Stephen Dixon - 30 Pieces of a Novel

They walked and talked. She took his hand, he let her for a minute and then pulled it away, patted the hand that had held his, and said, “I might meet someone — this is home territory, the whole Upper West Side is — or you might. They won’t know what to think. That concerns me; what can I tell you? They’ll maybe think you’re with your grandfather. And if they see us crossing the street, that you’re helping him across, and if they do think that, we’ll be lucky,” and she said, “Don’t be maudlin. And how can anyone think I’m helping you across if I’m not holding on to you?” “I see you, I see my daughter, what can I tell you?” and she said, “And I see you and I don’t see my father.” “You have to.” “Don’t tell me what I have to see. And you don’t see your daughter in me either. Besides, you need as much help getting across the street, and look it, as I do. Please, don’t be such a schmuck. You’re too old for it; it’s unbecoming and to me unattractive,” and he said, “Listen, I can’t take a girl forty-plus years younger than I, a young woman — a woman, all right, a woman — calling me a schmuck. ‘Unattractive,’ fine. When I was your age or ten years older that might have hit me, but not now.” “I meant in an ugly way, that ‘unattractive,’” and he said, “Still, I don’t care. But you don’t know what that ‘schmuck’ does to me.” “Then what should I call you, ‘my darling’?” “Of course not; it wouldn’t be true.” “I know. That’s why I said it,” and he said, “Good, then you also know now I’m slow.” “Really, Gould, we should talk some more about this and your perspective on it, but not while we’re walking. Would you care to go in someplace quieter and less crowded this time for another wine and beer?” “Coffee,” and she said, “I could make us coffee at my place.” “Oh, jeez, I don’t know. Haven’t I turned you off sufficiently where you’d rather have seen the last of me?” “You’re doing your darnedest but it hasn’t reached the point where I see anything too difficult to overcome.” “Nicely and graciously put, but I don’t deserve it. Okay, your place, so long as you know there’ll be no commitment from me to go further. ‘Urgency … push.’ I’m not saying it right — I’m doddering — but you must know what I’m getting at.” “Just coffee. If it only comes to that. Because I don’t like any prearranged restriction if there really seems no call for one.” “Listen. Suppose it went further — I’m definitely not saying for today — and you hated it, were even repulsed by it because you suddenly saw how old and doddery I was, and then we’d have to walk around each other on the street after that when we met, not wanting to say anything to the other or even approach him—” and she said, “So? First of all, we wouldn’t stalk around, or what you said. What does it mean anyway? You make it look like two snarling panthers — lions, cheetahs, one of the feral cat families — because one’s in the other’s territory, by gosh — or maybe cheetahs and panthers only go roaming — but the other doesn’t want him there.” “That’s not what I meant. I was talking about potential embarrassment, uncomfortableness.” “So I got it wrong. My turn to be incoherent. Sorry. But we’d just — and my ‘sorry’ was for insinuating you were being incoherent; you weren’t, or not much. But if I now have it right, we’d just say hello, talk politely a little, ask after the other’s family — I feel I know enough about yours to do that, or would by then, and I also know how much you love talking about them — and then go our two ways, something that shouldn’t be new in relationships to either of us. We all come across people we don’t particularly want to meet, but we deal with them civilly, don’t we? — no inclination to hurt or get revenge? But tell me why we’re talking like this. It’s ridiculously premature. For now, let’s just have coffee. Or if you want — I feel I’m pushing you too much on this, as you said, or did I get that wrong too? — maybe we should go home, you to yours, me to mine, so long till the next time, if we meet on the street or in the market or one of us wants to call and the other doesn’t object to receiving.” “No, coffee and dessert, on me and at a coffee bar, please.” “You paid for the movie tickets and drinks.” “I like to pay; I do it without argument or for reward,” and she said, “If we’ve settled on coffee and dessert, I have some Mondel’s chocolate lace cookies in a tin, just a few days old … well, I’ve given myself away: but at my apartment? I also have a new espresso machine never used: cappuccino, espresso, the works. And brandy, which I use for cooking, but it’s good stuff, if you want to cap the night,” and he said, “Do you have a roommate? Only because I don’t want to converse with anyone else tonight under forty,” and she shook her head. “I live alone. I thought I told you that,” and he said, “Not that I remember, but we’re both pretty aware by now of my deficiency that way,” and she said, “Well I do, my big luxury; the espresso machine was a housewarming gift from my folks, along with a Bokhara rug.”

They cabbed to her place. He looked at his building as he went into hers. He forgot to ask if it’s a student building, lots of young students around, and if there’s a Columbia University security guard at the door, but there wasn’t, and nobody in the lobby or at the elevator, and what would he have done if there was? He’d have gone in with her. She was the one who wanted to cab. “But it’s only ten blocks,” he’d said, “and I like walking and it’s a nice night,” and she said, “I’m tired: my feet. I haven’t been on them all day, but they hurt. I’m older than you think, physically; I also have a waitress job three days a week,” and he said, “Oh, you didn’t say,” and wondered where it was and what would happen if he went into it by accident in the next few days and saw her there, or let’s say if they said, later tonight, It isn’t a good idea to see each other again, and then sometime in the next few days he went into the restaurant, sat at a table alone or at the counter — he prefers counters to tables when he eats alone: it’s quicker and also easier to read a book on them — and she turned out to be his server. In the cab she’d asked if he had any siblings and he said, “One, a few years younger, but he died when I was a boy,” and she said, “So did mine, an older sister by two years, but she was killed by a hit-and-run when she was nineteen,” and he said, “I didn’t know; I’m very sorry. I only remember one girl from my dinner at your house, and I’m almost sure it was only once, so maybe it wasn’t even you I saw then,” and she said, “You forget it was I who first recognized you. It could be that Sue was sick that night and had to stay in her room or was on a sleep-over. Anyway, we’ve something very deep in common,” and he said, “But my loss was almost sixty years ago. It was in Central Park. We were standing by the bridle path. I was supposed to be looking after him, and a horse went nuts, tossed its rider, and kicked my brother in the head, and he suffered for a long time with a blood clot and seemed to recover, and then, like an old man shooting an embolism or whatever they shoot, died doing his rudimentary schoolwork at home. I think he was drawing the cover of his book report.” He thought, riding up the elevator and staring at the gash in the ceiling panel and cable moving above it, Why’d he lie about his brother, and what’s going to happen now with her? He’s not prepared for it. What does he do with a young woman? Not prepared with a bag either, but she probably has a packet of them in her night table or another kind of protection. If it comes to that, as she said, if that’s what she meant. It’s been so long with any woman. But a young one with such a young body, everything flat and firm, it seems. And he hasn’t made love with anyone but his wife since he met her — has kissed a few but hasn’t even touched one on the breast, and he thinks every kiss he did was when he was a little high and standing in someone’s kitchen. All his hand and finger movements will be the ones he did with his wife thousands of times. He knew what she liked, how she wanted it done, and if he didn’t, she told him, so he thinks he’ll probably do things to this girl’s body as if it were his wife’s. If he ends up inside her, he’ll come in a minute. No, he knows how to hold it back if he wants to, or for a few minutes after it seems he’s going to come soon, but that was with his wife and after many years with her. It’s going to happen though, sex, if not tonight then soon with her. If there’s a chance for it tonight, will he do it? Yes, because when she decides to do it — his age and looks again — that might be the only time she does. She’ll give him the smile, he’ll kiss her this time, it could even start right after they close the door and hang up their jackets: she’ll start rubbing his back, he’ll rub hers, they’ll be standing and embracing at the time — best it starts up after their jackets are off and maybe even their sweaters: more maneuverability, fewer layers to tug up and go under — then the legs, sides, behinds, they’ll feel around and this piece of clothing will be off and that one and soon all of them, and it’ll be many kisses later and he’ll be worrying if his breath stinks to her, if she’s imagining it stinks because he’s old, if she isn’t already turned off by him, his skin, wrinkles, and flab. But she’ll still be kissing — lips and tongue don’t change, he doesn’t think — and maybe thinking she’ll do it with him this once, what’s the harm? a different kind of experience, et cetera, and she’s already a little excited, see him on the street after that, say it just wasn’t going to work, that’s why she didn’t call or answer his answering-machine messages, but no regrets — and they’ll go to the bedroom and so on and then he’ll have done it, first time with someone since his wife, if it, please God, comes to that.