Gideon - 04 - Illegal Motion (28 page)

She smiles and reaches over and pats my hand.

“I don’t think so. Dennis Stanley. He’s never heard of you.”

About to explode in the heat, I unroll the window and rack my brain in vain for the name. The only Stanley I’ve ever heard of is the explorer. Dr. Livingston, I presume?

“What does he do?”

Rainey twists the ring on her finger. It is huge, now that I look at it.

“He’s a pediatrician. He’s five years younger. Never been married. He doesn’t care about having kids.”

A doctor who is younger! I could picture her with a guy that much older. This is too weird. It won’t last six months. She’ll go nuts worrying that she won’t be able to hold on to him.

“How long have you known him?” I can’t bring myself to congratulate her.

“Only for a couple of months,” she says, smiling.

“But I’ve never been surer of anything in my life.”

This is outrageous! Nothing could be more out of character Rainey agonizes over things.

“Did you meet him at Christian Life?” I ask, knowing I sound childish. Her conversion to fundamentalist Christianity was the final straw as far as I was concerned. I could never understand how she could close her eyes to reality.

“He’s a Presbyterian,” she says, with just a trace of irony.

“He’s very tolerant.”

“You’ll never see each other,” I say, knowing I sound like an old curmudgeon.

“Gideon,” she commands, “be happy for me!”

I try to get a grip.

“It’s a little difficult at the moment since until two minutes ago I was thinking that you and I might try to get back together.” I know this is not the cool tiling to say, but I feel as if I had been kicked in the stomach by a mule.

“I’ve got to go,” she says, and puts her hand on the door.

I summon my best fake smile. I don’t want the whole damn staff of the state hospital feeling sorry for me.

“I’m real happy for you, Rainey. We’ll always be friends.”

Whether she believes me or not, she pretends that she does. Her lips come back from her teeth, and she says, “I know we will.”

I drive off, and get to the corner before I let myself feel anything. Damn her! On again, off again, on again, off again. She jerked me around like a yo-yo. I wipe my eyes and decide to go home instead of back to the office. I could stand a drink.

At the house, after getting into some shorts and taking Woogie out, I call the office and without any explanation tell Julia to see if she can postpone my four o’clock appointment.

I ice down a twelve-pack, and Woogie and I go into the backyard. It is delightfully warm. If I start drinking bourbon, I will be sick tomorrow, and I don’t want anyone to think I am bothered by this. I can hear Julia reminding Clan when she hears I’ve been dumped:

“He was a no-show the day after she told him.” Fuck all women, I think. I haven’t met a decent one since Rosa.

What made her so special? Guts. She had guts. Left her mother, learned English, came to Arkansas, passed the state nursing exam, got a job. Rosa was a class act. Instead of putting the empties back in the box, I drop them in the yard by my chair. To hell with what the neighbors think.

“Come here, boy,” I say to Woogie, who is sitting in the shade staring at me. Reluctantly, he gets up and ambles over toward me. I stroke his warm back. So warm. I take off my shirt. It is wonderful out here today.

In the eighties, a record for this time of year. Rosa never would have finked out like Rainey. When things got tough, Rosa didn’t run. I know I am getting drunk, but so what? It’s easier to remember Rosa when I’ve had a few…. I wake up and look at my watch. Almost four-thirty. I have been out here almost three hours. My face and chest feel on fire. I look down and see my stomach is pink as the inside of a salmon. Woogie, seeing I am awake, comes over to me and licks my hand. I must be a total idiot I will look like a lobster tomorrow. I count six empties, glad I have a six-pack left. Inside, I can hear the phone ringing and push myself up out of the cheap nylon webbing and lurch toward the house, Woogie at my heels. Rainey, I think stupidly, calling to say she has changed her mind.

“Hello,” I say, grabbing the phone in the kitchen and trying not to sound drunk.

“Dad?” Sarah says.

“Are you okay? I tried to get you at your office.”

“Rainey’s getting married!” I blurt.

“She is?” Sarah asks, her voice sounding far away.

“Dad, you must feel terrible. Who is she marrying?”

“Some doctor whose last name is Stanley,” I say, un able to keep tears from sliding down my face.

“I don’t know him.”

“Promise me you won’t drive anywhere tonight,” Sarah says.

“Get something to eat and go on to bed, okay? It will be all right.”

Do I sound that bad? I sigh, “I’m fine.”

“Check and see if there is a pizza in the freezer and fix that,” Sarah says.

“I’ll be home in two weeks. Remember, we’re going to Bear Creek, okay?”

Why? I think. I can’t wake up.

“Okay,” I say.

“Remember to feed Woogie and make sure he has water before you go to bed.”

Bed? It’s not even dark.

“I will,” I say irritably. It seems as if all the women I know treat me like a child. I hang up and look for Woogie’s dog food.

At six, after trying to get through a few bites of some stuff that tastes like frozen glue (it doesn’t seem cooked enough), I decide to call Amy. I know I shouldn’t, but damn it, I want to.

“You sound skunked,” Amy says cheerfully.

“Does it take that much nerve just to call and say you’re wrong?”

I try to choose my words carefully.

“You remember saying that you were jealous of Rainey McCorkle?”

There is silence on the other end for a moment.

“Yes?”

Amy asks, her voice no longer so friendly.

“She’s getting married,” I say casually, “next month.”

“Poor Gideon!” Amy says instantly.

“No wonder you’re shit-faced. Who’s she marrying?”

“I’m not shit-faced,” I say shakily.

“A doctor who is five years younger. Some guy named Dennis Stanley.”

“I know Dennis!” Amy says.

“He’s a wonderful man and a fantastic doctor. A hunk, too! God, I’m impressed with your old girlfriend. She’s getting a real prize. Cheer up. It’s not like you lost her to a vacuum cleaner salesman.”

“Was he your boyfriend, too?” I ask sourly. If he’s so great, why doesn’t he have a better name?

Amy laughs.

“You sound so pitiful! He was the head resident at St. Thomas and testified in a couple of rape cases when I was at the prosecutor’s. He didn’t go to medical school until he was in his thirties.”

I crumple me empty beer can I am holding. I couldn’t have gotten into med school even if I owned it.

“A late bloomer,” I say, as though this were a terrible indictment.

“Gideon, would you like for me to come over and spend the night?” Amy asks.

“Yes,” I say.

“That would be very nice.”

Amy laughs again.

“I’ll be there in an hour.”

“I’ll time you,” I say, looking at the clock over the kitchen sink.

“That won’t be necessary,” Amy giggles.

“Why don’t you take a shower?”

The idea of anything touching my skin, even if it is cold water, makes me wince.

“Do you have some ointment for sunburn?” I ask, bringing my left hand to my chest. It feels like pie crust.

“I fell asleep for a little while outside.”

Amy’s reaction is swift.

“Oh, Gideon, you didn’t pass out in this sun, did you?”

“Just took a little nap,” I whimper. I feel terribly thirsty.

“Have you got some juice or something like that?

All I’ve got is beer.”

“I can tell,” Amy says.

“You’re probably so dehydrated that you’re about to go into shock. Drink as much water as you can. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

She hangs up before I can answer her. I ease over to the sink and rinse out a glass and fill it up with tap water.

Good of’ Amy. I haven’t been very nice to her lately. I should have called her when I wasn’t drunk. Poor women. They’re such suckers for us. They deserve to be in a better species. The water tastes good. I wish I had thought of it a couple of hours ago. I look through the kitchen window and see the beer cans scattered around the lawn chair. They look terrible. Get that white guy out of the neighborhood before he turns it into a slum. I laugh at my little joke and look at Woogie, who is lapping up his own water.

“Hey, boy, are we having fun or what?”

He won’t even look at me and goes off to the couch after he finishes. At least he had enough sense to lie in the shade.

Amy arrives about thirty minutes later with a quart of orange juice and an overnight bag.

“Oh, Gideon!” she wails.

“You look like you’ve been electrocuted!”

“Damn, it’s November! It shouldn’t be this hot.” I look down at myself again. My knees look like stoplights.

While I take off my clothes, Amy runs the tub full of water and helps me get into it.

“This is what it must be like to be old,” I complain.

“If you keep this up,” she says, taking my arm, “you’ll never find out.”

The water feels good. It is cool but not freezing. I lie back against the porcelain and sigh.

“Maybe we can make love later.”

Amy looks down at my shriveled penis which is limply floating in the water.

“Unless you can think of a way to detach it,” she says, giggling, “I don’t think you’re going to be terribly interested.”

Thirty minutes later Amy turns down the sheet and helps me into bed. Amy has rubbed so much Benadryl cream and Aloe into my skin that I feel like a greased pig.

Grateful beyond words, I watch her while she arranges the water and juice on my nightstand. Why is she here?

This hasn’t exactly been my finest hour. If the situation were reversed, I don’t think I would be playing her nursemaid. I sink back onto my pillow.

“This Florence Nightingale business is a side I haven’t seen before, Gilchrist. I think I like it.”

She sits down on the bed beside me and rubs cream into my feet. Even the soles are tender.

“I have a masochistic side. Most women do. I think it must be genetic.

Here I am doing everything but changing your diapers while you’re trying to turn yourself into a brisket because of another woman.”

What do I say? She is correct, of course. If I had a decent bone in my body, I would have called anybody except her.

“I could have called Clan, but I don’t think he would have been of much use.”

Amy laughs at the thought. From long acquaintance, she knows Clan is as helpless as I am.

“He might have brought you a gun, so you could have done the job right.”

I look down at my cooked flesh and wonder if I’m the one who has the masochistic streak. Rainey and I haven’t had a real romantic relationship in more than a year. Still, true feeling dies hard. I admit it to myself outright for the first time: I did love her. Yet, we could never make a commitment.

To her credit, she has moved on to another man who obviously inspires more confidence.

“What bothers me,” I admit to Amy, “is that I didn’t really even know she was seriously dating somebody. I just kind of figured everything would finally fall into place some day, and we’d end up together.”

A melancholy expression comes over Amy’s face.

“You miss the boat mat way. Even the dumbest dog will leave if you won’t feed it.”

“I know,” I say, growing more sober by the moment. I know she is telling me that she isn’t going to take care of me indefinitely. I don’t even know if I want her to try.

“You don’t know shit,” she says, putting away the Benadryl. She bends down and searches through her bag and withdraws a pink nightie with poodles on it.

“Don’t even think about saying a word about this gown. I grabbed the first thing I saw.”

I grin. Poodles aren’t Amy’s style. Yet, how do I know?

I haven’t given her a chance. For all I know she may sleep with a security blanket and her thumb in her mouth.

I seem to be floating through life more and more these days. Why? It is as if when Rosa died, I quit trying. She made everything so simple, or at least it seemed that way.

Something tells me that it probably wasn’t, and I just don’t want to remember how life really was. I watch as Amy pulls her T-shirt over her head. As unselfconscious as a two-year-old child, she slips out of her sandals, shorts, and bra and pulls the gown over her head. I feel a stir between my legs but it flickers and dies. As the old saying goes, tonight, at least, my eyes are bigger than my stomach. She eases into bed beside me, and watches me sleep.

“Good Lord!” Julia exclaims when I walk in the next morning.

“Did you fall asleep in your oven?”

“Just got a little too much sun” I say, checking for my messages.

“Shit!” she whistles.

“It looks like you laid out drunk all afternoon.”

As usual, Julia is revealing more of her own skin than is appropriate in a law office. Behind the counter that separates her from our clients, her lime sherbet colored skirt has crept up almost to her panty line, revealing two nicely tanned legs. I’ve seen belts wider than her skirt.

“I get to take off occasionally,” I mutter as I walk down the hall.

In my office I dial Dade’s number, waking him up. Instantly I wish I had called his parents first.

“I don’t want to take a lie detector test,” he tells me after I have explained why I called.

“I had a friend who took one and flunked it. I know he was telling the truth.”

My head still throbbing from yesterday’s fiasco, I go ballistic.

“This is your chance to get your charges dropped!

You might even get back on the team! Damn it, you’ve got to take it.”

“I don’t have to do anything!” he says.

“A white bitch says that I raped her, a white dude kicks me off the team, and now I’m supposed to let a white cop or lawyer hook me up to a machine and say whether I’m lying or not?

Get real, man!”

I back off and lower my voice. This is the first outburst of racism I’ve seen from Dade, but from his point of view, he makes sense. The only white person who has stood up for him was Carter, and he folded like he was holding a pair of deuces. I explain the test isn’t admissible in court and that he has nothing to lose, but it is like trying to convince a child not to be afraid of the dark. It occurs to me that Dade may be lying after all. Maybe he’s into drugs, too, or is trying to protect someone. I tell him I want him to think about it some, and that I will be calling him back.