52 Pickup (9 page)

FROM THE BEDROOM WINDOW
Barbara Mitchell watched her husband for several minutes. Sometimes in the summer, while she was still in bed, she would hear him in the pool doing his twenty-five lengths. This morning it was cold and there was no sound.

He was directly below her on the patio, sport coat open, hands in his pants pockets. He never wore gloves, and only occasionally a raincoat during the cold months. She wasn't sure what he was looking at or how long he had been there. When he moved finally it was to walk along the edge of the swimming pool, looking down, as if inspecting the pale plastic cover that was stained and streaked with dead leaves and the dirt of winter and spring.

When she came outside, wearing a housecoat over her nightgown, he was still at the pool.

“Thinking about going for a swim?”

A trace of a smile appeared as he turned.
“Pretty soon. Get her cleaned out, be ready for Memorial Day.”

Barbara's hands were deep in the pockets of the housecoat, her shoulders hunched against the chill.

“Did you sleep at all?”

“Little bit, on my couch. Couple of the turning machines were giving us the trouble. They got them adjusted and set, then I had to wait while they started the run again and checked the pieces, cylinder rod couplers. Some reason the outside diameters were coming out trimmed a hair undersize and we had to scrap thirty percent of the run. That costs money.”

She knew he was not explaining but was talking to be talking, filling a void. She knew his sounds. Something was on his mind and it could be cylinder rod couplers or it could be something else.

“I'm going to change and get back. Sit on the job till it's out. Supposed to be in Pontiac this afternoon.”

“You make the deliveries now, too?”

“Sometimes it looks like it's coming to that.”

“Well, how about breakfast first?”

“Couple of soft-boiled eggs would be good. Four minutes.”

“I know,” Barbara said.

She was in the bedroom waiting for him. She heard the shower turn off. He would be drying himself now. In a few minutes he would open the bathroom door to clear the steam from the mirror and would shave with the towel wrapped around his waist that was flat through the stomach, hard-muscled, but bulged slightly above his hips and around into his back. You could never get that area, he said. You could do two hundred situps and twists a day and never quite get to those little bulging handles of fat. Love handles, Barbara said. Or she would say it was because he wore his pants so low, down on his hips. Something left over from younger days. And he would say he would never wear his pants way up high, the way fat old men did. Where did they get those pants? The goddamn zipper must be two feet long.

When he came out, with the towel around his middle, and went over to the dresser, Barbara said, “I'll wait until you come down before I put your eggs on.”

He said, “Fine,” and got a pair of jockey shorts out of the dresser. He never wore an undershirt top or a T-shirt.

Watching him, Barbara's expression was calm, her dark hair combed, her skin clear and clean-looking without make-up. She was forty-two; a very attractive forty-two. She had confidence
in herself and in her husband, but she was worried about him and wasn't sure why.

She took off her housecoat, then timed it, waiting until he turned before she stepped into her panties, raising the short nightgown and pulling it up over her head.

“I probably got about two hours sleep,” Mitchell said. “I need a bigger couch.”

“Usually it's the wife who makes the excuse.”

He looked at her, her body, the lines showing her tan and the white breasts. “What?”

“The wife says she has a headache as the husband reaches for her.”

“I'm not making excuses. I'm not only tired, I got to get back to work.”

She reached behind her to hook the bra. “I've seen you dead on your feet, but you could always move other parts of you.”

“Barbara—do people argue about making love?”

“I don't know what other people do.”

“Don't you think it's better when it happens naturally? You both want to do it?”

“Let me know when you feel natural again,” she said and put the housecoat back on and went downstairs.

Now she was at the breakfast table with
The Detroit Free Press,
her coffee finished. He came
into the kitchen, wearing a clean shirt but the same sport coat, one that had been his favorite at least eight years. He took the sports section of the paper and began to scan it as she served his eggs, English muffin and coffee. When this was done Barbara sat down again.

“Sally called last night.”

“She did? What's the matter?”

“Nothing. She just wanted to talk.”

“Still likes Cleveland? And the battery salesman?”

“She's happy, you can tell. But she misses us.”

“Is she pregnant yet?” His eyes roamed over the sports page as he began to eat, passing up a report on the Tigers' spring training camp that he would have read yesterday.

“No, she's not pregnant. They're going to wait a while.” Barbara paused, watching him. “Did you see the mail?”

He looked up, momentarily interested, or pretending to be.

“No. Anything good?”

“A letter from Mike.”

“Another one? No, I didn't see it.”

“In the front hall.” She waited again as he returned to his breakfast, eating slowly, not finishing the eggs and pushing the plate away. “Don't you think it's sort of amazing? He's written
on the average of once every two weeks since he's been at school.”

“When he needs money.”

“I think he's a good writer. He tells you what's going on. How many do that?”

“I don't know. I guess not many.” Mitchell looked up at the big railroad clock on the kitchen wall.

“I got to go,” he said, but took time to finish his coffee before getting up. He looked at the clock again, then leaned over to kiss his wife on the cheek.

“Mitch?”

“What?”

“If it's such a pain in the ass, why don't you sell the business? Is it worth it, being tense all the time?”

“I'm not tense.”

“I don't know what you call it then. You're preoccupied, something. You don't talk anymore. All you think about is business or one of your committee things. You're so busy you don't even come home for dinner anymore.”

“Come on, maybe a couple nights a week I stay at the office or have to go to a meeting or something.”

“Mitch, it's almost every night, except weekends.”

“Okay, I've been busy lately. What am I supposed to do. I've got machines breaking down
for no reason. We're behind on orders. I got to keep customers happy, take them out to lunch. I got union contract negotiations coming up. I got to keep all these balls up in the air at once.”

“Poor me,” Barbara said.

“What'd you say that for?”

She shook her head. “I'm sorry, it was dumb. I guess what I'm trying to say is you're different lately. Somehow. I can't put my finger on it.”

“Listen, I got to go.” He kissed her again, this time lightly on the mouth, and patted her shoulder. “I'll try to get home early and we'll go out to dinner. Okay? Go to Charlie's Crab, get a good piece of fish.”

He was out of the drive, turning into the street, when Barbara reached the front door and got it open. She stood there, holding the letter from their son.

O'BOYLE KEPT STARING AT HIM.
Jim O'Boyle, his lawyer and friend, sitting across the desk now in the wood-paneled office.

“I never knew you fooled around,” O'Boyle said. “You really surprise me, Mitch, I never thought of you that way.”

“I
don't
fool around.” Mitchell leaned in, emphasizing his words, being open and honest. “I never fooled around in my life.”

“Then what do you call it?”

“I mean before. I never did anything like this before in my life.” O'Boyle kept watching him and Mitchell added, in a lower tone, “I didn't consider this fooling around. I mean I didn't honestly feel that's what I was doing.”

“What did you consider it then? The girl's what, a year older than your daughter.”

“I didn't consider it anything. I didn't put a label on it.” He wasn't sure what to say next and the sound of the buzzer on his telephone saved
him. He picked it up. “Yeah? . . . All right, tell him I'll be out in a couple minutes.”

Mitchell hung up. “Victor wants me.” He took a reel of tape from his desk drawer and held it in front of him with both hands, as though it might be fragile or of special value.

“I came back here after I talked to you on the phone last night, while it was fresh in my mind. Jim, I put it all down on the tape recorder, everything I could remember that happened. What the guy said, what he sounded like, what the film showed, everything I could remember that might mean something.”

“But you never saw any of them before. You're sure of that.”

“Jim, I don't know. I didn't see them last night, just a glimpse like half a second, how do I know? The machine's over there. Listen to it, Jim, I'll come back soon as I can.” Moving around the desk he said, “I got a plant supervisor pulling his hair out because the fucking machines keep breaking down or the bearings freeze up. I got more down-time than production and now I got these clowns who want to sell me a movie for a hundred and five thousand bucks. You ever have one like that before?”

“Go fix your machines,” O'Boyle told him.

And Mitchell said, “Yeah.”

In the outer office his secretary, Janet, who was efficient and always in control, gave him a funny look, a quick, warning expression.

The man standing by her desk said, “Are you Mitchell?”

He's a cop, Mitchell thought. That was the instant impression the man gave him. But there was also something familiar about him. He had seen him before, somewhere.

Janet said, “I've tried to tell this gentleman you can't see anyone. He walked right in, said he'd wait.”

“I'm sorry,” Mitchell said, “I've got a full day,” and walked past the man toward the hall.

“My name's Ed Jazik, business agent Local one-ninety-nine.” He was a step behind Mitchell, extending a card as he followed behind him down the hall, past the glass partitions of the accounting and engineering offices.

That was it, Mitchell had seen him in the parking lot the week before, talking to some of the employees. He felt himself relax and took the card, putting it in his pocket without looking at it.

“We've never met before, have we?”

“No, I been assigned to handle negotiations this year,” Jazik said.

“Well, that's not for a couple of weeks.”

“I thought we might talk about it before. See where we each stand.”

“That's what the contract negotiation's for,” Mitchell said.

“I just want you to know,” Jazik said, “I'm not taking any token cheap shit you might happen to offer. We don't come to a quick agreement, you got a walkout on your hands.”

They came to the end of the hall, to a fire door with a sign that read no admittance. authorized personnel only. Mitchell stopped and looked at the man now.

“I thought everybody was happy.”

“From where you sit,” Jazik said, “in your wood-paneled office. You don't happen to be operating a fucking machine all day long.”

Mitchell was tired and didn't want to lose his temper. He said, “What're you pushing me for? You don't have a grievance. Let's wait, okay? Contract time we'll talk all you want.”

“Maybe some people don't want to wait,” Jazik said. “They want to let you know conditions got to be a lot better.”

“Here's the thing,” Mitchell said. “We get in an argument now I'm liable to forget who you are and knock you on your ass. So for the time being, why don't we stay friends?”

He pushed through the heavy door, into the high-level vibrating sound of the plant, and let the door swing closed in the business agent's face.

* * *

O'Boyle said, “I thought you quit smoking?”

Mitchell leaned over the desk to get a light from him. “I started again. You listen to the whole tape?”

“Twice.”

“Well?”

“I think you're being blackmailed.”

“How much do I owe you so far?”

“Mitch, you're in fairly serious trouble.”

“Fairly serious. What's really serious?”

“Tell me how you met the girl and started seeing her. Everything.”

“I met her in a bar—”

“Wait a minute, I want to get it down.” O'Boyle moved the tape recorder closer to Mitchell and turned it on. “Okay.”

“I met her in a bar, a little over three months ago.”

“What bar?”

“I forgot the name. One of the topless go-go places down on Woodward.”

“What were you looking for, some action?”

“Jim, you want me to tell it? I was out with Ross. Once a week I take him to lunch, and I try not to make it a Friday, because he starts his weekend with the first martini. But it was Friday.
I pay the bill, we're walking out, it's only two clock, I'm thinking, thank you, God, I did it. And he says, ‘I don't feel like going back. Let's stop someplace and have a tightener.' “

“So you stopped at the go-go bar.”

“We stopped at four of them. Nice sunny afternoon we're doing the topless tour. The last place, she's sitting at the bar. Ross sees her, pats her on the ass thinking she's one of the go-goers and tries to move in.”

“What kind of shape were you in?”

“Not bad. I just had beer.”

“So you sat down with her?”

“Ross did, I sat next to him. He begins with the usual bullshit about his forty-two-foot boat and his place in Canada. Pretty soon he's dropping the news that he's president of Wright-Way Motor Homes and how would she like to go up north in one this weekend. You know, that ski lodge he's got an interest in. She says, ‘Wow, ride up north in a house trailer.' Ross says no, a
motor home
, with a built-in bar, the whole thing custom-designed and equipped, including a chauffeur. And she says, very innocently, ‘Gee, I don't know, sport. I don't know if I'd be able to handle it, a custom-designed motor home.' You know, putting him on a little. He says, ‘I got a ski lodge up there, near Gaylord. I own it.' She says,
‘That sounds great. What do you ski on this time of the year, the grass?' “

O'Boyle, watching the tape recorder, looked up. “She used the word
sport.
That's what the guy called you a couple of times, didn't he?”

Mitchell paused, nodding. “You're right.”

“Go on. Wait a minute,” O'Boyle said then. “If she doesn't work in the place and I assume she's not a hustler, what was she doing there?”

“A friend worked there. Cini used to pick her up sometimes, drive her home.”

“Where did Cini work?”

“I'll get to that,” Mitchell said. “I didn't start talking to her until her friend joined us. Actually I came back from the can and the other girl's there and Ross's already switched over, giving her the business. So I sat down next to Cini.”

“You know the friend's name?”

“I forgot. Donna. No, Doreen something or other. She's black. The best-looking black girl I ever saw. That's why Ross jumped on her. Really good-looking.” Mitchell paused.

“Go on,” O'Boyle said.

“I don't remember how Cini and I started talking. I mean, what about. But it was nice. She didn't give me the innocent big eyes she gave Ross. We just started talking—I think about meeting people, you know? How people meet
and start dating and then sometimes they get married. She told me she was married when she was eighteen and divorced two years later. So now she was taking a secretarial course at Wayne, night school, and working as a model during the day.”

“What kind of model? Ads? Commercials?”

“Let me get to it. We started talking and, Jim, I'll be a son of a gun, I asked her to go out to dinner.”

O'Boyle looked at him, saying nothing.

“I mean we started talking and I
liked
her. She was
real.
No bullshit put-on or, you know, cute acting.”

“She was real.”

“She was very honest and sincere, down to earth. She used a few words once in a while like ‘shit,' but it was natural. She was easy to talk to and we started laughing at things each other said.”

“So you took her out to dinner.”

“Yes. Listen, you try and think of a place to go you're not going to run into somebody. It's almost impossible.”

“I've never been faced with the problem,” O'Boyle said.

“Yeah, well good for you. We ended up in someplace downtown, I'm looking around the whole time we're there expecting somebody to walk in. Place you never even heard of, all of a
sudden you start picturing all your friends and neighbors walking in.”

“Guilty conscience.”

“That's what I pay you for, huh?”

“You score that night?”

“Jim, we were having a nice time, that's all. I didn't even think about it.”

“Well, when did you start thinking about it?”

“I guess when I saw her without any clothes on.”

“That could do it.”

“I told you she was a model? Well, when I first met her she worked in one of those places you go in, take pictures of a nude girl, fifteen bucks for a half-hour.”

O'Boyle stared; he didn't say anything.

“Thirty bucks you can body-paint them.”

“How much for a plain old-fashioned lay?”

“She didn't do that. Maybe some of the others did, I don't know.”

“She just took her clothes off for any guy who came in.”

“Jim, she didn't see anything wrong with it. She said a body's a body, everybody's got one, so what's the big deal? I told you she was . . . natural, honest.”

“A real person.”

“She was different. Jim, I'm not good at describing people. But I'm telling you I liked the girl. In fact, you want to know the truth, I fell in
love with her. Can you hear me saying that? I fell in
love.
I felt like I was twenty years old. We had a good time together, we enjoyed each other and we didn't even do anything. I mean exciting. We didn't go out and spend a lot of dough. I'd come to the apartment and most of the time all we did was talk. Have some wine, listen to music and talk. You understand what I'm saying?”

“You're going through your menopause and you thought you were in love.”

“I
was
in love. Christ, I know the feeling. When I wasn't with her I'd think about her all the time. I'd get a pain inside.”

“Where, in your crotch?”

“In my
gut.
Jim, I'm telling you it's a real honest-to-God feeling that's got nothing to do with sex. We went to bed, of course, naturally. But that wasn't the big thing. We liked being with each other. Listen, we'd sit there and ask each other questions like what's your favorite color? What's your favorite vegetable? What's your favorite movie?”

“Brief Encounter.”

“I don't get it.”

“What about Barbara?”

“What about her?”

“I mean if you were so in love, why didn't you leave Barbara and marry the girl?”

“Come on, Jim.”

“I'm serious. You say you think about her all the time, you're deeply in love. Why didn't you get a divorce and marry her?”

“Jim, last night when I went there, the reason? I was gonna tell her I wasn't coming back anymore.”

“Why?”

“Try faking it for three months,” Mitchell said. “Whether you're faking one or the other it isn't worth the state you get yourself in.”

“Conscience,” O'Boyle said.

“You said that before.” Mitchell was silent for a moment, thoughtful. “I'll tell you a funny thing though. I've been married twenty-two years. All of a sudden I fall in love with a young, really nice, good-looking girl. But you want to know something, Jim? Barbara's better in bed.”

O'Boyle was still in the office when the call came. Mitchell recognized the voice. Nodding toward the extension phone on the table by the couch he said, “Yeah, I know who it is.” O'Boyle went over and very carefully picked up the phone.

“Have you thought it over?” the voice asked.

“I'm still thinking,” Mitchell said. “A hundred and five thousand, that's a lot to think about, isn't it?”

“Not for you, sport. A little side money.”

“I guess I'm tight with it then. I work hard for what I make. I say to myself, why give it to some asshole who comes along trying to con you?”

There was a silence and O'Boyle made a face, closing his eyes. Finally the voice said, “This is no con. You don't come across you're going to find yourself up to your chin in shit, buddy, and I mean it.”

“But it's my decision,” Mitchell said. “If I want to be in up to my chin or not is up to me, right?” Again there was a silence.

“You can have it any way you want,” the voice said.

“All right, then give me a couple more days to think about it.” Mitchell looked over at his lawyer. “You've probably been working on this for a while. What's a couple more days? I mean you lay it on me all of a sudden, I have to have a little time to make up my mind.”