Tomcat in Love (39 page)

At the first sign of dawn I slipped into the bed of Mrs. Robert Kooshof.

“You’ve been gone,” she said.

“Just a walk.”

“A walk where?”

“Nowhere.”

“Bad night, then?”

I shrugged and said, “Not terrible, not good. Go to sleep now.”

“Down the street, I’ll bet. Sweet memories. Sweet Lorna Sue.”

I said nothing. For ten or fifteen minutes Mrs. Kooshof lay very still, her eyes fixed on a patch of pinkish light spreading out across the ceiling.

“Thomas?”

“Here.”

“Maybe I haven’t been totally clear. I do love you. Very much. All I can.”

“It’s clear.”

“But you still won’t …?”

The question dangled there—incomplete, unanswered—then she turned onto her side, facing away from me. Her crying was scarcely noticeable.

After an hour, when her breathing evened out, I curled up against her and shut my eyes, trying for sleep, but something in Mrs. Kooshof’s scent—her shampoo, I am almost certain—made me begin reviewing our months together. Simple things: meals, baths, bed. How she had taken me in, given me exactly what I needed. How loyal she was. How she never quit. Her vital data—all those manifest and uncommon virtues—filled nearly three pages in my ledger.

But what did I feel for her? What did I truly want? The human heart, I fear, is nothing if not ambiguous, and no definitive answers came to mind. It occurred to me, obviously, that the sensible thing would be to make amends as rapidly as possible: beg forgiveness, let the past be the past, marry her, fly off to Guadeloupe or Mexico City. For months now I had been living like a maniac, out of control, chasing my own diseased history, and in the marrow of my bones I knew that nothing good could ever come of it.

Even so, I was helpless—pulled along by the undertow of my
own obsession, a need to finish things. Explosions in the attic. Windows cracking. Lorna Sue screaming the word
sacred
through eternity.

I could almost hear it.

“Sacred!” she’d wail—that pious, God-infected, betraying little sweetie pie. “Sacred!”

W
ednesday, July 3.

Summer hot, small-town quiet, but the entire day had a choppy, accelerating, out-of-control feel. After breakfast I checked on my seven bombs, bade
adieu
to Mrs. Robert Kooshof, then set off at a brisk pace for the Owago County Library to pursue some background reading on the subject of explosives. For all my military experience, I had little technical expertise in such arcana, and it was therefore with considerable gratitude that I was guided by my helpful young librarian (one Miss Laurel Swanson) to a dusty volume entitled
Demolitions: A Handbook
. The girl stood well within nose-shot as I perused the title’s index. (Her cologne, for the record, was generic Walgreen. Her toothpaste Gleem. Her mouthwash fruity—pineapples, I reckoned—but of indeterminate trademark. Other vitals: Viking-blue eyes, slim haunches, boarding-ramp pelvis, elfin ears, a bust of telescopic grandeur, all professionally fitted on six sleek feet of high-grade Swedish soapstone.) I was pleased, of course, to detect the usual seeds of infatuation in her eyes.

I snapped the book shut, squared my shoulders. “Just the ticket,” I told her. “I am in your debt, young lady, and can only hope to return the favor. Very soon, I trust.”

“No favor,” said Laurel. “I’m a Christian. A librarian too, so it’s my job.”

“Which you perform most exquisitely. A saint of the stacks.”

The girl shrugged, frowned, stepped back, squinted at the hefty volume in my hands. “Well, good luck,” she said. “I guess you’re making fireworks.”

“Fireworks?”

“Cherry bombs and stuff. That book there.”

“Ah, yes,” said I. “Fireworks.”

She bobbed her pretty Nordic head. “The Fourth of July, it’s my favorite almost, except for the holy days, Easter and Christmas. And don’t forget Lent—that’s probably the best of all. Sacrifice and everything.” Her voice was alarmingly nasal, her eyes aglow with a very tempting evangelism. She tilted toward me in a chummy, confidential pose. “I’m Church of Jehovah,” she said seductively. “What are you?”

“I?”

“Come on! Don’t be a shy goose. Your
religious
affiliation.”

“Oh, that,” I said. “Up for grabs.”

I eyed the girl’s twin telescopes, imagining the rewards and punishments of a quick look-see. (Yes/No. No/Yes.) A sad thing to admit, but I could not resist sinking my teeth into this tempting Swedish apple. A noon luncheon appointment was proposed; Miss Laurel Swanson greedily accepted. (Again, the world pays little heed to linearity; our lives wander to and fro, sometimes along scenic Scandinavian byways. A “tomcat,” Mrs. Kooshof called me—who would not take secret pride?—and even now, at the bitter end, I remained true to my essential self.)

Miss Swanson and I settled on a venue—the Rock Cornish Café—smiled our farewells, then parted ways with the mutual expectation that our noon hour would prove well and deliciously spent. (Cherry bombs, indeed!)

Thus booked, I retired to a quiet reading room and devoted the
next hour to a study of detonators and primers and related technical topics. Fascinating material, to be sure, yet I found it hard to concentrate. A fuzzy feeling. No cohesion to the world. Even my immediate plans were less than fully formed: the problem of fuses still stumped me.

In midmorning, on a whim, I left the library, crossed the street to the Ben Franklin store, and once again inquired about the availability of firecrackers.

Same snippy salesgirl, same response. “I already told you,” she said, “they’re illegal. You can
hear
, can’t you? Try the playgrounds.”

I nodded dismally.

Odd thing: Not a single retaliatory barb popped to mind—in fact, no language at all—and as I turned away it struck me that my mental dexterity was rapidly deteriorating.

For the remainder of the morning, at times drifting outside myself, I wandered from park to park, with not a whit of luck. Blank faces. No explosives. The internal brain winds blew violent, chaotic snapshots here and there. A plywood airplane went pinwheeling by, then a turtle named Toby, then Herbie and the tycoon and Lorna Sue. At one point, in Perkins Park, a young tyke aboard a teeter-totter stared at me for several long seconds, his eyes fluent with pity.

“Firecrackers?” he said quietly. “Shit, man. You’re a grown-up, aren’t you?”

At noon, now thoroughly depressed, I arrived on schedule at the Rock Cornish Café. I waited in a back booth for thirty-eight minutes before Miss Laurel Swanson called to beg off. A sick colleague, she said. Couldn’t break away. Would it be satisfactory if she stopped by my home that evening?

As I put the phone down, a number of related thoughts swept in all at once.

First: Why had I not uttered the word
No
?

Second: What on earth was happening to me?

Third: Would Mrs. Robert Kooshof be willing to throw together a coffee cake?

——

The rest of the day is largely lost to me. More brain winds. Fuzziness at the moral periphery of things.

I do remember sitting on the brick steps of St. Paul’s, where I had a vantage on both Lorna Sue’s house and my own.

I watched Herbie mow the lawn.

Watched the tycoon supervise.

Watched Lorna Sue bring out two bottles of beer. (She laughed at something. She swatted the tycoon’s rear end. She had no appreciation for the word
sacred.
)

My reaction to this, whatever it was, has now faded. Wistful memories, I suppose—good things and bad.

How much I had loved her.

How much I had lost.

Later in the afternoon, around four or five, I was surprised to discover myself standing at an ironing board in Mrs. Kooshof’s living room, pressing the wrinkles out of my old military uniform.

My erstwhile fiancée watched from the sofa.

“Tom, please,” she finally said.

“Please
what
?”

“Please tell me. What are you
doing
?”

I grinned. I held the uniform up. I showed her my twinkling Silver Star with its V-device for valor.

“A war hero,” I said. “Have I told you about it?”

The doorbell rang at 7:24
P.M
. I had completely overlooked my invitation of hours earlier, and it was necessary to feign surprise as I escorted young Laurel into the living room.

“A guest!” I cried. “And what a delight!”

Even with Doomsday around the corner—my head crackling with short circuits—I could not shed the trappings of civility. I made the introductions, offered Laurel a seat on the sofa beside
Mrs. Kooshof, selected for myself an upholstered easy chair directly opposite my two north-country beauties. (Scenic vista, safe distance.) It goes without saying that both of these succulent, high-spirited creatures were initially ill at ease; thus I took it as my first duty to assure them that this was purely a social visit, not a mating competition.

I outlined for Mrs. Kooshof the spiritual background of the occasion; I explained to Laurel that (contrary to earlier appearances) I was not at present living completely alone.

Both gals nodded their appreciation.

“So then,” I said jovially, and clapped my hands. “Off to bed. Hope the two of you enjoy your little seance.”

To this, Mrs. Kooshof responded with scant enthusiasm. She riddled me, in fact, with eye bullets as Laurel rummaged through her handbag and plucked out a booklet chronicling the origins and history of the United Church of Jehovah. The girl placed it on Mrs. Kooshof’slap.

“Must run,” I murmured, beginning to rise.

“Must stay,” said Mrs. Kooshof.

I sat back. “Well, fine—for a few moments, perhaps.”

Laurel seemed perplexed. The girl giggled prettily, gestured at the booklet in Mrs. Kooshof’s lap. “I wasn’t expecting … I mean, I sort of thought this would be a one-on-one witness.” She paused and tugged at her skirt. “Anyway, maybe you can tell me something about your religious targets.”

“Religious what?” said Mrs. Kooshof.

“What the Lord wants for us,” said Laurel. “Spiritual goals and all that. It’s awful darn important to have good targets to aim for.” She clasped a hand to her daunting left breast. “Salvation—that’s one of my own biggies. And to lose four pounds.”

My surly housemate glowered at me. “William Tell’s mistress,” she muttered.

“Pardon?” said Laurel.

“Lose four pounds. And what exactly do you weigh, my friend?”

“Gee, I don’t know. One twenty-six, probably.”

“And how
old
are you?”

Laurel blinked. (To keep smiling in the face of such inquisitorial pressure, I thought happily, had to rank supreme among the girl’s long list of credits.) “Twenty-three,” she said, “but I don’t see why—”

“That’s
my
target,” said Mrs. Kooshof. “To be twenty-three. To weigh one twenty-six. Apparently it’s what you need to impress the men of this world.”

There was a moment of starchy silence.

“Well, honestly,” Laurel said, “I don’t mean to make trouble or anything. I’m just here to witness and recruit, if you know what I mean.”

“Oh, I do,” said Mrs. Kooshof. “Target practice.”

It was high time, I decided, to retire for the evening. I pushed to my feet. “You really must excuse me”—I yawned—“but tomorrow is a busy, busy day.”

With an exhausted wave, I adjourned to the bedroom.

Soon I was without troubles. Dreamland: the windy beaches of Fiji. (I spotted your ex-husband at one point. Or was he I? In which case, who would you be?)

Not until after midnight did I awaken, alone beneath the sheets, disoriented and very, very thirsty.

Strolling into the kitchen—most fortunately garbed in my ruined satin robe—I found Laurel and Mrs. Kooshof enjoying the spirituous manufacture of Mr. James Beam. Neither bothered to glance up as I filled a tumbler with ice water. “So why do you
stay
with him?” Laurel was asking, as if I were some nocturnal repairman, to which Mrs. Kooshof wearily replied, “Love, love, love—God, how I hate the word!. But it
was
love. It is. Every woman on earth, they’d all say, ‘Dump him, just get away.’ Everybody except that one blind bitch who’s actually
in
it. In love.”

Refreshed, I sallied back to dreamland.

(Morning, Early Afternoon)