Hardly Knew Her

“When are you going to marry me?” she asked abruptly one day, right in the middle of something that Charlie particularly liked, which distressed him, as it dimmed the pleasure, having it interrupted, and this question was an especially jarring interruption, being wholly unanticipated.

“What?”

“I’m in love with you, Charlie. I’m tired of sneaking around like this.”

“We don’t sneak around anywhere.”

“Exactly. For two years, you’ve been coming over here, having your fun, but what’s in it for me? We never go anywhere outside this apartment, I don’t even get to go to lunch with you, or celebrate my birthday. I want to marry you, Charlie.”

“You do?”

“I looooooooooooove you.” Sylvia, who clearly was not going to finish tending to him, threw herself across her side of the bed and began to cry.

“You do?” Charlie rather liked their current arrangement, and given that Sylvia had more or less engineered it, he had assumed it was as she wanted it.

“Of course. I want you to leave Marla and marry me.”

“But I don’t-” He had started to say he didn’t want to leave Marla and marry Sylvia, but he realized this was probably not tactful. “I just don’t know how to tell Marla. It will break her heart. We’ve been together thirty-eight years.”

“I’ve given it some thought.” Her tears had dried with suspicious speed. “You have to choose. For the next month, I’m not going to see you at all. In fact, I’m not going to see you again until you tell Marla what we have.”

“Okay.” Charlie laid back and waited for Sylvia to continue.

“Starting now, Charlie.”

“Now? I mean, I’m already here. Why not Saturday?”

“Now.”

Two days later, as Charlie was puttering around the house, wondering what to do with himself, Marla asked: “Aren’t you going to play golf?”

“What?” Then he remembered. “Oh, yeah. I guess so.” He put on his golf gear, gathered up his clubs, and headed out. But to where? How should he kill the next five hours? He started to go to the movies, but he passed the club on his way out to the multiplex and thought that it looked almost fun. He pulled in and inquired about getting a lesson. It was harder than it looked, but not impossible, and the pro said the advantage of being a begi

“You’re awfully tan,” Marla said, two weeks later.

“Am I?” He looked at his arms, which were reddish-brown, while his upper arms were still ghostly white. “You know, I changed suntan lotion. I was using a really high SPF, it kept out all the rays.”

“When I paid the credit card bill, I noticed you were spending a lot more money at the country club. Are you sneaking in extra games?”

“I’m playing faster,” he said, “so I have time to have drinks at the bar, or even a meal. In fact, I might start going out on Sundays, too. Would you mind?”

“Oh, I’ve been a golf widow all this time,” Marla said. “What’s another day? As long”-she smiled playfully-“as long as it’s really golf and not another woman.”

Charlie was stung by Marla’s joke. He had always been a faithful husband. That is, he had been a faithful husband for thirty-six years, and then there had been an interruption, one of relatively short duration given the length of their marriage, and now he was faithful again, so it seemed unfair for Marla to tease him this way.

“Well, if you want to come along and take a lesson yourself, you’re welcome to. You might enjoy it.”

“But you always said golf was a terribly jealous mistress, that you wouldn’t advise anyone you know taking it up because it gets such a horrible hold on you.”

“Did I? Well, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”

MARLA CAME TO THE CLUB the next day. She had a surprising aptitude for golf and it gave her extra confidence to see that Charlie was not much better than she, despite his two years of experience. She liked the club, too, although she was puzzled that Charlie didn’t seem to know many people. “I kind of keep to myself,” he said.

The month passed quickly, so quickly and pleasantly that he found himself surprised when Sylvia called.

“Well?” she asked.

“Well?” he echoed.

“Did you tell her?”

“Her? Oh, Marla. No. No. I just couldn’t.”

“If you don’t tell her, you’ll never see me again.”

“I guess that’s only fair.”

“What?” Sylvia’s voice, never her best asset, screeched perilously high.

“I accept your conditions. I can’t leave Marla, and therefore I can’t see you.” Really, he thought, when would he have time? He was playing so much golf now, and while Marla seldom came to the club on Thursdays, she accompanied him on Saturdays and Sundays.

“But you love me.”

“Yes, but Marla is the mother of my children.”

“Who are now grown and living in other cities and barely remember to call you except on your birthday.”

“And she’s a fifty-seven-year-old woman. It would be rather mean, just throwing her out in the world at this age, never having worked and all. Plus, a divorce would bankrupt me.”

“A passion like ours is a once-in-a-lifetime event.”

“It is?”

“What?” she screeched again.

“I mean, it is. We have known a great passion. But that’s precisely because we haven’t been married. Marriage is different, Sylvia. You’ll just have to take my word on that.”

This apparently was the wrong thing to say, as she began to sob in earnest. “But I would be married to you. And I love you. I can’t live without you.”

“Oh, I’m not much of a catch. Really. You’ll get over it.”

“I’m almost forty! I’ve sacrificed two crucial years, being with you on your terms.”

Charlie thought that was unfair, since the terms had been Sylvia’s from the start. But all he said was: “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to lead you on. And I won’t anymore.”

He thought that would end matters, but Sylvia was a remarkably focused woman. She continued to call-the office, not his home, which indicated to Charlie that she was not yet ready to wreak the havoc she was threatening. So Marla remained oblivious and their golf continued to improve, but his assistant was begi

ON THURSDAY, JUST AS HE WAS getting ready to leave the office for what was now his weekly midday nine, Sylvia called again, crying and threatening to hurt herself.

“I was just on my way out,” he said.

“Where do you have to go?”

“Golf,” he said.

“Oh, I see.” Her laugh was brittle. “So you have someone new already. Your current assistant? I guess your principles have fallen a notch.”

“No, I really play golf now.”

“Charlie, I’m not your wife. Your stupid lie won’t work on me. It’s not even your lie, remember?”

“No, no, there’s no one else. I’ve, well, reformed! It’s like a penance to me. I’ve chosen my loveless marriage and golf over the great passion of my life. It’s the right thing to do.”

He thought she would find this suitably romantic, but it only seemed to enrage her more.

“I’m going to go over to your house and tell Marla that you’re cheating.”

“Don’t do that, Sylvia. It’s not even true.”

“You cheated with me, didn’t you? And a tiger doesn’t change his stripes.”

Charlie wanted to say that he was not so much a tiger as a house cat who had been captured by a petulant child. True, it had been hard to break with Sylvia once things had started. She was very good at a lot of things that Marla seldom did and never conducted with enthusiasm. But it had not been his idea. And, confronted with an ultimatum, he had honored her condition. He hadn’t tried to have it both ways. He was begi

“Meet me at my apartment right now, or I’ll call Marla.”