The Trouble With Eden - Lawrence Block [128]
“You know I’m nothing if not a gentleman.”
“Oh, I know that, all right. God, isn’t she incredible?”
“That’s a good word for her.”
“Absolutely incredible. Now she goes back home to the hairy old bear with sperm running out of every part of her. I can’t understand why she wouldn’t shower.”
“Maybe she likes to smell like a whorehouse towel.”
“What a thought.”
“Well, to go home to her husband like that—”
“Maybe he’s not living at home. Or maybe she said she was spending the night with a girlfriend and she’s on her way to a motel or some such. Lord, her eyes were swimming in sperm.”
“That’s a beautiful image.”
“Henry Miller thought of it first. Although I’m sure it would have occurred to me sooner or later. It would probably have occurred to me tonight, as a matter of fact. I wonder what’s going to happen to that little girl.”
“No more than she deserves, I trust.”
“And no less, I hope.” Warren sighed heavily. “Actually I think we ought to adopt her. We could keep her as a pet. Dress her in pretty clothes—”
“Walk her on a leash—”
“Don’t be such a bitch. She’d be fun to have around, don’t you think?”
“I don’t think my heart could take it.”
“Christ, nor mine either. I don’t want to so much as hear the word ‘fuck’ for at least a month.”
“Well, you won’t hear it from me.”
“I couldn’t abide as much as a handshake. Unlike Miss Melontits, I think I’m going to treat myself to a shower. My skin has a skin of its own and I just hope soap and water will get rid of it. Perhaps I ought to use Clorox. Ugh. I don’t want company in the shower, in case you thought that might be a cozy idea.”
“I think it’s a revolting idea. You’re perfectly safe in the shower. Just don’t use all the hot water.”
“Bert?”
“Hmm?”
“A memorable evening, what?”
“It’s been that. It’s certainly been that.”
She had intended to drive straight home. Halfway there she was shaking so badly she had to stop the car, She pulled the car over to the side and gripped the steering wheel tight in both hands.
Images battered her mind. She thought of everything that had happened, saw it all as if it were a movie, tried to find a way to fit herself into the picture. It was hard to do this. She could see herself in that movie but she could not understand how it had been her.
She turned the car around, found an all-night diner on 202 and stopped for a cup of coffee. All she wanted to do was to get home to Sully, but she knew that if she went home right away she wouldn’t be in shape to see him. She smoked and drank two cups of coffee and felt the aspects of herself beginning to fit themselves together again.
Before it had consistently been Sully who had been shaken by the new direction their lives had taken. She had been quite calm, quite unshaken. If anything she had wondered at her evident ability to take everything in her stride.
Now things had changed.
She paid the check, ignored the speculative stare of the rheumy-eyed cashier. She did not need his glance to tell her what she looked like. She could guess well enough what she looked like.
I get too hungry for dinner at eight
Go to the theater, but never come late
I never bother with people I hate …
That’s why the lady is a tramp …
That was the song he had played when she walked into the Carversville Inn, and no one could have believed it was coincidental. It had begun as a tactic, a way of holding onto her husband, but after tonight there was no pretending that it was only that. It had become more, much more. She had discovered an appetite she had never realized she had, and every time she fed it it grew stronger, more intense more demanding.
That’s why the lady is a tramp
Back into the car, back on the road. She pictured Sully in his chair, eyes dull, but the dullness backed by a hidden glint of anticipation, the ashtray beside him overflowing with butts, his hand wrapped around a cup of coffee or a glass of applejack.
Waiting for her.
That’s why the lady
She saw herself springing from the ear; hurrying to the door and into the house. The question in his eyes,