Fast Start, Fast Finish

by Birmingham, Stephen;

  On Nancy’s second day at work Charlie, in a pair of ancient tennis shorts, was attacking the front lawn with a hand lawn mower when Alice Mayhew, in her station wagon, drove down the Lane and waved to him. He returned the wave, and Alice’s car slowed to a stop. She rolled down the window and called out, “Hi!” in a diphthonged voice that made it sound like “Hoy.”

  “Hi, Alice,” he said.

  “I hear you’re a bachelor these days!”

  “Well, I’ve got a working wife.” He pushed the mower.

  She said something then that he couldn’t hear over the mower’s sound, and so he put it down and strolled somewhat unwillingly over to her car. She leaned forward on the wheel and said, “I said, do you ever play bridge?”

  “Sure, we love to play,” he said.

  “Oh, I didn’t so much mean your wife—I was thinking mostly of you,” she said.

  “Oh?”

  “’Cause sometimes we girls play in the afternoon, and sometimes we need a fourth,” she said. “So from now on we’ll think of you.”

  “Well, thanks anyway, but—”

  “Wouldn’t you like that?”

  “I’m pretty busy these days, Alice, and—”

  “Oh, don’t tell me Tessa Morgan takes all your time!” she said with her little gasping laugh.

  In the daylight he noticed something about her that he had not noticed before: the tiny whispers of scars at her temples, just at the hairline, where the plastic surgeon had taken little tucks in that pink face. It was the damn fools, the damn fools that you had to watch out for, the damn fools that got you every time if you didn’t watch out. “I’ve got quite a few things to do,” he said.

  “Like what, for instance?”

  “Like cut my grass.”

  “But don’t you get—lonesome all day long in that house, Chuck? Goodness knows, I do—get lonesome. Especially when Sam’s away. Like now.” She sighed. “He’s in Detroit. Again.”

  “That’s a fine city, Detroit.”

  Her laugh interrupted him. “Goodness, but you’re sweaty!” she said. “You’re just all covered with sweat, Chuck! Oh, I know I should say ‘perspiration.’ Horses sweat, men perspire. It must be such hot work, mowing that lawn—”

  “Hot, but infinitely rewarding,” he said. “Because you always know where you stand with a lawn. You never—”

  “Unlike a woman, you mean,” she said.

  “Well, I didn’t exactly mean that.”

  She sighed again and pushed the fingers of one hand through her pink hair, whitening those little hand pleats at the border of her scalp. “Look, it’s so hot,” she said, “why don’t you come over to my house, Chuck, and I’ll fix us some nice iced tea. Why are you smiling, Chuck?”

  “Because I think you’re the only person in the world who’s ever called me Chuck.”

  She laughed once more and said, “Guess that makes me special, doesn’t it? Oh, come on.” She patted the seat beside her. “Hop in. Come on over—I’ll fix some nice iced tea. Or a drink—whatever you want. If you’re nice, I’ll even fix you some lunch, Chuck, ’cause I think you need someone to take care of you. Is there a man in the world who doesn’t need to be taken care of when his wife’s away? And I’m all alone. So—come on.”

  “No thanks, Alice.”

  She tilted her chin and her eyes lolled toward him like doll’s eyes. “Don’t worry, I won’t bite,” she said.

  He looked at her steadily for a moment. Then he said, “Neither will I, Alice, if that’s what you’re fishing for. In fact, this property is posted: No fishing.”

  “Oh?” She gave him a disagreeable look and put her hands on the wheel. “Then I suppose Tessa Morgan pays you.”

  “No, but she sometimes comes and cuts my grass. So how about it? Is it a deal?”

  “Drop dead,” Alice Mayhew said and drove away.

  The stupid bitch. Is that what I’ve got to look forward to? he thought. It was almost good enough to tell Nancy about when she got home. He started back toward the lawn mower. Then, with a glance at his watch, he saw that it was time to fix the sandwiches for the kids’ lunch and headed for the house. While cutting the grass he had had a nice idea. It had suddenly come to him. Nancy’s birthday was not far off, and he had been wondering what to do for her. Well, this weekend, he would take her on a trip—her, and the children too. He would surprise her. He would fix a picnic basket, and Friday night, as soon as she got home from work, they would all get in the car and drive up for the weekend—to Nahant, where he hadn’t been for so many years. And the timing was perfect, because by then he would have the portrait finished. He knew he could finish it in one more sitting. Whenever he thought of the portrait being finished something jumped in his stomach.

  “Tessa?”

  “I was wondering when I’d hear from you.”

  “Listen, can you pose today? We’ve got to—”

  “I want to talk to you.”

  “Can you talk and pose at the same time? We’ve really got to wind this thing up, Tessa. It’s been dragging on much too long.”

  There was a silence at the other end of the line. Then she said, “Sure. Anytime. I’m always here.”

  “Tessa?” But she had hung up the phone.

  Throw yourself into it, Dr. Harding had said. Well, if he hadn’t said that in so many words, that was what he had meant. And it was fun to feel that she was throwing herself into her work, losing herself in her job. The shop itself was fun, and it was fun to work with beautiful and expensive things. Keeping a shop was not at all like keeping a house because there were new things to do every day, new people, new merchandise. On her third day at work, no less, Mr. Singleton had asked her if she would like to try dressing the window, and though she hadn’t the slightest idea how to begin, she had taken a deep breath and said she’d be glad to try. “Do it however you’d like,” he said casually, as though he didn’t care, but she understood clearly enough that it was to be kind of a test. So after some thought she had decided to create a little fireside corner with two small wingback chairs, a candlestand, and one of those lovely Italian candlesticks—he wanted four hundred dollars a pair for them, and though she couldn’t possibly afford them, she had a place all picked out for them in her living room—and over the arm of one chair she threw, very casually, an antique Spanish shawl. He studied the window for a long time from the street when she had finished and then said, “Mrs. Lord, you’re good at this. I really think you have a flair.”

  It made her feel terribly pleased.

  “Have you ever wanted to be a decorator yourself?” he asked her.

  “But there’s so much I don’t know …”

  “There are courses you could take. Night classes. Would you ever be interested in that?”

  “Well—yes.”

  “You’d need to study if you ever want to become a licensed decorator. It’s not easy work, but I bet you’d enjoy it.”

  “I’d love it,” she said.

  “I may be crazy, encouraging competition,” he said with a smile. “But I’ll get all the information for you, if you’d like.”

  Not every incident was happy during that first week. Twice he reproved her for the large, scrawly handwriting with which she wrote out sales slips and asked her to write smaller and more legibly, please. And then, at the end of the week, she heard a familiar voice behind her say rather crossly, “Miss, can you please wait on me?”

  She turned quickly and said, “Oh, hello, Genny!”

  Genny said, “Oh, hi.” And then, “Look, I’m trying to find a gift for a friend’s anniversary. Under twenty dollars.”

  “Oh,” Nancy said, momentarily hurt but trying not to let it show. “Yes, we have some pretty things.… Have you thought about something in leather?” She led Genny toward the counter and said, “How’ve you been, Genny?”

  “Look, I’m in kind of a hurry,” Genny said. She picked up a heavy glass ashtray and looked at the price tag. “This’ll do,” she said. “Wrap
it up, please—as a gift.”

  “Would you like to enclose a card?”

  “No, thanks. And it’s a charge. Mrs. Robert L. McCarthy, Roaring Brook Lane.”

  “Yes … I know,” Nancy said quietly, writing out the slip in a small, round hand.

  When Nancy returned with the package Genny took it and turned toward the door. “Good-bye …” Nancy said as Genny swept out the door, and Nancy stood there, looking after her, her face crimson.

  “Isn’t it funny, Dr. Harding?” She laughed weakly. “Suddenly they’re treating me like a shopgirl. I suppose I’ll just have to get used to it.”

  “I wouldn’t let it worry you,” he said.

  Because of her new schedule the appointments with him were now for one o’clock on Fridays instead of three o’clock on Thursdays. It was a better hour for several reasons. Coming, as it did, in her lunch hour, it meant that she almost had to be punctual. That was one of them.

  “Maybe it’s because I didn’t join the Rootlets … or the club. Of course Mr. Singleton says it’s because they think I have access to their credit ratings, and I’m sure he’s right. But anyway, after that happened with Genny, I made up my mind. I’m going to take that decorating course Mr. Singleton told me about. They won’t be so eager to snub me when I’m a licensed decorator myself—with clients of my own. They’ll be coming to me for advice on what to do with their houses!”

  “And meanwhile the salary from your job ought to help,” he said.

  “Yes.… Or at least I hope it will. It will help, but the point is, will it help enough? I’ve gotten myself in such a horrible hole with the money, doctor. I just don’t know. You should see the kind of games I’ve started playing with the bills—who gets paid and who doesn’t—paying a little bit to this one, a little to that, just to keep them quiet for a little while longer—until—”

  “Until what?”

  “Oh, I know you’re thinking about your own bill, doctor. I haven’t forgotten about it, honestly. I’m going to pay it just as soon as I possibly can.”

  “Of course,” he said.

  He was a doctor, and doctors didn’t expect to be paid for years. Everyone knew that. Whenever she went through the pile, she put his bills at the very bottom, to be paid at the very last.

  “But it has been a long time, Mrs. Lord. I haven’t had any payment from you since June.”

  “I know.” She looked at him quickly. “I’ll get to it right away.” Was he going to start to scold her about that now? If it wasn’t one thing it was another. Typical. No wonder he had brought up her salary. He was going to start pressuring her about his bill, as if she didn’t have enough to worry about. “It’s just that there are so many other things,” she said.

  “What other little games have you been playing with the bills?” he asked her.

  “Oh, just—just this juggling.” Last month she had sent out checks to everybody, for the full amount she owed them. But she had deliberately signed none of the checks, so it looked as though it had been an oversight. A few days later the checks came floating back with little notes saying “Apparently you forgot …” It kept them quiet for a while, kept them off her back. Kept them from pestering her, showed them that she had good intentions. What did they expect her to do, rob a bank? But she wouldn’t tell him about that. She thought, a note: I HAVE A GUN IN MY PURSE. PUT $10,000 IN SMALL BILLS IN THIS ENVELOPE OR I’LL BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT.

  “How long do you think you can keep the juggling up?”

  “Oh, until—until some money starts coming in,” she said.

  “Which will be when?”

  She shrugged helplessly. “Naturally I hope it won’t be too much longer,” she said. But she had suddenly had a much better idea than robbing a bank. She had the solution. She had, in fact, the only possible solution. It was inspiration! She let herself bask in it.

  “Does your husband know about this financial crisis you face?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Once more you say ‘Of course not.’”

  “Listen, Charlie’s more of a fool about money than I am,” she said. “He’d be no help. No, it’s something I’ve got to work out on my own.…”

  “How do you intend to work it out?” But before she had a chance to answer he said, “Mrs. Lord, I’d like to ask you once more—will you please release your files from Dr. Seligman in California?”

  “No!”

  “Very well,” he said in his calm voice. “Then tell me how you intend to work it out alone.”

  “There’s only one way; it’s a perfect way,” she said quickly. “I’m going to sell the house.”

  “I see.”

  She leaned forward across his desk, glad to be able to address him, glad he wasn’t an idiotic couch man, like Seligman. “It’s the only possible solution,” she said. “Isn’t it? Don’t you think it’s smart?”

  “You said you’d already decided.…”

  “But I mean, isn’t it a smart idea? Oh, I mean it’s just too much house for us, don’t you think? I mean I don’t even think I like it very much anymore! It didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to, nothing came out right—sometimes I really wonder what I saw in it in the beginning. Harold’s going to college in September, and his tuition is due, and Lord knows I don’t have the money to pay it. But I do have the house. And haven’t I put all the improvements into it? The sump pumps, the painting, the decorating? Don’t you think I could get more than I paid for it? Why, I’ll bet I could get sixty thousand for it, don’t you think? I’ll even throw in the rugs—why not? And the—” He was giving her a very funny look, and she realized she was arguing to him as though he were a real-estate agent. But still she wanted his opinion. “So, wouldn’t it be smart?” she said. “Sell the house, and then we’d have lots of money. We could rent an apartment right here in Westmount. And we could live for years on what I’d get for the house. We could make a whole new start—with plenty to live on till the real money starts coming in. Is that smart or isn’t it?”

  Leaning back in his chair and steepling his fingers, he said, “Well, yes. Perhaps it is.”

  “Oh, and I keep thinking—what fun an apartment is. We always had good times when we lived in apartments, Charlie and I. Why, when he had his very first success we were living in an apartment! I must have been crazy to get myself saddled with houses. There’s something so—anonymous—about an apartment, that’s what I love. Nobody knows who you are and nobody cares, and people leave you alone, and goodness knows I’m ready for that—that anonymity. Neighbors—I thought I was moving into a nice neighborhood here, but it was exactly the same as any other place. They’re nothing but a bunch of stupid, narrow-minded snots, my neighbors. I’m sorry, but that’s what they are—snots! Even Genny McCarthy, who I thought was my friend—when the chips are down she turns out to be exactly like the rest of them, even snottier if you ask me. Fair-weather friends. Well, who needs them? I’ll show them—I’ll sell the house.” She giggled. “To Negroes.”

  “What does your husband think of this plan?”

  “What plan?”

  “Your plan to sell the house.”

  “Oh, this is my idea, not his.”

  “And you haven’t told him about this either, of course.”

  “Not yet—but it’s really my house, isn’t it? I mean, I think I can certainly legally say that it is. It was bought with the money we got from selling the house in Bel—I mean Encino, and that house was a house my father bought for us. So doesn’t that make it really my house? Doesn’t it?”

  “I see your logic. But what will your husband do—arrive home one evening and find that his house has been sold out from under him? Don’t you think—”

  “Oh, I’ll tell him—eventually. But don’t you see? Charlie’s a born loser. He loses at everything he tries. I might as well face it at this point. He’s lost—every job he ever had. And now the show. Postponed. Till next year, maybe—who knows? I’ve got to start doing things on my own. Why do yo
u think I took the job? Why do you think I’ve decided to sell the house?”

  “There’s one other thing you might try to face, Mrs. Lord.”

  “What?”

  “That perhaps he’s a born loser because you let him lose. Perhaps you want him to lose.”

  “That’s ridiculous!”

  “Is it? By cutting him out of everything, leaving him out of every decision, aren’t you just nursing any weaknesses he might have? You say he’s a fool about money, but you also say you hide the checkbooks and the bank statements from him so he won’t know about your own foolish overspending. You—”

  “What? I’m not a fool about money! What do you mean by that crack—my foolish overspending!”

  “Excuse me,” he said, turning back pages in his notebook. “On July eleventh, you said, ‘I’m a complete fool about money. I spend and overspend like a fool!’”

  “Oh, all right! But what has that got to do with—”

  “Feeding his weakness. By concealing your own weakness from him.”

  “Trying to protect him, perhaps! Because I love him. All he’s ever needed is someone to believe in him.”

  “And all you seem to need is someone to be totally dependent on you. Am I right? You seem to need him to lose. If he ever won at anything, what would you do? Let’s shift the subject slightly. You say that selling the house would give you the money to live on until the real money starts coming in. Not that I’m a financial counselor, but where will this real money come from?”

  “From his show, of course!”

  “But you just said that there might not be a show for an indefinite length of time. Is there going to be a show or isn’t there?”