Never Too Late for Love

by Warren Adler

  The idea of confessing must have surfaced in his subconscious during the night after his visit to the doctor, because when he awoke the following morning, there was no debate raging within him. The decision was made; he would confess. He would tie up those last loose ends of his life.

  He put on his bathrobe and went into the kitchen, where his wife, Rachel, was busy making coffee. They shared most household chores, and it was Arnold's job to make the English muffins. He put them in the broiler and watched them brown, pats of butter melting and running over their ridged surfaces.

  "I'm about to tell you something Rachel," he said, looking at the muffins as he lifted them from the broiler with a spatula. "I'm about to make a full confession." He sensed that his wife hesitated briefly as she poured the coffee, but it did not deter him.

  "I've been unfaithful," he said, finally turning toward her as he put the muffins on the small Formica surface where they had their breakfast. She continued to fill the cups with steaming coffee, then sat down, busying her hands with mixing the cream and sugar into her cup. She kept her eyes averted, concentrating on her task at hand. He knew she wouldn't look at him now, not directly, until he finished what he had to say. That was her way. She was a pouter, and her anger smoldered rather than erupted. He sat beside her, sipped his coffee, and started on his muffins.

  "Just don't say anything until I've finished," he said, biting off a tiny bit of muffin and washing it down with coffee.

  "Jam?" she asked, moving the jar of blueberry jam toward him.

  "It started when I worked in the Vogue Shoe Store on Kingston Avenue," he said. "We must have been married seven years. Believe me, Rachel, I never looked at another woman until then. But you were having those terrible headaches and, let's face it, I had certain needs." He looked up briefly. She was sipping her coffee quietly.

  "We're different, you and I," he continued. "You could take it or leave it--mostly leave it--but I was going crazy. She was Charlie Weinstein's wife. They owned the store, and Sherry Weinstein was helping with the books and the stocks."

  Arnold paused, spooning a pat of jam on his muffin. He noticed that the spoon shook as he felt a faint stab of chest pain. He wondered if he was getting another attack, but it passed quickly. He finished his muffin and washed it down with coffee.

  "She seduced me. I swear it. Charlie was on a buying trip in Manhattan, so we were alone in the store, and while I was checking the stock in the back, she came over and grabbed me. At first, I pushed her away. She knew I was a married man. You remember, we once met her on the street. But she seduced me, and since you had started having those headaches and I couldn't go near you, I was busting."

  They stood up from the table and moved the soiled dishes to the sink. Rachel rinsed and he dried. He didn't look at her, wondering if she was crying. Sometimes she cried quietly.

  "It went on for six months. Then she started to get too attached, and I wasn't going to give up my family. There was no way that I ever was going to give up my family. You know that, Rachel. No way. There was a terrible scene when I quit. Charlie couldn't understand it. I was the best shoe salesman they ever had. My commissions were the highest of anyone in the history of the store. You know that. That was the year we bought the Buick. But Sherry made one terrible scene right in front of Charlie, calling me an ungrateful bastard for giving up the opportunity they had given me. I never told you what I went through, Rachel. I was so filled with guilt and remorse that I could barely stand it."

  He felt a lump gather in his throat and his voice cracked, but he felt better for having said it. She might as well know everything, Arnold thought.

  When they finished washing the dishes, he followed her into the bedroom and they began to make the beds, he standing on one side, she on the other. He looked up at her and saw her lips pursed tight, her eyes concentrated on the movement of the sheets and blankets.

  "Hand me the pillow," she said. They tucked the bedspread under the pillows and rolled it above them, smoothing the sides.

  "There was no chance that she was going to break up our marriage. All right, so you weren't very sexy and I was. That wasn't everything. After a while, you can get used to anything. I wish I could have gotten used to it. But then, remember when I got that job selling the Debbie line in Macy's. One day a woman comes in, a small Italian woman with long black hair. I'll never forget the first time. She came in and insisted that she wore a size three. She had very small, well-made feet, but when I measured her, she was actually a four. 'You're a four,' I told her. I mean, I knew women were vain about their feet, but there was no way that I could have stretched a three or a three-and-a-half onto her feet, so I told her straight out that she was a four. 'I said three,' she insisted. 'No way,' I told her again. But she was really insistent so I went to the stockroom and brought out a size three in two different styles and wrestled with her feet for a while. Maybe it was the way I handled her feet. She also was married and wore a ring, as I did. I would never pretend I was anything but married. It was an act of faith with me Rachel. An act of faith."

  Rachel went into the bathroom to use the shower first, while Arnold vacuumed the apartment. As he passed the mirror, he shut off the vacuum cleaner and looked at his face. Over his lips was a thin film of sweat, which he wiped away with a tissue. This is the toughest thing I've ever done in my life, he thought to himself, sensing the anguish he must be causing her and wondering if things would ever be the same between them again. But he had to tell her. They had been married forty-eight years. My God, where did it all go? He wondered if he would ever make it to his fiftieth anniversary.

  When Rachel had finished in the bathroom, he went in, showered, shaved, and dressed. She was sitting in the living room when he emerged, stonefaced, reading the newspaper. It has to be said, he wanted to tell her, but he was afraid it would hurt her more if he put it that way. Better to be forthright. Just let it come out, he decided, steeling himself for the recriminations. "See what a damned liar your husband has been!" he wanted to cry out.

  He picked up the shopping list, which they had prepared together the night before, from the top of the television set, and she followed him out to the car. He welcomed the idea of doing something that required being watchful and looking straight ahead. She sat beside him, silently, listening. Occasionally, he imagined that he could hear her sigh.

  "Could you imagine? Her name was Concetta, and I used to meet her at her apartment in Greenwich Village about three times a week, before I got to work. It was on those days that I didn't start until twelve--only you didn't know that. I was crazy taking chances like that.

  "Her husband was a garbage man, and he usually left the place at five a.m. She lived on the ground-floor apartment and always left the door open for me. She had a kid, a boy, but he was always in school when I got there. If there was any problem, she would simply keep the door locked and I knew to stay away. I liked her Rachel, I really liked her, but luckily she was a Catholic and there was no chance that she would endanger either of our marriages. I know I should rot in hell for what I did, Rachel. But what was I supposed to do? I wanted you. But you were having cramps, or headaches, or were too nervous or too tired or the kids had gotten you down. I'm not making excuses. I really wanted you to want me." He swallowed deeply and didn't notice the speed bump in the street, and they lurched as he sped over it.

  "Be careful!" Rachel squealed as her head knocked the ceiling of the car.

  "Did you hurt yourself?"

  "You'd better watch where you're going," she said, the words ejaculating in a hiss that revealed her pain and anger. I have got to tell her, he vowed, pressing on with his story.

  "There's another thing I never told you," he said, the muscles in his throat constricting. "I don't know how to tell you this. It sounds so terrible, even when I say it to myself. But I masturbated a lot in those years. I couldn't help myself. I was young. I had needs. I used to think that maybe I was abnormal, a sex maniac or something. Sometimes I masturbated two, thre
e times a day. Can you believe that? It made me feel dirty. How was I going to tell you what I was going through? Would you have understood?" He listened for some reaction, but none came.

  "You weren't interested. You could take it or leave it--and you left it, mostly. I wasn't bitter. I respected what you felt and, after a while, I stopped pressing the point. Sometimes you would say it: 'Arnie, what's the matter? You getting old? You got a girlfriend?' Well, my girlfriend was Madame palm and her five sisters." How obscene, he thought, ashamed of the crude joke.

  "It wasn't that I was a philanderer, Rachel. I was emotionally involved only twice." He hadn't quite expected it to come out that way. He paused as he searched the parking lot of the supermarket for a space. The traffic was heavy and they had to circle the lot several times before they found a place to park.

  In the supermarket, they split the list and went their separate ways with their separate baskets, meeting, as they always had, near the first checker, where they unloaded the two baskets together.

  "How are things with the Golds?" asked the checker, a large woman whose glasses slipped down to the tip of her nose.

  "How are you Helen?" Rachel asked pleasantly, but with an edge that told Arnold she was putting on a front.

  "You're looking good, Helen," Arnold said, as they waited for her to make the change and pack the bags, which they wheeled in a cart across the parking lot before loading them into the car. Then they headed back to Sunset Village.

  "When they made me assistant buyer, they had a cashier at the store named Judy Farber. She was eighteen, a pretty little thing. I think I was thirty-six then, because I made a big thing about being twice her age. She would kid me a lot about it, calling me 'old man.' Imagine at thirty-six being-called 'old man.' We used to take our lunch hours together and, after we ate, we'd take walks down thirty-fourth street when the weather was good. I swear, Rachel, I wasn't looking for trouble. After Concetta, I had vowed that I would never be unfaithful again. Who needed it? I had you. I had our kids. I had a nice life. We had just moved to that new place on Empire Boulevard and had bought a lot of furniture on time, and I had to take another job to pay it off. You remember. I worked Saturdays at that shoe store on Flatbush Avenue. You used to tell me not to work so hard, and I used to say I had to or we couldn't pay these things off? Actually, it's a wonder I didn't have a heart attack then."

  He maneuvered the car through the Village gates, waving at the guard and slowing down to take the bump, then headed toward their court.

  "I'm really ashamed of this, Rachel," he said, pausing. "She was a virgin. She lived with her family in the Bronx, and since we lived in Brooklyn, I couldn't see her very much at first. Neither of us had any money, and there was barely any way to enjoy any real intimacy. We necked and petted in the stock room, or in doorways. A couple of times, we went to the movies and sat in the last row. Christ, its embarrassing to tell you this."

  Arnold was silent as he drove the car into their court and carefully edged it between the white lines of their parking space. They both carried groceries into the house and began to load them into the cabinets and refrigerator.

  "I think you forgot the soda," Rachel said. He went out to the car and found the six pack of soda on the floor behind the front seat and brought it into the house.

  "This cheese is moldy," Arnold said, sniffing a package that he was about to put in the dairy drawer of the refrigerator.

  "I never saw so much spoilage in my life," Rachel said.

  "We'll take it back tomorrow."

  When they finished putting away the groceries, they went into their bedroom to put on their bathing suits. They tried to get to the pool before one o'clock each day, so as to get chaise lounges that would allow them to take advantage of the sun late into the afternoon.

  While they changed into their suits, he began again.

  "It wasn't until we discovered that a friend of Judy's had an apartment, a cold water flat in a brownstone, in the forties, that we really found a way to be together. It cost us $5 a week; her friend was really hard up. I used to get there at about seven o'clock every morning. You were always asking why I had to go in so early when the store didn't open until ten. Sometimes it was pitch dark when I left the house. Well, it was Judy Farber. You know, I can barely remember her face. I try sometimes and it just fades away. I was thirty-six years old, and she was a virgin."

  He watched as Rachel smoothed her gray hair and wrapped it in a kerchief. Her profile was still sharply etched, though flesh had acccumulated under her chins and her jowls had fallen. As he studied her, she moved away to the kitchen and began making lunch.

  "You want a tuna-fish sandwich?" she called from the kitchen.

  "Again?"

  "What about bologna?"

  "Not too much mustard," he answered.

  He put on his cabana jacket, slipped into his sandals and went into the kitchen. When she had finished making the sandwiches, he cut them lengthwise, put them on plates, and filled their glasses with ice cubes. Rachel poured the soda, and they sat down at the table.

  "They say its kosher, but it tastes like goyishe bologna," Rachel said, through a mouthful of sandwich.

  "It's not that bad," he shrugged, chewing slowly and washing it down with a gulp of soda.

  "I'll tell you what was really odd about my relationship with Judy Farber," Arnold broke in headlong. "She didn't like sex that much either. Can you believe that? I would meet her every morning--nearly every day but Sunday--and two out of three times, she complained of cramps, or headaches, or feminine problems." He laughed, not looking at Rachel but knowing that her lips were fixed tightly again, the corners drooping. He wondered if her eyes had misted but dared not look into her eyes.

  "'Maybe it's because I feel so guilty,' she would tell me. 'Well, how do you think I feel?' I would ask her. Me with a family, a wife, responsibilities. Actually, I hated being involved with her--emotionally, that is. You didn't know it, Rachel, and I doubt if you could possibly understand, but I thought I was going to go crazy. Besides, I was exhausted--holding down two jobs, getting up early every morning, fighting the subway crowds at night, and working all day Saturday. Not to mention that I was on my feet all day. I felt like hell. I looked like hell. To make matters worse, if that was possible, she wanted me to leave you and marry her. The pressure was unbearable, especially since I had convinced myself that I was madly in love with her. I know this is all confusing to you, Rachel. Actually, we came that close," he said, holding up two fingers sideways, with just an air of space between them. "That close."

  He shook his head and the image of Judy Farber's face rose clearly to the surface of his mind for the first time in more than thirty-five years. Actually, he had seen her again a few years after their affair ended; she was married and had two kids in tow. And she had started to get fat. She gave him a big hello, with a wet smacking kiss on his cheek, as if he was some long-lost uncle.

  Arnold and Rachel got back into the car and drove to the pool, finding that someone was occupying their usual place. Disappointed, they moved to the other end of the pool.

  "So, we'll go home earlier" Rachel said, apathetically.

  "Might be a good idea. There's a new movie at the seven-plex, with Jack Nicholson."

  "We'll see," she said, smearing oil on her skin. He turned his back and she splattered some oil on him. Then she turned her back and he rubbed some on her. When she sat down, she pulled out her knitting and began to twirl wool through her fingers. He put a paperback book on his lap, a mystery novel. He liked mysteries, so much so that one side of his bedroom was literally piled high with a collection. But today, he kept the book closed on his lap.

  "I vowed, Rachel," he went on. "I swear, I vowed that never again would I get involved with another woman. My family meant more to me than anything. You meant more to me. That might be hard to believe right now, but you did." He listened to the clickety click of knitting needles. Occasionally, someone they knew would walk by and they would nod the
requisite greeting. They weren't part of any particular group. Neither of them played cards. And Rachel wasn't much of a joiner. Besides, the yentas were too gossipy.

  "I don't want to be in their pot," Rachel had said.

  Arnold hadn't made any friends. But then he had never made any friends. Actually, he thought now, the only friends he had ever had outside of his wife and kids were women.

  "Yet I didn't feel like a philanderer. It was as if your lack of enthusiasm about me, at least sexually, was a kind of permission. Only a man could understand that. Anyway, I vowed I would never again get messed up with any women, and I actually didn't for maybe ten years. Not that I didn't occasionally have a little nosh. There was always something around. Sometimes I even went with prostitutes. Look, I might as well tell you everything. Why should I leave anything out? But it used to scare the hell out of me that I might be picking up a disease. You would have killed me if I brought home a disease. You can't imagine how I worried. I was always worried about something. With Judy, I worried I would be making her pregnant. With the other women, I worried about bringing home a disease. Sometimes I worried that someone would tell you, and I don't think I could have taken the pressure in those days. I was very proud that I never once brought you home a problem, never once gave you cause to doubt my faithfulness as a good husband and a good father."

  He wanted to reach out and touch her arm, but he held back. She continued to concentrate on her knitting, the needles clicking, her fingers working swiftly. He knew that she was listening, that she was agitated, by the extraordinary speed of her work.

  "I can't even remember some of the names. Then, when I went to work for Gimbels, I met this woman, Dolly Schwartz. She worked in toys, and I met her when I went to buy a toy for Alan. There's poetic justice! I go to buy a toy for our first grandchild, and I meet Dolly Schwartz. She was good-looking, big and tall, with a full figure." He checked himself. Was it necessary to be so graphic, he wondered, remembering how much he had enjoyed the sight and feel of Dolly Schwartz's tits. They were so big and full, with huge red nipples, like little statues in a pond. He had buried his head in them, kissed them, sucked them. God, how could any man on earth ever forget Dolly Schwartz's tits? And how she loved to have them touched and looked at, how proud she was of them. He felt a rare surge in his loins. It had been a long time since he had thought of Dolly Schwartz.