"Like you were his car, or a TV," Lang was saying, shaking his head. "He wanted me to promise to like respect his ownership of you, or some such."
His arm brought Lenore into his chest again. She felt something pressing against her stomach, and didn"t even think what it was until later.
"How does he think something like that"s going to make us feel?" Lang was saying into her hair. "Where"s what"s fair in that?"
"Just sorry, is all."
"If such is appropriate."
"Which I rather think it is."
"Ricky that"s silly, don"t be sorry. There"s no need to be sorry."
"The situation, the way it turns out we are, sorry doesn"t enter into it at all."
"As it were."
"What?"
"You"re probably just all tense and worried, Rick. Being tense and worried is world-famous for doing this."
"Look, even if I weren"t tense and worried, you wouldn"t have been able to tell. Is that not clear?"
"You"re probably just tense and worried about your fiancee being in the arms of my husband right now. G.o.d knows I"m not exactly thrilled myself."
"Not after tomorrow I"m not upset. Tomorrow is the end."
"End of what?"
"Tomorrow Lenore and I are going to melt into the blackness, united in discipline and negation."
"Discipline?"
"Negation?"
"All so to speak."
"You"re just going to go out and buy admission tickets to Andy"s desert and look for Lenore"s grandmother climbing some dune. I know all about what you"re supposed to do tomorrow."
"Why on earth does Lenore tell you things like this?"
"Lenore never tells me anything, really."
"Rick, I don"t know how long I"ll be around, I mean I"m pretty sure I"ll have to go to Atlanta at some point in time, if you know what I mean, but while I"m here I think you"ll find I can do all kinds of things she can"t. Or won"t."
"I think it is always can"t. It now occurs to me that there has probably never been a bona fide won"t."
"You know Andy"s had your ex-wife, too, don"t you? I"m almost positive. I"ve seen him coming out of your house."
"She is a good person, it occurs to me."
"Who?"
"Do you think of yourself as a good person, Mindy? When you think of yourself, do you think of yourself as good?"
"Well of course, silly. Where are you if you don"t think of yourself as good?"
"Then you can"t even like yourself, and then where are you?" "...."
"This is the Christian Broadcasting Network. Stay tuned for the Reverend Hart Lee Sykes, please."
"What about my son?"
"What?"
"Vance, my son."
"I think Andy"s pretty much left Vance alone. I don"t think you have to worry about Vance."
"I mean have you seen him. Does he come home, ever. Do you see him around the neighborhood."
"Remember when Vance would be out kicking footb.a.l.l.s all day long? Honestly, I never could see how anybody could just kick a ball for hours and hours, over and over. And remember Daddy would spend the whole time looking out the window, making sure the ball never hit our lawn, and if it did he"d run out with a screwdriver and let all the air out of the ball?"
"I haven"t seen Vance for years, Rick. I don"t think I"ve seen Vance since I got out of school. Where is he now?"
"He"s in the city. He"s at Fordham. At least I certainly pay tuition to Fordham. "
"I haven"t seen him."
"Nor have I."
"I"m sorry."
"Certainly not your fault."
"Look, you can take it off, you know."
"Excuse me?"
"Your beret. You can take it off, you know. I like a spot. Daddy has a simply humongous spot, now."
"Great."
"Anyway, don"t be sorry, is what I want to say."
"Thank you, Mindy."
"But roll over."
"What?"
"You heard me. I think I can help you out if you"ll roll over."
"What?"
"Trust me."
"What are you doing?"
"This is ... going to hurt me more than it hurts you. Is that what I should say, Rick?"
"Good Lord. What on earth have you been told?"
"Daddy used to say I knew ... everything from the ... beginning ... of time. A ... witch in a tartan skirt, is ... what he said."
"Jesus."
"Now this is definitely cuddling," Lenore said. "Am I right? I think I know cuddling when I see it, and this is it."
Lang laughed.
Lenore and w.a.n.g-Dang Lang were on Lang"s bed, on their sides, facing each other, amid shirts and socks in their plastic wrappers. Lenore had on her bra and panties and socks; Lang had on just his chinos and belt. Lenore"s legs were together, and Lang had one of his legs thrown over her hip. Lang was looking at Lenore"s b.r.e.a.s.t.s, in her bra. Being on her side was pressing them together, and they were pushing partway over the bra, which Lang obviously liked. He looked at Lenore, and touched her. He rubbed the back of her neck for her. And from time to time he would trace lines on her body with his finger. He would trace a line down the center of her lips, her chin, her throat, and down the line where her b.r.e.a.s.t.s pressed together, and over the bottom of the bra, and onto her stomach, where his hand would spread out and cover her, making Lenore need to blink, every time. He would also shift a bit and trace the line where her legs pressed together, from the bottom of her panties to the tops of her knees. He would press his finger deep into the line between her legs, and Lenore knew her legs felt soft and hot to him, from being pressed together. Lang had an erection in his slacks, Lenore could tell.
As for doing anything much more than they were doing, though, Lenore had said she needed time to think it over carefully, and to think about absolutely everything having to do with Rick, before anything like that could even be possible.
"I couldn"t have intercourse with you without coming to an understanding with Rick first," she"d said. "Not the way things are now. I have to talk with him. That"s just the way I feel."
Lang had traced a line. "I don"t think I agree that we owe R.V. anything, but I"ll respect your decision for now."
"Thank you."
Lang laughed. "You"re welcome." He was very smooth: Lenore ran her hand over his arm and part of his back. It was really smooth. His chest had a fine covering of yellow hairs that were hard to see in the bright line of the overhead fixture. There was more hair on his stomach, in a line.
"And you shouldn"t say "intercourse." You should say something else. "Intercourse" sounds like you saw it in a manual."
"I"m sorry."
"Well don"t be sorry," Lang laughed, touching Lenore"s lip with his lip. "I was just making a point is all. Intercourse is what people have when they"re married, and about maybe sixty, and they"ve been married for years, and have kids and all."
"What would we be having, then, do you think?"
"Something very much else, believe you me. You just trust me and you"ll see."
Lenore had been tracing a line of her own, from the point on Lang"s forehead where his eyebrows almost met, down his nose and into the furrow of his upper lip. When she got to his lip she stopped and looked at him and took her hand away.
"Hey," she said. "What happened to the way you talk all of a sudden? Why aren"t you talking the way you usually do? Why aren"t you saying stuff like, "Well strap me to the hind end of a sow and sell me to Oscar Mayer"?"
Lang laughed at Lenore"s imitation of his voice. He ran his hand over the flank of her hip and smiled. "I guess I don"t know," he said softly. "I guess I just don"t feel like it about now. I guess maybe we all talk differently with different people. The good old boy stuff is what I grew up on, and then at school I was from Texas and so everybody expected this sort of talking, and so it kind of became my thing, at school. At school you more or less got to have a thing."
"So I hear."
"Without a thing there, believe me, you"re nothing," Lang said. His finger was in the hot part of her legs again.
"What about Biff Diggerence?" Lenore said. "What was his thing? No, let me guess: I"ll bet his thing was burping." She made a face.
Lang took his hand out of her legs to scratch along his jaw. "That"s kind of a tender subject, Lenore," he said. "Old Biff got screwed up at school. School messed him up. He got weird."
"What"s he doing now?"
"I do not know. I think he"s back in Pennsylvania or wherever. He got real screwed up, at school."
"Screwed up how? Did he maybe get teta.n.u.s from making people sign his bottom, or what?"
"Now that"s not very kind, Lenore," Lang said. He sat up and bent to get his gla.s.s of warm wine by the bed. Lenore looked at his back while he drank. "He just got real screwed up," he said. "Basically he just started stayin" in his room all the time. And I mean all the time. Never seein" anybody, never talkin" to anybody. Just locked up in his room, with the door locked."
"Well that doesn"t sound all that awful," Lenore said. "Lots of people keep to themselves. Lots of people stay in their rooms a lot. I stayed in my room a lot at school."
Lang turned around to her and shook his head. "Yeah," he said. "But when it gets to the point where you"re like p.i.s.sin" in empty beer cans so you don"t have to go out of your room to the bathroom just down the d.a.m.n hall, then that"s gettin" to be bad news, in my opinion."
"No argument on this end."
"He got creepy. He got weird."
"Maybe he pounded too many walls with his head."