Sam McCain - 04 - Save the Last Dance for Me (13 page)

He said, “Don’t try to pet him or nothing, Jamie. He looks kinda mad.” See what I mean? He’s got a lot of common

sense, Mr. C.”

The Common Sense Typing Method.

A volume that should be in every school library.

Between 2ccji and 3ccec I got four calls.

Two of the callers were clients explaining why they couldn’t pay me this month, and two were people who wanted to sell me some things. Maybe if the first two callers came through with money, I might be able to buy things from the second two.

I looked through some court documents the county attorney had shipped me; a dunning letter from my alumni association; a copy of Time with Ike on the cover. The Wwii people would always be my true heroes. Even a little town like ours lost twenty-eight men and women in the war. And you never forgot. Some people talked about their war experiences and some didn’t. But whether they held their memories public or private, they could never let go of them. There are some things you go through that change you forever —even if you don’t want to be changed—and war is one of them. My dad still has nightmares sometimes, my mom says, and they’re always about his war experiences. I didn’t agree with everything Ike believed politically but I admired him a damned sight more than I did showboats like Patton and MacArthur. MacArthur I gave up on when he said we should drop atomic bombs on China. He enjoyed war too much to be trusted. He loved posing against a backdrop of explosions and bombed-out people trooping down lonely roads. I always laughed about what Ike said when asked what he’d done as an Army captain in the South Seas during the 1930’s, when he’d served as MacArthur’s secretary: “I studied drama under General MacArthur.” MacArthur never forgave Ike for that crack.

Just before Sara Hall was due, my dad called and said, “Don’t forget Monday’s your mom’s birthday.”

“God, I’m glad you reminded me.”

“She says she doesn’t want us to make a big deal of it. But you know better and so do I.”

“Mind if I bring somebody new? And she’s not a date exactly. Kylie Burke.”

“That newspaper girl? She’s sure a

cutie. And nice, too. She interviewed a bunch of us at the Vfw last year. Sure, bring her.”

“Maybe Kylie can help me pick out a gift, too.”

“Well, I’m goin’ fishin’, son. Talk to you later.”

Four-fifteen and Sara Hall still hadn’t appeared. I picked up the phone book, found her number, dialed it. No answer.

Four twenty-one. A timid knock.

“Yes?”

“It’s Dierdre Hall, Mr. McCain.”

“C’mon in.”

She was dressed as she had been earlier, but her shades were pushed back on her head.

“Where’s your mom?”

“I-I’m not sure.”

“Boy, are you lousy at it.”

“At what?”

“Lying. Your entire face is red.”

“Oh, shit.”

“C’mon in and sit down and let’s talk.”

“I’m sorry I lied.”

“It’s all right. Just sit down. We can talk about your mom later. What I want to know for now is why you decided to come over.”

She hesitated a long time. “My mom’s going to kill me for coming here.”

“Let’s worry about that later.”

She scanned my office for gremlins, a pretty girl with more poise than one would expect in somebody her age. That was my thought, anyway.

But then she sort of spoiled the impression by jerking up from her chair, covering her mouth with her hand—the way I always did when the Falstaff beer started backing up—and rushed out the door to the john on the other side of the coatrack.

My charm had worked once again on a female.

They didn’t usually go so far as to barf literally.

Only figuratively.

The exterior door opened and Sara Hall, angry and frantic, rushed in, scanning my office much as her daughter had only moments earlier, and said, “Where is she?”

She wore the same outfit she’d worn earlier, too, but her shades were over her eyes.

“Who?”

“I don’t want any of your guff,

McCain. You know who. If you don’t tell me, I’ll have Sykes arrest you for contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Or maybe statutory rape would be even better.”

“Why don’t you sit down and quit acting crazy?”

“Where is she, McCain? I’m serious about calling Sykes.”

And then we both heard Dierdre throw up for the second time.

“Oh, Lord,” Sara said. She didn’t sound angry; she sounded drained, weary.

She came in and sat down and took off her sunglasses and then covered her face with lovely fingers.

“Sara, why don’t you tell me what’s going on?”

She shook her head. Said from behind her hands, “I can’t, McCain. I wish I could. I wish I could tell somebody, anyway.” Then, “This is when I resent my husband dying on me. He should be here. He was stronger than I was with things like this.” Then, whispering, “This whole thing.”

I almost asked what whole thing.

“You’re not weak,” I said.

“No, I’m pretty strong. But this whole thing—”

We were back to the this-whole-thing thing.

Toilet flushing. Water running. Paper towel being cinched free from the dispenser. Door opening.

She came up to the door and said, “Mom!”

Sara turned in her chair as if she’d been shot.

“How’d you know I’d be here?”

“You told me you trusted McCain,

remember? So when you snuck away this was the first place I thought of.”

“I didn’t tell him anything, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Sara seemed ecstatic. “Really?”

“Really, Mom.”

Then to me: “Really? She didn’t—?”

I shook my head. “Didn’t have time. Started to. Then got sick.”

Sara was as bad at lying as Dierdre.

“She’s been sick—the flu—”

“We’re way down the road on that one, Sara,” I said.

“I don’t know what that means.” Sounding scared.

“It means she’s pregnant. That’s why she was throwing up.”

Sara gasped the way women in movies gasp.

Dierdre showed no particular expression.

“Then you did tell him!” Sara

snapped, crazed again.

“Mom, he figured it out. Throwing up in the middle of the day. Me coming over here to tell him some kind of secret. You being so wound-up and all—he figured it out for himself.”

Sara turned to me again. “Please don’t tell anybody, McCain. Please promise me.”

My seventeen-year-old sister had gotten pregnant a few years ago. People still whispered about her, snickered, even after she’d fled to Chicago. Nobody deserved that kind of treatment.

“Don’t worry, Sara. I won’t say a

word.”

“I have to trust you, McCain.”

“I know.” I reached over and took her hand.

“And you can.” To her daughter, I said, “How about taking ole Mom home and helping her relax?”

Sara smiled anxiously. “Ole Mom here could sure use one.”

I hadn’t learned anything other than that a high-school girl had gotten herself in trouble, the kind of trouble small-town gossips, lineal descendants of the folks who ran the Salem witch trials, loved to dote on. But now wasn’t the time to push for anything more.

“You’re a good man, McCain.”

“And you’re a good woman, Sara.”

Sara and Dierdre hugged briefly and left.

Leaving me to wonder if her pregnancy had anything in particular to do with our two most recent murders.

We ended up eating in the backyard that night with Mrs. Goldman. She’d been grilling herself a burger and so we threw our own burgers on the fire and joined her at the small picnic table.

“We tried out that new dance boat last night,” Mrs. Goldman said, in between shooing away flies and slapping mosquitoes.

“How was it?” Kylie said.

“A lot of fun.”

A couple of retired men had spent a year building a large, completely enclosed dance boat that was decorated like a restaurant and dance club inside. Booths lined two of the walls and there were three decks where you could stand for romantic moonlit glimpses of the night.

“How about we give it a try?” Kylie said.

“Fine,” I said.

She mst’ve seen how Mrs. Goldman was watching us.

“My husband and I are separated for the time being,” Kylie said.

“It’s really not any of my business.”

Kylie laughed. “I don’t care about my reputation. It’s McCain’s I’m worried about. I don’t want to spoil his virginal image.”

Mrs. Goldman smiled. “His life

seems to have slowed down the last few months here.”

“He’s just resting up. He’ll come roaring back.”

“I really like it when people talk about you like you’re not here,” I said.

Kylie and I were sitting next to each other on one side of the table. Mrs. Goldman’s summer garden imbued the dusk with exotic odors you don’t usually associate with states where corn and pigs are economic staples. I was having my usual reaction to that purgatory between day and night, that melancholy that was not quite despair but came pretty close.

Kylie slid her arm around me. “I wouldn’t have made it these last few days without Sam here.”

“Ditto for her. I’ve been kinda down myself.”

“Well, you never know where things like this will lead,”

Mrs. Goldman said.

Dogs barked; children laughed; a group of three very young teen couples walked down the alley, boys nervously teasing the girls they liked, not knowing what else to do, that wonderful awkward terrifying time of first love; and night, irrevocable and vast, fell upon the prairie. I wanted, for a brief firefly moment there, to be one of those teenage boys, starting all over again, wanting in some ways, what with my failed foolish pursuit of the beautiful Pamela Forrest, to start all over again, an eternal late summer of county fairs and swimming-pool dates and Saturday night movie dates.

But even at the young age of twenty-four things had become irretrievably complicated.

Pamela, whom I shouldn’t have loved; Mary, whom I should have; and poor sad Kylie and her strutting jerk of a husband. I really wanted to sleep with Kylie but she was married. And so I was afraid I would, against my principles; and afraid I wouldn’t, against that pure clean lust I felt for her. She was so damned good and kind and smart and sexy in her kid-sister way.

We all went inside and had some iced tea in Mrs. Goldman’s apartment—Kylie whispering that she didn’t want me to leave her alone just yet—and then around nine-thirty, the fireflies thicker in the perfume-scented night, a white kitten on the garden fence looking as if she were posing before the half moon … we went upstairs.

“So,” Kylie said, half an hour later, “what happens if I stay here tonight?”

“I’m of two minds about that.”

“I’m of three or four minds about that.”

“Well, then, it looks like we have a dilemma here, doesn’t it?”

“A conundrum.”

“Where’s Chad tonight?”

“Whereabouts unknown.”

“And you—”

his—don’t feel like going through another Strindberg play with him. Strindberg being his favorite writer. So when we get into one of our arguments, he always starts doing Strindberg. And I’ve had enough Strindberg for a while.”

“You can’t ever have too much

Strindberg.”

“You like him?”

“Eh,” I said, shrugging. “In a pinch, I suppose.”

“So I’ll take the couch.”

“You’re too long for the couch.”

“I’m the same size you are.”

“You’re always telling me,” I said, “that you’re taller than I am.”

“Haven’t you figured out by now that I’m an incorrigible liar?”

“I’ll take the couch. It’ll make me feel nobler.”

“I’d really feel awkward doing that to you.”

“You’d deprive me of feeling noble?”

“It’s still pretty early. Could we watch a little Tv?”

“But of course.”

We started out watching “Highway Patrol.”

Broderick Crawford never takes off his trench coat. They could have deep-sea sequences like on “Sea Hunt” with Lloyd Bridges and Brod would still be wearing his trench coat, his Aqua-Lung strapped on outside of it. Oh, and he’d be wearing his fedora, too.

I say “started out watching” because, after about one act of ole Brod barking “Ten-four, ten-four”

into his two-way, we gave up and started making out.

I guess we resolved our dilemma and our conundrum.

At least sort of.

It was ninth-grade sex.

We French-kissed but when my hand drooped (of its own volition) toward her chest area (or chestal area as Judge Ronald D. K. M.

Sullivan would say), it was gently moved back up by her hand.

By the time “Highway Patrol” was wrapping up we lay lengthwise on the couch. Pressed very tightly together. She was a great kisser. Maybe the best kisser I’d ever been with. She was such a great kisser that kissing her was almost enough. But my hand kept drooping and her hand kept gently brushing it away. We did a little tenth-grade dry-humping but she wouldn’t let my hand linger on her bottom. I had one of those erections that make you crazy. One of those erections that takes you over so completely you are nothing more than a penis.

She was girl-flesh and girl-body and girl-mouth; girl-sigh, girl-gasp,

girl-moan.

She was moaning, I was moaning.

She was insinuating (a Kenny Thibodeau dirty-book word) herself against me as hard and fast as I was insinuating myself against her.

I suppose in the murky past I’d wanted the beautiful Pamela Forrest this badly but it was really murky. Nobody had ever seemed as fresh and vital and fetching as Kylie did right now.

And then she was up and grabbing her purse and rushing out the door.

“I’ve got to get out of here!” she said. “I don’t want to do anything I’d regret.

Good-night, McCain! I’m sorry!”

At seven-thirty the following morning I sat in my ragtop on a shelf of shale above the cup of grassy land where the hill folk lived. My field binoculars were trained on the Muldaur trailer behind the church. At 7ccdg, Viola came out with a magazine and a roll of toilet paper in her hand and headed for the outhouse to the east.

How’d you like to face the outhouse every morning?