Another Marvelous Thing Read Free Page A

She was standing between a rent-a-car and an animal hospital, wearing an old skirt, her old jacket, and carrying a ratty canvas overnight bag. No lacy underwear would be drawn from it, I knew. My mistress buys her white cotton undergarments at the five-and-ten-cent store. She wears an old T-shirt of Grey’s to sleep in, she tells me.
    For lunch we had hamburgers—no romantic rural inn or picnic spot for us—at Hud’s Burger Hut off the thruway.
    As we drew closer to our destination, Billy began to fidget, reminding me that having her along was sometimes not unlike traveling with a small child.
    In the town nearest our love nest we stopped and bought coffee, milk, sugar, and cornflakes. Because I am a domestic animal and not a mere savage, I remembered to buy bread, butter, cheese, salami, eggs, and a number of cans of tomato soup.
    Billy surveyed these items with a raised eyebrow.
    â€œThis is the sort of stuff you buy when you intend to stay indoors and kick up a storm of passion,” she said.
    It was an off-year Election Day—congressional and Senate races were being run. We had both voted, in fact, before taking off. Our love nest had a radio which I instantly switched on to hear if there were any early returns while we gave the place a cursory glance and put the groceries away. Then we flung ourselves onto the unmade bed, for which I had thoughtfully remembered to pack sheets.
    When our storm of passion had subsided, my mistress stared impassively at the ceiling.
    â€œIn bed with Frank and Billy,” she intoned. “It was Election Day, and Frank and Billy were once again in bed. Election returns meant nothing to them. The future of their great nation was inconsequential, so busy were they flinging themselves at one another they could barely be expected to think for one second of any larger issues. The subjects to which these trained economists could have spoken, such as inflationary spirals or deficit budgeting, were as mere dust.”
    â€œShut up, Billy,” I said.
    She did shut up. She put on my shirt and went off to the kitchen. When she returned she had two cups of coffee and a plate of toasted cheese on a tray. With the exception of her dinner party, this was the first meal I had ever had at her hands.
    â€œI’m starving,” she said, getting under the covers. We polished off our snack, propped up with pillows. I asked Billy if she might like a second cup of coffee and she gave me a look of remorse and desire that made my head spin.
    â€œMaybe you wanted to go out to dinner,” she said. “You like a proper dinner.” Then she burst into tears. “I’m sorry,” she said. These were words I had never heard her speak before.
    â€œSorry?” I said. “Sorry for what?”
    â€œI didn’t ask you what you wanted to do,” my mistress said. “You might have wanted to take a walk, or go for a drive or look around the house or make the bed.”
    I stared at her.
    â€œI don’t want a second cup of coffee,” Billy said. “Do you?”
    I got her drift and did not get out of bed. The forthrightness of her desire for me melted my heart.
    During this excursion, none of my expectations came to pass. We did not, for example, have long talks about our respective marriages or our future together or apart. We did not discover what our domestic life might be like. We lived like graduate students or mice and not like normal people at all. We kept odd hours and lived off sandwiches. We stayed in bed and were both glad when it rained. When the sun came out, we went for a walk and observed the bare and almost bare trees. From time to time I would switch on the radio to hear the latest election results and commentary.
    â€œBecause of this historic time,” Billy said, “you will never be able to forget me. It is a rule of life that care must be taken in choosing whom one will be in bed with during Great Moments in History.