None of this Ever Really Happened (22 page)

Charlie was a man with many friends, and
he counted you among the best of them. I'm
sure you'll keep him in kind memory.

Sincerely,
Dick

There's a painting by John Sloan in the Art Institute of Chicago
called
Renganeschi's Saturday Night,
that shows three
young women out to dinner in a popular New York restaurant
in 1912. The tablecloths are white, the waiters tuxedoed
and the place is busy, crowded, and gay. The painting always
reminds me of Mia Francesca, the spot Carolyn and I had
dinner that Friday night. It's a narrow, bright, loud, and festive
room on North Clark Street, just around the corner from
Carolyn's place. She already had a table against the wall and a
glass of red wine when I came in.

"Thought I better get a place. It fills up fast."

"I'll have whatever she's drinking," I said. "Cold out." We
talked about the cold and Christmas and Carolyn's new job
and Tanya Kim, who had left me a thank-you phone message
and said she was going to send me something that hadn't
arrived yet. We talked about that evening.

"You know, it was really interesting," Carolyn said. "These
three women . . . they couldn't decide if they were rivals or
allies. I've never felt a stranger dynamic in a room, yet it
wasn't bad. It was good, really. Don't you think it turned
out well?"

"I'm just glad it's over." I thanked her for recommending
Gene, and we talked about him. She said she liked that he
didn't make judgments rashly.

I said, "Neither do you, you know. I don't know if you've
always been like that or if you learned it from Gene, but it
seems to me you've always been like that. When people were
rolling their eyes behind my back, you treated me as if I
might actually be sane. I mean, I did go a little overboard
there for a while."

"Maybe, but when you told us about the accident, I
was touched. I think it was because you believed that you
could have done something—very few people think that
they can—and maybe even more, that you should have done
something—even fewer of us think that—and I guess I liked
that you believed in yourself when you must have known that
other people were doubting you, so I just kind of decided to
believe in you, too, and it turns out that your instincts were
pretty good and I guess mine were, too."

"Then you don't think what I'm going to do is harebrained?"
I asked.

"I think it's what you need to do."

"Think it will work?"

"Who knows, Pete. I have no idea. What are we
toasting?"

"I'm saying good-bye."

"Good-bye?"

"I'm going to Mexico." Carolyn raised her eyebrows. "It's
cheap and I'm not going to have a lot of money. And I really
like Mexico; I feel at home there, and I figure I can make a
little money writing travel pieces."

"To Mexico, then." She raised her wineglass.

I looked at her and she at me and we smiled. "I did fall a
little bit in love with her, you know."

"I know."

"I think its time to get beyond that, too. I've been thinking
I might start dating again."

"Good. I think you're ready for that," she said.

"Yeah, but I don't know where to begin."

"You must know a lot of eligible women. Aren't schools
full of them?"

"Yeah, but I'm not sure I want to date someone I work
with. And I'm not sure . . . that's the thing. What am I looking
for? I don't want to do this the same way I did it when I
was twenty-two, and you can imagine what criteria I used
then. No, I said to myself, don't even think about sex or love
or romance or marriage. Think about one thing: Think about
someone you would really enjoy having dinner with, nothing
more. So I decided to make a list. I went to Café Express
with a pad and pen and I wrote down your name, naturally,
since we do this from time to time, and I always enjoy it, and
then I couldn't think of anyone else whom I'd rather have
dinner with, or even whom I'd like to have dinner with, so
I stopped."

She looked at me strangely. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that I'd like to write you while I'm away. May
I do that?"

She didn't answer. She was flustered, and I liked that she
hadn't seen it coming. For all her wisdom and intelligence,
there was something in her that was also naïve and innocent.
She regained her composure as we looked at the photographs,
ate our meals, and talked of other people. Steve's doing this,
Wendy's doing that, and someone else something else. She
asked if I had talked to Lydia.

"No. You?"

"We haven't talked." She had called and left two or three
messages, but Lydia hadn't called back, and Carolyn thought
that meant that she wasn't interested in continuing their
friendship. Too many associations, probably. By this time we
had paid our bill and were standing in front of the restaurant
on the pavement, and Carolyn asked me where I was
parked.

"I'm right on your block. Can I walk you home?"

"Sure." I think we were both trying not to touch each
other—not even to brush shoulders—but when we came to
an icy patch, I took her elbow, and when we got to her steps,
she asked me if I wanted to walk Cooper with her.
"Sure." Cooper was happy to see me. We followed him
down to Halsted Street and back to Clark Street, and when
we got there, Carolyn said, "I'll buy you a nightcap at The
Outpost."

"What about Cooper?"

"We'll tie him to the no-parking sign, and everyone who
comes by will pet him. He'll love it." So we sat at the bar
sipping Grand Marnier and watching Cooper through the
plate-glass window. Carolyn mused, then turned to me and
said, "Pete, I know we've known each other a long time, but I
still don't think you know me very well."

"I know you have strong friendships," I said. "I know you
like to travel and scuba dive. I know your favorite color is
green. I know you don't allow dogs on your furniture. I know
you love to read."

"Reading is almost my favorite thing to do."

"And cooking," I said, "and singing."

"Yes," but she said she sang only in big groups or entirely
alone. She wanted me to know that; she didn't like to stand
out; she didn't like to be the life of the party. "I can't tell a joke,
and public speaking gives me panic attacks."

"Not good for a lawyer."

"That's why I'm not a litigator. I do not like to be the center
of attention. It makes me nervous. I do not like the limelight.
A lot of people find me a little boring."

"I do not, and you still haven't told me anything I don't
know. Tell me something that will surprise me."

"I'm a nervous driver. I'm scared of heights. I hate
football."

"I'm still not surprised."

"Okay, I don't like Christmas very much except for the
music and I hate 'Little Drummer Boy.'"

"Something more."

"You have a white car and I don't like white cars."

"What's wrong with 'Little Drummer Boy'?"

"It's repetitive and sentimental."

"Why don't you like Christmas?"

"It's a hard day for single people. I always try to be traveling
on Christmas Day."

"And white cars?"

"They look like kitchen appliances."

I held up my glass. "Would you like another one of
these?"

"And I never have more than one nightcap. See, I'm a real
stick-in-the-mud."

We walked back. She was standing at the top of the steps
with Cooper about to open the door, and I was standing at
the bottom when I called her name. "Carolyn."

"Yes?"

"May I write you?"

She thought about that for a moment. "Yes," she said.

I
T WAS LYDIA'S
first time in Mexico. We were quite
young. My Spanish was a bit rusty, and she didn't
speak any yet. I had just gotten my first travel-writing
assignments, and I was anxious to get going, but all
Lydia wanted to do was hang around San Miguel de Allende.

Not that there is anything wrong with San Miguel de Allende.
It is a lovely place, really, one of a handful of towns
scattered across Mexico that have been declared national
monuments in their entireties and preserved because of their
colonial character. That means a cathedral, narrow cobblestone
streets, plazas and bandstands, arcades and tile roofs,
a colorful town market, adobe walls over which orange and
bright purple bougainvilleas crawl and drape, and tantalizing
glimpses from the street through a door just closing or
one left ajar of private inner spaces, of courtyards, fountains,
flowers, secret trees, and hanging baskets of green, blue, and
yellow birds.

Maybe it is because San Miguel is so lovely a place or that
it has an excellent art school and a couple of little language
schools that there are just a few too many Americans around.
Enough so that the waiters all speak English, that there's an
English-language bookstore on the main plaza, a good pizza
place one block from it and, depressingly, a subdivision just
outside of town that is occupied almost exclusively by retired
gringos.

Of course, as a first timer, it was all of this minus the subdivision
that Lydia liked, but as a "professional travel writer,"
it was all of this especially the subdivision that I found embarrassing.
I wanted to go somewhere where I could use my bad
Spanish and good phrase-book, where they didn't have Cobb
salad on every menu, and where they didn't take American
Express. Instead we ate at Mama Mia's three nights running
because the pizza was good and also cheap, which I used as a
justification because neither of us had much money. Besides,
we liked the waitstaff, which was young, casual, irreverent,
and after nine there was live music on the tiny stage in the
open courtyard. But three nights was enough. I wanted to
leave the next day. Lydia wanted to stay through the weekend
to see the guitarist we saw the first night. We quarreled and
compromised; we'd stay Friday night and leave early Saturday
morning.

In the meantime I spent a day driving over the mountain
to visit Guanajuato, the old silver-mining capital of the region
full of stately nineteenth-century government and university
buildings and built quite dramatically in a narrow, winding
canyon. I saw no other Americans, spoke Spanish all day
long, and drove home feeling mollified and self-righteous.

Strangely, Lydia felt exactly the same; she had explored
the part of San Miguel on the hillside above the center and
found the little bullring I had searched for in vain, then spent
the afternoon in the studios of the Instituto Allende chatting
with other painters. We were each a little smug over our pizza
that night, and I think we were both wondering just how
much we needed each other. The courtyard at Mama Mia's
began to fill up, and we turned our chairs toward the stage.
Just before nine, five Mexican men crowded into the table
next to us. One of them was a big guy with broad shoulders,
a bushy mustache, and a big white smile. They talked in loud
Spanish. They were wearing cowboy hats and boots, new blue
jeans, and brightly colored shirts with snaps rather than buttons.
They seemed like farmers out on the town, but they had
more money than I expected farmers to have, and they were
out of place in a crowd of tourists and urban Mexicans. The
big guy stepped on Lydia's foot coming back to the table and
apologized in English. She made her stock joke about having
two of them, and he laughed appreciatively.

The guitarist came out and then a singer. She was the reason
for the crowd; she was very good and sang love songs and
ballads in both Spanish and English. A few people got up to
slow-dance. We were delivered a pitcher of sangria compliments,
it turns out, of the big guy. I guessed that was where
he went. This was all quite awkward because he wasn't sitting
across the room, but immediately beside us, and there
was nothing to do but grin, nod, clink glasses and toast each
other. Still, we'd already had a few drinks, drinking at six
thousand feet is problematic to begin with, and Lydia seemed
a bit tipsy. I tried to catch her eye, but couldn't. Then when
the musicians took a break, the Mexicans engaged us. Where
were we from? What were we doing in central Mexico? Did
we like it here?

Lydia was in her element, and I had fun watching her. She
had a brand of gay repartee and easy banter tailor-made for
this situation. Pretty soon she had all five laughing, even the
two who clearly didn't speak much English. I was now aware
of a little guy in addition to the big guy. He may have been the
big guy's sidekick or it may have been the other way around.
At any rate, they were a tag team; they had lots of eye contact,
sidebars, and inside jokes.

There was more music, and at the next break I offered to
share the pitcher of sangria the big guy bought us and was
relieved when the Mexicans accepted; but when I came back
from the bathroom, there was another pitcher on the table,
and when I tried to beg off using the elevation as a reason,
I saw the big guy's eyes were not on me but on Lydia's face
next to me, and out of the corner of my eye I saw that she
was mouthing something to him. Okay, I got it. There had
clearly been a conversation in my absence, and I was now an
unwitting player in one of the pocket dramas Lydia regularly
produced. This one was called "Pete the prig vs. Lydia the
free spirit," and I knew the only way out of it was not to get
in it, so I shut up, but it may already have been too late. Then
a little later I heard the big guy say to the little guy,
"No lleva
sostén."
She's not wearing a bra.

The little guy answered,
"Tal vez tampoco lleva las bragas."
Maybe she's not wearing panties, either.

I said,
"Las lleva."
Yes, she is. Then in English I said, "I
watched her put them on," and smiled.

There was an awkward silence. Then the big guy laughed
loudly and slapped my back. "You speak Spanish, my friend!"

"Un poco."

"Please do not take offense. It is just that your wife is a
very pretty girl."

"She's not my wife," I said.

"Then your fiancée . . ."

"She's not that, either."

"Your friend?" asked the little guy.

"I guess we haven't figured out what we are. We're working
on that. Right now we're just traveling companions."

"Then you won't mind if I ask her to dance?" asked the
big guy.

"Of course not."

He enfolded her in his arms. He was very large and she
was very small. Back at the tables (they had been pushed together),
he talked earnestly to her about something while
tapping her forearm with his very large index finger. The
little guy was sitting on the other side of Lydia, his arm draped
across the back of her chair. I leaned over and whispered in
her ear, "Have you ever gone to bed with a Mexican?"

She laughed. "Not yet."

"Have you ever gone to bed with five?" I asked.

She laughed again. "Oh stop it!"

I gave up. I turned back to the stage. There was more music,
more wine, more dancing. Things got a little blurred for
me. Then the guitarist was putting his instrument back in its
case, the waiters were putting chairs up on the tables, and
the little guy had sat down beside me to say, "My friend, we
would like you and Lydia to be our guests. There is a wonderful
cantina outside of town—"

"What's it called?" I asked.

"It's called La Casa del Fuego. . . ."

"It's a brothel," I said. "I read about it."

He dipped his head once. "There are women there, yes,
but it is many things. It is also a restaurant and a nightclub
and a casino, and it's open all night."

"No, thank you. We have to get an early start tomorrow."

"Oh come on." Lydia was suddenly sitting where the little
man had been. "This sounds like fun."

"You promised," I said. "It's already one o'clock and I want
to be in Oaxaca by tomorrow night."

"Come on, Pete, we're on vacation."

"No," I said firmly. "I'm not getting in a car with a bunch
of drunken Mexicans I don't know."

"Is that it? Is it that they're Mexicans?"

"Of course not."

"Then why did you say that?" Now we were standing on
the sidewalk in front of Mama Mia's and the Mexicans were
waiting for us down the block.

"Because we're in Mexico, for Chrissake. If we were in
Albania, I'd have said 'Albanians.'" I knew that sounded bad
as soon as I said it.

"And if we were in Columbus, you'd say 'drunken Ohioans'?"
She was laughing at me. "Sure you would." She turned
away.

"Lydia, where are you going?"

"I told you; I wanna see this cantina. I'm going with them."

I caught her elbow. "I can't let you do that." At that elevation,
at that hour, at that level of inebriation, it was the wrong
thing to say, and I knew it.

"You what?"

"Nothing."

"You can't let me do it? You can't stop me from doing it.
Watch." She turned and walked loosely if unsteadily toward
the men. One of them was watching her breasts. She hooked
her arms through two of theirs, and they all went down the
middle of the street and got into a big white pickup truck. Its
lights came on, and it drove away from me. I could hear ranchero
music blasting from it. The truck went around a turnabout
and came back toward me, the music filling the empty
street. Three of the men stood in the bed leaning on the cab.
I could see the little guy was driving and I could see the big
guy was riding shotgun. As the truck passed me picking
up speed, I could see Lydia sitting between them, her small,
round, alabaster face lighted momentarily by the streetlight,
her eyes fixed straight ahead.