How hard it is to sit still with a friend, a male friend, without a drink in hand, and talk. Best at a bar, standing up, with a lot of other people around.
“No thanks, Vic.”
“Red Label, eh?”
“Thanks, no.”
Vic looks through Oscar’s bottles, whistling thinly. Corky’s mouth is actually watering: he’s wondering if it isn’t just thirst, a strange kind of thirst, not alcohol deprivation that’s taken him over.
The document on Oscar’s desk, Corky sees it is the report on the Civilian Complaint Review Board. Must be coming up next Thursday, unavoidable. Corky’d been nominated for the committee but managed to get out of it, more shit he doesn’t need in his life, a no-win situation. The proposal, in the parlance of City Hall, is a class-A fucker. You push for the review board, you make enemies of the UCPD and their supporters; you vote it down, or stonewall it, you make enemies of the “ethnic minorities” and their supporters. The shrewdest strategy, which Corky guesses Oscar will work on behind the scenes, though Oscar hasn’t discussed it with Corky yet, is to dilute the proposal qualifying its actual legal power to challenge the UCPD Internal Affairs Division and get it passed before the Pickett trial. After that, depending on the verdict—God knows.
Corky thinks of bringing this subject up with Vic, finagling around to the subject of the UCPD, did Vic happen to see or to hear about Corky on TV the day before getting boxed into a corner by that cunt saying things he didn’t exactly mean to say at least in that context without controlling the situation Yes but in fact you meant it: don’t bullshit and is Oscar angry with him?—but why should Oscar be angry with him, the Mayor himself should be calling for a thorough police investigation.
God damn Marilee Plummer: killing yourself is revenge.
Corky lights up a fresh cigarette, why the hell not. Now Sandra’s out of the room, why the hell not.
One thing a man can’t stand, it’s a woman, any woman, your own or anybody else’s, trying to tell you what to do.
Whistling, seemingly in a good mood, Vic pours drinks for himself and Corky both, Corky sees to his dismay it is Red Label. In other circumstances he’d have to laugh, the coincidence of, twice within twelve hours, somebody close to him pressing upon him the identical brand of poison.
But Corky isn’t going to drink, and when Vic returns, handing him his glass, Corky sets it down on a table. “Thanks, Vic, but didn’t I tell you?—I’ve quit.”
“Yes,” says Vic, “—but you’re not serious.”
Corky laughs, his friend’s got his number. That’s how you know your friends: the guys who’ve got your number.
Vic raises his glass, murmurs, “Cheers!—thanks for coming, and for tonight,” and takes a small quick sip, then sets his glass down too. Eyeing Corky with a wan rueful smile, seeing Corky smoking but making no comment except, obliquely—“Sandra’s father died of lung cancer last year, maybe you remember? Poor man, it was a horrible death. She hasn’t gotten over it yet, entirely.”
Corky, intimate friend of the Slatterys, isn’t sure that he knew about this death. He exhales smoke through both nostrils, in grim acknowledgment.
Vic says, “I’m sorry Sandra came down quite so hard on you, Corky. She thinks, as I do, that so much of what happens to us we can’t control, what we can, we should.” He pauses. His breath is audible as if he’s been exercising. “At least, it’s an ideal principle.”
Corky nods. It’s a principle with him, too.
After an awkward pause, Vic asks after Corky’s family and Corky asks after Vic’s family as the men do whenever they meet, though it isn’t clear what either means by “family”—with the rapid passage of years, the original conceptions have changed many times. Vic’s questions about Corky’s ex-wife and estranged daughter are guarded, and Corky doesn’t press it about Oscar, accepting it that Oscar’s “well” and “busy as usual”—in any case, Corky knows that Vic Slattery isn’t privy to his father’s most intimate thoughts. The Mayor plays his cards close to his chest, and deadpan. If Corky’s on Oscar Slattery’s shit list for running his mouth in public, seeming to be critical of City Hall, Corky will find out soon enough on his own.
Another awkward pause, and Corky’s nerved up purposefully not looking at the glass of scotch so temptingly within reach, fuck it he isn’t going to take that first drink of the day no matter how thirsty he is and how his hands are trembling; or would be trembling, if he didn’t hold them firm. He gets the idea then to ask Vic about the energy bill, and Vic’s grateful, animated in replying, and at length, as if for an interview, speaking of the pressure he and other liberal Democrats were under for weeks to compromise on certain controversial issues—price increases for natural gas, offshore drilling restrictions. Corky’d forgotten there are forty-two members on the House Energy and Commerce Committee—forty-two!—a bipartisan group with a Democratic majority but working in uneasy anticipation of what Bush’s Energy Secretary Watkins will say, and what the Senate will do when it gets the bill; eventually, how the President will react—if negotiations fall through, if there’s some abrupt seismic swing in political consciousness, for instance more trouble from Iraq, with the Chief Executive taking charge again, and soaring in the polls, Bush could veto. Corky listens sympathetically as Vic speaks, how passionate his friend is, how genuine he is in caring, politics isn’t an abstract principle to him but an immediate reality, charged with emotion.
Vic’s voice trails off as if midsentence he’s forgotten what he’s talking about. Rubbing his eyes, and when he looks up at Corky his vision appears bruised. “It’s a peculiar life, isn’t it—needing to be liked for your livelihood. That’s what it reduces to, basically—in a democracy, a politician derives power from being liked.” For some reason this strikes Vic as funny: he laughs soundlessly, without mirth. His broad white smile is whiter than Corky remembers.
Corky mumbles, embarrassed, “Well—we all want to be liked, I guess. Even before we’re politicians. Maybe we think—” hesitating wanting to say then we’ll live forever, but saying instead, “—it will make a difference.”
But this isn’t what Corky wants to say, either.
Outside, Oscar and his companions have disappeared from view. The wind is louder, a high, hollow-sounding roar. Nothing to draw Corky’s and Vic’s attention except the grassy tip of the peninsula, the high fence with its military look, the choppy, agitated, slate-colored river. The gaudy striped American flag whipping in frantic gusts.
Then, this: Corky’s staring at his watch calculating how long it will take to get to Roosevelt Street, can’t let his uncle down another time. A drink? a drink, Jesus! his throat’s parched but he won’t, fuck it he will not. And out of his resolution a sudden question put to his friend pointblank, without warning, “Vic, look—I need to know: were you involved with Marilee Plummer?”
Vic lowers his glass of whiskey in silence. Afterward Corky will think Was he expecting this? Sure though at the time interpreting his friend’s reaction as surprise, hurt.
Vic says quietly, unhesitatingly, “In the way you mean, no I was not.”
“There’s just one way I mean,” Corky says, blundering, crude, “—were you fucking her?”
Again calmly Vic says, “No, Corky, I was not.”
Corky feels the blood rush into his face, knows he’s turning beet-red. And this sinking sensation in his bowels he’s really fucked up now, now you’ve done it asshole, you dumb shit killing the friendship that means the most to you in the world but Vic’s being a gentleman, hurt, maybe indignant but trying not to show it. Corky says, stammering, “I’m sorry as hell to be asking, Vic, but I—I’ve heard some things around town. And Thalia gave me this.” Corky’s taken out his wallet and carefully removes the snapshot taken at Rooney’s summer place of Vic, Marilee, Presson; Thalia and the unidentified man in the background. He hands it over to Vic who takes it wordlessly and stares at it without expression. A sleazebag lawyer’s trick, Vic will never forgive him. Corky says,
quickly, “—It’s just a party. Letting off steam. We go to parties all the time with and without our wives and what the hell, it doesn’t mean anything.” Continuing, in the face of Vic’s silence, “—Who’s that guy with Thalia in the background? She claimed not to remember.”
Vic, examining the snapshot, doesn’t seem to have heard. Like a man who’s taken a low blow but isn’t going to show it. How can Corky pull this shit on his friend? As evidence it is nothing. Vic hands it back and Corky sees he’s angry, and upset. His eyes suddenly bloodshot. “Whatever there was between Marilee and me is private,” he says carefully, “—but it was not sexual. She was my friend, and I like to think I was hers. During the campaign we saw each other almost every day but we were rarely alone together—quite possibly, never alone together. Then after the election she went to work for a PR firm, I think. Then for the historical museum.” He pauses, breathing quickly. “Sandra and I are devastated by what’s happened to her—it’s a terrible tragedy. But I can’t—”
Can’t get involved, sure. Corky understands.
In a democracy, a politician needs to be liked. Trusted. If not you don’t get the vote, if you don’t get the vote you don’t get in office. Your good intentions are worth shit.
Corky feels sorry for Vic, he’s sure it’s as Vic says—he could tell if Vic was lying. Doesn’t want to push it but has to ask, “What about after the Steadman business, then? After she went public, filed charges? Did you see Marilee then, were you in contact with her then?”
Vic says slowly, rubbing the bridge of his nose, “—I spoke with Marilee on the phone, but I don’t believe I saw her. We helped arrange for a lawyer for her—Steadman was threatening a suit for defamation of character, slander—she was under terrible pressure. I was in Washington most of the time, I wasn’t—here. And we’d about lost contact by then.” Vic begins to pace, his voice rising. “That bastard, Steadman!—that racist! He did it deliberately, I’m sure—raped Marilee, humiliated her—taunted her with being ‘white.’ If there’s any justice he should be charged for her murder, too.” Vic’s speaking so loudly Corky’s worried somebody will hear him outside the door. Those hundreds of guests milling around.
Corky remembers how after Vic was elected senior class president at St. Thomas he’d disappeared and they found him in the chapel praying—so grateful he’d won, tears on his cheeks. You had to love a guy like that, eighteen years old and still believing in God, Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary and St. Joseph—the whole campaign crew.
When Corky was elected treasurer of his class, the next year, he’d thanked the guys who’d helped him win; thanking too those he guessed hadn’t voted for him but in the aftermath of his victory would pretend they had. Everybody loves a winner, so you want to be a good winner. A good winner hides his grudges.
Corky would like to ask Vic pointblank were you screwing Kiki?—Thalia?—but he can’t. He’s through with his questions. Guessing that, if Vic was involved with Marilee Plummer in some ambiguous way, it wasn’t recently and it’s nobody’s business in fact, why tell Corky any of it. Lamely Corky says not meaning this as a joke but it comes out dumb-fuck funny, “—I tried to make her—Marilee—and her friend Kiki, too—I have to admit. But those girls hosed me out on my ass.”
Vic’s wiping his face with a handkerchief and glances over at Corky, not smiling, quizzical. Why tell me?
Vic takes up the glasses, goes to the bar to wash them, brisk and businesslike, wanting to hide the evidence of drinking from Sandra. Corky who’d been thinking of just maybe having a drink after all watches with dismay the premium whiskey meant for him alone poured down the sink with a blast of water behind it. God damn! Stone cold sober is a pitiless existence.
Corky says hesitantly, like a chagrined kid, “Vic, you’re pissed off at me, aren’t you?” and Vic shrugs, no, of course not, and Corky says, “I had to ask, that’s all,” and Vic says bemused, “Did you,” and Corky says, honestly, “I had to, yes,” and Vic says, turned away, wiping the glasses with a towel and setting them back on the shelf amid the gleaming bottles, “Corky, if people are saying things about me and Marilee Plummer, I’m grateful to know. But don’t tell me who they are. We can end it right here.”
So the men shake hands at the door. It’s 12:29 P.M. Memorial Day 1992. Vic Slattery says, amiably enough, “See you tonight, Corky,” and Corky grins back, “See you tonight, Vic!—terrific.” And only out in the crowded foyer dazed like a lightweight who’s managed to slip a heavyweight’s punches for several rounds but has exhausted himself in the effort thinking We can end it right here, what’s that mean? Feeling sick wondering if he’s lost his best friend and for what reason?—why?
Corky can’t remember.
4
Coldcocked
And then, on his way out of Stuyvesant House, three more things happen to Corky Corcoran.
The first, and quickest, is: he’s pushing through this crowd of men most of them older, potbellied, known to him but no friends of his, head lowered, preoccupied, not watching where he’s going when he feels a heavy hand descending on his left shoulder like a karate chop deflected just by inches from breaking his neck, and it’s of all people Oscar Slattery—“Corky Corcoran! How the hell are you?”—and a beaming-jovial smile, eyes boring into his, but before Corky can reply the Mayor’s barreled past, he’s in the company of that slick operator Father O’Brien and that new man in town the former Reagan Republican now a partner in Niagara Frontier Commodities Corp., and no time for Corky right now. So Corky, blinking, stunned as a dog who’s anticipated being kicked who’s been roughly fondled instead, can only call after, weakly, “Oscar! How the hell are you?”
So Corky’s not on Oscar Slattery’s shit list, after all! He’s been forgiven?
That’s it?
And then, before he can think this through, see how it might be fitted together with what Vic’s told him, there’s Sandra Slattery in her dazzling-daffodil suit, stepping forward unexpectedly too amid the crowd of departing guests, she lays a hand on Corky’s sleeve and says, reprovingly, “Corky!”—for of course Corky’s smoking, sucking at his cigarette like a baby sucking its mother’s teat, exhaling poisonous blue clouds of smoke; but then, in a softer tone, with a squeeze of his wrist that excites his prick, it feels so intimate, “Corky?—can I speak with you for a few minutes, in private?”
Corky thinks, feeling a chill: Bad news.
And in a rear corridor of the Mayor’s residence Corky learns just how bad, how bizarre and unexpected it is: according to Sandra Slattery, Thalia has been “harassing” Vic for months.
“She seems to have become fixated on him,” Sandra says, embarrassed, “—she calls him at home here, and at the office in Washington; she sends him, and sometimes me, clippings, and cryptic little cards; she’s shown up unannounced in Washington wanting to talk to Vic about legislation—animal rights, abortion rights—she’s been following the Energy and Commerce Committee closely. We didn’t want to worry you or Charlotte, we’re fond of Thalia and don’t want to humiliate her. You know what she’s like—passionate, and intelligent, and devoted to causes, only just not quite focused. Vic doesn’t know I’m telling you, he thinks Thalia will lose interest eventually. But this came about eight days ago, to our Chateauguay house, addressed to ‘Congressman V. Slattery and Ms. S. Slattery’—I didn’t show it to Vic.” Sandra takes out of her purse a small object wrapped in tissue paper, Corky can’t believe his eyes seeing it’s a turn-of-the-century porcelain doll he’d bought Thalia for her sixteenth birthday. About eight inches long, with waved brunette hair the color of Thalia’s, and a pretty-vacuous painted-on face, wide blue eyes and a rosebud mouth. The doll is wearing an aged yellowed lace nightgown and there’s a jagged crack in its forehead that wasn’t there the last time Corky saw it.
Corky whispers, “Jesus!” feeling for a scary moment he’s about to keel over.
Sandra says, “The note that accompanied it was ‘I perished—of Delight.’ I think it must be
Emily Dickinson, but I’m not sure. It sounds like Dickinson.”
Corky’s straining to make sense of this. “Dickinson—who?”
“Oh, never mind, Corky, a poet, a nineteenth-century woman poet, it isn’t important. What’s upsetting is getting it—trying to decode Thalia’s meaning.”
Corky has the doll in his fingers, turning it dumbly. How could Thalia give away his present to her?—she’d loved it so, or seemed to, when she was sixteen.
Sandra goes on to say that Thalia seems to assume there’s a special relationship between her and Vic, but Vic insists there isn’t, there never has been, it’s in Thalia’s imagination exclusively. Sandra says she believes Vic. Sandra says yes she knows that Vic was in a phase for a while in the 1970s, the early 1980s when he had affairs—fleeting affairs—with young women—women who threw themselves at him—but Vic no longer has these affairs, he’s sworn to her and Sandra believes him. So Corky mustn’t think what it’s probably in his head to think—because it isn’t so.
Corky hasn’t been following all this, exactly. He’s lost the thread. Turning the porcelain doll in his fingers, staring at it stunned. How the fuck do you decode such a thing? Corky’s in over his head.
Sandra takes pity on Corky, she’s pained at the sick sliding look on his face. Impulsively she hugs him, kisses him wetly on the side of his mouth. They stumble together like drunken dancers just as, as chance would have it, two uniformed black waiters pass by carrying something between them; if the waiters see they give no sign, nor do they murmur together, or laugh.
The worst of it is, dumping this news in Corky’s lap, handing him the cracked-head doll, Sandra Slattery now says she has to leave. She and Vic must get back to Chateauguay, there are a thousand last-minute things to be done between now and seven P.M. when the cocktail reception begins.
What I Lived For Page 62
