She was standing in the doorway with an odd expression on her face. From inside the apartment I could hear a shower running.
“Well, where’s the hero?” I asked her. “I got him a nice cold bottle of beer.” My voice was a little louder than it had to be; I didn’t know if he was listening.
“He’s cleaning up,” she said. Her voice was a little loud, too. “He said he wouldn’t feel right until he got out of that uniform and into some civilian clothes.”
I went past her into the front room and she closed the door and stood with her back to it, watching me with the same funny look.
“Well, I don’t blame him,” I said. “He looks pretty good, doesn’t he?”
She left the door and came toward me slowly. Her eyes looked dark and big. Everything about her looked drawn up tight.
“He’s lost a little weight, I think,” she said.
“Yeah, I guess he did.”
“He said he couldn’t eat at all on the boat.”
We were watching each other now and the things we said were just noises that didn’t mean anything. She kept coming closer until she could put her hand out and touched my arm.
“Johnny—”
I slapped her hand away. “I’d better fix him a glass of beer,” I said.
She looked at me steadily and the color began to come up in her face. “I guess you’d better.”
I went into the little kitchen and put the bottles on the table. I got an opener out of the drawer and when I turned around she was standing in the doorway.
“I’ll get the glasses,” she said.
I opened one of the bottles and she got glasses from the pantry and put them on the table. I picked up one and filled it slowly.
She was standing close, almost touching me, and her eyes were on mine, wide and shiny.
“Johnny, I can’t do it,” she said, and her voice was a whisper. “I want you, Johnny.”
“For God’s sake, shut up,” I said. I kept my voice down but the way I said it brought another patch of color to her face.
“Don’t talk to me that way, Johnny.”
My hand was shaking and some of the beer slopped over the edge of the glass and ran down over my fingers. It made me cold all over. I put the glass down and looked at her.
We were a few inches apart, staring at each other, our arms at our sides. I could hear my breath and I could hear my heart pumping heavily.
“Johnny,” she whispered. She raised one hand and touched my arm.
My arms went around her and I held her so tight I could hear her straining to breathe. She pressed closer to me and said, “Johnny,” in such a soft voice that I didn’t hear the word, just her breath against my ear.
I don’t know how long we were like that before I shoved her away and picked up another glass. She stood twisting her hands together and looking like she might cry.
“Johnny, it’s got to be you. I can’t stand it with him.”
My hands were shaking so I had to put the glass down. “He’s back,” I said. “We knew he was coming back. We knew how this was going to end. I’m out.”
“No, Johnny—”
“Will you shut up?”
She backed away from me a little and her hands came up slowly until they were touching her breasts. We stood there, not saying anything, just staring at each other, until I heard the shower stop and the bathroom door open.
“Where’s everybody?” I heard him call out.
“Right out here getting that beer ready,” I yelled.
“That sounds good. Where’s Alice?”
I picked up the bottle of beer again and looked at Alice until she turned and went back into the living room.
I filled two more glasses and put them on a tray. When my hands stopped shaking I went into the front room. He was sitting in one of the chairs and he was wearing just a pair of slacks. He was built like a coal heaver. Thick arms and shoulders and there was a mat of red hair on his chest. He put a big grin on his face when he saw the beer.
“This is the life,” he said.
Alice was standing beside him and he reached up and took hold of her wrist. “Sit down on Pappa’s lap and be comfortable,” he said.
“It’s hot, Frank. I’ll sit over on the sofa.”
“No, you won’t.” He laughed. “I’m not going to let you get that far away from me for a long time.”
He caught her around the waist with his other arm and pulled her onto his lap. She struggled a little but he held her arms tight and put his chin into her shoulder and worked it around until she began to squirm and giggle.
“I guess I’ll have to start showing you who’s boss again,” he said. “Maybe you’ve forgotten what it’s like to have a man around the house.”
“Frank, don’t!”
He laughed as she continued to twist around in his arms. He put his hand on her knee and squeezed it lightly.
I saw his expression change then and the color coming up in his face. When he saw me watching he grinned a little, embarrassed.
“I guess we’re forgetting Johnny with the beer,” he said. “But a guy doesn’t come home to his wife every day.” He laughed and took his hand away from her knee a little self-consciously. “I’ll take that beer now.”
I gave him a glass as carefully as I could, but some of it spilled. I couldn’t help it.
“Watch it, boy.” He grinned. “I just had my bath.”
I tried to smile. “A little nervous, I guess.”
“You look kind of pale at that,” he said. “Like you might be getting a little sick. You got to watch yourself in this weather.”
I put the tray down carefully. I felt like I was coming apart inside. Seeing her there, lying back against his bare chest, with his hands touching her familiarly, was what did it.
“I’ve got to be going,” I said.
Alice didn’t say a word. Her lips were parted and the expression on her face didn’t tell me anything.
Frank said, “Well, we haven’t been very polite, I guess, but you know how it is, Johnny.” He grinned and put his hand back on her knee.
“Yeah,” I said. “I know how it is.”
There was a chance there for a crack, a nasty crack that would have hurt her. But he might have tumbled to something. I didn’t feel like hurting her or making cracks.
I waved to them and went out of the door and down the steps as fast as I could.
Chapter II
I spent the next two days in my room. I used up a couple bottles of rye and I must have passed out completely two or three times. None of it helped.
I couldn’t get her out of my mind. I knew things between us weren’t over and never would be.
The night of the second day, I quit drinking. I felt sick and dirty and weak. My room had a stale hot smell and there was the coppery taste of whisky in my mouth. I pushed up on one elbow, switched on the bed lamp and looked around. There were two empty bottles on the floor, my clothes were in a pile and there was sweat on my bare chest.
It was a hot night and the wind coming in the window was suffocating. I was a million miles from anybody, shut away in a dirty hotel room and ready to come apart because of one woman who was gone from me forever.
That was the way I was feeling. I snapped off the light and stretched out again on my back. The darkness and heat came in on me, crowding close until I felt I wouldn’t be able to breathe again.
Thoughts came crowding in on me, too. I tried to push them away, but I was remembering the night I’d met her and it all came back like it happened yesterday instead of three years ago...
I was feeling good that night. I had a little book then, on Sheridan Road, out North, and things were breaking pretty good. I was sitting in a bar out that way when I saw her come in. This was ten o’clock, the middle of the week, and there wasn’t much of a crowd.