The Sunset Gang

by Warren Adler

  "Mr. Feinstein?"

  "Yes."

  "I found this outside the door."

  "They didn't put it in the mailbox?"

  "How should I know?" she said. Then she went down the elevator, found her tricycle and pedalled home.

  She was sticky from perspiration when she got into her condominimum. Also she felt silly and decided that was enough looking for one day. She took the addresses, put them on her dresser, changed into her bathing suit, and went off to the pool, where Minnie and their friends were sitting around squinting under big hats, talking about their children and grandchildren. She lay back and dozed. Their words floated repetitiously in the air.

  When she opened her eyes again the sun had shifted, throwing long shadows across one half of the pool. Occasionally an announcement of someone's name would blare over the loudspeaker system. They only allowed one announcement per person per day to cut down on the cacophony. Rising, she went to the edge of the pool and dipped her feet into the water, now warm from the intensity of the sun.

  Her eyesight was remarkable considering her years and, being slightly farsighted, she had a longer range of vision than most of her friends. That was why from her vantage point, she was able to see the faces across the pool with uncommon clarity. Again she imagined, since she dared not believe it was actually him, she saw him, full-face now, squinting into the sun which was coming over her shoulder. He was standing, flaying his arms, in some personal form of exercise, a common sight. She felt the blood surging in her heart, the beat amplified in her chest as she lifted her feet out of the water and circled to the edge of the shadows to observe the man more closely. He was bald, gray--where there was still hair. His skin was not quite tan enough to be the badge of the longtime resident, but in the way he moved, despite the thickness around his middle, she detected a familiarity, even an intimacy as she mentally stripped him of his bathing trunks and visualized the still-familiar outline of his rump and what hung in front of him. She looked around her to see if anyone had read her thoughts, then walked slowly toward the pay telephone. She found the dimes she kept in the pocket of her bathing suit and dialed the Sunset Village Clubhouse.

  "Will you page Mr. Harvey Feinstein. He's out by the pool."

  In the pause that followed she closed her eyes tightly, wishing, hoping it was him, trusting in the vividness of her memory. It was, after all, more than half a century since she had last seen him. Then the name blared over the speaker system with a grating, tremulous, unmistakable sound. She saw him stir suddenly, then look about him and upward in the direction of the sound. A woman who had been reclining near him also stirred, sitting up abruptly, a trace of fear in her face. At their stage of life, with their progeny spread all over the country, every telephone call brought a stab of anxiety. The man looked at the woman and shrugged, then searched, a hand over his eyes to shield the sun, for the phone box which coincidentally was next to Frieda. She turned slightly, hiding her face, pressing downward to break the connection. Her knees shook as she felt his presence, so close that she imagined she could smell the scent of his body, another lingering memory.

  "This is Harvey Feinstein," he said into the phone, the intonation clear as it was in her memory.

  "Hung up, you say. Did they leave a message?"

  She turned only after he hung up, watching the familiar walk or the familiar walk that was encased in an older man's body. He had once been slender, lithe, had had youthful energy. But it was him, unmistakably--Harvey Feinstein. She felt a gasp in her throat as if deep within her she was hungering to reveal her presence.

  "It's me, Frieda," she wanted to cry out. When she had got herself under control, she went back to where her friends were sitting.

  "Who did you call?" Minnie asked.

  "The dentist," she said, barely audible. "I've got a toothache."

  "Frieda. You're becoming a kvetch." Minnie laughed.

  But she had lain back and put a straw hat over her face through which, between broken straws, she could view Harvey Feinstein with more leisure. He was sitting at the foot of the beachchair on which the woman had been reclining, talking to her and looking at the phone. His wife, surely, she thought as she tried to gather a more complete picture of the woman, a bleached blonde with still a good figure. When she stood up Frieda could see that her thighs were starting to wizen, an image that despite her self-admonishment gave Frieda pleasure. She did not admit, even to herself, that something else had given her pleasure, a quiver in another place, down there. The signs were quite physical, rather frightening in a woman of her years, although from the talk of the yentas she knew that the yearnings were still active, even actively pursued and proudly acclaimed.

  "My Max, you'd think he was fourteen years old. He won't let me alone."

  "You're lucky," some widow would invariably say. "Stop complaining."

  "Who's complaining?" the lucky one would say.

  "If he has any left over, I know somewhere he could use it."

  "It's all right. He knows where his bread is buttered."

  When she came back from the pool, she looked at her body in the full-length mirror, something she had not done in years, and surveyed what time had done. There was a roundness to her belly and hips, and her breasts, although pendulous, still retained, in her view at least, a certain fullness around the nipples, which she was surprised to see were erect. There were crenulations around her buttocks and thighs, but considering the shape of her peers, the only logical yardstick of comparison, she might still consider herself womanly.

  The next day, she was up early and off to the bank, where she withdrew $1500 from her $6000 savings account and took the Sunset Village bus to the Poinsettia Beach Shopping Center. There, she bought three new dresses, two pantsuits, and a whole different line of make-up, the use of which was patiently explained by a blue-haired older woman with two-inch eyelashes. Then she went to the beauty parlor and had her hair dyed as close to its original color as possible, a kind of chestnut. The hairdresser frizzed it around the edge of her face, insisting that she looked twenty years younger.

  "You couldn't make it thirty?" she joked.

  "Got a young boy friend?" the hairdresser minced.

  "Seventeen."

  "Sounds divine."

  That evening after she had eaten a salad and was feeling quite good about her will power, she fiddled with the contents of the vials and tubes and pencils and put on her new make-up and carefully did herself up, satisfied that she had done the best she could with what she had--which wasn't much after sixty-eight years. But she did feel girlish. She felt young and that was the important thing. She put on her new pink pantsuit over a new girdle that held her in, a little too snugly she realized, but soon her diet would be working and it wouldn't be as uncomfortable.

  "Miss America," Minnie said, when she saw her.

  "I'm changing my image."

  She watched as Minnie surveyed her.

  "Be honest," Frieda said.

  "You look terrific. If I was a jealous woman, I'd be jealous."

  "But you are a jealous woman."

  "Then I'm jealous."

  On the way to the clubhouse, they sat on the little open-air trailer bus and she could feel Minnie's eyes on her.

  "You're looking for a man, aren't you, Frieda?" she asked gently.

  "What makes you think that?"

  "My eyes."

  Under her make-up and tan, Frieda knew she was blushing. She groped for something to put Minnie off the scent.

  "I'm in my second childhood."

  "One step from the home." To them the "home" was the next stop on the road to oblivion.

  In the clubhouse they found their usual card table and the canasta game began. She knew she couldn't concentrate. She surreptitiously searched the huge room, seeking out the face of Harvey Feinstein. Twice in the first hour she got up on the pretense of going to the ladies' room, conscious of the eyes of the men who turned her way, or so she imagined, since her new outfit and make-up a
nd hair job had made her somewhat of a central figure among her widowed canasta friends. She knew, too, that they were talking about her, probably discussing her strange behavior as a sign of senility, not uncommon in this place.

  There was no sign of Harvey Feinstein or his bleached-blond wife in the cardroom, in the lobby of the clubhouse, or in any of the special club and hobby rooms that lined the corridor adjacent to the cardroom.

  When she came back after the second time, she said, "I really can't concentrate tonight, girls. Something I ate." She lifted a palm to her chest in a gesture to validate her imaginary heartburn.

  They grumbled, of course, and she could see Minnie's lips tighten though they called after her to feel better. But she wasn't listening. Her eyes were like two searchlights scanning the crowd. It had never occurred to her how much older people looked alike and how difficult it was to find one particular person in this sea of tanned faces and bright clothes. She waited in the outer lobby of the auditorium, where some live show was going on, peeking inside when someone would open the door on their way to the bathroom. She calculated that she would have to wait until the show was over before she could make a proper inspection.

  There was, she knew, always the possibility that the Feinsteins had chosen to stay home that night and she was tempted to find their place and peek in the windows to make sure and save her all this energy. Walking into the quiet, gently warm night air, which was thick with the scent of tropical flowers, she moved around the back of the clubhouse to the shuffleboard courts, which were heavily in use, even at this hour. It was odd, she thought, how some people pursued their leisure as if it were hard work. She hated shuffleboard and couldn't understand why people, men and women both, were fascinated by it. She had planned to ignore it, giving the players only the most casual glance and deciding in her own mind that such an occupation would hardly be worthy of Harvey Feinstein--when she saw him.

  Calm down, Frieda, she told herself. Her objective was becoming quite clear to her. Her heart beat faster and her knees felt a bit unsteady as she walked toward the court on which he was playing, determined to display herself, to catch his eye, to insist that she be noticed. Pausing, she looked at her face in the hand mirror under the floodlights used to light the shuffleboard courts and proceeded to a place that would put her in contact with his vision. There was a bench directly behind the court on which he was playing. Moving toward it, she slowed down so as to catch his eye as he turned to prepare himself for his shots. Across the court she could see his bleached-blond wife, moving awkwardly as she attempted a shot in her husband's direction.

  Coming closer, she saw him turn and momentarily focus his eyes on her face, then move back to concentrate on his shot. He saw me, she assured herself, feeling fluttery and deliciously girlish although she did not see any flash of recognition.

  "You're terrific, Harvey," she heard the bleached blonde call. "Like you played this game on cruise ships."

  So he was not called Heshy anymore, Frieda thought, proud of her special knowledge. She stood behind him now, imagining that she appeared intent on watching the game and wondering quite seriously if there was such a thing as telepathy so that she might will herself into his thoughts. As she was thinking this, he turned and she forced herself to smile slightly, a gesture miraculously returned by him but so casual as to indicate his nonrecognition. His partner was a fat woman, whose chins shivered as she expended energy on her shot, her big hips and behind shaking visibly beneath her muumuu.

  "Not bad," Frieda said, making him turn. She could hardly just stand there watching them without making some sort of comment.

  "It's only my second time," he said.

  "You're a natural."

  She barely understood the game and, after a while, felt uncomfortable about just standing there like a pear ready to be plucked from a tree. The reference triggered her memory and gave her a momentary twinge of pleasure. Schmuck, this is Frieda, she told him urgently to herself. Stop that stupid game and notice.

  But he would not stop that stupid game and after watching a long time, she knew that she would have to catch him when he wasn't concentrating so hard.

  In bed that evening watching Johnny Carson, she pondered the ways in which she might catch Harvey Feinstein's eye. It was obvious, although she harbored secret feelings to the contrary, that his memories of her were too deeply embedded, so far beneath the surface of his consciousness that it would not be easy to dredge them up. She did not want to shock him with her presence, nor upset him, nor do something that would make him guilty or force his avoidance of her. Frieda Goldberg, she told herself, might have been many things, a cold domineering wife, a little overbearing as a mother, stubborn, independent, but not stupid. Frieda Goldberg was definitely not stupid.

  She was still pondering the method the next day as she lounged in a chair beside the pool watching the spot where Harvey Feinstein and his wife sat yesterday, wondering if her new bathing suit set her off well. She imagined she had lost weight. It was obvious to her that Minnie thought she was acting strangely.

  "You want to play tonight, Frieda?"

  "I'll see later."

  "You've got to give us time to get someone else."

  "I'll give you time."

  Without seeing, she knew that Minnie had turned away in disgust, rolling her eyes upward to indicate to their friends that something strange was going on in Frieda's head--which, of course, was true.

  When the bleached blonde walked across her field of vision, Frieda sat up alertly to see if Heshy was behind her. It was a peculiarity of this place for men to walk, or lag, behind their wives, and she waited patiently for a sign of him. When he did not appear after several minutes and the blonde had settled down to her ablutions, the smearing of the sun lotion, the tying of the kerchief, the adjusting of the lounge, the placement of the ashtray and the cigarettes beside it, she understood quite clearly what her method would be. She would reach Heshy Feinstein through his bleached-blond wife.

  Getting up casually, she strolled slowly to the pool next to the spot where the blonde was sitting and put her foot in the water.

  "Cold," Frieda squealed.

  "The water is cold?" the blonde asked.

  She now stood over the lounging woman, being sure not to block the sun. It was, she knew, a mark of politeness in this place.

  "It warms up later. Then it gets too hot. Like pishocks."

  The woman laughed. She had an even, good set of matching teeth, although the lines around her mouth were quite pronounced. From far she looks better, Frieda thought.

  "I saw you and your husband playing shuffleboard last night," Frieda said. She knew she was courting danger as being dubbed a yenta, but she hoped that the woman would take that role before she did.

  "You're very good players," she added after a pause.

  "Considering," the bleached blonde said, "we've just been here two weeks and this is only our second time." She seemed eager for friendship.

  "You like it here?"

  "Wonderful. Brooklyn was getting impossible. The schwartzes everywhere. We live in Flatbush."

  "They're everywhere now in Flatbush? I lived in Crown Heights. I'm here two years. Thank God, my daughter lives in Chicago."

  "You don't miss New York?"

  "You miss it?"

  She moved upright on the lounge, engaged at last. Frieda sat down at the foot of the chair, just as Heshy had sat the day before.

  "My children live there. And my grandchildren. It's not easy to break away. They both live on the Island. My boy is a dentist. And my daughter married a furrier. I figure that once a year they'll come here and once a year we'll go there. And their children will come for the holidays."

  "Everyone figures that."

  "My name is Frieda Smith," Frieda said, holding out her hand.

  "Ida Feinstein," she said, taking it gratefully.

  "I'm a widow."

  "I'm sorry."

  "Don't be sorry."

  "How long is
he gone?" Aha, Frieda thought, bracing for the interrogation, a true yenta.

  "Seven years."

  "There's a lot of widows here?"

  "You wouldn't believe it."

  "I'm so lucky to have my Harvey. He was a schoolteacher in the New York Public School System, in Forest Hills, which was lucky except for the long ride to Brooklyn. I used to worry myself sick. Thank God," she knocked her knuckles on the metal lounge, "he never had a problem."

  "He likes it here?"

  "Loves it. He doesn't like the hot sun so much. But he stays home, does the housework, the dishes, and reads. He'll come later. He taught biology. A very smart man. Not so sociable as I would like, but I'm sure he'll adjust."

  Frieda caught the tinge of regret, noting that Heshy was having a hard time adjusting to retirement. It was not uncommon.

  "You like to play cards?"

  "I love canasta. I miss my regular game. Also mah-jongg. I'm sure I'll find a regular game here," she said expectantly.

  "Ida," Frieda said, "you've come to the right store." She led her over to her friends and introduced her to Minnie and the others. Soon they were exchanging histories and information and Minnie was filling her in on the gossip, especially as it pertained to the new section in which the Feinsteins had just moved.

  "She'd be a perfect replacement," Frieda said after they had talked for a while.

  "A very attractive woman," Minnie said loudly enough for ingratiation. She could see Ida Feinstein beam.