Anthropology of an American Girl (65 page)

The taxi slows to a stop at Fifty-eighth Street and Third Avenue, near Alexander’s department store, before making the turn onto the bridge ramp. Creaking up to consume my entire field of vision is that bizarre mural of globular buttons over Alexander’s corner doorway, like a collection of random hemi-sected eyeballs, like some insane manifestation of things urging me to see. And so I see.

If it never occurred to me to move beyond the idea of having been abandoned by Rourke, it’s not because I’d been victimized, but because in my mind one is a victim when one does not triumph. The parts of me that came to life with Rourke were parts I could not have conceived of alone; naturally I believed that if the best I could be was with him, then
without
him I was nothing.

When he left, I told myself that I was not good enough, that he wanted someone better. My anguish rendered me insensible. At the time, I forgot that life is strange and long and beautiful, and that something so extraordinary in its success could hardly be ordinary in its failure. I persuaded myself that he did not love me, that he never had; and yet, not once when we were together did I need to tell myself he did. It should have been enough to love and be loved, but there was more, I thought—I must have thought—because at some point everything changed from my simply wanting more of him to my wanting more of something else—something substantive, something
normal
—all the while denying the egocentricity of my aspirations, and forgetting the universe we’d made.

The cab is on the lower roadway; the cables and girders are
thoomping
past, animating the steel beam windows of the bridge.

I feel shame to have doubted him, especially when I recall his absence of artifice, the way he knew me when he met me, the way he worked to move us despite obstacles of age and position, the way he trusted that I would feel as he felt, the way he was patient and true. And so, the way he let me go—let
us
go—surely must have been just as deliberate.

Since he knew things at the beginning, maybe at the end he knew things too. That we had gone as far as chance would take us. That nothing is more sacred than youth or more hopeful than turning yourself over to someone and saying,
I have this time, it is not a long time, but it is my best time and my best gift, and I give it to you. When I revisit my youth, I revisit you
.

I had not been walking on air. Rourke had been there, pressure, earth beneath my feet, always.

At Pinky’s everybody’s watching a game on television. Rob is down at the end of the bar, in his usual place, by the telephone. His mood has not improved since fighting with Mark—the stiff hunch to his back, the shaking leg. He does not smile when he sees me; he just kicks out a stool. I drop my book bag and climb up. Something happens in the game, and the men shout in unison—“Ho, shit!” Rob’s voice joins the chorus. He concentrates on the set, pretending to ignore me. Eventually he turns, his eyes drifting toward my lap. My legs are crossed, and with the pants I’m wearing, the crevice between my thighs is revealing. I slide my hands to cover myself.

Rob grabs a couple of bar napkins and blows his nose hard. “I’m allergic to something in here.” He looks over each shoulder. “Must be somebody’s cologne.” He gestures to my knapsack. “More school? It seems like you’ve been in school longer than anyone ever—why is that?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t, huh?” he says. “Well, when are you done?”

“I have three papers due Tuesday.”

“And that’s it?”

“And a presentation.”

“A
presentation
, oh, excuse me. What’s that, like Darrin Stephens?”

“Kind of. Only no witches.”

He faces the bar, puts his elbows up, and wipes his nose one more time. “Where’s the ring?” he asks, talking into his napkin.

“I left it at home.”

“Home,” he repeats facetiously. “That’s not fair play. Some poor slob might get the idea you’re available. Unless of course you weren’t
allowed
to wear it. Did he tell you I’m gonna steal it and hock it?”

“He doesn’t—”

“The future Mrs. Ross,”
Rob says, repeating Dara’s remark from the previous night. “I should have popped that vampire asshole. He was asking for it. Tell you the truth, I’d rather you were gonna marry that queer friend of yours. Dennis. He’s actually a good guy.”

“Mark’s okay.”

“Yeah, sure. Okay. Capital
O.”

“Do you hate him because he’s rich?” I ask.

“Do you sleep with him because he’s rich?” Rob snaps back. “Oh, no, I’m sorry,” he taunts, “you sleep with him because you
love
him.”

“No, I—”

“
No?
Then why do you sleep with him?”

“I—I’m not sure. He was there—”

“Lots of people were
there
. I was there.” He slaps his chest. “How come you never fucked me?” His fingers come together. “I’ll tell you why. Because I know the code.” He clenches his jaw, leans back, pulls out his wallet, and drops a fresh ten on the bar. Rob’s wallet is full of cash. Rob’s wallet is always full of cash. The bartender draws two tap beers and pushes them to us. Rob says, “Thanks, Pink.”

Pinky leaves the money untouched. “How you doing, sweetheart? Long time no see.” Pinky’s an albino. They call him Pinky because he looks like the inside of a conch. I had a cat like that once, like Pinky, with two different-colored eyes, only my cat was deaf. Pinky can hear just fine except for a vague ringing sometimes. He keeps thinking there’s a break-in at the pork factory across the street.

“Sorry, Pinky,” I say. “I’ve been busy with school.”

“She graduates next week,” Rob reports. “A 4.0 average, dean’s list. She got a certificate. One of these rolled-up parchment jobs.”

“If she’s so smart, what’s she doing with you?” Pinky cackles as he chugs off, sideways and slow, like a failing tug.

Rob lifts his mug and polishes off a third of the contents in one swallow, then bends in like he’s got a secret. “You wanna know what I think? I think you’re with him because he doesn’t care that you don’t love him. Any other guy, any
normal
guy, shit like that matters. But you don’t want anything normal. You’re holding on to the past. He knows it. That bastard worked your … your—situation to his advantage. Just like a crook, he saw an open window, and he climbed in.” Rob’s eyes screw up tight like the lens of a camera. “Lemme tell you something about Mark—he don’t come through. You know what I mean,
come through?
Principles, ethics, the code. He knows the code. He knows it and ignores it.”

“What difference does it make?”

“It makes a difference,” Rob says. “Certain things you don’t do.”

“Nobody owns me, Rob. And anyway, Rourke left.”

“He had no choice.”

“He had a choice.”

“Don’t tell me. I was there.” Rob wipes the bar around our mugs with another napkin. “The reason Harrison took that job in East Hampton with those kids in the first place was Diane backed out.”

“Diane
who?”

“Diane who,” he repeats.

“I’m serious. I’ve never even heard of her.”

“Nobody over there ever mentioned Diane
Gelbart
? A Mr. and Mrs. Gelbart? Does Mark open your mail too? Take your calls?”

“Do you mean Mark’s old girlfriend?”

“Oh, so you
have
heard of her.”

“I guess I just forgot.”

“I’d like to forget her myself. All the bad luck started with her. Let’s just say she’s overaccustomed to getting what she wants. And what she wanted at the time was—well, you can imagine.”

He doesn’t have to say. I
can
imagine. She wanted Rourke.

Rob stares into his mug. “I’m surprised you two haven’t run into each other. She’s always flying back and forth from California—like a carrier
pigeon. Her parents are friendly with Mark’s parents. They have one of those places in Southampton. Between the ocean and the pond.”

“Gin Lane,” I say, sounding outside myself.

“Yeah, that’s it, Gin Lane. Very swank. She tried to persuade Harrison to live there that winter, but forget about it. He’d rather live in a cold-water shack and have his freedom, if you know what I mean.”

I shift on my chair, lifting my ribs roof-ward, breathing deep. I try to remember what I’ve heard about Diane, something about Rita Hayworth and nightclubs and never looking at stars. Surely she’s beautiful and glamorous. Probably she visited Rourke’s house in Montauk, telling him it was
quaint
. Maybe the plans he’d had that first New Year’s Eve were with her. And during the summer we spent together, Rourke probably went to Gin Lane when I was working at the Lobster Roll, going to play tennis or eat dinner by the pool house, and when he left that September, he probably—No, Rob is right. Unlike me, Rourke had integrity. He would rather live in a shack and have his freedom.
You know what I mean
, Rob said. Unfortunately, I know all too well.

Oh, I remember what Mark had said about Diane.
Everyone wanted her, but only I could get her
. I suddenly feel sick to my stomach. I rest my head in my hands.

Rob’s hand touches my shoulder. “You okay?”

“It’s—hot in here.”

“That’s because Pinky’s a cheap bastard. He hates to put the air on before, like, August. I keep telling him it’s gonna kill business, but he has the brilliant philosophy that heat makes people drink more. I go, ‘Yeah, Einstein, at the bar down the street.’” Rob whistles. “Hey, Pink! Spend a couple dimes and hit the AC! She faints easy!”

Without removing his chin from the saddle of his hand, Pinky breaks from the television to acknowledge Rob, then heads out from behind the bar to flip the toggle by the front door. The machine in the transom sputters to life and starts to spit through its grubby vents.

Rob makes a squeaking noise with the side of his mouth, and stares at the ceiling. He looks like Reverend Olcott the time we talked about God. Like he has a whole reserve of information but is afraid to release it too fast in case it overwhelms me. And yet, he knows I want the truth, and
he wants to be truthful. I see him take a walk through the conversation a couple of times, weighing the dangers of honesty against the opportunity for personal gain. He hates Mark. There may not be another chance like this one.

“Okay. So, Diane’s two years younger than the rest of us. When we graduate back in ’77, me and Harrison stick around L.A., doing our thing. He fights, I do grad school for accounting, Chris DeMarco comes back east to NYU Law, and Mark heads to Harvard, not breaking off with Diane. He doesn’t want to keep her, but he doesn’t want to lose her. He prefers to string her along. It’s one of those things assholes do. He met his match in her, though. There’s no bigger asshole than Diane. Right off she demands attention from a distance; she doesn’t waste a minute. She hooks up with a bad crowd—booze and coke mostly but, like, a lot of coke. Several grams per week is my gentlemanly estimate. UCLA puts her on probation, her parents threaten to cut off the cash and ship her off to some Minnesota rehab—but she just keeps going. Finally she ends up at some party in the Hills where her girlfriend drowns.
Very
big deal. Diane paid for the drugs. Mark is worthless, of course. He flies out with her folks for one day—
one day
—the day she makes the declaration to the cops. That’s it. Her parents offer to send them on a vacation. A couple weeks in Europe, the Caribbean. But Mark’s too busy with school, he claims, he can’t spare the time, et cetera, et cetera. Basically, she’s a total fucking liability, and he’s worried about his reputation. You know, he wants to run for office someday, have a seat on the Exchange, whatever—that’s why he hangs around with those addicts from Washington.”

“Because they have money?”

“Lots
of people have money. They have connections. Anyway, Mark backs out; Diane calls Harrison. She’s alone, she’s scared, but basically, she’s vindictive. Of course Harrison steps in—me, I wouldn’t have bothered—and one, two, three, she’s clean. Nobody knows what he did to get through, but he got through.”

Oh, but I know. Just his eyes alone, looking at you.

“Naturally her parents are grateful. They pull some strings to get him a big shot agent who right off the bat hits him with decent stuff. Bit parts, but decent—commercials, voice-overs, print, extra work in TV, in
a couple of movies—but it turns out to be a deal with the devil. Harrison is under obligation now to Diane
and
this agent—Eliot something, from William Morris. Of course, the agent wants him to quit fighting, and behind Harrison’s back goes head-to-head a couple times with the trainer out there, Charles Lopez, Chucho Lopez, who happens to be connected himself, and who’s counter-pressuring Harrison to get serious, get management, and start the climb for a title. He’d been fighting for years by then, and he’d established an unbelievable record. But it’s a tough climb; it takes focus. Maybe Harrison has it in him, maybe not. I don’t know if you realize the kind of money that’s at stake.”

I shake my head.

“Could be millions. Could be many millions. I’ve been to houses that would make that Gin Lane place look like a trailer. And the owner will be some twenty-five-year-old living with twelve friends, eight Mercedes, and a basketball court off the kitchen. Harrison is smart, mature, and—whatever.” Rob tosses up his hand like it’s a lost cause. “Anyway, that agent Eliot gets his tires slashed and other unsavory shit I don’t care to get into, and in the middle of it all, we can’t shake Diane. She’s showing up at the fights, hanging around the gym. Every day she’s at the fucking gym. Once she got her teeth in, she infected everything, like a rabid dog.”

“Were you guys planning to stay in L.A.?”

“We had no plan.”

“Did he want to turn professional?”

“Yes and no. Yes, because of money. No, because of interference. Let’s just say he’s got a problem with management. I could take on some small stuff, but as far as cutting title deals, I was twenty-four. Just one guy. Obviously I’ve got access to organizations through my uncle, and I could work for whoever. But signing on to anything separate from Harrison would’ve meant a break. I wasn’t interested in repping other fighters. On top of it, with the acting thing a distinct possibility, he’s suddenly not so keen on ruining his face. He’s been lucky so far. Luck like that doesn’t last.