The Graduate (13 page)

“Hello,” Benjamin said.

Mr. Robinson had pushed his hands down into the pockets of his pants but now removed one of them almost immediately to glance at his watch.

“What would you say to a short one,” he said.

“All right.”

“Bourbon still your drink?”

“Yes.”

Benjamin waited until he had left the room, then turned back to Mrs.

Robinson, who was still sitting in the chair looking at the large glass panels enclosing the porch.

“Now listen,” he said. “This was not my idea. It was my father’s idea.”

“Benjamin?” she said quietly, not looking at him. “Didn’t I make myself perfectly clear about this?”

“I’m saying it was not my idea,” he said, taking a step toward her.

“I’m saying my parents thought it would be a nice little social gesture if I—”

“I thought I made myself quite clear to you.”

“You did, Mrs. Robinson.”

“Then why are you here.”

“Because it was either this or a dinner party for the two families. And I’m afraid I couldn’t quite handle that, if you don’t mind.”

Mrs. Robinson raised her glass to her lips.

“Now I’m taking her out this once,” Benjamin said. “We’ll go out to dinner and have a drink and I’ll bring her back. That’s it. I have no The Graduate

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intention of ever taking your precious daughter out again in her life. So don’t get upset about it.”

“But I am,” she said.

“What?”

“I’m extremely upset about it, Benjamin.”

Mr. Robinson came down the three steps leading onto the sun porch, carrying a drink for Benjamin and one for himself, which he took to a chair beside Mrs. Robinson.

“Sit down,” he said, gesturing at a chair. “Sit down.”

Benjamin sat.

“Well,” Mr. Robinson said, raising his glass. “Here’s to you and your date.”

As he was drinking Benjamin looked over the rim of his glass at Mrs.

Robinson. She was still sitting very straight in her chair looking out through the glass panels and into the dark back yard.

“Ben?” Mr. Robinson said.

“What.”

“How long has it been since you and Elaine have seen each other.”

“I don’t remember.”

Elaine appeared at the entrance of the porch wearing a neat brown dress. She was carrying a green coat over one of her arms and reaching up trying to adjust a small gold earring.

“Hello,” she said, smiling.

“Hello,” Benjamin said. He glanced at her, then back down at the floor.

“What’s the trouble there,” Mr. Robinson said.

“The clasp is broken on this,” she said. She tried again to fix the earring into her ear, then frowned. “Do you mind if I don’t wear these?”

she said to Benjamin.

“No,” he said.

Elaine removed the other earring and set them down in a glass ash tray. Then she seated herself. She folded the green coat in her lap.

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“I was just asking Ben how long it’s been since you two have seen each other,” Mr. Robinson said.

“I don’t know,” Elaine said. “Didn’t we go out once in high school?”

“We did,” Benjamin said.

Mr. Robinson nodded and looked down at his drink, which he was holding in front of him in both hands. “Well,” he said, grinning, “I want you to keep your wits about you tonight. You never know what tricks Ben picked up back there in the East.” He twirled his drink around in the glass, tasted it, then leaned back in his chair and looked at Benjamin. “Where did you think of going,” he said.

“Sir?”

“Where did you think of going.”

“Hollywood,” Benjamin said.

“You’re going to do the old town.”

“What?”

“I say you’re going to do the old town. Hit the big night spots.”

Benjamin finished his drink and set the empty glass on a table beside him. “Let’s go,” he said. He stood. Elaine stood and handed him her coat. As he was helping her on with it be happened to glance at the panel that was reflecting Mrs. Robinson. Her eyes stared back evenly at him out of the glass. “We’ll be back early,” he said.

“Oh hell,” Mr. Robinson said. “You stay out as late as you want.”

Benjamin salmmed the door of his car after Elaine had gotten in, then walked around to seat himself under the steering wheel. He started the engine and turned away from the curb.

“My mother’s in a strange mood today,” Elaine said.

“What did she say.”

“What?”

“I mean what are you talking about.”

“My mother,” Elaine said. “She’s been in kind of a trance today for some reason. I think she must have something on her mind.”

“What.”

“I don’t know what.”

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Benjamin turned his car onto a ramp and drove down the ramp and out onto the freeway.

“You don’t know her very well, do you,” Elaine said.

“No.”

“Because I’m afraid you must think she’s awfully rude.”

“Are you apologizing for her?”

“No,” Elaine said. “I’m just—I’m afraid you might have gotten the wrong impression of her. But it’s just this strange mood she’s in today.”

Benjamin pushed the accelerator of his car down to the floor and moved into the second lane. A car honked behind him. Benjamin glanced into his mirror, then swerved into the fast lane of traffic.

“You’re living at home now,” Elaine said. “Is that right?”

“That’s right.”

She nodded. “Do you have any prospects in mind?” she said.

“No.”

“You don’t have any jobs lined up. Or graduate schools or anything.”

Benjamin veered back into the center lane, pressed on his horn and shot in front of the car he had been following. Elaine frowned at him a moment, then looked out through the windshield again.

“What about that prize you won,” she said.

“What about it.”

“What ever happened to that.”

“I threw it away,” Benjamin said.

“What?”

“I threw it away.”

“Oh,” Elaine said. “Why did you do that.”

Benjamin sped up behind the bumper of the car travelling in front of him and began honking his horn. The man driving it held up his hand and began waving beside his head for Benjamin to stop honking.

Benjamin stayed several inches behind him and continued to honk.

Finally a space opened up in the next lane and the man swung into it.

Benjamin shot ahead.

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“Is anything wrong?” Elaine said.

“No.”

“Do you always drive this way?”

“Yes.”

Elaine looked back out through the front windshield.

The first night club they went to was called the Club Renaissance.

Elaine handed her coat across a counter to a girl just inside the entrance. A man in a tuxedo showed them to a table in the center of the room. Except for someone seated by himself in the corner theywere the only ones in the club. There was a bandstand at the end of the room with a piano and a set of drums on it but no music was being played.

“Do you want some dinner?” Benjamin said when two drinks had been set on their table.

“I’d love some.”

“Bring a menu,” Benjamin said to the waiter.

“Dinner for two, sir?”

“No,” Benjamin said. “Just for her.”

The waiter nodded and disappeared.

“Aren’t you eating?” Elaine said.

“No.” Benjamin lifted his glass off the table and drank.

“Why not.”

“If it’s all right with you I’m not hungry.”

The waiter returned a moment later with the menu but Elaine shook her head. “I’ve changed my mind,” she said. “Thank you.”

The name of the next night club was The Interior and there was a band playing as Elaine and Benjamin walked in through the front door.

They found a table and Benjamin ordered two more drinks.

“Do you want to dance?” he said.

“Do you?”

Benjamin shrugged his shoulders and stood. Elaine stood and followed him onto the floor. They danced for several moments, then Benjamin dropped his hands to his sides and nodded at the table.

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“The drinks have come,” he said. He pushed his way back to the table through several couples.

In the next club there was a strip show. Elaine followed Benjamin through the door, removed her coat and checked it. Benjamin walked across the room and selected a table immediately beneath the stage. He sat. When Elaine came to the table he nodded at the chair across from his.

“Benjamin?”

“Sit down.”

“Well Benjamin?”

“What.”

“Am I supposed to sit with the back of my head up against the stage?”

“You are.”

“But couldn’t we get a table farther back?”

“No.”

Elaine waited a moment longer, then slid in onto the chair. When Benjamin had ordered drinks he pushed his hands into his pockets and slouched down to watch the show.

A small band was playing on one side of the stage and in the center the stripper was bent over with her back to the audience, grinning at them between her legs. For a long time she stood flexing the muscles in her buttocks in time to the music, then she straightened up and began prancing back and forth across the stage. Attached to the shiny cups over her nipples were two long pink cords. At the end of each cord was a large pink tassel. She began swinging them around in front of her as she walked.

The waiter brought two drinks to Benjamin’s table.

“Will you drink mine?” Elaine said.

“What for.”

“I just wish you would.”

“Are you drunk already?”

“Yes.”

Benjamin picked her drink up off the table, drained it and returned it in front of her.

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“Why don’t you watch the show,” he said. She was sitting very straight in her chair, looking across the table at him.

“Benjamin?” she said.

“What.”

“Do you dislike me?”

“What?”

“Do you dislike me for some reason?”

“No,” Benjamin said. “Why should I.”

“I don’t know.”

Benjamin settled back in his chair with the drink. The woman on the stage was still prancing around but instead of swinging the tassels she was holding them out in front of her. Suddenly she stopped and faced the audience. She dropped the tassels. The band stopped playing except for the drummer, who began rolling his drumsticks against the top of his drum. The stripper began swaying one way, then the other, and the tassels began swaying back and forth with her. She swayed faster and faster until finally the tassels started swinging in circles around her breasts. Several of the customers began to applaud.

Benjamin held his hands out in front of him and clapped.

“You’re missing a great effect here,” he said.

Elaine turned in her chair to watch the two tassels swinging around the woman’s breasts, then turned back. She folded her hands in her lap and looked up into the smoky air over Benjamin’s head.

“How do you like that,” Benjamin said.

She didn’t answer him.

“Could you do it?”

“No.”

Suddenly the dancer caught one of the tassels and threw it around the other way so that the tassels were twirling around in opposite directions. The customers applauded. The woman slowly raised her arms out beside her and bent slightly forward. Then she walked to the front of the stage. Elaine was the only customer who had not brought her chair around to the side of the table facing the stage. The dancer walked over to where she was sitting and bent forward so the pink tassels began swinging down in front of Elaine’s face. She winked at The Graduate

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Benjamin, still holding her arms out beside her. Several men in the back began to laugh. Benjamin sat up in his chair and set the drink on the table. He frowned at the face of the dancer, then at Elaine, who was still sitting very straight in her chair looking up over Benjamin’s head with the pink tassels crossing every few seconds in front of her face. She was crying. Benjamin stood suddenly and held one of his hands in the path of the tassels. They stopped swinging. A man in back began to boo. Benjamin took Elaine’s hand and led her across the room to get her coat.

“Elaine?” he said when they were out on the sidewalk.

“Will you take me home now, please?”

“Elaine, I’m sorry.”

She wiped one of her cheeks with the back of her hand. “I think I’d better go home now, please.”

“But Elaine?”

“Which way is the car,” she said. She put her hands in the pockets of her coat and looked down the sidewalk.

“Elaine, listen to me.” She began walking ahead of him down the sidewalk. “Elaine?”

“Please take me home,” she said, walking faster and beginning to cry again.

“Well wait a minute,” Benjamin said, catching up to her. “I’m sorry I took you in there.”

“I want to go home!” She hurried ahead of him.

“Elaine,” Benjamin said. He took her arm to stop her. “Now I want to tell you something.”

“Take me home!”

“But could I just tell you one thing?”

“What.”

“This whole idea,” he said, still holding her arm. “This whole idea of the date and everything. It was my parents’ idea. They forced me into it.”

“Oh,” Elaine said, reaching up to wipe her cheek again. “That’s nice of you to tell me.”

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“But that’s why I’ve been acting this way. I’m not like this. I hate myself like this.”

“Can we go home now, please?”

“Well can’t we have dinner or something?”

“No.”

“Can we just sit somewhere and talk?”

“I want to go home!” she said, staring up into his face.

“But I want to just talk to you first.”

“Benjamin, people are looking at us.”

Benjamin glanced around, then led her away from the middle of the sidewalk and against a building. “Could you stop crying, please?”

he said.

“No I couldn’t.”

“But could you try?”

“No.”

He looked down at her a moment, then put his other arm around her and brought her up close against him and kissed her. They stood without moving for several moments and then finally Elaine turned her face away and cleared her throat.