Dan Wakefield - Going All the Way - A Novel

In the awful stillness that followed, Sonny wanted to die himself, or at least crawl under the crib. It was the kind of terrible silence that comes after somebody lets a fart in church.

“Gunner!” Patsi hissed.

She swooped down and plucked up the baby, nestling it against her chest. The baby started to cry. Ray looked like he’d been hit in the face. Gunner, snapped from whatever far place his thoughts had taken him, looked at his friends with panic. His hands reached in the empty air, groping for an explanation.

“He didn’t mean what it sounded like,” Sonny said, wanting to help.

“I didn’t mean,” Gunner said, “you know. I just meant, like all of us. We’re all going to die, but it hits you when you see a little kid, who has to grow up, and get old, and then—like all of us.”

“Stop it!” Patsi screamed. “Shut up!”

The baby squealed louder.

“Oh, Jesus,” Gunner said, “I’m sorry.”

Ray seemed to have collected himself and he came around and threw his arm on Gunner’s shoulder and said, “Let’s let Patsi take care of it, O.K.? Let’s sit down and have us a drink.”

They went in the living room, where one of those elaborate hi-fi sets covered a whole wall. Ray put on a Brubeck LP and quickly brought in some stiff drinks.

“Man, I’m really sorry,” Gunner said. “It just didn’t come out like I meant it.”

“Forget it,” said Shins.

He gently poked the ice cube in his glass with one finger, watching it bob back up.

“Guns,” he said, “I understand you got hit over there.”

“Yeh, once. Nothing much to it.”

“It must have been rough. Combat.”

“Well, it was weird. I mean, it wasn’t all bad. There were times when you felt more alive than you ever do, just because you know you might die. It’s—I don’t know. Hard to explain. It does something to you.”

“I guess it does,” said Shins.

His brow pressed into a furrow, and he took a long slug of his drink.

“So how’s the life of a family man?” Gunner asked, mustering a hearty tone.

“Old buddy,” said Shins, “there’s nothing like it.”

“How do you mean?” asked Gunner.

Shins looked a little surprised. “I mean it’s great. It’s the only thing.”

“Why?”

“What?”

“Why is it the only thing?”

“Well, you got any better ideas?”

“I don’t know,” said Gunner.

“Well, what are your plans?”

“I don’t know. I’d like to figure things out, first.”

“Of course, you just got back. You want to figure who to go with, huh?”

“Or whether to ‘go.’”

“To work?” Shins smiled. “That’s not much of a decision, is it? Or did you have a rich uncle kick off?”

“Well, there’s Uncle Sam,” Gunner said. “I’m entitled to the GI Bill.”

“But you graduated. You got your degree.”

“Yeh, but you can still go back. I could study for an M.A. in something.”

“In what?”

“In philosophy, maybe. I don’t know.”

“But that won’t do you any good,” Shins said. “I mean, if you wanted to go to law school or something you can use, that’s another matter. But that other stuff, you can’t use any of it.”

“Why not?”

“It won’t get you anywhere, for Chrissake.”

“Where should I get to?” Gunner asked.

Shins finished off his drink and bent his head down, staring at the floor between his legs. “Guns,” he said, “a lot of guys get shaken up over there. Jesus, who wouldn’t? I mean, it’s nothing against a person. But maybe you ought to talk to someone.”

“Talk to someone?”

“Someone who understands that stuff. You know. A doctor. I mean, the way you talk. You’re all confused.”

“About what?”

“See? That’s what I mean. You keep asking questions like that.”

“But I want to know ,” said Gunner.

“Know what , for Chrissake?”

Shins was really getting worked up and Sonny was scared that there would be another bad scene, like with the kid. But Gunner seemed to sense how things were heading, and instead of pressing on with it, he leaned back, took a drink, and said, “I dunno, Shins. I can’t explain it too well. I think I’ll just relax for a while. Play a little golf, maybe. Get some sun.”

Shins smiled with genuine relief. “Atta-baby,” he said. “You get a little fresh air and exercise, you’ll be ready to run ’em ragged.”

Gunner said they better be moving, made a lot of thanks and apologies, and he and Sonny hustled to the car. Gunner drove without speaking for a while, and then he asked, with puzzled impatience, what he obviously had wanted to ask Shins but was wise enough to restrain himself:

“Run who ragged?”

“The opposition,” Sonny said.

“Wow,” Gunner said. “Yeh. The other rats in the rat race.”

They went to a little bar called the Melody Inn and ordered boilermakers. Gunner seemed pretty low.

“Hey,” Sonny said, trying to cheer him up a little, “I never knew you were a golfer. I mean, that good, the way you clobbered those balls today.”

“I used to caddy a lot as a kid,” Gunner explained. “The pro over at Meridian Hills took an interest in me. One summer I got real serious about it, and McCardle, he’s the club pro, said he thought if I really worked I could make it on the pro circuit.”

“That’s pretty risky, isn’t it? For making a living?”

“Sure it is! That’s one thing I like about it. It’s a gamble, it’s none of that nine-to-five, work-till-you-get-the-gold-watch-and-retire shit.”

“Yeh, there’s that,” Sonny said.

He felt stupid and prudish asking about the risk, just like Shins and all the rat-race guys. But that’s what had really come to his mind. Most guys mainly worried about that. When he was stationed in Kansas City, Sonny sat up in bull sessions long through the night with guys in his outfit, college grads mostly, talking about the future and careers, and most guys wanted to know what kind of Security a job could offer. That, and the salary; how much you started at and how high you could go in twenty years.

Gunner was rubbing at his chin, pondering something. “It might not be such a bad idea,” he said. “The pro circuit. You’d get to see the whole country, travel a lot, be out in the sun and fresh air. You’d be in shape. You’d have a lot of time to read and think.”

“Sounds good,” Sonny said.

Gunner poked out a cigarette he’d only half finished and shook his head. “Shit, what am I thinking about? I’d just be a goddam jock again, when you got right down to it.”

“Well, there’s plenty of other things.”

“Yeh.”

Gunner was fiddling with a folder of matches. He opened it up and started staring at the inside. It was one of those that had a picture of a woman’s head and said “Draw Me.” You were supposed to draw the woman’s head and send it in to Artists Unlimited, and they would evaluate your talent and see if you had any chance of making it as an artist. If you did, you could sign up for their mail-order instruction course.

“That’s something else I used to crap around with,” Gunner said. “I did some sketches for the paper at DePauw and drew some cartoons for the humor magazine. Shit like that. But I really got a charge out of it.”

“I could never draw a straight line,” Sonny admitted.

“It’s easy,” Gunner said. He whipped a pencil out of his pocket and began to sketch the woman’s head on a cocktail napkin. When he finished he handed it over to Sonny.

“Hey, that’s just like it. You oughta send it in.”

Gunner shrugged and put the napkin in his pocket. “Maybe I will.”