Boys and Girls Together: A Novel

by William Goldman

  “No,” Esther screamed.

  Sid jammed his shoes on, buttoned his shirt, buttoned his fly, hands never once stopping until Esther said “No hospital.”

  Sid tried to take her hand and lift her from the bed but she fought him.

  “Esther, for God’s sake.”

  “No hospital!”

  “Es—”

  “Father might find out. Somebody else. No. No. Please don’t.”

  Sid grabbed her with all his might and pulled her into a sitting position. “Quit now.”

  “I don’t want people to know. Leave me here. Leave me here.”

  “Come.”

  “No. Please. Leave me be.”

  “Come.” Sid lifted her as well as he could, looping her arm around his shoulder, forcing them toward the door.

  “I want to die. I want to die.”

  Sid grabbed the front door, flung it open, started out along the corridor and down the stairs. The Dago woman next door appeared beside him but he shouted for her to get the hell away and she did as he took the stairs one at a time with Esther screaming every step, “No hospital, let me die, no hospital,” until suddenly she sagged semiconscious, just weight now, all fight gone. Sid staggered with her out onto the street praying for a cab and it worked, the driver helping to lift Esther inside, then breaking all records on the way to Michael Reese. When they reached the emergency ward Sid said, “My wife, miscarriage, miscarriage,” to whoever would listen and insisted on a private room for his beloved. As they started to wheel her away, Esther, who had staged a mild comeback, held his hand as long as possible. “Miscarriage,” Sid said to the wheeler, a young man in a white coat. “A private room. The best.” The white coat nodded. Sid indicated a desire for privacy and the white coat retreated. Sid bent to taste his wife’s pale lips. “Sleep, dumpling,” he whispered. “We killed it,” soft into his ear.

  “Sleep, dumpling,” Sid repeated, and he smiled. His was a helpful smile, a smile of reassurance.

  So why was she smiling back?

  As she awaited the arrival of the doctor, little Esther half dozed. The knotting pains of the bedroom were loosening now, and she was able to breathe again—a luxury. She remembered the piker yelling “Private room, private room” and that was something to look forward to. Also she had gone through, in her mind, those young interns and potential physicians she had known before E. Scrooge had worn her down, and none of them worked at Michael Reese, so she could relax on that score, confident that neither Maxwell Baum nor Tommy Sternman nor any of the other surgeons-to-be who pursued her on their nights off would come popping in and thereby provide her with an unnecessary humiliation. (Maybe the private room would have a view of the lake. In any case, she hoped it was wildly expensive; a little apoplexy would do Sid good.) Maxwell Baum and Tommy Sternman. Esther drifted. Doctors always appealed to her—more than lawyers, dentists, architects. The only trouble with doctors was it took so long before you started cashing in. The young goy pushing the wheelchair had looked at her with lust in his blue eyes, and that was flattering; if you could lure them at your worst, you were really something. That was what she was: a real something. Married to a real nothing, true, but everybody fumbles on occasion. The thought of divorce made her smile. In a month, probably, she would be looking herself again, and that was the time to make the move. Let Sid pay for the convalescence (do him good), then off to the races. Toot, toot, tootsie, goodbye. Let him crawl a little first, beg awhile (do him good), lead him on, let him think he’s still got a chance of keeping her, then out the door. Stick him for what she could on alimony (her smile broadened)—every penny. God knows she was deserving, living with the little letch the way she had. Esther began laughing softly but it hurt, so she stopped. Those pains. Never would she forget those pains. No matter what they told you about childbirth, it couldn’t be as bad. That Dr. Lautmann: some schlemiel of a surgeon he was. But that was typical; you marry a third-rater, you travel third class.

  An intern walked by.

  Esther returned his smile, watched him until he was gone. Tall, good head of hair, nice springy walk. Next time around, a doctor. Definitely. A surgeon; if possible, a specialist on the brain. If you made one thousand for an operation, and you did five operations a day, and you worked five days a week, that was ... mink for little Esther, that’s what it was. A mink coat and a mink stole and a mink blanket. A mink blanket? Did people have such things? She shrugged. Why not? Give one good reason. It would supply warmth; it would last and last, so it really wasn’t such an extravagance. No. In many ways, it was sensible. Her stomach began to hurt and she pressed down with her hands. Not so bad this time. The worst was over. The good days were coming up hard on the horizon. She had her looks, her good brain; that was plenty. From now on, nothing but doctors, early thirties at the youngest, maybe a little gray at the temples. The good days. From now on, nothing but good days. The future glistened before her, colored bright mink. She felt good. For the first time since the Shrimp had cast a blight on her life, she felt good. No Sid, no kid, no nothing to remind her of the past. Take an apartment on the near North Side and let the suitors come. She was a divorcee, now, a woman of mystery as well as beauty. What a combination. Mystery and beauty. She felt wonderful. Really wonderful. Really incredibly fantastically unbelievably wonderful.

  So why, all of a sudden, was she crying?

  The ex-papa danced a jig on the sidewalk in front of the hospital. It was late, five, six in the morning (who cared), and he was brimming to the top with piss and vinegar. “Toot, toot, tootsie, goodbye,” he sang, breaking into a little soft-shoe. (He was one helluva dancer when he wanted to be.) A cab cruised by and Sid whistled it dead, hopped inside and slammed the door behind him. To the cabbie’s “Where to?” Sid said “Drive,” and he settled himself in the back, content to watch the dying moon over Lake Michigan. Home was probably the place to go (wouldn’t be so bad with the Bitch gone) but who could sleep? They drove along the lake, Sid whistling a little Gershwin, a little Kern, punctuating the concert with occasional bursts of laughter. The thought crossed his mind to go beat the shit out of Mannie for doing a lousy job that was going to cost him a hospital bill, but was tonight a time for vengeance? Mannie could pay the bill when it came (if he balked, a little phone call to the cops), so why sweat? Sid’s fingers danced across his knees, and Sid, heeding their call for action, directed the driver to the Loop, where he got out at Painter’s, the best pool hall in the city, open all night. Ordinarily Painter’s was a little stiff for Sid, the sharks a little too tough, but tonight, his fingers told him, was no night to be chicken. So he mounted the inevitable steps, confident that he could kill any shark alive. Painter’s was empty, or nearly so, and Sid grabbed a cue (first testing the weight, making sure the balance was perfect), then proceeded to a table, where he hacked away like an amateur, whistling all the while. His act was good enough to lure a shark, an old man with watery eyes and not much hair, and after the usual pleasantries (Care for a game? Well, I’m not much good. Neither am I. Et cetera) they got down to business. The old guy could shoot and in the dim, low-ceilinged room he seemed quite at home as he moved his tired bones around the green, but Sid panicked not. No reason to with his fingers dancing the way they were, and when the watery eyes emerged the victor in the first clash at straight pool (they were both trying to give it away) there followed round two of the chatter (Christ, I stink. No, I was lucky. Shall we try it again? If you want to. I wouldn’t mind. You break. Here goes nothing) and Sid won the second game (still for free) but by the fourth they had ten bucks riding (a pittance) and the old man won, so they doubled up to twenty and he won that too but when it got to fifty bucks a game, Sid released his fingers and they went to work. They banked, they drew, they applied follow English, the touch elegant, precise, caressing the cue with genuine devotion. True love always finds a way, and by the eighth game Sid was up two hundred and roaring. The old man called for coffee, Sid for Scotch, and the night gimp (they gotta be gimps—
union regulation) returned with their orders, getting a fiver from Sid for his pains. The old man, hyped by the caffeine, staged a little comeback, but Sid hung in there, erasing the Elder’s earnings with a hot streak of his own, increasing the bankroll to two-fifty. “Last game double or nothing,” Sid (ever the sportsman) said and the Elder nodded, chalking his cue, lifting his watery eyes (maybe praying to Hoppe), sipping a fresh pot of tea (always change a losing game). The preliminaries done, they began.

  Under pressure, the old guy acted like a colt, his hands like rocks. He broke, left Sid nothing, and Sid’s return safety enabled the geezer to run a quick seventeen balls before he played safe again. Again Sid was blanked and this time the old man pounced on Sid’s shot and ran fourteen more, making it thirty-one to goose-egg. When Sid’s turn came, he had no shot except a wild bank the long way that a genius couldn’t make five times out of ten, which, besides, if missed, opened the rack for slaughter. Sid talked to his fingers, inquired after their health, and when they seemed sound he heard his voice saying “Eleven ball the long way,” after which he took a practice cruise with the pool stick, felt the need maybe of a touch more chalk, applied it, bent down low over the table, sighted for just the proper angle, found it, stood up, smiled at the old guy, inhaled, held it and shot.

  The ball banked like it had eyes. The rack split open and there he was, the one and only Super Sid, chuckling, smiling, making good swift chatter as his fingers fired ball after ball, the run growing from ten to eighteen, then thirty, forty-five, and with five balls to go the old guy was reaching into a pocket and counting the bills, licking his thumb in obvious pain with the departure of each C note. Sid polished off the last five, making an unnecessary bank on the last ball, taking a big risk but what was life without them?

  So there he was, on the streets again, five hundred nestled neatly in his right front pocket with the sun pouring down from all over, the time ten o’clock on a beauty of a morn. Probably some sleep would have been helpful but you can’t order its arrival, and if he was high when he left the hospital, now he was looking down at the stratosphere. With a wave of his finger he materialized a taxi and sat back humming while they journeyed to the Blackstone, a good enough hotel which housed, along with businessmen and rich old ladies, a legendary blonde, supposedly French and definitely expensive, ordinarily far out of his reach but today his arms were infinite. He buzzed her from the lobby, tasting her wrath (he roused her from slumber), but she sweetened when the subject reached dinero and falling victim to his appeal, invited him to visit. Supposedly she had (according to Pinky Katz, who had a rich cousin who had once tasted of her charms) great tits, and Sid, ever the connoisseur, licked his chops during the upward ride, anticipating what only money can buy, and when he knocked and she answered he saw (she met him in a negligee) that she was sufficiently top-heavy (slim in the waist though—that was good) to slake any appetite. The blonde was big, much taller than he and probably as heavy, but he was used to that, so unafraid. They got comfortable with a minimum of chatter, which suited Sid, and after a little financial exchange they set up housekeeping. She was practiced but lacking in inspiration, devoid of vision, and Sid rode her deftly into submission without the expected kick. Her body, great from any distance, was lacking on contact; softened by too much wear, no tone to the muscle, just flesh piled decently enough, but flabby, not remotely as satisfying as Esther on her bad days, let alone the good. Still, as Sid dressed he knew it was money well spent—the story should be good for months if he doled it out decently to the droolers across the poker table, so he noted carefully the decor, the perfume, the color of the rug. As he headed for the door, the stack accompanied him, urging him a speedy return (she knew a master when she saw one), and he had not the heart to tell her she was over the hill, so he smiled and whacked her a good one on the fanny and they both laughed loud as he departed, her probably for the sack to rest her weary flesh, he for the Palmer House, where he blew twenty-eight bucks for lunch (which wasn’t easy), such was his hunger. Belching, Sid sauntered across the Loop for a while, stopping into Field’s briefly for a silk; summer jacket, then on again to Florsheim’s, where a pair of black leather wing-tips soothed his feet. He had not slept, not really, in forty hours or more, but he was, if anything, even more chipper than earlier and he danced along the street in his wing-tips until he remembered Esther in the hospital.

  That soured him.

  It was an unhappy prospect, but a visit did seem required; so, grumbling, he taxied to Michael Reese, stopping outside to buy a bunch of posies for his beloved.

  She was sitting up in bed when he got there. He handed her the flowers and received the barest of thanks (gratitude for you!), but, undaunted, he went on with the charade, kissing her dutifully on the cheek, then sitting in a chair beside the bed, holding her hand, throwing her little kisses (what the hell, why not?).

  “Well,” Sid said, “how are you?”

  “Well,” Esther answered, “we’re fine.”

  The room, as hospital rooms go, was better than nice, being light and almost (but not quite) cheerful and possessing two windows overlooking the Illinois Central tracks and, beyond them, Lake Michigan. From where he sat Sid could see the lake, immense and solid blue save for the slits of white foam tumbling from time to time toward shore.

  “Pretty fancy, dumpling,” Sid said, smiling at the spouse. She looked good, almost all right again, though her face was stern. “Just like the Blackstone,” and he allowed himself a solid laugh. A train bumped by outside on the I.C. tracks and Sid followed its progress awhile before returning to the calm blue of the lake. “You get my phone message? I called you to tell you I might be a little late. Business appointment at the Palmer House. Otherwise I would have been here a lot—”

  “We’re fine.”

  “I’m sure glad of that, Tootsie. I didn’t go to sleep last night for worrying.” He flashed her a smile but it died when he realized her meaning and he sat gaping, suddenly a fool, the last to get the joke, the wearer of the dunce cap, the ass. “We are?”

  “We are.”

  “How come?”

  “You got me here in time. Those things Dr. Lautmann did to me, they didn’t have a chance to work.”

  Why was he so tired? Where had it come from?

  “A day or two rest here and I can go.”

  “Ah,” Sid said. “Ah.” He got up and moved to the window, staring at the blue, his head resting against the cool pane. He closed his eyes, intending a blink, but it felt so good he kept them shut a while. How long had he been without sleep? Too long. Too long. From somewhere far behind his eyes, a red ache started, complete with its own little throb. Sid pressed harder against the pane.

  “The baby is fine.”

  “The baby is fine,” Sid repeated.

  “You O.K.?”

  “The baby is fine,” Sid said again.

  “Come away from the window.”

  “Sure thing.” He groped back to the chair, fighting the pain in his head. All for nothing. Everything for nothing.

  Another train went by.

  Sid stared.

  “Sid, I got to talk to you—”

  “Maybe we’ll take a trip—”

  “I didn’t sleep either—”

  “A nice trip on a train—”

  “Sid, I’ve been doing some thinking—”

  “A long trip while you recover. We’ll sit back and relax—”

  “Are you listening?”

  “My head. It hurts so.”

  “Sid, this is important.”

  “I can’t hear so good, my head hurts so, go on, go on.”

  “All those things I had in the beginning that went wrong with me? You remember how I screamed and threw up and everything?”

  “Sit over the wheels. Sure, we’ll sit over the wheels. Take a long trip and sit over the wheels. Have a lot of fun, nice scenery, sit over the wheels, watch the nice scenery ...” Something in her face, some look, made him trail off, waiting, trying
to concentrate on the red pain creeping up behind his eyes and then the hush of the hospital was ended and Esther was shouting:

  “Are we animals?”

  “No,” Sid said, “no-no,” and then the dunce was crying, weeping unaccustomed tears as he fell across her body, clutching at her hands.

  “I faked, Sid! All those pains, the throwing up, I faked so you’d get a doctor!”

  “Butcher!” Sid cried. “He was no doctor. I led you to the slaughterhouse and you’ll never forgive me!”

  “I forgive!”

  “I forgive!”

  “Do you love me, Sid?”

  “I dunno, I dunno.”

  “Me either. But we can’t do anymore. We can’t.”

  “No, we can’t.”

  “Sid, we’re not animals,” and she was crying too.

  “Not us,” he managed as he crawled blindly up on her bed beside her and they wrapped their arms tight around, joining their private griefs, rocking, keening, seeking forgiveness from their ancient gods, twin sinners, Sid and Esther, for a moment together, all bullshit gone.

  So they had this kid.

  From the first he was different.

  Not that he didn’t soak his diapers twice an hour; not that he didn’t cry; not that he didn’t smile when bounced or laugh when poked or shriek when tossed or wail when startled or hungry or wet or sleepy or afraid or alone; not that he preferred Pablum to his mother’s milk; not that he liked beets or turnips or spinach or lima beans; not that he didn’t like sounds, rattles or music boxes or voices that went “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” during the day or “Rockabye, Baby” at dark; not that he didn’t lift his head to stare fascinated at the blank sides of his cradle or, when he could roll over, at the sunny particles of dust floating softly in the air; not that he didn’t give endless inspection to the soft pink skin on his hands or, later, suck his sweet thumb; not that he didn’t cry out in the night with the pain of teething or, when he was able to crawl, gnaw passionately on table legs; not that he was able neatly to master the spoon or guide the cup on its two-handed journey from table to lip to table without occasional mishap; not that he didn’t like to bounce and catch a red rubber ball or run or kick or jump up high or open a door or close a door or snip newspapers with tiny scissors or skip or hop or balance on one foot with one eye closed or climb unaided up long flights of stairs. What made him different was simply this: