9:41 (18 page)

“Downtown. I just came out of one of my favorite haunts. What are you doing?”

“Just sitting around recuperating from the week-end. Don, I'm telling you, … kicks! This was by far the greatest, and I really mean the greatest, week-end in the last year”, he said with enthusiasm. He had really been living it up since Gloria.

“Sounds wild. Where were you?”

“We were at the Colas Hotel. You know that place that I go to every summer. Well, they had a reunion up there this week-end. It was wild”.

“Really good, hanh?”

“The end. I don't think I got four hours sleep the whole week-end. Everybody was drunk as a skunk. I met a couple of nice girls while I was there. You should have seen this bit. All the guys and the girls are having this party, and every once in a while one of the guys would cut out with one of the girls, … and after a while they'd come back and then some other guy would cut out with the same chick, … or the guy'd cut out with another chick”.

“Sounds like a lot of fun. You find anyone interesting during one of your exits out the side door”, I asked. He laughed.

“Well there was this one chick, not a bad looking kid either … she was with some goose all night. He went for some drinks or something and she and I started to dance. Then we sort of disappeared out the side door. We walked down to my car. Boy, you should have seen that place. Every car in the lot was filled. A leg sticking out here, an arm there. All the cars were filled with couples. We got in the car and stayed there for a couple of hours, and later I drove to this all-night diner. Everybody and his brother from the hotel was there. It looked like everybody got up for breakfast, but it was four thirty in the morning. She was a pretty nice girl, … from Manhattan, in the eighties. I got her phone number. I'll have to try her some time. Promises to be an interesting night”.

“You really meet a lot of chicks, don't you?” I said.

“Got to keep moving, don't you man? I met another one when I got back to my room. She was sleeping in my bed. I don't know how the hell she got there. So I just pushed her to one side and went to sleep. When we got up we had a nice long talk. I think I'll call her one of these days too. What's happening with you?”

“Nothing much. I was going to suggest that I come over to your place for a drink”, I said.

“Sure, come on over”.

“Okay, see you in about fifteen minutes”. I hung up the telephone and got on the bus and started for Bob's place. He sure as hell is having himself a ball with all these girls he goes out with, I thought to myself. The bus moved down Third Avenue, past short-sleeve shirted men and cotton skirted women, who seemed to be acting out parts in a pantomime as the bus quickly passed them, making its way to the next stop. “Funny guy, Bob. Out with all these chicks, having a ball”. The bus' air brakes pulled the wheels to a halt. A man got in and the bus started up again … “Going out with all kinds of girls, and yet …” I remembered a girl that Bob had been friendly with. She was going out with one of the guys at the hotel. He told me she got plastered drunk, and her boyfriend, already sick from too much liquid refreshment, had passed out somewhere. There she was, loaded, knocking on Bob's door. He said, “I could've had anything I wanted. She even offered it to me, but you know, I just couldn't take advantage of her like that”. So Bob took her in his arms and dropped her on the bed in his room and then went out again. She awoke the next morning and didn't even remember how she got to his room. “Nice guy, Bob, … got some principles”. I reached up and grabbed the green cord that hung along the side of the bus. A little bell sound was heard. The bus pulled over to the side and the doors opened.

“Hey, Don”, I heard my name being called aloud from above. I looked up and saw Bob at the window of his apartment. “Bring some ginger ale up with you”, he called down. “You can get some in that store across the street”.

I looked around. There was a delicatessen lit up with neon signs across the street. “Okay, I'll be right up”. I went across the street and got two bottles of ginger ale.

“What do you want to drink?”, Bob asked me.

“Give me some gin, straight”.

“Here you go. So what's new, anything?”

“Not much. Still going out with Bea. How's Lillian?”

Bob shrugged his shoulders and sat down. “I don't know, Don. I think I'm going to cool it with this girl. I think I'm getting a little too involved”.

It seems I've heard this statement ten times before. He'd say it toward the end of a time when he'd have been seeing Lillian regularly. And then every time he'd come back from the week-end where he met a lot of girls but none that really interested him, he'd say how much fun Lillian was and that this was probably the girl he was going to marry. “I don't know, you know? I think this week-end is going to be it”, he said. “We're going away, and if I still feel this way I'm going to cool it”

I let the subject and the conversation drop. “I saw an old friend of yours tonight”, I began again.

“Really? Who?”

“Gloria”.

The name seemed not to phase him in the least, save that his eyes widened a little with curiosity. “No kidding”, he said slowly. “How is she?”

“Fine. She asked for you. Said to give you her love”. He was silently pleased by that.

“You know, we've often talked about her together, haven't we”, he said reflectively, “and about how we should get together. I wonder if I should try her?”

“Well, I mentioned that we used to have a lot of laughs together, and why didn't we get together one night, just for old-times sake”.

“What did she say?” he asked eagerly.

“She thought it was a good idea. Then we changed the subject”.

“That might be interesting, you know, Lillian is going away for a few days, week after next. I might just ask you to call Gloria and, …” I made a face. “Well, I just couldn't call her myself”, he began to explain. “Maybe you could call and say that it was your idea. Tell her perhaps you could arrange it with me if she were willing”.

I shrugged. “Sure, I don't care”.

“After all, she can only say no”, said Bob. He looked at me in a slightly embarrassed way and then added “that's all it would be for, you know, for old times. She used to be a lot of fun, and like I said, she can only say no”.

“That's right”, I agreed. “I'll call for you if you want. Maybe the four of us could get together for a few laughs just like old times”.

“Yeah, that would be kicks. As soon as Lillian goes away we'll make it”.

The night went on uneventfully, except for sporadic mentions of Gloria and times past, and soon I took my leave of Bob. But it never left me for a minute, that is, the feeling that Bob, … well, it seemed to me that underneath the grease paint Pagliacci was crying, only he didn't know it. We resolved to get in touch with Gloria the following week, but as it happened we didn't. Lillian didn't go away, and then Bob got into one of his stages when he was going to marry Lillian, so the reunion was put off indefinitely

I met Gloria again, more than ten months later. She was married by then. Married to the fellow I had met in the bar that night. I don't even remember his name now, Ted something or other. I do remember her though, same gleam in her eye, still asking about Bob. I wasn't sure why she asked, but it seemed that she still thought warmly of Bob.

The next time I saw Bob was at his apartment. I told him about the meeting. “I met Gloria a couple of days ago, Bob”.

“No kidding?”, he said slowed by amazement, with the same amount of interest he had shown on previous occasions.

“Yeah, she's married”, I said hesitantly.

“Married?” he said in a dumbfounded way, with the utmost of surprise, as if some impossible thing had happened. “Who did she marry?”

“Some guy, name of Ted, … I can't remember his last name. I met him that last time I met her”.

“Is he a nice guy?”

“Nice enough. I didn't get to know him very well”.

“Gloria married, … I never thought of her as being married. You remember how she and I were supposed to get married. That seems like a hundred years ago”. He was now far off, thinking, just staring over my head at the wall behind me.

“Yeah, it does seem like a long time ago”, I said. “Nice girl, Gloria, really nice”.

“You're right”, he said, nodding his head in agreement. “I hope that guy is nice enough for her. She deserves a good break. She's had it rough enough. Maybe I should call her and wish, … no, I don't think I'd better. I hope she'll be happy. That's more than she would have been with me”, he assured me, looking to see if I believed him.

“Yeah, guess so”, I agreed. He lit a cigarette, and inhaled, looking at me, smiling wearily to reassure me.

“What do you want to drink?”

“Gin is good”.

He handed me a glass, and sat in a chair across the room, and he now stared at me over the rim of his glass, his smoking cigarette in his hand. He didn't see me though, just sat there reflecting.

“I'm going to take off, Bob. I've got to meet Bea”, I said after a long silence.

“Yeah, yeah sure. I've got to go out soon myself. One of the chicks from the hotel”.

“One of your wild flings again?”

“Yeah, you should be single like me, man, a different chick every night if you want”.

“I'll give you a call in a couple of days”, I said backing to the door.

“Yeah, … take it easy”.

“Take it any way you can get it”, I said jokingly.

“Ain't that the truth”, he said laughing a little, looking at me with those sad, frightening eyes. He closed the door, and I walked down the stairs and out into the street.

THE BALLAD OF THE RUMBLING SUBWAY

Standing on tile tomb like platform, looking down the empty tunnel,

I behold in the inky gloom, gleaming lines aparallel.

Little green, red, and yellow lights glowing in the darkness,

waving messages of warning to the rumbling express

as it travels through the umbrageous steel forest.

Suddenly, afar off, we espy

the advancing; giantess, one green, one red eye.

Two little twinklings flickering to and fro,

as the writhing monster emits a screaming bellow …

piercingly goading a city at rest.

The air is thrummed by a pounding pandemonium …

pulsating, throbbing, erupting, in my cranium.

Whiffing within reach blurs a flickering glare …

clic-clacking unending, then a pff't of air,

the brakes upon the wheels hard prest.

The doorman presses a button, the gate whirrs open;

there's the transfer of humanity, the dropping of a token,

a rapid shuffling of feet as the door slides closed …

… stopped by an arm interposed.

Another victim the train is wont to digest.

Sitting on the tossing chair,

one is immedeately brought to stare,

at the fantastically strange surrounding,

with mysterious and odd sights abounding …

like a tattered man asleep with his head upon his chest.

Off in a corner one can see

an unabashed true love, girl upon his knee.

The conductor must keep orderly his train

and requests the couple to kindly refrain,

lest …

On their arrival at the next destination

he will certainly summon the guard of the station.

Who will, according to his disposition

be forgiving or demand contrition,

and thereupon arrest.

The epileptic train seems to be slowing,

the passengers to alight allowing.

At the next stop which is twenty third

there appears a person seemingly absurd,

dressed in the native habit of, perhaps, Budapest.

He adds his figure to the seated congregation,

who all told represent almost every nation.

Some of whom may have been kings and queens,

soon to be pressed and pushed like sardines,

when our train, the rush hours infest.

But now the subway enjoys its daily sleep,

as slowly through the tunnel the trains creep.

In a few short hours to awake,

to footsteps resounding like a quake;

jamming the train, till sides protest.

People, people, people, that's all that one can see,

save for an advertisement for the tuna, ‘Bumble Bee.'

Women, men, girls, and boys and some hard to define,

jam together, twine, incline, entwine, and intertwine,

and unknowing people, some erotica will molest.

Times Square, 59th street, Wall Street, Bowling Green

have people delivered to them, in number umpteen.

Masses arrive to perform their daily chore,

to earn enough coin to keep the wolf from the door …

and a little extra that the banks will invest.

Change for the express at Pacific stop.

The door slides open, people jump out to swap.

Others cram in, push prod, jab, jolt,

butt, beat, tap, thwack, and always it's the other's fault,

as the bruises on your shin attest.

Excuse me, excuse me, please,

I implore, as through the mass I squeeze.

Squirming, pulling, laboriously trying,

An effort which gets me off … exhaustingly sighing,

with one of two buttons gone from my vest.

Kleins, Macy's, and Gimbels, not to mention Ohrbachs,

have stock in trade overflowing their racks,

while buyers are sped to the mecca of retail

in a car impelled by an electrified rail.

Midday, these, our electric congest.

The end of the line finds the train tenantless.

The conductor snares papers for the press,

deserted by their buyers, full of news hum-drum,