Chapter Seven
It was hard to get up the next day. Not impossible, just hard. Discouraging. Her head ached, and she was dissatisfied with herself. For the first time she wanted to cut work. But she went and she did her job. It wasn’t until the middle of the afternoon that she jumped to hear Sarah ask, “What’s the matter, Laura? A little under the weather?”
Laura looked up at her. Do I look that bad? she wondered. “I’m a little tired. Why?”
“The reports are piling up,” Sarah said, nodding at them.
Laura rubbed her forehead. “I’m sorry, Sarah. I’ll catch up. I’ll work late.”
“Don’t be silly!” Sarah laughed good-naturedly. “Catch up tomorrow. There’s not that much of a rush.”
But the next day she didn’t quite catch up; she got farther behind, in fact. Burr and Marcie had kept her up. It was partly the quarrel and partly the torturing silence that followed it. She went to work still more tired than the day before. Dr. Carstens came in to tell her a story about one of his woman patients, and she was frankly irritated. He picked himself up from her desk, where he was sitting, and huffed out, offended. “Okay, don’t laugh,” he said. “The others thought it was funny.”
Laura drove herself almost crazy with her errors that afternoon. When her phone rang she jumped half out of her chair. It was Jack.
“Good afternoon, Mother,” he said. “I’m selling used toothbrushes. Interested?”
“No. I’m very busy. Good-bye.”
“I’ll see you at eight.”
“No.”
“Eight-fifteen.”
“No.”
“Eight-thirty.”
“All right! All right! All right! Good-bye!” She slammed the receiver down and Sarah stared at her.
Laura decided to work late, and it was close to eight-thirty when she got up to go. The reports, though fewer, were still not done.
At the elevator the boy said, “Nice evening.”
“Is it?” She answered him apathetically, involved in her own world.
“Yes, ma’am. It’s really spring tonight.” He smiled at her.
He was right. The air was soft and gentle, lavender and clear. It even smelled good, right there in mid-Manhattan, although that was probably a hallucination. Laura smiled a little. She hated to go underground to the subway, but it was late, and she wanted to get home in a hurry. It would really be gorgeous out on the roof tonight.
She walked in to find Jack and Burr playing checkers. Marcie was cross-legged on the floor, in velvet lounging pants and a silk shirt, humming while she covered the top of the round cocktail table with a plastic veneer treated to look like marble.
She smiled up at Laura, who paused to admire her. “Alcohol-proof,” Marcie said, rattling the table cover. “Mr. Marquardt gave it to me. We’re advertising it for a new client, and they passed some around today. It sticks by itself. How do you like it?”
“It looks wonderful,” Laura said. So did Marcie, her cheeks pink with enthusiasm.
“You’ve had it, Mann,” Burr said, and Laura heard a checker smacking triumphantly over the board in a devastating series of jumps. “Touché, boy.”
“Why don’t you take up tiddly winks? I could beat you at tiddly winks.” Jack sat with his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hand. He looked up at Laura without raising his head and smiled. She looked at him, absorbed in the idea that he had once been infatuated with the man beside him, and Burr had never known it. Burr thought he was as normal as himself. But of course, they had never roomed together. Suddenly Laura recalled that she had agreed to go out with Jack.
“Jack—” she began, but he cut her off.
“I see I have less allure than your typewriter,” he said. He cocked an eye at her. “Well, never mind, I don’t have so many friends I can afford to be jealous of their typewriters.”
“Thanks, Jack,” she said with a little smile. She turned to go into the kitchen, but he jumped up and followed her.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?”
“Straight to the icebox. I’m starved.”
“We have a date. I’m taking you out to dinner.”
“Why don’t we just stay here?” she pleaded.
But all he said was, “No,” and she understood that he had made his mind up and had something planned.
She was reluctant to leave Marcie, who looked so pretty. But the prettier Marcie looked, the worse Laura suffered. Maybe it would be better just to talk about her tonight. Talk to Jack about her. It sounded good.
“Okay, but let’s get home early. I’m beat, I really am,” she said.
“Whatever you say, Mother.” He smiled, and she felt suddenly that it was terribly good to have him for a friend.
When they got outside she said, “Let’s go over to Hempel’s. It’s only a block.”
“No. We’re going to The Cellar.”
“Oh, God no! It’s miles away. We wouldn’t get home till midnight.”
“A friend of mine wants to meet you.”
“Who?”
“The name wouldn’t mean anything. It would just scare you away, probably. She saw you when we were there last week. She likes your face.”
“Oh, that’s ridiculous. Come on, I’m starving. I’ve got to eat or I’ll faint.”
“This is a very interesting girl. She could teach you a lot.”
“I know everything I want to know.” He laughed, but she went on, “Jack, I’m not going to the Village with you.”
But when they reached Broadway he hailed a cab and she let him put her in it, as she knew she would. “I can’t. I won’t. I’m tired and hungry,” she said. But she got in. “I’ll fall asleep over my typewriter tomorrow,” she moaned.
When they reached The Cellar she felt a lift of excitement in spite of herself. They arrived after the kitchen had closed, but Jack was a regular customer, and they were willing to fix him up.
They followed a waitress to a table. Laura walked with a strange light queasiness in her stomach and sat down with Jack feeling terribly self-conscious and looked-at, as if every pair of eyes in the room was inspecting her. Jack laughed, waving at somebody.
