Chapter 8
Gil had brought home a fifth of good bourbon whiskey. He had started on it when Susan and Lucia reached the Emory house. He was, Susan could tell, beginning to feel his oats. She could recognize the relaxation that comes from a good jolt at the end of a work day. He was seated at the table in the dining area. When the girls walked in, he got up, handed them two prepared drinks.
"Whiskey and water for Susan," he said. He turned to Lucia. "I figured you for whiskey and Seven-Up. Right?"
"Perfect," Lucia said, giving him her best smile.
"This is real service," Susan said. "Do you think I should hire this man on a permanent basis to serve us drinks when we walk in the door?"
"This is for a special occasion, lover," Gil said. "I'm merely trying to put up a front for our guest."
"You're doing fine," Lucia said. "Keep up the good work, and I might be so impressed with husbands that I'll give up being a gay bachelor girl." She winked at Susan over the word gay.
Susan went to work on dinner. There wasn't really much to do. She took the frozen spaghetti sauce from the freezer and put it on low heat to thaw. While the sauce was thawing, she readied a fresh batch of spaghetti, made a hasty tossed salad and put the plates on the table. She sipped at her drink as she worked.
Gil and Lucia were seated at the table. Gil, having a good head start, was at a stage of gaiety Susan knew well. Having had the two stiff ones at the store, she was not doing badly herself. She knew she'd have to space her next few drinks carefully, or she'd end up being really lit.
Gil and Lucia talked while she moved around the kitchen, preparing the simple meal. Lucia sparkled. Looking at her, seeing the undivided attention she gave to Gil, made Susan wonder. However, she rationalized Lucia's making a play for Gil by thinking that a girl like Lucia, an acknowledged Lesbian, must be under pressure at all times to hide her true nature.
Lucia, Susan thought, could not afford to have the whole area know that she liked girls, so she probably went overboard to make herself seem attracted to men. It was, Susan thought, an effective smoke screen. It was far better, for a girl in Lucia's position, to be damned as a flirt than as a Lesbian.
She joined in the talk occasionally. It was light chatter, booze talk, the little, unimportant things people say when they're beginning to be looped, things that sound, to them, very clever. It was Gil who began telling jokes. At first, the jokes were only mildly risque.
Then, as Lucia and Susan joined in and the supply of "clean" jokes was exhausted, the subject matter became less inhibited. There was an undercurrent of suggestion to the most innocent remark. Sex, that lively subject which heightens almost every party, was referred to slyly at first with innocent smiles or knowing accents.
Gil mixed more drinks. Susan forgot that she was supposed to go easy. She was getting lightheaded. She didn't really like to drink too much. She always begrudged the waste of a day after having had too much to drink. Still, she occasionally went too far and woke up with that blah feeling which makes one want to do nothing more than drink ice-water and lounge around feeling blue.
She had finished her second strong drink before the spaghetti sauce began bubbling. She went to work on the spaghetti itself and sliced garlic bread, buttered it, put it into the oven to warm.
By the time dinner was on the table she was feeling no pain. Gil had started the record player in the living room. It was turned up very loud.
Susan asked him if he shouldn't turn it down because of the neighbors.
"Hell, it's only eight o'clock," Gil said. "We'll turn it down at four a.m."
"Don't wake me when you do," Lucia said. "I'm an early-to-bed girl."
"Good idea," Gil said. He took Lucia's arm and tugged her toward the door. "Good night, Susan," he said.
It was funny. Susan laughed for two reasons. One, because she felt good and laughing came easily. Two, because of poor Gil, all turned on over a woman who had no use for men. Let him paw the floor, she thought. Let him pant. Fat lot of good it would do him.
However, there was a hint of resentment toward Gil deep inside her. She had never been wild about the sexy little by-play between married couples that went on when otherwise sensible people had too much to drink. She didn't like to see Gil acting like a stallion in rutting season. It wasn't like him at all.
If he's so damned horny, she thought, why doesn't he use some of that energy on me? The logical follow-up was to blame Gil for what had happened with Lucia earlier that evening. If Gil had been doing his homework with proper en-thusiam, she told herself, she wouldn't have sacked out in a three-quarter-size bed with a pretty Lesbian.
She caught herself with a start. There was somewhat of a revelation contained in her thoughts. So, she told herself grimly, you do feel guilty.
Well, hell! she told herself. It wasn't right, what I did. It wasn't normal. It was fun. It was very interesting, but I didn't have to do it, and I don't think I'd do it again if I had it to do over. It wasn't really necessary.
At heart, she decided, she was somewhat of a prude. Or was it that she was, after all, faintly jealous of the way Gil looked at Lucia? Not that she blamed him. Looking at Lucia was a pleasure. You'd never guess, from her fresh, wholesome look, that only a couple of hours before she'd been nude in bed with another woman. Lucia was hanging on Gil's every word, encouraging him to be more witty, more wild in his double entendres.
"All right, kiddies," Susan said, putting the bread on the table and sitting down, "know this. It's time to knock off the horseplay and feed the hungry bods."
"Who's hungry?" Gil asked.
"For food, that is," Lucia said, smiling sweetly at him.
"Honey," Gil said to Susan a bit later, after they were all seated, "Lucia is playing footsie with me under the table."
"Behave, Lucia!" Susan said.
They thought it was funny. They laughed like crazy. They were so silly about it that Susan couldn't help laughing too. She leaned down quickly and looked under the table. Lucia had kicked off her shoes. She was rubbing both feet on Gil's leg. Susan rapped Lucia's leg with the handle of a knife. Lucia yelped and jerked her feet back.
"Caught in the act!" Lucia giggled.
"Where did you get the idea that I'm a foot man?" Gil wanted to know. He raised his hand and pinched Lucia through the open back of the chair. "I'm a fanny man, myself."
"Hey you two," Susan said. "Eat!"
"I beg your pardon," Gil said loftily. "Do we know that woman?"
"Not in the slightest," Lucia said. "Ignore her."
Lucia was pretty well potted, Susan noted. Her dark eyes were squinted, her hair was f ailing down over her forehead. She ate slowly and carefully, making a production of each bite. She looked very sexy. Susan caught herself remembering the wild abandon of their session in the storeroom. She shut off the thought guiltily and looked at Gil. He, too, was more than mildly looped. Susan served coffee and insisted that they drink a cup. She had one herself.
The sobering effect of the food and the coffee was counteracted by a very strong drink for each of them when they finished eating. The fifth was more than half empty. Gil looked at it for a long time and announced that he was going to the store for reinforcements.
"We have plenty," Susan said. "Unless you want to get bombed out of your gourd."
"Why not?" Lucia beamed happily at Susan.
"She's some kind of party-pooper fink," Gil said.
"All right, all right," Susan said. "If you want a head tomorrow, go get some reinforcements."
"I need company for the long, snaky trip," Gil said, standing in the door.
I'm going to wash the dishes," Susan announced. "If we're going to get blasted, I don't want to have to face dirty dishes tomorrow."
"I'll help," Lucia said. She wobbled to the sink.
"No," Susan told her. "Just sit down and keep me company."
"I insist," Lucia said. "I'll wash. You dry and put away since you know where things go."
"I need company," Gil said. "I might get lost."
"We'll send out scouts," Susan said. "Now shoo."
"Lucia, come along," Gil said.
"Oh, no, you don't!" Susan said, laughing. "I don't have enough scouts to find both of you."
"Either Lucia goes or I pout," Gil said, sticking out his lower lip. Lucia thought it was very funny. Susan laughed.
"All right," she said. "Take off, both of you. Just don't forget where you live, lover."
"I'll keep him straight," Lucia promised.
"Who's going to keep you straight?" Gil asked.
Susan watched the car back from the driveway and then she started the dishes. She glanced at her watch. The liquor store was five minutes away. Five there, five inside, five back. They should be back in a quarter hour.
They were not. She finished the dishes, dried them, put them away, tidied up the kitchen, and it was only then that she thought to look at her watch again. A half hour had passed. She swept the floor, although it really didn't need it, and sat down with the remains of her last drink and a cigarette. Fifteen minutes later, she heard the car in the drive. She saw the glow of the car's lights go out and then there was a considerable wait, three or four minutes, perhaps, before she heard a door slam, heard them coming into the kitchen.
"Honey," Gil started as he came in the door with a fresh bottle in his hand, "you'll never believe it. I got lost. I got lost right in my own back yard. If Lucia hadn't been along to guide me and give me aid and comfort I'd still be out there somewhere, searching, searching for home and loved ones and the fire of the hearth."
"Your lipstick is smeared," Susan said. She couldn't decide whether to be angry.
"Blood," Gil said, wiping the tell-tale smear with the back of his hand.
Lucia came in. Her hair had fallen more around her face. She used her hand to push it away.
"You've got a tiger here," she said.
"That's funny," Susan said. "I always thought his growl was worse than his bite."
"Arrrrrrg!" Gil growled, putting his arm around Lucia, trying to bite her ear.
"All right, Tarzan," Susan said, deciding to be slightly amused. "Slow down. That's my boss you're trying to eat."
No, she wouldn't be angry. She couldn't understand what had come over Gil, being so open with his flirting with Lucia, walking into the house with Lucia's lipstick a blatant testimonial to the fact that he had kissed Lucia at least once, probably more than once to judge by the size and extent of the smear. If he were still trying to make her jealous so that she would quit her new job he was on the wrong track. She wasn't about to give in under pressure.
She was free, white and twenty-two, and wives were no longer slaves to the home and the man of the house. If she wanted to work, she would, by God, work. If Gil wanted to make an ass of himself over Lucia, fine! If Lucia wanted to play along with him, that was fine, too! Fat lot of good it would do both of them! She, Susan, herself, had what Lucia wanted, and what Gil wanted, Lucia didn't give a damn about.
Drinks. Music. Gil seemed to settle down slightly. In the living room, he sat next to Susan on the couch and used his hands in little caresses. He was feeling very amorous. She supposed because he was so stirred up by his flirtation with Lucia. It wouldn't be the first time a hubby got the hots over some woman and then brought his energy to bed with his wife. That seemed to be the direction in which the evening was going. Well, it wasn't such a bad deal for wifey.
She smiled to herself. Let someone else do the stirring up, then grab all the gravy. She belted her drink, in the mood for a party, happy, lightheaded, gay. There was one helluva fine bossa nova number on the record player. She swung her foot in time with the beat and hummed. She had kicked her shoes away, as had Lucia, and was barefoot.
"Hey, man," she said. "That's dancing music!" Gil got to his feet, swayed, pulled her up. He didn't do the bossa nova very well, but neither did she. Gil tried to go into a clutch, and she had to hold him off. Damn, he was feeling amorous.
"You're not keeping the beat," Lucia told them.
"What are you," Gil asked, 'some kind of a critic fink?"
"What I am," Lucia said, "is probably the foremost bossa nova dancer in all of Florida."
"Yeah, yeah!" Susan said.
Lucia came out of her chair and fell into the rhythm of the dance, moving alone, all grace, all sensuous flowing hips. Gil and Susan stopped dancing and leaned on each other to watch.
"Not bad," Gil said.
"Not bad? Hell, it's terrific and you know it!" Lucia moved toward them, her hips swaying, her fingers snapping the beat.
"So show me," Gil said, leaving Susan.
Lucia said, "I'll show Susan." She led. Her arm was pressed lightly around Susan's waist, guiding. There was no hint of sexiness in it. It was only when Gil broke in that old mother sex began to make herself felt. At first, Gil concentrated on trying to keep in step with Lucia, then he went into a clinch.
"Dancing," he announced, "begins to lose its purpose when it gets too complicated. Dancing is just huggin' set to music."
"Absolutely not," Lucia said. "Dancing is dancing, and huggin' is huggin'. You can't do both at once. You can't do justice to either."
"We can fix that," Gil said happily, pulling Lucia tightly against him. He grinned over Lucia's shoulder at Susan.
"Maybe you'd better concentrate on dancing," Susan said. She felt good. Having decided not to be upset by Gil's play for Lucia, she didn't mind his horsing around. Let him get himself riled up something fierce, then she'd take him to bed and work it all out of him.
Lucia jerked away from Gil. "He's wrong, you know, about not being able to dance and hug at the same time."
"You said that," Gil objected.
Susan giggled at their confusion. "You're both blotto."
"You said," Lucia told Gil, standing very straight with apparent effort, her head drooping slightly, her lips parted and lush, "that you can't do both at once."
"You said that," Gil repeated.
"And I can prove it," Lucia said. "Susan, can I borrow this lout for a minute?"
"He's yours," Susan said giddily.
Lucia wrapped herself around Gil in a sensuous embrace. She held herself high with her arms locked around his neck. She flattened her breasts against his chest. She stretched her body, putting her weight on her arms, leaning in toward him with her back bowed. She ground against him.
The slow, rhythmic beat came from the music. Lucia moved with it, her feet not leaving their original points on the floor, her hips marking time, grinding, moving, her whole body stretched and pressed against Gil as she made erotic, wild movements against him. It seemed to Susan that Gil's eyes actually glazed.
He glanced at her over Lucia's shoulder and grinned, a silly look on his face. He seemed to be asking Susan, what do I do now, coach? Lucia put her face against Gil's neck. Her eyes were closed, her body undulating, her hips grinding in small circles. She seemed to be trying to crawl between Gil's legs. It was very interesting.
Susan, sitting down on the couch watching, her legs folded under her, wondered what Lucia was feeling. She knew what she felt when she danced with Gil that way. She felt him begin to stir and she felt like being taken. But Lucia? Lucia was just playing a game!
At that, it made an interesting picture. Susan watched as their bodies pushed hard, trying to make the contact more intimate. They made a nice couple. The problem was, Lucia didn't care for men. Poor Gil. All the promise of that warm body in his arms and it wouldn't do him a bit of good. Of course, he must be enjoying himself. He had that silly grin on his face and Lucia knew what she was doing.
She was putting on a good act. Susan wondered if Lucia were secretly revolted by the close contact with a man. She saw Gil's hands lower themselves on Lucia's back and clasp her rounded buttocks to lift her even higher. It was time to do something, Susan decided. She had to rescue two fairly nice people from themselves, to deliver Lucia from an intolerable situation and free Gil from an attraction which could only lead to frustration. She rose and pulled on their shoulders. They came apart reluctantly.
"My turn," Susan said. "I don't dig this wallflower bit."
"Who are you cutting in on," Lucia asked, "me or Gil?"
"Thursday is my day for girls," Susan said. "This is Saturday."