The Ladies' Man (15 page)

“What's this called?” he asks.

“Finger-walking,” says Dina. “Sometimes I say ‘moon-walking.' ”

“Aren't you in the vicinity of my private parts?”

She frowns as she works the medial side of his foot between ankle and heel, exactly what one is supposed to do to rev up and clean out the pathways that carry sperm and related fluids.

At the door he asks, “Did he call last night?”

“Nash? He left a message.”

“Can you tell me what he said?”

“Nothing: the name of his stupid hotel.”

“That's it? Nothing personal?”

“ ‘Take care, Deenie.' And that was all.”

“Did you want to talk to him?”

“No,” says Dina. “Well, maybe. It wouldn't have killed him to leave his number. Or to call on the other line.”

“I told you he's no good,” says Byron.

“He deliberately called my work number because he knows I don't pick that up at night.”

“Shmuck,” says Byron.

“It's not like he can avoid me forever. Most of his clothes are still here, and all of his equipment.”

Byron asks if the Miata was his.

“His name is on the lease, but I make the payments.”

“Then maybe it's better this way. You'll talk to him after the dents are fixed and you're over the trauma. Last night you might have felt compelled to blurt out the whole story.”

Dina bites her lip.

“Are you going to cry?” he asks.

Dina shakes her head no, bravely, but Byron doesn't believe her. It's his own fault. He sees how indelicate he has been, and how inappropriate. A person doesn't break up with a long-seated boyfriend one minute and engage in a flirtation the next. It's time for him to be sincere, to admit that a certain amount of creativity went into his speech making of the night before. He should tell her: Inadvertently, he had slipped into the joke maker–sidekick–Gig Young role of the romantic comedies of his youth, in which insincere and halfhearted bids for the leading lady result in warm feelings, even lunches, but not sex or love. They are great guys, these old movie frat brothers and army buddies. Theatergoers love these characters. They express it at curtain with a burst of fond enthusiasm as the best friend of the leading man takes a witty, acrobatic bow, and brings the house down.

Byron puts his arm around Dina's shoulder for a consoling, platonic squeeze. He thinks, I'll send her flowers when I get back to New York with a card that confirms my demotion to friendship, and full acceptance thereof.

Dina does not move away. Byron croons, “I know. It's hard. It's like a divorce.” She doesn't break down, nor does she prop herself
against him in any body language that suggests grief. To the contrary, she tilts her face upward, closes her eyes, and kisses him full on the lips.

Byron is surprised and amenable. He hasn't been kissed in weeks.

When the kiss ends he says, “That was an unexpected thrill.”

“I don't know what came over me,” she whispers, patting her neckline and smoothing her hair.

“I like to be kissed,” he says. “I especially like it when the woman takes the initiative.”

Dina asks if the earlier offer—dinner, was it? In Laguna?—is still on the table because she has a favorite restaurant there that she thinks he'd like: Mexican seafood and the best margaritas.

“What time?”

“Eight?”

“It's a date, cookie,” he says, “as long as you don't mind driving.”

“Wonderful,” says Dina, finding his hand and squeezing it.

This is great, thinks Byron. Travel is great. I must be great. I love the culture out here. I haven't even known her twenty-four hours. We'll have fun while I'm here and I'll send her flowers when I get home. Now the card will have to be entirely different—sensitive and appreciative instead of brotherly; sexy but not rhapsodic; enough to pave the way for more lovemaking on future California trips, but not enough to lure her to New York.
Carpe diem
, he reminds himself. Call later and tell her you're counting the hours. Read up on reflexology. Find an A.T.M. Walk to Balboa and buy rubbers. And tonight, God willing, after dinner and a short mood-enhancing walk on the nearest beach—unless you've woefully misread the cues—get laid.

C
ynthia John has been hearing the name “Adele Dobbin” in her head all day, and suddenly remembers why: It's the woman with the patrician accent and dark red hair, well cut, who asks for money on Channel 2. Cynthia reflexively calls the station and asks if Adele Dobbin works there. The answer is nonverbal, a click and a connection, then a new voice saying, “Development.”

“Oh,” says Cynthia. “I'm just confirming that Adele Dobbin works there.”

“Yes, she does,” says the friendly male voice, “but she's not in.”

Cynthia, without a plan in the world, asks when Ms. Dobbin
will
be in?

“We don't know.”

“Later today?”

“She's sick,” says the voice. “She went home after lunch and isn't coming back today. Can Scott or I help you?”

Liar, thinks Cynthia. She's taking a personal day, revisiting her haunts and her youth with Nash. “It's about gift giving,” she tells him. “But I'll call back.”

Cynthia buzzes her secretary, Philip, and asks, “If I'm out sick, what do you tell people?”

“It depends. Why?”

“I just called someone's office and was told, ‘She went home sick today and won't be back.' It struck me as extremely unprofessional.”

“I'd kill that person,” says Philip dryly. “Then I'd fire the corpse.”

“I mean, if it's my sisters, that's one thing.”

“Or your mother, right?”

Cynthia thinks this over. “Maybe I'll make a list of who that would include.”

“I think I know that, Cyn,” says Philip.

“Let me add a name.” She waits a few seconds. “First name, Nash. Last name, Harvey.”

“Got it. Nash, like the car. Phone number?”

“Really? The car? I'd forgotten about that.”

Another line lights up, and Philip repeats with more urgency, “Phone number?”

“Not at this time,” says Cynthia.

Lorenz calls the Dobbin home, using the excuse that Kathleen, in her haste, left the “open” sign in the storefront. Would she like him to unlock the door and flip it to “closed”?

“Don't bother,” says Kathleen. “I think people will get the idea. And I'll be in first thing.”

Lorenz asks, with the authority of a man in possession of skeleton keys, Does she need anything from the store? From her desk? Could he make a deposit for her? Did she turn off her computer and activate the alarm?

“I think I'm all set.”

“Is your sister okay?” he asks. “Do you feel like talking?”

Kathleen says, “Not right now. I'll fill you in tomorrow. But I will say this: I've been behaving badly.”

Lorenz is overjoyed to be the receptacle of a confidence. “That's hard to believe,” he says.

“Wait'll you hear what I've done,” she continues. “You're going to have to promise you won't think I'm a crazy woman after I tell you.”

Lorenz waits.

“Lorenz? Are you there?”

“Of course! I'm all ears.”

“I didn't mean now. Everyone's waiting for me. I'll tell you when I see you.”

Lorenz swallows, checks his watch, and feels a trickle of sweat
leave his sideburn and drip down his cheek. “Would it be possible—” he begins, “would it be
agreeable
to you to discuss it over dinner tonight?”

Kathleen says, “I can't over dinner. Not tonight, anyway. There's a houseful of people—”

“I understand,” Lorenz says too quickly. “Of course. It's very short notice.”

“It's not that,” says Kathleen. “It's what happened today. The man who did the Heimlich is here—Lois invited him to stay for dinner—and Adele and I just walked in with a ton of Chinese food.… What about coffee later? Say, eight o'clock?”

The question squeezes the breath out of him, but he manages to ask, “You mean tonight?”

“We're sitting down now, then after we eat I'll make sure Adele is settled, then I'll excuse myself. Eight should be fine.”

“Or eight-thirty,” he suggests out of joy and generosity and confidence.

“Let's do eight.”

Lorenz composes himself enough to ask for directions to her house. Kathleen asks if he'll be arriving by trolley or by car.

“Car!”

“Do you know Coolidge Corner?” she asks.

Lorenz says he knows how to get there, but not the specifics of the neighborhood.

Kathleen describes where he can make a legal U-turn on Beacon Street, and how to find Stearns Road from there.

Lorenz mentions the famously restricted Brookline parking.

“No!” says Kathleen. “Don't park. I'll be waiting downstairs. It's too complicated here.”

Lorenz says, “I'll be here until seven-thirty, in case you want to change the time or if Adele objects.”

“I won't and she won't,” says Kathleen.

Adele sips only broth spooned from the top of her House Special Soup. Kathleen and Richard, who notice the pained look on her face as she swallows, exchange worried looks around and over the jubilant Lois.

“Tell us,” says Lois, “when did you reverse the Nash and the Harvey?”

Nash says, “Exactly? You mean the year?”

Lois nods eagerly.

“I was always called Nash in school by friends, so it wasn't that big a deal.”

“
Nash
,” Lois repeats as if sampling the most appealing entry in a book of baby names. “It is distinctive.”

“Did you change it legally?” asks Richard.

“Somewhere along the line, I did.”

“Harv,” says Richard, “I'm betting that you never made it official. I bet you pay your taxes as Harvey Nash.”