A New Life (17 page)
Authors: Bernard Malamud
“Would you rather go to a movie?”
“Would you?” Her eyelids moved like a bird’s wings.
“Then let’s be honest,” Levin said. “Will you come with me to a hotel?”
“Not in town. We’d be recognized as faculty people. I know
I
would. So would you with your beard.”
I
would. So would you with your beard.”
“We could take a cab to the one in Marathon. It wouldn’t be too expensive.”
“The night clerk in Marathon is one of my former Grammar
Z
students,” Avis said. “Couldn’t we stay here?”
Z
students,” Avis said. “Couldn’t we stay here?”
“In the office?”
“Might we?”
Levin seized a practical suggestion. “Gladly. I’ll spread my raincoat on the desk.”
“The desk?” She hesitated. “It seems sacrilegious.”
“I hate to mention the floor but what else is there?”
“I have a blanket I keep in my office for football games,” Avis said.
“Marvelous. Shall I go get it?”
“You’ll find it in my closet.”
Levin went for the blanket. When he got back she had her dress and shoes off and was in brassiere and half slip. He folded the blanket lengthwise on the floor, then removed his jacket and tie.
As they were undressing they heard unmistakable footsteps coming up the stairs. Avis frantically stepped into her slippers and pulled on her dress. Levin got his shirt partly buttoned, and tie on, knotted badly. He helped her zip her dress.
A knock sounded on the door.
“Sy?” The voice was Gilley’s.
Levin shuddered. The danger was if he said nothing Gerald might open the door with the common key.
Avis frantically gestured: answer.
“Here,” Levin said. He said, “Avis is with me.”
There was a pause. “Could I see you?”
“Why not?” He heaped the blanket and kicked it under the desk. Avis had seated herself and poked her dead nose into a grammar text. Her poor neck was rigid.
“I saw the light under your door,” Gilley said. He had a mackinaw and boots, and was holding a hunting cap.
Avis smiled dimly. “Hello, Gerald.” She looked a wreck.
Gilley’s eyes roved uneasily but Levin’s glance assured him the blanket was invisible.
“Avis has been helping me in Grammar Z. She says I’m trying to cover too much in an hour.”
“Good,” said Gilley. He said he had come up for a book for Pauline. “George and I are taking off for some early shooting.
We usually snooze in his wagon and are right on the spot when the ducks fly in. Pauline hasn’t been sleeping too well lately and she wants something by Hardy around. All we have home is
The Return of the Native,
which she reread recently. Have you got something by him in your bookcase, Sy, maybe
Far From the Madding Crowd?
Maybe you have, Avis?”
We usually snooze in his wagon and are right on the spot when the ducks fly in. Pauline hasn’t been sleeping too well lately and she wants something by Hardy around. All we have home is
The Return of the Native,
which she reread recently. Have you got something by him in your bookcase, Sy, maybe
Far From the Madding Crowd?
Maybe you have, Avis?”
“No, Gerald, I don’t care for Hardy.”
Levin searched his shelves. “Here’s
Under the Greenwood Tree
in paperback.”
Under the Greenwood Tree
in paperback.”
“I don’t think she’s read that. Could I give either or both of you a lift?”
“Not me, thanks,” Levin said.
“Nor me,” said Avis. “I promised to return a set of quizzes Monday. Now that Seymour has his lessons in shape I think I’ll go back to my office and finish grading my tests. I hate to work on Sundays. Good night, gentlemen.”
“Good night, Avis,” Gerald said.
“Good night,” said Levin.
She walked quickly down the hall.
“Thanks for the book,” Gilley said. “Don’t work too late, Sy.”
“I’ll quit soon.” Levin yawned. “Got a letter to my cousin to finish up.”
Gerald lingered. He doesn’t believe me, Levin thought. “Give my best to Pauline. I hope she sleeps tonight.”
“She has these periods.” He said after a minute, “I’ll make a note to have this window Duffy cracked, replaced.”
“I would appreciate it.”
Gilley said, “Listen, Sy, you might as well know the boss is very strict about the separation of the sexes in offices. That’s why he’s never allowed a man and a woman to share one.”
“You don’t say?”
“I just want to give you an idea how he thinks.”
“I’m much obliged.”
Still Gilley stayed. “Avis is a very nice gal, but if I were you I’d keep in mind that women her age who aren’t married can be upset pretty easily. Well, so long.”
“Good night, Gerald. Tell Pauline I hope she sleeps well.”
“She will. She has these periods on and off.”
When Gilley had gone, Levin rested his head on his arms on the desk. His galloping heart slowed down to a fast trot. He finished his letter and was thinking of leaving.
But then Avis was back, freshly made up, her orange blossom renewed.
Her eyelids throbbed. “Shall we—go on?”
Levin peeled his jacket, snapped the lock, and again spread the blanket.
“This time we’d better put out the light,” she said.
When her brassiere came off, her breasts, handsome under clothes, hung like water-filled balloons from her chest. Levin shivered a bit, that splendid bosom formless. Still, for a starving man—
Once more they embraced, Levin in white shorts, Avis in pink panties.
He snapped off the light. Again she stopped his hand when he touched her left breast. “Not that one, it hurts.”
“Hurts?”
“Feel this.” Her fingers guided his. He felt a long scar on the underside of her breast.
She said she had once had an operation. “It was a benign fibroma. Now I have another and the doctor says it’s the same thing but I’ll have to have it out anyway, I imagine during the Christmas vacation. Here’s what hurts when you press.”
He felt a hard spot under his fingers.
Levin snapped on the light.
“Why, what’s the matter?” Avis asked.
“I’m sorry for your breast.”
“Don’t worry about it. You may fondle the other.”
Poor dame, he thought. She has little, why should I make it less?
He wavered indecisively, then reached for his pants and drew them on.
“I don’t understand,” she faltered. “Aren’t you—aren’t we going on?”
“When we have a better place, when you feel better,” Levin said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
Avis dressed quickly, grabbed her football blanket and left furiously.
To escape occasionally from town and loneliness, Levin, after much debate with himself—having consulted Bucket and Courtney Haddock, who knew about second-hand cars, bought himself one. He had arranged with a student of his, Lyman Myler from Los Gatos, another expert, a former hot rodder now majoring in automotive engineering, to accompany him to a used-car lot. Almost everyone of his freshman could drive, and most of them owned cars, usually new, but not Levin. Lyman helped him settle on a 1946 Hudson, a brown, two-door, five-passenger sedan, which though it sagged a bit in the rear, was in decent shape; and Levin agreed to pay three hundred and fifty dollars, a sum it made him nervous to owe anybody. He later learned he had bought ex-Dean Feeney’s trade-in for the latest model. The Hudson didn’t look like something he had dreamed of, but at least it moved on wheels, and so might Levin. He knew the town and a mile or two beyond, but not much more. It was time to venture forth.
Lyman drove the Hudson home and parked it in Mrs. Beaty’s garage. The next day he gave Levin his first driving lesson. The instructor fancied he would learn fairly quickly but found himself less apt than he had expected. He couldn’t understand how it was possible to shift, accelerate, turn, while watching direction, signs, and traffic–a confusing task for a mind that was non-mechanical or had come too late to mechanics. At the same time he felt a useless anger against himself for not at once mastering this carapace of tin over box of oil-soaked nuts and bolts. Two weeks later he knew the operation of the car but still overshot corners and skidded against curbs when pulling to a stop. He was uneasy in traffic, especially when
making left turns off busy streets. What bothered him most was that he was careless in ways he would not have predicted: momentarily lost in thought he could forget stop signs, and which was one way in a one-way street. Twice Lyman had to grab the wheel to prevent a mishap. As a result, Levin had his fears of the car and said so. Lyman said, “We all have to die sometime sooner or later.”
making left turns off busy streets. What bothered him most was that he was careless in ways he would not have predicted: momentarily lost in thought he could forget stop signs, and which was one way in a one-way street. Twice Lyman had to grab the wheel to prevent a mishap. As a result, Levin had his fears of the car and said so. Lyman said, “We all have to die sometime sooner or later.”
“Better later,” Levin muttered. “I have not yet begun to live.” Lyman said Levin would feel better once he had passed his test and driven a hundred miles alone. However, Levin seriously considered giving up the car and going back to walking. He was at best a bus and subway man. As for loneliness, better than a car was a girl; he would look actively now.
A few days later he failed his driver’s test and went home humiliated, convinced he must part with the car. Lyman offered to see if one of his frat brothers was interested, and Levin agreed to sell for three hundred dollars. He was ashamed of himself and mildly depressed. But after supper that night he sneaked downstairs, and backing the Hudson out of the garage, took off alone, a feat to begin with. It was of course raining and he felt a throb of satisfaction when he turned on the windshield wiper and it worked. Levin drove slowly in the rain, his heart beating thickly over the illegal thing he was doing, at the same time thinking he had never before so clearly seen raindrops falling into light. He felt intensely the danger of the adventure, pictured himself blundering into accident, arrest, being forbidden to drive in Cascadia, possibly sent to jail. It would all get into the paper, and everybody, including his students, would know him for the fool and lawbreaker he, by nature, was.
Bent over the wheel, peering into the dewy gloom, he drove in the emptiest part of town, practicing turns from street to street, and later—heart high and dry—drove downtown. Almost at once he saw the police car coming his way and felt paralysis of arm and leg; but when the car with its spinning blinker passed him, neither of the cops giving him so much as a glance,
Levin headed for the main highway out of Easchester. He drove for three miles at his fastest speed ever, a breakneck forty-five–then not to tempt fate, turned at a gas station and drove back. Behind him on the misty light-studded highway lay San Francisco, ahead Seattle, cities he longed to see. He pictured the U.S.A. as a structure of highways and freeways, Levin at the wheel, embarked on one leading to another, speeding up hill and down in his trusty Hudson, his lance at his side, driving through a series of amorous and philanthropic adventures. Home safely, though his legs trembled when he stepped out of the car, he was all in one piece and marvelously elated.
Levin headed for the main highway out of Easchester. He drove for three miles at his fastest speed ever, a breakneck forty-five–then not to tempt fate, turned at a gas station and drove back. Behind him on the misty light-studded highway lay San Francisco, ahead Seattle, cities he longed to see. He pictured the U.S.A. as a structure of highways and freeways, Levin at the wheel, embarked on one leading to another, speeding up hill and down in his trusty Hudson, his lance at his side, driving through a series of amorous and philanthropic adventures. Home safely, though his legs trembled when he stepped out of the car, he was all in one piece and marvelously elated.
After passing his driver’s test and getting his license, Levin was giving some thought to calling Avis Fliss, if at all feasible, when an attractive girl in one of his classes, Nadalee Hammerstad, began to haunt the surprised forefront of his mind. One day as they were sitting together in his office, discussing her latest theme—she had come in to ask about her grades—Nadalee, imperceptibly leaning forward, nuzzled her hard little breast against Levin’s lonely elbow. He moved his arm as if bitten although somehow managing not to be abrupt, at the same time considering the touch unintentional—someone else wouldn’t have noticed. He continued talking about her paragraphs, and although he could almost not believe it, the breast again caressed. To test whether this was his imagination overworking, Levin kept his arm where it had been, and the girl for the third time gave him this unmistakable sign of her favor as he droned on about her writing, his thoughts in the wild wind. Two minutes later she thanked him for his criticism and left with a happy smile, not the vaguest sign of a blush on her, although Levin glowed as with high fever.
He had noticed her more than once, a slim girl with short dark-brown hair, pretty, with greenish eyes, mature face, and shapely figure. Although her lower lip was thin and
she used eyebrow pencil a bit smearily, she had a way with clothes. Whereas the other girls in her class were contented with skirts and sweaters of pastel shades, or blouses, Nadalee fitted into tight dresses and favored bright colors, a blessing on rainy days. The freshman girls smelled of body heat and talcum powder, but she wore a spicy perfume, which when it touched Levin’s nostrils, never failed to interest him. When she slid into her seat in the second row he knew it without looking. There was about her a quality of having been and seen, that made the instructor feel he could talk to her. And she wrote well, sometimes imaginatively. He felt let down when she was absent. Still, he paid her no special attention, and had given her not much thought after class until her visit to his office. After that she was in his mind so tenaciously it wearied him.
she used eyebrow pencil a bit smearily, she had a way with clothes. Whereas the other girls in her class were contented with skirts and sweaters of pastel shades, or blouses, Nadalee fitted into tight dresses and favored bright colors, a blessing on rainy days. The freshman girls smelled of body heat and talcum powder, but she wore a spicy perfume, which when it touched Levin’s nostrils, never failed to interest him. When she slid into her seat in the second row he knew it without looking. There was about her a quality of having been and seen, that made the instructor feel he could talk to her. And she wrote well, sometimes imaginatively. He felt let down when she was absent. Still, he paid her no special attention, and had given her not much thought after class until her visit to his office. After that she was in his mind so tenaciously it wearied him.
Nadalee took on a private uniqueness, a nearness and dearness as though he were in love with her. Although he told himself he wasn’t, she had in a sense offered love, and love was what Levin wanted. Though he tried diligently to cast her out of his thoughts, she sneaked back in with half her clothes off to incite him to undress the rest of her. He tried to figure out how to achieve an honorable relationship with the girl. If they were elsewhere in another season—if let’s say, in the Catskills in July or August, he might with comparatively undisturbed conscience have taken a bite of what she offered. But here in Easchester, at Cascadia College, English 10, Section Y, 11 A.M. MWF, she was his student and he her instructor, in loco parentis, practically a sacred trust. Levin determined to forget the girl, but his determination was affected by hers. Nadalee appeared in class, the day after the time she had upset him in his office, in one of her prettiest dresses, a thickly petticoated affair, white with wine stripes encircling hips, belly and breasts. She crossed and uncrossed her slim young legs enhanced in nylon stockings. On her narrow feet she wore black ballet slippers in which, without much trouble, he could see her on her toes in
Swan Lake,
himself the evil magician.
Surely, he thought, this dressing up isn’t for me; and though he went on in class as if he knew what he was doing, he could not keep from desiring her—to consume and be consumed. Afterwards, alone in his office, his chest palpitating as though he were contemplating murder, or flying off on a roaring drunk, Levin reread her themes and in one came across a biographical bit he couldn’t understand why he had forgotten. When she was eighteen she had spent a summer on her uncle’s ranch in Northern California. In the afternoon when it was hot Nadalee rode her horse to a small lake surrounded by pine trees, tossed off shirt and bra, stepped out of levis and underpants, and dived into the cold blue water. Though Levin’s legs cramped after a too hasty immersion in cold water, he jumped in after her and spent most of the night swimming with Nadalee.
Swan Lake,
himself the evil magician.
Surely, he thought, this dressing up isn’t for me; and though he went on in class as if he knew what he was doing, he could not keep from desiring her—to consume and be consumed. Afterwards, alone in his office, his chest palpitating as though he were contemplating murder, or flying off on a roaring drunk, Levin reread her themes and in one came across a biographical bit he couldn’t understand why he had forgotten. When she was eighteen she had spent a summer on her uncle’s ranch in Northern California. In the afternoon when it was hot Nadalee rode her horse to a small lake surrounded by pine trees, tossed off shirt and bra, stepped out of levis and underpants, and dived into the cold blue water. Though Levin’s legs cramped after a too hasty immersion in cold water, he jumped in after her and spent most of the night swimming with Nadalee.
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