Chapter 15: Moving on

Karen had invited me to her girls' softball practice for the stated purpose of meeting some of her single ballplayers, but I don't think that was the reason at all. She didn't introduce me to her

team, and accused me of disrupting the practice. During our brief conversation, she made a point of telling me to forget about the three remaining pips. She became provoked when I differed with her. One minute she was telling me to leave and the next she was saying that she needed a mixed doubles partner.

Kevin was just as perplexed as me. He just wanted to play catch, and his mother had put an end to it. He said that he would bring two gloves next time. Would Karen object to her son carrying out his plans?

Not wanting to go back to Cynthia's house until much later, I went to the office with the intention of catching up on anything that had come up since I'd been gone. Judging by the stack of papers in the middle of my desk, it would take the rest of the day to go through it.

The office was my refuge. I was using it as a way to avoid thinking about Cynthia. As was my practice, I took a tennis ball from a can, and began squeezing it as I perused the correspondence.

"Hello, Sammy."

I looked up to see Ruby standing in the doorway. "Hi, Ruby, what's so important that you're here on Saturday?"

She didn't respond immediately. Her lips formed a half-smile, half-frown. "Stacy's coming back on Monday. I don't want her to think I've been goofing off. You know how she is."

"That's good," I said, and saw that Ruby had misunderstood me. "I'm sure you've done a marvelous job. It will be good to have Stacy back. That's what I meant."

"She'll only have one week to get back into the swing before your dad and mom go away."

Suzanne was not my mother, but I didn't correct her. "They said they were going to Florida, but I didn't know it was going to be that soon."

Ruby hesitated, like she knew it was time to leave, but didn't know how to put it into words.

Should I tell her that I like her outfit? The knitted sweater was one shade lighter than her tan slacks, and the boots she was wearing matched her suede jacket. The resemblance to her sister was remarkable, same trim figure, same expressions, only her hair was one shade darker. I bounced the tennis ball on the floor, thinking 'no, ' that would be ill advised.

"You always have that ball in your hand," she said.

Was she making small talk or did she expect an explanation? "I use it to help me concentrate when I read. I guess you could call it my pacifier, but I don't drive with it in my hand, eat with it, or sleep with it."

She nodded; like that bit of information satisfied her curiosity, smiled and left me squeezing the tennis ball.

I resumed reading a memo that pertained to an upcoming sales meeting. Damn, Ruby had interrupted my concentration. Wanda had told me that Ruby had a crush on me. As much as she reminded me of her sister, she was not Stacy. Stacy had let me know right off that she was devoted to her husband. Ruby had a way of letting me know that she was available.

I recalled those trips back to C.M.A. on Sunday afternoons, when Ned dispensed advice about everything from how to study for an exam, to how to stop a running back, to how to tell what a girl really wants. I was especially interested in what he had to say about girls. I'd made some mistakes, and I wanted to know what I'd done wrong. Ned admitted that he didn't know very much about what women want. "The one thing I can tell you with certainty is that they change their minds."

While Ned's advice was vague, I've always remembered his warning. "Just when you think you know what they want, you'll discover that you are wrong. You need to know when to take a pass."

Alice broke it down from first hand experience. "Ned's right. We are changeable because we don't know what we want. That's how we keep the opposite sex off guard."

"Are you admitting that you don't know what you want?" I asked.

"It's not intentional; we really don't know. That's something you must be mindful of, Sammy. Even in this neighborhood, where the girls your age come from upper class homes, you will find some that will try to take advantage of you."

"I know," I said, thinking of Paula, and the way she'd used me to provoke her step-mother.

"The girls that attend the sister school to C.M.A. must come from advantaged homes, but that won't preclude them from taking advantage of you."

"I know," I said, thinking of some of the stories I'd heard about guys falling for the wrong Speedwell girl. Come to think of it, Paula was a Speedwell girl.

"What I'm saying is that if you can't count on the girls in your own backyard to know what they want, just wait until you get out into the world."

I needed clarification as to what she was really saying. "Have you been that way?"

Alice considered my question for several seconds. "I've told you about my boyfriends and my husband. Every one of those relationships ended because I didn't know what I wanted. Sammy, what I'm telling you is that girls may say they enjoy having sex with you. They make you believe them because they're being sincere. They really do enjoy fucking you. We change. It's not our fault; it just happens. It's inherent for us to want more; marriage, children, security, who knows? Jim accused me of being flighty, and he was right. Something was missing and I couldn't decide what it was."

I thought at the time that Alice's 'be wary' speech was exaggerated, but as the years have gone by, I've come to think that she and Ned were giving me the benefit of their experiences. I've taken advantage of numerous willing partners, and I've also been disappointed by some that changed their minds about what they wanted.

What does Karen want? Why had she waited months to return my phone call? Why had she invited me to her softball practice on the pretense of introducing me to her single women, and then told me I was a disruption? Did she really want a mixed doubles partner? Was that what this was about?

Well, I knew what I wanted, and it was not to meet single ballplayers. Did she want the same as I did? If playing on her side of the net would get me on her side of the bed, I was ready to play with her.

I was on page three of a document before it occurred to me that I hadn't been concentrating. Reminiscing about the mistakes I'd made must have triggered my conscience. Did I regret some of my past actions? Had I taken advantage of the less fortunate? Had I left any of my conquests permanently damaged?

Thinking back at the way Alice and I had ended our brief encounter, as 'friends for life, ' I'd used our parting as a template for future breakups. Most had not ended with the same commitment Alice and I had made to each other. While I could think of amiable partings, many others had been messy.

If I drew a line down the center of a sheet of paper and listed the girls with whom I had parted on friendly terms on one side, and the girls who would never speak to me again on the other side, I guessed that the count would be close. The question was what did the ones on each side of the line want? What was their expectation when they lay down with me?

What would Doctor Koskowski say about this? It came to me. She would view the problem from a different perspective. She would asked, "What were your expectations, Sammy?"

All this self-examination was becoming a waste of my time. I left the papers in a neat stack in the center of my desk, placed the tennis ball back in the can, put my jacket on, and turned out the lights.

"So long, Ruby, I'm leaving now," I yelled in the direction of her office.

"Wait," she said, and quickly appeared in the hallway. The sweater looked oversized for her chest, but when she turned, I saw that the slacks clung to her ass. "I just wanted..." she began, stopped, and began again. "I just wanted to say that it's been ... ah ... enjoyable to work with you."

"I'll be here all next week. We'll talk before you leave us," I said.

"I know, but there will be others ... I mean ... this is the only time we're..."

"In that case, let me say that it has been enjoyable working with you, too," I said, smiling before walking away.

What did she want? What did any of them want? This was a case where Ned's warning, 'take a pass, ' applied. Ruby's expectations were written all over her face. I'd made some mistakes in the past, but I'd also made a few right choices.

Alice's words, 'be wary' had guided me well. Caroline, the auto rental person, had her sights set on lassoing a rich husband while Gladys, the pizza girl, had no such expectations. I very wisely 'passed' on Caroline. Gladys was different. I took a chance on her and was not disappointed. A lot of other guys were not disappointed either.

Perhaps I'd judged Cynthia's most recent actions harshly. She didn't feel well. That entitled her to revert to her previous ways, didn't it? I would give her a few days for the prescription to take effect. If her disposition didn't improve, I would give her another taste of my medicine. It had worked before, and it would work again.

It was mid-afternoon when I drove into the garage. The first thing I noticed was that the Alfa Romeo was missing. Knowing that Robert never drove that car, I decided that Cynthia must have gone on an errand.

Margaret confirmed my suspicion. "She didn't say where she was going," the maid told me when I entered the kitchen. "Are you hungry, Sammy?"

How did she know that I hadn't eaten since having the light breakfast earlier? "I'm starving," I said.

Margaret proceeded to make me the breakfast I would have had if I hadn't planned on going for a run.

"Did Cynthia eat lunch?" I asked.

Margaret shook her head. "I don't know how she gets by on so little food. I couldn't do it," she laughed.

After devouring a plate of eggs, corned beef hash, coffee, and toast, I thanked Margaret, and headed upstairs to shave and take a shower.

It was a few minutes after four when I entered the room that Cynthia had relegated me to. I was pulling the sweater over my head when it occurred to me that my travel bag was missing. It wasn't where I'd set it down, and it was not in the closet. I went to the stairs and leaned over the railing.

"Margaret, did you move my overnight bag?" I yelled. It took her a minute to walk from the kitchen and look up at me.

"I unpacked it and pressed your suit and shirt. Aren't they hanging in the closet?"

"Cynthia," I said to myself. Margaret was coming up the stairs, like she couldn't believe that my suit and shirt were missing.

We searched the room; opened doors and drawers, even looked under the bed.

"It wasn't just the suit. I had the shorts and socks I'd worn on Wednesday and Thursday, shoes and my shaving kit in that case," I lamented.

"I took your underwear and socks downstairs," Margaret volunteered. "Give me the sweater. I'll wash and dry everything," she said.

She took the sweater, and left me to curse the day I'd met Cynthia Collingsworth. I stayed under the shower a long time, considering what my next move should be. My stuff must be in her room. Breaking down the door was an option. Hmmm. The hot water helped to wash away the rage that I felt.

I don't know how long I stood with one towel wrapped around my waist, and another one over my head, looking out the window. The bull's eye in the archery target stared back at me, daring me to try to hit it. Eventually, Margaret returned with clean shorts, socks and my sweater.

"I may have shrunk it," she said, as she handed me the sweater.

Seeing that she was not going to leave until I tried it on, I stepped into the shorts and removed the towel from around my waist before trying the sweater. She was adjusting the shoulders, and pulling on the sleeves when Cynthia came into the room. She was carrying a garment bag, but gave no explanation as to where she'd been.

"Hi, Cynthia," I said, doing my best to hide my irritation. She didn't deserve to know how disappointed her petty actions had made me. Entering a yelling contest with her would have served no purpose. I was well beyond that. "I've been waiting all day to see you. I wanted to tell you about the dream I had last night, early this morning, really. You see, I was the judge at a wet T-shirt contest..."

"Pick up those towels before they soil the carpet," she said, interrupting me. Her dictatorial tone infuriated me, but I was able to conceal my anger.

"I'll take them downstairs Ma'am," Margaret said, but when she turned Cynthia had already left the room. We heard a key being inserted in the lock on the door to her room.

"I should have passed."

Margaret stopped trying to make the sweater fit me, and stood back with a questioning look in her eyes.

"Its advice a friend gave me a long time ago. He said you need to learn when to pass and when to hold em. I should have passed"

Margaret didn't know that I'd borrowed from the country song, substituting 'pass' for 'fold em, ' but she got my point. Her mouth opened, and she showed a full set of teeth as she laughed. I laughed, too, and we were soon releasing the tension that had invaded the entire house that day.

Margaret picked up the towels and backed toward the door, still chuckling to herself. "Wet T-shirt contest, I do tell," she said, as she left the room.

I put on the jeans that I'd worn for the last few days, and gazed down at the target. The bull's eye at the center of the target was red, but it changed colors as I searched for something to take my mind off of Cynthia. I'd always been attracted to eyes. The color didn't matter; it was what they projected that I looked for. I'd seen fear in the eyes of running backs. I'd also seen fear in Sheila's eyes that day in her den. What did she want? Later, when her eyes changed from fear to desire, she admitted that she hoped I would disregard her half-hearted attempt to dissuade me from 'showing her' as well as 'telling her' how her son had lost his virginity.

Loretta's dark eyes showed assent. No matter how she tried to convince me that she was an Aztec princess, she couldn't hide her craving. She wanted a night of sex, nothing more. Why aren't there more women like Loretta? She kept me guessing, but I'm glad I didn't pass.

The round circle at the center of the target changed from red to green to blue to hazel to amber. Behind the color, I saw greed, contentment, longing, and hope. As I went down the list of partners, placing them on one side of the page or the other, I calculated their average age. Why had I always sought older women? Was it because older women could drive me where I wanted to go? No, it was more that that. Jessica and Alice were my teachers. Becky was younger, but she was smart. What did she want?

A knock at the door startled me. I turned from the bull's eye to see Daisy. She was wearing a starched maid's uniform, black with a white apron.

"The gatekeeper called to say the guests are beginning to arrive. Aunt Margaret told me to come and get you."

How long had I been staring down at the target? Was it seven o'clock already?

"You look ... very ... nice," I said, and watched Daisy grin, sheepishly.

Robert was dressed in his butler's tux, already pouring Chablis into plastic wine glasses. I opened the front door to greet the guests, took their coats, and directed them to the guest book. They must have thought that Mrs. Collingsworth would require formal dress because the men wore suits and ties, and the women wore long dresses. They were on their best behavior, admiring the marble floor, high ceilings, paintings, lighting fixtures, and the furnishings. If they found my jeans, sweater, and sneakers out of place, they withheld their remarks.

When Marsha Cody arrived, she took over the greeting duties, but not before she introduced her guest to me.

"Sammy, I'd like you to meet my boy ... I mean my date. This is Arnold. He's curious about our organization. As I extended my hand to Arnold, he whiffed the air, like my two day growth of whiskers reeked of stale fish.

Marsha told him to sign the guest book and fill out a name tag, while reaching for my arm.