We All Fall Down (17 page)

No more the intensity, the desperate quality of drinking but a different kind now, dreamlike, gentle.

Stepping through the revolving doors of Filene’s one afternoon, they emerged on the sidewalk and met his mother. Stunned glances, time suspended for the fraction of a minute as they stared at each other. He stumbled through the introductions: “Jane … my mother … Mom … Jane Jerome …” His mother, elegant as usual, every hair in place although a windy day, paused, eyebrows raised in curiosity, glancing at him inquiringly as if to ask: How long has this been going on? And he realized, sadly, the chasm between their lives, how they, did not connect anymore. She had not mentioned the retreat since that meeting in her bedroom. He had not asked her about it. Felt dismayed now.

It’s lovely to meet you,” his mother said. He was proud of her stylish manner. Leaning confidentially toward Jane, she said: “Buddy has been so happy lately that I thought there must be something wonderful going on in his life. And now I see why …”

Which inflicted further guilt. He should have told her about Jane. Then thought: why hadn’t she inquired if she saw how much I had changed? He saw that life was never simple.

Walking along later, whipped by the winds, Jane’s hand tucked in his and both their hands in his jacket pocket, he thought about his mother and father—and love. How they had probably once been swept with the same
kind of love he and Jane shared. Did love change over the years? Become diluted, pale? Or did it deepen? Or did it become less equal? His father had fallen in love with someone else. But not his mother. He knew how devastated his life would become if Jane were to leave him. Is that what had happened to his mother, abandoned by her husband, the man she loved, the man who was supposed to love her and keep on loving her through the years? Until death do us part. And his father: he was in love now with this woman, Fay, enough in love with her to leave his family. A terrible thing but—but did he feel toward that woman, Fay, the way Buddy felt about Jane? Suppose he had met Jane when he was involved with someone else and …

“What’s the matter, Buddy?” Jane asked, pressing against him, warding off the wind, her hand still in his, warm and moist.

“Nothing,” he said, confused by his thoughts, by the strange thing love could be.

“Your mother seems very nice,” she said. “She’s beautiful …”

Right. But my father still left her, he thought.

That night, he said to Jane: “I will love you forever.” Making a pledge, solemn, enduring.

He waited for her response, waited for her to say:

I will love you forever, too.

But she didn’t speak, her head inclined, her hair brushing his cheek, the scent of her shampoo radiant and fresh.

He waited. Then said: “Jane?”

“Yes?”

“I said: I will love you forever.”

She nestled closer to him.

“Will you love me forever, too?” Sad, because he had to ask.

She drew back, puzzled, a frown creasing her forehead. “Don’t you know that by now?”

He hugged her to him, trembling inside, having just seen, as if in a light-bulb flash, how empty and meaningless his life would be without her.

Shuddering, he drew her to him, kissed her passionately, unendingly, until they drew away and she whispered tremulously: “Oh, Buddy.”

The whole world in her voice as she spoke his name.

“When are we going to meet this mystery man of yours?” her father asked at the dinner table.

“He’s not a mystery man, Dad,” she replied. He’s just … shy.” Fumbling for the word
shy,
unable to find another word for Buddy’s reluctance to meet her parents.

“Maybe there’s no Buddy at all,” Artie said. “Maybe he’s a figment of her imagination, Dad.” At times, there were flashes of the brat who had been her brother before the trashing. Although he still did not play his video games, he did not have nightmares anymore and had again joined the brat pack on the streets and sidewalks of the neighborhood.

“He’s real, all right,” Jane said, remembering his touch, the way he had tremblingly cupped her breast the night before. “Give us time …”

“He may be a very nice boy, Jane,” her father said, an edge to his voice, “but I think we should meet him. I don’t like the idea of having you dash out of the house and into his car …”

“His mother’s car,” she amended.

“I’m not talking about whose car,” her father said, voice sharp now. “I’m talking about a boy you’re spending
a lot of time with, that you’re all dreamy-eyed about, and we’ve never met him. He’s never set foot into this house …”

“We’re just trying to show you that we care about you,” her mother said, gently, placatingly.

“Don’t you trust me?” Jane asked.

“Of course we trust you, hon,” her mother said. “But is it so unreasonable to want to meet this boy you think is so wonderful? Don’t you want to share it all with us?”

Brushing her hair later in her room, she knew that her relationship with Buddy would remain incomplete until two things happened: telling him about the trashing and introducing him to her parents.

Both happened unexpectedly that same night.

She and Buddy had just stepped off the bus that brought them back to Burnside from Wickburg when they encountered her mother and father strolling along Main Street after seeing a movie at the Downtown Cinema. Flustered, embarrassed, but delighted, she managed the introductions and then stood silently proud as Buddy, very politely, shook their hands, murmuring “Pleased to meet you” a bit shyly, stammering endearingly. Looking at him through her parents’ eyes, she was pleased at what she saw: a good-looking and polite young man, neat in his tan cords and brown sport shirt. Her pleasure increased when her father said: “Hope you’ll drop around the house sometime,” and Buddy answered: “Thank you, sir, I will.”

Perhaps that meeting was the reason why, a few minutes later, Jane told him about the trashing as they sat on a park bench at the edge of Jedson Park, basking in the warmth and fragrance of the spring night. The words popped out of her mouth without plan or rehearsal.

“My house was trashed a while ago,” she said. “These guys wrecked it. My sister is still in the hospital, in a coma.
She fell down the cellar stairs. Or was pushed …” Could say no more, her throat constricting.

His arm went around her shoulder, gripped her tightly. “I know,” he said, voice hoarse as if his own throat were constricted.

“You knew all the time?” she asked, turned to him. “Why didn’t you say something?”

“I didn’t know how much it would hurt you to talk about it,” he said. “I wanted you to do it in your own time.”

“It was terrible, Buddy,” she said, shuddering, relieved that the topic was out in the open and that he had not withdrawn from her. Her earlier reluctance to talk about the trashing was replaced now by a need to talk, to tell him what had happened from her point of view, not from what he had read in the newspaper or heard from other people. As she spoke he kept shaking his head, frowning, wincing sometimes as if her anguish were his own, as if he, too, had been damaged by the trashers. She had never loved him more than at this moment.

“Poor Buddy,” she said, stroking his cheek. “Don’t feel so bad. My family’s fine now. The doctors are sure that Karen will come to soon. All the tests show that there is no brain damage.” Actually, the doctors weren’t sure at all—but she wanted to offer him consolation because he seemed so sad.

Later, when he left her at the steps of her house, he kissed her with a prolonged intensity that left her breathless, as if he would never kiss her again.

“I love you,” she whispered as she slipped out of his arms. She had spoken those words to him a thousand times but never with such passion and fervor. “Thank you for being so wonderful …” Dashing into the house, she was exhilarated by the evening’s events. But later, slipping on
her pajamas, she wondered if she should have asked him about Harry Flowers.

While Buddy, at home, desperately drank himself into a stupor and then oblivion for the first time since he had met her.

They had just left the Pizza Palace at the Mall two days later when he spotted Harry Flowers stepping off the escalator. Buddy stiffened, looked around wildly for a place to hide although he knew there was no way to escape. He turned toward Jane, trying to block Harry’s view of her and she leaned against him, misinterpreting his movement, thinking he wanted to get closer to her body. She looked up at him, smiling that self-satisfied smile he loved to see on her face. Taking her elbow, he steered her away from the escalator and she allowed herself to be navigated. He could not resist looking back over his shoulder, however, risking a quick glance to assure himself that Harry had come and gone without seeing them. The pizza with pepperoni became lead in his stomach when he saw Harry standing twenty-five feet away, a weird and evil smile on his face as he waved to Buddy.

Buddy did not wave back, did not acknowledge Harry’s presence but maneuvered Jane around the corner, sick to his stomach suddenly.

That night, at home, he waited for the telephone to ring. He roamed restlessly around the house, looking out the windows, turning the television on, watching it awhile, then turning it off again. Harry Flowers: his nemesis, his downfall. After Jane had told him of the trashing on that park bench, he had been waiting for her to mention his name. His name had been in the newspaper. Jane had certainly read that story and saw it. Buddy waited, in fear that she would say: “Harry Flowers—he goes to Wickburg Regional,
too. Do you know him?” She had not mentioned him but ever since, he had endured a special kind of torture when they were together. He felt trapped, helpless, sensing that he was on the verge of losing Jane Jerome.

The telephone rang as he went into the bathroom. He let it ring, standing motionless, hoped it would keep on ringing and nobody would answer. Which was impossible, of course. Phone rings, someone answers.

“Buddy, it’s for you,” Addy called.

He picked up the phone in the living room, out of earshot of Addy in her room and his mother going over household accounts in the den.

“Hey, Buddy, what’s going on?” Harry asked. That sly insinuating voice.

“Nothing,” Buddy said. Maybe he had not seen him and Jane together, after all.

“Saw you at the Mall today, too bad we didn’t have a chance to talk …” Voice casual now, almost too casual. But at least no phony accent.

“Was that you? I thought it was you but wasn’t sure …”

“Oh, it was me all right, Buddy, but you seemed in a hurry. Either that or you didn’t want to talk to me right then …”

“Well, I
was
in sort of a hurry …” And let the sentence end, blowing air out of his mouth.

“You were with a girl, Buddy. You keeping secrets from Harry? Got a girlfriend and haven’t told Harry about it?”

“She’s not my girl,” Buddy said. “Just a girl I knew. We have a pizza together once in a while. I think we went to a movie once.”

“You
think
you went to a movie? Aren’t you sure,
Buddy? Is your memory that bad? I mean, did you go to a movie with this girl or didn’t you?”

“Yeah, that’s right, we did go to a movie. I mean, it wasn’t really a date …”

How can I get out of this stupid conversation?

“Who is she, Buddy? Anybody at school? Anybody I know?”

“No, you wouldn’t know her.”

“Why wouldn’t I know her? I mean, I know a lot of people, Buddy, and you don’t know everybody I know, do you? So how do you know I wouldn’t know her?”

Jesus, Buddy thought, perspiration gathering in his armpits, his palms, his crotch, everywhere.

“Well, she’s new in town. So I figured you wouldn’t know her. I mean, she doesn’t know many people here and she doesn’t go to Wickburg Regional …”

“Where does she go then?”

Buddy’s hand was so slippery with sweat that the telephone almost said from his grasp.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? Let me get this straight. You’re going out with this girl, right, you eat pizza with her, right, you go to the movies with her and you don’t know where she goes to school?”

“She doesn’t like to talk about it. About school, I mean. She’s having problems transferring from out of town and would prefer not to discuss it.”

Buddy’s mind was racing so fast, to lie, to fabricate, that he felt dizzy.

“Poor kid,” Harry said, and Buddy tried to pin down whether Harry’s sympathy was real or synthetic. “Know what, Buddy? I just caught a glimpse of her. I mean, you were blocking my view of her, for crissakes. But she looked familiar. I don’t know. I’ve been trying to place her ever
since. Something about her. I’ve seen her before somewhere …”

“Is that right?” Could Harry hear the hollowness in his voice?

“Yes, it’s one of those things. You know, like a name on the tip of your tongue and you can’t quite remember …”

“Sure, I know what you mean.” Was Harry toying with him, teasing him?

“Listen, what is her name, anyway? Maybe that will solve my memory problem …”

“Her name?”

“Yes, you know. What’s on her birth certificate. What she signs on her theme papers at school, what she puts down at the end of her letters.”

He knows, of course, he knew all along.

Reckless suddenly, figuring he had nothing whatever to lose, he said: “Guess, Harry.”

“Guess what?”

“Guess her name. You’re good at games. Go ahead, guess.”

Let him say her name, if he knows it. I’m not saying it.

“Give me a clue, then.”

“Like what?”

“Like her initials. The initial of her first name.”

“Nope, you’ve got to guess the whole name.”

Big pause. Buddy almost smiled. Harry liked cat-and-mouse stuff and he was being given a taste of it.

Harry sighed. “This is going to be hard. I mean, there are twenty-six letters in the alphabet and her name has to start with only one of them. I’ll tell you what, Buddy. I’ll have to think about it. I’ll have to give it some time. Let me think about it tonight and I’ll call tomorrow and give you my guesses. Okay?”

“Okay,” Buddy said, trying to disguise the relief in his voice.