Seated on the sofa, in passionate but still-clothed embrace, were the two stars of the show, Jack Pine and Marcia Callahan, she a forthright brunette of twenty-eight, tall and slender, whose seventh starring role in a Broadway show — and seventh affair with her leading man — this was. Or would be. Or might be.
Jack found himself kissing Marcia’s eyebrow, and then her forehead, and then the top of her head, realizing her lips and hands were working their way down the front of his body, destination unmistakable. With a little surprised smile, the visual equivalent of Jeepers! he shifted to a position more comfortable for them both, relaxed, smiled more lazily, then all at once sat up again, pulling up the bewildered woman by the shoulders, saying, “Marcia, no. Better not.”
She gazed at him with bewilderment in her forthright eyes. “Are you kidding?”
Embarrassed, his less-than-forthright gaze slipping away from her, he mumbled, “George.”
“George?”
“He’s due here any minute,” Jack said, unhappy but trapped. “He’ll want me to be pleased to see him, if you know what I mean.”
“Oh.” Understanding made her back away along the sofa, adjusting her clothing. Glancing down at him with dismissive scorn, she said, “That’s right. I was forgetting where it’s been.”
They both got to their feet, as a knock sounded at the door and a voice called, “Ten minutes to curtain. Ten minutes to curtain.”
“I heard you, I heard you,” Jack snapped at the closed door. Turning to Marcia, he said, “George made this whole thing possible for me. I owe him... I owe him everything, Marcia. There’ll be time for us.”
“I think maybe our time is all used up,” Marcia said.
“Don’t say that. You know how I feel about—”
Another knock sounded at the door. “I heard you!”
Marcia laughed, lightly. The doorknob rattled. Marcia said, “It isn’t the warning, it’s your playmate. See you on stage, lover.”
She opened the door, fixing her face into the false smile to be presented to the author of the play, but it was Buddy who entered instead, in his uniform and carrying his duffel bag over his shoulder, saying happily to Marcia, “Well, look at you, will you.”
“My mistake,” Marcia said. “The rough trade is here.”
Easy and amused with her, Buddy said, “Don’t be misled, doll. I can be very gentle.”
“Buddy!” Jack cried. “You’re here!”
“Sure I am,” Buddy said. “How you doin’, Dad?”
Jack embraced his friend, holding tight. Buddy returned the embrace but looked over Jack’s shoulder to grin at Marcia, who watched with some uncertainty, not exactly sure what was going on here.
It was Buddy who ended the clinch at last, saying, “Let me breathe, Dad.”
“Oh, sure, Buddy, sure!” Turning to Marcia, grinning in delight, holding Buddy’s elbow, Jack said, “Marcia, this is my oldest friend in the whole world, Buddy Pal. We grew up together.”
“That’s nice,” Marcia said.
“Buddy,” Jack said, pride and pleasure in his every atom, “this is Marcia Callahan, my co-star in the show.”
“I recognized her from the pictures out front,” Buddy said. Grinning at Marcia, looking her up and down, he said, “In person, you don’t have too much on top, do you?”
“On top of what?” Marcia asked him.
They’d left the dressing room door open, and now George Castleberry appeared in the doorway, melting face in a loving smile at first, but then becoming immediately irritable as he looked around the room. “Well,” he said. “A crowd.”
“I’m just going, George,” Marcia said.
But George’s mood had changed again; he gazed with amused pleasure on Buddy in his marine uniform, saying, “Be still, my heart. Is that real?”
“Sure is,” Buddy told him. “Just got out of the marines two days ago. Don’t have my civvies yet.”
“Well, never change, that’s my advice,” George told him.
Turning to Jack, Buddy said, “In fact, Dad, that’s why I came by. If you could tide me over...”
“Oh, sure, Buddy,” Jack said, his smile suddenly nervous, uneasy. “How much do you need?”
“A hundred or so.”
“No problem, Buddy,” Jack said. Taking his wallet from his hip pocket, his movements and expressions awkward and clumsy, he made introductions while counting money into Buddy’s waiting palm: “George Castleberry, our playwright, I’d like you to meet my old friend Buddy Pal.”
Dryly, Marcia said, “They grew each other up together.”
“Doll, it’s you for me,” Buddy told her. Linking his arm with hers, he said, “Would you like to see my old war wound?”
Amused by him, intrigued by him, she permitted him to lead her from the room, saying as she went, “I don’t know. Would I?”
George closed the door after them, then turned to Jack with arms outstretched. “Dear boy,” he said.
Jack performed a boyish smile. “Hi, George.”
A knock sounded at the door, and a voice called, “Five minutes to curtain. Five minutes to curtain.”
Jack took George’s hands, held them in his, a movement that seemed to suggest togetherness but which nevertheless subtly kept George at a little distance. “I’m sorry, George,” Jack said. “It’s too late.”
Petulant, George said, “Traffic was terrible. I hate this city, I really do.”
Jack did truly like his benefactor, and his sympathy showed through his nervousness and reluctance. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “I have to go.”
“Later,” George told him. “I’ll see you here later. After the performance.”
His smile wan, Jack said, “After the performance, the performance.”
George leaned forward to kiss Jack’s cheek. Jack awkwardly patted the older man’s back, then moved gracefully around him and left the room, closing the door behind himself.
George roved the tiny room, wringing his hands, a series of agonized expressions on his face, small moaning sounds rising from his throat. At last he flung himself into the chair in front of the dressing table and stared desperately at his own reflection. “You fool, you,” he cried, and put his head down onto his folded arms and wept.
How it all comes back to me now, those wonderful days of first success, when I was still young and naive and hopeful and caring. I had such genius in those days! I could do anything. And with Buddy again at my side... Buddy would always save me, protect me, keep me from harm. He’d been doing it from the beginning. (We don’t — we never — talk about that.)
I sit smiling at the patio, under God’s sun (the high clouds have cleared away, but I’m not even afraid of that anymore), and I bask in my memories of those glorious days, until I notice the interviewer frowning at me again. Now what’s his problem? “Something wrong?” I ask.
He says, “Wait a minute. That last part. Where George Castleberry looked at himself in the mirror and said, ‘You fool, you,’ and put his head down on his folded arms and wept.”
I nod, agreeing. “A lovely scene, isn’t it? Touching, dramatic, full of pathos and understanding and deep revelation.”
“But,” he says, “you didn’t see that part. That happened after you left the room.”
“One knows these things,” I say, and Hoskins rolls into view like a giant passenger ship, possibly the QEII, bearing a tall, shimmering glass on a silver tray. “Ah, Hoskins,” I say.
“Your fuzzy drink, sir.”
“Thank you, Hoskins.”
Hoskins recedes, like one of those literary ghosts — Scrooge’s father, Hamlet’s Christmas — and I raise the shimmering glass. “To Marcia Callahan,” I say.