Joseph McElroy - Women and Men

The little bathroom was unexpectedly long. Davey’s hair was up against her nose and she put her arm around in front of him across his stomach, and she turned to look into the eyes of a short, bald man, who instantly frowned and turned away from her toward the toilet end, where there was a small, half-open window. "Where does that lead to?" he asked importantly, but the owner, whom he did not look back at, continued to shake his head. The bald man said, "Excuse me," and edged between the others and reached around them to the toilet, leaning over it. "Anyone else want to leave your wallet behind the toilet?"

A dark woman in a dark turtleneck sweater, whose shoulder was against a dark man, also in a dark turtleneck, with such firm tightness that you knew if you followed their arms downward you would find them holding hands, said, "What if he wants your wallet — what are you going to give him?"

"I got ten bucks in my pocket," the man said.

"Ten bucks," said the woman. "Are you kidding?"

The waitress had not appeared. The owner was shaking his head, butnow to himself. They were close together in the narrow, longish lavatory, yet exposed by the peculiarly high ceiling. Ann didn’t count how many were crowded in here. Davey whispered huskily, so the others heard, "There are ten people in here."

The dark man in the dark turtleneck looked a bit scared. The blonde woman, whose lacquered bouffant seemed to be in the wrong restaurant, had pursed her lips, but she bent around and gave the bald man a kiss that just missed his mouth. The black man at the door turned on the basin faucet and turned it off. The two young men who were at the rear by the toilet and the window had given way for the bald man to stash his wallet. One of them now said, "Are your lunch receipts in that register?"

The owner hesitated. He seemed to have a clear sense of what was outside the room where they were. "There’s always a first time," he said, and his accent gave a poignance to his words. "Well, it’s too bad," said the other young man by the toilet. "It really is." His friend said,"My spinach quiche is getting colder by the minute," and the other said, "Remember Greece— they said you should never eat food piping hot."

Davey leaned the back of his head against his mother’s shoulder and growled softly, "Where’s my mousse?" He said to the owner, "Somebody ought to see what’s happened to the waitress."

The owner opened the door and seemed to hear something and slipped out.

Ann hugged Davey. Her arm came around his stomach. "Did he say, ‘Everyone into the bathroom’?" she asked and she looked down at her bag, its flap covering the top but not fastened down through its leather loop.

"No," Davey said, "he said, ‘Everyone get into the back into thebathroom’—that’s what he said."

"I guess he doesn’t want us," said the woman in the dark turtleneck.

"Beware of pickpockets," growled Davey in his mother’s ear.

A terrific sadness descended upon her. The black man eased himself out the door.

"I don’t think I want my mousse," said Davey.

"We’ll ask for the check," Ann said. She put both hands on Davey’s shoulders. When this is all over, she meant.

"Do you want your strawberry tart?" he asked.

The owner appeared and said the man had gone.

The man who had hidden his wallet asked one of the young men to pass it to him.

The restaurant, when they came out, seemed especially empty, because the waitress was at the far end by the window, sitting beside the pastry desserts, huddled in the chair, and the black man was comforting her. She was quietly hysterical; she was not quite sobbing. She looked as if she were waiting for someone. There were half-empty wineglasses and salad plates with forks across them and chairs pushed back. Someone said, "I wonder if he helped himself."

It had been over so soon that Ann couldn’t think, except that with a pistol the young man could have made them go with him. Or killed someone just like that, so the person wouldn’t be around to go through the mug shots at the local precinct. She didn’t know the address of the local precinct. She didn’t know the address of the local precinct or what number precinct it was.

The waitress sat in the window crying. People were sitting down again. Ann told the owner she would have her coffee later. This sounded as if they were having hot dogs and beans in a diner. The check included the chocolate mousse and the strawberry tart. The owner subtracted the desserts.

The waitress stood up and smiled. Now it was the waitress Ann was paying; the owner was outside in the street. Davey looked up into the waitress’s face. He didn’t say anything.

"Are you all right?" said Ann as the waitress put down on the table the change from a twenty. "Have you ever been in a holdup before?"

The woman shook her head. She had shining blue eyes and rather curly brown hair, and she was tall and had delicate shoulders.

Davey said, "Our money is all that’s in the cash register."

Ann, being a genial, alert parent in the waitress’s presence, said, "Then where did she get the change from?"

"That’s a good question."

"Have you seen him before?" Ann asked the waitress.

The waitress shook her head. "I hardly looked at him."

"I’d never forget him," said Davey.

Ann heard herself say, "He was wearing a turquoise belt buckle."

The waitress excused herself. Ann left two dollars and as they got up to leave, Davey asked what percentage that was.

"Something over fifteen percent."

It was the very same restaurant, except that the owner, like a neighborhood Parisian, was standing out front, looking contemplatively down the street. A cab turned into the street and came very slowly by with a passenger looking out the window.

"Do you think he was dangerous?" Ann asked.

"Mom," said Davey, embarrassed.

"I think so," said the gray-haired man, his eyebrows raised.

"How much did he get?" asked Davey.

The man looked down at Davey and smiled and shook his head, but it didn’t mean he didn’t know.

"Are the police coming?" said Davey.

The owner gestured toward the street. "That’s what they said."

When Ann and Davey said goodnight to the owner, the holdup was all his. At the next corner Ann looked back and he was gone. Some people seemed to be looking at the menu in the window.

"Why did you shush me when I asked if the man was dangerous?" Ann asked.

"Because of course he was dangerous. He had a gun."

"I think it was a knife."

"No, it was definitely a gun. I saw it."

"I don’t see how."

"I was even closer than you."

"But they were still behind you, and when he pulled her out into the aisle his arm, his forearm, was turned around the way it would be if he had a knife handle in his palm."

"I know I saw the metal of a gun."

"I’m sure you’re wrong."

"I saw it."

"You saw something."

They crossed another avenue as the light changed in the middle.

Ann took Davey’s arm. He didn’t crook it at the elbow.

"It’s going to be a good weekend," said Ann.

They walked in silence.

"I got to call Michael and Alex," said Davey.

"You’re going to see Alex tomorrow."

"I’m going to see them both tomorrow. I’ve got to tell them about the holdup."

"Listen, it was real, Davey, it was serious."

"You’re not kidding it was serious," said her son. "We could have gotten killed."

"Well, I doubt that," she said, "but I was afraid he might reach for you, Davey, and he might have if the police had arrived." But it wasn’t delayed-reaction fear that seemed now to be overtaking her.

"How could the police have arrived?" said Davey. "No one called them till after it was all over."