telling stories about fighting the dons in Cuba and chasing after outlaws in Oklahoma. 'Kitty saw me as a geezer before my time,' Carl said. 'She had Robert, and took off and I never went looking for her.'
This was the occasion Carl said to Ben, 'I hope you have better luck with women. We seem to have 'em around for a year or so and they take off or die on us.'
Kim said, 'What's that supposed to mean, a curse?' She said, 'Luck has nothing to do with it,' starting to show some temper. 'You know what your granddad's problem was? He saw himself as a ladies' man without knowing a goddamn thing about women. It was all guy stuff with Carl, and you ate it up. My Lord, raised by an old man with guns and livestock out in the middle of nowhere. Having a jarhead drill instructor for a dad wouldn't have helped either, even if you never met him. To tell you the truth,' she said, 'I'm surprised you're considerate and know how to please a woman.'
They'd argue over dumb things like how to make chili and Kim would say, 'I'm from where they invented it, for Christ sake, hon. We do certain things my way or I'm out of here. Like Kitty, or whatever her name was, your grandma.'
This Kim Hunter, from Del Rio, Texas, down on the border, had come to Hollywood hoping to be a movie star and was told she'd have to change her name, as there already was a Kim Hunter. This Kim Hunter said, 'Have the other one change hers,' like she'd never seen her in Streetcar playing Marlon Brando's wife. She was a physical fitness nut and got into stunt work falling off horses, getting pushed out of moving cars, jumping off the Titanic, stepping in to get beat up in the same dress the star was wearing...
He said, 'You think you'll ever leave me?'
She said, 'I doubt it.'
Their arguments played like scenes they could turn on and off. Their home in Studio City was aluminum siding with a flagstone patio, a lot of old shrubbery in the backyard and bats that would come in the house through the chimney.
Three weeks ago they'd spent Sunday on the beach at Point Dume, where Charlton Heston kisses the real Kim Hunter playing a monkey chick in Planet of the Apes, and she doesn't want to kiss him because being a human he's so ugly - right before he takes off and comes to the head of the Statue of Liberty sticking out of the sand.
'You'd never catch me playing an ape,' Kim said.
That day they walked along the edge of the Pacific Ocean talking about getting married and spending the rest of their lives together.
'You sure you want to?'
Ben said, 'Yeah, I'm sure.'
'If we're gonna have any children - '
'I know, and I want kids. Really.'
They had fallen in love falling off a ladder in a movie, five takes, and were still in love almost two years later. She was slim and liked to wear hiking boots with print dresses.
Crossing the rocks to the path up the cliff - that bed of volcanic rock at Point Dume - Kim twisted her ankle. They got home, she put ice on it and an Ace wrap and said she was fine. They had talked about going to a movie that night, Harry Potter or Ocean's Eleven. Kim said no problem, she was up for it, and said, 'You promised to fix the chimney today.'
Ben was in the kitchen adding mushrooms to the Paul Newman spaghetti sauce. He said, 'In a minute.'
She limped out saying she'd take care of it, not sounding mad or upset; it was just that impulsive way she had. He called to her to wait. 'Can't you wait one minute?' No answer from outside. If she thought she could do it - she had done enough climbing and falling gags, she knew how. He thought of the day they fell off the ladder together five times in the LONG SHOT of the couple eloping... and now they were getting married. He told Kim and told himself he was all for it and believed he meant it.
She had dragged the ladder out of the garage, laid it against the chimney to climb up and replace the screen over the opening so the bats would quit flying in. She must've got right to the top... He heard her scream and found her at the foot of the ladder, on the flagstone.
For the next three days and nights he sat close to the hospital bed taking her hand, touching her face, asking her to please open her eyes. He prayed, having once been a Baptist, see if it would do any good, but she died as he watched her and had to be told by the nurse she was gone.
They let him sit there while he tried to place the blame somewhere, going through ifs.
If he had quit slicing the mushrooms right away.
If Kim wasn't so - the way she was.
If they hadn't gone to Point Dume she wouldn't have twisted her ankle. He was sure it was the ankle caused her to fall.
That evening at home he got out the Jim Beam and it reminded him of his granddad that last time they were together, Carl hoping Ben had better luck with women, having 'em around a year or so and 'they take off or die on us.'
He tried to find a way to blame Carl for telling him that, Ben now looking at four generations of bad luck with women. He was afraid it meant that if it wasn't Kim's time had come it would've been some other girl's.
The idea was in his head now, stuck there. He didn't see it as a curse; there was no such thing. Still, there it was and he had to ask himself, You think you can handle it?
They had talked about taking a trip one of these days to show each other where they came from, Kim saying, 'A bull rider, I imagine you'll show me a stock tank on a feed lot, like you're proud of it.'
Turning off the highway into Okmulgee he was thinking this could be his part of the tour, Kim sitting next to him in her denim jacket, Ben in a wool shirt hanging out of his Levi's. It was mid-November, the best time of the year to show off his land. They'd be harvesting the pecans and Lydell, his caretaker-foreman, would have a crew out shaking the trees and gathering up the nuts. First, though, a tour through town. And right away he was thinking of Denise again, Denise appearing in his mind ever since he left L.A.
Okmulgee, population: 13,022.
Show Kim some history, the Creek Nation Council House, and tell her about the 'Trail of Tears' and how Cherokees and Chickasaws and Creeks were forced to move here from Eastern states. He'd be serious about it and she wouldn't say anything. He was surprised to see a brand-new jail next to the county courthouse.
Here was a chance to tell about Denise if he wanted to. Say to Kim, 'See the courthouse? That whole top floor used to be the jail. I spent a night there when a girl named Denise got me in trouble.' Kim would want to know about it. He'd tell how he and Denise went skinny-dipping late one night in the country club swimming pool and he got caught. Denise ran, leaving her clothes, but he wouldn't tell on her so they locked him up they said to teach him a lesson.
Kim would want to know more about Denise. He'd tell her that in high school - right up that street, see it? Okmulgee High, Home of the Bulldogs - she was known as Denise the piece.
But now he was thinking it wouldn't be fair to say that. It was the reputation Denise had, but you couldn't prove it by him. They had fooled around some but never gone all the way.
Okay, there was Boy Howdy, the variety store where he got his sweatsocks and T-shirts. Ralph's barbershop, he'd stop in once a month for his crewcut. Marino's Bar...
It was where he last saw Denise, home that time for Carl's funeral in '86. She was about to marry a country entertainer Ben had never heard of, Wayne Hostetter and the Wranglers, but kept touching him as they had a few beers and talked about things they did twenty years ago, like yesterday.
His close friend in school, Preston Raincrow, mentioned her only once, Preston on the tribal police now, a Muskogee Nation Lighthorseman. They had played basketball together and would write each other when they felt like it. Ben never asked about Denise, but Preston happened to say in a letter she had left Wayne, the country singer, and Ben would think of her - sometimes even while he was living with Kim - and wonder what she was doing. He didn't know why he kept thinking of her.
He drove past her parents' home on Seminole Avenue, but didn't stop. Denise's dad was a lawyer. He liked to bird-hunt and Carl used to take him out to their property on the Deep Fork River.
The Orpheum was showing Harry Potter and Monsters Inc. That Sunday they went to Point Dume they were going to see Ocean's Eleven after Kim talked him out of Harry Potter. And if she were sitting next to him right
