Jill strums to reclaim their attention. "Well, to make a boring story short, one summer" – she searches ahead for a rhyme, then adds, "after her daddy died."
"Uh-oh," Rabbit says, tiptoeing back with two beers.
"She met a boy who became her psycho-physical guide."
Rabbit pulls his tab and tries to hush the pff.
"His name was Freddy -"
He sees there is nothing to do but yank it, which he does so quickly the beer foams through the keyhole.
"And the nicest thing about him was that she was ready." Strum. "He had nice brown shoulders from being a lifeguard, and his bathing suit held something sometimes soft and sometimes hard. He came from far away, from romantic Rhode Island across Narragansett Bay."
"Hey," Rabbit olés.
"The only bad thing was, inside, the nice brown lifeguard had already died. Inside there was an old man with a dreadful need, for pot and hash and LSD and speed." Now her strumming takes a different rhythm, breaking into the middle on the offbeat.
"He was a born loser, though his race was white, and he fucked sweet virgin Jill throughout one sandy night. She fell for him" strum – "and got deep into his bag of being stoned: she freaked out nearly every time the bastard telephoned. She went from popping pills to dropping acid, then" – she halts and leans forward staring at Nelson so hard the boy softly cries, "Yes?"
"He lovingly suggested shooting heroin."
Nelson looks as if he will cry: the way his eyes sink in and his chin develops another bump. He looks, Rabbit thinks, like a sulky girl. He can't see much of himself in the boy, beyond the small straight nose.
The music runs on.
"Poor Jill got scared; the other kids at school would tell her not to be a self-destructive fool. Her mother, still in mourning, was being kept bus-ee, by a divorced tax lawyer from nearby Westerlee. Bad Freddy was promising her Heaven above, when all Jill wanted was his mundane love. She wanted the feel of his prick, not the prick of the needle; but Freddy would beg her, and stroke her, and sweet-talk and wheedle."
And Rabbit begins to wonder if she has done this before, that rhyme was so slick. What hasn't this kid done before?
"She was afraid to die" – strum, strum, pale orange hair thrashing – "he asked her why. He said the world was rotten and insane; she said she had no cause to complain. He said racism was rampant, hold out your arm; she said no white man but him had ever done her any harm. He said the first shot will just be beneath the skin; she said okay, lover, put that shit right in." Strum strum strum. Face lifted toward them, she is a banshee, totally bled. She speaks the next line. "It was hell."
St-r-r-um. "He kept holding her head and patting her ass, and saying relax, he'd been to life-saving class. He asked her, hadn't he shown her the face of God? She said, Yes, thank you, but she would have been happy to settle for less. She saw that her lover with his tan skin and white smile was death; she feared him and loved him with every frightened breath. So what did Jill do?"
Silence hangs on the upbeat.
Nelson blurts, "What?"
Jill smiles. "She ran to the Stonington savings bank and generously withdrew. She hopped inside her Porsche and drove away, and that is how come she is living with you two creeps today."
Both father and son applaud. Jill drinks deep of the beer as a reward to herself. In their bedroom, she is still in the mood, artistic elation, to be rewarded. Rabbit says to her, "Great song. But you know what I didn't like about it?"
"What?"
"Nostalgia. You miss it. Getting stoned with Freddy."
"At least," she says, "I wasn't just playing, what did you call it, happy cunt?"
"Sorry I blew my stack."
"Still want me to go?"
Rabbit, having sensed this would come, hangs up his pants, his shirt, puts his underclothes in the hamper. The dress she has dropped on the floor he drapes on a hook in her half of the closet, her dirty panties he puts in the hamper. "No. Stay."
"Beg me."
He turns, a big tired man, slack-muscled, who has to rise and set type in eight hours. "I beg you to stay."
"Take back those slaps."
"How can I?"
"Kiss my feet."
He kneels to comply. Annoyed at such ready compliance, which implies pleasure, she stiffens her feet and kicks so her toenails stab his cheek, dangerously near his eyes. He pins her ankles to continue his kissing. Slightly doughy, matronly ankles. Green veins on her insteps. Nice remembered locker room taste. Vanilla going rancid.
"Your tongue between my toes," she says; her voice cracks timidly, issuing the command. When again he complies, she edges forward on the bed and spreads her legs. "Now here." She knows he enjoys this, but asks it anyway, to see what she can make of him, this alien man. His head, with its stubborn old-fashioned short haircut – the enemy's uniform, athlete and soldier; bone above the ears, dingy blond silk thinning on top – feels large as a boulder between her thighs. The excitement of singing her song, ebbing, unites with the insistent warmth of his tongue lapping. A spark kindles, a green sprig lengthens in the barren space between her legs. "A little higher," Jill says, then, her voice quite softened and crumbling, "Faster. Lovely. Lovely."
One day after work as he and his father are walking down Pine Street toward their before-bus drink at the Phoenix Bar, a dapper thickset man with sideburns and hornrims intercepts them. "Hey, Angstrom." Both father and son halt, blink. In the tunnel of sunshine, after their day of work, they generally feel hidden.
Harry recognizes Stavros. He is wearing a suit of little beige checks on a ground of greenish threads. He looks a touch thinner, more brittle, his composure more of an effort. Maybe he is just tense for this encounter. Harry says, "Dad, I'd like you to meet a friend of mine. Charlie Stavros, Earl Angstrom."
"Pleased to meet you, Earl."
The old man ignores the extended square hand and speaks to Harry. "Not the same that's ruined my daughter-in-law?"
Stavros tries for a quick sale. "Ruined. That's pretty strong. Humored is more how I'd put it." His try for a smile ignored, Stavros turns to Harry. "Can we talk a minute? Maybe have a drink down at the corner. Sorry to butt in like this, Mr. Angstrom."
"Harry, what is your preference? You want to be left alone with this scum or shall we brush him off?"
"Come on, Dad, what's the point?"
"You young people may have your own ways of working things out, but I'm too old to change. I'll get on the next bus. Don't let yourself be talked into anything. This son of a bitch looks slick."
"Give my love to Mom. I'll try to get over this weekend."
"If you can, you can. She keeps dreaming about you and Mim."
"Yeah, some time could you give me Mim's address?"
"She doesn't have an address, just care of some agent in Los Angeles, that's the way they do it now. You were thinking of writing her?"
"Maybe send her a postcard. See you tomorrow."
"Terrible dreams," the old man says, and slopes to the curb to wait for the 16A bus, cheated of his beer, the thin disappointed back of his neck reminding Harry of Nelson.
Inside the Phoenix it is dark and cold; Rabbit feels a sneeze gathering between his eyes. Stavros leads the way to a booth and folds his hands on the Formica tabletop. Hairy hands that have held her breasts. Harry asks, "How is she?"