The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [321]
“Bill, let’s learn to play golf this summer.”
“That’s just what I was thinking,” he answered as they returned to the walk.
“It’ll be lots of fun, I’ll bet, but it would take me ages to learn how to hit the ball right.”
“I imagine one could pick it up more easy than you suspect.”
“Even if I couldn’t learn to do it well, I think it would be nice as long as we did it together.”
He studied the expression on the faces of passing strangers, wondering what went on in their heads, and were they worse or better off than he was. Three girls strolled by them.
“And Conroy, he was the biggest simpleton, and when he danced he just ruined my brand new shoes,” one of the girls said.
“I had the grandest time, Katie, and Hal just said the funniest things,” the girl in the middle, a frail blond, said.
“The only thing funny about my date was his face. He looked like... like some kind of a chimpanzee or something,” the third one said.
Studs watched them wriggle on. Young, younger than girls he’d ever get, nice to look at.
“High-school kids talking about their dates,” Catherine said sagely.
He turned his eyes toward her, and she blew him a kiss. “We’re going to have our dates, too, this summer.”
“Sure.”
“It won’t be long now before we can go to the beach on Sundays. And let’s sometime get Phil and Loretta and Carroll and Fran and have a beach party. We can bring a picnic lunch and a guitar and roast marshmallows by a fire and sing. It’ll be loads of fun.”
“Sure, we’ll plan on it sometime this summer, and we’ll also ask Red Kelly and his wife.”
It would be a good idea, but going to the beach that way would be a little different than it used to be when he’d go alone with some guys and be expecting to find some jane there, keen and lively, who would flirt and afterward put out and think of it as only fun and nothing serious. This was different, and those days and the expectation of that kind of a thing was gone. Still, he guessed that it was just natural for a guy to think of that kind of thing now and then.
“Bill, dear, I’m so happy thinking of all the things we’ll be able to do this summer, beach parties, and picnics, lots of things we can do together, can’t we? And when I get my vacation, if you can be free, too, we could go away together and find a nice summer resort where we can stay and have separate rooms, of course, and just be together in the same place, having two full weeks to do things together. Won’t it be fun?”
He nodded. If they did, would she? He was getting tired of waiting for it from her, and he wondered would all this long wait make it any better?
Delayed at the drive by the procession of automobiles, she took his arm. They skirted across and walked along by the lake.
“The lake’s simply grand today, Bill, look...”
They peered over the lake, its waters like a shiny cover being stirred from underneath, like a blue cloak being ruffled, and the sunlight on the lake seemed like a pattern sewn into the cloak.
“Darling, I’ll never forget the night we became engaged and walked down by the lake.”
“Yes.”
“And will you ever forget it?” she asked.
“No.”
“I know you will. You men, you think such things are sentimental or foolish, and you don’t remember them. I know you don’t.”
“I do,” he said with an effort to make himself sound convincing.
“Honest?”
He nodded.
“Cross your heart?”
He quickly crossed his heart.
“I love you.”
He wanted to tell her the same thing, telling himself how he did, really did, think a hell of a lot of her. He grinned sheepishly.
“Love me?”
He nodded and she squeezed his hand. Then she clung tightly to his arm.
“We won’t be able to come swimming here, though, this summer,” he said, pointing to the low gray pavilion of rough-edged stone which housed the Jackson Park beach.
“It’s become the hunkies’ community center here now. I came here one day last summer, and I tell you I didn’t think there was as many hunkies and polacks in the world as I saw