Goodbye, Columbus by Philip Roth Read Free Book Online Page B

the table. That’s illegal—”
    “I didn’t lean and it’s not illegal.”
    I felt the cherries hopping among my nickels and pennies.
    “Neil, you gypped me out of a point. You have nineteen and I have eleven—”
    “Twenty and
ten,
” I said. “Serve!”
    She did and I smashed my return past her—it zoomed off the table and skittered into the refrigerator room.
    “You’re a cheater!” she screamed at me. “You cheat!” Her jaw was trembling as though she carried a weight on top of her pretty head. “I
hate
you!” And she threw her racket across the room and it clanged off the bar, just as, outside, I heard the Chrysler crushing gravel in the driveway.
    “The game isn’t over,” I said to her.
    “You cheat! And you were stealing fruit!” she said, and ran away before I had my chance to win.

    Later that night, Brenda and I made love, our first time. We were sitting on the sofa in the television room and for some ten minutes had not spoken a word to each other. Julie had long since gone to a weepy bed, and though no one had said anything to me about her crying, I did not know if the child had mentioned my fistful of cherries, which, some time before, I had flushed down the toilet.
    The television set was on and though the sound was off and the house quiet, the gray pictures still wiggled at the far end of the room. Brenda was quiet and her dress circled her legs, which were tucked back beneath her. We sat there for some while and did not speak. Then she went into the kitchen and when she came back she said that it sounded as though everyone was asleep. We sat a while longer, watching the soundless bodies on the screen eating a silent dinner in someone’s silent restaurant. When I began to unbutton her dress she resisted me, and I like to think it was because she knew how lovely she looked in it. But she looked lovely, my Brenda, anyway, and we folded it carefully and held each other close and soon there we were, Brenda falling, slowly but with a smile, and me rising.

    How can I describe loving Brenda? It was so sweet, as though I’d finally scored that twenty-first point.
    When I got home I dialed Brenda’s number, but not before my aunt heard and rose from her bed.
    “Who are you calling at this hour? The doctor?”
    “No.”
    “What kind phone calls, one o’clock at night?”
    “Shhh!” I said.
    “He tells
me
shhh. Phone calls one o’clock at night, we haven’t got a big enough bill,” and then she dragged herself back into the bed, where with a martyr’s heart and bleary eyes she had resisted the downward tug of sleep until she’d heard my key in the door.
    Brenda answered the phone.
    “Neil?” she said.
    “Yes,” I whispered. “You didn’t get out of bed, did you?”
    “No,” she said, “the phone is next to the bed.”
    “Good. How is it in bed?”
    “Good. Are you in bed?”
    “Yes,” I lied, and tried to right myself by dragging the phone by its cord as close as I could to my bedroom.

    “I’m in bed with you,” she said.
    “That’s right,” I said, “and I’m with you.”
    “I have the shades down, so it’s dark and I don’t see you.”
    “I don’t see you either.”
    “That was so nice, Neil.”
    “Yes. Go to sleep, sweet, I’m here,” and we hung up without goodbyes. In the morning, as planned, I called again, but I could hardly hear Brenda or myself for that matter, for Aunt Gladys and Uncle Max were going on a Workmen’s Circle picnic in the afternoon, and there was some trouble about grape juice that had dripped all night from a jug in the refrigerator and by morning had leaked out onto the floor. Brenda was still in bed and so could play our game with some success, but I had to pull down all the shades of my senses to imagine myself beside her. I could only pray our nights and mornings would come, and soon enough they did.

4

    Over the next week and a half there seemed to be only two people in my life: Brenda and the little colored kid who