“Thanks,” Bill said, managing not to meet his wife’s eyes. “They’ve got a bed set up and I guess we can find everything we need, but thanks just the same. It’s mighty nice of you.”
The redhead said, “You’ll find this is a nice friendly bunch. We get along pretty well together.”
I just bet they do. Morning coffee together every morning, and shopping trips and PTA committees. Probably just walk in without knocking. Maybe a full-time job, something to get me out of the house?
Bill put his arm around her as they stood in the doorway, seeing the guests off. His face was high colored and his eyes slightly bloodshot from the long drive; he needed a shave. He said cheerfully, “That was nice of the girls, wasn’t it? They seem like nice kids.”
“Sure.”
“You didn’t act too friendly.”
“You know it takes me a while to get acquainted.”
“Yeah. The thing you have to remember is, it makes a big difference in a place like this. People aren’t cold and impersonal in the way they are in a big city. These gals run around together all the time.”
She tried to pull away. “I’m a small-town girl, remember?”
Bill said in a wheedling voice, “Don’t be crabby.” There was no doubt about what was on his mind. She had seen that look too many times before, the fatuous but determined look of a man set on going to bed with his woman.
He said, pressing against her, “Come on upstairs. You haven’t even seen the upstairs yet. There’re four bedrooms and a sewing room, or whatever you want to use it for, and the guy Bowers bought it from is supposed to put all new fixtures in the bathroom. You can pick them out.”
“That’s nice. When it quits raining I’ll bring my suitcase up and have a bath. I’m tired out.”
“You’ll feel better after a good nap. Come on upstairs and lie down for a while.”
“Oh, Christ!”
“Don’t be that way.”
She let herself be led up the stairs, feeling his body solid and urgent against hers. With every intention of being a good wife, even a cooperative wife, she couldn’t relax or smile or even look at him. His self-conscious methods embarrassed her. She let him lead her from room to room, a husbandly arm around her waist; she predicted accurately the moment when his hand would creep up and cup her breast. He left the room with the bed till last, of course.
If he only didn’t act like sex was something to be ashamed of. There had been some good times early in their marriage, not many, but a few, enough to make her feel that all might not be lost—if he would only leave the light on, and take her as though love were a joy and not an embarrassing necessity, like having to go to the bathroom.
Frances saw no reason why she shouldn’t do anything she felt like doing when she was bedded down with someone she loved. And she had tried with Bill, not too long after their reunion. Scared but desperate and determined to salvage what she could for both of them, she had asked him to perform the acts that made her happy. He was so shocked that he sat up in bed. “Where did you find out about such things?” he wanted to know, his voice heavy with suspicion. When she told him of the book she had read, his silence let her know that he thought she was lying. To Bill’s way of thinking there was only one way she could have learned about such goings-on, and he wasn’t going to discuss it.
She had never brought the matter up again.
I guess that takes care of that, she thought, looking dully at the empty sewing room, the large bathroom, the two completely empty rooms that looked small and shabby as empty rooms do, no matter how recently they have been painted and papered. In the two front bedrooms the familiar beds and dressers were standing at all angles, but at least the beds had been set up and the box springs and mattresses pulled into place. Trust Bill to take care of any details that would make him comfortable.
He left his socks on, like a man in a hurry to get it over with and get back to work. She undressed with shaking hands, trying not to feel like a virgin facing defloration. Shut your eyes, she reminded herself. It’s not so bad if you shut your eyes.
He was neither harsh nor tender. It was the same as before, as mechanical as eating or washing dishes. He’d make a wonderful machine operator, she thought, sighing wearily, as he rolled over and lay beside her.
She got up and pulled her clothes on, ignoring him. “What’s the hurry?”
“I’m cold.”
“Well, I ought to get up and go over to the plant for a while anyhow.”
She felt sticky and smeary and she wanted a bath. Instead, she went downstairs, trying to take her mind off what had just happened. Standing beside the dining room window, she looked out on a view almost identical with the one she had left behind on Chicago’s South Side: a brick house next door, a wider expanse of lawn and healthier-looking flowers here, a tricycle forgotten in the rain.
She wondered where Kay was at this moment and what she was doing. And Bake. But that hurt, the thought of Bake and Jane having a rainy Saturday at home. She tried to think about Karla’s instead. If I were there I’d pick somebody up. Anybody. Anybody would be better than this.
But Karla’s was a million miles away and a million years ago. She had made her choice. The door was shut.
In a few minutes Bill came down, wearing his old jacket and slacks but with his hair neatly combed. “If you don’t care I think I’ll run over to the shop a few minutes—see how they’re making out. We’re running a skeleton crew on Saturdays till we go into full production. You don’t mind staying alone for a while, do you?”
“Of course not.”
He couldn’t look at her. Never could after one of these daytime performances. He said, “I’ll bring back a pizza or something.”
“That’ll be nice.”
The good provider. He would probably let her have a Victorian sofa bristling with red velvet and brass tacks, if she showed any sign of wanting one. Or a mink stole. Anything, except the right to be herself.
When the sound of the car died away she locked the doors and searched methodically through all the cupboards, hoping insanely that someone had left a bottle. They hadn’t, of course. She wandered into the living room and sat down on the sofa (not Victorian, but late Sears Roebuck) and looked out at the dripping rain.
I’m not a good wife, she thought dismally. I’m not even a very good whore. I don’t know what I am.
3 FURNISHING AN EIGHT-ROOM HOUSE IS WORK, BUT it comes to an end eventually. Two weeks after that rainy moving day, Frances backed down off a stepladder and stood looking up at her new curtains. There wasn’t another thing she could do to the place. Not one.
Now what?
Bill was apparently there to stay. He had given her a guided tour of the place, pointing out the solid foundations, hardwood floors and full-size basement and attic. The bathroom and downstairs lavatory were not only tiled with real tile but equipped with copper piping guaranteed to last a lifetime. The roof was fireproof, the siding waterproof. What more could anybody want?
A home-owner’s pride colored his voice when he suggested, “You could make a swell TV room down here. Put in one of those portable bars.”
“Why don’t you mention it to Mr. Bowers?”
His look accused her of treason. “Hell, he’ll never get back to work. He ought to retire and move to Florida or someplace where it’s warm. Be glad if I took the place off his hands.”
She was trapped, then. These were