Where the God of Love Hangs Out - Amy Bloom [80]
“Christ,” Ray said, “no defense at all.”
“I hear you,” the man next to him said, and someone tapped Ray on the shoulder.
Ray’s elbow tipped his glass and the man to his left caught it and the barmaid said, Good catch, and Macy was standing beside him.
“What in Christ’s name are you doing here?” Ray said. “Where’s Neil?” In the five years since the wedding, Ray had never seen Macy take a drink, let alone in a black bar at the ass end of Meriden.
Macy shrugged. “I used to live around here,” she said. “I took a drive and … You want to get a booth?”
“I would,” said the man on Ray’s left. “I would definitely get a booth.”
“She’s my daughter-in-law,” Ray said.
“Let he who is without sin, cast the first stone,” the man said.
“I thought you were from Iowa. Kansas? Was I wrong?” Ray said, when they’d brought their beers to a table.
“No. I said my parents were dead and I had an aunt and uncle in Des Moines. Which I don’t.”
Macy drummed her fingers on the table.
“I love Neil,” she said. “I really do.”
“I’m sure you do. And he loves you. Christ, you have only to look at him—he thinks you hung the moon.”
“Really? He wants to have a baby.”
“Good,” Ray said. “Have two.” Babies having babies, he thought.
“He thinks I hung the moon? He’s the best man I know,” Macy said. “I’m just not who he thinks I am.”
“That’s not the worst thing in the world,” Ray said, and Macy put her hand, cool and wet from the beer, over his lips. Her hand smelled like grapefruit.
“I don’t mean he doesn’t know my essence on some metaphysical level. I mean I have lied to him on a million different occasions about a million things.”
Ray nodded.
“When I was ten, my mother fell down on the kitchen floor, and blood was pouring out of her nose. So, you know, I understood she was OD’ing on coke.”
Ray nodded again, like women OD’ing on coke in front of their children was as much part of his life as reading the paper.
“I had this amazing babysitter, Sammy. So—I don’t want this to take forever—when I’m fourteen my mother moves in with this guy, we’ll just call him The Asshole, and I moved in with Sammy. It turns out, Sammy’s a transvestite.”
Ray nodded again; he had defended a dozen middle-aged guys in dresses who were caught speeding.
“So, I do Sammy’s hair and nails. And I do his friends’, too, and Sammy basically sets me up in the tranny business in our TV room. I do hair, nails, and makeup every day after school and most of Saturday. When I graduate from high school, I have three thousand dollars in my savings account. Plus, I got into Bryn Mawr on scholarship and I graduated second in my class.” Macy smiled shyly. “My name’s not Macy. I changed it—I mean I changed it legally, when I was sixteen. Sammy’s mother’s name was Macy. So when we get to Bryn Mawr, Sammy is just the shit. All the parents love him. He drives off and he goes, Au revoir, honeybun, and don’t look back. He got a horrible staph infection, from the acrylic nails. Ten days in the ICU. It was terrible. He was a really, really nice man,” Macy said, wiping her face with a beer napkin.
“When I was in college,” Ray said, “I let a guy give me a blow job. Let me be clear. This guy paid me fifty bucks, which was a lot of money at the time, and I let him do me once a week for three years. If not for him, I would have had to drop out of college. You already know my father was a bum.”
“Thank you,” Macy said, and she laughed. Ray smiled.
“Also, you might already know this—I’m in love with Randeane.”
“I really like her,” Macy said. “Everything about her, she’s just so great. She’s read everything. I’m sort of in love with her.”
“Maybe,” Ray said. He sighed and spread his arms along the back of the booth. “I’m pretty sure not like this.”
One morning, Ray told Macy, he’d gotten to Randeane’s late, between the morning people and the lunchtime people, and there was a man sitting at Ray’s usual table.
Oh, Ray, Randeane said. This is my friend, Garbly Garble. Ray couldn’t make out the man’s name. He was