That whole business with the guns had been just spooky as hell. “Maybe someday I’ll just decide that you’re no good, and I’ll take my gun and shoot you. Bang! just like that, and you’ll be dead, and I’ll betcha you wouldn’t like that at all.” When had I said that to Jack? Somewhere back in the long, shabby morning of our childhood. The words came echoing down to me, along with a picture of a dog rolling over and over in the snow. I tried to shrug it off.
I saw McKlearey’s car in the lot at the Green Lantern Tavern about two blocks from the court, and I decided that if he was still there when I came back, I’d haul in and buy him a beer. If we were going to go hunting together, I was going to have to make some kind of effort to get along with him. I still didn’t much like him though.
When I drove past Jack’s trailer, I saw the two little girls out in their play-yard, and I waved at them. I parked at my place and checked my mail — nothing, as usual. Then I slung Jack’s cleaning over my shoulder and hiked on up to his trailer. Maybe I could promote some lunch out of Marg if she didn’t have a whole trailerful of gossiping neighbors the way she usually did.
As I came up to the trailer, I glanced through the front window. I saw that mirror back in the hallway I’d noticed the first time I’d visited. I’d meant to tell Jack about it, but I’d forgotten. The angle from where I was standing gave me a view of part of the bedroom. I had visions of Margaret unveiling her monumental breasts to the scrutiny of casual passersby. I straightened up and craned my neck to see just how much of the bedroom you could really see.
Margaret was on the bed with McKlearey. They were both bare-ass naked, and their hands were awfully busy.
I have my faults, God knows, but being a Peeping Tom is not one of them. I think I was actually frozen to the spot. You hear about that, and I’ve always thought it was pure nonsense, but I honestly couldn’t move. Even as I watched, Lou raised up over her and came down between her widely spread thighs. Her huge, dark nippled breasts began to bob rhythmically in a kind of counterpoint to Lou’s bouncing, hairy buttocks. Her head rolled back and forth, her face contorted into that expression that is not beautiful unless you are the one who is causing it. I don’t think I’d ever fully realized how ugly the mating of humans can look to someone who isn’t involved in it. Even dogs manage to bring it off with more dignity.
I turned around and walked on back to my trailer, suppressing a strong urge to vomit. I went inside and closed the door. I laid Jack’s clothes carefully on the couch, went to the kitchen and poured myself a stiff blast of whiskey. Then, holding the glass in my hand, I took a good belt out of the bottle. I put the bottle down and drank from the glass. It didn’t even burn going down.
The phone rang. It was Clydine.
“I’ve been trying to get you all morning,” she said accusingly. “Where have you been?”
“I was busy,” I said shortly.
She started to tell me about some article she’d just read in some New Left journal she was always talking about. I grunted in appropriate places, leaning over the sink to watch Jack’s trailer out of the kitchen window. Even from here, I could see the whole damn thing rocking. I’ll bet you could walk through any trailer court in town and tell who was going at it at any given moment. Old Lou had staying power though — I had to admit that.
“Are you listening to me?” Clydine demanded.
“Sure, kid,” I said. “I was just thinking.”
“About what?”
“We’ve been invited to a party.”
“What kind of a party?”
“Probably a sex orgy,” I told her bluntly. “My brother and another guy and their girlfriends — it’s in a house.”
“I thought your brother was married.”
“So’s the other guy,” I said. I told her the details.
“No swapping?” It sounded like a question — or maybe an ultimatum, I don’t know.
“I doubt it. I’ve met the girls — one of them would probably dig that sort of stuff, but I’m pretty sure the other one wouldn’t. You want to go?”
“Why not? I’ve never been to an orgy.”
“Come on, Clydine,” I said. “It’s like being spit on. They’re not inviting you to meet their wives — just their mistresses.”
“So? I’m your mistress, aren’t I? Temporarily at least.”
“It’s different. I’m not married.”
“Danny, honestly. Sometimes you can be the squarest guy in the world. I think I might get a kick out of it. Maybe I can catch some of the vibrations from their sneaky, guilty, sordid, little affairs.”
“You’re a nut, do you know that? This thing tomorrow has all the makings of a sight-seeing trip through a sewer.”
“Boy, you’re sure in a foul humor,” she said. “What’s got you bum-tripped now?”
“My brother pulled a gun on me.”
“He what?”
“Just a bad joke. Forget it. Are you sure you want to go on this thing tomorrow?”
“Why not?”
“That may just be the world’s stupidest reason for doing anything,” I told her. “Hey, let’s go to a drive-in movie tonight.”
“What the hell for?”
“I want to neck,” I said. “No hanky-panky. I just want to sit in the car and eat popcorn and drink root beer and neck — like we were both maybe sixteen or something.”
“That’s a switch. Well, why not? — I mean, sure.” She paused, then said rather tentatively, “you want me to get all gussied up — like it was a real — well — date or something?’ She sounded embarrassed to say the word.
“Yeah, why don’t you do that? Wear a dress. I’ll even put on a tie.”
“Far out,” she said.
“And wear your contacts. Leave those hideous goggles at home.”
“Are you sure we aren’t going to — well — I mean, I wouldn’t want to lose my contacts.” I’d asked her before why she didn’t wear contact lenses. She told me she had them but didn’t wear them because they popped out when she made love. “I don’t know why,” she’d said, “they just pop out.” I’d laughed for ten minutes, and she’d gotten mad at me.
“They’re perfectly safe,” I said. “Hang up now so I can call my brother and tell him you want to go to his little clambake tomorrow.”
“Bye now.” She hung up, then she called right back.
“What time tonight?”
I told her.
I opened myself a beer and sat down at the kitchen table. What in the hell was I mixed up in anyhow? This whole damned situation had all the makings of a real messy blow-up. Christ Almighty, you needed a damned scoreboard just to keep track of who was screwing who — whom. When they all caught up with each other, it could wind up like World War in with bells on it, and I was going out in the woods with these guys — every one of them armed to the teeth. Shit O’Deare!
I didn’t belong in this crowd. But then I didn’t belong with a guy like Stan either, with the chic little gatherings and the little drama groups. Nor probably with my little Bolshevik sweetheart with her posters and pamphlets and free love. Nor with the phony artsy crowd with the paste-on beards and the Latvian folk-music records. Maybe for guys like me there just aren’t any people to really be with. Maybe if they were really honest, everybody would admit the same — that all this buddy-buddy crap or “interaction” shit was just a dodge to cover up the fact that they’re all absolutely alone. Maybe nobody’s got anybody, and maybe that’s what we’re all trying to hide from. Now there’s an ugly little possibility to face up to in the middle of a cool day in August.
Finally Lou left. I waited a while longer and then took the cleaning up to Jack’s trailer. Marg pulled a real bland face. She’d be a tiger in a poker game. We talked a few minutes, and then I drove back over to Mike’s place and went back to work on the rifle. At least that was something I could get my hands on.
10
I picked up Clydine about three thirty the next afternoon, and we drove on out to Milton for the combination GI-party-sex-orgy Sloane had cooked up. I was still a little soured on the whole thing, but Clydine seemed to think it would be a kind of campy gas to watch a couple of Establishment types and what she persisted in calling “their sordid little affairs.”