Читаем Gould полностью

First night he’s to stay there his shoulder’s in a sling. They have dinner, some wine, she puts her son to bed, he says “He’s a cute kid, I like him, very sharp, you can tell,” and she says “He’s the love of my life. I’d die if anything disastrous happened to him and would become violently insane if he was seriously mistreated, know what I mean?” and he says “Hey, don’t look at me, absolutely the wrong pervert,” and she says “Just saying, which I’d do to my father if he ever slept over or baby-sat, and as far as I’m able to remember he never did a filthy or untoward thing to me, but I was a girl,” and he says “Personally, I’d think you’d be overstepping your anxieties there or honesty or outspokenness or something, if your father had never shown any inclination or sign, etcetera, or done anything along those lines to any sex or age. But do what your want, that’s your business,” and she says “No, I like that, you’re right out there and put it well in a fumbling way,” and they sit on the floor playing a board game she suggested while listening to records of her favorite music, free jazz, which he’s never heard and now doesn’t much like but she keeps closing her eyes and smiling and bobbing her head to, and she looks at him — she’s killing him in the game, mostly because he’s still learning how to play, or maybe she’d always win that well anyway: it was the only time they played — and it’s the look of someone wanting to be kissed and she’s pretty but small, very small, her body, he wonders, if it ever got that far, if she’d even be able to take a guy his size, he never made love with someone so short and slight and thin and he thinks Give it a go, why not for two weeks? though maybe he’s wrong about the look and says “What?” and she says “Did I say something?” and he says “Your look . okay,” and thinks Just forget it, don’t want to press and based on a misperception get berated for it, and she leans forward with that look and he thinks It must be, and moves to it and it’s just a peck but once she pulls her face away she brings it back to within an inch of his and puts her arms around him and he says “Oy, watch the shoulder, it’s separated bad, they think it could even be a break,” and she says “I don’t want to make asinine double-trouble remarks and say ‘I’ll be gentle.’ I’ll just play it safe and keep my hands off,” and he says “Sorry,” puts his left arm around her and rubs her back but recoils his hand when he feels the bony knobs, but maybe it’s the way she’s bent forward that they’re sticking out like that and rests his hand there and she grabs his penis through the pants and says something and he didn’t hear what and wishes he did but won’t ask her to repeat it, that’d be stupid, and puts his left hand on her shorts and then inside them and so on and she says “We can rip at it anytime, you know; you don’t have to worry. But won’t this make your shoulder worse?” and he says “We’ll stay off it.”—shoulder hurting like hell now but he doesn’t want to say, she might think it’s too dangerous for him and stop — and she says “What position would be the best for it?” and he says “Let’s wait till we get to the bed before we decide, unless you want to do it here,” and she says “On the floor? Or the couch? No support underneath for the former and the latter with no room? What could be less appealing,” and he says “All this talk,” and she says “You’re right,” and when they get to the bedroom he takes his shirt and socks off and lies on the bed with her and says “We don’t have to do it immediately, but probably — wait, the door’s okay?” and she says “He sleeps for the first few hours like a stone, then has to pee or has peed in his bed and I have to get him up either way,” and he says “Then probably if you got on top for me, though only when you’re ready and if it’s okay,” and she says “No good for me; the way I’m built. Would side-by-side be all right?” and he says “Fine,” and she says “It shouldn’t hurt you — we’ll make sure your right shoulder’s not involved — and if it does, we won’t continue it. Later, if we like each other and want to do it again — not tonight, so much, but another time — we can do it once the way you like; but for now my way till I get the hang of you, is that all right?” and he says “Again, what’s good for you, though you’ll have to show me what you mean, I haven’t a precise picture of it . may I?” and slips off her shorts and underpants and starts taking off her shirt and she says “I have petite breasts — I hope you don’t mind too much; some men do; or my being concerned about it. You might not even think I have breasts when I get my bra off. I don’t want to scare you, there’s nothing freakish there or any scars, and I promise I’m not a boy,” and he says “What are breasts anyway? I mean, I like them—” and she says “All right, okay, thank you,” and he says “I was about to say I like them but I don’t think they’re essential to my liking a woman,” and she says “Good, for the truth is mine are practically nonexistent. They’re there, of course, two dots and circles, but they just don’t bulge. Everything else is in place and relatively normal, although I love sex inordinately, do you?” and he says “Inordinately? I don’t know. But I like it, sure, what else am I to say at this moment?” and she says “I love it, love it, with the right person and setting, though it’s always good. And you look like — you even felt like, little I was allowed to feel, as if you have a nice body for it,” and he says “What are you saying? That I’ve something against you touching me?” and she says “No, even if we didn’t play around too long. But by nice body I mean that you’re not too soft or fat or small or crooked,” and he says “Crooked? And small I’m not, which you saw when I was standing up. I’m average, maybe a little above, and she says “I meant in the joint department,” and he says “‘Joint.’ You said that word before and I guess it means—” and she says “Yeah.”