Tully

He said yes, never taking his eyes off her, while hers were all over the room. ‘Hotel California’ just finished. Tully wasn’t sure if Jennifer was hugging her drunken blond or holding him up. Julie was making out with Tom and adjusting the zipper on the side of her dress at the same time. Stones again, and Jagger’s hoarse ‘You’re out of touch, my baby…’

Tully grasped Robin’s fingers and skated with him onto the ice. Closing her eyes, Tully saw the music and moved to the music, while Robin moved to her. Tully, eyes closed, swayed her hips and thrust them closer to him, almost grinding against him. With her eyes still closed, she let go of his hands and ran her palms up and down her torso, from her breasts to her thighs, pulsing to the rhythm. When the song ended, she was sweating, panting, grinding up to him. She opened her eyes. Tully saw him looking at her with an expression she knew very well and had seen very often. He was definitely closed. Okay, now she was ready to go.

They said their good-byes quickly. Tully ran upstairs and got her clothes out of the hamper. Striding over to Jennifer, Tully noticed Jen had an embarrassed look on her face, having just finished talking to Gail. Jennifer let Tully kiss her on the cheek. ‘Happy Birthday, Mandolini,’ Tully whispered. ‘And thank you.’

‘Are you coming with us to St Mark’s tomorrow?’ asked Jennifer.

Tully shook her head. ‘Not tomorrow, okay?’

‘Tully, you haven’t been since school started.’

‘Not tomorrow, okay? I’m going to have to rake the leaves in the morning.’

Jennifer made a skeptical face. ‘You don’t have a rake.’

‘With my teeth, okay?’ said Tully, moving away and waving.

Robin opened the door for her, and they were out. The cool air smelled so fresh after the staleness of the living room. It was quiet and windless, unusual for Kansas. Tully’s head throbbed and her ears rang a continual dog whistle, as they always did after hours of loud noise, even if it was Jagger noise.

In the car, Tully silently bit her nails.

The walk home was long, but the ride seemed short. If he is going to get to work, he’d better get to work fast, thought Tully.

‘Would you like to see me again?’ Robin finally said.

‘Yeah, sure,’ Tully replied laconically.

He drove slowly, at one point obeying the stop sign for about a minute.

‘Tully,’ Robin said at the stop sign. ‘Tully. That’s an unusual name.’

‘Robin. That’s an unusual name. Is that Italian?’

‘Third generation DeMarco,’ he answered. ‘My mother was of mixed blood and my father wanted to Americanize the family. Also,’ Robin added, ‘they were bird lovers.’

‘Were?’ said Tully.

‘My mother is dead,’ said Robin, and drove on.

Tully swallowed, and said, ‘My brother couldn’t pronounce my name properly and it stuck.’

‘So is that your name?’ asked Robin. ‘Properly.’

‘Yeah, that’s me,’ said Tully. ‘Properly Makker.’

‘What’s your real name?’

‘Natalie,’ said Tully. ‘Natalie Anne Makker.’

‘That’s nice,’ said Robin. ‘What’s your brother’s name?’

She paused. ‘Henry, Hank.’ She almost did not mind the questions, for this one was particularly cute. Still, she bit her nails furiously. She had no harmless answers. Why do they always have to know so much before they fuck you? she thought. Why?

‘There are three brothers in my family,’ Robin said. ‘I’m the oldest.’

‘How old is oldest?’

He looked over at her and smiled. ‘Oldest is twenty-five. Is that very oldest?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Ancient.’

‘How many kids in your family?’ Robin asked. ‘Two?’

He is tough, she thought, shaking her head. She had nearly forgotten how tough they all were. ‘Only one,’ she replied. Only one left.

‘One? I thought you said you had a brother.’

‘I did,’ said Tully, ‘have a brother.’ Two brothers, even. Two that I know of. ‘He’s not around anymore. Make a right at the next corner.’

Tully navigated him through the short streets near her house. And then the Grove. Robin pulled up near her house, took one short look at it – broken porch, long grass – and then one long look at her.

‘Can I come and see you tomorrow?’ he asked.

Nothing would be better, thought Tully. My mother on one side of him, Aunt Lena on the other. And so Tully smiled and gave him her stock answer, the answer she gave to all the boys, the only answer she had. ‘Sure, great, come. Maybe we could go for a ride in the afternoon.’ She looked around her. ‘Am I sitting in a red Corvette?’

‘With red leather seats,’ he replied.

‘Cool,’ said Tully. Right in front of him, she pulled on the big black skirt over her little skirt and a sweater over the T-shirt, then took a tissue and started wiping her makeup off.

Robin watched her. ‘You live pretty far away from everything, don’t you?’ he said.

‘Oh, but that’s not true,’ she said. ‘I live very near the railroad.’

‘The railroad? The St Louis and Southwestern Railroad?’

‘I guess. What does it matter?’

‘It’s got a lot of history,’ Robin said.

‘Oh, good,’ said Tully.

‘Like you?’

‘Me? I’m history-less,’ Tully said.

‘I never would’ve guessed you live near a railroad. You didn’t strike me as the type.’

‘Oh, but that’s not true.’ Tully smiled. ‘I am exactly the type. You can always tell.’

‘Always? How?’

‘Because,’ Tully said, handing him the smeared tissue, ‘the girl who lives near the railroad always wears the brightest lipstick.’

‘Hmm,’ said Robin. ‘As I recall, when you came in, you weren’t wearing any lipstick at all.’

The look she cast him quickly prompted him to ask her if he could walk her to the door.

Shaking her head, Tully said, ‘My mother is very sick.’ Hedda’s room was on one side of the house and Aunt Lena’s on the other; the house was dark, the entire street was dark, not too many people were up. Tully leaned over and kissed Robin full on the mouth. His lips were soft and wet; he smelled of alcohol and apple strudel. She liked that and kissed him deeper. Deeper and deeper; his lips were open while his eyes were closed. Tully always watched when she kissed them. What’s the point otherwise? Their faces are everything. She groped for him; his lips got more urgent, more and more urgent. She touched his hair, his neck, his shoulders. He groaned softly as he ran his hand under her skirts, over her bare legs, over her thighs, to touch her, one hand under her skirt, one on her breast. She was almost naked underneath her clothes; the Corvette windows got all fogged up. Robin kissed and kissed her. He pulled up her T-shirt and buried his face in her breasts as Tully stroked his hair, nearly shutting her eyes herself at the feel of his brown head. ‘Tully, what are you doing to me?’ he whispered, getting over to the passenger seat, on top of her, grinding himself against her. ‘What are you doing?’

Tully felt his erection, his need, his want, his breath, oh, this was just what she wanted. It had been such a long time since she had smelled lust and desire, had felt an erection. She moaned aloud, and that only made Robin grind harder against her. She unbuttoned his pants and took him out. He groaned. Really wanting him inside her, Tully moved her G-string over and guided him in. Robin went to touch her with his fingers, but she was already pushing him past them, inside, inside, inside.

Robin was much too excited, and it was over very quickly. As Tully liked it; she always liked it best when they came fast and out of control. It wasn’t very comfortable in the car; backseats were better, but the Corvette seemed better altogether. Tully had never been in one. When Robin came, she held him against her and caressed his back. Good, she thought, and smiled. Good. He stayed there, propping himself up but on top of her for some minutes, until she patted him lightly on the arm. ‘I gotta go,’ she whispered.

‘Oh, Tully,’ he said. Gently, she pushed him off her, and when he moved back to his own seat, she adjusted her skirts and brushed her hair. Robin buttoned his pants. ‘So you gotta go. You don’t want anything else? Anything else for yourself?’

Tully was amused. How to tell him that in the last ten minutes she got everything for herself she possibly could get from him, and anything else was out of his league, out of his Corvette, and in any case, completely unnecessary.

‘Robin, I’m so fine,’ she told him. ‘But I really gotta go.’

‘Can I still see you tomorrow?’ Robin said, touching her cheek.

Tully smiled. This one was a real gentleman. Some of them were. ‘Sure, great. Come,’ she said, kissing him quickly, and then was out, up the path, up the porch steps, and inside.

THREE Robin

September 1978

Sunday morning, Jennifer sat by the phone and waited for Jack to call her. Last night he said he would call her, but here it was, noon already. Jennifer didn’t even go to St Mark’s for the ten o’clock Mass, waiting for him to call.

The last guests had left by about midnight, and Jennifer spent until two in the morning compulsively cleaning her room before she lay down in her bed. How did he get home? Jen had thought. He left around eleven, mumbling something about getting a ride. But he lived nearby, so he might have just stumbled home.

Jennifer slept poorly, waking up at five-thirty in the morning to sneak into the garage. Then she started cleaning up the house, and at six-thirty her mom and dad got up and helped her. Jennifer went back to her room, vacuumed, dusted, polished, shined. Then she came down to breakfast.

Sunday breakfasts! How she loved the mozzarella and onion omelettes her mom made; the whole family, all three of them, did. But this morning, Jennifer looked down into her omelette and thought about his breath, his breath on her shoulders, on her hair, his breath as he leaned over and laughed in her ear while she felt his sweat-soaked blond hair brush against her face.

‘Jenny, did you have a good time?’ Tony Mandolini asked her.

‘Great,’ she said into her food.

‘Did anyone get drunk or embarrass themselves?’

And they danced, oh, they danced together to ‘Wild Wild Horses.’

‘Only Mom,’ replied Jennifer, trying to be jovial, ‘but everyone knew she can’t handle her liquor, so they were real sympathetic.’

‘Jennifer!’ Lynn slapped her daughter’s arm.

Jennifer smiled. ‘No, everything was great, Dad, thanks.’

‘Hey, your mom did most of the work. Thank her.’ Tony reached over and patted Lynn’s thigh.

Tony and Lynn glanced at each other, and then Lynn said, ‘We have another surprise for you, Jenny,’ handing Jennifer a little wrapped box with a white bow.

Jennifer stopped eating, put down her milk, wiped her mouth, looked at her mom and dad, and picked up the little gift. She knew what it was. So when she ripped the wrapping paper, opened the box, and took out a pair of keys, Jennifer summoned all her powers to open her eyes wide and to put on a big surprised smile on her face.

‘Dad! Mom! What’s this? You know, I already have a pair of keys.’

Tony and Lynn were grinning. ‘Yes, darling, it’s what you always wanted,’ Lynn said.

It’s what you always wanted rang in Jennifer’s ears as they went outside and her father opened the garage door and showed her a huge white bow, this time wrapped around a brand-new baby-blue Camaro.

To match my eyes, thought Jennifer wearily.

‘To match your eyes,’ said Tony as his daughter stood and stared. She then effused sufficiently. Hugged and kissed them both. But did not take the car for a ride just then and spent the rest of the morning in her bedroom, sitting on her bed in utter silence, not moving at all.

‘I told you they were gonna get me a car,’ Jennifer said when Julie called at nine-thirty.

Julie squealed. ‘A car! A beautiful car! Your car! You can take us all everywhere in your car!’

‘Hmm. What are you so happy about? You didn’t get a car.’

‘I should’ve been so lucky,’ Julie answered.

‘Well, maybe if your mom and dad didn’t have twenty kids, you might’ve,’ commented Jennifer.

‘Five,’ said Julie. ‘But why were you so sure it was going to be a car?’

Because it’s what I always wanted, Jennifer thought, and wearily said so.

‘Going to St Mark’s, Jen? My grandmother wants me to take communion today.’

‘Not today, Jule, okay? I really gotta help clean up.’

They talked about Tully a little and hung up; afterwards Jennifer sat back down on the bed with hands folded on her lap and waited – until Robin called.

‘Jennifer, I want to take Tully out,’ said Robin.

Jennifer sighed. The only phone calls she had received were from Julie and now from Robin to ask permission to see Tully.

‘Go right ahead,’ said Jennifer. ‘By all means.’

Robin was pacing around his bedroom. He could tell Jennifer was not listening to him, and hated finding himself in a ridiculous position of having to confer with a seventeen – no, eighteen-year-old. But he remembered Tully’s face and sweet lips as she kissed him. He would have been delighted with her lips alone. The rest of their encounter confounded him. Robin felt vaguely that unwittingly and unknowingly, he was being sucked into some bottomless mire. That last night’s encounter with Tully felt like he had been had. With no choice in the matter. Simply sucked in, and had. Tully seemed like a mosquito in the summer that sucked just enough blood to feed itself but not to kill him, and when the mosquito was swollen and bloated with the little it took, it buzzed off, to digest Robin’s blood and then feed off some other poor slob. Still, Robin felt persisting for Tully was the right thing to do. It felt like the right thing to do.

‘Jen, can you help me out a little, please?’

‘What can I do for you, Robin?’

‘I want to take her out.’

There was a short pause.

‘What would you like me to say?’ said Jennifer.

What’s she like? Robin wanted to ask. Is there something about her I should know? Do you think I’m her type? Is there something that’ll scare me off her? But he already knew the answer to that one. She was scary as hell, devouring him as she did, on a whim, unexpectedly, and then patting him on the back, sort of like, good boy, Robin, good doggie, now sit. But all Robin asked was, ‘Well, is she going out with someone?’

‘No,’ said Jennifer. ‘But you are.’

Robin ignored her. Gail was strictly short-term.

‘She said her mother is sick. Is it a chronic thing?’

Another pause, slightly longer. Robin sighed into the phone. Dentist visits were easier than this.

‘Oh, it’s pretty chronic, all right,’ said Jennifer.

Robin was silent.

‘Robin,’ said Jennifer. ‘Tully is not the easiest person to take out, you know.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t know. I was hoping you’d tell me.’ Pause. ‘She told me to come in the afternoon to her house and take her for a drive,’ he said finally.

‘She did?’ Jennifer seemed to liven up.

‘Yes, uh-huh.’

Jennifer chuckled. ‘She didn’t mean it.’

Robin’s circular pacing around his bedroom speeded up.

‘How’s your dad?’ Jennifer asked him.

‘Fine, fine,’ he said. That was not strictly true, but he really did not want to talk about his dad at the moment. ‘What’s Tully’s dad like?’

‘He’s not,’ said Jennifer, ‘around.’

‘Not at all?’ asked Robin.

‘Not at all.’

‘Is he dead?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Jennifer.

‘How long has he been not around?’

‘Ten years,’ said Jennifer.

‘Jennifer, will you do me a favor?’

He heard Jennifer sigh. ‘Robin, I kinda gotta go. I’m expecting a phone call.’

‘Jennifer,’ said Robin. ‘If he’s going to call, trust me, he’ll call back – now please, would you?’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘Call Tully, find out if she really wants to see me again, and if she does, please find out the best way I can get to her. Can you do that for me?’

Jennifer quickly agreed, and they hung up. Robin sat quietly for a few moments. He was thinking of Tully, of the way she held on to him last night and of her soft needy moans. Then he inadvertently remembered how upset Gail was with him and how he meant to apologize. Robin thought of calling Gail up but decided against it. He did not want to be talking to Gail while he was thinking of Tully.

Tully was the first girl whose smell and taste and expression affected him enough to humiliate his date at a party for a mutual friend. Robin hoped Tully was worth it.

When Robin was twelve, six months before his confirmation and seven months before his mother’s death, he found out that he and his younger brothers were all adopted by Stephen and Pamela DeMarco from some adoption agency that had managed to palm off all three little male siblings to one set of parents. Sort of like a kitten litter. Robin had been three, Bruce a year and a half, and Stevie three months.

Robin had been looking for his birth certificate because he wanted to open his first savings account for the anticipated earnings from his confirmation. His adoption papers shattered him. Robin ran downstairs to his parents, wildly waving the certificate and crying ‘Why didn’t you ever tell us? Why? Why didn’t you ever tell me?’ The DeMarcos tried in vain to comfort their oldest boy. But for the next six months, young Robin went to school, worked his paper route, came home, ate dinner, did his homework, watched a little TV, and went to sleep. For six months, he hardly spoke to his mother and father. At his confirmation, he coldly kissed Pamela DeMarco and thanked her for going through the trouble of throwing him such a great party, even though he was not her son.

A month later, Robin’s mother died unexpectedly of congestive heart failure. Young Robin quickly forgave himself for not forgiving his mother in time. After graduating from high school, he went to work for his dad and proved himself to be a hardworking and smart manager. The family business prospered under Robin. Then money came his way. Money, good clothes, great cars. Robin worked, played soccer, and took in a great many women. He usually had his pick of most girls he met – and he met a great many girls. He was always courteous to them, but often he was not particularly sensitive. He spoke little of himself and regularly broke up with his girlfriends without letting them know about it; one day he would just start going around with a different girl and that seemed to say it all for him – what more was there to say?

Shying away from girls who were in touch with their feelings and wanting to talk all the time, Robin preferred those similar to his adopted mother: flashy, fair-haired, and private. Gail was nothing like his mother.

The phone rang again as soon as Jennifer put it down. She closed her eyes and let it ring three times before picking it up.

It was Tully. Jennifer sighed.

‘No, no, don’t worry,’ said Tully. ‘I know that you are glad to hear from me deep down.’

‘Very deep,’ said Jennifer. ‘Robin called, asking for you.’

‘He did? Did you tell him he called the wrong house? I don’t live with you.’

‘But wish you did,’ said Jennifer, half kidding.

‘Well, that’s pretty thrilling,’ continued Tully. ‘I didn’t think I’d see him again. What did he want?’

‘He asked if you were going out with anyone.’

‘And you said…’

‘I told him that you weren’t going out with anyone but that he was.’

‘Nice going, Jen.’

‘I told him,’ continued Jennifer, ‘that your mother might be a problem.’

‘Well done!’ exclaimed Tully. ‘Nothing a guy likes more than a problem mom.’

‘Tully, did you tell him he could pick you up at your house?’

‘Yeah,’ said Tully. ‘I say that to everybody. I didn’t mean it. I didn’t think he’d show up.’

Jennifer said, ‘Well, he was definitely going to show up. Good thing I talked some sense into him.’

Tully was silent.

‘Tull, you wanna see him?’

Silence. A grim ‘A little.’

‘He’s going out with Gail, and Gail was very upset with the both of you,’ said Jennifer.

‘Fuck Gail,’ Tully said. ‘Is he in love with her?’

‘Tully, she’s seventeen and I think she kind of loves him.’

‘Yeah, so? I’m seventeen, too. Besides,’ she added, ‘I’m not responsible that he calls me up.’

‘That he calls me up,’ Jennifer corrected her, smiling at the phone.

Jen arranged to pick Tully up in her new Camaro and drive her over to The Village Inn, the popular hamburger place on Topeka Boulevard, where Robin would meet them. Then she called Robin to tell him the plan. Jennifer thought that Robin seemed pleased with that, and this struck her as odd because she always perceived Robin as unemotional. He must like Tully, thought Jennifer.

‘Is there anything I should know about her?’ Robin asked Jennifer.

Well, there are a lot of things you should know about her, thought Jennifer, but right now, I really want to get off the phone.

‘Yeah, she is not much into talking.’

‘She and you both. What’s she into?’

A different kind of communication, Jennifer thought. Tactile communication.

‘Into? Dancing,’ Jen replied. ‘Music. National Geographic. Books.’

No one knew Tully better than Jennifer, no one knew Tully on such personal terms, but even Jennifer was hard-pressed to define what Tully was into, or what was into Tully. When she was twelve, Jennifer overheard her mother and father discussing adopting Tully; she wished she could have heard that conversation better, but the words were big and vague. Something about Wichita, something about foster care. Then Tully more or less dropped out of Jennifer’s and Julie’s life. Oh, Tully came over, ate dinner, did some homework, talked, watched TV.

But it was all pretend. Like the games they used to play when they were children. Pretend. Tully was a Stepford Tully during 1975, 1976, 1977. Jennifer knew only a bare skeleton of Tully’s life during the years Tully was dancing and getting into dance clubs with her fake ID.

In 1977, things got a little better. Tully showed Jennifer the ID. ‘Natalie Anne Makker,’ it read. ‘Female, 5’6”, 105 pounds, gray eyes, blonde hair, b. January 19, 1955.’ Jennifer had been shocked at how Tully looked in the photo, done up so old. Tully made herself to look six years older, but she might as well have made her lie be sixteen years or sixty, so large had been the chasm separating Tully from Jennifer. And even after 1977. They didn’t play softball anymore, Tully and Jen.

‘Yeah, Tully is really not much into all that verbal stuff,’ Jennifer finished.

‘Ahhh, a girl after my own heart,’ said Robin, hanging up.

Afterwards, Jennifer sat back on her bed and did not move for an hour until it was time to go pick up Tully in her new Camaro.

‘Nice car, Jen,’ Tully said, getting in. ‘Now you can drive us all to school.’

‘Makker, Julie and I walk to school. And I’m not driving every morning to pick your ass up from the boondocks of town, that’s for sure.’

‘Oh, yes, you are, Mandolini,’ said Tully. ‘You got nowhere else to go but to pick me up.’

‘I got plenty of places,’ said Jennifer.

‘Yeah? Name one. Admit it, you don’t really need this car.’

‘I admit it,’ said Jennifer. ‘But Makker, whether I need it or not, you are not getting this car, not even for five minutes. Absolutely not.’

‘I don’t want this silly car,’ said Tully, smiling and touching Jennifer’s hair. ‘I just want you to teach me how to drive.’

At The Village Inn, Robin sat down across from Tully. Or rather, Tully sat down across from Robin. Tully looked entirely different from last night, looking more as she did when she first arrived at Jen’s: no makeup. She was wearing old faded jeans and a HAVE FUN! IT’S TOPEKA! sweatshirt. Her eyes were sweet and gray and she had large blue bags under them. Her nose was a little misshapen and her mouth was pale. She had short, kinky hair. She didn’t look like a party girl, she didn’t look scary, she didn’t look much like anything, but as Robin sat and watched her dig into her burger and talk to him, he thought she was the most beautiful girl he had ever met.

‘Why did you tell me I could come to your mother’s house?’ he asked her.

She flashed him a smile. ‘I didn’t think you’d come.’ Beaming at the waiter, Tully ordered black coffee and lemon meringue pie.

‘You really transform yourself for a party, don’t you?’ Robin said.

‘What’s the matter? Regret you came today?’ Tully asked.

He shook his head quickly. Gray is not an especially warm color, he thought, never having seen gray eyes before. ‘No, you look better now, but different.’

They sat and talked for an hour.

‘What do you do, Robin?’ Tully asked him. ‘With yourself? When you’re not accompanying high school seniors to parties?’

‘I work for my dad,’ he told her. ‘DeMarco & Sons. Fine men’s clothing.’

‘In Manhattan?’ Tully seemed surprised. ‘Is there a market for that sort of thing out there?’

Robin shrugged. ‘We have no competition. It’s not bad.’

‘Well, that explains why you’re so well dressed,’ said Tully, smiling lightly.

As Tully talked, she gestured with her hands, which reminded Robin of his profoundly gesticulate family, and he found her hand motions very Italian and very endearing. They were having a good time. She was funny, nonthreatening, and, well, seemed entirely normal to him. They both smoked. He lit her cigarette for her, and she stared into his face as she inhaled.

But while Tully was holding up her hands – thin, white, and thoroughly pleasing – to imitate a friend of hers during a police raid on a dance club, Robin saw her wrists. On both her wrists, very close to her palms, he saw two horizontal scars, jagged and dark pink, scars about an inch long. He inhaled sharply. She stopped talking and looked at him; Robin could only imagine what his expression looked like to her – fear? pity? more fear? How often had she seen these expressions on the faces of men who encountered her and those wrists of hers? All that mixed with lust and tenderness. How often?

Instantly, her demeanor changed. She wasn’t animated anymore, and her eyes were cold.

To sit and say nothing seemed somehow unthinkable, somehow worse than acknowledgment, so Robin steadied himself and acknowledged Tully. Touching her sleeve, he said, ‘Are you okay?’

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I’m great.’

Robin looked at her wrists, and so did she. ‘Oh, these,’ Tully said. ‘I cut myself shaving.’

‘Oh,’ Robin said, letting go of her sleeve and feeling himself go pale. ‘I hope you don’t…shave them very often.’

‘Not too often, God help me.’ She attempted a smile.

I love her, Robin thought then and there with a spasm of emotional clarity that pulled at his stomach and tugged at his throat. I love her. How is that possible? How? What has she done?

After leaving The Village Inn, they drove to 45th Street and headed east, in the direction of Lake Shawnee and Lawrence. Tully was much quieter than she had been at the restaurant. Basically, she just sat and stared at the road, commenting that the weather was certainly turning chilly.

‘Shawnee County is really beautiful,’ Robin said. ‘Look at this place. Hills and valleys and meadows.’

‘And long grass,’ said Tully impassively. ‘It’s the prairie, Robin.’ She looked out the window.

‘Yeah, but looking at this, you wouldn’t think it was the prairie,’ said Robin.

‘It’s the prairie, nonetheless,’ said Tully.

They parked at Lake Shawnee and had sex again; it was just as brief this time, just as confounding. There was no one around. Tully stroked Robin’s hair, and then gently pushed him off her. He sighed and got dressed. ‘Done with me, are you, Tully?’ he said.

‘I’m not done with you at all,’ said Tully, touching his cheeks. ‘But I have to get back.’

‘What’s the matter? Your mother sick?’

‘Very sick,’ said Tully. ‘If you only knew.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Nothing to tell,’ said Tully.

Robin took a deep breath and told her about his dad’s cancer.

‘I’m sorry, Robin,’ said Tully, cracking her knuckles. ‘My mother is not really sick, nothing like that. She is just…strict, that’s all.’

‘How strict, Tully?’ he wanted to know. ‘Is there a curfew? Does she insist you do your homework all the time and not go out? Does she make you do housework?’

‘If only,’ said Tully. ‘No, nothing like that. Robin, it’s really hard to explain about my mother. She is not very communicative.’

‘From what I understand, neither are you,’ said Robin.

‘Right,’ said Tully. ‘So, me and my Mom, we just don’t talk much.’

Silently, Robin looked at the lake. ‘She is still your mother, Tully,’ he said. ‘She’s the only mother you’ll ever have.’

Tully glanced at him. ‘Robin, that’s not necessarily a good thing,’ she said. ‘Let’s go.’

It was nearly seven in the evening when they hit 45th Street again. The sun was hiding behind the hills. The trees, the barns, and oblong grain silos were dusky silhouettes along the road. Robin and Tully had been driving for about ten minutes on 45th when a car coming the opposite way passed them and all of a sudden something hard and black bounced off the other car, and then the Corvette smashed it with its right fender, and the black thing bounced off and fell with a thump to the ground.

‘Robin!’ exclaimed Tully. Both cars stopped. Two young men in plaid shirts came out of the other car, and all four of them carefully stepped to the middle of the road to see a Doberman, prone on its side still breathing but unable to move any part of itself.

‘Oh, God,’ said Tully.