Page 42 of Good Days Bad Days
“Just the two of you at your apartment? That’s a date.” Facing the open locker, he takes off his towel and tosses it into a canvas bag, exposing his bare ass. It’s not a new sight. Plenty of exhibitionism here, and Mark definitely isn’t the only one.
“Two adults of different genders can be in the same apartment together and have it not be about sex.”
“Whoa. You’re the one making it about sex. I said ‘date.’”
“My God, you’re annoying,” I say, tossing my towel at him once I have my boxers back in place.
“Ugh. Yuck. That touched your dick.”
“You’re sitting on a wooden bench in a men’s locker room naked. Don’t tell me you’re worried about my towel.”
Mark mimics a vomiting sound, which I ignore. I’ve taken him up on the offer to get together a few times a week, sometimes for basketballor tennis or even to swim a lap or two. Thankfully, Hollinger has only joined us twice, and both times he talked of nothing but football and work, not his girlfriend, who we all know about but don’t talk about.
Betty seems to be taking the same approach. She’s been joining me at Ike’s more and more often lately. She doesn’t talk to me about Hollinger or even much about her part-time work as a Bunny, though she does insist she’s getting ready to quit. Hollinger has a key, and though she’s good about finding out his schedule ahead of time, she’s had a few close calls recently that’ve left her with an urgency to leave for good.
She said she’s finding it so hard to get out because of how much the money helps her family. Now that her parents have both passed, she feels responsible for her sister and her nieces and nephew who still live in her childhood home. She speaks of her past in vagaries that zoom in and out like a camera’s lenses.
“Learned most of the things I talk about on TV in my parents’ house. I grew up reading books on how to eat for a week off one chicken and how to stretch a grocery budget. I taught myself to sew so I could turn my sister’s skirts into pants for my brother Adam and then into a layette for little Eliza. Necessity is a harsh but precise teacher.”
She sounds so wise sometimes, so experienced. Then other times I question her thought processes, mostly how she talks about Hollinger like he’s some kind of Greek god who will save not only her but the world. I’m fully aware of my jealousy, but it’s not like I’m trying to be with Betty. I want the best for her, and she can do better than Don Hollinger. I only wish she knew it.
Martha and Mark join us for a lot of our diner meals. Lucy calls us the Cleanup Crew—mostly because of our work onThe Classy Homemaker, especially Betty, who gets recognized more and more often, but also because we’ve been known to stay late enough to close out the restaurant on a weeknight. Most of the time we don’t talk about serious topics at all. Betty insists the Beatles are superior to the Rolling Stones, and Martha thinks we’re both sellouts. We talk about books and laugh about oldI Love Lucyepisodes.
It’s nice having this kind of camaraderie. Martha is softening to Betty, offering her feminist books likeThe Feminine MystiqueandSexual Politics. I think she’s hoping to challenge the traditional female mores Betty leans into so often around men. And Mark is learning to keep his chauvinistic side to himself to avoid a smackdown from Martha and occasionally Betty.
Despite our closeness I haven’t told a single one of them about Betty’s secret, and I don’t plan to. I know it’d change how they all see her. Martha would return to her self-righteous coldness, Mark wouldn’t be able to stop himself from seeing her as a sex object, and who knows if either of them could keep the truth from the one person who really matters to Betty—Don Hollinger.
Tonight it’s Martha, not Betty, I’m inviting into my apartment for a “totally not a date” date. Dressed in my casual jeans and white cotton T-shirt I’d worn to the gym, I run a comb through my hair and check my watch. Six thirty-five. I have less than half an hour to make it home, change, and tidy my apartment before Martha arrives. No more time for pep talks or locker-room banter.
“Gotta run, man,” I say, slamming my locker door and clicking the lock. I quickly tie my shoelaces, and Mark gives me a shirtless salute.
“Good luck! And don’t do that quiet-guy shit. Speak up.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I say, waving him off lightheartedly, heading for the swinging exit door.
“And for God’s sake, if you get the chance—kiss her!” Mark shouts his last bit of advice as I break into a run. The YMCA is three blocks from my apartment, and I make it there in a few minutes, undoing all the work of my postgame shower.
Tonight is a work meeting, like I said to Mark, but it’s definitely the first time I’ve ever had a woman in my apartment. I sprint up the stairs, get the door unlocked, and run into my room to change into my least faded slacks and a slightly wrinkled button-up shirt, then there’s a knock at my front door.
I look around my bachelor pad—the sink is clear of dishes; my overgrown fern, Jerry, is leaning toward the front window like he’s trying to soak up the last rays of the evening sun; and my Steinway is nestled against the wall on the opposite side of the room like it’s hiding from the same light that feeds Jerry. My brown couch with orange flowers has a dented cushion where I usually sit at night to read and listen to the radio or occasionally bring out my portable television set to catch the news or a rerun ofClassy Homemakerwhen it replays overnight.
It’s not much, but it’s tidy, and though some dust catches my eye, it’s too late. I know Martha will give me a pass because not much is expected of a bachelor. That’s technically why I should be in search of a wife. Then I’d have someone to look after me, the apartment—I note my rumpled shirtsleeves—my ironing.
But I’m also proud I manage myself for the most part. I don’t know if it’s because I gave up on the idea of a wife when I haven’t even had a girlfriend yet, or if seeing Jim’s fiancée cry at his funeral and then walk down the aisle with another man a few months later reminded me of how quickly life can change on you. I don’t want to marry to get a maid or a cook or a babysitter. I want to marry because that person makes me happy and I make them happy. I want to marry because I can’t imagine living a life without them in it.
There’s a second knock. I can’t stall anymore.
When the door swings open I remember I’m barefoot, which seems like an incredibly informal way to greet a guest. A delicious scent rushes in, and I realize that I haven’t eaten since my egg salad sandwich and a cup of stale coffee at lunch. There on the other side stands Martha, a paper grocery bag in one arm and a cardboard box with a burnt-orange pot in the other. She wears bright blue jeans and a formfitting maroon sweater with a comb holding back one side of her curly hair. She has a splash of color on her cheeks and a clear gloss on her lips.
“I brought you some chili,” she says, rushing inside like she’s visited a million times before. She puts the pot on one of the burners andspills a block of cheese and a loaf of bread out of a cloth bag. “I think I burned it a little.”
“My mom always said that it gives chili extra flavor,” I say, even though as a kid I knew it was her way of getting us to eat our dinner after she’d been distracted teaching piano or ironing piles of clothes for Mrs. Green to help make ends meet.
“Well, God bless your mother,” she says, wiping at her forehead with a friendly titter. Martha is standing in my kitchen, cheeks flushed, eyes dancing, and the intimate nature of having a woman in my apartment make my nerves rise, and a warmth comes over me.
Keep talking, Greg.
“Thank you for cooking. I haven’t had a home-cooked meal in ... forever.”
