Young Mr. Keefe by Stephen; Birmingham Page B

Margie Maguire fixed asparagus with Hollandaise sauce, and fresh fat lamb chops, and the inevitable California garden salad. She had given him the avocado stone and told him how to make it grow, on toothpicks in a glass of water. She had a profusion of avocados growing in her picture window. For dessert, for a touch of gaiety, she served vanilla ice-cream topped with green crème de menthe . He had made the mistake of mentioning this dessert to Claire one time. She had made a face. “Why doesn’t she serve it on top of mashed potatoes?” she asked.
    After dinner, Bob Maguire liked to bring cold beers—quick-chilled in the freezer—into the living-room. They would lower the lights and watch television. The Maguires were fond of I Love Lucy , and, thanks to the fifty-foot antenna which was almost a requisite in the valley, the reception was good. Jimmy realized that he was really leading three lives. One was the quiet, polite, weekday evening life of the Maguires, thanking Margie kindly for the nice dinner, bringing her, occasionally, the box of Mary See’s chocolates that she liked. The second was the week-end life, shared with Claire and Blazer in their apartment on Russian Hill in San Francisco, seeing, from time to time, old friends from the East who were always passing through, on their way to or from Hawaii or Southern California, and who were always ready for a party. The third was his lonely private life, like now.
    He had told the Maguires about Claire and Blazer, his friends in San Francisco, his friends from home. Margie Maguire had asked him to bring them by. She might be able to introduce them to some new people, to some of their Sacramento friends. But Jimmy had been wise enough to see how hopeless this would be—how dull Claire and Blazer would have considered the Maguires to be, how strange and Bohemian Claire and Blazer would have seemed to the Maguires. He could imagine the things Claire would have to say about the Maguires. About their little house, their tiny fruit trees, their backyard barbecue, their picture window.
    Yes, he was moving in three worlds, really. No two of them were compatible. And, in a way, all three seemed empty.…
    The liquor swirled inside and warmed him. The night was cold and ominous; it was easy to imagine himself the only living, pulsing being in it. Yes, he was drinking too much. For too much of a reason. That was the frightening thing. Perhaps his mother had been right. Perhaps he should have let his father help him. Perhaps he should have gone to New York, found a job with a brokerage house, gone to work carrying an umbrella. And yet he was sure that he was doing the right thing. It was a challenge—this was—the sort of challenge Claire had meant, the challenge none of them seemed to have, but all of them needed. He wanted to meet it, and he would meet it, he told himself. If only he didn’t get lost along the way. Perhaps he could explain to Claire. He thought of her face, white and tear-stained, on the mountainside when she had slipped. “I’ll make this without your help!” she had said.
    And for a moment, in her eyes, he had glimpsed a kind of bone-hard courage. This is what I must have, he thought.
    All right, he thought. The drink in his hand glowed palely in the moonlight. With a quick, angry gesture, he threw it on the ground. He stood up and walked back to his sleeping-bag. The ground was cold and frosty under his bare feet. He felt good—as though he had argued something out with himself, and settled something for all time. If Helen should appear now, he would have the right answers for her. As he crawled back into the sleeping-bag, he realized that he had not really been thinking about Helen at all. Just as well, he thought. I won’t think about her any more to-night. I will turn my mind off now.

5
    There was a noise in the night quite close to his shoulder and he sat up abruptly. “ Jimmy?