The Last Picture Show

by Larry McMurtry

  The rest of the way home she sat quietly, but it wasn’t really that she was just sitting, either. It seemed to Sonny that in some way she was pulling at him, trying to get him to say something to her. He would have been glad to say something to her, only he had no idea what to say. Even algebra class would have been better than what she was doing: nobody had ever pulled at him in such a strange way. It made him so nervous that he grew careless and let the car edge off the shoulder of the road. After that he concentrated very hard on his driving.

  When they got to her house Sonny drove the car on into the garage. He got out, relieved that it was over, but Mrs. Potter kept sitting in the front seat as if she didn’t know she was home or in her garage or anywhere. She wasn’t crying, just sitting there. After a minute Sonny went around and opened the door for her.

  “Oh,” she said. “Thank you.”

  “Here’s the car keys,” Sonny said. “I guess I better go back to school.”

  “No, not yet,” Ruth said. “If you can stand me for a few more minutes I’d like you to come in and have cookies and a Coke.” She looked at him apologetically, but she didn’t take the car keys.

  Sonny knew he couldn’t get out of going in. Somehow or other Mrs. Popper had got in control and he didn’t know anything to do about it. Reluctantly he followed her through the back door and into the kitchen. The yellow kitchen linoleum was old and worn out.

  “Just sit at the table,” Mrs. Popper said. There was something wild in her face that made Sonny think of his father—when she smiled at him there was a pressure behind the smile, as if something inside her were trying to break through her skin.

  “Would you like milk or a Coke?” she asked. “I’m really sorry I made you come in—you can go right now if you like. For a minute I was just scared to be alone.”

  Sonny said he would take a Coke. She got one, and set a plate of thin Nabisco cookies on the table with it. For a minute of two, watching him eat, she seemed to be getting all right, and then to his amazement and disgust she burst out crying again, loudly. She put her head in her arms and sobbed, her body shaking as if she had the heaves. Sonny was sure she must be crazy and he wanted to be away from her. He didn’t even want to swallow the bite he had in his mouth. Mrs. Popper seemed to know what he was thinking; she looked up at him and tried to quit crying.

  “You’ll never forgive me, I know,” she said. “You think I’m pitiable, you’re disgusted. Go on away if you want to, you don’t have to stay any longer.”

  “Thank you for the Coke,” Sonny said hastily, taking her at her word. “Maybe you’ll get to feeling better after your operation.”

  “Oh no, it’s not the operation,” she said, wiping her face with a yellow table napkin. “It’s not the operation at all. The tumor probably won’t be dangerous. It’s just that thinking about it makes me so lonely I can’t stand it.”

  “Well, I guess you’ll be glad when basketball season is over,” Sonny said, feeling a little more kindly toward her. “Coach probably doesn’t get to stay home much during football and basketball season.”

  Mrs. Popper laid down her napkin and looked at Sonny as if she were seeing him for the first time. She quit crying and became completely calm. “My God,” she said. “You don’t know a thing about it, do you?”

  Then she did a thing which he would never forget: she got up, came around the table, put out her hand, and traced her fingers down his jaw almost to his mouth. Her fingers were cool. She put her hand on his head for a minute, felt his hair against her palm and between her fingers, and then quickly reached down for one of his hands and pressed it against her cheek and throat. She held his hand there for a moment and then laid it back on the table as carefully as if it were a piece of china.

  “I know I mustn’t be that way,” she said, and again it looked as if something were pushing at the inside of her skin. Sonny felt very confused, but no longer particularly scared or particularly anxious to get away. From the way she touched him and looked at him he knew she had thought about kissing him when she put her hand on his face. He didn’t know what would have happened, because he had no idea how it would feel to kiss someone older than himself, someone who was married. But when he looked at Mrs. Popper’s mouth he wished that she had gone ahead, or that he had done something. He was sure it would have been nice to kiss her, much nicer than it had been to kiss Charlene.

  But Mrs. Popper went back to her own chair and looked at the splotch on the tablecloth her tears had made.

  “Here I am wanting to tell you I’m sorry again,” she said, smiling a little. “I know I’ve given you a bad afternoon. For ten seconds there I was ready to try and seduce you, if you know what that means. To tell you the honest truth, I don’t know what it means myself. I’ve never seduced anyone and I’ve never been seduced, but I’ve always liked the word. I thought if I was ever going to find out what it meant it had better be now.”

  She sighed. “I don’t guess you can imagine being seduced by the wife of your coach. I’m not so terribly pretty and I don’t think you even like me. It probably wouldn’t be best for you to be seduced by a forty-year-old woman you don’t even like. Do you have a girl friend?”

  “I did have,” Sonny said. “We broke up last Saturday night.”

  “Why did you break up?” she asked. “Do you mind talking? I wish I wasn’t so avid. You don’t really have to answer my questions if you don’t want to.”

  “I was going with Charlene Duggs,” Sonny said. Something had changed; he felt more comfortable with Mrs. Popper than he had all afternoon. “Charlene thought I got fresh with her, but I never did, really. I guess the reason we broke up was because we didn’t like one another much to begin with.”

  “I shouldn’t be sad about it, if I were you,” Ruth said. “I know Charlene and I don’t think she’s nearly nice enough for you. Even I would be better for you than she would.”

  She put her fingers to her temples and smoothed back her hair. “Besides, she must be a dumb creature, not to appreciate you. I can’t even imagine how it would be to be young and have someone like you get fresh with me.”

  Sonny decided she really was a little crazy, but he liked her anyway. He even wanted to compliment her in some way, say something that would make her feel nice.

  “I already like you better than I ever liked her,” he said, wondering if it was a wrong thing to say.

  Mrs. Popper’s face lightened—she looked glad that he had said it. They were silent for a moment and Sonny finished his cookies and Coke. There was no longer a reason for him to stay, but he kept sitting, hoping that Mrs. Popper might want to come around the table again.

  She knew that was why he was staying, too, and she did stand up, but not to come to him. She went to the sink and looked out the back window a moment before she spoke. She was not crying, but her face was sad. “Maybe you better go on to basketball practice,” she said. He stood up and she walked with him to the front door.

  “I see you feel you’ve missed a chance,” Ruth said, when they were at the door. She looked at him frankly. “You see, I’m very confused, even if I look like I’m not. That’s why you must go. I’ve got on a great many brakes right now—what I was thinking about a while ago is nothing I’ve ever done except with Herman, and for a long time I haven’t even believed a man could want me that way. I don’t know if I believe it now, even though I see you do. But then I think it isn’t really me you want, it’s only that … sex. Not that there’s anything wrong with you wanting that, it’s perfectly natural….” She was talking faster and faster, but suddenly she stopped.

  “You must really think I’m crazy,” she said. “I am crazy I guess.”

  “Why’s that?” Sonny asked.

  “What?” Ruth said, caught by surprise.

  “I mean why do you feel crazy? I guess I shouldn’t be askin’.”

  “Of course you should,” she said. “I was just surprised you had the nerve. The reason I’m so crazy is because nobody cares anyth
ing about me. I don’t guess there’s anybody I care much about, either. It’s my own fault, though—I haven’t had the guts to try and do anything about it. It took more guts for me to put my hand on your face than I ever thought I had, and even then I didn’t have enough to go on.”

  She shut the screen door and they stood for a moment looking through the screen at one another. Sonny hated to leave; in some funny way he had come to like Mrs. Popper and he knew that the minute he left she would go in the house and cry again.

  “Maybe I never will know what seduce means,” she said quietly. “Thank you for putting up with me. You don’t need to tell Herman about the operation. I’ll tell him when he gets home.”

  Sonny was trying to think of something appropriate to say that would let her know that he really liked her, but he couldn’t think of anything that didn’t sound corny. Ruth noticed, and to spare him further embarrassment she shut the living-room door. When she heard his footsteps on the sidewalk she began to cry.

  Basketball practice was so far along that Sonny didn’t bother to suit out, but he did check in with the coach. Joe Bob and one of the freshmen had done something wrong and the coach was sitting on his bridge chair watching them run punishment laps.

  “Come on, run ’em,” the coach yelled. “Be men. I don’t want no sissies on this team. Quit flapping your hands, Joe Bob, you look like a goddamn goose.”

  Sonny slipped his shoes off and took some free-throw practice with the rest of the team. He expected the coach to ask about Mrs. Popper, but he just sat on the bridge chair, chewing tobacco and occasionally scratching his balls. When he did ask, after practice, it was not exactly about Mrs. Popper—he wanted to know if the doctor had given her any prescription.

  “I don’t think so,” Sonny said. “We didn’t get any filled.”

  “Good,” the coach said. “Damn doctors. Every time she goes over there they prescribe her ten dollars’ worth of pills and they don’t do a fuckin’ bit of good. I tell her to take aspirin, that’s all I ever take. If she’s got a sore place she can rub a little analgesic balm on it—that’s the best thing for soreness there is.”

  He didn’t say so, but analgesic was also free. The school bought it by the case and the coach took what he needed.

  “She wasn’t feeling too good when I left her,” Sonny said, thinking the coach might be worried enough to hurry on home. Instead, the news seemed merely to disgust him.

  “Hell, women like to be sick,” he said. He was on his way to the showers, but he stopped long enough to grab a cake of soap from a passing freshman. “Ruth had rather be sick than do anything. I could have bought a new deer rifle with what she’s spent on pills just this last year, and I wish I had, by God. A good gun beats a woman any day.”

  CHAPTER VII

  “I GUESS SHE JUST couldn’t get out of it,” Sonny said, chalking his cue. It was Saturday night and Duane had just found out that Jacy wasn’t going to be at the picture show that evening: she was going to a country club dance with Lester Marlow.

  “She wasn’t sheddin’ no tears over the telephone,” Duane said bitterly. “She may be getting to like country club dances, that’s what worries me.”

  He was in such a terrible mood that the pool game wasn’t much fun. Jerry Framingham, a friend of theirs who drove a cattle truck, was shooting with them; he had to truck a load of yearlings to Fort Worth that night and asked them to ride along with him, since neither of them had dates.

  “We might as well,” Duane said. “Be better than loafin’ around here.”

  Sonny was agreeable. While Jerry went out in the country to pick up his load he and Duane walked over to the café to have supper. Sam the Lion was there, waiting for old Marston to bring out his nightly steak. Penny was still at work and Marston was hopping to get the orders out. Penny had taken to wearing orange lipstick.

  The boys sat down with Sam the Lion and ordered chickenfried steaks. “Sam, how’s the best way to get rich?” Duane asked.

  “To be born rich,” Sam said. “That’s much the best way. Why?”

  “I want to get that way. I want to get at least as rich as Lester Marlow.”

  “Well, of course,” Sam said, buttering a cracker. “You’re really too young to know what’s good for you, though. Once you got rich you’d have to spend all your time staying rich, and that’s hard thankless work. I tried it a while and quit, myself. If I can keep ten dollars ahead of the bills I’ll be doin’ all right.”

  “How much do you think Gene Farrow’s worth?” Duane asked. “How rich would I have to get to be richer than him?”

  “How much cash you got?” Sam asked.

  “Fifty-two dollars right now. Fifty-one after we eat.”

  “Then cashwise I imagine you’re as rich as Gene,” Sam said, looking suspiciously at his salad. Marston was always sneaking cucumbers into his salads, against strict orders. Sam the Lion regarded cucumbers as a species of gourd and would not eat them.

  “I doubt if Gene could lay his hands on fifty dollars tonight,” he added.

  Both boys were stunned. Everyone thought Gene Farrow was the richest man in town.

  “Why Sam, he’s bound to have lots of money,” Duane said. “Mrs. Farrow’s fur coat is supposed to be worth five thousand dollars.”

  “Probably is,” Sam said. “That’s five thousand he don’t have in cash, though. He’s got lots of trucks and equipment and oil leases, too, but it ain’t cash and there’s no way of tellin’ how much of it’s his and how much is the bank’s.”

  He broke a biscuit in two and wiped his gravy bowl clean. “There ain’t no sure-nuff rich people in this town now,” he said. “I doubt there’ll ever be any more. The oil fields are about to dry up and the cattle business looks like it’s going to peter out. If I had to make a guess at who was the richest man in town I’d say Abilene. He may not own nothing but his car and his clothes, but I’ve never seen the day when he couldn’t pull a thousand dollars out of his billfold. A man with a thousand dollars in his pocket is rich, for Thalia.”

  Duane cheered up suddenly and began to go after his steak with good appetite. “Well that’s all good news,” he said. “Maybe if the Farrows go broke they won’t mind my marrying Jacy.”

  Sam grunted his disagreement. “Penny, bring me a dish of that cobbler,” he said. “Apricot. Nope, Duane, you’re wrong. I don’t know about Lois, but if Gene was to even think he was going broke he wouldn’t want you to get within a mile of that girl. There ain’t nobody snootier than an oilman who’s had to sell one of his Cadillacs.”

  “Aw, Sam, it’s not him,” Duane argued. “I get along with him all right. It’s Mrs. Farrow who don’t like me. I bet it’s her fault Jacy’s off with Lester tonight.”

  “Well, Lois has got a lot of judgment, maybe she’s doin’ you a favor,” Sam said. “That little girl is goin’ to be a hard one to please.”

  Talk like that made Duane huffy. “I please her well enough,” he said. Sonny wished the meal were over. It was getting so Duane wanted to talk about Jacy half the time, and for some reason the conversations always left Sonny depressed.

  Outside, after they had all finished, Sam the Lion slapped them on the shoulder. “Well, have fun in Cowtown,” he said. “If I didn’t have all these businesses to run I’d ride along with you. Ain’t been to Fort Worth in fifteen years.” The night was cold and sleety and he hobbled on back to the poolhall on his sore feet.

  The boys walked over to the courthouse where they could wait out of the wind. While they were waiting they saw Lester and Jacy drive by in Lester’s Oldsmobile. Jacy wasn’t sitting very close to him but as they passed under the street light the boys could see that she was laughing at something. Her hair was rolled up on her head in a fancy way.

  “You don’t need to look so blue about it,” Sonny said. “This time next year you’ll probably be married to her. Look at me, I ain’t got no date either.”

  “Yeah, but you ain’t in love,” Duane said.

 
Finally Jerry’s cattle truck screeched up to the stoplight, jam-packed with Hereford yearlings. When it stopped they all began to bawl and shove around and shit through the sideboards. The boys ran over and climbed up in the high cab—Jerry whanged the truck in gear and they were off.

  “Break out the beer,” Jerry said. “There’s two sixpacks there on the floor somewhere.”

  Sonny found an opener in the glove compartment. When he popped into a can the cold beer spewed all over him, its smell filling the cab. “The coach would have a shit fit if he knew we were breakin’ trainin’,” he said happily. For a moment Mrs. Popper crossed his mind—what would she be doing on a Saturday night?—but it was so much fun to be going down the road in a high, bouncy cattle truck that he soon forgot her. All he and Duane had to do was drink beer and watch the fence posts and the culverts whiz by; before the first six-pack was finished their troubles were forgotten and they were happily reminiscing about old times in Thalia High School, reliving all the ball games they had played and the fights and adventures they had had. Jerry Framingham enjoyed the conversation: most of the kids he had graduated with were in the army and he seldom had any company at all on his cattle hauls.

  Sonny and Duane found that they were a little out of shape for beer drinking. By the time they reached Fort Worth they were both fairly drunk, and the anecdotes they were telling seemed so funny to them that it would sometimes take them three or four miles to quit laughing. One classic story simply broke them up: it was about the time they had persuaded Billy to come out for football, although he wasn’t even enrolled in school. Billy knew nothing about football and hadn’t thought it at all strange when they put his shoulder pads on backward, daubed foot toughener in his ears, and made him wear a jockey strap for a noseguard. When he trotted out on the field with his jockey strap on his nose the whole team had hysterics and Coach Popper laughed so hard he almost ruptured himself.

  Jerry Framingham was not drunk and thus did not become uncontrollably amused when he heard such stories retold—in fact the boys’ laughter seemed to irritate him a little. “You drunk bastards can’t do anything but laugh,” he said.