— Jack don’t be silly it’s raining and your throat’s…
— Raining and my throat do you think it’s the first time I’ve ever been out in the, do you think I’m eleven years old? One of your class six J eleven-year-old…
— You’re behaving like one.
— Well what! what do you, you tell me to call tell me not to call, tell me to find someplace for the night tell me not to go out in the rain I don’t even know where we are, that sofa must have cost two thousand dollars like camping out in Bloomingdale’s window where the hell are we, do you know? Whole place is empty, little room where we came in here with a bed in it do you want me to…
— No no please close it it’s, it’s just a, just a cubby it’s…
— Well then will you tell me what… he pulled the door to it closed, coming back to stand over her there, — what I, what, listen why tears what have I…
— No they’re, they’re nothing to do with you… she pulled the robe loose catching it up to her face.
— No but, Amy please what…
— They’re nothing to do with you I said! and she stood that abruptly, caught the robe’s yellow to the full white spill of her breast without a look back — if you want to stay here stay or go out to your White Rose and look for your, for anybody but take off that perfectly ridiculous suit and take a hot shower before you get pneumonia.
— All right he stood there and said, to no one, — all right… and came down on the sofa, got one shoe off again and found a plastic spoon down there, up looking for something to dig it into reached the macaroni salad and got down several bites before he turned to look back through the empty door and start for it, his uneven gait silent through it and down the empty hallway past a darkened door ajar toward the one lighted ahead which he pushed closed behind him, half closed, he turned to close it hard but paused, closing it slowly with the douche swinging there from the back of it, before he turned back to stand at the toilet, wrench off the other shoe, jacket, trousers shirt all in a heap and sodden with steam from the shower when he came out to find a lavender towel monagrammed EMJ to wrap around him into the lighted hall, one step silenced in the carpet as the next, as his pause at the darkened door, and his touch on it.
— Jack?
He caught the towel tight at his waist — just, a blanket thought I might need a…
— Where are you going.
— Going in to the sofa thought I might need a blanket, shall I get one from…
— Don’t be silly.
— What? Amy…? he shivered, pushed the door further on darkness, — Amy? Can’t see a thing…
— Do you have to? And bedsprings strained abruptly as under her weight come up on one elbow, under his coming down.
— God…
— Not so, Jack not so tight I can’t breathe…
— Amy God I, God… her head fell back to the pillow his buried in her throat, in her hair lips seeking the details of her ear, moving hands stilled and, stilled, moving again as though life had stopped threatened only to seize it where her breast yielded, to flee that and descend to climb the cradled rise of bone and over perfect smoothness cleave down where creviced fingertips engulfed in taste and smell and raising pinks to purple browns clawed at the confine of their single sense, sudden heat puckered tight against their plunge to depths come opened wide as her knee rose heavy over him, her own hand’s rake of nails brushing up from his without hurry, and back, and up to close without surprise where firmness ended, move there in flow all rhythm against the thrust of muscles elsewhere hard with tension and mounted toward her and away as though to force their tension and their strength and very size into her moving hand small as it was and still enveloping all it held, still moving with expectant calm when he went over on his back as though hurled there, hand seizing where hers failed as though to tear himself from his roots and she came up against his chest convulsed with its echo, breast crushed against the hard stiff length of his arm to reach his shoulder whispering — no it’s all right… holding him, his hand behind her burying a tremble in her hair to press her head down the rise and fall of his chest where her lips, brushing, kissed, but where his hand held firm, chest rising further with each breath until its hardnesses of bone gave way beneath her cheek to muscle drawn tight under hairs bristled at her lips unparted brushed suddenly by a warmth softer than the tongue they curbed and she came up torn away face buried in his neck to cling there, whisper — please… half on him as though to swallow up his shudders, — don’t please she whispered, — it happens to everyone… the weight of her leg warm over his gone rigid for his twist away leaving only his back to her where she kissed his shoulder in the darkness and clung as though for warmth until, as of its own weight, it eased away, and she caught breath at the stealth of springs across the gap, the desolate toss of covers on the bed there and then, for warmth, pulled up her own.
When he waked it was empty, he’d sat up and looked over in shadow spread from the drawn shade and said — Amy…? but it was only a swirl of blankets, and he sank back hands drawn heavily down his face to leave his stare fixed on the ceiling. And then he was up all at once, pulled the closed door open half out in the hall listening, looked both ways before he reached the bathroom with long steps, found only shirt and shorts wilting from the shower rod and tore the seat in the haste of getting them on, coming out that way to find a silent kitchen, open the refrigerator on a jar of honey and opened can of tomato juice rusting at the puncture, a drawer on two lightbulbs, each step slower back up the hall to stop in the doorway and call — Amy…? He cleared his throat, crossed to open a closet door on an empty camera case, another on one patent leather evening pump, back to the closet in the bedroom where he found a soiled raincoat torn pocket to hem pulling it on coming up with a crushed Gitanes box from one pocket, matches from Sardi’s and two weightless five lira pieces from the other, out again down the hall to take the white telephone the length of its cord behind the white sofa where he sat on the floor and dialed. — Mister Eigen please, in… Can’t remember his extension he’s in public re… the Gitane he lit blazed up with dryness, — hello? Mister Eigen there…? Still out to what? Wait what do you mean he might be gone for the day for what day… But what time is it? Wait never mind listen this is sort of a, not really an emergency but… personal call yes it’s Butterfield eight, one wait… his voice dropped near a whisper, — I’ll call him later… he put down the phone and hunched there, blew to disperse the signal column of smoke rising over him.
A door closed. — Jack…? He was up from his elbows. — Oh you frightened me! what are you doing there…
— I was just, just making a call I…
— But why are you making it hiding back there? and what, what on earth are you wearing…
— I just woke up didn’t know what time it was look I don’t even know where I am, how the hell did I know who might walk in the door there and I couldn’t find my…
— I had to go downtown, Jack I’m sorry it took me so long, she came on to drop all she’d been standing there holding to the sofa. — I was just so afraid you’d be gone…
— Gone where! Where could I go like this! Couldn’t find my clothes I found this thing in a closet where’s my…
— Not that suit you had on Jack I took it to be cleaned but it’s quite hopeless, and you really don’t…
— Look I want to get out there and clear things up, tell Whiteback I’m wait where’s my money where’s my money!