The Year of Pleasures by Elizabeth Berg Read Free Book Online Page B

papery but warm. She sniffed at my hand as a dog might, tentatively but knowledgeably, and Delores and I exchanged a quick glance. Then she took off her glasses and peered closely into my palm. “Long life. Given to dreaming. Oh, lucky in love, I see. And you . . .” She grew quiet, looking even more closely. She stayed so still I thought for a moment she had fallen asleep. But then she dropped my hand and sat back in her chair. “Price of the house just went up,” she said, and cackled—there was no other word for it. She put her glasses back on carefully. Then she clasped her hands on her lap, and one thumb began rapidly tapping the other. A passerby might have thought,
Parkinson’s.
I saw it for what it was:
I’m waaaaiting.
    “Lydia,” Delores said. “You can’t do that!”
    Lydia gripped the sides of her wheelchair and turned a fierce gaze onto Delores. Her eyes were beady and dark, her mouth turned dramatically downward. “I can. I’m the owner.”
    “It went up to what?” I asked, and Lydia turned slowly to me, spider to the fly. She was sweet-faced now. “Went up to three hundred and sixty. Five.”
    “Sold,” I said, though I could hear Delores’s silent objection.
    “I meant, three hundred and seventy,” Lydia said, and I said no. And then she seemed to suddenly tire; she sighed and said, “All right. Take it, then. Three hundred and fifty.”
    “You mean . . . sixty-five?” I said, and heard Delores inhale sharply. Later, we would have a conversation.
    “Three hundred fifty!” Lydia said. “And that’s my last offer!”
    I looked over at Delores, who shrugged.
    “Deal,” I said, and offered Lydia my hand to seal the agreement. But she waved me away.
    “Take me back to my room,” she said. “I want to watch the news.”
    After Lydia was settled in front of her television, Delores and I said goodbye and started out of her room. But then, “You,” she said to me. “Come over here.”
    I went to stand before her, bracing for another price increase. She looked up at me, her brown eyes watery and searching. “He will come,” she said finally. I felt a cold grip at the back of my neck.
    “What do you mean?” I cleared my throat, smiled.
    She leaned her head around me. “Don’t block the television. Get out of the way.” She sniffed, pulled a wadded-up tissue from her sleeve, dabbed at her nose, regarded with interest an ad for a sporty car. Then she yelled into the hall, “Thanks for the sundae, Dorothy! Bring me another one when you come with the papers for me to sign. Bring me two!”
    “It’s Delores.”
    “Oh, what’s the difference? You know who I’m talking to!”
    Delores turned wearily toward me. “What do you say we go and get some dinner? And a drink.”
    I nodded, then turned to Lydia. “Goodbye,” I said. “I’m glad to have met you. I love your house, and I want you to know I’ll—”
    “Enough,” she said.
             
    Delores and I sat in an overly dark booth at the Chuck Wagon Round Up, chosen in part because it was right next door to a moderately priced motel where Delores had suggested I’d be comfortable staying. She pulled a tiny flashlight out of her suitcase-sized purse so that we could read the menu.
    “That’s handy,” I said.
    “You have no idea how often I use it,” she said. “I’ve got a little bitty fan in here, too, and the
most
adorable tool kit.” We placed identical orders for dinner: barbecue ribs, baked potatoes, salads with peppercorn dressing, and Bacardi cocktails.
    “I have to apologize for Lydia,” Delores said. “At the very least, I should have prepared you better. Still learning how to sell houses, I guess.” She pulled off her clip-on earrings and threw them in her purse, then leaned in closer to tell me, “My shoes are off, too. And my girdle’s not far behind.”
    “How long have you been in real estate?” I asked her.
    “Oh, hell, it’s just a hobby. Like macramé. I got into it a few years