The Feast of Love - Charles Baxter [61]
“Well,” David said. “Well.” He gathered himself, sat up in my bed, and stared at me. I looked away. “Hey, Diana,” he said, “look at me.” I did. No problem there. “You’re a pretty strong woman, you know that? And you’re beautiful. But the trouble is, you’re a thug. What do you think you’re doing here, doing this lonesome-girl thing in bed with me? Are you just playing with this guy? Do you love him? This Bradley person? Do you love this guy you’re going to marry?”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Sure it is. It’s always that simple. So. Do you love him?”
“He’s lovable, David. That’s what counts.”
“No. That’s not what I asked. Lovable is different. Do you love him?”
“What a question. I don’t know,” I said. “Sort of.” I grinned and shrugged.
He wound back and slapped me, hard.
I got out of bed, right then, right away. I stood naked next to the window. On the bedside table the little votive candles that we always light for lovemaking were blown out by the breeze of my passing. “You bastard. Get the fuck out of my house,” I said.
“Oh, no, I don’t think so,” he said, a calm and sexy insolent look on his face. “Nope, I think I’ll stay here for a little while.” He snaked down under the sheet. “I’d like some coffee, if you please, Diana.” He thought for a moment. “Decaf.” He then gave me a strange look, one I can’t describe, as if he’d been gratified by hitting me.
“Don’t you ever do that again,” I said. “Don’t you hit me ever, you bastard.” I said this calmly.
“You’re marrying a man you’re not sure you love?” he asked from where he lay, scary and calm. “That’s what you’re doing? You cunt, you deserve to be slapped.”
“Don’t you ever call me that.”
“What?”
“That word. I hate that word.”
“Yeah, I agree. It’s an ugly word. But, you know, somebody should knock some sense into you. Honey pie, I should beat the living shit out of you.” At once he was on his feet, putting on his boxer shorts. Standing there, he cut a figure (David’s vice is his physical vanity), and I couldn’t help it, I watched him. He has nice legs, powerful thighs, every inch of which I had kissed and put my tongue upon, and I didn’t care anymore. “I’ve never hit a woman before in my life. Now I see the logic in it, if it’s you,” he said. His voice was heading toward a shout and soon would arrive there. “I would save you a ton of grief if I beat the living crap out of you, so you didn’t marry someone you didn’t love.” His eyes were glistening and bright with rage. “Goddamn you.” He was pacing. “You’ve just hired him as an entertainment. This is beneath you. Excuse me while I do the dishes. I have to calm down.”
He went into the kitchen. When I heard the sound of running water, I sat on the bed and I cradled my face in my hands for a few minutes. My cheek was burning where David had struck me. I made small wrinkles in the bedsheets with my toes. I was trying to think but seemed to be out of basic cognitive resources. That was new for me. I’m good at the complexities of argumentation. Somehow I hadn’t — I don’t know why — expected him to react the way he had. At last I stood up and put on a nightgown and went into the kitchen.
David was standing there in his boxer shorts, washing the soup bowls and rinsing them, washing the wineglasses and rinsing them, all with his usual care and thoughtfulness. I looked at the curve of his spine as it plunged into his shorts. I thought of how I would miss his body, the soups, the wine, the talk — the whole of this beautiful fucked-up man. I would miss the commotion we made together. That more than anything. Making love to him was like going through a car wash, except you came out dirtier and more alive at the other end.
“You made that coffee yet?” he asked.
“Not yet. I thought you could brew it yourself.”
“Why don’t you do that right now? And go to hell, if it’s no trouble, while you’re at it.”
“This coarse language isn’t like you, David.”
He turned around and gave me the