Out of the Shelter

by David Lodge

  – Here’s the staircase. Hold on to the rail, here.

  – Whew! she said as they reached the bottom of the stairs. I don’t know how you do it.

  – I suppose I learned to find my way about in the dark in the blackout.

  – What blackout?

  He explained.

  – Gee, that must have been scary.

  – Oh, you got used to it.

  – I guess I’m beginning to get used to it now. I can see you, more or less.

  – I can see you, too.

  They fell silent. He was still holding her hand.

  – It’s taking them a long time to mend the lights, she said eventually.

  – He must have fused them, the second time.

  – Ray? D’you really think so? He’s crazy.

  – Well, he saved me from having to dance, anyway.

  – Have you really never danced before in your whole life?

  – Never. He cleared his throat and added: I’ve never kissed a girl, either.

  There was a silence. Then she murmured:

  – Why did you tell me that, Timothy?

  He laughed nervously.

  – Well, I’d like to kiss you, but I’m afraid I’ll make a mess of it.

  – You’re a funny boy, she said, not unkindly. Are all British boys like you?

  He thought for a moment.

  – Quite a lot are, I think.

  Another silence. Her face, pale and dim, was lifted to his. He bent towards her and closed his eyes. The kiss landed high up on her cheekbone and his glasses, striking her forehead, slipped sideways on his nose.

  – See? he said.

  By way of reply, she removed his glasses and kissed him gently on the lips. He clasped her clumsily round the waist. She nestled against him and he felt her breasts yielding against his chest, and her cool fingers on the base of his neck. He kissed her again. And again. And again.

  The sixth time, she forced his lips apart and pushed her tongue between his teeth. It came into his mouth like a live thing, long warm wet supple strong.

  – What did you do that for? he said distractedly.

  – Don’t you like it?

  – Oh yes!

  – It’s called French kissing, she whispered. Some kids call it soul-kissing.

  Because you lose your immortal soul? he wondered; and did it back to her, at greater length.

  – Hey! she panted, surfacing.

  –Baby! Is that you, Baby?

  Mrs. Eastman was approaching. Timothy pulled Gloria into the deeper darkness of an alcove beneath the staircase, and they heard her pass, bumping against deckchairs, followed by her husband muttering murderous threats under his breath.

  – Have you got the lifebelt, Harold? Mrs. Eastman wailed.

  – She hasn’t fallen overboard, for Chrissake, Lola!

  – Then where is she? Baby! Why don’t you do something?

  – The crew are working on the fuse. There’s nothing I can do.

  Mrs. Eastman sobbed.

  – Poor Cherry! Her party’s ruined. Who could have done it?

  – If I find him, said Major Eastman grimly, I will personally tie a knot in his balls. A reef knot.

  Gloria buried her face in Timothy’s shoulder, heaving with suppressed giggles.

  – Did you hear him cuss? she whispered breathlessly, as the Eastmans stumbled out of earshot. That she had heard the crude words excited him, and he kissed her again, passionately straining her body against his.

  – Oh Timothy, she whimpered.

  – Oh Gloria!

  Eventually the lights came on again, but the party had fragmented beyond repair. Couples danced where they stood, in the shadows of the lower decks, draped over each other’s shoulders, and swaying only just perceptibly to the music. In other shadows other couples necked without the pretence of dancing. The Eastmans had retired, evidently defeated, having found Baby asleep in the saloon. Timothy and Gloria stayed huddled in their alcove. He didn’t suggest that they should sit down, because he wasn’t sure he could comfortably do so.

  – Those must be the lights of Heidelberg, he said.

  – Really? I didn’t even know we’d turned back. Is it late?

  He squinted at the luminous dial of his watch.

  – About half-past ten, I make it.

  – Harf-parst ten, she mimicked him. You mean ten thirty.

  He wondered whether he dared to touch her breast. He touched it, lightly, holding his breath.

  – I don’t want this boat ever to stop, she said.

  – Neither do I, he said, stroking her breast more firmly. It felt lovely. Gloria, where are you going when we get back?

  – Home, I guess.

  – Couldn’t we go somewhere, first?

  – I can’t, I have to go home. Where to, anyway?

  – We could go to my room. I have my own room.

  He had a very clear picture in his mind, so clear he could have drawn it: their two naked bodies on the bed in Dolores’ room, his head pillowed on one breast, his hand clasping the other, a rosy nipple peeping between his splayed fingers.

  – Are you staying at a hotel?

  – No, a kind of hostel.

  – They let you bring girls in? What are you laughing at?

  – It’s a girls’ hostel, he said.

  It seemed a good joke, and they giggled over it for a little while.

  – Don’t you feel funny, living in a girls’ hostel?

  – You get used to it.

  – Like the blackout?

  – Like the blackout.

  – You know something, Timothy? You’re real cool.

  – Am I? I don’t feel it.

  – Well, you are, I’m telling you.

  – Will you come then? Back to my room?

  – I have to go home, really I do. My girl friend Edith, her father’s driving me home. My folks will raise all hell if I don’t go back with her.

  – What about tomorrow then? Can I see you tomorrow?

  – Tomorrow’s Saturday. I’m supposed to be watching the fireworks with my folks.

  – So am I. What about the daytime? Tomorrow afternoon?

  – I said I’d go to the pool with Edith. You could meet us at the pool.

  – Not with Edith. Let’s meet on our own.

  – Well, maybe.

  – Please, he said urgently.

  Eventually they made a date for half-past one on the following afternoon, outside the Stadtgarten. As the boat was tying up, Timothy took Gloria round to the other side of the deck for a last long kiss, with bruised, aching lips.

  – See you tomorrow, then, he said.

  She nodded, smiled, and left him. He went into the lavatory. His face in the mirror over the washbasin surprised him, ruddy and smeared with lipstick as if by the blood of combat. He washed it off. Coming out of the lavatory he met Larry, tilting a bottle of Coke to his lips.

  – Last one! He brandished the bottle proudly, and belched. Say, what happened to you all evening?

  – Oh, everything! he said gaily, and slapped the astonished Larry on the back. Goodnight!

  Well, nearly everything, he corrected himself. Everything was for the following afternoon.

  By the end of the following afternoon, Timothy was in a state approaching delirium, and far beyond anything he recognized as pleasure. He had got so far towards the consummation of his desire that he was stretched out on the bed with Gloria, and they were both partially unclothed; but it had been a long, exhausting process, and now, at what he thought must be near the climax, he wondered whether he was capable of commanding his perspiring, aching flesh any further.

  The fault was entirely his. It had taken him a long, long time to realize that Gloria was of the same mind as himself, and would not resist any of his advances. When, no doubt impatient with his ineffective plucking at the straps of her brassiere, she suddenly sat up, put her hands behind her back and deftly unfastened the catch, and her breasts tumbled into his hands, he
felt as if he had reached an ultimate plateau of delight on which he would be content to rest for ever, enraptured by their pliant weight, fascinated by the different shape they had when freed from the sharp, conical cups of the brassiere, flatter and rounder and wider apart, falling to each side like arms opening in a gesture of submission, tipped with blunt nipples that hardened mysteriously under his touch.

  Then he had made an almost fatal error, recalling facetiously the way in which Larry had first called his attention to her. She had responded with indignation, and a determined doing up of hooks and buttons. She denied the story and reproached him for believing it. Later, much later, when he had coaxed her back into a loving disposition, she admitted that she had shown her breasts once, for a dare, a long time ago, but that she hadn’t taken any money from the boy, only from the girl who had bet her a dollar she wouldn’t do it. Then slowly, hesitantly, he had made up his lost ground.

  All that was a long time ago, or so it seemed to him. Her brassiere was on the floor beside the bed now, a strange, forlorn-looking object, like a pair of empty conch-shells stranded on the beach, along with her blouse and his shirt. His cheek was pressed against her left breast, but its nakedness, though agreeable, no longer seemed so extraordinary. His thoughts and his nerves were active down below, with his fingers, and her fingers. His fingers had crept underneath the loosened waistband of her jeans, underneath the elastic of her knickers, over the warm swell of her belly, to be halted by the expected but still electrifying brush of her hair. And her fingers had plucked his vest from its moorings, scampered over his torso, unbuckled his belt, unzipped his fly, and were now, holy God, stroking through his underpants the hard, rocklike pillar of his straining flesh.

  They had not spoken for perhaps twenty minutes, just lying there almost immobile, exploring each other with their fingers, their eyes closed. At least, his eyes were closed; he didn’t know about hers. He had always thought he would want to look, but now he would have been grateful for darkness, pitch darkness. The green curtains were drawn, but the room still seemed uncomfortably bright, the furniture and fittings too sharply defined, crowding round the bed like inquisitive and disapproving presences.

  A squadron of jets suddenly screamed overhead, making the windows rattle. Feeling a commotion beside him, he opened his eyes and saw Gloria arch her back, kick, and the blue jeans flew off her brown legs. He shut his eyes again. His hand now moved freely under the light tension of her flimsy briefs. He ran his hand over the fine, springy nest of hair, and reached a moist crevice. There was a distant rumble, as of bombs or guns. The sound barrier. He heard her breathing quickly beside him. He scarcely dared to breathe himself. She spread her legs and his index finger slipped in like a seal into a rock pool, slithering against the slippery walls, and touching something that quivered and contracted, fluttering like a shrimp under bare toes at low tide, and he thought he must be losing his senses, for there was a strange smell of shrimps in the room. She moaned and began to rub herself against his finger. His heart pounded, and there was almost terror in the pounding, for he was afraid of the strange powerful rhythms he had started in her, as though he had her whole body balanced effortlessly on his finger tip, and could make her do anything, split open like a pea-pod, turn herself inside out, at the slightest extra pressure; and afraid for himself, afraid to move, though this was obviously the moment to do it, because if he moved, if his tensed, straining body were disturbed in its balance by even a millimetre, he knew he would spill, he would burst, he would fountain.

  Then she slipped her hand under the elastic waistband of his underpants, and at the first touch of her fingers he gave a despairing cry and he spilled, he burst, he fountained. He tried to stop himself, he bit his lip, he clenched his fists, and twisted aside; but he could not stop, he did not want to stop, he only wanted to reach oblivion, to die, like a wasp dying in jam, clogged and sticky and exhausted.

  When the last spasm had spent itself, he rolled over on to his stomach and buried his face in the pillow. He was ashamed to look at her. He hoped she would dress quickly and go away. But she made no move. After a few minutes he felt her hand creep under his vest and draw a line down his backbone.

  – Hey, she said softly.

  – I’m sorry, he said hoarsely, keeping his head turned away from her.

  – What for?

  – I’m sorry I . . . you know.

  – You wanted to, didn’t you?

  – No. Well, not like that.

  – Like what then?

  – Well, you know . . . inside you.

  – You’re crazy, she snorted, but she didn’t sound angry or disgusted.

  He stared out over the edge of the bed at the room, at the washbasin and the cupboard and the armchair, Dolores’ books and the green curtains drawn against the sun, and a pair of socks hanging over the radiator to dry. They were all charged with an an insistent reality, like objects in a still-life, and he felt as if it had been drawn out of himself. He felt hollow, as if the marrow had been sucked out of his bones.

  – Why am I crazy? he said.

  She sighed, and nuzzled his neck.

  – Don’t you know anything? That’s how girls get pregnant.

  – I know, he said, but not every time, do they?

  – Nope. But who would take the risk? Anyway, I don’t think it’s right.

  He was somewhat staggered by that.

  – You don’t think what’s right?

  – Going all the way with a guy, unless you’re going to marry him. And even then . . .

  – Even then, what?

  – Even then I think you should save it up, so there’s something special about getting married, don’t you?

  He turned to face her, propping himself up on his elbow. She looked very vulnerable and waif-like, with her white, tender breasts and her long bare brown legs and the brief blue pants.

  – Gloria . . .

  – Yes?

  – D’you think this is right then? What we just did?

  – Don’t you?

  – It’s a sin, he said.

  He thought to himself: I must go to Confession tomorrow before I leave for home. Trains could crash, ships could sink. Gloria looked uncomfortable, and crossed her arms over her breasts.

  – Are you a Christian? she asked.

  – I’m a Catholic.

  – That’s a Christian, isn’t it?

  – Yes. What are you?

  – I’m not anything, much. We’re sort of Jewish, but we don’t go to Temple or anything.

  He lay back on the bed, his hands behind his head.

  – I never met any Jews until I came out here, he mused.

  – Aren’t there any Jews in England?

  – Oh yes, lots. Petticoat Lane, for instance. But I mean to talk to.

  – Petticoat Lane, that sounds kind of cute.

  – It’s a Jewish market in London – they’re allowed to open on Sundays.

  – Do they sell only petticoats?

  – Oh no, anything. Mostly second-hand stuff. My father took me there to buy my first bike.

  Her face softened.

  – Your folks were pretty poor, huh?

  – Well, they’re not exactly well-off, but . . .

  – You said you had a second-hand bike.

  – Oh, you couldn’t get new bikes then, he laughed. It was just after the war.

  – I guess we didn’t know much about the war in the States, when I was a kid.

  – How d’you feel about living in Germany now?

  – How d’you mean?

  – Well, after what happened to the Jews.

  – I don’t think about it much. I don’t like to.

  – Oh, but you should, he said.

  – It doesn’t seem real. I can’t believe it happened.

  – That’s why people should think about it, he said. That’s why it happened in the first place, because people couldn’t believe it was happening. The Jews didn’t think it was real. They queued up for
the gas chambers.

  – Don’t, she winced.

  – You see, I have a sort of theory that the worst things that happen are the things you never think will happen.

  – Oh no! The nicest things are always unexpected. Like us meeting on the boat. I didn’t expect that.

  – I did – I told you. That’s why I went to the party.

  – Tell me again, she said, wriggling comfortably against him.

  – Just a minute.

  He had a thread of thought between his fingers and he didn’t want to lose it. It was something he had never put into words before.

  – Don’t you think that when something really rotten happens, it’s much worse if you don’t expect it – if it’s a nasty surprise?

  – Mmm . . . I guess so, she conceded.

  – And don’t you try and stop rotten things happening by thinking that they might happen, in advance?

  – How would that stop them? If something’s gonna happen, it’s gonna happen.

  – I don’t know, but it always seems to me that you can. For instance, examinations. I always tell myself I’ve done badly, and then I usually do quite well.

  She laughed.

  – I always reckon I’ve done O.K. and I usually flunk.

  – Try my system next time, he advised her earnestly.

  – It’s no use if you haven’t got the brains! She laughed again. I think your system’s crazy.

  – It isn’t crazy.

  – It is, too. Are you trying to tell me that if you could think of all the lousy breaks in the world, none of them would ever happen?

  – If you knew enough to think of them all . . . Well, I’m not saying that none of them would ever happen, but I still think you could stop quite a few.

  She chuckled.

  – For instance, this morning, he went on. I kept telling myself that you wouldn’t come. And then you came.

  – I wanted to come.

  – But you mightn’t have.

  – That wouldn’t have had anything to do with what you were thinking.

  – How could you prove it?

  She held her breath for a moment as she groped for an an answer, then exhaled in a spluttering laugh:

  – It’s obvious. Che sarà, sarà.

  – What’s that?

  – Italian. What will be, will be.

  – You’re a fatalist.