Our Town (18 page)

“Is there, by any chance, anyone we could call for you? Anyone who could, perhaps, come pick you up?”

“Sure. Sure, there’s someone you could call for me. Call in the person who stole my luggage and have him bring it back.” She blew an O in his face and it dissipated around his nose.

He shook his head and put his hands to his eyes. “No one has your bag, ma’am.”

Now she shook her head and ashed her cigarette. It fell near his untied red shoelace.

“Who has it then? I certainly don’t,” she said and puffed another O. Then another. They circled around his eyeballs. He wore them like reading glasses.

“Exactly, ma’am. You don’t have your bag and didn’t. Now, if you wouldn’t mind, I . . .”

“Now I don’t mind talking so let me do it,” she leaned forward. “Just get me my bag, and don’t get smart with me. Get me my bag. I bought
it in the city. It’s new and it’s mine. It has my things in it. It has
my
things in it. It was on that plane, and then I went to sleep, and then I woke up, and then it’s gone. Now, if you don’t tell me what happened to it, or who stole it, or where you’ve hidden it, I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’ll tell you what I do know, though. Talk smart to me again and see what happens. Seriously. Honestly, I’d love to see you try. Do it. Do it just to see. I’ll put you across my knee is what I’ll do, but you’d probably like that too much. Fucking sissy. Now, go find my bag. Go find me my fucking bag, and go find it now.”

He stared into her eyes. And she stared back at him through her oversized, black-framed glasses. With her ire, they’d grown askew.

“No one knows what you’re talking about, ma’am,” he said and stared into her.

“Go get my bag, now.”

He wouldn’t look away.

“Go get my bag. Go get my bag. Go get my bag. Go get my bag . . .”

She continued until she ran out of breath. Then he watched, and in the silence there was calm. But then.

“Ma’am, now listen,” he said, loud now. Angry. “I promise you we don’t have your bag. Please, and this is the last time I’m asking, if there’s anyone we could call, or anything else we can . . .”

While he spoke, she removed her perfume atomizer, again, from deep within her shark-skin purse. Before he was finished, she sprayed him twice in the eyes. He doubled over, and the flight staff rushed to help. Then she dropped her cigarette on the floor, sprayed in front of her, stepped into it, walked out of the room—surprised as it was left unlocked—and through the office of the flight superior, who looked up from his papers and over his gold-framed aviator eyeglasses and furrowed his brow and moustache, most certainly surprised to see her, and through the terminals and gates, where people—idiots—sat anxiously, preparing themselves for what was on the other side, and past the food court—and the baggage claim, where those same idiots hugged and kissed their loved ones and watched for their luggage and thought they’d finally made it. And then past the smokers and the
taxi stand and the gypsy cabs—poachers—by the taxi stand and then to the other side of the road from the airport—the far side of West Way—where she was dwarfed by one-story-high gray block letters.
LAX
was surrounded by well-trimmed green shrubbery, and she stood underneath in a red phone booth, on a pay phone, awaiting an answer on the other line. She’d already dialed. Ring ring ring.

“Yello?”

“Ah, finally. Thank heavens! Gary, can you come get me? I’m near the airport.”

“Dorothy-ody?”

“Yessir.”

“Why are you talking like that?”

“Talking like what, Gary?

“Like that, Dorothy-ody. Exactly like that. You know I don’t like it when you speak in your native accent. It’s plebeian, and pedestrian. When you address me, you speak formally. Understood?”

She waited and shook her head.

“Understood?”

“Oh my God, Gary, can’t you just cut a girl some slack. I mean I was just—”

“Dorothy-ody, you know you don’t use the Lord’s name in vain in front of me, either. If you expect me to help you with everything—with getting you back on track—you have to at least be aware of my tenets and know that when you speak like that it really hurts me. And it’s bad for you. It’s really bad form, and it’s truly unacceptable. But really, Dorothy-ody, it hurts you more than me—you more than anyone—because, as you well know, I’m not the only one listening.”

“I know, Gary, I know. I’m just in a bad way right now. These plane attendants stole my bag and I forgot where I parked my car before I left and I need some help. I’m sorry I used the Lord’s name in vain. You know I don’t mean nothin’ by it.”

“Don’t apologize to me, Dorothy-ody. You know who you have to apologize to.”

“Gary.”

“Dorothy-ody.”

“Oh, Gary, I’m hot and sticky and tired and really don’t want to do this right now.”

“Dorothy-ody, recite it for me, right now, full through, or you’re staying at the airport.”

“I don’t want to, Gary.”

“Do it, or I’m hanging up the phone.”

“Okay, Gary, okay. Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy; is not boastful or vain-glorious; does not display itself haughtily. It is not conceited, arrogant, and inflated with pride; it is not rude, unmannerly, and does not act unbecomingly. Love—God’s love—does not insist on its own rights or its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful or resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it; it pays no attention to a suffered wrong. It does not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness, but rejoices when right and truth prevail. Love bears up under anything and everything that comes; is ever ready to believe the best of every person. Its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything without weakening. Love never fades out or becomes obsolete or comes to an end. Love never fails. Love never fails,” she paused, and took a few deep breaths. “So maybe now you could pick me up?”

*
  
*
  
*

Dale arrived home to find Clover at the sink doing dishes. Clover took her time with the dishes. She enjoyed it. Sometimes it took her almost an hour, but that was okay. It helped her think less. Or at least more positively. To her thinking was hard. Sometimes she’d do anything not to. Her brain made her afraid. The existential dilemma that sat—relaxed—behind her eyes suddenly got transferred to her fingers—to something utilitarian—and because her fingers were farther from her brain than her eyes it hurt her less. Or it just took longer to feel it. Or something like that.

It was the morning and Dale was arriving home. He was coming home from a girl’s house. Somebody from the roster. Just any. One of the many. He probably doesn’t even remember her name—this behavior was rather typical—and he was coming home with a hangover. He was also rather annoyed because said nameless girl—let’s call her Brenda—hadn’t responded to his sexual advances earlier that morning. Brenda said, as he rolled onto her, that she had, during the course of the night, realized that her friend, whom she had known since puberty, had come around, again, and so she couldn’t. He said he didn’t know what that meant. So she said her “friend”—finger quotes, which she’d indicated with her fingers—who comes around monthly—like literally every month—was back, again, and that’s why she couldn’t fuck him. He said he didn’t know what that meant either. Just speak English, he said. No more riddles. So she said she was on her period.

“Oh,” Dale replied. “Well, so what?”

“Well, so,” she paused. “Well, so then I don’t want to.”

“What does that matter?”

“It matters because I don’t want to,” she said and put her head so far under the covers that only her eyes were showing, like a little girl might. A little girl who thought she was in trouble. “I don’t want you to see me that way.”

“Well I don’t care about your period, baby.” And he kissed her ear. “I think you’re beautiful always. Always.” And he licked her neck. “You know that.”

“Well, I don’t, okay? So get off, already,” and she pushed him off of her and went to the bathroom and closed the door.

“Well fuck this, then. Fuck you, then.” He shook his head and thrust off the covers. “Dumb twat.” And Dale put his clothes on and went back home.

So then Dale—hung over and frustrated—that cunt—walked into his house and then into his kitchen and found his daughter doing dishes. She turned around when she heard the door open and saw him walk in.

“Oh, hey,” she said, and then turned back around. “I didn’t know you were home today.”

“Why aren’t you in school?” he asked her as he walked to the fridge.

“Jewish holiday or something.”

“Great,” shaking his head. “Just burning money over there. And for them.” He opened the fridge and looked inside. Yogurt, a half a rotisserie chicken, orange juice, a glass bottle of chocolate milk—still sealed, still thinking about his children—and a quarter-full bottle of Prosecco. “And why is the fucking fridge always empty?”

No reply.

“What is it that you two actually do?”

He waited.

“Yes?”

“I don’t know, Daddy,” she paused and thought. “I guess dishes?” she smiled.

He didn’t.

“Fucking ingrates,” Dale breathed as he pulled out the bottle of Prosecco.

He shook his head and stepped his steps hard as he walked behind Clover to the drying rack beside the sink and grabbed a newly clean highball and filled his glass to the top, perfectly finishing what was left of the bottle, as though that last third was meant just for him. But before that, as he reached over her shoulder when he was first grabbing the glass, he noticed that the tag on her shirt was facing outward as it hung off her waifish frame. And as he read the tag it read
Missoni
, which he knew to be expensive from buying it for girls he’d fucked in the past. Not because he knew they’d like it—he hardly knew them at all—but instead because he’d sometimes take them shopping—some mornings—if he thought it might make the next time they saw each other more fun.

“Who bought you that shirt?” Dale asked his daughter.

“What?” Clover responded. She was polishing a colander, remembering her last night’s penne à la vodka for one, and how perfectly satisfying it was.

“I said, who bought you that fucking shirt?”

“What are you talking about?” Clover said and turned around, breaking her ritualistic cleaning tendencies—one of the only things that made her happy—drying her hands on a rag.

“I said,
who
bought
you
that fucking shirt.” And he stepped toward her and he stopped blinking. “I’m not gonna ask again.”

“You did, I guess. I mean, you paid for it,” she crossed her arms and put her head down.

“Of course I did. You two are un-fucking-believable.” He shook his head and then drank his Prosecco. It was flat, but whatever. “You know what? I paid for that, right? So then give it to me, then. It’s mine.”

“What?” she answered, dumbfounded. No, not dumbfounded. Awestruck, maybe. Very, very surprised. “What do you mean?”

“Take it off,” he said. “I’ll give it to somebody who deserves it. Somebody better than you.”

“You want me to take my shirt off?” she asked him. “Here?”

“Yes. You heard me. Now.”

“Okay,” she said and she pulled her shirt over her head. It hung, reluctantly, in her fingers. Dale reached out and grabbed it away. She pulled her arms back and crossed them over her lace bra. She was cold. She put her head down but still looked up at him. Her eyes were sharp.

“And who bought you those fucking jeans?”

She didn’t answer, and her stare got even more tight.

“Do I have to ask again?”

“I guess you did.”

“So then give me them. Give me them, now,” and she waited a moment, and stared into his eyes. But then she pulled them off, one leg at a time, and tossed them to him. This time more confident. This time more true. She stood before him in her mismatched underwear—her panties simple white but thin so slightly see-through—and felt the air on her skin. She uncrossed her arms and put them to her side. She pulled her head from her chest and stood tall, her upper back even arching slightly upward. She’d been relatively full-figured for the past few years, but it seemed, given Dale’s face, that this was the first time
he noticed. She was a woman. She was nineteen. She’d been with a man, and she knew how much power that gave her. He had, perhaps, not yet seen that side of her, but he would now. This is what he asked for. This is what they wanted. This is what they’ll get.

“Good. That’s good.” He looked down at the clothes and then moved them back and forth in his hands. His voice was softer now, but still strong enough. “I’m gonna give this stuff to someone who deserves them. Somebody better.”

“Okay,” Clover added.

“Okay is right.”

“Well,” she stepped forward. “Who bought me this bra?”

“Excuse me,” he said with her clothes in his arms.

“Who bought me this bra?” Clover stared into her father’s eyes. “Who bought me this bra?”

“What?”

And Clover stepped closer to her father. So close that when she breathed her father felt her warmth. She never broke her stare.