“I promise.”
She inhaled the smoke, holding it in her lungs for a few seconds. “I think I’m beginning to feel keen. But I’m not sure — I never felt keen before.”
“You promised to leave.”
“In a minute. I haven’t had a chance to ask you the question I came to ask you.”
“Go ahead.”
“Do you think I’d look good in tight pants, the kind Lisa wears?”
“How the hell would I know?”
“I could show you my figure.”
“Hey, wait a minute. For Christ’s sake, don’t...”
But she’d already taken off the pink nightgown and was standing naked, pale and shivering as though she had a chill. She didn’t have a chill.
Ted closed his eyes.
“Ted, are you sleeping?”
“Yeah.”
“You didn’t even look at me.”
“I looked enough.”
“Well, what do you think?”
“About what?”
“Gosh, you must have foggy moments like me. You haven’t paid any attention. I asked you a question.”
He sat up on the bed. Sweat was pouring down the back of his neck.
“Are you having a foggy moment, Ted?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re not sleeping, are you, Ted?”
“No.”
“You haven’t even looked at me yet.”
“I looked enough.”
“I like being here with you, Ted, you know? It’s cozy. Do you like it, too?”
“Yeah.”
She sat down on the bed beside him. Their thighs were touching and he could feel the quiver of her body and her warm breath against his neck.
“Cleo... listen. You better...”
“Now I’ve even forgotten the question I was going to ask you and it was terribly important. Oh, now I remember. Do you think I should wear tight pants like Lisa?”
“Not now,” he said in a whisper. “Not for a while.”
“You’re feeling real keen, aren’t you, Ted?”
“Lie down.”
“What if I don’t want to?”
“You want to.”
He put one hand between her legs. She let out a squeal and fell back on the bed.
Hilton was awakened by the sound of a car. He thought it must belong to a neighbor, since Ted wasn’t due to arrive until the following morning and his arrival was usually accompanied by the blare of a stereo and the whine of tires.
Hilton lay for a long time listening to the night sounds, the ones he hated: Frieda snoring in the adjoining room, the dog Zia barking at a stray cat; and the one he liked: the song of the mockingbird which could begin any time of the day or night. During the day it seemed a medley of all the noises in the neighborhood, coos and rattles and squawks and shrieks, but at night it was mainly a pure clear whistle, the same phrase repeated over and over again, like an impressionist revealing his true self only after the audience had left.
There were other sounds, too: a cricket in the rosebush outside Hilton’s room and the rolls and gurgles of hunger inside his stomach. He got up, put on a robe and slippers and went out into the hall intending to go down to the kitchen for some milk and crackers. Before he reached the top of the stairs he saw a light shining under the door of Ted’s room at the end of the hall.
Hilton stood listening. Ted’s presence was always accompanied by noise of one kind or another, but tonight there was none, not even faint music from a radio. He thought Frieda or the day maid had left a light on after cleaning the room to have it ready for Ted.
He opened the door. Two people were lying across the bed, their bodies so closely entwined they looked like one, a monster with two heads. It wasn’t the first time Ted had sneaked a girl into his room, and Hilton had started to close the door before he realized the girl was Cleo.
A scream formed in his throat, froze, melted, trickled back down into his chest. The two bodies separated and became two.
“God almighty,” Ted said and sat up on the bed.
“Get dressed,” his father said, “and get out.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake, this is some homecoming.”
“Put your robe on, Cleo.”
“I don’t have a robe,” Cleo said. “Only that pink nightie Frieda gave me for my birthday.”
“Here.” Hilton took off his own robe and covered her with it.
“Are you mad at me, Hilton?”
“No.”
“Cross your heart and hope to...”
“Please be quiet.”
“He’s mad at me,” Ted said. “I’m the villain.”
“You are a despicable cad,” Hilton said. “And I want you out of this house tonight.”
“I’ve been driving all day. I’m tired.”
“Not too tired, I notice. Now move. And don’t come back to this house, ever.”
“Well, for Christ’s sake, how do you like that,” Ted said. “This crazy kid comes in here naked and flings herself at me and...”
“Shut up. Get moving and don’t come back to this house. Ever.”
“This is crazy, I tell you.”
“Cleo, go to your room. I want to talk to you.”
“You are mad at me. I,” the girl said, “I knew it, I just knew it. And I didn’t come in here naked. I had my nightie on and I took it off to show Ted what my figure looked like, in order to get his opinion.”
“It seems to have been favorable.” Hilton walked out into the hall and after a minute the girl followed him, dragging the pink nightgown on the floor behind her like a guilty conscience.
In the blue and white room whose furnishings had not been altered since she was a child, Cleo sat in a white wicker rocking chair that creaked and squawked with every move she made. Hilton stood with his back to her, facing the wallpaper Cleo had been allowed to choose for herself: masses of white flowers and green leaves and blue-eyed kittens.
“Stop that,” he said. “Stop that rocking.”
“You are mad at me.”
“I’m disappointed.”
“It’s the same thing.”
“No.”
“Is Ted going away?”
“Yes.”
“Forever and ever?”
“He won’t be living in this house anymore.” His voice shook. “Are you sorry for what you did?”
“I guess. If you want me to be.”
“I want you to be sorry.”
“Okay, I am.”
He knew he might as well be talking to one of the blue-eyed kittens romping across the wallpaper, but he couldn’t stop trying. “I love you. You realize that, don’t you, Cleo?”
“Oh, sure. You’re always telling me.”
“Do you love me in return?”
“Sure.”
“No, you don’t,” he said in a harsh whisper. “You care about nothing.”
“Oh, I do so. I love Zia and ice-cream cones and TV and flowers and strawberries...”
“And where do I rate on that scale — somewhere between ice-cream cones and strawberries?”
She’d begun to rock again, very fast, as if to outdistance his voice, and muffle the funny little sounds that were coming from her mouth. These were the sounds of her foggy moments. After a time they would go away.
“Cleo, answer me. Where do I fit on that scale of yours?”
“I have to love Zia best,” she said slowly, “because he never gets mad and when I talk to him he always listens like I was a real person.”
He turned and grabbed the back of the wicker chair to keep it quiet. “You are a real person, Cleo.”
“Not like the others. You said I didn’t care about things. Real people care about things.”
“I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry. I’m terribly sorry.”
“That’s all right.”
“Cleo.” He fell on his knees beside her, and began stroking her hair. “Promise me something. You must never let another man touch you. Will you promise me that?”