by Chuck Kinder
Jesus, Alice Ann! Ralph croaked. (But he covered his mouth with one of his paws like a reflex.) —Why do you always have to go too far, Alice Ann? Ralph mumbled through his fingers.
Hey, gosh, come on, you guys, Judy chirped. —Hey, I know. Somebody should make a toast to something. To something, you know, romantic, in honor of the occasion.
How about toasting romantic, albeit sordid, buying trips? Jim suggested, which was about the first thing he had had to say that evening, for he’d been basically just parked there feeling real broody and mean and reconsidering seriously his promise not to pound the crap out of his first wife’s latest boyfriend.
Say what? Ralph said, his own old, furry ears perking up. —What in the world does that mean, old Jim?
Come on, Jim, Judy said, eyes like daggers. —Don’t you start up, too, buster.
I know something tres romantic we can toast, Alice Ann said, and raised her glass. —Here’s to Ralph’s rubbers.
Holy moly, Ralph lamented, and shook his head.
Or, Jim said, to love and marriage. Some fool songster said they go together like a horse and carriage. So come on, everybody, let’s all ironically bubble up, Jim said, and tipped his glass against Alice Ann’s.
Oh, why not? Judy said, and tipped her glass against Jim’s and Alice Ann’s glasses, and then she uncharacteristically guzzled her drink down. —I just love champagne to death, Jim’s first wife informed everybody.
Count me out, Ralph mumbled through his fingers, which were cupped around his festering mouth and chin again.
By the way, Alice Ann, Judy said, refilling her glass with the cheap-ass bubbly, what did your hubby give you for an anniversary present, anyhow?
A mercy fuck, Alice Ann said, and threw back her own glass of bubbly. —But since Ralph was out of his romantic rubbers, he had to practice withdrawal after about, oh, six or seven seconds.
Let’s all drink a romantic toast to the honorable practice of withdrawal, Jim suggested, and lifted his refilled glass.
Okay, buster, Judy had hissed, and if looks could kill...
A mercy fuck, Alice Ann? Ralph said. —Are you trying to be funny? Are you? he said, and picked up the little candle-lantern from the middle of the table and held it in front of Alice Ann. He waved it slowly back and forth before her face. —It’s so dark in this wretched cave I can’t even see the expression on your face, Alice Ann. Alice Ann?
2
Spanakopita, troops, Alice Ann said as she exuberantly fed her face. —God, thin yummy layers of pastry filled with spinach and feta cheese baked to a golden brown. A perfect description of manna. Forgive me, please. It’s not my fault. Greek food always does this to me. It drives me crazy hungry, and I know this will sound crazy, but it makes me horny as hell.
Feta cheese? Judy said. —You mean that stuff is in here? Ugh. I didn’t know that. Feta cheese, ugh. Feta cheese always makes me think of toe jam.
I agree with you wholeheartedly on that matter, Ralph said to Judy. —That spana-whatever-you-call-it is just so much smelly crud in my book. Let my wife fill herself to the brim with toe jam. Far be it from me to stop my wife from eating anything she has her heart set on eating.
Later, after the waitress had cleared the table and everybody had decided against dessert, but Alice Ann had ordered a final round of drinks, Alice Ann smiled at Ralph and announced that what she had her heart set on doing was footing the bill for this whole night of fucking revelry. Ralph was flabbergasted. Ralph dropped his jaw and fork. Jim raised a toast to Alice Ann’s amazing generosity of spirit and good taste and the lovely way she looked that evening. Ralph spluttered and gasped that if they even pulled their way-beyond-their-credit-limit bandit plastic out in public, they could well find themselves thrown under a jail- house. No fooling, Ralph had lamented, this is no joke. At the very least, Ralph lamented, as sincere as Jim had ever seen him, that worthless, pathetic piece of plastic could well be returned to them on a tray cut into quarters, which would not be the first time for that singular humiliation. Like that shameful, wretched time in Iowa City.
God, what a riot! Alice Ann had laughed.
No, don’t even talk about it, Ralph said. —I shouldn’t have even brought it up. Jesus. Talk about stupid. That’s my middle name, all right. Stupid. Just call me Mister Stupid. That’s one sleeping, flea-bitten dog we should just let lie.
Ralph was a student at Iowa then, Alice Ann said. —And he was in John Cheever’s writing class. Ralph just adored John Cheever. We had noticed that John seemed distracted and sort of lonely at a faculty cocktail party one Friday afternoon. You know, sort of quiet and sad and off to himself, lonely, yes, if you can believe a famous man like that being lonely. So we just said to ourselves, Why not take John Cheever out on the town? Buy John Cheever a big dinner and show him a high old time. Shoot the works in the John Cheever department was our motto that night.
Who is this John Cheever guy, anyhow? Judy asked.
He’s a pretty famous writer, hon, Alice Ann said. —So anyway, we took John to the best restaurant in town. Or was it to that swanky place at the edge of town? Whatever. So we ordered champagne, and not this cheap stuff Ralph insisted upon tonight. I did the ordering that night, so we were drinking nothing but Mumm’s no less. Two, maybe three bottles. Who remembers. Shoot the works for John Cheever was our motto that night.
What was old Cheever like? Jim asked Ralph.
You know, Ralph said, the first thing I remember Cheever saying to me about writing was that you aren’t your characters but your characters are you. The man took me seriously enough to sit down with me and go over a story and move words around until they fit perfectly.
He must have thought you were cute, Jim said.
I was, Ralph said. —Back in my youth.
So everything was going to be on us that night, Alice Ann said. —John Cheever’s money was no good in Iowa City that night. So we ate high off the old proverbial hog, and when the check was presented, we offered up our dubious plastic.
Cheever told me to trust a story’s accidents, Ralph said. —Its accidental revelations. The way things you never suspected could emerge in your story. Unlike your life, of course.
Then the old proverbial shit hit the fan, Alice Ann said, and laughed. —Every month or so, Bank of America issues a hit list of bad cards, you know. Well, for some reason the asshole maitre d’ checked out our card.
He checked it, Ralph said, because you had bounced a check there for lunch a couple of weeks earlier.
Actually, I had bounced two checks there before, Alice Ann said, and laughed. —Anyway, the asshole maitre d’ checked our card. God, were we ever over our credit limit. Bank of America had been sending us nasty letters for weeks begging us to be responsible American citizen adult types and please quit playing with our poor plastic. We had become your basic B-of-A bandits.
We hadn’t always been like that, Ralph said. —Things had just gotten out of hand. We’d gotten so far behind the eight ball, we just sort of threw up our hands.
Well, if you’re going to sink, sink with style, Alice Ann said. She blew thin streams of smoke through her elegant nostrils. —Anyway, the asshole maitre d’ brought the little card back to our table personally. He put the fucking little tray on the table and just stood there smirking. And, sure enough, there was our poor little precious, plastic baby. Mutilated. Cut into quarters. It was hilarious.
It was not either, Ralph said.
What in the world did you-all do? Judy asked.
Alice Ann asked if they would take a check, Ralph said, and laughed, the big slope of his shoulders shaking with mirth.
You’re kidding! Jim said, in genuine appreciation.
Honest to God, Ralph said. —Alice Ann didn’t bat an eye.
Tres true, Alice Ann said. —I didn’t give an inch.
They almost called the police, Ralph said. —They were not amused. They made threats.
Well, Christ, what was Cheever doing all this time? Jim asked.
>
John simply sat there through all this humiliation and smiled, Ralph said. —A sad smile, though, is how I would characterize it. Kindly, but really sort of sad. And his eyes held that same expression, too. As though he had seen people like us going down that old road before and he knew what was in store for them. For us. He was somehow serene about it all. All the yelling and screaming in the ensuing scene. He was drunk, John was, sure. Weren’t we all! But he was somehow serene as a Buddha. That’s the word that comes to mind. Serene. He was that night, anyway. I had the feeling this really was an old story for John and he knew its ending by heart.
That’s not the way I remember it happening, Alice Ann said. —John started yelling at that fucking maitre d’, too. That’s what happened. He was as irate as I was at our treatment. Then they wouldn’t even touch his plastic either. They wouldn’t even consider it. And of course the assholes wouldn’t take a check.
Well, my lands, what really did happen? Judy asked.
Oh, Alice Ann said, John spotted some university people he recognized across the room. So he stumbled over and borrowed the necessary funds from them. One of them was a bigshot dean. No, I think two of them were deans.
That’s not what happened, Ralph said.
How would you know, you motherfucking smarty-pants, Alice Ann said. —You were ripped.
Well, so were you.
But you, as usual, were more ripped.
I know what happened that sorry night, Ralph said. —No one has to tell me what happened that wretched night of my life.
We should have walked that fucking check, Alice Ann said. —It was a failure of imagination not to walk that check. Cheever was drunk enough. He would have done it in a second. What a character that wonderful man is. What a story that would have made.
But what in the daggone world really happened? Judy asked. Not much really, Ralph said. —When all was said and done. John just shelled out. He got stuck with the tab that night. Which was embarrassment enough, let me tell you.
Did you ever pay him back, old dog? Jim asked Ralph.
Not yet, Ralph said. —But I intend to. Any day now.
Shoot fire, Judy said. —I’m going to have to visit the little girls’ room pretty soon. Where is it, anyhow?
Go back through the bar, Alice Ann said. —Turn left.
Sounds like you really do know this place like the back of your hand, Ralph said.
Oh, come on, hon, Alice Ann said, and put her cigarette out. She stood up from the table and tossed her napkin on the table. —Let’s go powder our twats.
3
When the wives had walked away, Ralph said to Jim, okay, just what all has Alice Ann told you?
Say what? Jim said. —What has Alice Ann told me? Nothing. What would Alice Ann tell me?
She’s always airing our dirty laundry for you. Don’t try and tell me she doesn’t.
Well, you’re just being paranoid, as usual. She hasn’t told me a thing. Why, what’s up?
Alice Ann found the letters.
What letters? You’re talking in code, old Ralph.
My girlfriend’s letters, that’s what letters. Alice Ann found them. God knows how. Jesus. She must have torn the house apart. She must have rooted around like crazy. I had those babies hid, really hid, I’m telling you. If I had buried them like bones in the back yard I couldn’t have hid them any better.
So where were they hid?
Oh, they were hid, all right. I’ve got my places. My secret places not even those criminal kids have found yet. I thought the place where I hid those letters was my best secret place, too. Jesus. Nothing is sacred. Nothing.
Right, especially your girlfriend’s love letters. So what happened? What did she do?
You really don’t know? Alice Ann hasn’t already told you her side of the story, really?
No, Ralph, I told you.
She did plenty, that’s what. She sprung them on me. She caught me off guard. Listen to this, old Jim. She waited until today. She saved everything up. Then this morning the, you know, so-called shit hit the fan. Breakfast in bed for the anniversary boy is what she said. She was all smiles. Good-morning kisses for the anniversary boy is what she said. I should have known the jig was up. So she brings me this tray. It’s got all my favorite breakfast treats on it. Three eggs sunny-side up. Scratch biscuits with orange marmalade. Those tasty litde link sausages done to a turn. Home fries. Cinnamon rolls hot from the oven. Fresh-squeezed orange juice. Coffee. You name it. I should have known. The handwriting was on the wall. So I’m sitting there in bed stuffing my face, happy as a clam. Then she says, I’ll bring the paper and the mail in to the anniversary boy, sweetie-pie. No bills, I say. Bury the bills today. I’ll deep-six the bills, sweetie-pie, she says. So she brings me the paper and it’s turned to the funny page. I like to read the funny page first thing. Then she says, Hey, big anniversary boy, I’ve got a bright idea. How would you like to play a little post office with your anniversary girl? And she’s winking and blinking at me to beat the band. Well, you can guess what I thought she meant by that. So I said, Sure, why not. I mean, I was sort of looking forward to finishing that swell breakfast while it was hot, but when duty calls ... So I put on my best bedroom look, all sappy with smiles and bug-eyed with feigned desire. And then she says . .. Through rain and snow, through sleet or hail, we never fail to deliver the United States mail, motherfucker, and then she tossed this fat pack of letters, Lindsay’s letters, smack in the middle of the goddamn tray. Food went flying everywhere. Eggs. Those tasty little sausages. Home fries all over the funny page. Jesus. Where’s it all going to end?
Damn, Jim said. —So then what?
Oh, screaming, Ralph said. —Yelling. Snarls. Lefts and rights. Some bloodletting. Although minor so far, all things considered. You know, just the usual heated discussion.
Oh boy, Jim said.
But it’s only the beginning, Ralph said. —She’s saving her best, or worst, I should say, for later. Whenever that’s going to take place. Take my word for it. This affair is far from over. What’s more, she has suspicions about this cute student of mine.
Are they true?
Well, sort of. But nothing serious. Just a, you know, student. An A student, I might add.
So you got those runny sores around your mouth from eating out some A student, huh?
No! Ralph gasped, clomping a paw over his mouth. —No way! he mumbled. —These are, you know, fever blisters. Plain and simple. She’s a nice, clean girl, an A student, like I told you. Please don’t breathe a word of this. Please, old Jim.
You can count on me, old dog. This business about you eating out your nice, clean A student is buried. I’ll take this little conversation with me to my grave.
And on top of everything else, we’re going belly-up again, Ralph said.
Belly-up? What’s that mean, old Ralph?
We’re on the verge of bankruptcy again. No fooling. Belly-up. Broke. Busted flat. Just like seven years ago, when we declared bankruptcy before. Jesus. It has become a way of life. I read this article recently. It was that kids’ Science Made Simple column in the Sunday paper. You know. And it told about how at the end of seven years all the cells of your body have changed over. They’re all new, see? It’s sort of like at the end of every seven years you’re sort of this totally transformed human being. Somebody new, in terms of cells, anyway. Well, I’ll tell you this. I’m not a brand->new human being from seven years ago. Maybe my so-called cells are new, but I’m the same old sorry human being belly-up again. In California, after you declare bankruptcy, you have to wait seven years before you can declare it again. That’s the way I know seven years of my life have gone by. It’s time to belly-up again. You know something? Ralph said, and looked over at Jim and shook his old, woolly head. —You’re the best friend I have on the face of this earth.
