“No you’re not,” she said, but there was a lot of emotion in the voice, what sounded like relief and pleasure.
“Yes I am,” he answered very softly. “I’m glad you’re happy, though. Are you getting married?”
“We’ve only been dating for two months, Tony,” she answered self-deprecatingly. How amusing this game was— now she was minimizing the seriousness of her commitment, just as he had once played down his marriage with Betty. “Life is a performance,” his mother had said countless times, only moments before entering a party. Standing gloriously in her fluffy white mink, Tony dressed neatly and conservatively in gray flannel pants, a white shirt, a gray cashmere sweater, a red tie, and a cute little blue blazer, his hair a little long the way she liked it, just before ringing another door to enter another show-business party. Squeezing his hand and smiling brilliantly, “Life is a performance,” she’d say, her rich voice making music of the words, the syllables stretching and moaning like a lover in ecstasy. When he was very young the phrase was magic, an incantation that summoned up a mother he loved and admired Her gloomy and scary moods were gone at those parties, she was funny, a little dangerous sometimes, but fast, fast, fast, catching people with their ideas down, showing up the pompous and the self-righteous. Later, in adolescence, he realized the sentence was desperate, a tiring athlete hoping to have one last good game. Indeed, the quick wit had slowed, the years of drinking slurring more than simply the words: the new faces blurred into the old, the politics of the sixties merging oddly with positions of the fifties, attacks and defenses losing their accuracy and cleverness, the fast talk now merely garrulousness. That made her seem more right than ever: life was a performance. People began to have less patience with her acting, and the invitations came less frequently, and then so did the parts. The same loss of muscle tone and quick reactions were happening to him, witness the blunder at lunch with Hilary Bright and this conversation with Lois. And he didn’t have his mother’s valid excuses: the blacklist, a monster for a husband, a career crippled, an addiction to drink. The truth was he didn’t have his parents’ virtues: his father’s ability to command, his mother’s brilliant talent; he only possessed their faults: his father’s arrogance and impatience, his mother’s vanity and weak nerves.
“I love you,” he said.
“Then why the hell did you stop seeing me?”
“I was scared.”
“Of what, for God’s sake? Hurting Betty? How do you know she’d even miss you?” Lois groaned at herself. “Oh God, it’s starting.” She sounded wounded. “I hated this the most about our affair. It turned me into a shit. I don’t even know Betty. She’s probably a wonderful woman. I’ve got somebody else now, Tony. And I’m glad. God! Am I glad!”
“I’m happy for you too.” He swallowed. Something about this defeat was appalling. It was so fucking unexpected. Lois was an option for him, not a human being capable of hurting him. “I’m sorry I called,” he said.
“You haven’t left her, have you?” she asked, blurting it out, scared and excited.
For the first time he felt better. She still wanted him. She had given up, gotten involved to reassure herself, probably by now almost convinced the new relationship was more than mere compensation.
“I guess you haven’t,” she said after a pause.
“I don’t love her,” he said. His stomach contracted on the words, like a poison hitting his system, shriveling his strength and well-being. “I know that now. I love you.”
“Well—” she began, and there was a choking noise. “It’s too late,” she let out, and now there were tears. “Too late,” she mumbled through them, and hung up.
Betty looked energetic and concentrated as she flipped through the rack of dresses. She stopped at one, frowned, pulled it out partially, and angled it so Patty could see.
“Are we getting that old?” Patty asked.
Betty smiled and let it go. “There’s nothing here.”
They walked outside into a glittering day. After the dark, cool interior of the store, the sun was blinding. Betty turned from it suddenly and stumbled into Patty. “Whoa,” Patty said, holding her up.
Betty looked at her and smiled. “Can you imagine spending your life doing this?”
“Who does?”
“Our mothers.”
“They didn’t shop their whole lives.”
“No?”
“They changed diapers, remember?”
Betty laughed. “No, somehow I don’t think my mother did.” They walked on. Patty wanted to confess to her: get rid of this damn secret, talk it out, find an exit from the ridiculous mess she was in. Betty seemed happy these days, carefree. Patty was glad. She had grown much fonder of Betty, despite her wariness of the business situation they now faced.
“Things are going well with Tony,” Patty said.
“Oh?” Betty said, surprised. She glanced at Patty. “I’m glad to hear it.”
“Aren’t they?” Patty asked. She was used to Betty’s moods shifting with the ups and downs of Tony’s life.
“Not for him. I feel good. I’m happy to be publishing your book. I got a good novel last week from Paul Yarmouth—”
“He’s a good agent.”
“—yeah, I think you should talk to him about representing you. Anyway, it’s a terrific, not very commercial novel by a journalist in Seattle, a reporter. Autobiographical novel about his sister’s nervous breakdown and his attempt to help her through it. Really moving book. I think I can get a contract for it.”
“Great.” Patty studied her. “That’s why we’re so happy.”
“That’s right, nurse. I’ve decided Tony’s life is his problem. I can’t give him what he wants.”
“What does he want? What do any of them want?”
“He wants to be famous. Sometimes I think he wants to be famous without having to do anything.” She brought a hand to her mouth, actually covering it for a moment. “I shouldn’t say that.” She checked with Patty. “That’s a horrible thing to say, isn’t it?”
“Not if it’s true.” This was her friend, she realized. This was the person who had done something for her only because she cared to help. Betty was cowardly, she was too prim, she was often abstracted, but she had given Patty advice, support, and a contract without even asking for a kiss, much less a blow-job. “Let’s get a cup of coffee.”
“Oh, no. I’ve gotta keep going. This is the last day I can shop for two weeks. And everything will be gone by then.”
“I have to talk to you about something.”
“No …” Betty said, looking at Patty with dread. “You’re not having an affair, are you?”
Patty smiled at her, amazed. “How did you know? Am I that transparent?”
“Yeah,” Betty said. “You’ve been acting weird for months. First I thought it was because I was editing you. But I figured it out two weeks ago. You’ve been very hard to pin down for midday dates, and when I called yesterday and got David, he made a joke about how often we’ve been seeing each other. I haven’t seen you that much.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to drag you into it.”
“It’s okay.” She put an arm through Patty’s. “We have to stick together.” Amazing. A year ago Betty would have been disgusted and offended to have been used as part of an adulterous lie. “Who is it?”