for the short skirts she favored, and she was a little hairy for his taste. Still, she dressed as if she believed herself a knockout and he did not want to disabuse her of this notion.
(And did Charlie, who was fifty-six, with thinning hair and a protruding stomach, ever wonder what Sylvia saw in him? No.)
“I’m not sure how I could get away,” he said at last.
“I’ve already thought that out. If you told people you were playing golf, you could get away Thursdays at lunch. You know how many men at the company play golf. And then we could have Saturdays, too. Long Saturdays, with nothing but fucking.”
He winced. “Sylvia, I really don’t like that word.”
“You’ll like the way I do it.”
He did, actually. Sylvia applied herself to being Charlie’s mistress with the same brisk efficiency she had brought to being his administrative assistant, far more interested in his needs than her own. He made a few rules, mostly about discretion-no e-mails, as few calls as possible, nothing in public, ever-but otherwise he let Sylvia call the shots, which she did with a lot of enthusiasm. Before he knew it, two years had gone by, and he was putting his golf clubs in his car twice a week (except when it rained, which wasn’t often, not in this desert climate) and he thought everyone was happy. In fact, Marla even took to bragging a bit that Charlie seemed more easygoing and relaxed since he had started golfing, but he wasn’t obsessive about it like most men. So Marla was happy and Charlie was happy and Sylvia-well, Sylvia was not happy, as it turned out.
“When are you going to marry me?” she asked abruptly one day, right in the middle of something that Charlie particularly liked, which distressed him, as it dimmed the pleasure, having it interrupted, and this question was an especially jarring interruption, being wholly unanticipated.
“What?”
“I’m in love with you, Charlie. I’m tired of sneaking around like this.”
“We don’t sneak around anywhere.”
“Exactly. For two years, you’ve been coming over here, having your fun, but what’s in it for me? We never go anywhere outside this apartment, I don’t even get to go to lunch with you, or celebrate my birthday. I want to marry you, Charlie.”
“You do?”
“I looooooooooooove you.” Sylvia, who clearly was not going to finish tending to him, threw herself across her side of the bed and began to cry.
“You do?” Charlie rather liked their current arrangement, and given that Sylvia had more or less engineered it, he had assumed it was as she wanted it.
“Of course. I want you to leave Marla and marry me.”
“But I don’t-” He had started to say he didn’t want to leave Marla and marry Sylvia, but he realized this was probably not tactful. “I just don’t know how to tell Marla. It will break her heart. We’ve been together thirty-eight years.”
“I’ve given it some thought.” Her tears had dried with suspicious speed. “You have to choose. For the next month, I’m not going to see you at all. In fact, I’m not going to see you again until you tell Marla what we have.”
“Okay.” Charlie laid back and waited for Sylvia to continue.
“Starting now, Charlie.”
“Now? I mean, I’m already here. Why not Saturday?”
“Now.”
Two days later, as Charlie was puttering around the house, wondering what to do with himself, Marla asked: “Aren’t you going to play golf?”
“What?” Then he remembered. “Oh, yeah. I guess so.” He put on his golf gear, gathered up his clubs, and headed out. But to where? How should he kill the next five hours? He started to go to the movies, but he passed the club on his way out to the multiplex and thought that it looked almost fun. He pulled in and inquired about getting a lesson. It was harder than it looked, but not impossible, and the pro said the advantage of being a beginner was that he had no bad habits.
“You’re awfully tan,” Marla said, two weeks later.
“Am I?” He looked at his arms, which were reddish-brown, while his upper arms were still ghostly white. “You know, I changed suntan lotion. I was using a really high SPF, it kept out all the rays.”
“When I paid the credit card bill, I noticed you were spending a lot more money at the country club. Are you sneaking in extra games?”
“I’m playing faster,” he said, “so I have time to have drinks at the bar, or even a meal. In fact, I might start going out on Sundays, too. Would you mind?”
“Oh, I’ve been a golf widow all this time,” Marla said. “What’s another day? As long”-she smiled playfully-“as long as it’s really golf and not another woman.”
Charlie was stung by Marla’s joke. He had always been a faithful husband. That is, he had been a faithful husband for thirty-six years, and then there had been an interruption, one of relatively short duration given the length of their marriage, and now he was faithful again, so it seemed unfair for Marla to tease him this way.
“Well, if you want to come along and take a lesson yourself, you’re welcome to. You might enjoy it.”
“But you always said golf was a terribly jealous mistress, that you wouldn’t advise anyone you know taking it up because it gets such a horrible hold on you.”
“Did I? Well, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”
MARLA CAME TO THE CLUB the next day. She had a surprising aptitude for golf and it gave her extra confidence to see that Charlie was not much better than she, despite his two years of experience. She liked the club, too, although she was puzzled that Charlie didn’t seem to know many people. “I kind of keep to myself,” he said.
The month passed quickly, so quickly and pleasantly that he found himself surprised when Sylvia called.
“Well?” she asked.
“Well?” he echoed.
“Did you tell her?”
“Her? Oh, Marla. No. No. I just couldn’t.”
“If you don’t tell her, you’ll never see me again.”
“I guess that’s only fair.”
“What?” Sylvia’s voice, never her best asset, screeched perilously high.
“I accept your conditions. I can’t leave Marla, and therefore I can’t see you.” Really, he thought, when would he have time? He was playing so much golf now, and while Marla seldom came to the club on Thursdays, she accompanied him on Saturdays and Sundays.
“But you love me.”
“Yes, but Marla is the mother of my children.”
“Who are now grown and living in other cities and barely remember to call you except on your birthday.”
“And she’s a fifty-seven-year-old woman. It would be rather mean, just throwing her out in the world at this age, never having worked and all. Plus, a divorce would bankrupt me.”