30 Pieces of a Novel (36 page)

Looks at the woman. She's lying mostly on her side and looking at him through the sunglasses. Or is looking his way, since all he sees are the dark lenses, no eyes. He imagines her coming over to him. He's been sitting alone where he is now. She's thinking, I see a guy who looks interesting, he seems by all his looking at me that he's interested, then I can make a pass at him as well as him doing one to me. If I see right away once I talk to him or even when I get near him that he's gay or a nut or not interested and that I've misinterpreted his glances and even the direction his looks went or find out he's been playing some sort of flirty game with me and has nothing else in mind but fooling me into thinking he's interested, I say, “Sorry, I thought you were someone I know; it must be my dark glasses,” or say nothing but just walk away. So she comes over. He sees her coming and doesn't know what to make of it. She seems to be looking at him and heading his way, flicking the Frisbee against her leg, but maybe she's going to go right past him. She stops beside his bench and says, “Excuse me, but bad as this introductory remark must sound, about as unartful and unimaginative as one could be, I just can't think of a way of putting it different: don't we know each other from someplace? And don't crack up at what I said either, or I'm really going to be mad at you.” He says, “I won't, and not to my recollection, our knowing each other. Because where do you think it was?” “Funny, but I thought someone introduced us in the park last week. At this Frisbee game over there where the kids are screaming, or you just came in on it and after we were playing awhile we got to talking. I think we were even on the same side.” “I know that's not it. I like to play Frisbee a little, or did—last time must've been ten years ago. But I would you like to have a catch now? Is that what they say, ‘catch'?” “‘Throw it' rather than ‘catch.' Or ‘toss' as the next best thing, if you get tired of saying ‘throw.'” “I meant as the noun, when you're practicing or playing around with the Frisbee,” and she says, “That's what I meant too. But yeah, I brought it out here hoping maybe I'd j get some exercise with it. So, you want to?” He asks if she knows a good spot to throw it and she says, “Follow me,” and he gets up, takes his book, and she leads him to an open area about fifty feet away from the nearest group playing or person sitting on the grass. “Okay,” he says, “what do we do, just throw? I think I remember how it's done.” “Sure you do. No one forgets once they get the knack. Flick it like this,” and she demonstrates without releasing the ‘ Frisbee. “Now let's step back about fifteen feet.” “Each?” “Each. We'll start off nice and easy, and if we start clicking we'll move back even farther. Now I'm not saying I'm great at it, I want you to know”—both stepping backward—“but I can throw it without a wobble most times and snatch most anything within reasonable reach, behind or front.” “So it's all in the wrists, that it?” he yells, making the throwing motion with his hand, and she says, “No, I don't think so,” and laughs. What's funny? he thinks, nodding and opening his mouth as if he's laughing. Sex? She's out here primarily for that? Meets a guy through the phony line about knowing him from someplace but not having a better way of putting it at the moment, and the Frisbee's to see if he's athletic enough for her, isn't too clumsy or something, and doesn't drop after a few throws. “Ready?” she says, when they're about thirty feet apart, or forty or so, and he says, “Let her rip.” She throws. It's for him what would be a perfect toss, gliding smoothly and straight toward him but goes over his head by about two feet and lands some ten feet past him. “Sorry,” he says. “You should have leaped for it, or at least run back and got under it. I kept it up long enough.” “Thanks, but I'm no pro basketball center or cheetah.” He wants to get it right, practices flicking it a few times; she yells, “Come on, get rid of it!” and he lets it go. It wobbles from the start and flops about fifteen feet in front of her and rolls to the side on its end and down a hill a little so she has to chase after it. “Sorry.” She says, “Hey, who told you you can play? No throw or snatch. You're getting old, man, old.” “Thanks,” and, under his breath, “Up yours, ballbreaker.” “Only kidding,” she says. “You're okay, just a bit rusty. One's coming to you; mind your head,” and throws another perfect one but right to his chest. He reaches out for it, and it bounces off his fingers—“Sorry again”—and picks it up angrily and sends it flying without concentrating on throwing it right. It spins well but too far to her left to give her any chance of reaching it. “Big improvement in the aerodynamics, but you're not there yet,” she says, and flips it to him gently and he catches it. “Now we're hot,” she says. Again he just lets it fly without thinking of how to throw it and it's a graceful one a few feet over her head. She backs up, waits for it to drop, and turns her back to it and grabs it from behind. “Great, two in a row,” he says, “and fantastic catch.” “And good basic throw also. You had it hanging up there long enough for me to get creative.” They throw it around like that for about twenty minutes. Then, tired, he says, “Okay, I give up, you win,” and makes a calling-it-quits motion with his hands. She says, “A few more, but from much farther out. Let's really strut our stuff.” She signals him to step back, which he does, till they're about thirty to forty feet apart again, since they'd moved closer and closer to each other once they'd started. She flips it to him; he wants to let it sail past and fall to the ground but grabs it on the run and almost in the same motion whips it back to her; she makes another fancy catch, this one with her arm behind her neck. Back and forth a couple of dozen times or so and then she says, “Now I'm bushed and drenched; let's get a cool drink and wipe ourselves off. You did good, my man, really good,” when he comes up to her. “What's your name?”

“Did it suddenly get cloudy?” his mother says. “No. Same blue sky, no clouds, pretty high humidity, temperature around eighty-five.” “Not going to rain? It looks like it, everything darker, as if a real storm.” “I told you, Mom, it's only your eyes. The day's clear and sunny.” “That hot?” “It could be worse, believe me. Eighty-five degrees is nothing,” and she says, “What I've become, I can't believe it. What did I do wrong in life for my body to get so fouled up as this?” “All you have is an ophthalmological problem—you know, your eyes. Otherwise, you're in relatively good shape.” “I know. And as for ophthalmology, remember: I once wanted to be a doctor. I should consider myself lucky. No cancer or major brain disconnections, and I still got an appetite and my hearing hasn't gone completely kaput. But I don't really care about my health, much as I talk of it. It's you and your wife that—what's her name again? I suddenly forgot.” “Sally.” “Sally, excuse me. What a doll. And your dear children. How are they?” “Fanny and Josephine. They're fine. You saw them yesterday.” “I did? I forget. And your wife? There's nothing to help her?” “The scientists are working on it.” “They'll come up with something. When I was still able to read the papers, I read about it. A breakthrough any moment, they say, right? How'd she get what she's got?” “Nobody knows.” “No signs when you first met her? It just came? They say if you work hard enough you get what you work for, but it's not always true.” “What do you mean?” “I mean your wife, your children, your life. That she's such a good person. That God isn't always looking after us, and how can He? Not that I believe in Him after all I've seen.” She picks up the ginger ale can. “What should I do with this?” “You done with it?” “For now I am, but I don't want it anymore. Are you permitted to just throw them away? You can't get fined?” “The scavengers canvass through the trash cans here and get a nickel apiece for them, so I think it's okay. By the time a cop comes over to arrest us, the evidence will be gone.” “What?” “Nothing. I'll get rid of it.” He takes it to a trash can near the woman, though there's one much closer to his bench, and drops it in and looks at her sitting on the grass, sunglasses off and somewhere, head arched back, eyes closed, facing the sun.

“Henrietta, Henrietta!” a man yells from the path and waves to her. “Gosh, where the heck were you?” she says. “I was getting set to leave.” The man sits beside her, fanning himself with his hand. He puts her sunglasses on, looks at her as if to say, How do I look?, takes them off, grabs her Frisbee, and throws it up a few feet and catches it. “Where's Jackson?” she says, and he says, “I decided to leave him home. I wanted to really get a workout this time. Whenever he's with us he ruins it by leaping at the Frisbee and, if he gets it, hogging it, and you know he's only going to tear it to pieces one day.” “I love it when he goes after it.” “Well, then get a dog.”

He goes back to the bench. “I'm feeling tired,” his mother says, “think we should go home?” “Anything you want.” “I don't want to spoil it if you're enjoying yourself here, but let's leave. I hate falling asleep in public, with my mouth open and people staring inside.” “Don't worry, nobody's doing that. Looking and staring's just one of the things—two of the things?—people do in the park, but I don't think they do it too deeply and I've a feeling they forget what they see in seconds, because it's always on to the next.” “What?” “It's always on to the next thing they look and stare at not too deeply. Do you understand?” “I didn't hear it.” “I'll tell you at home.” He unlocks the wheelchair, looks over, and sees the woman and man talking animatedly, the man slapping his knee and finding something very funny. As he's wheeling his mother, she says, “Those trees over there—” He leans over her and says, “Mom, why do you keep insisting the trees are painted black when I've told you a dozen times already—” “That isn't what I was about to say.” “I'm sorry, what was it then?” and she says, “When do you go back?” “First week in September.” “September? That's right around the corner. Before you know it, it's over.” “Mom, it's mid-June, two days or a day or three—whenever the first day is—before summer even begins. We have
to go
through more than two months till September. Till that time I have another two weeks here and then go to Maine. Then we come back to New York and see you for another five days or so, and then I head south back to my job.” “It's not September? I can't believe it. Why do I always think it is?”—shaking her head. “I got to get my head examined, but I know you'll tell me I don't have to.” A minute later, while he's pushing her, she says, “Those trees over there. It's so mysterious.” “Why? Because you think they're painted black and you don't know why?” “They're not? I didn't see how they could be, because what would be the reason? But that's how they all look to me, as if someone came with a brush. It's terrible getting so old and losing everything at once.” “But you haven't, which is what I told you before. Listen”—bending over her from behind—“I want you to listen to me. Are you listening?” “Yes, but you're not saying anything yet.” “I'm saying, which, as I said, I've said before, that regarding your health you at least haven't got some horrible and painful and disabling illness, disease, or affliction. One not just where your walking's affected, like now, but where you can't walk at all. You were never really sick in your whole life, which is something for someone in her early nineties who smoked a lot and probably drank too much too. You're going to be in reasonably good health till you're past a hundred, I'm sure. Good genes, it must be, though they seem to have skipped over your siblings and folks. And just luck and I don't know what else contributing to it. A certain vanity, a feeling of things due you, and so on: positive outlook, though you don't have too much of that now, but you'll bounce back. And just that: when things went truly bad for you, you didn't dwell on them too long but quickly worked them out and bounced back. Though I can understand—I don't want you to think I'm not sympathetic—what you mean about the little infirmities and things—your hearing, that you don't have the energy you once had, and of course your eyes—that can make you feel much worse.” “Is that what you were saying before? I don't believe it,” and she turns around and looks at him and laughs. “So you think what I said's funny and maybe even everything I say is funny too? Well, that's good and no doubt healthy for you too. And for the most part I agree with you,” and he laughs too.

He's pushing his mother to the park entrance when he thinks of the young woman again. Jesus, what a body! He imagines lying beside her in bed, all their clothes off, and reaching out to touch her, but shakes the thought away. But she had to be somewhat interested in him to look over so often, isn't he right? No, and for all the reasons he gave. Or she was a little interested, and just maybe, but after a while, no matter how many times she looked over, he should have stopped sneaking looks at her. Oh, well, gone now, and next time he takes his mother to the same spot—it's her favorite because it's so shaded, where they sit, and quieter and cooler than just about any other place in the park nearby, while still being safe and having a steady flow of people walking past to distract her—and if the woman's there he'll make a point of not looking at her once he first sees her. He'll in fact sit on one of the opposing benches with his back to her and his mother facing her this time in her wheelchair.

As he's leaving the park he imagines the woman rushing up to him. First he hears from behind, “Mister, say, mister!” and turns around and sees her coming. He stops and points to himself, and she says, “Yeah, you, could you hold it there a second?” “Yes?” he says when she reaches him. He doesn't know what to expect, though it doesn't look good; she seems solemn, a bit angry, and she says, “I want to ask you something. Before, when I was sitting on the grass back there, didn't you have anything more interesting to look at than me? Because if you want to know, and I don't care if you don't, since I'm going to tell you anyway, your constant looks at me made me nervous and uneasy and, frankly, just plain pissed off. I mean, where do you come off doing that crap?” “What do you mean?” he says, and his mother turns around and says, “What is it, Gould? Do you know this young lady?” “No, and I don't know what the heck she's talking about, either.” “You damn well know what I'm talking about, so don't try to worm your way out of it with that bullshit. It took all the courage I had in me to chase after you, for even my friend I was sitting with told me to forget it. But I had to tell you what I thought. And now I'm not going to be put off or made to feel confused or crazy or anything like that by your saying you know nothing about it and some other lame excuses you might be thinking up. I also don't care if this woman's your mother or the person you look after or whatever she might be to you. If she is someone like that, it's about time she saw what you're up to when you're supposed to be taking care of her, if she already doesn't know.” “What is she saying?” his mother says. “I didn't quite get it.” “She's saying nothing, believe me,” he says, and the woman says, “I'm saying something to you, all right, and that's that from now on go ogle-eye the trees or rocks or people passing by or anything like that, but leave women like myself alone. We're tired of having your eyes poring over us without stop and intentionally, really, trying to make us uneasy, when all we want to do here is relax and get away from that stuff like anybody else. So, I said what I had to and have always wanted to tell guys like you. Maybe, but I doubt it, it'll keep you from repeating your behavior with other women in the future. If it doesn't, you can be sure some other woman my age will say the same thing to you I did till you finally let the message sink in.” “Excuse me,” he says, “I can see how upsetting the whole thing is to you, and I understand why also, but you got the wrong guy, believe me, the wrong guy.” “Yeah, sure, you bet.” She starts walking back, every few seconds turning around and looking sharply at him, and then he faces forward and resumes pushing the wheelchair. “I still don't know what that was all about,” his mother says, “but she seemed annoyed at you for something. Was she?” “It was a big mixup. She had to have me totally confused with another man. Or else she caught me looking at her when I was sitting on the bench before. You know, I was looking around as people tend to do when they're sitting in a place awhile and the conversation, for instance, suddenly stops or the person you're with drops off into a nap. And my eyes in their wandering happened to land on her for a few seconds and maybe stayed a few seconds more because she was fairly goodlooking, and she got it in her head I'd been gawking at her since I sat down. So like a lot of women today, and some not as young, she used it as an excuse to nail a man for looking lecherously at a woman, when it was nothing like that with me, nothing, but what could I do? When someone screams at you loud enough, you just shut up and hope they go away soon.” “For some reason I still don't get what you're saying now. Come in front and tell it to my face,” and he says, “It's not worth stopping the chair and coming around and saying it to you or even repeating it from behind, so let's forget it,” and pushes her out of the park.