Terms of Endearment (41 page)

“Take time? Why, what else do they have to do, dear? I’ve
noticed that mediocre people always pride themselves on their discrimination. It’s a vastly overrated ability, I can assure you. One creditable lover is worth a ton of discrimination, more or less. I discriminate instinctively, as it happens.”

“Arrogantly, like I said,” Emma said.

“Uh-huh, well, just be grateful that you’re grown,” Aurora said. “You’re spared the pains of living with me. I’m going to hang up and call Rosie.”

She did and called Rosie, only to get the same busy signal. She called the phone company, who informed her that Rosie’s phone was out of order. She considered the information for a moment and called Emma.

“She’s broken her phone,” she said. “That’s very inconvenient. I know how her mind works. She won’t call me because she’ll assume I’m still mad at her. That means this impasse will continue until I actually go over there. It’s quite intolerable that it should continue, so I shall have to go over there at once.”

“Your logic is relentless,” Emma said dryly.

“The timing is most unfortunate,” Aurora said. “Hector will be returning any moment now, expecting a lot of praise and admiration for doing what any normal person would do as a matter of course. He’s going to be in a snit if I’m not here, but then that’s his lookout. I would like it if you would accompany me, just in case Rosie is in a mood to be difficult.”

“Sure,” Emma said. “I haven’t seen Little Buster lately. My husband won’t like it, though. He’s due home too.”

“So what. He’s not a general,” Aurora said. “He can open his own beer for once. Tell him your mother needed you.”

“Surprisingly enough, he thinks his needs take precedence over yours.”

“Goodbye. I’m hurrying,” Aurora said.

2.

A
T SIX-THIRTY
, when they arrived at Rosie’s door, most of the evening traffic had subsided, but Lyons Avenue was still choked with beat-up pickups and cars with crumpled fenders, many of them honking and competing recklessly for position.

“Amazing,” Aurora said, watching a few of them go by. A mauve Cadillac with a little antenna on top flashed by, driven by a thin Negro in a huge pink hat.

“Now where’d he get that?” Aurora asked, fanning herself.

“By trafficking in human flesh,” Emma said. “If he sees us he may come back and try to traffic in us.”

“It’s amazing that Rosie’s survived, isn’t it?” Aurora said, surveying the street. A Mexican dance hall was a few doors down from Rosie’s house, and a Negro liquor store right across the street. They got out and went to Rosie’s door, but their knocks brought no response.

“She’s probably over at her sister’s, telling her what a bitch you are,” Emma said.

“Royce had a broken ankle,” Aurora said. “Do you suppose that man has hobbled off to a bar?”

The house key was under an old washpot in the back yard. A large colony of bugs was also under the pot in a circle of bleached grass. The back yard also contained two broken tricycles and the motor of a Nash Rambler Royce had owned many years before.

Once they were inside, it took only seconds to determine that the Dunlups had vanished. Three of the four rooms bore the stamp of Rosie’s orderliness: the dishes were washed in the kitchen, the toys neatly stacked in the children’s room. Only the bedroom showed signs of activity. The bed wasn’t made, the bureau drawers were open, and, most mysterious of all, the telephone receiver was lying on top of the bureau.

“That’s rather drastic, don’t you think?” Aurora said. “If she
wasn’t in the mood to talk she could have stuck it under a pillow. I didn’t think she’d be this mad at me.”

“It could be Royce,” Emma said. “Maybe they broke up again.”

They went back out and dropped the key back amid the bugs.

“Most inconvenient,” Aurora said two or three times.

They got in the car and started back down Lyons Avenue, but they had not gone three blocks before Emma, glancing casually at a drive-in and wishing she could have a milkshake, spotted the very person they were looking for carrying a large tray of food to one of the parked cars.

“Stop, Momma!” she said. “There she is at the drive-in.”

Instead of stopping Aurora executed a majestic turn, narrowly missing a pickup full of Mexicans, all of whom began to curse her in spirited terms. When she did finally stop it was in the middle of a side street that ran by the drive-in—the street, as it happened, that the pickup full of Mexicans had been meaning to drive down. They began to honk, but Aurora was not to be hurried. She peered calmly across the parking lot, trying to ascertain if Rosie was actually there.

“I don’t see why those men didn’t pass me when they had the chance,” she said. Then she coughed, almost overcome by exhaust fumes as the old pickup roared by. A number of brown fists were shaken at her.

“I’m glad I don’t live in a Latin country,” she said. “I’m sure I’d have a great deal of trouble if I did.” She did another majestic turn and brought the Cadillac to rest midway between two convertibles, both of them full of raucous white boys with long sideburns.

“You’re taking up two spaces,” Emma said. “Maybe three.”

“That’s fine,” Aurora said. “I don’t like our neighbors. I’m sure they’re saying very profane things. I’d rather your young ears weren’t sullied.”

Emma giggled at the idea, and as she did Rosie walked out toward them. Her head was down and she was not noticing much. She had only been working an hour, but she had already learned that it was better to keep her head down and not notice much. Before she had been at work ten minutes a heavy equipment operator with a little bulldozer tattooed on his arm had
hinted that he might like to marry her if, as he put it, they “hit it off.”

When she looked up to take an order and found herself looking into the apparently uninjured eye of her former employer, the shock was almost too much. It rendered her speechless.

“Yes,” Aurora said. “There you are, aren’t you? You’ve already secured employment. I suppose I’m to be given no chance to ask to be forgiven, though I would have thought you might offer me that chance after all our years together.”

“Aw, Aurora,” Rosie said.

“Hello, over there,” Emma said.

Rosie couldn’t answer. She was about to cry. All she could do was stand and look at her boss and her favorite girl. Their appearance at the Pioneer Number 16 seemed nothing short of a miracle.

“Why did you cut that phone?” Aurora asked. “I only waited a reasonable interval before I called you.”

Rosie shook her head, then leaned it against the car door. “Honey, it wasn’t over you,” she said. “I come home an’ caught Royce talkin’ to his girl friend. I don’t know, I just got the shears and cut it before I even thought.”

“I see,” Aurora said. “I should have guessed. That was perfectly sensible, only you might have called me first so I would have known what was happening.”

“I thought of it two seconds too late,” Rosie said. “Y’all want anything to eat?”

“Milkshake,” Emma said. “Chocolate.”

“I’ll be back in a minute,” Rosie said.

They watched silently as she delivered two large trays of food to the adjacent convertibles. “Look at her,” Aurora said. “She acts like she’s been doing it for years.

“Go take off that uniform and get in the car,” she said when Rosie came back. “I take it back about firing you.”

“That’s a big relief,” Rosie said. “I’ll be there in the morning. I can’t walk off the job just when they’re busiest. Did Royce tell you where to find me?”

“No, Royce was not about. My eagle-eyed daughter spotted you.”

Rosie heaved a deep sigh and without a word walked off shaking her head. Two or three cars had begun to honk for service. It was several minutes before she got time to stop at the Cadillac again.

“That means he’s gone back to her,” she said. “I guess that’s that. I ain’t takin’ him back no second time.”

“We’ll talk about this tomorrow,” Aurora said, but Rosie had already taken their tray and gone.

3.

“D
O YOU
ever hear from Vernon?” Emma asked as they were riding back. The moon had risen early, and it hung above the buildings of downtown Houston.

Aurora didn’t answer.

“I think you might have made something of Vernon if you’d tried,” Emma said.

“I’m not an educator. Enjoy that nice moon and mind your own business. When I was younger it was sometimes amusing to draw people out and give them polish, if they needed it, but it’s been my lot to know quite a number of people who are already polished, and I suppose they’ve pampered me.”

“Are you and the General thinking of marrying?” Emma asked timidly.

“Hector is thinking of it,” Aurora said. “I am not. I thought I told you to mind your own business.”

“I’d just like to find out what makes you tick,” Emma said. “I don’t care what it is, I’d just like to know.”

“Yes, that’s your academic bias showing,” Aurora said. “In this case you made a bad choice of metaphor, since clocks tick and I am not a clock. If you’re interested in the source of clicks you will have to study clocks. Horology, I believe it’s called. You’ll never know much about me, I’m afraid. Half the time I’m a mystery to myself, and I’ve always been a mystery to the men who think they know me. Happily, I enjoy surprises. I’m always happiest when I manage to surprise myself.”

“I wish I’d never brought it up,” Emma said.

“Since you are my daughter, I’ll tell you something,” Aurora said. “Understanding is overrated and mystery is underrated. Keep that in mind and you’ll have a livelier life.”

When she stopped at Emma’s apartment, they could both see Flap. He was sitting on the steps that led up to the apartment. They both sat and looked at him through the deep twilight.

“He isn’t running out to embrace you, is he?” Aurora said.

“Is the General going to run out and embrace you when you get home?”

“Well, at the very least he’s going to be pacing the floor,” Aurora said. “Thank you for accompanying me. I trust you’ll give your old mother a call when you sense that you’re about to give birth.”

“Sure. Give my best to the General.”

“Thank you, I shall. I always do anyway, but it was nice of you to say it. This time it can be legitimate.”

“Why do you always say it?” Emma asked, waving vaguely at Flap in reassurance.

“The General’s fond of believing that he’s widely loved and adored,” Aurora said. “In fact he’s hardly loved or adored at all, but since I seem to have taken him under my wing I have to do my best to conceal that from him. The slightest whiff of disapproval casts him down.”

“You mean you become an approving person when you’re not around me? I’d like to see that sometime.”

“It’s quite a sight, I admit,” Aurora said, waving as she drove away.

4.

T
HE MINUTE
she turned into her driveway Aurora knew there was trouble ahead, because Alberto’s disreputable old Lincoln was parked where her Cadillac was supposed to sit. Alberto was not in the Lincoln, which meant that he was probably in the house somewhere. There had been no light on in the General’s
house when she had passed it, so it was not unlikely that he too was in her house. She managed to squeeze the Cadillac in past the Lincoln, wondering how in the world Alberto had managed to squeeze in past Hector.

She sat and thought about the whole matter for perhaps a minute, and decided that the more leisurely her entrance the better, if only because it would save her breath. A lot of breath was going to be necessary, she felt sure. Despite several lengthy telephone calls on the subject, Alberto evidently refused to accept that the General had become a serious part of her life; the General, for his part, had never accepted that Alberto was a member of the civilized orders. It seemed likely to be an interesting evening, so she brushed her hair for a while before getting out of the car.

She opened her back door a crack and listened for the sound of angry male voices, but she heard nothing. The house was intimidatingly quiet—so quiet, in fact, that she allowed the situation to intimidate her briefly. She eased the door shut and took a short walk along the sidewalk, trying to work out in her mind what her position ought to be relative to the two men. They had been rivals for a good twenty-five years, and matters would require some delicacy, she knew. Alberto had had his success early, and the General was having his late—the twain between the successful and the disappointed was not likely to meet. All she really hoped to accomplish was to get Alberto out alive. He had always been the least self-protective of men, and she lingered a while on the sidewalk in the hope that perhaps he would emerge on an errand, or in disgust, or something, so she could have a moment or two alone with him before the storm broke.

But Alberto did not emerge and Aurora went back and opened the back door wide. “Yoo hoo,” she said. “Are you boys in there?”

“Of course we’re in here,” the General said. “Where have you been?”

Aurora stepped into the kitchen and saw that the two of them were sitting at the kitchen table, one at each end. A vast profusion of flowers were ranged along the cabinets. Alberto wore a familiar much-injured look and a shabby brown suit. The General was glaring at her with his usual fierceness.

“Why, I’ve been out,” she said. “Why do you ask?”

“Aurora, I won’t have you answering questions with questions,” the General said. He seemed about to say more, but then abruptly he stopped.

“Alberto, what a surprise,” she said, giving him a pat. She set her purse on the table and looked both men over.

“You’ve raided the flower shops again, I see,” she said.

“Well, I buy a few flowers … for old times’ sake,” Alberto said. “You know me, I have to buy some flowers.”

“I’d like to know why,” the General said. “Look at those things. It’s ridiculous. I haven’t bought that many flowers in the last twenty years. I don’t expect to have that many flowers at my goddamn funeral.”

“Oh, stop grumping, Hector,” Aurora said. “Alberto has always had a weak spot for flowers, that’s all. It’s his Italian heritage. You’ve been in Italy surely. You can appreciate that.”