“No rush at all. Have a good time.” He lifted his jumper and pulled his wallet from where it was jackknifed over his waistband. He put a ten and a five on the table and said, “That ought to cover it.”
“Oh, come down, man,” Andy said. “This is on me.”
“No, let me take it,” Bud said. “I’m flushed with mustering-out pay.”
“Suit yourself,” Andy said airily. “You sure you’re not sore?”
“Nothing to be sore about.”
Their eyes met. “Look, man,” Andy said, “stick around, huh?”
“No,” Bud said, “you don’t need me—” he paused — “any more,” he added softly.
“What?” Andy said.
“Come on, dad,” Eddie Cann said, “let’s meet Iris.”
Bud watched while Andy went over to the next table. Eddie introduced him to the redhead, and he sat down beside her, and the redhead gave him her undivided attention, leaning over the table. Bud took a cigarette from his jumper pocket, lit it hastily, and then started out of the club.
He was angry, but in a strange way he was relieved too. A great weight had been lifted from his shoulders, and he could not have described what that weight was if he’d tried.
He only knew that the air outside the club smelled very clean and very sweet — the way oxygen must smell at high altitudes, high above the earth, where everything was unpolluted, where birds Hew in complete and absolute abandon.
26
sock chorus, ii
OCTOBER, 1946
In October, with the leaves a molten red and gold, with the air crisp and biting, with the weather ideal for a freshman enjoying his first semester of college, a Hunter College House Plan invited a City College fraternity to a gathering at Roosevelt House.
Bud and Frank were pledging in the City College fraternity, and so they went to the gathering.
Bud had never held a very high opinion of anyone who went to an all-anything school, and he appreciated even less the girls who inhabited a convent like Hunter College. He was surprised, therefore, to find himself having a good time. Some of the boys from his frat had smuggled in a fifth of Old Grand-dad, which they’d discreetly poured into the punch bowl, and he and Frank had visited the bowl often. Some of the House Plan girls had lugged along their boyfriends, a few of whom were Hunter College Veterans — why would anyone want to go to an all-girls’ school, ask a silly question you get a silly answer. Most of the boys, though, belonged to Bud’s frat, and so he felt right at home. He danced with several of the House Plan girls, and he kept hitting the spiked punch bowl, and he was enveloped in a warm rosy glow of comparative comfort when Frank came up to him at about ten o’clock.
“Guess who’s here?” he said.
“The Maharaja of Mee-aho,” Bud said.
“No, come on, get serious.”
“Who?”
“Give a guess.”
“Julius Caesar.”
“Very funny.”
“Who, then?”
“Guess.”
“Jesus Christ!”
“Are you expleting or guessing?”
“Frank, why don’t you drop dead?”
“Helen Cantor,” Frank said.
“What?”
“Helen. She’s here. Talked with her a few minutes ago. She goes to Hunter now, how do you like that?”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Hell, no. Don’t tell me you’re interested! I thought you were all wrapped up making Carol comfortable while friend Andy is on the road.”
“Lay off that Carol routine, will you? We’re friends, period.”
“I’m only an observer,” Frank said, winking.
“Well, you’re crazy. For Christ’s sake—”
“Crazy like a fox. Anyway, Helen’s here.”
“Good for Helen.”
“I thought you might be interested. She looks very collegiate. She’s wearing a little button marked hostess. She looks too clean to suit me. I guess Andy didn’t teach her very much that night, eh, Buddy?”
“Knock it off,” Bud said.
“What’s the matter, pal? You still sensitive.”
“No, I’m not still sensitive. Helen and I... oh, what’s the use explaining anything to you?”
“You know what’s wrong with you?”
“No, tell me. What’s wrong with me?”
“You take your friend’s girl on platonic dates, you eat yogurt, and you bay at the moon.”
“Frank,” Bud said seriously, “you are really very witty this evening. You are so witty, I can hardly stand you. It’s a wonder you can even stand yourself.”
“I think I’m pretty damn sharp,” Frank said. “You going over to say hello?”
“Maybe.”
“She looks too clean,” Frank said sadly.
“Well, that’s life.”
Frank didn’t pick up the opening. “Yeah,” he said dully. “I’m gonna dance.” He walked away from Bud and over to a brunette in a fuzzy pink sweater. Bud watched him for several moments, and then he turned and walked over to the punch bowl. A girl was standing with her back to him, near the cups. He reached for a cup, and the girl turned, and he did not recognize her for a moment, and then he did, and his eyes went wide with surprise, even though Frank had told him she was there.
There was sudden joy on her face, and then the joy retreated, as if it had been carefully and calculatedly pulled back. They stood a foot apart from each other, and neither spoke, and then Helen shook her head in bewilderment and said, “Bud, what are you doing he... I...” She shook her head again, and then she gave a short confused laugh, and Bud said, “Hello, Helen.”
“I... forgive me... I didn’t expect to see you here. How are you, Bud?”
“Fine, thanks. And you?”
“Fine.” She paused and studied his face. “You didn’t write.”
“No. I was busy.”
“Growing up?”
Bud shrugged, and then smiled noncommittally. “Do you belong to this House Plan?”
“I’m Recording Secretary.”
“Well, bully for you.”
“Indeed.” He was smiling, and she realized that she was smiling, too, and she wondered why there wasn’t more tension between them, and she searched his face again. He seemed so very much at ease — no, that wasn’t the word she wanted, not simply at ease with her, or with his surroundings, at peace, yes, yes, he seemed to be at peace with himself — and on impulse, and because she somehow sensed a change which she could not as yet describe, she tentatively asked, “Are you still busy?”
“What?”