• • • •
BETH’S HANDS WERE caked with flour and eggs, joining the chocolate which stained the patched red apron; she had no sense of embarrassment before Puppy.
“My son’s not here.”
“Know when he’ll be back?”
“He’s with his girlfriend.” Beth started closing the front door.
“Can I wait?”
The thought of Puppy in her home was much like finding piles of rotting rats on the couch.
Beth grudgingly stepped aside, leading him through the house and out the kitchen door into the tiny neat yard. He wondered if she’d scour the floor where he stepped or just tear up the tiles. Beth half-heartedly straightened the wobbly metal table; Puppy squeezed uncomfortably into the small chair, which gave her pleasure.
“I don’t know how long he’ll be.”
“I haven’t any plans.”
“I do, Mr. Nedick.”
“Don’t let me stop you. Smells good.” He awkwardly buttoned up his jacket with his left hand. “Nice night.”
Beth disappeared for about ten minutes while he ignored the all too familiar view of the backs of the weathered apartment buildings, clothes fluttering off the fire escapes and draping the flower and vegetable gardens like diffident canopies.
From inside the house, pots slammed, a dish broke and Beth cursed very precisely so he would hear every word and know who was to blame for the cooking accident.
She returned, spreading out a napkin and laying down a thin cheese sandwich.
“Thank you.” He smiled gratefully. “I haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
Beth waited to make sure she had properly served her guest. Unless it was rancid, the proper response was a polite murmuring of approval while you ate silently. Dropping a slice of cheese because you weren’t used to eating with your left hand was wrong.
Offended, Beth picked up the cheese and took away the sandwich. More banging in the kitchen. In about fifteen minutes a sizzling AG hamburger on a burnt bun dropped before him like a grudging sacrifice.
“Thank you.” He smiled again. “I haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
He grimaced and held the burger with both hands, chewing out those appropriate gentle murmurs. Beth yanked away the burger.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” Puppy wiped ketchup off his chin.
Beth gestured at her pained mouth and sneered.
“I’m not lying,” he insisted.
She winced and grimaced and made all sorts of faces he suspected had little to do with his opinion of the hamburger.
“The food is good.”
Beth didn’t buy that. He’d insulted her hospitality and made it seem as if she couldn’t cook. What faults would be next?
“It’s not your damn food.” He shouldn’t tell her. Or anyone. “It’s my arm. It’s a little sore from pitching and hurts to hold the burger. That’s why I made a face.” He simulated her wide range of expressions.
She softened slightly. “How bad is your arm?”
“It’ll pass. I hurt it nearly twenty years ago.”
“Then why would you pitch again?” Beth seemed genuinely baffled by his stupidity.
“Because it’s a dream. Another last chance.”
“So you hurt yourself so badly you can’t hold a hamburger for a dream?”
“Yeah. Maybe if you’d ever had one, you’d understand.”
Beth slammed the sandwich onto the table and turned out the back light when she went inside. It was even colder in the dark. He stormed in, finishing the burger.
“What is your problem, lady?”
“Don’t you lady me.” Beth poked her finger into his throat.
“You hate me.”
“Yes.” She nodded matter of factly, returning to her pie.
“But why?”
She squished the dough in the pan as if it were his head. “You’re a bad influence on my son.”
“Really? By giving him a good job, promoting him…”
“He got promoted?”
“Yeah. Twice.”
Beth slammed the pie into the oven. “Parroting the propaganda.”
“What’re you talking about?”
“The museum ll about 10/12.”
“That was his idea.”
Beth went white with rage. “That’s not possible. He doesn’t think like that. Never thought like that. Until you.”
“I don’t think like that, either.”
“You don’t think at all, do you, Mr. Nedick?”
“Not as much as other people and I’ll probably live longer. I care about baseball. And I care about your son.”
“He’s not your child.”
“I wish he were,” Puppy said quietly. “I wish I’d had a kid like that.”
“So you could ruin his life?”
“How am I doing that?”
“You’re filling his head with nonsense.” Beth rushed into Frecklie’s bedroom, the mattress creaking up and down, returning with the sketch pad which she shoved at Puppy. “He’s drawing stadiums. Stop smiling.” She yanked the pad back. “There are no stadiums. There will be no stadiums. He’s dreaming like his father did, which killed him. I won’t let my son be killed by dreams. Look what it’s done to you.”
He took a breath and grabbed her wrist with his right hand. “It’s given me a reason to wake up. It’s made me think that my life wasn’t a complete waste, no career, bad marriage, no children, looking forward to writing copy for a funeral home in a few months because that’s all there’s left. So let the boy draw his pictures. Let him dream. Otherwise what the hell do we have other than baking pies at midnight?”
“Get out, Mr. Nedick,” she said very quietly.
Beth seethed for half an hour after Puppy left. That put her way behind on sewing. But she couldn’t concentrate. She tried working on the Gutierrez wedding dress only to rip apart the stitching; by one AM, she gave up.
When Frecklie finally came home exhausted after humping the sex she-devil Dale all night, Beth was in the dark backyard, kneeling and praying. He hated when his mother prayed because it usually had to do with him.
• • • •
KENUDA SLIPPED ON his new checked overcoat, squirming around pleasurably at the wonderful real cotton material. His A12 waited in the doorway with that insufferable way the garbage cans had of silently entering rooms or knowing what you wanted. Damn, for just a human secretary. But we took away their faces, meh, meh, he muttered darkly, so must be nice to
