An American Love Story (18 page)

“I don’t even know what I’m going to be doing for the next five years,” Susan said.

“I hope a lot of interesting projects,” he said. “I intend to be there.”

She smiled. “So you’re not saying good-bye.”

“Good-bye?” He stared at her; he actually looked frightened. “Of course not. Never. I love you.”

She was stunned for only a moment. Then she realized, as the warmth seeped through her, that she had known for a long time that there was more between them than they pretended, and that he wouldn’t disappear.

“I’m in love with you,” Clay said. “Don’t say anything. You don’t have to love me. But I love you, and you can’t lose me unless you want to.”

She looked at him, a man who had never yet kissed her, who had never yet touched her, who was married and had a child, and who loved her, and she realized he had been afraid to come near her because he was afraid she wouldn’t want him—and if she had had any sense at all he would have been right.

“I love you too,” she said. It was still so new that the words felt strange in her mouth.

“You don’t have to say that.”

“I know I don’t.”

They sat there memorizing each other’s faces for a moment, and then he looked at his watch. “Come on, I have to feed you. You must be starving.”

“Not really …”

“Well, I am.” He had her up and out of the apartment in ten seconds, taking her to a small, dark, and very expensive restaurant nearby, where she had been with him once before. They sat at a corner banquette and picked at their food. “I go to the South of France every spring,” Clay said. “On business. It’s beautiful there now. They have those tiny strawberries and the gray wine. You have to taste the gray wine, you can’t get it here. The season is very short. And the tiny strawberries … come with me.”

“I have three pieces on deadline,” she said, half wishing she didn’t, half glad she did. What she meant was: it’s too soon, you’re married, I don’t really know you, France is too far away.

“Can’t you get an extension? I wish you could come with me.”

“I can’t.”

“I love you,” he said. “You’re so bright and so beautiful. You make me smile. I love your hair.”

“My
hair
? If you ran your hands through it it would eat them.”

“It’s sexy.”

“I’ve always hated my hair,” Susan said.

“What do you know?”

She laughed.

“The first time I saw you,” he said, “across the room at the RBS party, I said: That’s for me. I knew the minute I saw you that I would fall in love with you. I don’t say this lightly. This has never happened to me before.”

“Never?”

“No. There are lots of opportunities for a man in my position to play around … actresses … I didn’t. I never wanted to get involved where I worked. I thought I had chosen my life and made my mistake and I would live with it. I never thought I would meet you.”

Touch me
, she thought. As if reading her mind he took her hand, and she could hardly catch her breath. “Can we go back to my apartment?” she asked. He nodded and gestured for the check.

Then they were in her bed, and Clay was making love to her as if he had been starving for her for years. He was totally uninhibited, tender and wild, and he never stopped kissing her. He seemed to be worshiping her body. Without being asked he did all the things she had wished other men would do and seldom did; and he was not doing them to show off or because he was obligated to, but because it gave him the utmost pleasure.

His tanned skin felt unexpectedly like silk, and smelled fresh and warm; not the faint cologne, which was long gone, but something exciting and indescribable. She melted into him, into his arms, his legs, his scent and embrace, his warmth, the solace of his totally unselfish sensuality. Yet one small part of her kept holding back, dreading the part of his life that was unavailable. They made love for hours and it was almost perfect, almost; for perfection would be too dangerous and she would be lost. He would have to get up and leave, and she would have to survive and sleep. This, after he had said he loved her.

At last they dozed, in each other’s arms, and then side by side. Susan glanced at the clock and it was four o’clock in the morning. Clay looked at it, cupped his hand around her skull and put her head on his shoulder, and went back to sleep. She lay there on the wrinkled sheets that had cooled, and moved closer into his side. He was sprawled out like a starfish. Suddenly, a wave of love for him swept over her and she felt her glass heart crack wide open. Such tenderness for him poured out that she held him to her so tightly she woke him up. He smiled and put his arm around her and they lay there holding each other, surrounded by her tenderness, and she was glad he knew.

She loved him more than she had ever loved anyone in her life. She would love him as long as it lasted. There would be neither thoughts of endings nor of forever, only this happiness.

He had won. Perhaps they had both won.

11

1971—SEATTLE

I
t was May, a beautiful spring day, the blue sky so clear you could see the mountains in the distance and the snow on top of them, the tiny bunches of green that were the fragrant forests below, and you thought of the joys of camping, of fishing in the bright water. Bambi was huddled in her bedroom, with the shades down, crying. Other people were happy to be in this outdoor wonderland, and she was miserable because she was going to be trapped here and alone. The college acceptance and rejection letters had arrived. Simon had gotten into Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and the University of Puget Sound in nearby Tacoma. Bambi had only gotten into the University of Puget Sound.

Those colleges that had taken him and rejected her hadn’t even bothered to tell her why they didn’t want her. She had some idea. Simon was a straight A student and winner of the senior science prize. She was glad for B’s.
She
knew she was an artist not a scholar; but what good
did it do when her hostile creative writing teacher had given her only a C-plus, and the school literary magazine had refused to print the stories she had started writing? She was lucky she had gotten into the University of Puget Sound.

What would happen to their dream of living together at college, free at last? Simon would have to choose one of those big three Ivy League schools. Everyone said he was brilliant. Loneliness clutched her chest like a steel band. They had thought they were like John Lennon and Yoko Ono, two bodies, one soul; but they were really just defenseless kids.

Her bed was covered with little wads of wet tissue from her grief. She was hunched up into a miserable ball, holding her knees, when a cheery tapping sounded at her bedroom door.

“It’s meeee,” Simon called softly. She had locked the door so she could cry in peace. He rattled the knob. “Hey, Bambi, let me in.” She got up wearily and opened it.

He kicked the door shut and put his arms around her. She laid her head on his chest. “The University of Puget Sound is a terrific school,” he said.

“Fine,” she said, and pushed him away.

“If it’s good enough for me it should be good enough for you,” Simon said blandly.

“Well, you’re going to Princeton.”

“No I’m not.”

“Yale?”

“No.”

“Harvard,” she said, and started to cry again, her face turned to the wall so he wouldn’t see how ugly she looked.

“I am going to the University of Puget Sound with you,” Simon said. “We always planned to go to college together and we will.”

She could hardly believe her ears. Her crying stopped and her heart began to pound like crazy. “You’d give up your … no, you’ll hate me,” she said, none too convincingly. “Everybody at school is talking about your great future.”

“My future is great only if it’s with you,” Simon said.

“Oh, Simon, I can’t believe you’d do that!” She threw her arms
around his neck and covered his face with kisses. Then she drew back as reality hit her. “Your parents won’t let you.”

“What have they got to do with it?” Simon said calmly.

“They could threaten not to pay for your college if you don’t go where they want. Parents can be really cold and mean when they don’t get their way.”

“I’ve already made plans for that possibility,” Simon said. He smiled. “I’ve applied for a scholarship at the University of Puget Sound. They’ll be glad to get the genius who turned down Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. For the rest of the money I’ll take a job at night working in a coffeehouse. It will be sort of like business school, learning and preparing for the day when I open Simon Sez. I don’t want to be a doctor or a lawyer or a nuclear physicist. I want Simon Sez. This will be perfect for us.”

Us
 … 
us
 … the magical word, her doorway to the future. “My parents are giving me a car for graduation,” Bambi said. This morning she had accepted their offer of the gift dully, but now she was excited about it. “A Volkswagen beetle. I get to pick the color and I told them I want yellow. The school’s only an hour away; I can drive home to get money from them. You and I are going to be a team. We can do it. I love you so much.”

“I love you more than anything,” Simon said. He reached over and locked the bedroom door. They were brave and comfortable together, a real couple. “Nobody’s downstairs,” he whispered, nuzzling her neck.

They fell onto the bed together, inflamed and breathless, kissing and rubbing, pressing and sucking, right on top of the crummy little Kleenex wads of her recent and now long ago tears; they might as well have been rose petals.

The next afternoon Bambi was sitting at the desk in her bedroom, cheerfully making out a list of the people she would invite to her graduation party, when her phone rang. It was Simon’s mother.

“Bambi, I wonder if you could come over and help me plan a surprise for Simon’s graduation.”

“Sure,” she said. “When?”

“Could you come now? He’s not here.”

“Okay.”

She put away her list, smoothed her hair, and trotted over. Maybe they’ll give him a car too, she thought. His mother greeted her at the door and led her into the big eat-in kitchen. She was very different from Bambi’s mother, who colored her hair, wore jeans, and went to an exercise class. Simon’s mother had gray hair and didn’t care, and was plump and matronly—she looked almost fifty.

“Would you like a Coke, dear?”

“Thank you.” Bambi sat down in a kitchen chair and folded her hands primly in her lap. She had never been alone with Simon’s mother before, and she was a little nervous.

“A cookie?”

“No, thank you.”

“Well.” His mother smiled, but her face looked strained. She poured the Coke into a glass and put it in front of Bambi with a paper napkin. “I’ll tell you why I asked you to come over here,” she said. “It’s about Simon’s future.”

“Oh?” Bambi said innocently. She sipped delicately at her soft drink.

“You know he’s refused to go to Harvard, Yale, or Princeton. He says he wants to stay near home. We know he wants to be with you.”

Bambi said nothing. So far his mother’s voice was sweet and conciliatory; she didn’t seem dangerous. Bambi waited.

“The two of you have always been so close. I know you understand how bright he is, how much promise he has. I was hoping you might have some influence with him. If you really care for him, and I know you do, you care about his brilliant future.”

There’s nothing wrong with the University of Puget Sound, Bambi thought. I’m going there, and I plan to have a brilliant future too, you fat tub. She continued to say nothing.

“And there’s Harvard’s science program,” his mother went on. “It’s just right for him.”

“I’m not sure he wants to stay with science,” Bambi finally said, mildly.

“I’m thinking of his financial future too,” his mother said. “If you two continue to see each other, possibly you might get married someday, and it would be important for both of you, and your children, to have a good financial start.”

Bullshit, Bambi thought. If he goes five thousand miles away we’ll only see each other on holidays, and he’ll meet somebody else and marry
her
. You think I’m that stupid?

“We love our son very much,” his mother said sadly. “We’re older, more experienced. Simon is only eighteen, he’s impetuous. We don’t even know what he wants to do with his life. Does he tell you?”

Bambi looked down at her prim little hands.

“You young kids think you have no time,” his mother went on, realizing she would get no response. “You haven’t lived long, naturally every few months seem forever. But it really isn’t that way. Believe me. You’ll write to each other, you’ll call each other, there are so many holidays and they’ll be there before you know it, and then you have the entire summer to be together.” Bambi tuned her out. The woman went on talking, her mouth moving, her eyes misting over, and Bambi looked past her plump shoulder at the kitchen appliances and thought that avocado was probably the ugliest color she’d seen in her life.

Then Simon’s mother’s mouth stopped moving and Bambi came out of her reverie. She gave a little nod. “I’ll try, Mrs. Green,” she said sweetly.