Elmore Leonard - The Big Bounce

They played tag, with a lot of running dives and grabbing under water, stopping for a swig of beer every few minutes. After enough of that Nancy fell into a lounge chair to rest, her chest rising and her flat stomach sucking in as she breathed. They sat staring at her until she got up and stretched, showing them her stomach again, and said she was going in to change.

Hey, but would one of them mind unhooking her bra? It was so darn hard to reach.

They both went for it, and while they pushed and wrestled for position, Nancy reached behind and unfastened the strap. Walking to the sunroom door, she knew they were watching. She went inside, closed the glass door behind her, and pressed the lock catch. She took off the bra. She stood with her back to the glass until she knew they were close to the door and one of them was trying the handle. Then she turned around.

One of them said, “Hey, come on. Open the door.”

Nancy looked from one to the other, the tall stringy athletes trying to look casual in their wet jockey shorts. She hooked her thumbs in the low waist of the bikini and smiled.

“Come on. Open up.”

“What’ll you give me?” Nancy asked them.

“You know what.” They both laughed at that.

“Come on,” the other one said again.

“I’m going to bed,” Nancy said.

“Open the door, we’ll go with you.”

“What’ll you give me?” Nancy said again.

They were both looking at her, seriously now, silent. Finally one of them said, “What do you want, anyway?”

And Nancy said, “Fifty bucks, Charlie. Each.”

She could still see the dumb look on their faces.

And the look on her mother’s face a few days later, the no-look look.

“Is it true, Nancy?”

Her mother had found out about the two boys because one of them happened to have a buddy relationship with his father. The little buddy told the big buddy. The big buddy told his wife, who told a friend, who told Nancy’s mother, the friend saying she didn’t believe a word of it, but perhaps Nancy’s mother would like to look into it. Then the scene-her mother sitting in the living room, Loretta a few steps behind her.

“Is it true, Nancy?”

The brown stones in her mother’s solemn eyes stared up at her and, watching her mother’s eyes very closely, she said, “Yes, it’s true.”

The eyes did not seem to change expression. “Do you know what you’re saying?” her mother asked. “You want us to believe you offered yourself to those boys?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Don’t say uh-huh, dear. Say yes or no.”

“Yes.”

“All right, tell me why.”

“I don’t know.”

“If you think this is cute-have you thought of the consequences?”

Nancy hesitated, interested. “What consequences?”

“That people,” her mother said quietly, “might hear about it?”

Nancy began to smile; she couldn’t help it. “Mother, you’re beautiful.”

“I don’t see anything amusing,” her mother said. “I want to know what happened.”

Nancy looked at Loretta, who looked at Nancy’s mother. “Whatever you heard is probably true.”

“Loretta said they left before midnight.”

“How long do you think it takes?” Nancy said.

Her mother’s solemn expression held. “I want you to admit you thought this up as a not very funny joke.”

“Mother, I did. I propositioned them.”

“All right,” her mother said, rising, smoothing her dress over her hips. “There doesn’t seem to be much point in talking about it.”

“Really. It’s true.”

“It’s up to you,” her mother said. “But until you admit the truth and start making sense, you won’t be allowed out of the house.” Her mother turned and started across the room.

“I’ll tell you everything we did,” Nancy said after her. “Do you want to hear it or not?”

Her mother didn’t. A few days later she told her mother only part of the story was true, the part about blocking Loretta’s door. Her mother said, then the boys made up the rest of it as some sort of perverted joke. Yes, Nancy said, and she was allowed to go outside again and play.

It had been all right but very minor. She had been a little girl then and now she was a big girl and had to think as a big girl. Everything was relative. It became relative as one changed one’s approach and went on to bigger and better bounces.

Playing with the two boys had been fun.

Faking out the fathers taking her home from babysitting had been fun.

Putting on Bob Jr. had been fun.

Fooling around with Jack Ryan and thinking of how to take Ray’s fifty thousand had been fun. But even this was fairly low key compared to what she had in mind now.

If she could set it up. If she could work out the timing, it would be the biggest bounce of all.

RYAN SKIMMED OUT the swimming pool, with the little Fisher kids watching and asking him if they could jump in and try and touch the end of the skimmer, but he told them he had to hurry and didn’t have time to fool around. He didn’t feel like playing. He got the rake and cardboard box without running into Mr. Majestyk and took them down to the beach. There was no one down there yet and it was a good place to think.

First, was there anything to worry about or not?

There was always something to worry about when other people were involved.

Even before Nancy presented him with the beer case, there was something to worry about. He had gotten rid of the beer case. He had taken care of that early this morning, burying it five feet deep in the vacant lot. But he hadn’t gotten rid of Nancy. He hadn’t gotten rid of Billy Ruiz or Frank Pizarro. They were all hanging over him and could fall on him and maybe the only way was to run out from under. Disappear.

He could still go into Ray’s lodge. It would still be possible to pull it off.

It was a funny thing, he could see himself going into the place, but he didn’t look right. He could see himself going into other places with Nancy, the great boy-girl burglary team, and that didn’t look right, either. He looked dumb, doing it because she wanted to do it. A game and not real at all. She talked about real life. It wouldn’t be anything like real life. It wouldn’t be anything like going into places with Leon Woody. That had been real. But now it seemed like a long time ago and something that would never happen again. Like hanging from the roof. He did it and still had it to take out and look at, but he knew he would never hang from a roof again.

He felt some sand inside his right sneaker. He had the shoe off and was pouring the sand out when he saw Mr. Majestyk coming across the beach. He hadn’t seen Mr. Majestyk since Wednesday night, after they had looked in his window. Ryan thought of it now, but he said to himself, the hell with him, and looked right at Mr. Majestyk.

Mr. Majestyk’s gaze shifted beyond Ryan and moved around the beach, squinting a little in the sunlight. He said, “What’re you doing?”

“What am I doing? I’m raking the beach.”

Mr. Majestyk was staring at Ryan now, for a moment frowning. “What happened to you?”

“Nothing.”

“I can see nothing.”

“This guy and I had a disagreement.”

“Boy, you get in an argument you start swinging, don’t you?”

“I didn’t start it.”

“Listen, there’s some painting has to be done in number five. I painted most of it in the spring, but I didn’t get the kitchen.”

“What about the beach?” Ryan looked off in the direction Nancy would come.

“Leave it,” Mr. Majestyk said.

“They’ll be coming down pretty soon.”

“That’s all right. It’s not bad.”

“I don’t know,” Ryan said. “There’s some junk over there and up by the steps.”