The Stories of Richard Bausch (86 page)

Hopewell stares at him. “Gosh, Tom. It’s so good to see you after all these years. I feel like a resurrected man.” He stands next to his wife, saying her name again. “Darlene’s the lady who saved me. Literally saved me.”

“Oh, please, Eugene,” she says, “can that stuff.” Her accent is of the North, Chicago. She bows and her amazingly soft, liquid-looking hair slips down over one eye. The sun strikes it, little blazes in the facets of each strand. Then she turns to gaze at the crowded first tee.

Hopewell says, “I just can’t believe it, Jerry. Tom. Look at us. After all this time.”

Barnes says, “Is that a new car?”

Hopewell turns to look at it. “Oh, no, it’s a ninety-six.”

“How about the clubs?”

“I’ve had the clubs awhile, too.”

“You two look like new money,” Barnes says, obviously meaning to be jovial. “All crisp and fresh-minted.”

Hopewell seems embarrassed. “Well, it’s Darlene’s car.”

“My mother gave it to me,” Darlene says. “You know Tex-Mex Mary’s Restaurant chain? We’ve got seven of them, all over Virginia.”

“And you play golf every week?” Barnes says to Hopewell.

“Every chance I get. Maybe not every week.”

McPherson feels a little shock that this man is the same person he knew as a boy, eighteen years old and worried about a heart murmur. He can’t bring himself out of himself; can’t force the casual pleasantness that’s obviously required. He believes he heard something like a huff come from Darlene, who seems more interested in the road and the entrance to the parking lot than anything else. Hopewell is slim, tan, with a white, white smile. He doesn’t look quite forty yet.

“These shoes are new,” he says. “Five hundred fifty bucks.”

“I picked them out,” Darlene says, with a strange little unidentifiable edge in her voice. “Yesterday.”

“Do you play, too?” McPherson asks her.

“I
hate
the game.”

“She’s agreed to come learn about it, though,” says Hopewell. “That’s how sweet
she
is.” He reaches for her, and kisses the side of her face. She moves her head aside, but lets him nuzzle her. She’s really stardingly beautiful.

“You’re here to learn about golf?” McPherson asks her, wanting to go on and say that from present company, she could learn how to do it badly. But as usual, he can’t form the words quickly enough, and she interrupts him. Her tone is that of a person making an admission for which she’s been steeling herself.

“If you want to put it that way.”

“Well,” says Barnes, “actually, Tom and I hate golf, too. We do it for the
remission of our sins. We think it’s the most ridiculous thing ever invented by man.”

“How do you know it was a man?” Darlene says quietly.

Hopewell looks nervously from one to the other of the two men. “She’s kidding you. My sweetie’s actually very tolerant of new experiences. I mean, look at me. She tolerates me, a fifty-year-old former—a dumb guy like me who plays golf.”

“Eugene likes to describe me to myself,” she says, with a small smile, watching Jerry Barnes line up a putt.

“I admit it,” says Hopewell.

Jerry strikes the ball and it wobbles a little, glides to the edge of the cup and drops in. He lines up another, and misses.

“I’m very close to my mother,” Darlene says.

McPherson finds himself going over what she’s said so far, looking for a thread of something to latch onto for a response. He says, “I’m thinking maybe we ought to punt this morning’s round of golf.”

The others stare at him. “Punt?” Darlene says.

“It means cancel the game,” says her husband. “He’s just kidding, sweetie.”

Darlene’s still looking at McPherson and Barnes. “You both play a lot?”

“Not all that often,” McPherson says. “I was about to say we’re the wrong crowd to learn much from.”

“Do your wives play?” she asks. Hopewell nuzzles her on the side of the face again, and this time she pushes him away. “Eugene.”

Barnes says, “Our wives already teed off.”

“That’s too bad, if it’s true.”

“Why wouldn’t it be true?” Barnes says. “You think I’d lie about a thing like that? I mean I
am
lying, but I’m surprised that you’d
think
I’d lie. We’ve barely been introduced.”

“Darlene’s mom is coming out, too,” Hopewell says, too brightly. “I hope you guys don’t mind. I’ll rent an extra cart.”

Barnes turns to McPherson, his red face showing nothing. “You’re not gonna crap out on us, are you, Tom? Miss a chance to meet Darlene’s mother?”

“Are you being sarcastic?” Darlene says.

“Hell, I don’t believe so. I’m trying to get Tom, here, to say he’s not gonna crap out on us this morning.

“Language,” Darlene says.

“Pardon me?”

“I wish you’d please watch your language.”

Hopewell rubs his hands together and says, “Let’s practice some putting.”

“What exactly were the words you didn’t like?” Barnes says to Darlene. “You let me know what they are and I won’t say them.”

“Hey, let’s forget about it. Man, I need some practice putting.” Hopewell brings the putter out of the new bag and holds it up, rests it on his shoulder like a baseball bat. He’s clearly anxious to cover everything in talk, and begins by remarking that McPherson has put on weight, filled out. “You don’t look anything like the kid I knew. But I always thought you were too skinny and rangy to be behind the plate.” He turns to Darlene. “Sweetie, when these two guys were kids, you’d’ve thought we were brothers. We even looked alike—three skinny, crew-cut boys.”

“People who overindulge are not my cup of tea,” Darlene says, as if this has all been an intellectual discussion. “It’s like they’re carrying their sins around on their bones. You three have kept reasonably trim at least.”

“Well, but your metabolism slows down at a certain age,” Hopewell says.

“Metabolism,” Barnes says, dryly. “There’s a word I love to think about at night when I’m lying on my back in bed with a plate of sausages on my stomach.”

“We’re vegans,” says Darlene.

Barnes stares. McPherson says, “Pardon me?”

“I said we’re
vegans.”

After a pause, Barnes says, “What the hell is that?”

“Please,” she says. “Language.”

“It’s a language?”

“Sweetie,” Hopewell says, “come on.”

“No,” says Darlene, ignoring her husband. “What you—your language. I wish you’d watch your language.”

“What the hell did I say?” Barnes asks. He seems sincerely puzzled.

She rubs her arms and turns slightly away from them. “My mother should be here.”

“Is it a religion?” McPherson asks. “Vegan? They don’t like swearwords?”

“Sounds like something from
Star Trek,”
Barnes says. “Wasn’t Spock a vegan?”

Darlene says, “What it means is, we don’t use or eat anything that comes from animals.”

Again, there’s a pause; it’s as though they’re all trying to think of the various kinds of food and materials that fit the category. “What about makeup?” McPherson asks. He recalls having read somewhere that cosmetics come from animals.

“I don’t wear it,” Darlene says, as though responding to a challenge. “My lipstick is made with animal-free substances.”

Hopewell speaks so fast that it’s as if he’s chattering: “Of course it’s not everybody’s cup of tea, but did you know that you can make chocolate without using anything at all that comes from animals?”

“I can
smell
animal fat on people,” Darlene says.

The shade moves with the slightest stirring, and the amplified voice rasps the names of the next group of golfers scheduled to tee off. McPherson putts, walks a few feet away; he catches himself marking that he is downwind.

“I told her it’s a talent I don’t want,” says Hopewell, still talking fast. “It’s been a year since I’ve had anything made from an animal, and I’m beginning to sense the odor, too, you know. Like I’m about to be able to smell it around people. It’s all around us, of course.”

“The smell of meat,” says Barnes. “Bacon on the grill in the clubhouse. I like that smell. You’re not gonna tell me I’m not supposed to like how that smells?”

“I can smell meat on a person’s
skin,”
Darlene says. “Sometimes it actually makes me nauseous.”

“No shit,” Barnes says.

She glares at him and then turns away again.

McPherson sinks a practice putt, then sees Hopewell gazing intently, nervously, at him. He thinks of Regina, and has the idea of going to the clubhouse to call her on the phone. He craves the familiar timbre of her voice.

Hopewell says, “But I’m all health food now and I weigh less than I did when I left here for California in 1973. Darlene has me on this vegan thing. I feel like a million bucks.”

“Health is not just a privilege,” she says as if reciting it. “It’s a sacred obligation.”

“Well, shitsicles,” Barnes says. “I feel guilty. Even being reasonably trim for my age.”

“Please,” Darlene says, low. “Do you have to speak so crudely?”

“Is that part of this Vulcan thing? Language?” Barnes says. And when she ignores him, he says, “So—this—this
Klingon
thing—”

“Vegan,” she says, patiently.

“Okay. So—you don’t take anything from animals because you don’t believe in killing them, is that it?”

“Yes, exactly,” she says. “I’m very strong for animal rights. I believe in that totally.”

“He’s kidding you, sweetie,” Hopewell says to his wife. “That’s Jerry all the way.”

“I
gathered
that, Eugene.” She turns to Barnes, who’s standing there swinging his putter back and forth in a gentle small arc, concentrating, but with a smirk on his face. “I am an advocate for the rights of animals,” she says. “And so are a lot of famous people.”

“I guess you’re against torturing animals, then.”

She’s wary. “You mean with the medical experiments and all that? If you mean that, then yes, I’m very much against it.”

“Well,” Barnes says. “No, the thing is, I was basically talking about torturing them.”

“I’m sure you think that’s funny,” Darlene says, folding her arms.

Barnes goes on. “You know, nothing real serious. Just light stuff—like, say, bury a cat up to its neck in the yard and run a power mower around it in an ever-shrinking circle.”

McPherson steps forward and makes a remark about the breezy day, no threat of showers. His own voice sounds shaky and uncertain to him. The others don’t respond. He says, “Jerry would never do anything of the kind, of course. He’s just being—trying to be funny. He’s got dogs—and
cats
—at home. A regular menagerie.”

There’s a long pause, now. No one quite looks at anyone else.

“Some people,” Darlene says, “think they have a sense of
humor.
And they’re just sick.”

Barnes seems to ponder this. “Maybe I should be a Vulcan. I bet meat eaters laugh more, though—what do you think? And they all cuss a blue streak, too, I’m told.”

“It’s just teasing, sweetie. He doesn’t mean a thing by it.”

Again, there’s a pause.

“That is one
heck
of a pair of shoes,” Barnes tells Hopewell. “Yeah. Six hundred dollars.”

“You said five fifty,” McPherson puts in. He recognizes the literal-minded sound of it, and feels dull, unable to catch up with the unfriendly turn everything is taking.

“Well, taxes and all,” says Hopewell.

“Mr. McPherson is apparently into
accuracy,”
Darlene says.

McPherson feels unjustly attacked. He says, “I’m not
into
anything.”

Darlene hasn’t heard him. “And his friend is into sick jokes.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Barnes says. “You thought I
was joking
about the torture.”

Hopewell quickly remarks that Barnes certainly hasn’t changed. But she speaks over him, at Barnes. “If I thought you weren’t just being childish, I’d call the police on you.”

“He
is
just joking, sweetie,” says Hopewell. “Come on, you know that.”

“Don’t the shoes come from some animal or other?” Barnes asks.

“Synthetic.” Hopewell emits a forced-sounding laugh. “Look, why don’t we change the subject?”

For some reason, Darlene glares at McPherson, who tries a smile. Her expression is that of someone who is trying to achieve a lofty indifference.

Hopewell indicates the first tee, with its crowd of waiting women. “Are we gonna get to play or not?”

Barnes addresses a ball, then steps back from it. McPherson gives him a pleading look, which he doesn’t react to. Everything feels out of control now, almost pathological. There doesn’t seem to be any way back from it. Hopewell drops a ball, then hits it hard, and it hops past everything, off the putting surface and into the woods.

Barnes says, “What’re you using, Eugene? A driver?”

“Underestimated myself,” Hopewell says with studied good-naturedness. “It’s been a couple weeks.” He moves to the edge of the woods and stands there.
“I hope I didn’t lose it first thing.” He steps into the underbrush, sweeping it aside with the putter. Then he swings the club like a machete, heading into the thick growth, hacking at it. His motions are oddly desperate looking; there’s something exhausted about it all. Darlene has walked over there. The green wall of brush and leaves closes behind him. She waits at the edge, all her weight on one foot, arms folded.

“If he plays every week,” Barnes says, low, “you can have my house.”

“What the hell were you trying to do back there?” McPherson asks him.

“Exactly what I
did
do. He’s so anxious for us to see his fucking trophy wife. And she’s as humorless as a goddamn speed-limit sign.”

“I didn’t think what you said was funny,” McPherson tells him.

“What’re you whispering about?” Darlene says, looking over her shoulder at them.

“Nothing,” says Barnes. “Accuracy.”

She faces the woods again. McPherson tries to concentrate on a putt. Some of the AARP women have wandered down and are practicing on the other end of the green. He misses a putt, and as he lines up another, he hears one of the women remark about the thrashing around in the woods. He looks over at Barnes. “Aw, hell, Jerry, let’s call this off.”