Thirty - Jill Emerson [27]
Of course there is no separation agreement nor will there be one. I charged some clothing the other day. And a handbag on his Mastercharge card. I wonder if he will stop those charge accounts. It might not occur to him. Sometimes it takes months for a purchase to show up on a statement. Except that it would be typical for Howard to go to a lawyer the day I left him, just to touch all the bases as he would say it, and the lawyer would probably tell him to close the accounts.
Why should I worry? I haven’t had any trouble using the cards yet. And they’re never going to arrest me. The worst that could happen is that they tell me they can’t accept the cards or something along those lines.
I have plenty of money anyway.
I didn’t talk to him. I dialed the office and asked for his extension and his secretary answered. I wonder if he’s fucking her. She’s a real honey-voiced thing. I asked for Howard. She asked who was calling. I said Gloria Steinem. God knows why. It was the first name that came to mind. The stupid girl got it wrong anyway. “One moment, Miss Stein.” Dumb bitch.
When Howard came on I let him say hello a few times. I didn’t say anything. He said, “Nobody on the line,” and hung up.
Why did I want to hear his voice? A genuine puzzle. To convince myself that he still exists?
I did love him once. I know I did. And he me. I wish I knew what happened. Somewhere along the way we must have started being different people. I stopped being me and I became very boring, and so did Howard, and we were two boring people leading a boring life. That’s what happened to us.
Why?
I don’t know. Happens to everybody.
Any way for people to avoid it?
Probably not. Or maybe yes. Don’t get married, don’t get in ruts, fuck constantly. That might do it.
I feel wonderful. Really wonderful. Groovy and all that stuff. Happy and loose and free.
March 29
I almost feel too good to write.
In fact I do. More later. Like tomorrow.
April 2
The last entry was supposed to be about what happened with Arnold and David.
I think I’ll sort that out now.
They picked me up at six-thirty, the two of them. Arnold was wearing a corduroy jacket with leather elbow patches and dungarees. David wore a leather maxi coat, one of those German-officer jobs with acres of lapels. He had a slightly Prussian look about him, longish blondish hair, finely chiseled features. The well-spoken SS man who loves chamber music and likes to burn girls with cigarettes.
He didn’t exactly look like a faggot, but then neither does Arnold. But when you saw them both together it was not hard to believe it of them. Maybe this is simply because one is conditioned to believe it of any two men seen together, especially if they look any more sensitive than total clods.
I was all prepared to be very uptight at the first meeting. Surprise—everything is very cool and easy. They come to the door, I invite them in for a drink. We each have glass of wine, then across town to a Korean restaurant that David likes. Ginseng cocktails before dinner. Fried seaweed, other weird things. Everything tasted so great it didn’t bother me to think about what I was eating. We had a second round of ginseng cocktails. They were like daiquiris but with an aftertaste. Of ginseng, one would assume. They’re supposed to be very yang, which means something if you understand the macrobiotic diet, which I don’t. They’re also supposed to be aphrodisiacal, which they may be, and then again they may not be. Who could tell?
We went from the restaurant to David’s apartment, which was mildly slummy but a much better proposition than Arnold’s, much less depressing and better furnished and not all those fucking flights of stairs to climb. We were really beautifully relaxed with one another. You could actually feel a three-way love thing developing, a bond uniting me with David, me with Arnold, and Arnold with David.
Not love.
What, then? Call