Ed Gorman - Wake Up Little Susie

But within five minutes tonight I was on first base and rounding toward second. And in her sweet, somewhat tentative way I sensed she was as up for it as I was.

We sank into the hay and did some serious making out. A hoot owl and a coyote crooned to the moon to lend everything a note of prairie romance.

I always carried my emergency red Trojan, and I had reason to believe that my erection would soon start making overtures in that direction. Bad enough I wasn’t in love with Mary. But to make love to her and still not be in love with her would be awful.

“We’d better stop,” I whispered.

“Oh, God, why?”

“You know.”

“Oh, McCain, c’mon. I’m twenty-two years old. You want to see my driver’s license?”

“It’ll just make things worse.”

“For whom?”

“For you. And me.”

“For you, you mean. The guilt.”

But by then the point was moot. A private plane was buzzing the wagon and everybody on the loft was waving. Mary got embarrassed suddenly and eased me away.

By the time we got back to the barn, I was so charged up with lust I had lost the use of my eyes, ears, and nose. I was virtually insensate.

I went into the men’s room-a stall; standing at a trough with a hard-on was apt to get you some funny looks-and commanded my penis to cease and desist.

I threatened lawsuits; I hinted at solitary confinement. And it finally complied.

Mary had used the time to freshen up. We’d both had to de-hay ourselves the way you have to de-tick yourself after a walk in the woods.

She looked even better than before. And she loved me. And she was tender and smart and faithful and would make a great wife and great mother and-why had God saddled me with Pamela? Why? Oral Robbers could heal people, supposedly. Maybe he could cure me of Pamela. It was something to think about anyway.

The dance pavilion was built right onto the east side of the barn.

We danced fast to a Rick Nelson song and then slow to a Patti Page song and then we went over to the bar and ordered two Falstaffs in the bottle. A bartender with a big ragged straw hat and a piece of hay sticking out of his mouth served us.

From what I could hear around us, the conversation this evening was Susan Squires’s death.

“I hope this doesn’t make me sick.”

Mary wasn’t much of a drinker.

“Then don’t drink it.”

“Well, I like to feel like an adult every once in a while.” She slid her hand in mine. “That was a lot of fun. On the hayrack.”

“It sure was.”

“I just wish you didn’t worry about stuff so much.”

“So do I.”

“If you’re worried about breaking my heart, McCain, I’m the only one responsible. I could’ve walked away a long time ago.”

A Little Richard song came on. Most of the people were on the dance floor and I mean they were wailing and flailing. I wonder what our ancestors would have thought-y know, the ones who always look so prim in those 1880 photographs-if they could have seen my generation cavort. Probably put the lot of us in the public stocks.

I slid my arm around her. Pushed my face into her lustrous and sweet-smelling hair.

“I’m very seriously in like with you,” I said.

“Well.” She smiled. “That’s a start anyway.”

“Hi, Mary.”

The words came over my shoulder. I saw Mary’s face as they were spoken. She seemed less than happy to see the speaker.

“Hi, Todd.”

He walked around me where I could see him.

Our town was getting just big enough that it was impossible to know everybody’s name. I’d seen him around, a big towheaded guy who could’ve doubled for the hearty lumberjack on a cereal box. He even dressed that way. Plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up, big studded belt, jeans. I was just happy he wasn’t carrying an ax. He looked to be about my age. He also looked to be drunk.

“You goin’ to the funeral?” he said to Mary.

“Of course.”

“I can’t decide. Her folks don’t like me much.”

“I wonder why.” Then: “Todd Jensen. This is Sam McCain.”

He didn’t acknowledge me in any way.

“Maybe if she’d married me instead of him, she wouldn’t be dead.”

“Meaning what exactly?”

“You figure it out.”

“That her husband killed her?”

“You figure it out. She treated me like shit.”

“And you were always such a prince.”

“Bitch lied to me.”

“Why don’t you just leave, Todd? She was my friend.”

“You always treated me like shit too.”

“Good-bye, Todd.”

And then he was gone, wobbling off down the bar, people just naturally making room for his hulking body.

“Friend of yours?”

“Oh, sure. Couldn’t you tell how happy I was to see him? He was Susan’s old boyfriend, believe it or not. She went out with him for six or seven months before she met David Squires. He was one of those insanely jealous guys. She had to account for every single minute she wasn’t with him. He used to follow her around until she caught him at it one night. When they broke up, he used to call her ten times a night. And when she started seeing David Squires, he started sending her threatening letters.

Squires had Cliffie pay him several visits, but he still wouldn’t lay off. Finally, Squires wrote a letter to the local medical association in Cedar Rapids.”

“Medical association?”

“Yes. Believe it or not, Todd’s a doctor.”

“No surgical tools for that guy. He just tears your liver out when he wants to examine it.”

“Anyway, he seemed finally to give up.

Then about four months ago, the threatening letters started again. Susan was sure it was Todd.”

Then: “How about a dance?”

“My feet are at your command.”

Then I saw him.

At first I wasn’t sure I was seeing right: Mike Chalmers? I used to play sandlot baseball with him until he stole my bike one day and tried to blame it on a kid who hung around the diamond. That’s how Mike’s life ran, one scrape after another. Stealing bikes.

Stealing money from cash registers. Stealing cars.

Breaking and entering. Finally, armed robbery. He’d gotten out of prison a couple of years back.

Chalmers, a slight man with a hard peasant handsomeness, smirked at me and then looked away.

“Friend of yours?” Mary asked.

“I helped send him up.”

“God, I’d hate to have your job.” Then: “He looks kind of sad, doesn’t he?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Yeah, he does.”

We were slow-dancing to a Pat Boone song when I glanced out one of the barn windows and got the idea for the taillight check. There had to be a couple of hundred cars here this evening, maybe one of them with a broken taillight. I was going to get an early A.M. call from the Judge, demanding to know what I’d done on the case so far.

Maybe I could sell her on the idea that I’d come to the hayrack ride to check out the cars. We live by blind hope, don’t we?

I wasn’t sure how Mary would respond.

This was a date, not a stakeout.

But she said, “Good. I’ll help you.”

“You will?”

“Sure. I’ll take the cars on the far side of the barn. You take the cars on this side.”

“You really don’t have to do this.”

“God, McCain, please quit treating me like a little kid, all right?”

“All right.”

“When I don’t want to do something, I’ll tell you. And I won’t be subtle. I promise.”

I should have been working for the Kinsey Report.

I saw a lot of couples coupling in the backseats of their cars. High school kids, mostly. I moved quietly as possible. They were too enraptured to hear me. But I heard them: sighs, gasps, cries of pleasure, and a symphony of car springs. What could be lovelier on a Indian-summer night with a full harvest moon?