But Tatiana had known very well how he felt.
“Tania, what if…” Bradley broke off. “What if you weren’t married?”
“But I am.”
“But what if…he never came back from war? What if you were still alone, like before, in New York? When it was just you and Ant.”
“State your question,” Tatiana said quietly.
“What about you and me, Tania?” His blue eyes were so emotional. “If you weren’t married?”
“But I am,” she whispered.
“Oh God. Is there no chance for us? No chance at all?”
Reaching out, Tatiana put her hand on his face. “No, David,” she replied. “Not in this life.”
Bradley looked across at her. For a moment he did not speak, and she did not take her palm away. Then he whispered, “Thank you. Thank you for giving me my answer.” He kissed her hand. “You are a very good wife,” he said. “And perhaps in another life, I might have known that.”
“I really have to go,” Tatiana said, hastily getting up. “Please don’t mention this again.” As steadily as she could, Tatiana walked out of the cafeteria, leaving Dr. Bradley alone at the table.
Jingle Bell Swing
A day later, on Friday night, Tatiana was working, Anthony was overnight with Sergio, and Alexander was at Maloney’s with Shannon, Skip and Johnny. Johnny was regaling everyone with stories of how Emily went out with him for dinner earlier in the week, how Emily agreed to go to Scottsdale Commons with him on Sunday, how Emily was planning to invite him over for Christmas to meet the folks.
“The problem is, you see, she is looking at it like a courtship, when courtship is the last thing I need. Why am I spending so long getting her to do what I want her to do?”
“A week is too long?” Alexander laughed. “Oh, man. They have places for people like you, Johnny-boy. Special darkened places that don’t require courtship.”
Johnny waved him off. He was a young hard kid in good duds with a hot rod, a biker, a strapper. “I’m not paying for it, no way. Who do you think I am?”
Shannon, Skip, Alexander exchanged glances, and shook their collective married heads. Alexander said, “Johnny, how much have you spent so far on dinner, drinks, pictures, flowers?”
You could tell Johnny had never thought about it like that. “It’s not the same,” he said, downing his drink. “It’s the conquest, the chase that’s interesting. The pro-cre-ative process.”
“Oh, the pro-cre-ative process,” mimicked Shannon. “You’re such an a*shole.”
Skip and Shannon branched off to talk about their new babies. Alexander and Johnny branched off to talk about Emily and whether she was worth pursuing further.
“Don’t you think,” said Johnny, “it’s too much effort to expend on a little fly-cage?”
Alexander was thoughtful. “Depends how much you like her,” he replied. “If you like her, it’s not too much effort.”
“Well, how would I know? I haven’t—”
“If you liked her,” said Alexander, “no effort would be too much.”
“You know something about that?”
“I know something about that,” said Alexander.
A hand went on Alexander’s shoulder. “Well, hello!” It was Carmen and Emily. They had gotten all gussied up and sprayed. Johnny suavely kissed Emily’s cheek.
“Alexander, we really must stop meeting like this,” said Carmen. “It’s our third time in a week.”
Soon Shannon and Skip left to go home to their waiting wives, who cared what time they came home.
Emily, Johnny, Carmen, and Alexander went to a corner booth and ordered drinks. Carmen sat next to him on the bench. Her perfume was unfamiliar and a little strong but not terrible. She herself wasn’t terrible. Her dark eyes flashed, she had some vim. She had a good laugh, she was a flirt, a talker. She was not shy, she was not afraid. During their conversation she moved her leg and it touched his. And at one in the morning, Alexander didn’t move it away.
“So, Alexander,” Carmen said, “is my memory failing me, or are you the same Alexander Barrington who killed a man that broke into your house late one night a few years ago? I recall reading something in the paper about that.”
“He’s one and the same man, Carmen,” said Johnny. “So don’t get on his bad side.”
“Oh, how positively frightening!” squealed Carmen, moving an inch closer. “So you have a bad side?”
“I might,” said Alexander.
“How bad?” she asked in a low voice.
Alexander could have said nothing. Certainly he should have said nothing. But it was late Friday night and he’d been drinking, and his head was swimming, and so what he said instead of keeping silent was, “Very very bad, Carmen.”
And Carmen went red, and tittered, and moved even closer to him on the bench seat.
She told Alexander that she and Cubert, married for two years, wanted a bigger place because they were trying for a baby. The truth was, though, that Cubert was not home so often, she needed the building of the house to occupy herself because she was becoming “awfully bored.”
Johnny was busy talking to Emily, and so Alexander quietly said, “With him away so often, it might be difficult to have that baby.” He didn’t want to add that blinding proximity still guaranteed nothing.
Carmen laughed. “That’s why I said, trying. Not succeeding. But I am late this month, so we’ll see.” She looked slightly sheepish when she said it.
Alexander actually asked, “Do you, um, want children?”
“Oh, yes, very much,” Carmen said. “All my friends are having children at nineteen, twenty. I’m starting to feel old at twenty-four.” She smiled, raising her eyebrows. “But I’m doing what I can to keep myself youthful.” She pinched his arm. “Do you have any children?”
“Yes,” said Alexander. “A son. He’s fourteen.”
“Fourteen!” said Carmen. “He’s practically a grown up. Does he look like you?”
“A little.”
“He’ll be a lucky boy,” she said, giving him a diffused stare, “if he looks like you.”
Alexander took a sip of his cold drink and a long inhale of his burning cigarette. “Carmen,” he said, “how in the world did you get together with Cubert?” What Alexander was really saying is he thought Cubert was too pale and small for vivid Carmen, and she must have known it because she threw back her head.
“Why, thank you, Alexander! Coming from you, that’s quite a compliment, you are a very reticent fellow.”
He smiled. “I’m not reticent. I’m thoughtful.”
“Oh, is there a difference?” She chuckled. “Cubert, though he doesn’t look it, has a few things going for him that I really liked when we were courting.”
“Like what?”
“Are you being insinuating and naughty, Alexander? How delightful!”
“Not at all.” He kept a straight face. “I’m asking a polite question.”
“Well,” she said, “first of all, he is quite enamored of me.”
“And second of all?”
“He is quite enamored of me.” When she laughed her breasts rose up and down. The more Alexander drank, the more he noticed the breasts.
“So tell me,” said Carmen, “how does a married man get to stay out until all hours on a Friday night? My Cubert is away,” she said, “but where’s your wife?”
“My wife is also away,” said Alexander. “She works Friday nights.”
Carmen’s eyes went wide. “The fact that your wife works is shocking enough. But at night? In the name of all that is gracious, why?”
“You are not the only one who asks this question, Carmen.”
She laughed. She sat close, swelling, laughing at any stupid thing he said. When he lit her cigarette, as gallant men do for ladies, she cupped his hand and, raising her eyes to him, breathed out, “Thank you.” For a moment their eyes met.
And Alexander, suddenly finding himself mental years away, in a uniform, at Sadko, in a different time, in a different life, as a different man, said to Carmen, “Did you girls come in one car?” Though at Sadko he would have said something else. Do you want to go for a walk, he would’ve said. For a walk by the river parapets, for a smoke in the alley?
“Yes,” said Carmen throatily. “We came in Emily’s car.”
“I have to go home, Carmen,” said Emily. “My parents will kill me for staying out this late. It’s absolutely ghastly—why, it’s nearly last call.”
Carmen grazed Alexander’s hand. “Do you think you can give me a ride so Emily can go home now? I’m only half an hour south from here, in Chandler.”
He glanced over at Johnny, who was staring at him with an expression that said, I don’t know what the hell you think you’re doing.
Alexander himself didn’t know. But even at two in the morning on a Friday night after five hours of drinking, Alexander knew this: no woman other than his wife could get into his truck. Another woman could not sit in his truck, where Tatiana sat, where his son sat, in which he took his family out. Even when not sober, when youthfully stirred up by an attractive, well-built young woman, all decked out and ready to party, this was something that a 38-year-old Alexander could not do. He also could not explain it to Carmen.
“I can’t drive you,” he said. “I’ve got to go home. My son is waiting.”
“So? He’s likely asleep. You can drop me off on the way.”
“I’m not on the way to anything,” he said. “But Emily is on the way, and she’s leaving. You might as well go with her.”
Reluctantly Carmen stood up, while Alexander paid, remaining behind, as the other three got ready to leave.
“Aren’t you coming?”
“In a minute. Good night now.”
Carmen shooed Johnny and Emily away and sat down again. “I’ll wait with you while you finish your drink.”
He stared at her, wondering if she was worth it. She didn’t seem bright, though somehow that wasn’t so important. “Carmen,” he finally said when minutes passed and she couldn’t figure it out, “I come to this bar every Friday. This is my local joint. People know me here. I come here with my friends, with people I work with. I come here with my wife. Do you understand why I can’t leave this bar with you?”
Why did she look so pleased by that? She left by herself, and Alexander waited a few minutes, and then left, too.
In the parking lot she was waiting, coming up to him to say goodbye. “So will you be here on Tuesday?”
“No, not likely.”
“What about next Friday?”
He shrugged. “That I might.”
“So maybe I’ll see you then.” She smiled. “Have you had any cancellations in your schedule so we can meet some evening, have dinner, talk about the house perhaps?”
“I’ll have to check,” he said, “I might have a cancellation.”
“I hope so.” She planted a slow moist kiss on his cheek. “Well, good night, now.” Her breasts pressed into his shirt.
After she left, Alexander sat in his truck, his hands on the wheel.
He didn’t go home.
He went to the hospital.
He lurched and lurched, scraping away what was left of his clutch, trying to put the transmission in gear, and after parking—badly—meandered his way into ER. There was no one at the reception desk, the unit nurse was out, no one received him. He staggered instead to the waiting room, where half a dozen people were arrayed like sacks in chairs. One of those people was Charlie. Alexander fell into a chair one away from him. “Has there been a sighting?”
“Not yet,” said Charlie. “That just means there might be one soon.”
They waited.
And soon and summarily she appeared in their view. Small, round-faced, freckled, pale, her lips unadorned by lipstick, her neck by perfume, her breath by wine, her hair tied up in a bun inside the nurse’s cap, her legs in white stockings, slender and subdued, Tatiana came, and yet her lips were full and pulpy, her breasts swayed, and Alexander could see them, could feel them warm. She might as well have stood in front of him naked, lay in front of him naked, so clearly could he see all of her, see her, smell her, taste her.
Her white uniform covered with eight hours of a Friday night, her high forehead glistening, her freckles diminished by winter, Tatiana’s green-spoked eyes stared sad and despondent on Alexander. Sitting between them, she took their hands, Alexander’s in one, Charlie’s in the other. “Now, Charlie,” Tatiana said. “Now, Alexander. I’ve told you and told you not to drink so much. It leads to no good. It’s leading you to a bad place. It’s leading you to darkness.” She looked from one to the other as they sat and nodded. “You both have made promises to me. Charlie, you swore that you would not drink this Friday night.”
“And what did I promise you, Tatiana?” Alexander said, slurring his words.
She turned to him and said nothing. A small tear trickled down her cheek. She let go of Charlie’s hand but held on to Alexander’s. “I’m going to go get you some coffees, a little ice for your head. Wait here.” As if either had anywhere else to go.
She came back with two coffees. Charlie said he wanted whisky in his. Alexander put his down on the floor and, taking Tatiana’s wrist, pulled her to him to stand between his splayed legs. “Smell my breath,” he said huskily, breathing on her. “So good, right?” He entwined her in his large, intoxicated arms. “Babe, come home with me,” he muttered. “Come home and I’ll”—he still had the sense to lower his voice to a whisper—“give you some of that drunk true love you like.”
Staring down at him, Tatiana brushed his hair away, and bending, kissed his forehead. “That drunk love is sometimes a little rough on your wife,” she said quietly. “Finish the coffee, put some ice on your head, sober up a little, go home. Anthony is home alone.”
“Ant is with Sergio,” muttered Alexander. “He is not alone.”
Gently she wrested herself away from him. “I’ve got broken bones in the tent, a busted median artery, a perforated stomach, and an unstable heart. I have to go.”
As she was walking away Tatiana turned her head. “Next time you come,” she said, “wipe the lipstick off your face first, Alexander.”
O Come, All Ye Faithful
The following Friday night at Maloney’s, Johnny happily and unexpectedly admitted he was no longer pursuing Emily. Apparently at last week’s Saturday night Christmas party, Emily, nicely drunk and relaxed, had given him some milk for free in one of the upstairs bedrooms, and his thirst thus slaked, Johnny met another girl at the party and was now “courting” her.
“So needless to say Emily won’t be coming here tonight?” Alexander asked, palming his glass of beer.
They all agreed with a hearty laugh that she probably wouldn’t be.
At midnight, Shannon and Skip left; at one Johnny left.
Alexander had two more drinks alone, and then left himself.
He was about to get into his truck when a voice said, “Alexander.”
It was Carmen. She got out of the sedan parked next to his truck. She was wearing a circle skirt, a button-down blouse, a cardigan. Her hair was all teased and prepared. Her lips were painted. Alexander remembered wiping her lipstick off his cheek in the hospital last week. A pang of something hit him.
But just a small pang.
“Well, hello there.” He smiled. “What are you doing here?”
She smiled happily back. “As I’m sure you found out, your slimy friend Johnny did not do right by my nice friend Emily, so now we can’t come here anymore. And I don’t have other unmarried friends that I can drag to bars with me while my husband is on his little trips. So…”
“So…” He looked her up and down. “I like your blouse,” he said.
“Do you? Well, thank you…” She appraised him herself. “Are you done for the night? Do you have to run?”
Alexander chewed his lip.
“Because I brought some wine and beer,” Carmen said quickly. “I have glasses. We can have a drink in your truck if you want. Listen to some music.” She smiled.
“I tell you what,” he said, coming close to her. “Why don’t we have a drink in your car where the wine is?”
“Oh, sure. You don’t want to go into your truck? Is it messy?” She glanced in. The truck was spotless. He didn’t elaborate or answer her, but took off his bomber jacket and threw it on the bench in his truck. He didn’t want unfamiliar smells on it he would not be able to explain.
They fit into her front seat, turned on the engine, turned up the radio. Alexander poured her a glass of wine, himself a beer. They clinked. “What do you want to drink to?” she asked.
“To Friday nights,” he replied.
“Amen,” she said, adding cheerfully, “it’s tough when the spouses are away, isn’t it?”
“Hmm.” He lit his cigarette, and hers, too.
“But you know what,” Carmen said, “I’m so used to Cubert not being here, that when he is here, I almost don’t know what to do. We’re always fighting over something or other. Is it the same with you and your wife?”
“No.”
“Oh? What’s it like?”
“Carmen, you’re sitting in the car with me, drinking, your hair all coiffed, your lipstick bright. You can’t think of anything else to talk to me about other than my wife?”
“Oh, all right, when you put it like that.” She tittered. “What do you like to talk to girls about?”
“I don’t know,” said Alexander. “I don’t talk to girls other than my wife.”
She laughed.
The music played.
“Winter Wonderland.”
“Santa Baby.”
They sat in her car, they smoked, he drank, she drank, she became tipsier, and with every swallow of the wine, she moved closer to him on the bench seat, touching his shirt sleeves, his jeans leg, his hand.
“So…do you want to talk about your wife?”
“I can,” said Alexander, “but then I’ll have to leave.” She really wasn’t very bright. But she smelled pretty good. And her boobs were huge.
“I told you about Cubert. Tell me at least what I’m up against. What’s her name?”
What she was up against? What did that mean? He didn’t reply.
“All right, all right. How many years were you married?”
“I’m still married. Fifteen.”
She whistled. “Wow.” She took his hand and sighed. “Me just two, and already I’m not sure if I’m in love with Cubert. Do you know what I mean?”
“No, I don’t know Cubert at all,” said Alexander.
Carmen held his hand, placing it against her own. Her hand was long. “What about you and your wife?”
“I’m still in love with my wife,” Alexander said, taking his hand away.
“So what are you doing in my car, Alexander?”
“Drinking,” he said. “Smoking.”
She picked up his hand again. “You’ve got such large hands,” she said huskily.
“Well,” he said, “I am a man.”
She looked at him through lowered lids. “Are you comfortable behind that wheel?”
Alexander palmed the steering column. “I’m fine. Nice car you’ve got.” It was a Ford sedan like Tania used to drive.
“What I mean is…would you be more comfortable in the back seat?”
He didn’t reply, his male blood flowing, his excitement bubbling.
The music played on. “Only You Can Bring Me Cheer.”
They got out of the car, switched to the back seat.
“It’s getting very late,” Carmen said, stretching. She smiled. “Isn’t it?” She moved across the back seat to him.
Without putting down his drink, Alexander leaned over and kissed her. She smelled of smoke, of liquor, the tastes were unfamiliar, the feel mushy, all was so foreign and not entirely pleasing, but not entirely unpleasing either after the drink. He lowered his lips to her neck, where the perfume was better, and with his one free hand unbuttoned her blouse. Carmen readily helped him. Her long-line bra was like armor over her breasts. It had eight or ten hooks and she had to dislodge the bra herself, but when the breasts were out, they were very large indeed. His face must have shown his surprise.
“Nice, huh?” Carmen said proudly. “Come on,” she said, “put your big hands on them.” He put his drink carefully on the car floor, and fondled her. He felt he could have used an extra pair of hands. Carmen pushed his head down, pressing his face flush into her breasts. Alexander had to push away a little, take a breath before moving over her nipples. They took a while to harden. She didn’t stir at his mouth. “Mmm,” she said, holding his head. “You like them, don’t you?”
“I like them.” What Alexander liked best though was the women’s response to him. Even in the days of the Leningrad garrison, when the flow of girls was like a three-ring circus, coming and going in all shapes and sizes, and he liked them all. Aside from his purely personal esthetic preferences—that happened to be met by the one woman he had married—his sexual preferences had always been about one thing only: the girls’ reaction to his action. “Do you like my mouth on you?”
“I like that you like it,” Carmen said, placing her hand on his jeans. “And I feel that you do like it…”
Still at her breasts, Alexander looked at her. “Where are you going with this, Carmen?”
“I don’t know.” She smiled, giving him a squeeze. “Where are you going with it? Where do you want to go with it?”
“Oh, it’s like that, is it?” He dragged his hand underneath her petticoat, up her fleshy legs.
“Hey,” she said, trying to push his hand away. “I’m not going to be that easy for you. I want you to come back next week for some more. I’m not going to repeat Emily’s mistake.”
As if not hearing her, Alexander moved his hand up her stocking and found her closed panty girdle that came down to the middle of her thighs. His excitement morphed slightly into dismay. He couldn’t imagine how they would get this thing off in the car—it would require his army knife, which was in the nightstand by his bed. When he thought of the nightstand, he thought of the bed, when he thought of the bed, he thought of Tania buying the quilts and the pillows and the sheets for it over eight years ago, making the bed and then happily calling him in. Alexander took his hands away from under Carmen’s skirt.
She pressed his head back into her breasts. “Go ahead,” she murmured. “This will have to be enough for now. I love your face in them. Go ahead. Feast.”
When he touched her nipples, she didn’t move. Alexander was not used to that and decided he wasn’t trying hard enough. He rubbed them, kneaded them, squeezed them, sucked them, pulled on them, twisted them harder than he thought was conscionable. Carmen sat, her eyes closed, her body still, her hands on his head, looking extremely contented. “That feels so good,” she said. “Doesn’t it feel good?”
“Carmen, is there, um, anything else you want me to do for you?” Alexander said.
She opened her eyes. “Oh, baby, what are you offering me?”
“I got a little of everything. What do you want?”
“I really like you touching my breasts.” She put her hands on him. “What do you like? Is there something you want me to do for you? Or are my breasts enough?”
“They’re certainly plenty,” said Alexander. “But I might need a touch more.” He smiled.
Carmen touched him, rubbing him to attention, and was soon unbuckling him and he wasn’t stopping her.
“Get out of that girdle, Carmen,” said Alexander.
“The breasts are out,” she said joyously. “But who said I’m getting out of the girdle? Boy, you grown men. You don’t waste any time, do you?” She was smiling. “I like that, though. So forward. Always know what you want.”
Alexander said nothing. His hands and mouth on her breasts were getting more insistent as her hand on him was getting more insistent. They were both panting.
She stopped touching him. “Wait. I don’t want to get into something we’ll have to cut in a hour.”
Alexander paused, considering her briefly, trying to figure out the polite thing to say under the circumstances. What did she think this was? And was this really the best time to be pointing out to her what it was? “Um—so—what would you like?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” She smiled, unbuttoning him. “What would you like? When does your wife get home?”
Carmen broke the cardinal rule—the taboo against talking about a man’s wife while she was taking his joint out of his jeans. Alexander pushed her hands away and said, “You know what? I think you’re right. It’s getting late.”
But Carmen had gotten a feel of a bare Alexander, and she said, “Oh, wait just a second. Wait.” Her breath quickening, she rubbed him and said in a low voice, “Do you think you might have that cancellation for me next week? Perhaps we can get together, have dinner, talk about that house?” She squeezed him tightly. “Go somewhere a little more comfortable?”
“Perhaps,” said Alexander, closing his eyes.
She continued to stroke him. “How does that feel?”
“Good.”
“Will you come next week?”
“I’d like to come now.”
“Oh! You are funny! You are—something.”
“Am I?” He let her rub him another moment or two, and then his hand went in her hair. “Carmen…?” said Alexander, pushing her head down slightly.
“Oh, you are something else,” she said. Chuckling, she adjusted herself on the seat, bent her head, and took him into her mouth. He sat with a drink in one hand, eyes closed, while she struggled up and down on him.
Alexander knew himself very well: she would have had to be magic mouth—and she clearly wasn’t—to get him off this way when he’d had so much to drink. Knowing this, he still let her persevere to see if maybe he would surprise himself. He steadied her head, tried to get her to move more rhythmically, told her to hold him a little tighter. She tried to do what she was told, but couldn’t seem to do it all at once. Finally Carmen pulled her mouth away, looked up and said, “You’re getting close, I can tell.”
He smiled politely. He wasn’t anywhere near close.
“Because I just want to warn you, I don’t do any of that…” she waved her hand, “you know…milt in the mouth stuff. I know some men really go for that.”
“Some men?” Sighing into his last sip of beer, Alexander put down the glass. “Look,” he said, “I’m going to have to get going.”
“Get going? What do you mean? You’re so…unbelievably hard.” She was still yanking at him.
He put his hand on her hand. “Carmen, shh,” he said. “Steady on.”
“But don’t you need to finish?”
“I’ve been drinking,” said Alexander. “I need something else.”
“I have something else.” Carmen straightened out, showing him her breasts. “I’ll lie down on the seat, you climb over me and put yourself between them, and do what you have to. As hard as you want. Honestly, as hard as you want. It’s the best way. All the boys love it.”
His hand moved inside her formidable cleavage. “Won’t work for me after the drink. But thank you.”
Carmen smiled, taking hold of him again. “So what will work then?”
He didn’t answer.
“Fine,” she said, squeezing him. “To feel that inside me, I’ll break my own cardinal rule, I’ll take off my girdle here and now. I only put it on for a little extra protection, if you know what I mean. Come on, help me take it off. Then you finish how you want.”
He played with her breasts. But Alexander had brought nothing with him.
She saw his hesitation. “What? Don’t worry. I have a pessary.”
“Oh yeah? Filled with acacia?” In the olden days that’s what the women used. Plastic rings filled with tropical flowers. Still got pregnant.
“What?”
Alexander moved her hands off him. “No. I need a condom.”
“Why? I told you. I’m safe.” She put her hands back.
“Yes, but I’m not.”
“What do you mean? Come on, look at you. Let me…”
“Can’t do it, Carmen.” He moved away from her on the seat, buttoning himself up, fixing his belt.
She scooted close to him, looking up at him with dreamy eyes. “What about next week? You can bring what you need then.”
“Yes, next week I’ll bring what I need.”
“I can’t wait,” she said. “I won’t be able to think of anything else. Mmm. Me, on top of you, with these babies over your face.” She actually made a sound of pleasure at the anticipation. “Doesn’t that sound good?”
“Very good.” Alexander helped her hook her bra in the back.
“So did you like them?” Carmen asked. “Cubert is crazy for them.”
Not so crazy that he stays home, Alexander thought. When she was dressed, he helped her out of the backseat and behind the wheel.
“He’s in town next weekend, unfortunately,” said Carmen. “He’s going away Monday to Thursday, though. You want to meet Wednesday night?”
They agreed to meet in a restaurant in Chandler where she lived. The restaurant was next to a Westin Hotel. He told her he wouldn’t be able to stay out too late and Carmen said with a smile that that was okay; they would have to get right down to business. She turned up her face to him from the car window. “Well? Aren’t you going to kiss me good night?”
Alexander gave her a kiss on the cheek.
“I’ll see you Wednesday,” she said.
“See you Wednesday,” he said, got into his truck and drove away.
It was five thirty in the morning, and for some reason, as Alexander was coming up Pima, he became afraid that Tatiana was already home, that she got off work early and came home and found him not there. His heart started beating so violently that he had to pull over to get a grip on himself. It was another twenty minutes before he could get back on the road.
Tatiana wasn’t home. Yet the relief wasn’t there. Alexander smelled like all kinds of bad news. He unlocked the door stealthily. Anthony’s door was closed. When he opened it, he saw his sleeping son in the bed. Why was Ant home? He was supposed to be at Sergio’s!
Alexander took off his clothes, ran them through the wash, and had a long shower, as hot as he could stand it, where he scrubbed himself raw. When he smelled like himself again, he put his clothes in the dryer and went to bed. It was light out, nearly seven.
No sooner had he closed his eyes that he felt Tatiana’s small hand on his face and her soft lips on his forehead. “Hey,” she said. “Woo-hoo. Wake up, sleepy head. You’ve got to go to work. Did you have fun last night with your friends?”
Rolling over, he muttered he wasn’t going to his morning appointments. A truck had run him over, he said; he could not open his eyes.
“What time did you get back?”
“I don’t know,” he muttered. “Around two, three, maybe.”
“A little hung over, are we?” Tatiana said, kissing him on the back of the head. He heard her switch on the shower, and that’s all he heard. But in bed she lay close to him, still slightly damp. He turned away from her. She pressed her bare breasts into his back, nuzzled his shoulder blades, rubbed against him, murmured that it was nice to have him so big and warm next to her on a Saturday morning, put her arms around him and fell asleep.
At eleven Alexander dragged his sorry self out of bed, showered again, dressed and went out into the kitchen. While he was making coffee and fixing some rolls, Anthony came out, fresh from sleep, and Tatiana, who heard their voices, came out, too. Anthony and Sergio apparently had had a fight, which was why Anthony had stormed home.
“I hope no broken noses, Ant,” said Tatiana.
“No, Mom, Serge is my best friend. I’d never hit him. Dad, how come you’re not at work?”
Tatiana smiled sleepily. “Daddy had a late night last night.”
“You can say that again,” said Anthony.
“Tania,” said Alexander, “you want a cup of coffee?”
“Oh, yes, please.”
“Because,” Anthony continued, “I got up around six to use the bathroom and your truck wasn’t outside.”
Alexander’s back was to Tatiana as he poured cream into her coffee and studiously stirred the sugar. “No, I’m sure it was,” he said.
“Well, I don’t know then. Because you weren’t in your bed.”
And then silence dripped through their just the right size double wide trailer, through their little home.
Turning around, Alexander extended his hand to her with the coffee but couldn’t look up. Tatiana stood for a few moments holding on to the back of the kitchen chair, and then turned and slowly walked back into the bedroom without taking the cup from his proffered hands.
Alexander sat down with Anthony but the roll kept getting stuck in his throat. He needed to go to work, but how could he walk into that bedroom to say good-bye? How could he not walk into that bedroom?
His mouth tight, his coffee drunk, Alexander stood at the open bedroom door. Tatiana was in the bathroom with the door shut.
“Tania,” he called out, “I have to go.”
There was a gathering of silence and then her barely audible voice. “All right, see you later.”
Alexander left.
When he came home Saturday night, Anthony was watching TV alone and the door to the bedroom was closed. Alexander dropped his keys on the table, took off his jacket and sat by Anthony. “What’s Mommy doing?”
“She said she wasn’t feeling well.”
The house didn’t smell like Saturday usual—like it had been cooked in. “What, there’s no food?”
“Mom and I had leftovers. She said you would have had your dinner out.”
“She said I would have had my dinner out?”
“Yes.”
After fixing himself a plate of cold stuffed peppers and bread, Alexander sat back down on the couch. “Did you go grocery shopping? There’s no milk.”
“We didn’t go. She said we weren’t going today.”
“What’ya watching?”
“Gunsmoke.”
“Um—so you didn’t go grocery shopping, what did you do?” The Christmas tree stood in the corner of the living room unlit. “No one turned on the tree?”
Anthony looked. “Guess not.”
Alexander went to turn it on. “So what did you do?” he repeated.
“Spent all day at the mission orphanage.”
“Where?”
“Dad, remember? We go every Christmas. We bring our old clothes, I do crafts with the kids, Mom reads to them.”
“Oh. Yeah. So…how was your mother today?”
“Silent. I thought I’d done something wrong.”
“Did you?”
“I asked her, she said no.”
Alexander finished his food and waited until Gunsmoke was over. “Ant, you shouldn’t have said anything about me coming home so late. I had told Mommy I came home earlier because I didn’t want her to worry. Now she thinks I was lying.”
“Well…” Anthony was weighing his thoughts. “Weren’t you?”
“Technically. Because I didn’t want to upset your mother for nothing.”
Anthony clammed up.
They sat.
“She didn’t seem upset, like angry, Dad, if that’s what you’re worried about,” said Anthony at last. “She just seemed extra tired. She said she hadn’t been feeling well.”
Unable to go into his bedroom, Alexander asked the boy if he wanted to go to the pictures. Anthony jumped up, they threw on their jackets and went out. They saw Attack of the Crab Monsters and Aztec Mummy, and when they came home, the bedroom door was still closed.
Alexander couldn’t face her. He didn’t know how he was going to get into bed with her. After Anthony went to sleep, Alexander had three shots of vodka and half a pack of cigarettes and thought about all the things he could say when she would inevitably ask him why he had lied to her. He decided he would blame it all on poker-playing Johnny.
Poker with Johnny, till six in the morning—stayed out too late, didn’t want to tell you, when I was half dead, in bed, upset you for nothing, I’m sorry I’m sorry, was going to come clean—Poker with Johnny, till six in the morning.
Were they going to see Johnny any time soon? He’d need to give Johnny-boy a heads-up on that one. Thus fortified with poetic lies and prosaic vodka, Alexander opened the bedroom door. Tatiana was sleeping in a fetal position on top of the covers. The room was dark. Not wanting to accidentally wake her—God forbid—Alexander covered her with a couch blanket and crawled into bed. He was unconscious in seconds, having barely slept the night before.
In the morning when he finally woke up, he heard noises of her and Anthony making breakfast outside.
“Good morning, Dad,” said Anthony when Alexander staggered out. “Today is cookie day.”
He had forgotten that, too. Five friends of Tatiana’s from the hospital were coming over to bake cookies for St. Monica’s Mission. In the evening they were going to Shannon and Amanda’s Christmas party. Would Johnny be there?
“They’ll be here soon,” Tatiana said, not addressing him. Meaning, he was nearly naked, wearing only his snug-fitting BVDs, reminiscent of his Red Army skivvies. He wore them because Tatiana liked the way he looked in them. Not today perhaps, because her back was to him. When he turned to go, he heard her voice. “I found your clothes in the dryer,” Tatiana said. “I didn’t know you knew how to use the washer and dryer. Imagine my surprise. I folded them for you and put them on your dresser.” Slowly Alexander turned to her. She was facing the stove.
“I spilled beer on them,” he said lamely.
Poker with Johnny, till six in the morning—stayed out too late, didn’t want to tell you, when I was half dead, in bed, upset you for nothing, I’m sorry I’m sorry, was going to come clean, I spilled beer on my jeans—Poker with Johnny, till six in the morning.
She didn’t bring him any coffee. He poured his own. But since she made eggs and bacon for herself and Ant, she did put some on a plate for him, and she did put the plate in front of him. They didn’t speak, not even through Anthony. Alexander was incapable of speaking to her about bullshit when an African elephant was sitting on top of their breakfast eggs.
At noon the girls came and started baking, eating, laughing, reading recipe books. Christmas music went on, there was cheer. Anthony helped part of the time, Alexander disappeared in the woodshed, and then he and Ant went out to shoot some baskets. It was a mild December Sunday in Arizona, sixty degrees. “Tatia, would you like to live in Arizona, the land of the small spring?”
Alexander was outside picking the ball out of the bushes, and he was careless for a moment—careless because he was consumed with the impossible and trying not to think of the impossible—and was not paying attention, and didn’t see two rolled-up cholla clusters that had separated and drifted over to the basketball. The germinating cholla plant pollinated by jumping and attaching itself to whatever was near. Alexander was near. He grabbed the ball, and the cholla instantly attached itself to his palms. Hundreds of needle-like fine teeth penetrated his skin, pierced it, broke in and dug in, burrowing inside like malignant animals. The palms immediately started to swell. The ball game was over.
Anthony ran to the house. “Mom! Mom! Look what Dad did. Mom!”
Her hands were covered in flour. “What did he do now?” she said to Anthony, turning to look.
“It’s nothing,” Alexander said.
“Alexander,” said Tatiana, “you have blood on your hands.”
They stood. “Just a little cholla,” he said. “Nothing to worry about.”
The girls, all nurses, gasped and twittered, fussed and fretted, dispensing anxious, extremely high-pitched advice. “Oh, no, not cholla!” “The needles will fall out after seven to ten days.” “Oh yes, but there will be such an infection!” “Oh, yes, but to pull them out is impossible!” “It will positively shred him!” “The cholla is like barbed wire!”
There was so much lamentation. Only Tatiana remained silent.
“Well, what do you want to do?” she said, looking into his face, the first time this Sunday. Her eyes were green ocean water, frozen over. “You want to leave the needles in? They’ll get infected, but they will fall out in a week. Or I can pull them out. It’ll rip your palms up. But they’ll be out.”
Anthony was patting him on the back. “You’re between a rock and a hard place, Dad,” he said. “As you say, either way, you’re—”
“Anthony!”
“What?” Anthony was all innocence.
“Rip them out,” Alexander said to Tatiana.
He sat at her table; she took out her anesthetic needle. He declined. The anesthetic he needed was not for his palms. “If you want me to do this for you,” Tatiana said, “let me numb your hands.”
“Tania,” said Alexander, “you stitched a gash in my shoulder, a shrapnel wound, without anesthetic. I’ll be fine.”
Without discussing it further, Tatiana put the needle away and started to take off her surgical gloves.
“All right, all right.” He sighed. “Numb the hands.”
“Mom,” said Anthony, “how come you’re wearing gloves?” He chuckled. “Are you afraid Dad will infect you?”
Tatiana paused a little too long before she said, “The needles penetrate. I’ll need two pairs of gloves, to protect myself, and it still won’t be enough.”
Alexander’s gaze was on his unfeeling bloodied hands. Anthony stood by Alexander’s side, his supportive patting arm on his father’s shoulder, and five women stood watching, over Tatiana’s back, over Alexander’s, while she with surgical pliers wrenched the barbed-wire cholla glochids out of his upturned palms, leaving oozing wounds.
Anthony, not flinching and never taking his hand off Alexander’s back, said to the women, “Want to know what my dad says about cholla?”
“Anthony!”
“What? No, no, this is the mild version.” Anthony grinned. “When we first came here, Dad didn’t know what cholla was. But he learned quick, though he’s never gotten hit like this. So he started saying, ‘I know there is no hell, because they keep telling me it’s hot down there. Well, don’t give me hot, because I do hot every day. Now if they told me there was cholla in hell, then I’d believe them.’ Isn’t that right?”
“Well,” said Alexander, “they don’t call it the devil cholla for nothing.”
“Mom says,” said Anthony, smiling at his mother, “that the cholla is possessed by evil spirits.”
“Well, Antman, they don’t call it the devil cholla for nothing,” said Tatiana.
The ladies clucked as Tatiana continued to twist the needles out of Alexander’s palms. She had to stop at one point to staunch the copious bleeding by pressing a cloth to his hands for a minute before continuing. They sat during this minute, with him looking down at her blonde braided head and her looking down at his palm in her hands.
“I would not, could not, be so calm,” said Carolyn, with an impressed chuckle. “I’d be a wreck with my Dan. Tania, how do you stay so calm with your own husband?”
Tatiana’s head was bent. “I really don’t know,” she said without glancing up.
Alexander flinched.
“Dad,” said Anthony, “your hands are numb. Why are you flinching? Mom, maybe you should give him another shot.”
“Your father needs a shot of whiskey, is what he needs,” said Carolyn, going to get the bottle from the cabinet. “Tania, do you think if his hands were smaller, less cholla would have gotten in?”
“Cholla is cholla,” Tatiana said, leveling her frigid stare away from Alexander. “What does it know about hands?” After she was done, she disinfected his wounds with iodine, cauterized them with silver nitrate, bandaged them tightly, and said, oh, and you’re welcome by the way. And Alexander flinched again.
Poker with Johnny, till six in the morning—stayed out too late, didn’t want to tell you, when I was half dead, in bed, upset you for nothing, I’m sorry I’m sorry, was going to come clean, I spilled beer on my jeans, the cholla knows nothing—Poker with Johnny, till six in the morning.