The New Valley Read online

  Which is why he can finish in you?

  Could, she said. If he wanted to. You know what I mean by finish?

  I wiped up the last of my name on the plate but then I felt strange about putting my finger in my mouth so I just held it there. I thought he said he wanted to, I told her.

  I thought so too, she said. Not that it would make any difference. I mean, how the hell would I nurse anyway?

  It’s easy, I told her. Ma B just had a button on her shirt what she’d undo and—

  Listen, she said. I don’t want you to think what I do back here has any weird thing to do with the fact that I don’t have kids or nothing, Okay? She picked up her plate and scraped the leftovers back into the Styrofoam. She said, I only do kids because it wouldn’t be safe to do anybody else. Not for me, and not for them. A grown man—Waker’d kill him. Waker found me with a grown man, he’d beat the shit out of him, and then he’d beat the shit out of me, and then he’d divorce me, and I can’t afford that. So that’s why, she said. She stacked her Styrofoam container on top of mine. It’s not anything wrong with you. Okay?

  It was quiet. Them crickets musta either gone to sleep or moved on to another part of the crap field.

  Listen, she said. It’s really pretty simple. Kids don’t count. It may seem strange, but Waker’s a strange man. He knows what I do back here and I know what he does. Paid women. Women who’re still whole. We have a agreement. But if I was to do a kid all the way—you understand what I’m saying? Or do a full grown man? He doesn’t even like me talking to men outside of work. Except for his brother. His brother’s the only one he’ll let me alone with, the only grown man Waker will allow me to talk to like a friend. The last time I had friends, I mean male friends, God it must have been high school. We were high school sweethearts. You have any idea how long ago that is?

  Nuhuh, I said.

  A long time.

  I put my empty down and reached for the last two and opened them and she put a hand on my arm instead of taking the can.

  I gotta go, she said.

  Okay, I said. So you can’t give me a blow job because I’m a full grown man?

  Her hand stayed on my arm. I could feel her looking at me. I watched the cans. I could feel her looking at me more. What? I said.

  She said, That’s what I’m trying to figure out.

  What’s what you’re trying to figure out?

  Just exactly what you are.

  I put the cans down. Her hand stayed on my arm the whole way.

  I’m Geoffrey Sarver, I said. I’m not retarded.

  I know, she said.

  I’m not a kid.

  I know, she said.

  I’m just a little slow.

  You’re handsome, she said.

  I looked at her hand on my arm and I told her, Mom Wasco used to say I looked like someone smacked my forehead flat with a clothes iron.

  That was when she kissed me. She kissed me right under the ear. Then she kissed me on the forehead. Then she kissed me right on the mouth.

  That, she said, was against all the rules.

  Monday of July

  I wonder does she come and visit you.

  Tuesday of July

  Last night was the night I decided to do it. My face is healed pretty good. I got the wires off but there’s still them ugly red marks all over, and them bruises what make my neck look wrunged. Last night I got into Jackie’s makeup and done my best, which wasn’t much good. But I guess I never been a looker, as they say, and Linda never cared nohow, so I thought heck to it and lets get it done.

  After I come back, I was too plain beat to write you. Tonight too, but Roy and Jackie is shouting and yelling again behind the door to the house part and I can’t sleep. So, I will put it down. I have missed her terrible horrible and deep. I wish I knowed how you did for yourself when you felt the same. How you get yourself shut of it. I know there must be a way but I am new to this life of the adult kind. There’s got to be a way to get on. I know I ain’t the first to miss somebody. Sometimes I look at everyone what comes to fill up their tank and I think, Who do you miss? And, Who do you miss? And, Who do you miss? Till it seems the whole of Eads County knows a secret to how to go on and don’t want to clue me in. I’m fed up with it. I was fed up last night. Let’s get it done, I said. Get on your bike, I said. Go over say hi.

  Now what I’m living in My Hall, it was strange yesterday to get ready after work in the Sunoco Men’s Room how I used to back in the spring. Felt like back in them times what was after she lay her kiss on me.

  Back then I’d get washed every single day after work. Full body washed. Done my hair in the sink and brushed my teeth and shaved and combed like it was morning and the first customer rolling over the bell. But outside, the Sunoco sign was lighted up for nighttime and the lights over the pumps was turned dark to show we was closed. I’d lock it all up and get on my bike.

  Them first weeks way back in spring before it all gone bad, I rode out of town to Crigger’s every night. Took 502 all the way, didn’t even mind being on the big roads with the vehicles what used to make me shaky. Them spring weeks all that looked to me like kid stuff what I’d kicked off and left. I just let them vehicles wait or go around. Even then, at the end of April, it was already late for redbuds, but a mile or two before Crigger’s, where the creek cut through the pipe beneath the road, there was some hangers on. I’d stop, go down in a spread of crap land, pick off a branch. Redbud’s pretty tough. First time I tore it up, had to use my teeth. After that I brung the wire snips.

  I’d park my bike round back and knock on the kitchen door and wait outta sight. If she wasn’t back there, one of them in the kitchen would tell her. Pretty soon, she’d come out and I’d give her the branch. She’d switch the old one out and put the new one in. With all its buds. After the first couple days, she’d come to the door ready with last night’s branch what she could just toss and take the new one and put it in the jar top the dishwasher. I know that’s where she kept it cause sometimes I’d sneak to the door and look through the screen and see it there. If the machine was working that branch would sit up and shake.

  She didn’t like me to look through the door but sometimes, if I’d been waiting there more than a hour between her visits, I’d do it anyhow. If she was real busy she wouldn’t even notice. Sometimes though, she was just sitting there talking with one of the kitchen people. Or at the bar, talking with someone else. If she seen me then, she’d give me a look what sent me packing. I didn’t mind. Cause it’d bring her out in a minute. She’d tell me what I wasn’t supposed to be hanging out there and I’d better keep my face hid so she didn’t get in trouble and I’d tell her, All right, and Can I have a kiss?

  Three, four times during the night she’d come out for real. She’d light up and sit with me against the back of the Dumpster and we’d talk about everything could be talked about. End of her shift, she’d close down. I’d help with what I could, throw the bag up in the Dumpster for her and whatnot. Sometimes we’d share a beer after she locked up. Sometimes we’d just do some good-night talk and she’d get in her car. But either way I’d follow her out of the lot onto 502. Head back the way we’d come. And every time she’d start to pull away up front she’d hold her cigarette out the window so’s the tip glowed and give it a little shake, just to say one last extra good night.

  Mondays there’d be Russ and Vic in the Party Van waiting too. The first time they come they seen me sitting out there by the Dumpster and waved me over.

  Russ had rolled down the window. Hey, he said. Long time no see.

  Yuhuh, I said.

  We went by the Sunoco but you wasn’t there.

  I was there.

  You was?

  I was in the office.

  We honked, Vic said.

  I know, I said.

  Russ looked at Vic. They both shaked their heads and grinned. Good ol’ Geoffrey, Russ said. Hey, get in the back. He patted the slide door with his hand.

  It was the
same in there, except it felt smaller. I hadn’t been around that much smoke in a while and it made me cough.

  Here, Russ said but I didn’t want any. I could see through the screen door into the kitchen what they was closing up. After a while, Vic said, Our band practice has gone for shit. A while after that, Russ said, Where you been Geoff?

  Nowhere.

  I hope it was nowhere good, he said.

  Vic laughed. Man, Geoff lives in nowhere. Right Geoff?

  I don’t know what you mean, I told him.

  See, he said.

  We’s just joking with you, Russ said.

  She come out and Russ flashed at her and she held up five. I seen her glance at the Dumpster.

  I gotta go, I said.

  You ain’t gonna stick around? Russ said.

  What the fuck, Vic said.

  I said, Don’t it ever get old? Don’t you ever get tired of it?

  Of blow jobs? Russ said.

  There isn’t a man on earth gets tired of blow jobs, Vic said. Anyone gets tired of blow jobs is either a homo or ain’t hit puberty yet.

  That’s not true, I said. There’s more than just blow jobs.

  How would you know? Vic said.

  You got something on the side? Russ said. Geoff? Geoffrey?

  Just his hands, Vic said. Hanging left and right. Right Geoff? No, seriously though, you got a point. He’s got a point.

  I asked her last time, Russ said.

  Maybe I oughta ask her, Vic said.

  She won’t do it, Russ told him.

  You say please? Vic said.

  She won’t do it, Vic.

  Do what? I said.

  Open her cooch, Russ said. Like you was talking about. Then he said, Here she comes. I for one ain’t complaining.

  I watched him go behind the propane tank and I wanted to get out and drag him back so bad what when Vic said We oughta go over there too, I almost said okay.

  Instead I said, She wouldn’t like it.

  How do you know so much? he said. A nympho like that gets bored with just one dick.

  She’s not a nympho, I told him. She’s married.

  He laughed.

  Don’t laugh, I told him. You don’t even know her name.

  She’s Mister Podawalski’s wife, he said.

  I told him, You’re almost done with high school and you still don’t know what’s more than just a blow job.

  What’s that supposed to mean? he said. I put open the door and got out. What’s that supposed to mean? he said again, but I was already walking away to get my bike. That was the first time I rode back without her cigarette goodnight.

  The next Monday I hid behind the Dumpster when I heard the van and stayed till they was gone and had a beer with her after. The next Monday after that Monday I did the same. Then, well, Mister Podawalski, it wasn’t long after that what you showed up.

  I wonder do you remember seeing me. Did you even know it? Did you even look? I know you could see right through the kitchen from where you sat at the bar, right through the kitchen to the screen door, because I could see you. It was the first time I’d got a picture of how you looked. For a while I’d been trying to think back on if I’d seen you come through the Sunoco but if I did I couldn’t find it in my brain. You must have used the 76. I even asked Linda. I asked her how come I never seen you even anywhere in Ripplemead? She said you was always working on the highways over east. Or you was at the church out by Harts Run where you’d growed up. She said you didn’t much care for any people who was between. Them was her words, but it is true I hadn’t seen you till that night.

  Even so, I knowed it was you. I knowed just from looking at her. She was leaning on the bar. You was talking. She done the thing with her apron what I seen her do when she was happy talking to me. But she done other things too what I never seen. Like she picked at her earring till she took it plumb off and then put it on again and she did it twice. I stood in the screen door watching. Waiting for her to turn round and give me one of her Oh Get Outta Sight Geoff looks. She never looked my way once.

  What was you talking with her? What did you do to make her laugh that laugh what was entire new, I ain’t yet heard. You was in a suit jacket. You was the only man in there with a suit jacket. I don’t mind telling you you looked good in that suit jacket. And, by the way, you looked better with a beard how you had that night. I don’t mind telling you how bad I wanted that suit jacket for my own.

  When she finally come out it was late. She stood there. Lit up. I lit up too and tried to look at her without her knowing while we smoked. By then I knowed her levels of tired. First time she’d come out she’d be pretty good. Second time she’d be quiet and just trying not to think about how long it was to go. Third time she’d be a little mad at how long it’d been. Fourth, it was coming to a close and she’d got her wind again all full of zip. That night it was her first time out, but she was looking like it was the fourth. Full of zip. I will confess I’d thought she’d look something different if you come around. What with her talk of getting shut of you. But having seen you and her it made sense to see her out there like that. After all, you two got married. You two lived together in love. You two was husband and wife which meaning I guess I’d simple forgot.

  Sooner or later we got talking. Not good as usual, but I didn’t mind. I was glad she’d chose to leave you there at the bar and come spend the time with me. I made the most of it. She give me the laughs she always give me and they was pretty good. When she gone back in I looked after her to see what you thought. You was gone from the bar. I didn’t see you the rest of the night. I guess you done gone home.

  It was on a few nights later what she come out with the old redbuds like usual and took her new ones like usual, but then was back for her first smoke more early than usual. She was full of good talk and didn’t once complain about the coming night. She never did come for her second smoke. You know your end of how it gone from that. I won’t go into it. There’s no point, and I don’t like to. I will say it hit me bad when she kissed you. I knowed you done more, but it was different to know it and to see it. The decent thing woulda been to take it somewhere else and do that stuff. Just so you know. I know you seen me sooner or later cause I caught your eye. Even though she didn’t turn and look, I could tell you was talking about me.

  Let me tell you from my side of Linda what you don’t know. You don’t know how that night at her car, once you was gone, I said to her, Why don’t he stick around till you done?

  Geoffrey, she said.

  Why don’t he drive back home with you?

  I think you know that, she said.

  He go to bed before you get there?

  I’m not talking about it now, she said.

  You liked to talk about it before he showed up.

  I’m tired, she said.

  Me too, I said. I been waiting out here all night.

  I know, she said. She put her hand on my hand and moved it off the car door and shut the door and said through the open window, Come down here, Geoffrey.

  I come down there.

  You’re a sweet boy, she said and give me a kiss the same side of the head she did you.

  It was the first time she’d ever named me a boy.

  You don’t know neither about the night she forgot to bring the old redbuds out with her on her smoke break, and how she took the new ones back in with her and just left them on the counter next to the water jar, and how I watched them go bad slow over hours all night. You don’t know how that night I followed her out the parking lot on my bike and how she reached out and did her cigarette wave and how that changed everything from bad to good in one shake of her hand.

  You don’t know how a night come what she didn’t head out back at all. How I stood there with my fresh redbuds, looking at the old ones in the jar till I couldn’t take it no more and gone in there on my own to swap them out. The kitchen people give me hell and made a noise so’s she took me out back, and talked to me, and when I looked back
through the kitchen I seen you standing by the bar watching on.

  The next night there was no jar at all. When I looked in, them in the kitchen caught me at it and said to me stuff what nobody shouldn’t got to hear and take it. She didn’t come out once all night. Towards the end it was quiet enough I could stand there with my ear to the wall and listen to who was doing what and so I knowed when she gone out the front door to take her smoke break. She didn’t talk to me at the car more than to say good night. I followed her fast as I could far as I could waiting for her to shake her cigarette out the window, but you can’t keep a bike even with a car what don’t want to be kept even with. I never seen her hand reach out, just way up ahead in the dark the sparks hitting the road. I looked for them when I got there, but they’d gone black as the hardtop.

  The next night I watched you through the window, and when you left I watched her till she gone out front for her break, and then I caught her at it.

  Oh for God’s sake Geoffrey, she said, I thought you’d gone home.

  No you didn’t, I said.

  Okay, she said. But you ought to.

  We stood there for a while.

  I’d like you to, she said. For me. Geoffrey. What do you want to say? What’s there to say?

  I love you, I told her.

  No you don’t, she said.

  I do, I told her.

  That’s puppy love, she said. Puppy love is something you think is love, Geoffrey. It’s something—

  Well, do you got puppy love for me?

  No, she said. I’m too old.

  I don’t care how old you is, I said. I’m gonna stand here every night till you say—

  Don’t be childish, she said. You’re acting like a—

  I called her something I never called no one before.

  I’ve gotta go back to work, she said.

  I’m sorry, I told her.

  You’ve gotta stop saying you’re sorry, she said. Part of being a adult is knowing when you mean what you say.

  Did you mean it when you said you wanted to leave Mister Podawalski?

  My husband? she said.

  Did you mean it when you said he never touched you?

  Yes I did, she said. Okay?