Short Cuts (3 page)

“Maybe you’re right,” she said. She dropped her nightgown and looked at him and then she took her nightgown off.

They talked about diets. They talked about the protein diets, the vegetable-only diets, the grapefruit-juice diets. But they decided they didn’t have the money to buy the steaks the protein diet called for. And Doreen said she didn’t care for all that many vegetables. And since she didn’t like
grapefruit juice that much, she didn’t see how she could do that one, either.

“Okay, forget it,” he said.

“No, you’re right,” she said. “I’ll do something.”

“What about exercises?” he said.

“I’m getting all the exercise I need down there,” she said.

“Just quit eating,” Earl said. “For a few days, anyway.”

“All right,” she said. “I’ll try. For a few days I’ll give it a try. You’ve convinced me.”

“I’m a closer,” Earl said.

He figured up the balance in their checking account, then drove to the discount store and bought a bathroom scale. He looked the clerk over as she rang up the sale.

At home he had Doreen take off all her clothes and get on the scale. He frowned when he saw the veins. He ran his finger the length of one that sprouted up her thigh.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he said.

He looked at the scale and wrote the figure down on a piece of paper.

“All right,” Earl said. “All right.”

The next day he was gone for most of the afternoon on an interview. The employer, a heavyset man who limped as he showed Earl around the plumbing fixtures in the warehouse, asked if Earl were free to travel.

“You bet I’m free,” Earl said.

The man nodded.

Earl smiled.

He could hear the television before he opened the door to the house. The children did not look up as he walked through
the living room. In the kitchen, Doreen, dressed for work, was eating scrambled eggs and bacon.

“What are you doing?” Earl said.

She continued to chew the food, cheeks puffed. But then she spit everything into a napkin.

“I couldn’t help myself,” she said.

“Slob,” Earl said. “
Go ahead, eat! Go on!
” He went to the bedroom, closed the door, and lay on the covers. He could still hear the television. He put his hands behind his head and stared at the ceiling.

She opened the door.

“I’m going to try again,” Doreen said.

“Okay,” he said.

Two mornings later she called him into the bathroom. “Look,” she said.

He read the scale. He opened a drawer and took out the paper and read the scale again while she grinned.

“Three-quarters of a pound,” she said.

“It’s something,” he said and patted her hip.

He read the classifieds. He went to the state employment office. Every three or four days he drove someplace for an interview, and at night he counted her tips. He smoothed out the dollar bills on the table and stacked the nickels, dimes, and quarters in piles of one dollar each. Each morning he put her on the scale.

In two weeks she had lost three and a half pounds.

“I pick,” she said. “I starve myself all day, and then I pick at work. It adds up.”

But a week later she had lost five pounds. The week after that, nine and a half pounds. Her clothes were loose on her. She had to cut into the rent money to buy a new uniform.

“People are saying things at work,” she said.

“What kind of things?” Earl said.

“That I’m too pale, for one thing,” she said. “That I don’t look like myself. They’re afraid I’m losing too much weight.”

“What is wrong with losing?” he said. “Don’t you pay any attention to them. Tell them to mind their own business. They’re not your husband. You don’t have to live with them.”

“I have to work with them,” Doreen said.

“That’s right,” Earl said. “But they’re not your husband.”

Each morning he followed her into the bathroom and waited while she stepped onto the scale. He got down on his knees with a pencil and the piece of paper. The paper was covered with dates, days of the week, numbers. He read the number on the scale, consulted the paper, and either nodded his head or pursed his lips.

Doreen spent more time in bed now. She went back to bed after the children had left for school, and she napped in the afternoons before going to work. Earl helped around the house, watched television, and let her sleep. He did all the shopping, and once in a while he went on an interview.

One night he put the children to bed, turned off the television, and decided to go for a few drinks. When the bar closed, he drove to the coffee shop.

He sat at the counter and waited. When she saw him, she said, “Kids okay?”

Earl nodded.

He took his time ordering. He kept looking at her as she moved up and down behind the counter. He finally ordered a cheeseburger. She gave the order to the cook and went to wait on someone else.

Another waitress came by with a coffeepot and filled Earl’s cup.

“Who’s your friend?” he said and nodded at his wife.

“Her name’s Doreen,” the waitress said.

“She looks a lot different than the last time I was in here,” he said.

“I wouldn’t know,” the waitress said.

He ate the cheeseburger and drank the coffee. People kept sitting down and getting up at the counter. Doreen waited on most of the people at the counter, though now and then the other waitress came along to take an order. Earl watched his wife and listened carefully. Twice he had to leave his place to go to the bathroom. Each time he wondered if he might have missed hearing something. When he came back the second time, he found his cup gone and someone in his place. He took a stool at the end of the counter next to an older man in a striped shirt.

“What do you want?” Doreen said to Earl when she saw him again. “Shouldn’t you be home?”

“Give me some coffee,” he said.

The man next to Earl was reading a newspaper. He looked up and watched Doreen pour Earl a cup of coffee. He glanced at Doreen as she walked away. Then he went back to his newspaper.

Earl sipped his coffee and waited for the man to say something. He watched the man out of the corner of his eye. The man had finished eating and his plate was pushed to the side. The man lit a cigarette, folded the newspaper in front of him, and continued to read.

Doreen came by and removed the dirty plate and poured the man more coffee.

“What do you think of that?” Earl said to the man, nodding at Doreen as she moved down the counter. “Don’t you think that’s something special?”

The man looked up. He looked at Doreen and then at Earl, and then went back to his newspaper.

“Well, what do you think?” Earl said. “I’m asking. Does it look good or not? Tell me.”

The man rattled the newspaper.

When Doreen started down the counter again, Earl nudged the man’s shoulder and said, “I’m telling you something. Listen. Look at the ass on her. Now you watch this now. Could I have a chocolate sundae?” Earl called to Doreen.

She stopped in front of him and let out her breath. Then she turned and picked up a dish and the ice-cream dipper. She leaned over the freezer, reached down, and began to press the dipper into the ice cream. Earl looked at the man and winked as Doreen’s skirt traveled up her thighs. But the man’s eyes caught the eyes of the other waitress. And then the man put the newspaper under his arm and reached into his pocket.

The other waitress came straight to Doreen. “Who is this character?” she said.

“Who?” Doreen said and looked around with the ice-cream dish in her hand.

“Him,” the other waitress said and nodded at Earl. “Who is this joker, anyway?”

Earl put on his best smile. He held it. He held it until he felt his face pulling out of shape.

But the other waitress just studied him, and Doreen began to shake her head slowly. The man had put some change beside his cup and stood up, but he too waited to hear the answer. They all stared at Earl.

“He’s a salesman. He’s my husband,” Doreen said at last, shrugging. Then she put the unfinished chocolate sundae in front of him and went to total up his check.

I HAD A JOB
and Patti didn’t. I worked a few hours a night for the hospital. It was a nothing job. I did some work, signed the card for eight hours, went drinking with the nurses. After a while, Patti wanted a job. She said she needed a job for her self-respect. So she started selling multiple vitamins door to door.

For a while, she was just another girl who went up and down blocks in strange neighborhoods, knocking on doors. But she learned the ropes. She was quick and had excelled at things in school. She had personality. Pretty soon the company gave her a promotion. Some of the girls who weren’t doing so hot were put to work under her. Before long, she had herself a crew and a little office out in the mall. But the girls who worked for her were always changing. Some would quit after a couple of days – after a couple of hours, sometimes. But sometimes there were girls who were good at it. They could sell vitamins. These were the girls that stuck with Patti. They formed the core of the crew. But there were girls who couldn’t give away vitamins.

The girls who couldn’t cut it would just quit. Just not show up for work. If they had a phone, they’d take it off the hook. They wouldn’t answer the door. Patti took these losses to heart, like the girls were new converts who had lost their way. She blamed herself. But she got over it. There were too many not to get over it.

Once in a while a girl would freeze and not be able to push the doorbell. Or maybe she’d get to the door and something would happen to her voice. Or she’d get the greeting mixed up with something she shouldn’t be saying until she got inside. A girl like this, she’d decide to pack it in, take the sample case, head for the car, hang around until Patti and the others finished. There’d be a conference. Then they’d all ride back to the office. They’d say things to buck themselves up. “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” And, “Do the right things and the right things will happen.” Things like that.

Sometimes a girl just disappeared in the field, sample case and all. She’d hitch a ride into town, then beat it. But there were always girls to take her place. Girls were coming and going in those days. Patti had a list. Every few weeks she’d run a little ad in
The Pennysaver.
There’d be more girls and more training. There was no end of girls.

The core group was made up of Patti, Donna, and Sheila. Patti was a looker. Donna and Sheila were only medium-pretty. One night this Sheila said to Patti that she loved her more than anything on earth. Patti told me these were the words. Patti had driven Sheila home and they were sitting in front of Sheila’s place. Patti said to Sheila she loved her, too. Patti said to Sheila she loved all her girls. But not in the way Sheila had in mind. Then Sheila touched Patti’s breast. Patti said she took Sheila’s hand and held it. She said she told her she didn’t swing that way. She said Sheila didn’t bat an eye, that she only nodded, held on to Patti’s hand, kissed it, and got out of the car.

That was around Christmas. The vitamin business was pretty bad off back then, so we thought we’d have a party to cheer everybody up. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Sheila
was the first to get drunk and pass out. She passed out on her feet, fell over, and didn’t wake up for hours. One minute she was standing in the middle of the living room, then her eyes closed, the legs buckled, and she went down with a glass in her hand. The hand holding the drink smacked the coffee table when she fell. She didn’t make a sound otherwise. The drink poured out onto the rug. Patti and I and somebody else lugged her out to the back porch and put her down on a cot and did what we could to forget about her.

Everybody got drunk and went home. Patti went to bed. I wanted to keep on, so I sat at the table with a drink until it began to get light out. Then Sheila came in from the porch and started up. She said she had this headache that was so bad it was like somebody was sticking wires in her brain. She said it was such a bad headache she was afraid it was going to leave her with a permanent squint. And she was sure her little finger was broken. She showed it to me. It looked purple. She bitched about us letting her sleep all night with her contacts in. She wanted to know didn’t anybody give a shit. She brought the finger up close and looked at it. She shook her head. She held the finger as far away as she could and looked some more. It was like she couldn’t believe the things that must have happened to her that night. Her face was puffy, and her hair was all over. She ran cold water on her finger. “God. Oh, God,” she said and cried some over the sink. But she’d made a serious pass at Patti, a declaration of love, and I didn’t have any sympathy.

I was drinking Scotch and milk with a sliver of ice. Sheila was leaning on the drainboard. She watched me from her little slits of eyes. I took some of my drink. I didn’t say anything. She went back to telling me how bad she felt. She said she needed to see a doctor. She said she was going to
wake Patti. She said she was quitting, leaving the state, going to Portland. That she had to say goodbye to Patti first. She kept on. She wanted Patti to drive her to the hospital for her finger and her eyes.

“I’ll drive you,” I said. I didn’t want to do it, but I would.

“I want Patti to drive me,” Sheila said.

She was holding the wrist of her bad hand with her good hand, the little finger as big as a pocket flashlight. “Besides, we need to talk. I need to tell her I’m going to Portland. I need to say goodbye.”

I said, “I guess I’ll have to tell her for you. She’s asleep.”

Sheila turned mean. “We’re
friends
,” she said. “I have to talk to her. I have to tell her myself.”

I shook my head. “She’s asleep. I just said so.”

“We’re friends and we love each other,” Sheila said. “I have to say goodbye to her.”

Sheila made to leave the kitchen.

I started to get up. I said, “I said I’ll drive you.”

“You’re drunk! You haven’t even been to bed yet.” She looked at her finger again and said, “Goddamn, why’d this have to happen?”