Boys & Girls Together (19 page)

“I warned you, Howard. Always remember that.”

Rose watched as he moved to the door and out. She stood very still, and when it did not reopen Rose ran to the mirror and hated her face for a while. Then she stepped back, raised her skirt above her knees and whispered, “My legs are better, my legs are better,” until, in spite of all she could do, the tears came.

After two hours of walking alone through the streets of Manhattan, Howard came back. He stood in the doorway of the darkened suite and said, “I didn’t see her off, Rosie. Honest, I just walked.” Then his hand flicked on the light.

“Turn it off,” Rose commanded.

Howard obeyed. “What is all this?”

Naked, Rose advanced on him. With terrible efficiency, she got him out of his clothes. When he was naked, she put her arms around his waist. Together they fell back onto the bed. Through it all, Rose never said a word.

Nine months later to the day, her son was born.

When Howard came to the hospital later that day, he kissed her on the cheek and sat on the foot of the bed. “What do you think of William?” Howard asked.

“For what?”

“His name.”

“Not for my boy. Anyway, he’s already got a name. Last night it came to me. Branch. His name is Branch.”

“Are you kidding, Rosie?”

“Do I look like it?”

“But what kind of a name is that?”

“Strong, Howard. You know what that means, don’t you? A branch from a tree. Strong.”

“But William was my father’s name.”

“Your mother’s named Flora. You wanna call him Flora?”

“Listen, Rosie—”

“It’s settled.”

“Branch William maybe? Would that be all right?”

Rose relented. “Branch William would be fine.”

When the boy was ten months old he contracted pneumonia. For sixty hours Rose sat by his bed, never sleeping. The doctor came several times and Howard hired a full-time nurse, but Rose never left his side.

“For God’s sake, Rosie, get some sleep. You’ll kill yourself if you don’t watch it.” This was the second day.

Rose stared at the boy.

Howard took her hand.

She jerked free.

“The nurse is right here.”

Rose reached out and touched the boy’s fevered skin.

“Get some sleep. Please. Come to bed.”

“I can’t.”

“Why can’t you?”

“If I leave him, he might die. But he won’t. Not so long as I stay right here.”

Rose stayed right there. Then, halfway through the sixty-first hour, the fever broke.

“See?” Rose said, staring triumphantly up at her husband. “See? I told you.”

He was her baby; there was never any doubt about that. As he began to grow she let his hair remain uncut, long and curly. She dressed him in elegant clothes, making sure that he was always immaculately clean. “Little Lord Fauntleroy,” Howard said time and again. Not that it did much good.

Branch was a verbal child. He spoke sentences by the time he was two, and he knew all the letters of the alphabet by sight. Whenever company came over Rose would get out his blocks and he would say the letters in order while Rose beamed. Branch was thin and his appetite was poor and he cried a lot. But other than that he was fine.

Flora spoiled him terribly, worse than Rose almost, and Miss Dickens would stop by from the office after work with presents several times a week. Howard endured it until one spring Saturday when Branch was almost four.

Howard awoke that morning with a particularly bad hangover and at breakfast he yelled at the maid, a nervous young Negro girl who burst into tears on the spot. Shortly afterward Branch ran in. He was dressed in perfectly pressed short pants and a clean white shirt and his hair seemed to Howard to be longer and curlier than usual. “Hi, fella,” Howard said.

Branch paused for just a moment, then ran out of the room and upstairs.

Howard got up from the table and went into the foyer. “Hey, Rose,” he shouted. “Come on down here.”

While he waited for her to appear, Howard paced.

“What is it?” She stood halfway up the stairs, dressed, as usual, in green.

“Let’s talk.”

“What about?”

“Our son. Oh, pardon me.” Howard bowed low. “I mean your son.”

“If you can’t hold your liquor, don’t take it out on the rest of us.”

“I’ve had it with the kid,” Howard said then.

“What are you talking about?”

“He’s spoiled, he’s bad-mannered and he’s just about to blossom into the biggest sissy in the whole state of Ohio.”

“Shut up,” Rose said.

“Why doesn’t he play ball or something?”

“So he can grow up to be Babe Ruth? Thanks.”

“Other kids play ball.”

“What is this ball business? Since when are you such a fan?”

“I just don’t like the way he’s acting.”

“Branch,” Rose called. “Come here, baby.” A moment later he was standing alongside her on the stairs. “Do you want to play catch with your father?”

“No,” Branch said.

“But you’d like it,” Howard said. “Come on. Give it a try. Just for a little, Branch. Out in the back yard. We’ll quit whenever you want to.”

Branch looked up at Rose.

“Humor your father,” she told him. “He’s having a hard day.”

“I’ll play for a little,” Branch said.

But there wasn’t a ball in the house. Howard looked in all the closets and in the basement and up in the attic and the best he could do was an aged tennis net, gray and moldering.

“Some athlete,” Rose said when he told her.

“I’ll drive uptown and buy one,” Howard said. “You want to come along, Branch? We’ll have fun.”

“No,” Branch said.

“It’ll only take a second,” Howard said, and he hurried to the garage.

It took close to half an hour. Branch was painting a picture when Howard found him. “O.K., fella,” he said. “All set.”

“I’m doing a pitcher now, Daddy.”

“That can wait.”

“So can you,” Rose said suddenly, coming up behind him.

Howard waited.

Finally they moved out onto the back lawn. Rose stayed on the porch, watching them. Howard moved a few steps away from his son. “Now I’m going to toss it to you, fella. And you catch it. Here she goes.”

He lofted the ball gently into the air. Branch watched it. It bounced off his stomach onto the grass.

“That’s pretty good, fella. Shows you’re not afraid of it. But you’re supposed to catch it with your hands. Like this.” Howard cupped his palms together in demonstration.

Branch shook his head. “That would hurt.”

“No, it wouldn’t. I promise you. Just toss it to me and I’ll show you.” Branch picked up the ball and threw it at Howard. Howard caught it. “See, fella? It doesn’t hurt a bit. That was some toss. You’ve got a good arm. Now you catch it this time.” He lofted the ball toward his son. Branch turned his head as the ball dropped to the ground a few feet to his left. “Bad toss on my part,” Howard said. “Give it here. I’ll do it again.” He was starting to sweat and his head ached slightly.

Branch threw the ball toward his father. Howard picked the ball up and tossed it gently back toward his son. The ball struck the boy in the chest.

“Now, you could have caught that one, fella. You’re just not trying.”

“I must be careful of my hands. So I can paint. Mamma tells me to.”

“Well, I’m telling you to do something now. So you do it.”

“Have you had enough?” Rose called from the porch.

“We just started,” Howard yelled back. “We’re having a wonderful time.” Howard retrieved the ball and tossed it to Branch. Branch half turned, and the ball missed him. “Now come on, fella. Try.”

“I don’t want to play anymore,” Branch said.

“You hear that, Howard? He wants to quit.”

“We just started!” There was a crazy tone in his voice and Rose must have heard it too, because after a pause she called out to her son.

“Play with him a little more, Branch. Just a little more.”

Howard walked over to Branch and put an arm around his shoulder. “You’re going to learn this now,” he said. “You’re not leaving till you learn to cup your hands. A baby can do it. You can do it.” His headache was worse now, the pain moving down, camping close behind his eyes. “Cup your hands.” Branch did as he was told. Howard dropped the ball into the hands from a foot above. “Now, did that hurt? Tell me the truth.”

“No.”

“All right, then. Catch it this time.” He threw the ball harder than he meant to and it struck Branch on the knuckles.

“That hurt, Daddy.”

“No, it didn’t. Now throw the ball back here.”

“But it hurt.”

“Dammit, it didn’t. Quit being such a baby and throw me the ball.”

“Howard ...” It was Rose calling from the porch.

Branch threw the ball back to his father. Howard dropped it. Perhaps the sun had suddenly blinded him or perhaps he had been staring at the shadow of his wife on the porch. At any rate he dropped it.

And then the lawn was loud with Rose’s laughter. “You’re some teacher, yes, you are.”

“Shut up.”

The laughter grew louder and suddenly Branch joined in and then blindly, with all his might, Howard threw the ball toward the sound.

The ball crashed against Branch’s temple.

Branch screamed and fell.

Howard rushed toward him, tears in his eyes, kneeling beside the writhing body of the boy. He reached out to touch him, but the body rolled away and Howard was about to reach out again when Rose was on him.

“Lush,” she said. “Lush!” Cradling Branch in her arms, she carried him away.

Howard stayed where he was, embracing the grass where his son had fallen.

Branch began dreaming of a black prince.

For weeks on end he would wake in the middle of the night, the dreams vivid in his mind. They were all more or less the same. He was always bound up, either with belts or chains or cords of fire. Nothing could save him. Not this time. But then, always at the last second, a figure would appear.

The black prince.

The beautiful black prince.

With a slash of his silver sword, Branch’s bonds fell dead. Then the prince would step forward and they would stare at each other. Then the prince was gone.

Awake, Branch shivered in the night.

Waiting ...

“Sal-
lee
.”

“What?”

“Come out and play.” Her name was Sally Baker and she was five when he was six and she lived across the street.

“No.”

“Why?”

“I hate you, that’s why.”

“I promise I won’t pull your pigtails.”

“That’s what you always promise. Bully. Branch is a bul-ly. Nyah-nyah-uh-nyah-nyah.”

Later, Branch in pursuit.

“Sal-
lee
.”

“What?”

“I’ll let you play with my train if you’ll come out and play.”

“Your fingers are crossed.”

Branch held his hands up high. She stood in the window of her room on the second floor watching him.

“Your legs are crossed.”

Branch uncrossed his legs.

“I won’t play with you. Bully.”

Later.

“Sal-
lee
.”

“No.”

“I’ll let you play with my train and I’ll give you a lollipop if you’ll play with me.” He held up the lollipop.

“What flavor is it?”

“Grape.”

“No.”

Still later.

“Sal-
lee
.”

“No. You’ll just pull my pigtails.”

“But I’ll give you three lollipops and nineteen red rubber bands if you’ll play with me.”

“Nineteen?”

Branch opened his hand. “I’ve got ’em right here. All red. Every last one.”

“You promise you won’t pull my pigtails?”

“Scout’s honor.”

“And you’ve got nineteen rubber bands and they’re all red?”

“Yes. Yes.”

She stuck her finger in her mouth.

“You coming?”

“Just for a little while.” She disappeared from the window.

As soon as she was outside he gave her the lollipops and the red rubber bands. While she was counting them out loud—“ten, ’leven, twelve”—he stepped behind her and grabbed her pigtails. Then he started to pull. He yanked and pulled until she cried. Then he stopped. She whirled around and began to hit him. She slapped him in the face and kicked him in the shins, and the more she did it the more he wanted to smile.

When Branch was seven Howard took to drinking much too much and gambling on Saturday nights. Once, as Branch lay in bed quivering from the closeness of his escape—he had been bound with snakes and as the black prince struck them they doubled in size and number until they almost overwhelmed him and he had to kill them all with his bare hands—he heard his mother and father talking in her bedroom. It was a hot summer night and the windows were open, so he heard every word, starting with his mother’s voice saying, “I couldn’t care less about what you did Saturday.”

“You’re lying.”

“Like hell. Just so long as you don’t enjoy yourself, I don’t care what you do. And you don’t enjoy yourself, do you, baby? You haven’t enjoyed anything much since Dolly.”

Then his father’s voice, suddenly soft. “I didn’t put her on the train. I just walked around all by myself. That was eight years ago. Can’t you forget that?”

“Can Hell freeze?” his mother wanted to know.

Howard took to washing his car.

Every day after work and every Saturday afternoon he spent in the driveway, hosing down his red LaSalle, then sponging it off, cleaning the whitewall tires, shining the chrome. It got to be a joke on Waverly Lane and he knew it, but he went right on, day in, day out, washing his car. “Get it good and clean, Howard,” the neighbors would call out when they drove past. “Shine it up good.” And he would smile, nodding to them, waving. If the Japanese hadn’t bombed Pearl Harbor, he probably would have gone on washing it forever.

“I was thinking of enlisting.” Howard stood in the doorway of Rose’s bedroom. It was night on that cold December Sunday. The room was dark.

Her voice from her bed. “Think all you want to. Just don’t do it.”

“I’m serious, Rosie.”

“You’re a laugh.”

“Tomorrow morning. I think I’m going to do it.”

“They don’t takes lushes in the Army.”

“I can stop drinking.”