I told Laura I probably wouldn’t’ve even approached the country club, because I really did think it was completely off-limits. But drizzle started falling and there was no real place for me to stand around outside; I was getting soaked. So I slipped in through this gateway I was passing—they have this big black cast-iron gateway in the middle of this high ivied wall out front—and I crossed the courtyard to this building, where I stood in a doorway. All I wanted was to stay warm and dry, and I was listening to the rain tap on the pavement when a waiter stuck his head out the door, smiled nicely, and asked if I’d like to come in and get dry and maybe have a Coke or something.
I said I would.
He was foreign-sounding, the waiter, with gray in his hair, and wearing this white sort of formal jacket that had brass buttons up the side of the front.
One thing I can say is, he was, like, the politest guy I’d ever met, because he never lost his smile, and he sort of waved me forward with his hand so I’d know exactly where I was going.
He led me into this very fancy and old-fashioned bar area where everything was made of very heavy dark wood, thicker with varnish than a gym floor. There were long tables and big dark leather chairs and sofas everywhere. It was pretty quiet in there, but I noticed a few old men in suits were sitting around, reading newspapers and having drinks.
I sat at the bar and the waiter went behind and poured me a Coke and passed it to me.
And I don’t know what it was, but when he asked me some question—just a simple question about where I was from or something—I just went off.
I told him I was the son of the police chief.
I don’t even know why I picked that.
I mean, you’d think I’d say I was the son of a congressman or senator or something like that, but what I said was police chief, because it sounded important to me. And I don’t mean the local police chief, because I sort of instinctively figured they all might know him—the old men in the suits, I mean—so I said the police chief in Chicago, because I thought it sounded right, and that I was in town visiting a friend. Then I said—and he hadn’t even asked me but I just sort of volunteered it—that I went to a boarding school and was on break, and how I wasn’t even staying in a hotel or house, but on a big yacht downtown moored at the marina near where the old spice factory used to be.
I kept my eyes on him while I talked; he was polishing some glasses. But the truth is, I wasn’t saying all this just to tell the waiter, but more so those old guys—and I’d counted five or six of them sitting around drinking drinks—would hear me.
And sure enough, the more I said about the Great Lakes and anything else I knew about Chicago—calling it the Windy City because I’d heard it called that somewhere—these old guys sort of perked up and nodded and grinned at one another. I could tell they were listening to everything I said, until finally—and it only took, like, a minute—they all got up from their tables and stood in a circle around me at the bar while I blabbed on and on.
I don’t know what it was, but for the first time in my life it was like I could talk endlessly. I’ll admit it was a little hard keeping up with all the lies, but I kept track of everything pretty good. I had, like, a lot of vital mental energy for some reason, probably because it was a real rush like Carol had said, and I could tell that these old guys in the country club had had a few drinks anyway even though it was still morning.
In the beginning I didn’t know if they actually believed me, but I just kept talking anyways, because, at first at least, it was really fun.
But the thing is, after just a minute or so, I could tell that none of them were doubting a word I said.
I mean, they wanted to believe what I told them—I could tell just looking at their drunk, grinning faces—and if they chimed in and said that at their boarding school there had been an indoor pool or polo grounds or some tree everybody carved their initials on—because, you know, they sort of wanted to relate to me—I’d say that we had a really big pool and dozens of horses and that an English guy named Withers taught us to ride and play polo. And they never even tried to contradict me, these old guys, and if anything they tried to encourage me—I mean even correct me—and said my dad was actually police commissioner instead of chief, because it sounded more official, and so I went along with it, and for a while I was thrilled to be getting all this attention, and I really felt—at least for a minute—that I’d sort of created a new me.
But it wasn’t long before something felt off.
I don’t mean my lies fell apart; they held together perfectly.
I just for some reason started feeling sort of down.
For one thing, I kept watching these wet, drunk smiles on all these old-man faces, and their glassy eyes that looked kind of red and teary—and I had the feeling they would never have wanted to know who I really was, I mean just a kid from the fifty-cent side.
But as long as I kept it up with the lies, they all were happy and sort of took what I was saying as a chance to relive their own memories, maybe,
