Group Sex

by Ann Arensberg

  “Glaaargh,” said Frances, miming sudden death.

  “I won’t take Fred,” said Margaret, “and you can’t make me.

  Hammy started to laugh. In his congested state, it sounded more like choking than amusement. Frances reached over to pat him on the back. In a moment she was laughing, and so was Margaret. Ursula joined in last, but laughed the loudest. When Ruthanne opened the door, since no one had heard her knock, she found Hammy encircled by three hilarious ladies, one patting his back, another his hand, and the third his pate.

  Ruthanne waved at Frances until she caught her eye. Frances gave Hammy an extra pat and came to meet her. Ruthanne looked pale, as if she had bad news. Frances wondered what petty crisis was in the making. Had Panda rejected the sketches for her jacket? Had the copy editor left the Peace Corps memoirs in a taxi?

  “What’s the trouble, bean?” said Frances. “Tell me slowly.”

  “It’s a P,” said Ruthanne. “On the phone. It all came true.”

  “The king of spades?” asked Frances. “Or the queen?”

  “King,” said Ruthanne. “He says his name is Paul.”

  “Why would he lie?” said Frances, acting casual. “I’ll take it at my desk. The meeting’s over.”

  Telephone calls were used to make appointments. Paul Treat had never called Frances on the telephone. He had thought of her as a part of Madeline’s household; now he saw her as a separate person with a private life. What would she do if he asked for a secret meeting? She might agree to a meeting in a well-lit public place. Frances should have been racing to her office like an eager lover. Instead, she paused at the water fountain to have a drink. She stopped to read the fire-drill regulations and a notice announcing charter flights to Zurich. She was dragging her feet like a prisoner under trial returning to his place in the courtroom to hear the verdict. As she loitered, she was seized with a pang of pure nostalgia, as if her tenure at Harwood were already in the past. She loved the part of her job that resembled village life, orderly, gossipy, civil, and unsurprising. For the sake of their common work and the general good, she and her colleagues found ways to blend and think alike. They applauded each other’s maverick sparks of brilliance. Frances sensed that Paul Treat would disrupt this gracious structure. At rare, odd moments she had heard the voice of the Paul-Within-Her whispering that Frances and Harwood were not a perfect fit. She had thwarted and ignored this crafty inner demon, but an attachment to Paul would give it food and life.

  Paul spoke before Frances had barely said hello. “Get over here. Where are Madeline’s sleeping pills?”

  Frances sat down. Her tongue seemed to be tied. Whatever it was, Paul’s mission was not romantic.

  “Frances?” Paul’s tone was testy. “I’ve got to find the pills.” It was only the second time he had used her name. “They’re not in the bathroom. Or on the bedside table. I’ve had it. I don’t need this aggravation.”

  “Pills,” answered Frances, like a gifted parrot.

  “I mean it,” said Paul. “You get your ass in gear.”

  “I’m at work,” said Frances.

  “Thanks a lot,” said Paul. “Do you want me to sit around and let her take them?”

  The line went dead. Frances stared at the telephone. She forgot to replace the receiver for several moments. For several more, she sat in her chair like a statue. Frances never resisted a plea for aid and service. Why wasn’t she tearing out the door and grabbing a taxi? Was Madeline expiring, even as she sat there? Sinking onto piles of pillows edged with lace? This spiteful vision shamed her into action. What kind of weasel had wicked thoughts in an emergency? What kind of person had thoughts at all when help was needed? Frances scribbled a note to Ruthanne, who had gone to lunch. She ran to the lobby, where the elevator doors were opening.

  Like all row houses, Madeline’s house was poorly lit. There were windows at the front and back, but none on the sides. Electric lights were needed in the mornings, as well as in the longest days of summer. Frances arrived at forty-five minutes past noon. When she opened the door, the house was dark and silent. Where was the ambulance? Where were the paramedics? A lifesaving squad created no small commotion. She flew up the stairs and burst into Madeline’s room. The room was empty. The bedclothes were smooth and tidy. The bathroom adjoining the bedroom was clean and vacant. Madeline’s nightgown was hanging behind the door. Had the rescue team collected the pills and mopped up the vomit? Bagged Madeline in plastic, as naked as the day she was born? Where was Paul, the sorrowing swain, now bereft of his backer? Was he lying in an upper room, following her example? Frances was frightened. If she found him, how could she lift him? How could she carry him and force him to walk off the poison? Frances was not only frightened, but resentful. This is what came of consorting with theatre people. They lived their lives under spotlights. Nothing was private. Suicide attempts got headlines in the papers. Bad publicity was better than no publicity at all.

  Frances was running short of selfless zeal. Before it ran out, she was obliged to search the house. There were two rooms left to check on the second floor, the extra bath and Madeline’s book-lined study. There was no one in the tub behind the shower curtain. There was nobody sprawled across the knee-hole desk. The closet was crammed with papers and filing boxes. Some fell on her head. She did not pick them up. She started to climb the stairs to the third-floor landing. As she reached the highest stair, all hell broke loose. In fact, hell had been tuning up for several seconds, coinciding with the rain of boxes from the closet shelves.

  From one of the guest rooms came a grisly din. In a wooden house, the din would have shaken the rafters. Pieces of furniture were sliding and colliding. Were mirrors or windows popping out of their frames? Was a bird caught inside that made this frantic flapping? A very large bird, the size of a Western condor? Frances heard another crash and a nameless clanging. She could hear them in the pit of her stomach and the soles of her feet. Madeline had threatened suicide, not murder. Suicide was a sedentary venture. Someone who had taken pills was limp and feeble, too weak to be the agent of that clamor.

  Frances was brave enough to hunt for corpses. She did not want to tangle with animate malefactors. They, or he, had a heavy tread. Was he wearing boots? Were they kicking the chairs to pieces, or each other? Why would a pack of thieves smash up the guest room? Madeline’s silver was stored in a chest in the pantry. Frances crouched down and tried to plug her ears. Thieves, like suicides, plied their trade in silence. They did not call attention to their deeds by screaming, at a pitch that was rarely reached by human lungs. Frances backed down two steps and froze in place. What if the screams were made by nothing living? What if the house was beset by noisy ghosts, haunting the spot where Madeline had met her doom? Poltergeists sometimes camped in a single chamber; more often they usurped whole households, room by room. Poltergeists made bad landlords for human tenants. They harassed their tenants, plotting their eviction. They hoisted them up and shook them in unseen fists; they stuck out an unseen foot and sent them sprawling. They made floorboards move like a rubber conveyor belt. They enjoyed sending streams of blood gushing down the staircase.

  Frances was poised for flight when she heard a shout, a masculine bellow followed by a female shriek. Poltergeists were good at faking human voices. She noticed, as she listened, that their language was quite profane. She wondered how they had learned such modern swearwords. Was “ball-breaker” a term that was known to ancient ghosts? Or did Frances put ghosts, incorrectly, into period costume? She heard a spate of words that began with f. The voices were familiar now. PolterPaul and PolterMadeline.

  Frances jumped to her feet in anger and kicked the stair rail. She ran to the room that housed the fracas and kicked the door. She kicked again. The medley of howls grew louder. To the uproar was added the sound of running water. Frances hopped on one foot. Her toes hurt. The pain helped to clear her head. It was just as painful to discover she had been a patsy. Madeline never took pills. She had the gagging reflex. Sh
e did not even eat chewy foods for fear of choking. Paul and Madeline were co-producing a steamy drama. They were at loggerheads about the dénouement. Madeline wanted a romantic resolution. She had used threats of pills to expedite that plotline. Paul did not want the lovers wed by final curtain. He had decided to triangulate the action. If he brought on another character—i.e., Frances—she could step in and throw the plot off course. If Paul had offered her a starring role, she might have taken it. She had no inclination to play the second lead. She did not want to watch a preview or a performance. Left to herself, she would not have purchased seats.

  Frances stood at the guest-room door massaging her foot. The ruckus inside had dwindled to a murmur. An amorous murmur, marked by suggestive laughter. The water stopped running. Perhaps they had climbed into the tub. If they started to fight in the bathtub, Paul might drown her. Or she might drown Paul. With luck, they might drown each other. Frances had earned her lifesaving badge at camp. They would not get the benefit of her special knowledge. Should she let them drown, or burst in and surprise them? Which would hurt worse, death or humiliation? People who had their taste for flagrant conduct would not feel disgraced by being caught in action. They would laugh at Frances and flaunt their lumps and bruises. And what if she opened the door on the Scene of Scenes? Would they ask her to join them, or grind away unmindful? One thing was certain with pigs like Paul and Madeline: They would not try to save her face or spare her feelings.

  Hypocritical Frances. Her heart was black as coal. She had worked herself into a fine-haired righteous swivet. She had censured Paul and Madeline for lust and excess, and considered doing excessive things with Paul. There was no health in her; she had coveted her landlady’s beau. Worse still, she had imagined that he might covet her. Who would covet a lowly worm, however tow-haired? A worm should be seen, not heard. A worm conforms. Frances had tried to rise above her station. She had tried to borrow spirit and height from Paul. She might never reach his height in her only lifetime. Paul Treat was an artist, and Frances Girard was a clerk.

  Frances climbed Madeline’s stairs to Madeline’s garret. She emptied Madeline’s closet and Madeline’s drawers. She vacuumed Madeline’s rugs and dusted her furniture. She mopped her floors and waxed her kitchen linoleum. She stripped the bed and folded Madeline’s sheets. She put the sheets in the hamper with Madeline’s towels. She packed her own belongings in a suitcase. The suitcase had been a hand-me-down from Madeline. She wrote a check for the rent, but she left no note. She propped the check on the mantelpiece, in plain view. Her winter coat took up too much room in the suitcase. She decided to wear it, as well as her fur-lined boots.

  The suitcase was heavy. She slid it as far as the landing. She bumped it down the first flight of stairs and paused at the guest room. She listened at the guest-room door. Paul and Madeline were quiet. Had they left the house, alerted by the roar of the Hoover? Or were they lying in bed, sleeping the sleep of the sated? Frances had been packing and cleaning for an hour and a half. In that interval a couple might have joined and rejoined six times. Sliding and bumping, Frances carried her bag two more flights. She got out her key ring and pulled off Madeline’s house keys. She left them in a bowl on the table with the morning mail. She stepped outside. She closed Madeline’s front door behind her. The weather was hot. It was more like August than June. People would stare at Frances in her coat and boots. She deserved their stares. She deserved their smiles and jeers. She deserved to walk thirty blocks carrying her suitcase, passing by buses waiting for the light at bus stops, ignoring the empty taxis that slowed down and honked. She deserved the blisters on her heels and the cramps in her hands, and the spots in front of her eyes from the glaring heat. In fact, her penance was lighter than she deserved. She should have had bigger blisters and sharper cramps.

  Edie Childs asked no questions when Frances arrived at her door. She put Frances to bed in a cool, dim room with the blinds drawn. She brought her cold water and told her to sip it slowly. She sponged her forehead with a washcloth soaked in cologne. Frances slept like a stone between linen sheets smooth with age. The next morning, Edie brought her her favorite breakfast on a tray: coffee with boiled milk and an egg fried as stiff as a wallet. When Frances tried to get up, Edie pressed her down. Frances slept through the day and dreamed no dreams worth recording. Once she heard Edie hushing Hill Childs when he talked too loudly. In the evening, Edie woke her with soup and crackers for supper, and the news that she had found her an apartment. A colleague of Hill’s had been sent for a year to Denmark. The apartment, which was furnished, came with a black-and-white cat. Edie unfolded an enormous damask napkin and tucked it over Frances’s collar, like a bib. “Your problems are solved,” she said as she straightened the covers. “Now you can have your little collapse in peace.”

  Frances was as weak as any convalescent. She followed orders and stayed in bed all weekend. She dozed and read and listened to the life of the household: early meals, church on Sunday, and sherry after the service. There was much to be said for an orderly, well-run household. Frances’s life could be orderly, too, if run by Edie. With Edie in charge, her life could be as peaceful as a sickroom. Soon Edie would submit a bill for private nursing, and Frances would return it, stamped and paid in full. The payment would consist of: the story of Madeline’s “suicide” (reported in minutest detail, many times over); a season of Saturday lunches and daily phone calls; and dinners with friends of Hill’s who were still unwed. Edie’s yoke was heavy; Paul’s would have been no easier. With Edie, Frances knew where the harness pinched. She adjusted her pace to keep the weight evenly balanced. Paul’s pace was too fast. His frame was built for distance. Fastened to Paul, would she not grow lame and footsore? Fastened to Edie, however, her limbs might wither. Living by Edie’s code, she lived a worm’s life. Who, or what, could she be had she kept in step with Paul? Paul saw through her, where Edie saw her own reflection. What had Paul seen—someone bold, inspired, and restless? Someone lonely and gifted, whose gifts, once uncovered, might prosper? With Paul in the lead, her stride might have lengthened and quickened. If Paul had prevailed, the worm might well have turned.

  Frances had found a new beau, who was also an author. He had won the Harwood Prize for Younger Poets. He was thin, as a poet should be, and had insomnia. He subsisted on nuts and fruit, like the creatures of the field. He was gentle and good and shy of other people. He built bookshelves for Frances’s apartment and painted them himself. He enjoyed taking walks. He enjoyed staring out of the window. When he stayed overnight, he kept to his side of the bed. Sometimes Frances woke up and found him at the kitchen table, writing down lines that had come to him as he lay sleepless. He wrote very slowly. He scratched out as much as he wrote. There were days when he labored, hunched over, to find one right word. Edie approved of her poet, who had lovely manners, and remembered to put on socks when he came for dinner. Frances admired him and found his companionship restful. Even when he was working, he took up so little space. He would bring her his poems and ask her permission to read them. He read standing up, while Frances stretched out on the couch. His poems were simple. They were set in a rough, northern landscape, at three seasons of the year—he never wrote about summer. There were birds in his poems, and plants, but very few people. If people were introduced, they were harming creation, setting fires, cutting trees, or diverting streams and rivers. Frances listened with attention. With closed eyes, she could listen better. She liked the poems, but at times they made her peevish. She would long for some drama, color, riot, or magic. Why didn’t they flash on and off or glow in the dark? Why couldn’t they walk on stilts, or bark like seals? Why weren’t they painted like a rainbow, or wired for sound? It wasn’t the fault of her kindly, serious poet. The fault was Paul Treat’s; he had spoiled her for peaceful scenes.

  Several months later her poet departed for Iowa, leaving nothing behind him except for his well-crafted bookshelves. He promised to send her a poem about their alliance. When he did, its centra
l image was sooty snowdrifts. There was snow on the sidewalks to go with the snow in the poem. The pavements were scorching when Frances had last seen Paul Treat. Through the cold and the sleet, Frances went to the Mercer Place Theatre where A Midsummer Night’s Dream was still playing to boisterous audiences. She waited outside the stage door when the curtain went down. Sometimes she sat through the play, all five acts and nine scenes. Very soon she would catch sight of Paul. He might notice her first. She had made no fixed plan and had memorized no prepared speech. She was taking a risk in defiance of sense and tranquillity. Would he run to her side or pass by without deigning to greet her? Was she equal to losing him? What would she do if she found him? She asked these vexed questions while making her way to the lobby, where a crowd was forgathering to stretch their legs during intermission. Did that man up the aisle by the doors, who was turning her way, have Paul’s height and Paul’s beard? Or perhaps he was thinner and taller? In case it was Paul, she took cover behind a fat woman. She peeked over the woman’s fur collar. Paul had already seen her. She was sunk. She was saved. Paul was striding remorselessly toward her. He swept down the aisle, scattering his public like pigeons. Frances took a step back, crushing somebody’s toes with her heel. With the houselights full up, Paul reached out his arms and engulfed her.

  II

  GROUP SEX

  FRANCES AND PAUL WERE arguing over the source of Pom Foster’s nickname.

  “It’s from Winnie-the-Pooh,” said Frances. “‘The more it snows, tiddely-pom, the more it goes, tiddely-pom, on snowing.’”

  Paul had decided that Pom was baby talk for Pamela. Frances was holding out for A. A. Milne. They were two hours southwest of Boston, clearing Hartford on Route 91, after the champagne christening of Pom and Toby Foster’s baby, Joshua. They had left the party early because Frances had seen pure evil in Paul’s blue eyes. She knew that look. Once, at a hamburger palace called The Hippo, they sat waiting twenty minutes for some service. Suddenly, Paul had bellowed like the restaurant’s wild namesake. The owner, the manager, and two waitresses came running, but that had not made up, to Frances, for the stares and whispers and hasty exits.