J. Powers - Wheat That Springeth Green

“Have to turn off the sign when you leave?”

“I don’t have to do nothin ’.” She was feeling around in her handbag. “Gimme one of them things.”

He produced his English Ovals, pushed in the dashboard lighter, pulled it out, but not too soon, and held it away from her mouth, making her come for it — all while driving in traffic. Randy couldn’t have done better.

“Phew! You like these lopsided stinkers?”

Not what Diane would say, he thought, and was silent.

Cheerfully: “Know why I like this boat, kid?”

“No.”

“Looks like a hearse.” She laughed at the idea.

“Uh-huh.”

“Smells like one too.”

“Uh-huh.” He produced his (really Mama’s) little silver flask. “Scotch, babe?”

She turned on him. “You crazy kid! You shouldn’t drink when you drive! You shouldn’t drink! You wanna get us both arrested?” She was panting, arousing him.

He took a nip from the flask and put it away.

“And don’t call me babe,” she said.

“Don’t call me kid,” he said.

“Call you what I like.”

“Call you what I like.”

She shut up then, so he did, and they rode in silence. He’d meant to stop at the drugstore, but stopped instead at the station, which he wouldn’t have done if he hadn’t seen Dale out in front, hosing down the pavement. “Carton o’ Luckies,” Joe called to him — knew her brand from his afternoons in the sun with her and Frances, from being so observant then — and Dale hurried into the station.

“I got some in my apartment.”

“Get you some more.”

When Dale came out of the station, Rock did too, and while Dale collected for the carton and cleaned the windshield, especially the passenger’s side, and talked about the weather, failing, though, to bring the passenger into it, Rock did the pavement, holding the hose between his legs, about a foot from the nozzle, all the time looking over at the car solemnly, which was embarrassing. When Joe drove away, he could — fortunately, she couldn’t — see the attendants standing together in the rearview mirror, Rock laughing, Dale shaking his head.

“Them jerks know you?”

“They know the car.”

He drove down the alley so she’d be on the right side to go into her place when she got out of the car, and then he reached across and opened the door, his arm resting for a moment on her legs above the knees but not much.

“Thanks for the ride and ceegrettes, Joe.” Joe, not kid.

Yes, but he was afraid she was saying good night to him, had changed her mind about doing business with him, and the laugh was going to be on him — there wouldn’t be anything, as there might have been, to keep her from telling Frances what had happened that night.

“Gimme a few minutes ’fore ya come up, Joe.”

“O.K.” Blasé .

He put the car in the garage, went into the house, washed his hands and face, his armpits and crotch (into which he shook talcum powder), combed his hair, urinated, and retired to his room to top up his flask from a bottle of White Horse on loan from the pantry, then returned to the garage, to the car for — it was on the floor in back — the bouquet of roses.

The door at the top of the stairs was wide open — on account of the heat or him? — and he could hear the shower running, but he politely knocked — no response — before entering. Her apartment (what she called it) was just one big room with kitchen facilities and a bathroom, the door of which was wide open — on account of the heat or him or both? A small oscillating fan was playing on the opened-out couch, her bed, a pillow and sheet on it. He didn’t want to sit there, naturally, or in the overstuffed chair, on account of the heat, and chose a straight-back chair from which he could see straight into the bath-room. It then occurred to him, sitting there with the bouquet wrapped in green wax paper, how he might look to her — like an old-fashioned beau, Harold Lloyd or somebody, in the movies — and so he put the bouquet on the floor. Then he got up to draw the shade of the window into which it was possible for a Peeping Tom to see, but not very well, from the house across the way. He returned to the straight-back chair, took a nip from his flask, and was reaching for his cigarettes, but forgot all about them when she stepped out of the shower wearing, it seemed, because of her tan, a white bathing suit.

“Oh, hi,” she said.

He nodded. Blasé.

She held up a towel. “Do my back.”

He went, not hurrying, into the bathroom and did her back — she was softer than he would have thought. Down below, where he wanted to do her, but did not, she was whiter, bigger than he would have thought, and was probably softer.

“Do my bottom too.”

So he did, and she was.

“Do it good.” She spread her legs and reached around to feel him down below. “My.”

He — it was strange— enjoyed his embarrassment and reached around to cup one of her creamy cherry-tipped orbs.

“You nasty man!” She snatched the towel away from him and held it crushed to her body, above the waist, and spoke to him, but down below. “Should be ashamed of ya’self! Go stand in the corner!”

He knew she was kidding, but he left the bathroom, blasé, stiffly though, somewhat hobbled by his erection, and stiffly stooped down for the bouquet, in it a little envelope — this was something he’d worried about and wanted to get over with.

She came bouncing and jiggling out of the bathroom in her black pumps only. “For me ! Oh, hon, ya shouldn’a !”

“It’s in the envelope.”

“Whut?”

“You know.”

After she counted it — he’d made it thirty — and she gave him a hug, a loose quick one because she had the bouquet in one hand and the envelope in the other, she stood back and stared at him down below. “My, my.”

Enjoying his embarrassment, but blasé, he offered her his flask. “Drink?”

“ Now? ”

“Not now?”

“Later, hon.”

He had one anyway.

“You’re bad as Rex. I gotta put these in water.” She went bouncing and jiggling over to the sink with the roses. “Take off your clothes, hon.”

This was something else he’d worried about and wanted to get over with and was why, because there was something funny about a man in underwear, he wasn’t wearing any. There was something funny too about an otherwise naked man in shoes and socks but he kept his on, not liking the look of the floor.

“ My .” She had put the roses in a papier-mâché vase such as undertakers use and had set it on the end table by the couch. At the other end of the couch, the open end, she spread a towel. “Bring any safeties?”

“Oh, yeah.” He hadn’t forgotten them, he just hadn’t known exactly when he’d need one, and went over to the straight-back chair, to his coat. She helped him on with one, kneeling down to do it. “ My .” She stood up and bumped her bottom into him.

“I better shut the door,” he said.

“No. That’s part of it.”

“How d’ya mean, Dora?”

She laughed at him. “Oh, nobody’ll come—’cept you, I bet.” And plopping down on the couch where the towel was, she raised and cocked her legs back so he could see her bottom very well, also the soles and heels of her pumps, and then, using both hands, her fingers pressing down and fanned out, she parted the hair at her crotch and the lips there. “See?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Move the light closer.”

He moved the floor lamp closer.

“See more now?”

“Uh-huh.”

“What ya see?”

“You know.”