“They’re good parents.”
“Want me to walk you to the door?”
The Morrises’ front porch was the only lit-up spot in GroVont and that’s where we stood to say good night. I didn’t want to kiss her, but her face bent up toward me seemed to expect it. Sexiness and pity just don’t mix. When I leaned in to Chuckette’s thin lips, the porch light flashed.
“I’m in trouble now,” she said. “Daddy’ll make me ask God for forgiveness.”
“We didn’t do anything.”
“I had an impure thought.”
“I didn’t.”
I got back to the Ford to find Dothan and Maurey’s faces in a lock. I hopped in the front seat next to them.
“Fun night,” I said.
Dothan looked over Maurey’s shoulder. “She bite your tongue again?”
Dothan pulled up beside Hank’s truck and turned off the engine. We all three sat in silence, staring at the cabin.
“Good night, Sam,” Dothan said.
I opened the door, but didn’t move. I looked at Maurey. “You coming in?”
“In a minute.”
“I can wait. The lock is kind of tricky and we’d be less likely to wake up Lydia if we go in together.” Which were lies; the door wasn’t locked, and Lydia was either awake and getting laid, or she was already asleep and nothing short of a fire would affect her.
“She’ll be in when she comes in,” Dothan said.
“I can wait if you guys want to say good night.”
“Get out of the car, Sam,” Dothan said.
I looked at Maurey. She reached over and patted my hand. “I’ll be in in a minute.”
“I don’t mind waiting.”
Dothan said, “Sam.”
In the bathroom, I did the introspective mirror deal for a while. I stuck out my tongue to check the white moldy stuff that sometimes grows there. I wondered if Lydia really connected to herself by touching her tongue in the mirror. Seemed kind of stupid, but I guess you do whatever it takes to feel like you and the person in your body are related. I brushed my teeth with Maurey’s blue toothbrush, then I shook it as dry as possible and hung it back next to my red one. Maybe the basic way people connect is through the mouth; that would explain the French kiss.
Because the dryer was broken, Lydia had clothes draped all over Les’s horns. I tried to picture Les as a noble beast surviving the wilderness, then carried the deal onto some religion where awareness stays with the body after it dies and he was up on the wall knowing full well that a neurotic woman had hung bras and hose around his horns and stuck a Gilbey’s label over each eye. What indignities would fall on my body after I died?
I sat at the kitchen table, staring down at one of Lydia’s ever-present half-finished crossword puzzles, drinking a Dr Pepper, and chewing on some of Hank’s jerky, which also came from a noble beast of the wilderness. More indignities.
I figured if sex was poker, the order of the winning hands went like this: mouth to mouth, fingers to tits, mouth to tits, fingers to crotch, mouth to crotch, crotch to crotch; although mouth to tits and fingers to crotch might be reversed or equal. Subheads would include fingers to tits through shirt and bra, through bra only, or directly on nipple. Then there was tongue in ear.
Dothan and Maurey would be about stage two by now— fingers to tits, probably below shirt and above bra. Her right tit was a little bigger than the left one. The tip end stuck out farther.
They wouldn’t fuck in my driveway, would they? Get sweaty and wet, blow come right in the Ford? There was nothing in the world to stop them. I could flash the porch light like Chuckette’s father did, only our porch light was burnt out. That would only piss Maurey off anyway.
Alice jumped on the table and sat on the crossword, mewing. I didn’t care what went across or down anyway. I poured a little Dr Pepper in a saucer and watched as she lapped it up. Would he undress her completely or just pull her skirt up? Dothan was the kind of jerk who would expect a blow job and give nothing in return.
I stood in the dark in the living room and peeked through a crack in the curtain. The half-moon gave the snow a dull nickel look and Soapley’s trailer could have been a spaceship or a bloated pill. Dothan’s car was too steamed to see into, but I imagined movement; I imagined her mouth around his penis and his fingers tangled in her hair.
As an act of rebellion, I put on the paisley pajamas and sat at my typewriter, pretending to read
She came in the bedroom and shrugged out of the blue shirt and pulled the white dickie off. I couldn’t see any marks on her body.
“You used my toothbrush,” she said.
“I deny it.”
She slid the white nightie on over her head, then sat on the bed to pull off her shoes and skirt. No panty shot tonight. “We saw you spying at the window.”
“Maurey, I do not enjoy these double dates.”
Maurey picked up her hairbrush. “You’d rather I go out with him alone while you sit here and wonder?”
“I’d rather you not go out with him.”
“Not an option.” She talked as she brushed. “If it makes you unhappy, I’ll move out. I’m not here to make you unhappy.”
“I don’t want you to move out. Living with you is neat.”
“What do you want then?”
“Within the options?”
“Within the options.”
She held her head down to brush up from the back of her neck. The truth of our baby floating around in this little girl zipped in and out of my grasp. I’d never even looked at a baby up close before. Alice hopped in my lap and I sat, petting her and wishing I could touch Maurey and tell her I loved her, but knowing that would be squirrelly. I wished I had a father.
“I want a Fudgsicle. How about you?”
She looked at me and smiled. “Okay.”
I made pecan pancakes while Hank walked to Kimball’s Food Market and back for the
Maurey wore my red slippers. Her hair had that clumped-to-one-side look women get when they sleep.
“Sam slept in paisley jammies again last night,” she said.
Lydia lit a cigarette. “What a chump; your mother and I should exchange children. Annabel would love a child in paisley pajamas.”
“She could iron them every afternoon.”
A tiny row of bubbles appeared around the edge of each pancake. I eased the flipper under a corner and checked for golden brownness. On the one hand it was really nice and homey sitting around the kitchen like this,
