Toby Olson - Seaview

“Nothing, Daddy, just sitting here thinking.”

“Thinking, huh. It’s getting to be time,” he said as he stuck the key in the ignition and twisted it, starting the car.

“Hey, good Daddy, I’ve been waiting for the right time,” she said, but he thought she didn’t understand what he was referring to and thought it was sex. He let it go, feeling what for him was a kind of benevolence in not taking her up on her mistake.

They drove out of the parking lot and down the blacktop road past the small clubhouse on the right. The yellow night light at the clubhouse door was burning, and it shone enough to illuminate the dark figures of pine trees and the edge of the green beyond them. He caught a glimpse of the ripple of the flag on the flagstick as they passed. When they got to the end of the road, they turned right and headed back toward the mid-Cape highway. The road that took them there was guarded from the openness of the course and the sea beyond it by high trees and brush.

It could have been a road in another part of the country entirely, and as such it seemed of little consequence to Seaview Links and its fortunes.

THE TWO OF THEM SAT ON THE SAND OF THE WINTER berm below the lighthouse, and up the beach and away from it. It was not really cold there, but they both felt a little chill and pulled their blankets around their shoulders, gathering themselves in tight around the small fire they had built with driftwood. The stars seemed very hard in the sky, the partial moon a dark, burnished yellow and not giving off much light. Frank Bumpus talked, and Bob White listened. At times Bob White asked questions about particular people or the nature of local political affiliations. He jotted things down in a small notebook, holding it close to the fire when he wrote. Then he talked for a while, and Frank Bumpus listened, interjecting information when necessary. They tried hard to admire the beauty of the night on the beach and the sounds and look of the waves when they curled and flashed phosphorous, but they continued to feel a little cold and their admiration never really got a good start.

After a while, seeing that there was not much use in staying there, they stirred the fire in sand, rolled their blankets and, staying in close to the cliff, headed under the lighthouse and down the beach to the cut that would take them up the dunes to Frank Bumpus’s house. When they got there, they drank tea and talked a little more by candlelight. Frank Bumpus got some Courvoisier and a couple of Swiss cigars out of the cupboard when their tea was gone. They drank and smoked and talked about strategy and implementation. Then they talked some about Thoreau, and Frank Bumpus spoke about the Seaview Historical Museum, where the Pamet documents were on display, suggesting they go there tomorrow and have a look at them. He said he would also show Bob White the place of the underground river that had been the people’s watering place. Bob White spoke of the Indian school he knew about where the teacher, herself a Pima, had taught the students by having them assemble the skeleton of a deer from the bones brought from various places. The students were asked to do it without the aid of books or foreknowledge about human or animal anatomy. It was a good way for them to learn about skeletal structure, he said. He said that it may be that it is a good way to learn about other things as well. They talked on for a little while, finishing their brandy and cigars. When they were done, it was one o’clock in the morning, and they went to bed.

I LEARNED WHIPPING AND WHAT IT COULD BE ABOUT when it was tender. And I was good at it and could teach it too. It was a way of cleaning up before lying down, properly, with a woman. And then I taught it to him, and he twisted it. I liked it that way too at first, but coming out was like going into a dream — he had so much scag and blow for me — and I didn’t see he turned it to shame and guilt. You grow too old for those things after a while. It’s a look back into childhood, and there comes a time to get rid of that. Forcing and saying the words, faking and pretending, don’t really make it happen.

I never hit Annie very hard, just enough to sting her, to wake her up, and I talked to her all the time that I did it. The talk was about how the men, though they never really beat her, might as well have been doing the same thing, because they wore her mind down, and I told her she needed a change of attitude.

Before Annie got sick and died in the joint, the whipping stopped, and we had a good two months together before they took her off to the infirmary. We used to lie in bed facing each other, just the nipples on our breasts and the tips of our toes touching. I’d run the end of my tongue over her lips then, and we would put our hands on the curves above each other’s hips. We didn’t use any devices that reminded us of men, nor did we touch each other in manly ways. I kissed her eyes, and she kissed mine. I bit her ear lobes gently. I took quiet handfuls of her soft flesh. She kissed the little cups behind my knees. We rubbed our mounds together and had sweet names for them. We were never violent or aggressive, nor did we order each other to do things. I gave her a swatch of fabric from the inside of the leg of an old pair of jeans of mine. She gave me a metal comb. I took her to the window to see the birds in the high trees beyond the walls. She told me stories about dreams of flying. I read her Virginia Woolf and Kate Chopin. I gave her cigarettes. I liked the way she sighed when she saw the birds sit on the walls under the trees. She gave me a small purse that she made out of cigarette wrappers. She said she liked the way I was thin and graceful when I walked. I gave her a green marking pencil. She liked to draw pictures of natural objects on my stomach. I liked the way she hummed to herself in the morning, washing up. We painted each other’s toenails with glitter.

She said she liked my eagerness, my little sounds, when I kissed her. She gave me anemones that she had saved up for. I gave her a black, domed pearl button she had admired on a frock of mine. I liked to put my knee between her thighs when we were sleeping. I liked the narrowness of the bed. She told me stories about her childhood in great detail while we were drifting off.

I dabbed her tears away with Kleenex and kissed the places where the drops had rested. I liked the way her breath smelled when we awakened. She gave me her wedding ring to wear on my thumb. I gave her salted peanuts in small packages. I opened the packages with my teeth and handed them to her. I liked her smile, a little cockeyed, and her even teeth. She told me she liked my toes, and she did the little piggie game for me. I gave her some peace of mind, I think. She liked to comb my hair out by the window. We liked to walk together in the courtyard, making no show of affection but enjoying the looks of the others who knew about us. We liked it that they really didn’t know anything at all. She gave me kisses in the palms of my hands.

I gave her a picture of myself to carry in her pocket. I cut the man out of it with scissors. She liked to brush against me secretly in public. I enjoyed it when she lifted me off the bed and sat me up. I rocked her in my arms when she got sick and fearful. We had secret names for each other, different ones we didn’t think were silly. I gave her pieces of hard candy. She told me she was in love with me and made a small occasion out of saying it. I liked the feel of the thickness of her ankles, holding them when I rubbed her feet. We liked to stand together at the window. She gave me a hanky she had embroidered: a crewelwork crown of red vines and a small blue flower in the corner. I gave her a peach when I got it. She said she liked the way my teeth felt under my tongue. She gave me a felt bookmark with a prayer on it. I liked to look up and see her listening hard when I read to her. She mouthed the words of repeated passages. She fluffed the pillows for me.