Only the Strong (23 page)

The aroma of disinfectant had subsided considerably when Goode and Artinces met again in Exam Room No. 3 a few days later. They spared the floor, choosing instead to do it standing up. Afterward, Artinces inspected the wall that had born the brunt of their exertions and found it none the worse for wear. Two days after that, Billie arrived in the morning with her customary promptness and, following her habit, walked through the building turning on lights. In Exam Room No. 3, she discovered the examination table crumpled and bent beyond hope of repair.

When she reported the damage to Artinces, the doctor seemed unperturbed.

“It was getting old anyway,” she said, shifting in her office chair. “Order another one. In the meantime, we'll make do with two exam rooms.”

“That's it?”

“Yep,” Artinces replied, staring at a chart.

Billie lingered at the threshold, staring at Artinces, who refused to meet her gaze.

The collapse of the exam table had briefly frightened Artinces. One minute they were losing themselves in something wonderful, with Goode stretched out underneath her. Then they were on the floor, having destroyed the table with their vigorous exertions. But she and Goode were both laughing seconds later. “Are you okay?” she asked. She was still straddling him. He had lost his erection in the fall, but she knew he'd get it back. “As okay as I can get, with you wearing me out and all,” he replied. “I'm almost 50, you know.”

“Really? I figured you for about 19,” she said.

They graduated from playing doctor in the exam room and moved on to clandestine couplings at each of the three motels that serviced the entire North Side. Once they'd even done it in his car, down on the cobblestones at the edge of the river. So noisy were they that Goode paused mid-stroke to turn on the radio to drown out their sounds.

Had it been four weeks? Closer to six?
You really do lose track of time
, Artinces noted with amusement. As usual, she sat in her car and waited while Goode checked in at the front desk of the Goodnight Motel. Earlier in their affair, she'd allowed him to talk her into sharing a room at the Park Plaza. It had seemed like a good idea, with its grand hallways and posh suites, a far cry from the humble seediness of a place like the Goodnight. Her giddiness vanished when she found that nearly everyone seemed to recognize her, from the white captains of industry in the lobby to the black men who carried luggage, operated the elevators, and ran the shoeshine stand. “Hello, Doctor Noel.” “Good to see you, Doctor Noel.” “Can I help you with anything, Doctor Noel?” Each interruption chipped at her dignified facade and made it harder to walk with anything like grace.

Artinces was sweat-soaked and furious when she finally got to the room, where Goode awaited. “What was I thinking?” she raged, pacing frantically. “Hey. Hey,” Goode said softly. He had already removed his shoes, jacket, and tie. He took her in his arms. “Let me run you a bath,” he offered. The warm suds and his skillful hands finally put her in the mood to do what they'd come there for.

She had vowed never to take such a dangerous chance again, preferring instead to risk the tawdry shadows of the motel parking lot until Goode emerged with a room key. Maybe, under the influence of a glass or two, she might have confessed that she liked it a little bit, the sordidness of their escapades. Like her cramped examination room, something about the Goodnight's pervading seediness set loose her inhibitions. And she always brought her own sheets.

The taste of him lived in her mouth. As a result, everything she ate seemed more delectable. She hadn't yet broken his flavor down into individual components, hadn't yet identified notes of chocolate, bourbon, honey, hickory. She'd only learned to let slices of orange linger on her tongue before she chewed and swallowed, to use her teeth to tear through chicken flesh with exquisite thoroughness and, ever so slowly, to suck the marrow from the bone. Although everything tasted better, it was never as delicious as the real thing. She couldn't help looking forward to the next
encounter, when she'd eat him up as if digesting his essence was the only thing that could keep her breathing. She'd get lost in the imagining while eating her lunch, grinding bones to powder beneath her molars, blissfully ignorant of the loud crunching and the oily residue coating her lips. Once she looked up and noticed Billie in the doorway of her office, staring at her as if she'd gone crazy. Artinces blinked rapidly and fussed with her napkin. “I guess what they say is true,” Billie said. “That chicken really is finger-licking good.”

Their six weeks together hadn't gone without interruptions. She had been to two conferences, made presentations, testified at a public health hearing. He had his own absences, the reasons for which were much less clear. He didn't explain and she didn't ask. Mostly she discouraged talk because talking got in the way of the thing they did best, and also because she enjoyed having her life compartmentalized. Keeping it so made it easier to pretend that she continued to honor promises she had made to herself long ago. Goode wasn't husband material, clearly. Did that matter anymore?

She convinced herself she was too mature to be jealous or possessive. Still, when he dropped a pocket square on a motel room floor, she jumped on it and slipped it into her purse. On nights when she didn't see him, she clutched it like a talisman, wondering where he was, what he was doing, and with whom.

She decided that what she felt for him wasn't love. Could you really love someone without knowing him? They had never even exchanged phone numbers or had a long conversation. He'd just show up, flash that devastating smile, and away they'd go, with him cruising in his New Yorker and her following at a discreet distance. She knew his taste and smell, the touch of his hands. What more information did she need?

As it turned out, there were other salient facts. She was in a shop on Washington Avenue when she learned the truth about him. She had stopped there to buy him a hat. President Kennedy had supposedly made hats unfashionable, but word had not filtered down to the well-dressed men of North Gateway. The popular shop attracted a cross section of local black society. On a typical day, pastors and postal workers, some of them accompanied by
their wives, tried on trilbies, fedoras, and homburgs alongside pushers and pimps, some of them accompanied by their whores. Artinces ambled along the aisles, imagining her lover in various styles, when she nearly bumped into a broad-shouldered man. “Pardon me,” she said.

The man turned, then smiled. “No, excuse me, Doctor Noel. It's been a while. How have you been?”

Artinces tried and failed to hide her confusion. “I'm sorry,” she said, “forgive me.”

“Don't remember me, huh? That's okay. My name's Lawrence. I trained at Abram H.”

“Of course,” Artinces said. Male nurses had been extremely rare at the hospital, especially ones built like football players. “Good to see you, Lawrence. Are you still in the profession?”

“Yes, ma'am. I do private, in-home care.”

Artinces had already moved on in her mind. “Oh? And how do you find it?”

Lawrence smiled. “Oh, it's good, real good. One patient, easy to manage. And Mr. Goode pays a fair wage.”

Artinces stopped. She frowned, then quickly recovered. “You work for Mr. Goode?”

“Yes, ma'am. Ananias Goode. I figure you've heard of him.”

“Is he ill?”

Lawrence laughed. Some men's bellies shook when they laughed. Lawrence's muscles rippled. “Mr. Goode? Aw, I bet he could go 15 with Floyd.”

Artinces blinked.

“Floyd Patterson? The heavyweight champ? Anyway, I take care of Mrs. Goode. His wife.”

The big nurse probably said something else after that. She must have mumbled a few words and politely excused herself, but Artinces had no memory of it. She just remembered sitting in her kitchen sipping wine while Belafonte crooned condolences from the hi-fi in the living room. How had she gotten home? How long had she been there? She stared at the empty bottle. Then she drained her glass and tossed it against the wall.

She'd already known he was into shady dealings. He hadn't lied about that. But she didn't know about the wife. Artinces was many things; some of those things she was only just discovering about herself. But she wasn't a home wrecker and she was certainly nobody's whore. She told him as much a few days later when he showed up at her back door, before she slapped his face.

That clash was the first of many they waged over the course of the next decade, darkening their on-and-off romance with pitched battles that marred their mutual obsession. Artinces never got over the fact of Goode's marriage, even after he explained—in the barest details—that his wife was comatose. But neither could she get over him, despite the impressive stretches when they tried to pretend the other didn't exist. Goode was her one irresistible vice amid a life of exemplary discipline, forbearance, and virtue.

Goode was equally stung, perhaps even more so. He didn't fully appreciate the depth of his attachment until several weeks after he'd worked his way back into the doctor's good graces by way of her willing thighs. He'd left her in the motel room while he went out to buy her favorite wine. When he returned, she cracked the door open just wide enough for him to see that she was wearing nothing but her usual white gloves and—even though it was Tuesday evening—a Sunday-go-to-meeting hat.

“Where's the rest of your get-up?” Goode asked. “For a minute there I thought you were about to go to Bible study.”

Artinces crossed her arms across her breasts and pretended to pout. “Are you making me fun of me?”

“No, darlin',” Goode assured her, “I'd never do that.”

“Yes you would. You think I'm some prim biddy who doesn't know up from down.”

“I don't think that. I know you're country smart, just like me. These city women ain't got nothing on you.”

She made a soft clucking sound and grabbed Goode by his necktie. “That's right,” she agreed. “Now come on in here. I'm about to spin you like a top.”

And spun he was. Three hours later, he stepped out on the street with his tie askew and a stupid grin plastered across his face. He needed three tries to get his key into his lock. Finally he eased behind the wheel, realizing even through his fog that he'd likely be bruised and limping in the morning. Even a full night's sleep, or several of them, did little to lessen the residual ache left by his partner's forceful lovemaking. She went full tilt or not at all.

At a subsequent session, he asked her about it as tactfully as he could while zipping up her dress. “Why you do always have to fight me while you're fucking me?” he asked.

“I don't do that,” she said. She walked over and sat at the room's tired vanity table. Looking in the mirror, she fastened her earrings. Lately they'd been staying at the Goodnight well beyond the witching hour, escaping just before dawn.

“What? Fight? Then why the hell do I have all these scratches on me?”

“Not fight. That other word.”

“Oh, you mean fuck?”

“Yes. I don't do that. I make love.”

“You got a funny way of showing it. I dig what you do to me, don't get me wrong. But damn, woman, sometimes I think you're about to kill me, like you're mad about something.”

She brushed her hair. “What would you rather I do?”

“I don't know. Maybe slow down a little bit.”

The next time they met, she was clad in lingerie from Aldo's, a pale-blue silk peignoir that she kept on, even when he was fully nude. She kissed him like she had never done it before, letting him drink deeply while she drew the breath from his lungs. Every time he let his hands wander down to her breasts or hips, she gently pulled them up and wrapped them around the back of her neck. She finally led him to the bed and lowered him onto his back. Every kiss she placed on his body was sweet agony, slow, soft, and moist. She covered every inch of him. She discouraged every urgent gesture, every impatient thrust, with a finger to her lips and a delicate “shh.” She climbed astride him and even when he was fully inside, she hardly moved at all. It was torture. “Remember,” she teased, “you wanted it slow. Tender.”

Goode had enjoyed women of every size, every flavor, every color. But he had never had a woman leave him so utterly exhilarated. So intense was his desire, and so completely was it fulfilled, that spilling himself inside her prompted a tear to slide from his eye.

After a respectable interval, he excused himself and went to the bathroom. Grasping the sink with both hands, he stared into the mirror. He'd heard of punk-ass niggers who cried when they had sex, but he thought that was just corner talk. Now here he was, weeping like a bitch. What the fuck?

He was still soul searching, or the closest to introspection he ever got, when she entered the bathroom behind him. The air around him changed and he found he could not speak.

But she could. She wrapped her competent hands around his waist and, with one hand, she dipped lower and tugged him playfully. “Ready for round two?” she asked.

As the months progressed and Goode managed to hold on to his presence of mind while holding on to Artinces, information passed between them in fits and starts. For her part, Artinces regarded dialogue as an inconvenience that only delayed what they were both in need of. For his part, Goode had never encountered a woman who talked so little. The way she entered a motel room and resolutely undressed him occasionally left him feeling—what was it? Yes, used. He, Ananias Goode, felt like a mere sexual object instead of a human being. But she rebuffed his efforts at exchanging confidences of any kind. She made it clear that genuine intimacy was not only improbable, but the very last thing she wanted.