"Black power?" she said, and he nodded. "Who will be playing tomorrow?"
He laughed. "Mostly guys who were good high school players a few years back, but not good enough to get college scholarships— or a few got them and flunked out. Some are unemployed, they just hang out, so the Saturday morning games are a big thing for them. You might even see a little action on the side . . . some of the local bookies turn out."
"Are you the only white?"
"Afraid so. Eli is the big star. They tolerate me because of him."
"That doesn't sound like much fun, for you I mean."
"It's okay," he said, and because she didn't know what he meant she asked if it would be better if she didn't show up.
"No," he said slowly, "it's okay to come. But it's up to you, if you don't feel easy . . ."
"I feel easy," she answered.
He pulled into the drive behind the Winged Victory. "Sam's here," she offered, "would you like to come in?"
"Big game tomorrow," he told her, "coach says I have to turn in early."
She got out, then leaned down to speak through the window: "You've got all sorts of excuses for being home before midnight. First the Dobermans, now your basketball curfew . . . I'm beginning to wonder if you turn into a werewolf or something at midnight."
"Some one of these nights you'll have to find out," he told her in a Dracula voice.
It had rained during the night, but when May got up the next morning the sun was shining, and the air seemed almost iridescent. She pulled on jeans and a loose Italian knit sweater, then she asked herself why she had taken Eli's dare. (By then she was certain it had been that: a dare, not so much testing her as teasing Hayes.)
She was ready to leave and Karin was still in bed so she left her a note: "Borrowed your car. Keys to Jaguar on my dresser."
On the way out she ran into Sam.
"Where you heading?" he asked.
"To the lab," she lied.
He watched as she climbed into the Volkswagen. "What's wrong with the Jag?" he asked.
"I'm leaving it for K," she answered evasively, irritated that she did not want to explain where she was going or why she didn't want to drive the Jaguar.
When she pulled up at the playground a few minutes after eleven, a small crowd was gathered—a cluster of boys and middleaged men. A knot of girls, about high school age, May guessed, were noisily calling out to the players.
Eli saw her and waved as he called out to Hayes, who turned to wave as he loped down the court.
"He you boyfriend?" one of the girls asked.
Before May could answer another chortled, "Who you think? He the only white man here."
"Maybe she come to see Eli," the other snapped back.
"I've come to watch both of them play," May answered.
"Eli, he play basketball," the first girl offered, "the rest, they just flop around the court, chasing after him." The other girl said in agreement, "No shit."
Hayes, May could see, was better than he made out to be, was probably as good, she thought, as most of the men on the court. What was obvious was that none of them could hold a candle to Eli. While the others pounded down the court, breathing hard, Eli seemed to dance with the ball, dribbling and smiling, moving with a grace that suggested he was making no effort at all.
"Hayes—here!" Eli called from the free throw line. Hayes fed him the ball and watched as Eli turned, executed a perfect four-step which delivered him under the basket where he jumped, pirouetted in the air, and dropped the ball perfectly through the basket.
"The Skywalker," somebody shouted in awe. They crowded around Eli then, jostling him and joking, patting and touching, so you knew they were grateful to him for being there, for reminding them of their own glory days, too short and too long ago.
Hayes grabbed a towel, mopped his face and joined her. "The last female who came out to watch me play on a cold Saturday morning was in high school. Her name was Bunny Felderman, but that was before she had her nose fixed."
"Minor confession time?" May said, lowering her voice. "The ladies here," she said, nodding at the high school girls, "say you play okay for a white boy, but they also say that Eli's the whole show. I have to admit," she added, "I think I've never seen anyone move so . . . elegantly."
Hayes looked at her for a long moment. "You're right," he finally said. Then: "I need a shower. If you'll give me a lift back to my place, I'll let Eli take my car to drop some guys off. He'll meet us there."
Hayes lived in a duplex on Benvenue on the south side of campus, a wide street with old trees and lawns and shingled houses built fifty or more years before, except for an occasional newer building made to blend in with the old. His was one of these, brown-shingled with its own deck and set back in the privacy of sycamore trees.
While Hayes showered, May studied the living room. It was furnished in what Karin would call "student semi-classic"— bookshelves put together by stacking cement blocks and two-by-fours, a desk fashioned of a door balanced on two-drawer filing cabinets, several canvas chairs, a sofa that was vaguely Danish, and a wicker chest that doubled as a coffee table. A calendar hung on the wall over the desk; it was, May noticed, filled with notations.
The room itself was neat enough; his desk, which on first glance had appeared to be cluttered, was actually organized. May stood back, trying to decide why the room seemed so impersonal. Finally she knew: there were no pictures on the wall, no mementoes, little that was private.
She heard the short, shuddering noise of the water being turned off. She glanced at the books in his shelf. Most were law books, but one corner had a small cache of volumes: Pride and Prejudice, Huckleberry Finn, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, and Tristram Shandy. She opened this last; on the frontispiece was written: To Hayes from Mother, Christmas 1952. Quickly, so he wouldn't find her looking at it, she put the book back. In her haste, she almost toppled a coffee mug. It was of plain white glass, the cheap kind you can buy at the dime store, and on it—printed in ragged letters in red fingernail polish was: For Hayes. Selma, 1965. Love, Doolie.
"Who is Doolie?" she asked, without turning around.
"The most beautiful female in Alabama," he answered, coming into the room in a wash of warm, moist air from the shower.
"How old?" she asked.
"Ten then, fourteen now."
His hair was damp, his shirt, fresh from the laundry, was sharply creased and, she noticed as he moved to stand behind her, he smelled of soap.
"Sounds like love," May offered lightly.
He was, for once, serious: "She was the sweetest child you can imagine. Her hair braided and tied with pink ribbons. White patent leather shoes and pink socks to match the ribbons."
She turned to face him. He put his hands over hers on the cup; at his touch, May felt her breath catch.
"You must be hungry," he said quietly.
"Not very," she answered.
The words did not matter, she was not listening to the words but to the warm throbbing of her body, the rush of heat that began between her legs and moved, shimmering, into her stomach. Their faces were close, their voices hushed.
"What did you think of my form this morning?" he asked.
"I liked your form," she told him.
She ran her fingers over the tips of his starched collar; he pulled her to him, his hands moved up her back while he whispered into her ear, "Do you know anything at all about basketball?"
"Nothing," she confessed in the moment before his lips pressed on hers, lightly at first, then hard; before she felt the heat race through her body. They held together, swayed. His hands caressed her back, moved up her sides to her breasts.
She pulled him to her. His mouth was on her neck; she put her head back and opened her eyes and saw the white cup with the bright red printing and tears stung her eyes. She reached for his mouth again, breathless.
The doorbell rang, sharp and shrill.
He held her close for an instant, then with his hands strong under he
r arms held her away to look at her. She wanted to cry but she tried to smile, and he bent to kiss her forehead.
"One second, Eli," he called out, and lowering his voice said, "I'm sorry."
May shook her head in protest and wrapped her arms hard around his neck. "Don't be sorry," she whispered. "I don't want you to be sorry."
EIGHT
THE NOISE SCRATCHED at the corners of her sleep; May heard it, tried to ignore it, could not. She lifted her head enough to see from the glowing hands of her bedside clock that it was not yet six. The noise billowed, low and humming and then swelling. It was a daytime sound but it was not yet day, not yet light. She rolled out of bed and stumbled to the door, shivering in T-shirt and underpants. As she moved down the hall, her bare feet guided by the carpet, she could see a light in the living room. The sound grew louder, reached a crescendo.
"Sam," she shouted over the din, "turn that damned thing off." When he did not hear, she grabbed the cord to the vacuum cleaner and yanked, pulling the plug.
"What is this all about?" she managed to ask, dangling the end of the cord in the air like a dead snake.
"I'm cleaning house," he said.
"I can see that," she snapped, "but why now? Why at this ungodly hour on Sunday morning when people are trying to sleep?" She slumped against the door frame, too tired, almost, to be angry.
When he said nothing, she went on: "Let me see if I can make you understand. I was up until three working on a paper. That's right, Saturday night and you were out carousing or doing God only knows what, and I was working on a paper. I had planned to sleep until nine a.m. Six hours of sleep, then up again to finish my paper. It seemed a reasonable plan, at least until you decided to sabotage it." She tried to stifle a yawn and couldn't.
"You're cold," he said, "better put on a robe."
"I don't want to put on a robe," she answered, "I want to go back to bed."
"Put on a robe. I've already made the coffee."
She groaned. "I don't want coffee, Sam. I want to sleep."
"I need to talk to you," he persisted.
She held the cup to her lips and let the steam rise to fog her vision. He sat across from her at the table, and watched as she took a first, tentative sip.
"What's this about you and Hayes Diehl?"
"Is that why you got me up? To ask about Hayes?" She glared at him for a long moment. "If that's it, I can set your mind at ease real fast. We went to a basketball game once, to lunch once, and to see a Woody Allen movie once. That was three weeks ago, and I have not heard from him since. Now that I've made my full report, may I please have permission to go back to bed?"
He grabbed her hand. "Hold on, hold on," he said, "I didn't mean to set you off, and I didn't mean to make you mad. I was the one who introduced you to Hayes, remember? I have some problems with his family—his mother drinks like a fish, and his old man is dour as hell. They're quite a pair. And Andy is a hell raiser like you've never seen. Hayes is the only normal one in that family."
"Then why the cross-examination?" she demanded.
"What cross-examination? I only asked what was going on between you, that's all."
May ran her hands through her hair. "To answer your question then, nothing is going on between us."
"Okay," Sam said, as if to accept an apology. "What I need to talk about is my schedule. I'm having problems—classes require a certain minimum, and I'm cutting that very close. My work hours at the chem lab are set, and I can't get around them. The thing is, I can't garden after dark so that means the housework has to be done at night or very early in the morning, and that is messing up my shooting schedule."
"What shooting schedule?"
"My own," he answered. "If I'm going to make it as a photographer, I need to shoot as much as possible. That means using the early morning light, and it also means being free to photograph whenever the occasion arises—the demonstrations for instance, and all the things that are going on in San Francisco now in the Haight, the hippie kids."
"Make it?" she repeated.
"Become a professional photographer, make a living at it."
"That's what you want? You're sure?"
"I've been at it for six months. I'm good, I know that. But to answer your question: Yes, I'm as sure as I've ever been of anything."
The dense gray of the dawn had become a soft pewter, and it caught the determination in his face. May reached across the table to touch his hand.
"So what can I do . . . short of getting up at five in the morning?"
"I don't know," he answered, "help me figure out how to juggle everything. And I have to get my own photo equipment, cameras and lenses. I can't keep using Faith's, and besides, hers is out of date. I can't drop out of school, and I can't get another job because I don't have time to do the ones I've got."
"Maybe if we get someone else to do the house and garden?"
"Then how do I pay for the cottage?"
She hesitated. "You don't, Sam. Listen, we've all lived here together for more than a year now, and you've done twice as much work as you needed to, you really have. As far as I'm concerned— and I know Karin agrees with this—you've got a nice fat credit built up, and I think you should cash it in now. The cottage is yours. Maybe you could find someone to garden for us, and we'll hire someone to clean the house."
"I don't know."
"Why not?" she asked. "When you start making big bucks as a photographer, you can pay rent."
He hesitated. "Are you sure?"
"Yes I'm sure, especially if it means you don't get me up at the crack of dawn again."
He managed to combine a groan with a grin, and they sat in silence for a time, the coffee aggravating the dull ache of sleeplessness May felt in her stomach.
Sam broke the silence. "Now all I have to do is figure out how to get my equipment."
She looked out of the window; it was light, soon the sun would flood in, the kitchen would be bright and full of air. Now it seemed marble cold.
"I could make you a loan," she offered carefully.
He said nothing.
"I'm sorry," she added quickly, "I didn't mean to offend . . ."
"You didn't," he cut her off, and then he repeated purposefully: "You didn't."
"Does that mean . . ." she began.
"It means I'll think about it," he answered.
"One more thing," he said as she got up to go back to bed, "I've got myself into something of a corner, and I'm hoping you and Karin will help me out."
What more? she thought, but she said, "What's that?"
He stood, shoved his hands in his pockets and began to pace. "My parents have been after me to bring you and Karin down to the house for what my Mother calls a tea party. I know how busy you both are, and I didn't think you'd be till that wild about spending an afternoon at my folks'. I've been putting them off for months, and they keep after me. Somehow, a couple of weeks back, I guess I agreed to a date . . . and then I forgot about it. Mother called to remind me yesterday. She's been baking for a week, and it seems to have become something of a big deal for them . . . for Mother and Pop."
"When?" May asked.
He raised his eyebrows and shrugged: "Today."
"Oh Sam," she said, leaning her head against the wall and closing her eyes. "I am so tired and I've got this paper to do, and if we go it means I'll be up all night again . . ."
But she knew, even as she said it, that they would go. She climbed the stairs slowly, pulling herself up by the bannister, the bitter taste of coffee and disappointment in her mouth.
She went back to bed but she could not sleep. She was chilled, the sheets were cold, all the warmth had left them. She closed her eyes but there was no drowsiness left in her, only an empty weariness. Hayes moved into her thoughts, she ran the memory through her mind one more time, as she might a loop of film, searching for some new meaning in his words, going over them again as if they held some secret code, some message she had not been able to decipher.
Throughout the movie she had been conscious of him, distracted by his closeness, by the touch of his sweater against her arm, by the sound of his laughter. She had to make herself pay attention, she was impatient for the film to be over, she wanted to be alone with him.
They walked across campus, pausing in front of the campanile, stopping to sit on a bench under the plane trees. It was early still, and unusually warm. Knots of students passed on the paths by the library, the sounds of their voices drifting in short, cheerful bursts.
She had expected him to ask her back to his apartment. She had wanted it, her whole body ached for him, but sitting on the bench in the evening warmth she knew it was not going to happen. She felt a stab of disappointment.
"Sam said you'd been in the Peace Corps . . ." she began, not to let a silence fall between them.
"Sam said," he repeated, making it sound like a question.
"I suppose we should talk about that—about Sam, I mean."
"Why?" he asked.
"I don't know why," she answered, and she didn't. She did not want to talk about Sam, she wanted to talk about him. About them. "Why did you join the Peace Corps?"
"Good question. In fact, it turned out to be the Big Q." He sat forward, and spread his hands as if to study them: "I joined the Peace Corps because I believed that John Kennedy had pressed some golden button, and I was excited that it had happened in my generation, and I guess I was convinced that I had something to give." He stopped, turned to grin. "I didn't stay convinced very long. I had been in Africa about two months when I finally figured out what I was doing there . . . what most of us were doing there. It was a grand adventure, going into this impoverished Third World and exuding all this wonderful good will, showing them how righteous we were in the USA . . . Except, most of us didn't know how to do the things they needed us to do. There weren't many carpenters or plumbers or engineers among us. About the only thing we were qualified to do was to teach and spread good will. And in the end, for a lot of us—myself included—it was a relatively safe way to test ourselves, a helluva lot better than the old-fashioned way, war being a chancier business all around.
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