Флетчер Флора - Wake Up With a Stranger

In the hall below, Wayne Buchanan was standing at the door and looking out through the small glass pane to the street. He turned when she came up behind him. His face was livid and loose on its bones, and he was at that moment, though she didn’t know it, more afraid and alone than he had ever been.

“Are you going?” he asked.

“Yes, I’m going.”

“Will you come back to see me when you can?”

“No. I hope that I never see you again.”

“But... but why?”

“You are not my father and have never been. You are only the man who helped to beget me.”

“How can you say such things?”

“Since they are true, they are not difficult to say. Perhaps it is difficult to hear and accept, but that’s your problem.”

“I have always tried to do my best for my family.”

“Do you actually confess that you could have done no better? Anyhow, it does not matter, because it’s a damn lie, and you know it very well. You have been mean and petty and cruel, and you have never tried honestly to do a truly generous thing. I was sick of you long ago, and I am sick of you now, but I am willing to do you the courtesy of forgetting you entirely if you will do the same for me.” He stepped aside abruptly and opened the door.

Because she wanted to restore at once the pattern of life which had been interrupted by her mother’s death, she went to the shop. She arrived just before closing time and went through the salon to her workroom. There, she threw herself into a chair and stretched her legs out long in front of her, arching her back, and feeling in calves and thighs the pleasant tension of muscles. She felt liberated, cut loose, in a way exonerated. She did not have any idea of precisely what she had been exonerated of, but she was conscious, nevertheless, of the lifting of an obscure indictment. Corollary with the liberation was a sense of being caught in a quickening current, a conviction that something of significance was going to happen to her, and that the thing to happen would be good. Reacting physically to the spur of her thoughts, she felt in her flesh a kind of tingling resiliency, and she was impelled to laugh aloud.

After a while, Gussie Ingram knocked and entered without waiting for a response. She slouched in a chair and lit one of her interminable cigarettes.

“Well,” she said, “how did it go?”

“Miserably. I’m immensely relieved that it’s over.”

“I hope you don’t mind because I wasn’t there. I simply cannot endure a funeral.”

“Of course not. It would have been completely unnecessary.”

“What will your father do now?”

“I don’t know. He’ll get along, I suppose.”

“I was wondering if perhaps you’d move in with him, now that he’s alone.”

“No. I wouldn’t even consider it. My father and I are not compatible.”

“Oh? Well, neither were me and mine, so far as that goes. What in God’s name is it that makes fathers so frequently impossible?”

“Maybe they aren’t. Maybe ours were exceptions. Anyhow, I am feeling too good at present to spoil it by talking of unpleasant things. Do you think it wrong of me to feel good under the circumstances?”

“I have long ago abandoned judging what is wrong or not wrong, darling.”

“Well, I was just sitting here feeling free and rather excited. Rather like I used to feel the last day of school when I was a child. As a matter of fact, I have a peculiar notion that something good is about to happen. Do you believe it is possible to have valid premonitions?”

“Oh, God, darling, don’t ask me.”

“Wasn’t it Huxley who defined metaphysics as the art of befuddling oneself methodically?”

“I wouldn’t know about that, either. Huxley and I are as incompatible as my old man and I were, but for different reasons.”

“Well, to hell with Huxley and metaphysics. Tell me how things went in the shop today.”

“Nicely, darling. I sold your red taffeta.”

“Really? To whom?”

“Mrs. Christopher Polk, no less.”

“Jesus, Gussie, it’s impossible for her!”

“I know. Her ass is far too big. Serena modeled it, however, and Serena’s ass is neither too big nor too small, but intolerably perfect. The moment Polk saw the taffeta on Serena, she assumed, of course, that it would look the same on her. The vanity of some of these bitches is perfectly incredible.”

“It will have to be altered all to hell.”

“I know. The seamstress has it upstairs now.”

“Oh, well, it’s another original sale, anyhow, and everyone will certainly recognize that the gown can’t be blamed for Polk’s tail. Some day, Gussie, nothing but originals will be sold in this shop. Nothing at all.”

“Say, you are feeling good, aren’t you? Are you withholding information by any chance? Did Tyler tell you something over the telephone to bring on this optimism?”

“Tyler? Telephone? What do you mean?”

“He called earlier this afternoon and left word for you to call him back. There’s a memo on the desk in the office. Didn’t you see it?”

“No. I’m sorry. I haven’t been in the office since I got here.”

“Then you’d better go and call him at once.”

“In a minute, Gussie. I don’t suppose there’s any hurry.”

Actually, now that the cure for action had been presented, she was oddly reluctant to commit herself. It was not that she dreaded hearing whatever Tyler had to say, but just the contrary, for she still felt the imminence of something significant and good, of which the call might very well be the beginning. She wanted to savor the expectation for a while, and she decided that she would smoke a cigarette slowly and call Tyler afterward. Lighting the cigarette, she blew out smoke and watched it rise and thin and disappear.

“Did he imply at all what he wants?” she asked.

“No. It wasn’t even him personally. It was a woman. His secretary, I suppose. Why don’t you call him?”

“I’m going to. Just as soon as I finish my cigarette.”

“Well, finish the goddamn thing, will you, darling? I would like to get away from here, if you don’t mind, and I’m damned if I’ll go before I learn what he wants.”

Donna laughed and stood up, bending down to grind the cigarette out in a tray.

“Jesus, Gussie, you’re simply a slave driver. All right, then. I’ll go and call, and afterward we can go out and have a drink together in celebration, or several in mourning.”

She went out of the room and across to the office that had been Aaron’s and was now, at least for the time being, hers. Gussie had written Tyler’s number on the memo pad, and she dialed, leaning with one hip against the desk for the duration of two long rings, after which the voice of Tyler himself came over the wire.

“Hello,” he said.

“Hello, Mr. Tyler. This is Donna Buchanan.”

“Oh, yes. Miss Buchanan. Did you think I had forgotten you?”

“I was beginning to wonder.”

“I assure you that I hadn’t. I would like to talk with you again, but it is a little late in the day for it now, perhaps.”

“It’s not too late for me, if it isn’t for you.”

“Well, let’s see. I’m just preparing to leave here, but I plan to stop for a drink in a small bar I patronize. Would you care to meet me there? We could have a drink together and talk comfortably. Or I could pick you up at the shop, if you prefer.”

“That won’t be necessary. I’ll be happy to meet you.”

“Good. Could you make it in, say, half an hour?”

“If it isn’t too far. What is the name and address of the place?”

He told her where to come, and she hung up, after saying goodby, and returned to her workroom where Gussie was waiting.