by 26 Nights (Memoirs of a Contemporary Gentleman) [MF] (retail) (epub)
“Next time,” I said.
The cab had let out the couple in front of a Chinese restaurant called Jade Empire, and I had seen them go in, so there was a good chance I had chosen the right cab to follow. I walked toward the restaurant. Actually, I wasn’t too sure just what I was doing, following them. What did I expect to see? I knew it was foolish, not to say sneaky—but both my brain and my conscience were a bit numbed by the thought of Miss Greenglass and my imbecile brother …
A peek in the window showed me nothing of interest. What now? I didn’t want to be spotted, but I had come this far. I opened the restaurant door to take a cautious look inside.
“Good evening, sir. You like table?”
The query came from a young woman of Asian extraction who approached me as I stepped halfway in. She was carrying a handful of menus and was evidently the hostess or maître d’ (maîtresse d’?) or whatever.
“Ah … no. No, thank you. I was just …” I was looking around the restaurant as I spoke, and on the far side I spotted a couple just sitting down. It was almost certainly the people who had gotten out of the taxi, and it was just as certainly not Henry and Miss Greenglass.
“Damn,” I said. “It was the wrong cab after all.”
“Sir?” the lady said.
“Oh, sorry.” I looked at her closely for the first time. She was rather tall, and looked even taller because of the way her hair was pinned up atop her head. She was very pretty, and very Asian-looking, with high cheekbones and sleepy, entrancing dark eyes. Her voice was low, and her clipped accent was charming and somehow sexy.
“You like table, sir?” she said again. “Dinner for one?”
“Oh. No, thank you.” I was about to retreat, when I noticed something that stopped me in my tracks. She was wearing a traditional Chinese dress, high-collared and clinging to her slim but lissome figure. It was blue and looked like silk, and pinned to it just above her left breast was a small name tag. It read, “Li Mai.”
“On second thought,” I said …
Her traditional dress had the traditional slit up the side, and as I followed her to a table I was mostly following her long, lovely leg. Not that there was anything wrong with the rest of her body, slender though it was. I had asked for something secluded if possible, and she obligingly led me to a corner table that was, if not private, at least out of the crowd.
“Thank you,” I said when she had seated me. “Ah … I don’t suppose you could join me? At least for a quick drink?”
She gave me a swift appraising glance from those obsidian eyes, but her smile was no more than polite. “Oh, afraid not, sir. I’m working now.”
“Maybe when you get a break,” I suggested.
She shook her head. “It will be another hour, at least.”
I smiled at her. “I’ll eat slowly,” I said.
She didn’t smile back this time, she just gave me the eyes again. “The waiter be right with you,” she said, and turned away.
I ordered a drink, and then dinner, and ate slowly. Whenever she passed my table in the course of her hostess duties, I smiled at her with all my manly charm. She didn’t smile back.
But while I was on my second pot of tea, she was suddenly there across from me. “I already know the line,” she said. She was smiling, but warily.
“Good for you,” I said. “Which line?”
“You want to know if it’s true about Asian women.”
“Good grief,” I said. “Do you actually get that?”
“Many times,” Li Mai said.
“And does it work?”
“Not many times.”
“That’s a relief,” I said. “Actually, what I’m curious about is your name. Li Mai. Lovely name.”
“Thank you.”
“But aren’t Chinese names sometimes reversed? I mean, the first name is actually the last name, and vice versa? Or something like that?”
She smiled slightly. “That’s old-fashioned,” she said. “Now we in America, okay? Different country. My name is Li Mai Chang.”
“I’m glad,” I said. Much more than she knew. “So is it?”
“Is what?”
“True about Asian women?” Actually, of course, I knew it wasn’t. I had known a few very memorable daughters of the Orient in my time.
“Ah.” She flashed the eyes at me. “Now I’m supposed to say, ‘Why you don’t find out,’ right?”
“That would be nice.”
“Then we go in back,” she said. “Lock ourselves in storage pantry …”
“Sounds good to me,” I said.
“There is even a table to lie on.”
“Better and better.”
“Or maybe you like the floor. More room that way.”
“You’re just playing with me, aren’t you?”
“How you guessed?” Li Mai said.
“Damn clever, we Occidentals,” I said.
She went back to work, and I ordered another pot of tea. It was another hour before she came back to me.
“Better leave waiter big tip,” she said. “I’m hoping it will be money well spent.”
“You going to say you don’t take no for answer?”
“Sometimes I do, actually,” I said. “But you haven’t said no yet, have you?”
“You patient man.” She paused, looking at me. “Li Mai likes patient men.”
“And I like women with beautiful cheekbones and slit skirts. And the legs to go with them.”
“In China girls more modest,” she said.
“And here?”
“Different country,” she said. Our eyes met. She didn’t look away.
“You know,” I said. “It happens I’ve been making a study of the storage pantries of various ethnic restaurants. I’d certainly like to see yours.”
Those dark eyes glinted slightly.
“Go in back,” she said then. “All the way, then right. Fifteen minutes.”
“Make it ten. I’ve been here so long the waiter looks like he’s ready to hit me.”
She smiled faintly. “That’s not the reason he’s angry.”
“No? Then what is?”
“He’s my husband,” Li Mai said.
There was indeed a table, though it wasn’t very big. Li Mai was sitting on it. As I closed the door and slid the bolt, she lay down on her back, bringing one leg up so that the slit skirt fell open, revealing that leg to the top of the thigh. In a moment I was in front of her, running my hand along the length of it, then pushing the dress up to her waist. She raised her hips in invitation, and I responded to her signal by pulling her panties down and off.
“It’s not true,” I said. “What do you know.”
“You sure?” she said, somewhat breathlessly. “Maybe you need to look a little more close.”
I did so. I bent down over her to get a really good look. “I’m pretty sure,” I said. “But I’d better check it out.” Which I did, first with my fingers, and then with my mouth.
This took a while.
As I was doing it, she squirmed around a bit, partly with passion and partly because she was reaching around to unzip her dress, then taking off her bra. Her breasts were small and perfect. I held on to them to steady myself as I went on with my investigation.
When I had researched the question to my satisfaction—and even more, I think I can say, to hers—I hastily pulled off most of my clothes and climbed up to join her. The table was small, but fortunately sturdy. Our bodies fit together with no trouble at all, and her fine, shapely legs came up to curl around me. For a long pleasant time I probed deeply into the mysteries of the East—although the words Li Mai cried hoarsely into my ear from time to time were definitely English. Old English.
As we were dressing, I asked her about her waiter husband. I was not particularly anxious to be confronted with a meat cleaver upon emergence.
“Don’t worry,” Li Mai said. “This America now. I own restaurant. He want to keep his job, he keep quiet.”
“God bless America,” I said.
The next morning, I reported this bit of progress to Miss Greenglass, who received it with her accustomed sangfroid. Of course I didn’t explain how it was that I happened to discover that particular restaurant, and fortunately she didn’t ask.
“So that was my evening,” I finished. And then added, as casually as I could, “How was yours?”
“Very pleasant, thank you,” said my imperturbable assistant.
“You and Henry … got along all right?”
“Yes,” Miss Greenglass said.
“But you didn’t … I mean … Nothing happened. Did it?”
“I don’t know what you mean, Mr. Walling.”
“Oh, come on. You know exactly what I mean.”
“I tell you again, Mr. Walling, that my private life is no concern of yours. I hope you will remember it this time.”
“And I tell you again, Miss Greenglass, that it damned well is. Especially where my brother is concerned.”
“The subject is closed,” Miss Greenglass said firmly.
“You can be damn sure Henry would tell me,” I said. “In detail.”
“Then I suggest you ask him,” Miss Greenglass said.
Which wasn’t a bad idea. But I waited until she was out of the office before calling him.
“The chick is a dyke,” Henry said.
“Aha,” I said. “That means she wouldn’t go to bed with you, I take it.”
“She’s frigid. She hates men. Probably a guy in disguise.”
“She just has good taste,” I said.
“Don’t worry,” Henry said. “I’ll get her next time.”
“Next time?” I said faintly.
“Saturday,” he said. “We’re going out again. I’ll take her to a show this time, so maybe she’ll come through.”
I hung up.
“You’re seeing him again?” I said incredulously, when Miss Greenglass returned.
“That’s right.”
“I can’t believe this! How could you possibly—”
“Incidentally, Mr. Walling,” Miss Greenglass said, “as Saturday is not a working day, he will be picking me up at my house. Seven o’clock. Just in case you’d like to try to follow us again.”
“Grr!” I explained.
Chapter 13
MAYBE IT WAS MY IDIOT BROTHER HENRY’S irritating attempts to seduce Miss Greenglass that put me in a nostalgic mood, since it was in high school that he first started trying to steal my women—never successfully, of course. (Well, almost never.) Or maybe not; the fact is that for some time now, in thinking ahead to the letters of the alphabet still remaining for the completion of my wager, my mind had conjured up one name when it came to the letter M: the name of my first real girlfriend, Marcia Bradbury.
We had both been seniors in high school, eighteen years old and ready for anything, when our youthful romance had kindled. It took a while for our petting and gropings to progress to the point of actual culmination. And then, when the point had actually been reached—or to be more exact, when it was just within reach, and was just about to be grasped—
Her parents had come home.
And somehow our romance had never recovered.
Such frustration was not a very pleasant experience. I have labored assiduously to avoid such an experience ever since.
I had not thought of Marcia for years before making my bet with Miss Greenglass, but once she had come to my mind, I couldn’t get her out. It would be wonderful, I thought, if I could go back in time, as it were, and at long last consummate that rudely severed relationship. Of course Marcia would no longer be the nubile virgin she had been then, but she might still be a very attractive woman, if she hadn’t let herself go. I wondered if I would be able to find her.
Meanwhile, I had other problems.
My Miss Greenglass had indeed gone out with Henry a second time, although this time I had made no attempt to follow them. As before, I could learn nothing from Miss Greenglass about their evening together; and this time, when I called Henry, he was almost equally reticent. His general moroseness, however, made me fairly certain that he had still not succeeded in maneuvering my lovely assistant anywhere near a bed.
Of course I hadn’t believed for a moment that he would. But still, the relief I felt was so powerful that it surprised even me.
“I assume,” I said to Miss Greenglass a bit later on, “that you’re not going to see my brother again. Two dates with Henry should be more than enough for anyone.”
“You shouldn’t assume anything, Mr. Walling,” the lady said coldly. “And I don’t wish to discuss this subject any further, if you don’t mind.”
“I do mind. As I’ve said before, Miss Greenglass, when I win our wager it would make me extremely unhappy to know that my imbecilic brother had claimed my prize before I did.”
“You are still very far from that goal, Mr. Walling,” Miss Greenglass said. “And if you do not concentrate on something other than this obsession with your brother and me, that problem will most certainly never arise.”
“Hello?” A female voice. It didn’t sound familiar; but then, it had been a long time.
“Hello,” I said. “I’m looking for Marcia Bradbury. Does she still live there, by any chance?”
“Who?”
“Marcia Bradbury. At least that used to be her name. I don’t know, she may be married or—”
“Oh, Marcia. Yeah, I think she’s here. Hold on a minute.”
I held on. I had looked up the number of Marcia’s parents’ house, and found it still listed under her father’s name. Though I doubted that she was still living there, I had thought I might be able to trace her.
“Hello,” came a new voice. “This is Marcia.”
My heart, astonishingly, skipped a beat. “Marcia? Marcia Bradbury?”
“Well, not anymore. Who is this?”
“This is Steven.” I felt ridiculously nervous. “Steven Walling.”
A pause.
“Steven Walling,” I said again. “From high school?”
Another pause. “Ah,” Marcia said then, but without conviction. “From high school.”
“Yes,” I said. “We were … involved. Sort of. Our senior year. You remember? We were—going together.”
“Senior year. Hmmm. That was a long time ago.”
“Yes, but not that long,” I said. I couldn’t believe she didn’t remember. “We had … we almost …” I was stammering like a schoolboy. This was absurd. “Remember the night your parents came home and caught us on your sofa?” I said. “We were just about to …”
“Oh dear,” Marcia said. “Right in my living room?”
“Yes, and they caught us half naked, and after that—”
“What a shame,” Marcia said. “How naked was I?”
“You don’t remember?” I said.
“Oh, of course I do, dear,” Marcia said, but not very convincingly. “And we never got to do it after that?”
“No. We broke up. Your parents …”
“Well, they’re dead now,” Marcia said. “They can’t stop us anymore.”
I blinked, though there was no one to see me. “I guess not,” I said. “I mean, I’m sorry.”
“I still have the sofa,” Marcia said. “Well, maybe not the same one. But that doesn’t matter, does it? What you want is to relive that night, only this time with no interruptions. Isn’t that right, dear?”
This was weird. But she was right, that’s what I wanted. “Well, I—I thought maybe we could get together, and then—”
“Why don’t you come over, dear? You know the address?”
“I remember,” I said. “But do you, Marcia? Do you remember me?”
“Of course, dear,” she said. “Your name is … ah … what was it again?”
“Steven. Steven Walling.”
“Yes. What was I wearing that night, Steven? Do you recall?”
Actually, I did. “A wool sweater,” I said. “A blue one, with a little pin on it. And a dark sk
irt. And you had a blue ribbon in your hair. We had just come back from—”
“All right, Steven. When would you like to come?”
“Any time,” I said. “How about right now? I could be there in half an hour.”
“I’ll be waiting,” Marcia said.
Both Marcia and I had grown up in Brooklyn Heights, a rather affluent enclave just across the river from Manhattan. As I taxied there I was filled with both anticipation and puzzlement. I was looking forward to seeing Marcia again; and it would be wonderful if we could indeed consummate our youthful passion at last. But it had appeared that she really didn’t remember me at all … and in that case, why had she invited me over? Why had she all but promised that we would …
I paid off the cab driver in front of the familiar brownstone, and as I mounted the steps and rang the bell, I couldn’t help feeling a bit like the nervous youth I had been when I had first performed those actions. The door was opened by a young and very attractive, if somewhat overly made up, blonde.
“Hi,” she said.
“Uh—hi,” I replied. “I’m here to see Marcia Brad—that is, Marcia. I’m Steven Walling.”
“Oh, Steven, right. Come on in.”
She took me into the living room. “She’ll be right with you,” the blonde said, and she went off, calling, “Marcia! Steven’s here!”
The room was not exactly as I remembered it, but the sofa—a different one—was in the same place, and I was already feeling the grip of nostalgia. And then Marcia came in, and I was lost.
She was older, of course. She was not the girl of my memory, radiant with youthful beauty. And yet she was. Her smile was the same, her eyes held a familiar warmth. Her figure, if less slender, was still curvaceous and perfectly molded. And … she was dressed just as she had been that night, just as I had described on the phone. The woolen sweater, the skirt … the ribbon in her dark hair …
“Marcia!”
“Hello, Steven.” She smiled that smile, and came up to me. I leaned to kiss her hello, but our lips met, and clung. My head was swimming when we parted.
Marcia backed up and pirouetted for me. “Is this how you remember me, Steven?” she said. “Do I look all right?”
“God,” I said. “You’re beautiful. You look—” I took a breath to steady myself. “But Marcia—do you remember me? On the phone I thought—”
