David Gates - The Wonders of the Invisible World

“At any rate,” said Byron, “my curiosity of course got the better of me, and down I went. And you know, I thoroughly enjoyed myself. In both senses. I was on-screen for all of three minutes, and let me tell you, I was as bad a bad guy as ever chewed the scenery.” Finn had heard Byron tell this story before, in exactly the same words. “And do you know what happened?” Finn knew. “A rousing cheer went up! The house lights came on! And there stood my entire class, applauding. Jeannette, it seems, had called one of my students — Finn, you remember her, a Susan somebody? Lovely girl — who in turn had called the fellow at the theater and arranged the whole thing. Jeannette had been prepared to drag me there bodily if necessary, sick as she was. Well, let me tell you, it was like The Ed Sullivan Show. Toneet in air steeyewdio audience …” Even Byron’s Ed Sullivan was no good.

James was staring down at his plate through all of this, mixing together his turnips and mashed potatoes with his salad fork. Must he show his boredom so plainly? Finn had civilized him in some respects — he no longer drank Kahlúa, for instance — but his table manners were still an embarrassment. Not just the elbows, but the face hanging over the plate and the clumsy business of having to switch his fork to his right hand after cutting a piece of meat because no one had ever taught him to use his silverware properly. Well, that was a lost cause nowadays.

James began mixing in his cranberries, turning the whole mess gray. Finn leaned over to Carolyn and whispered, “I think your brother’s attention span has reached its limit. I should never have put him between Byron and Bill.” Before Byron had gotten the floor, Bill Whitley had been holding forth on Simon Callow. Which Finn couldn’t help but think was punningly appropriate, though to say so later to James would be a cheap shot.

“But God help me,” Byron Solomon was saying, “if there’s a kinescope floating around of my episode of Judge Roy Bean. Also pseudonymous. ‘Law West of the Pecos.’ Now, that’s one I do not care to see revealed.”

“Edgar Buchanan!” cried Bill Whitley. Everyone but the Whitleys had heard this, too.

“Suppose I mobilize him to help me clear,” Carolyn said to Finn. “Meanwhile you can rescue poor Deborah.”

Deborah Whitley, whom Finn had seated at his left, had her golden, mostly naked back to him, leaning into her conversation with Peter Sykes. Who had filled his and Deborah’s wineglasses twice now, and was speaking too low for the rest of the table to hear. He made a fist, then stretched forth the fingers like a tenor hitting a high note. Muscles bulged in his forearm: Peter Sykes was a sculptor who’d spent the past three months working in an auto body shop to sharpen his welding skills. Deborah Whitley laughed.

Finn admired Carolyn for her civilized pretense that her husband was a bore, bending the unwilling ear of the large-breasted, precariously halter-topped Deborah Whitley. Carolyn’s intelligence would probably get her through until her looks began to go. Good Christ, one’s friends.

After dinner, Byron nodded off in Finn’s armchair; then his eyes flew open and he said he guessed he’d better toddle along. The Whitleys had brought him, but Bill looked so crestfallen — Finn was flattered that he was enjoying himself, but appalled by his bad manners — that Peter Sykes offered to drive Byron home. This jogged Bill into a belated sense of the decencies, and that was it for the evening; one couldn’t very well ask Peter and Carolyn to stay on with the Whitleys standing right there. Carolyn offered to help with the cleanup, but Finn wouldn’t hear of it. She said she’d be glad to. Finn said they had things well in hand.

“Oh, don’t be such a macho man,” she said. “You’ll be up till all hours.”

“Well …,” said Finn.

“Shoo,” James said. “No girls allowed.”

“If you’re sure,” said Carolyn.

James rolled his eyes. “Ve vant,” he stage-whispered, “to be alone.”

Carolyn looked down at the beautiful wood floor.

After closing the door on all of them, Finn turned to James.

“There was no need to be brutal. Couldn’t you see she was upset?”

“What?” said James. “What are you talking about now?”

“Oh, come,” Finn said. “Even you couldn’t have missed what was going on at dinner. I assure you, your sister took note.”

“What, Stanley Kowalski and Little Bo Peep? Oh, for God’s sake. Parties are for flirting. That’s what they’re about. I mean, if there’s anybody there under fifty. Or wasn’t it like that back in your day?”

“This was a social evening,” Finn said, hating this tone he was being maneuvered into taking. “I don’t regard that as giving people license to hurt other people’s feelings.”

“Ooh,” said James. “Well I guess that tells me. The Queen of Feelings has spoken.” He walked into the kitchen with that walk Finn hated. That goddamn faggot walk, where the shoulders didn’t move. The fourth bottle of Montalcino — Finn also hated white wine — had only about that much left. He picked it up, glanced at the kitchen doorway and polished it off. What would the Italian be for À même la bouteille? He carried the dead soldier into the kitchen, not even looking at James (who fetched a loud sigh as he bent over the dishwasher), and on through into the mudroom, where he dropped it, clank, in with the green glass. All this environmental malarkey was accomplishing exactly nothing except to give a bunch of small people the power to tyrannize you when you went to the dump. Even grocery bags had turned self-righteous: WE RECYCLE, with the arrows going around. Finn hated that “we.”

On Saturday morning the phone rang while he was standing at the refrigerator eating cold stuffing with his fingers. “Hi,” said Carolyn. “I hope I’m not calling too early.”

“No no no, I’ve been up since seven-thirty.” Finn looked at his watch: eleven on the dot. “Didn’t you see me out back with my trusty wheelbarrow? That bloody sandbox is finally going the way of the swing set. This time next year we’ll have a backyard suitable for grown-ups, by Jesus.” He hated saying “we” to Carolyn, but “I” would’ve been even worse. “Did the O’Donnell children really play on that flimsy little swing set?”

“And everyplace else,” Carolyn said. “ Four of the little monsters. From sunup to sundown. Peter and I used to pray for a rainy day.”

“Ah, but sure and they were precious souls for Holy Mother Church,” said Finn.

“Listen, Finn?” Carolyn said. “There’s something — listen, James isn’t right there, is he?”

“Christ, no. Lazy little son of a bitch is still asleep.” The lumberjack mode, he felt, compensated for that “we.” “You want me to call him? It’s about time he—”

“No,” she said. “No, what I mean is, could I talk to you about something?”

“Of course.” He edged over to the kitchen table, watching the coils of the telephone cord stretch, and sat down. He put his hand to his shirt pocket as if pledging allegiance. Only the rattle of a matchbook.

“There was a message on our machine when we got home last night,” Carolyn said. Finn was scanning the room: damn it, his cigarettes were over there on the counter, far out of reach. “My father went in for some tests a couple of weeks ago. And now they want him to go back and have more done. And — you know, it just doesn’t sound very good.”

“Tests,” said Finn.

“See, he’s had, you know, rectal bleeding …”

“Right,” said Finn.

“And I just thought James ought to be told.”