McMurtry, Larry - Novel 05 (43 page)

 
          
 
"We better just quit," I said.
"This isn't working."

 
          
 
Cindy looked depressed.

 
          
 
"Don't look that way," I said.

 
          
 
"It's depressing to have to give
up," she said.

 
          
 
"It's not such a big deal," I said.
"You just don't want to make love right now."

 
          
 
"I do and I don't," she said.

 
          
 
"You mostly don't," I said.

 
          
 
"It's because I'm so scared," she
said, clutching my penis. "I'm not my normal self."

 
          
 
"Can I make a suggestion?" I said.
"Call Spud and tell him to forget it. Then we'll go buy some classy
boots.”

 
          
 
She was silent.

 
          
 
"Why see a man you're deathly afraid
of?" I asked.

 
          
 
She shook her head helplessly. Denying him a
single wish seemed to be beyond her.

 
          
 
"Just help me," she said. "Try
some things."

 
          
 
While I was trying what she wanted tried I got
so depressed I lost my erection. By the time it was technically possible for
Cindy to have sexual
intercourse,
I was technically
unable to perform the act. I began to get a headache, just from confusion and
anxiety.

 
          
 
"Uh-oh," Cindy said. "Now
you're impotent."

 
          
 
"Not really," I said. "I just
have a headache."

 
          
 
"You look impotent to me," she
noted.

 
          
 
I gave up, both on sex and talk, and just lay
beside her.

 
          
 
"Maybe it's just as well, with your wife
on the loose," Cindy said, in a cheerful voice. My impotence had restored
her spirits more effectively than my potency could have.

 
          
 
"I think I'll have one more steak,"
Cindy said. "I don't like to start the day on an empty stomach."

 
          
 
By the time she had polished off the steak
much of her glow had returned, and some of her interest in life. She looked
around the coffee shop, which was full of insurance salesmen and wheat farmers,
plus a few cowboys.

 
          
 
"People probably eat a lot of protein
here," she said. "That's good."

 
          
 
It looked as if she was going to fly
cheerfully off, but as we were standing in the terminal, waiting for her flight
to board, traces of anxiety began to reappear.

 
          
 
"I hope I don't make any mistakes,"
she said. She was so beautiful in her doubt that I could hardly bear to look at
her.

 
          
 
"You could come," she said,
suddenly. "You could get a car and drive around buying things. Then you'd
be there if something went wrong."

 
          
 
"I better not," I said. "I
better stay here and look for boots for your exhibit."

 
          
 
"You could be more flexible," she
said. "If nothing went wrong you could fly back here and get the
boots."

 
          
 
Most women make their own rules, where love and
language are concerned, but Cindy's rules were so oblique that I could only now
and then discern them. Spud seemed to have been the first destructive
possibility she had ever encountered, and she was far too healthy to welcome
destruction. The mere possibility of it played havoc with her nerves.

 
          
 
"I keep getting nervous," she said.
"I think I won't and then I do. I can't control it.

 
          
 
"I hate it," she added. "I wish
you'd come."

 
          
 
"I know why, too," I said. "You
just want to have one person around that you're sure you can control."

 
          
 
"Yeah," she said, brightening. She
was pleased that I had made such simple sense of her fears.

 
          
 
"That's exactly right," she added.
"What's wrong with that?"

 
          
 
There was nothing wrong with it, really. A
strong self-preservationist instinct was functioning healthily.

 
          
 
"So why won't you come?" she said.

 
          
 
"I'd like to see you have to take a few
risks," I said.

 
          
 
She looked at me more closely than was her
custom. "You better promise you'll come if I get in real trouble,"
she said.

 
          
 
"Of course I will."

 
          
 
"Do you want to buy your ticket now, just
in case?" she asked.

 
          
 
"No, I may not stay in
Lubbock
," I said. "Just call me on the
car phone, if you need me."

 
          
 
"Boy, I never expected you to behave like
this," she said, just before she turned and walked onto the plane.

 
          
 
When I got to the motel I slept all day. I
don't think I even turned over—I just slept, awakening to
a
gloomy
plains dusk and the sound of sand beating against the
window-panes. A second norther had struck, weaker than the first but still
strong enough to move the sand around a little.

 
          
 
I felt so puzzled that there didn't seem to be
any real reason to even get up. I tried to think of a next step, but it wasn't
easy. My trading instincts were at
a low
ebb. I was
supposed to go buy boots, but I didn't really feel up to it.

 
          
 
Boot collectors are tenacious by nature.
Trading with them takes some energy, though most of them aren't really
collectors in the true sense. They're just rich people who tend to buy a lot of
boots while they're buying a lot of other things, too.

 
          
 
On impulse I picked up the phone and called
Jean Arber. I think I just wanted to know if she still liked me.

 
          
 
Belinda answered on the first ring.

 
          
 
"You must live on the top of the
phone,"
I.
said.

 
          
 
Belinda was silent a moment.

 
          
 
"I like to get it," she said.
"Is this you?”

 
          
 
"You who?"

 
          
 
"I forgot," she said. "What's
your name?"

 
          
 
"Jack," I reminded her.

 
          
 
"Who is it, Behnda?" I heard Jean
ask.

 
          
 
"It's Jack," Belinda said, as if I
were someone who had been hanging around the house for weeks.

 
          
 
"He wants to talk to me," she added.

 
          
 
"He has talked to you," Jean said.

 
          
 
Belinda decided to yield gracefully, in this
instance.

 
          
 
"What a surprise," Jean said.
"Where are you?"

 
          
 
"I'm in
Lubbock
," I said. "I miss you."

 
          
 
I had not meant to be so direct, but the words
popped out.

 
          
 
"It serves you right," she said.
"Poor planning, this trip of yours."

 
          
 
"I may come back sooner than I had
planned," I said.

 
          
 
"Does this have anything to do with
me?" she asked.

 
          
 
"Sure," I said. "Is that
okay?"

 
          
 
"It's a free country," she said.
"I'm still amenable to being taken out. What happened to the friend you
were
traveling with?"

 
          
 
"That didn't work out too well."

 
          
 
"So now you're in the mood for a normal
woman," she said. "That's understandable."

 
          
 
"Do normal women spend all their time
buying trunks?" I asked.

 
          
 
"Listen," she said. "A few
eccentricities like that
doesn't
mean you're not
normal."

 
          
 
"How are the girls?" I asked
,
to change the subject.

 
          
 
"They're fine," she said.

 
          
 
I couldn't think of anything else to say. I
didn't know Jean well enough to be talking to her on the phone. On the other
hand I loved her voice. Even when she was jousting with me she sounded kind.

 
          
 
"You sound quite depressed," she
said.

 
          
 
"I am quite depressed," I said.

 
          
 
"That doesn't surprise me," she
said. "I could tell you were a potential depressive the minute I met
you."

 
          
 
"Would you like to bring the girls out
west?" I asked.

 
          
 
"I certainly wouldn't," she said.
"What a bizarre suggestion."

 
          
 
"Well, we could take them to Disney
World, then," I said.

 
          
 
"Ssh!" Jean said. "Whisper when
you say that. A person with big ears is sitting in my lap."

 
          
 
"What'd he say?" Belinda asked. Fortunately
her attention had wandered.

 
          
 
"He says you ask too many
questions," Jean said.

 
          
 
We were silent for a bit.

 
          
 
"I think you ought to learn not to be so
spur-of-the-moment," Jean said. "It can cause enormous trouble. I'd
like to be taken to a few movies, if you don't mind, before we start planning
any road trips. Then I'd know if our tastes really jibe.

 
          
 
"Besides, there's no big rush," she
added.

 
          
 
"It feels like there is," I said. It
was true. I was conditioned to rush. At estate sales the best pieces go in
seconds. At flea markets there's nothing good left ten minutes after the
dealers set up. It seemed to me the same was probably true of women.
One as good as Jean could hardly be expected to last a day on the
open market.

 
          
 
"If I don't rush someone else might find
you," I pointed out.

 
          
 
"Someone already has," she said,
cheerfully.

 
          
 
"Who?"
I
asked,
my fears confinned.

 
          
 
"A man," she said. "Fortunately
for you he’s very shy. He hasn't asked me out yet."

 
          
 
"He'll probably ask you tomorrow," I
said.

 
          
 
"Nope," she said. "I'm not
divorced yet, and he's very proper."

 
          
 
"I'll probably head back there
tomorrow," I said.
"Just as soon as I buy a few
boots."

 
          
 
"This call is costing too much,"
Jean said. "I'm from a family that doesn't believe in spending money just
to talk. Jimmy didn't believe in it, either."

 
          
 
"I believe in it," I said.

 
          
 
"I wish I did," Jean said. "I
hate being tight-assed about anything, but the fact is I still get anxious when
long distance calls go over three minutes."

 
          
 
"I'll cure you of that," I said.
"Tell the girls goodnight for me.

 
          
 
"You better not try to exploit my
mother's heart," she said. "These girls will pursue you to your
grave, if you wrong me."

 
          
 
"I will," Belinda said. "What
is it you said?"

 
          
 
"Never mind," Jean said.