Lawrence Block - Warm and Willing

Grace was the older of the two. “We can only sit for minute,” she said. “Allie’s been sniffling all week. You know her constitution. Every time she turns around she catches another cold. Autumn is a bad time for her, autumn and spring. The changing weather.”

Alice smiled bravely. “I’m all right. I’ll sleep late tomorrow. I was anxious to meet you, Rhoda. You’re very attractive, you know. Megan has good taste.”

She was embarrassed, and covered it by a lighting a cigarette. Grace lit a cigarette of her own. She smoked like a man, Rhoda noticed, holding the cigarette at the base of the V between her second and third fingers near to the palm. Now she said, “I’d be jealous, Rhoda, but Allie doesn’t go for pretty girls. She needs somebody like me.”

“Of course I do.”

“Someone to take care of her.” Grace blew out smoke. “Gawd, what a day. I’ve been running around until I can’t see straight. You two coming to Jan’s place tomorrow? No, today’s what? Thursday? Jan’s thing is on Saturday, not tomorrow. Coming?”

“We haven’t been invited.”

“Oh, you’re invited. You’ll come won’t you?”

“I suppose so,” Megan said.

A few minutes later Grace got to her feet and said that Alice really had to have her rest, especially in this weather. Alice smiled weakly and followed her out of the bar.

“Those two,” Megan said. “Alice always has a cold, or a weak ankle, or dizzy spells. A fragile flower, a dainty little china doll. Grace spoils her silly. Pays all the bills, waits on her hand and foot, never gets to lay a hand on her for a week before or after her period. But that’s the way they both want it. Alice needs someone to take care of her and Grace needs somebody to take care of, so they both get what they want out of it. People usually do, I guess.”

“What?”

“Get what they want.”

“I got what I wanted.”

Megan took her hand. They were halfway through a second round of drinks when Bobby Kardaman came. Rhoda saw her in the doorway, standing at the foot of the stairs and scanning the dark room carefully. Megan waved to the girl, and she cut quickly across the room, not stopping to talk to anyone. A few of the girls called to her. Bobby Kardaman ignored them.

She sighed, sank into a chair, “I’m sorry, I got tied up. Did I keep you long?”

“We’re on our second round,” Megan said. She handled the introductions. Bobby smiled, offered her hand. Rhoda shook it. Bobby’s eyes held hers for a moment, then stopped to study her. Rhoda felt herself coloring. She reached for her drink and sipped it.

Bobby said, “Megan, you’re a lucky girl. A lucky lucky girl.” She sighed again. “I amn’t. Aren’t? I aren’t? No, I am not. That’s the right way. I am not lucky.”

Bobby Kardaman was drunk. Not reeling, not staggering, but tight enough to be slightly glassy-eyed, tight enough to slur the corners of her words. She was a striking girl, Rhoda saw. Chestnut hair, high cheekbones, a full mouth, deep blue eyes, a full-blown body. She patted at her hair with one hand now and looked around for the waitress. “Where is that bitch?” she said. “I need a drink in the worst way. Jesus, what a night. Meg, honey, I’m coming unglued. I really am.”

“Bad?”

“Oh, the worst. Really. You know how you see who you want to? How when you’re gay the whole world looks gay? Oh, Jesus, listen to this. I saw a girl on Macdougal, a corn-fed thing fresh from the farm, you know, and some idiot bell rang and I thought, well, this one has to be gay. Can you imagine? She didn’t look it, she didn’t act it, nothing, but old Kardaman got an idea in her fat head and that was that. If I wanted her to be gay, then she was gay.”

“What happened?”

“Well, I was a little bit stoned.”

“Like now?”

“Not quite, because that was a whole two bars ago. A little less stoned. But I went right up to that Iowa cornball and propped her. Right there on the street. Come with me, I cooed, and I’ll make love to you and we’ll have a ball. Oh, very bad, the worst. The kid cracked, she was scared out of at least three uneventful years of her life. I thought she was going to scream for the law. I left hurriedly. Meg, I have to find somebody. Meg, this is bad.”

“Easy, girl.”

“Oh, sure.” She forced a half-hearted grin. “I must be making a lovely impression on you, Rhoda. Can I call you Rho? Like the Greek letter? Listen, Megan’s friends aren’t all horrid like me. I’m not even this bad all the time. Look, Rho, why don’t you ditch Meg? We’ll get married. I’ll put on a suit and a tie and we’ll run off to Maryland to get married. We’ll make babies, even. Good enough, Rho?”

Bobby blew hot and cold. She would swim in self-pity, then turn bright and begin to joke, telling most of the jokes on herself. The banter she aimed at Rhoda was double-edged, as though she meant it but had no intention of pressing her point. They didn’t stay with her long. When they finished their drinks they stood up and walked out into the night. Bobby stayed behind. “I’ll find something,” she said. “Something for the night, something I’ll hate in the morning. The perfect accompaniment for a hangover. Night, ladies.”

Outside, they walked the length of the block in warm silence. Megan took her arm.

“She likes you,” she said.

“Bobby?”

“Uh-huh. She’d like to take you away from me.”

“No chance of that.”

“I almost got mad at her. But you can’t take her seriously. And she’s having a tough time.”

“I felt sorry for her.”

“Is that all?”

She looked at Megan. “You’re not jealous, are you?”

“Slightly.”

“Don’t be. What does she do?”

“Bobby? Nothing. She’s a remittance man. Or remittance woman. A rich family in a Detroit suburb that doesn’t want a lesbian daughter around to embarrass them. She lived in Cuernavaca for awhile on money from home, then came back to the city. She gets a check every month, just enough to live on. A lot of families are like that. You’re our daughter and we’ll take care of you, but stay away from our door, you dyke. True parental love.”

“You sound bitter.”

“I am.” Megan’s arm around her waist. “I’m going to need you tonight, kitten. Very badly. Be good to me.”

Saturday noon, cold and rainy, Eighth Street clogged with wet and hurrying tourists. “Runch time,” Mr. Yamatari said pleasantly, if inaccurately, and she slipped into her trenchcoat and belted it snugly around her and ducked out into the street. She stood there for a moment, then turned quickly and headed for a lunch counter halfway down the block toward Sixth Avenue.

Someone was calling her name. She looked around uncertainly but couldn’t see anyone.

“Rhoda Haskell-”

And then he had reached her. He stood in front of her and held her arm in one hand. “My God, Rhoda,” he said. “How long has it been? Months. I didn’t even know you were still in town.”

He was Ed Vance and he was a bright young man in some public relations office, she didn’t know which. A friend of Tom’s, a person she had known fairly well during the two years of marriage. A bachelor, bright and good-looking in an Ivy League way. A ladies’ man according to popular report.

“Are you living here now? In the city?”

“Yes.”

“When was the divorce? About half a year ago, wasn’t it?”

“Just about. It was an annulment.”

“Well. Jesus, it’s pouring, isn’t it? C’mon, we’ll get a bite to eat. Across the street all right?”

There was a steakhouse across the street. She had never been there. She said, “I don’t have much time.”