Saturday Night (15 page)

He’ll ask me out.

He’ll ask me for next Friday night, but he won’t be able to stand the wait. He’ll telephone me Sunday noon to ask if I liked the dance as much as he did. He’ll drive over Sunday afternoon. We’ll sit and talk and then we’ll go for a drive. And we’ll park out by the reservoir near the Nature Preserve and we’ll kiss and hug and go crazy. And I’ll invite him for supper on Monday and he’ll say, Oh, let’s have pizza out instead and. …

Anne’s heart was beating as if she was on a blind date with a sexy stranger. But it almost is, she thought, taking the familiar hand, resting her head on the familiar shoulder. As Gary and Beth Rose moved out onto the dance floor, Anne and Con began dancing very slowly right where they stood. Anne felt so reassured! How could she have doubted Con? Kip was right; it was a disgrace that she had surrendered her belief in him after two sentences, two minutes.

His strong heavy arms wrapped around her like protection from all storms. She smiled at him, their eyes locking the way they always did, and his were filled with the affection she had always felt from him.

Oh, Con, how I love you, she thought. “Listen, Con,” she said. “I’m sorry I threw that at you so fast. I know it’s hard to believe. The test was six days ago and I’ve been reeling from the shock ever since. And I know the dance is fun, but Con, tonight I can’t have fun. We have to talk.”

She had gotten some of these words out by looking down, by studying the button on his starched white shirt, but now she looked into his eyes again. He was staring at the black shadows behind the barnboard refreshment shed, and a muscle in his jaw clenched and jerked. Anne rested a loving fingertip on that taut muscle. Con pulled back from her. The embrace that had been so secure and safe turned tight and angry.

“Con?” she whispered, frightened.

“I don’t want to get into it,” he said flatly.

“Con, you
are
in it.”

He tried to keep dancing, but Anne was no longer moving. “Is this the time and place?” he demanded. “What is your problem, Anne?”

“It’s our problem,” she hissed. “And the problem is, I’m pregnant.”

He tried to cut her off before she said the word
pregnant
, but failed. “Anne, I’m not in the mood.”

“You think
I’m
in the mood?” she snapped. “You think pregnancy is a
mood
? Well, it’s not. It’s the direct result of our—”

“Shut up,” Con said.

Anne froze. I need you and you tell me to shut up? Kip, it was true; all the terrible things I said to you were true.

Anne was stiff with panic. Con began dancing again, and he shifted her on the floor, rather like a mannequin instead of a real person.

That’s what I am, though, Anne thought. A mannequin. A store dummy. God knows I have the wardrobe, and the same amount of brains.

She began to cry.

Con hissed, “Not here. I cannot
stand
it, Anne. Do you follow me? Read my lips.” He made each word into a single sentence, spat from between his teeth like something vile. “I. Can’t. Stand. It!”

Anne could not speak. Fears flew through her mind like a flock of blackbirds. I did everything wrong. I spoke wrong, I played the game wrong, I blew it completely.

She felt slack and limp, like an old clothesline sagging in the backyard. And then she thought, Why is it
my
responsibility to get everything right? Why isn’t some of this Con’s responsibility?

Con had danced her away from everybody, off the dance floor entirely, and back to the wooden bench where they had sat with Gary and Beth Rose. Beth Rose, let me tell you something about men, Anne thought. Let me tell you what happens when it’s time to pay the price.

Con started to say something. His eyes fixed not on her eyes, but on the tear tracks that had worked down her cheeks to the fine slender line on her chin. They stared at each other. For a moment she thought he would touch the tears, and wipe them away, and they would hug in love and desperation and it would all be better.

But Con walked away.

She knew without looking that he was not asking a junior high girl in a Victorian maid costume for another soda, that he was not bringing the photographer to the wooden bench, that he was not rounding up his buddies so they could have a private party.

He was leaving.

For good.

Con transferred school so often that transferring Monday morning would be nothing for him. He wouldn’t even have to move to do it; just saunter into his previous high school, grin at the vice principal, pass through guidance with a cocky salute, and enroll himself back where he’d been half of tenth grade. She knew Con. And his mother would sign the papers without even questioning what she was signing.

Oh, he was well named.

A true con artist.

And how I fell for him, she thought.

B
ETH AND GARY WERE
dancing slow. He circled, shifting his weight more than dancing, and gradually Beth was swung into a different position and she could see Con and Anne behind her. They couldn’t hear a thing because the band played so loudly. I can lip read, she thought, laughing to herself.

“Con, say something,” came from Anne, and some emotion made her purse her lips more than usual, so that the words were as clear as written letters. “Con, I’m pregnant. It’s our baby. You and me.
What are we going to do
?”

Beth nearly fainted. Not for a moment had she given Molly’s rumor any credence. Molly was horrid; anything she said was lies; Anne was perfect. Blood rushed from Beth’s head and she sagged against Gary more than dancers do. Gary simply moved closer to her, supporting her more.

She could still see Anne clearly. Anguish crossed Anne’s face, and tears shone like jewels in the half light of the dance floor.

Beth Rose, who knew little, knew that Con would hate a public display. Although it meant she had to detach herself from Gary, Beth Rose straightened so she would have a better view of Con’s face.

Blank as a piece of typing paper.

Does he really feel nothing? Beth thought. Or does it take all his self-control to hide what he does feel? Anne is crazy, bringing it up now. Why did she come to the dance at all? Why didn’t she tell him before, or after?

“What’s the matter with you?” Gary asked.

She had forgotten to continue dancing, but had come to a full stop to stare at Con, as if watching a freak show at the circus. Flushed, Beth mumbled that she had something in her shoe. Gary looked skeptical. She bent over to take off her shoe—and she was not wearing them. Like half the girls there, she had kicked her shoes off under the benches and was dancing barefoot.

“Pebble on the floor,” Beth said desperately.

“Uh huh,” Gary returned dryly.

Beth did not know what to say next. I haven’t had enough practice, she thought. I haven’t been around boys enough. Oh, if I were anybody else in this room I’d know what to say next.

She gave him a silly little smile, which she knew made her look like somebody cringing before the dentist’s drill. They stood still. “Well, I’m really in a dancing mood, Beth,” said Gary. He smiled at her. A sweet smile. Her heart flipped again. She started to say, “Me, too, Gary,” but he said first, “So maybe I’ll dance with Jennie; she’s sitting this one out.” He smiled again. Identical smile. Beth found herself reflecting the smile, as if she were his mirror.

He’s going to leave me here, right out on the floor in front of everybody, she thought. She wanted to throw up, or cling to him, but there were too many witnesses.

And then he was gone.

Like the sun behind a cloud.

Beth stood very still, trying to look as if she enjoyed standing alone, as if Gary had gone on an errand of her choice.

Gary bent over Jennie, and Jennie giggled, and looked around for her date. It was Bob, and Bob was laughing and nodding, because he was talking with another boy and didn’t feel like dancing. Jennie took Gary’s hand and in a moment they were dancing, just as she and Gary had been.

I’ll pretend to myself that Gary is coming back any moment, and that’ll make me feel okay. I can carry it off if I pretend to myself as well.

Chin high, skirt rustling, Beth moved toward the side of the room. Wallflower, she accused herself. You’re not retreating, you’re running. Whatever you call it, you’re not sticking it out. A real woman would have gone over there and asked Bob to dance.

She shuddered at the mere thought.

On the wooden bench she had just left sat Anne Stephens.

Alone.

Frozen. Even her tears seemed frozen.

How absorbed I am by my own troubles, Beth thought guiltily. I actually forgot about Anne’s. Beth looked around for Con, but did not see him.
No. He couldn’t have.

Timidly she sat next to Anne. She could still feel the warmth from when Con had been sitting there. “Can I help?” she said hesitantly.

Anne’s head turned as if her neck hurt. “Nobody can help,” she said tonelessly. “I have to go home alone.”

“Hey!” said Christopher Vann. “You!”

The lead guitarist looked over at Chris, didn’t like what he saw, and kept on playing. Christopher Vann did not appear to notice that the band was in the middle of a piece and three hundred people were dancing to it.

“Hey, stop it,” Christopher said loudly. Loud enough to be heard over the boom of the guitars and the throbbing of the drums.

The guitarist was a fairly small man. He didn’t much care for the way this drunken football player type loomed over him. Uneasily he said between verses, “Hey, buddy, buzz off, huh?”

“Who you telling to buzz off?” demanded Christopher.

The band could not draw any closer together. Their positions were fixed by their instruments. The keyboardist could not leave his keyboard and the drummer could not leave his drums. The guitarists could shift only as far as their electric cords would let them.

Both guitar players moved back into the collection of drums and cymbals. They were not on a stage. Kip had tried to rig one, but had had trouble with electrical outlets and given up. So Christopher towered over them and on top of them.

“Listen!” said Christopher. “I don’t like the junk you’re playing.”

They finished the song they’d been doing. People clapped for the dance and stood waiting for the next one; the band was just back from a fifteen minute break. Now the kids wanted their money’s worth.

“So what kind of junk do you like?” said the guitar player, smiling. “We aim to please.”

Christopher lurched forward, stumbling over a cord. The guitarist put out a hand to steady Christopher, and Christopher threw the hand aside. Wonderful, thought the musician. Just what I need … some drunk slob who’s going to smash my instrument. Guy looks older than high school. Who is he, anyway?

The musician scanned the crowd for help, but nobody had noticed anything yet. By the time they noticed, he would probably have a bloody nose and a broken guitar.

“I like hard stuff,” said the drunk. He began listing bands whose specialties were obscenity and violence. They could never use that kind of thing at a high school dance. They’d never get another job again. Besides, the girl who organized the dance—Kip somebody—made it clear that one rule broken and the dance would be shut down like a nuclear plant with a leak.

The guitar player kept a friendly smile on his face, but he knew he looked like someone afraid of dogs smiling at a slavering rabid Doberman pinscher. The smile was a smirk of fear.

Caitlin said, “Watch me.”

Sue shivered with delight and apprehension. Caitlin had nerves of steel. Sure enough, Caitlin led her foursome over to Molly. Molly was talking with a half dozen seniors, the kind that Con and Anne would be when they were seniors—special.

Caitlin interrupted everybody’s conversation. They all let her, neither frowning nor continuing. Sue had read somewhere this was a sign of power—being able to interrupt at will. She waited for Caitlin’s power display. Caitlin said without preliminaries, “So, Molly. Got your Harvard weekend all lined up?”

Jimmy began edging away. He didn’t go in for this.

Molly, sensing a trap, smiled without committing herself.

Caitlin said to the seniors, “Molly brought a Harvard man. Or at least, a
former
Harvard man.”

“What do you mean by that?” Molly cried.

“Yeah, we saw him lurching around,” said one of the seniors.

“I mean he got kicked out, of course,” Caitlin said to Molly. “Why else would he be at a high school dance? In November? When even colleges aren’t on vacation?”

“He has a long weekend,” Molly said stiffly.

“A hell of a long weekend,” Jimmy said, pitching in when Sue pinched his arm.

Everybody laughed. Sue said, “It was so clever of you bringing him here, Molly. He can’t get liquor here, so eventually he’ll dry out on soda. Only you would think of that.”

The senior girls began laughing. “Miaow,” said one of them, turning away. “Listen, you juniors go have your fights on your own time, okay? We’re busy.”

“Okay,” said Caitlin cheerfully. “Want to stick with us, Molly, and be juniors together?”

“I think I’m glad I’m graduating,” observed a senior girl.

Sue and Caitlin linked arms with their boyfriends and moved away, laughing.

Christopher was making quite a scene, but because he was on the same floor level as the musicians, only the dancers pressed right up against the instruments realized it. Two senior boys, Billy and Roy, were mildly interested. “I remember him,” said Billy. “Always picking a fight.”

“Yeah,” Roy said. “They threw him off the football team for fighting. You have to be some fighter for that to happen.”

“How did he ever get into Harvard to start with?” asked Roy’s date, Megan. Megan had a high-pitched voice, and it carried. It carried, unfortunately, as far as Christopher. Christopher swung around to listen, but Roy didn’t notice. With a grin he said to Megan, “Must’ve lied on the application.”

The second guitar player took one look at Christopher’s face and quietly unplugged his guitar, preparing to beat a hasty retreat. The drummer thought exclusively of the dollars invested in his outfit and hoped that Billy and Roy were stronger than they looked. The keyboard man wondered if his accident insurance covered football players falling backward into his instrument.