Insomnia

Lois Chasse had large dark eyes-the kind that had been called Spanish eyes when Ralph was a kid-and he bet they had dancej through the minds of dozens of boys during Lois’s high-school years They were still her best feature, worry he saw in them now. It was… what? A little too neighborly but Ralph didn’t much care for the for comfort was the first thought to occur to him, but he wasn’t sure it was the right thought.

“Fine,” Lois echoed.

“You betcha.” He took his handkerchief from his back pocket, checked to make sure it was clean, and then wiped his brow with it.

“I hope you don’t mind me saying it, Ralph, but you don’t look fine.”

Ralph did mind her saying it, but didn’t know how to say so.

“You’re pale, you’re sweating, and you’re a litterbug.”

Ralph looked at her, startled.

“Something fell out of your paper. I think it was an ad circular.”

“Did it?”

“You know perfectly well it did. Excuse me a second.” She got up, crossed the sidewalk, bent (Ralph noticed that, while her. woman who had to be sixty-eight), and picked up the circular. She hips were fairly broad, her legs were still admirably trim for a came back to the bench with it and sat down. There,” she said. “Now you’re not a litterbug anymore.”

He smiled in spite of himself. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it. I can use the Maxwell House coupon, also the Hamburger Helper and the Diet Coke. I’ve gotten so fat since Mr. Chasse died.”

“You’re not fat, Lois.”

“Thank you, Ralph, you’re a perfect gentleman, but let’s not change the subject. You had a dizzy spell, didn’t you? In fact, you almost passed out.”

“I was just catching my breath,” he said stiffly, and turned to watch a bunch of kids playing scrub baseball just inside the park. envied the efficiency of them They were going at it hard, laughing and grab-assing round. Ralph r air-conditioning systems. “Catching your breath, were you? “Yes.” ’Just catching your breath.”

“Lois, You’re starting to sound like a broken record.”

“Well, the broken record’s going to tell YOU something, okay? You’re nuts to be trying UP-Mile Hill in this heat. If You want to walk, why not go out the Extension, where it’s flat, like you used to?), “Because it makes me think Of Carolyn,” he said, not liking the stiff, almost rude way that sounded but unable to help it.

“Oh shit,” she said, and touched his hand briefly. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. I should have known better. But the way you looked just now, that’s not okay, either. You’re not twenty anymore, Ralph. Not even forty, I don’t mean you’re not in good shape-anyone can see you’re in great shape for a guy your age-but you ought to take better care of yourself. Carolyn would want YOU to take care of Yourself., “I know,” he said, “but I’m really-”

“All right,” he meant to finish, and then he looked up from his hands, looked into her dark eyes again, and what he saw there made it impossible to finish for a moment.

There was a weary sadness in her eyes… or was it loneliness?

Maybe both. In any case, those were not the only things he saw in them. He also saw himself.

You’re being silly, the eyes looking into his said. Maybe we both are. You’re seventy and a widower, Ralph. I’m Sixty-eight and a widow -How long are We going to sit on Your porch in the evenings with Bill McGovern as the world’s Oldest chaperone? Not too long, I hope, because neither of us is exactly fresh off the showroom lot.

“Ralph?” Lois asked, suddenly concerned. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” he said, looking down at his hands again. “Yes, sure.

“You had a look on your face like… well, I don’t know.”

Ralph wondered if maybe the combination of the heat and the walk up Up-Mile Hill had scrambled his brains a little. Because this was Lois, after all, whom McGovern always referred to (with a small, satiric lift of his left eyebrow) as “Our Lois.” And okay, yes, she was still in good shape-trim legs, nice bust, and those remarkable eyes-and maybe he wouldn’t mind taking her to bed, and maybe she wouldn’t mind being taken. But what would there be after that?

If she happened to see a ticket-stub poking out of the book he was reading, would she pull it out, too curious about what movie he’d been to see to think about how she was losing his place?

Ralph thought not. Lois’s eyes were remarkable, and he had found his own eyes wandering down the V of her blouse more than once as the three of them sat on the front porch, drinking iced tea in the cool of the evening, but he had an idea that your little head could get your big head in trouble even at seventy. Getting old was no excuse to get careless.

He got to his feet, aware of Lois looking at him and making an extra effort not to stoop. “Thanks for your concern,” he said. “Want to walk an old feller up the street?”

“Thanks, but I’m going downtown. They’ve got some beautiful rose-colored yarn in at The Sewing Circle, and I’m thinking afghan.

Meanwhile, I’ll just wait for the bus and gloat over my coupons.”

Ralph gri

“Missed the tag, you hoser!” he shouted.

“The hell I did!” the catcher responded indignantly, but then he began to laugh, too.

“Ever wish You were that age again, Ralph?” Lois asked.

He thought it over, “Sometimes,” he said.

“Sit with us awhile.”

Too strenuous. Came on over tonight, “Mostly it just looks “I might just do that,” she said, and Ralph started up Harris Avenue, feeling the weight of her remarkable eyes on him and trying hard to keep his back straight. He thought he managed fairly well, but it was hard work. He had never felt so tired in his life.

Hearing sirens, but the carrot-top bounced to his feet.

CHAPTER 2

Ralph made the appointment to see Dr. Litchfield less than an hour after his conversation with Lois on the park bench; the receptionist with the cool, sexy voice told him she could fit him in next Tuesday morning at ten, if that was okay, and Ralph told her that was fine as paint. Then he hung up, went into the living room sat in the wing-chair that overlooked Harris Avenue, and thought about how Dr. Litchfield had initially treated his wife’s brain tumor with Tylenol-3 and pamphlets explaining various relaxation techniques.

From there he moved on to the look he’d seen in Litchfield’s eyes after the magnetic resonance imaging tests had confirmed the CAT scan’s bad news… that look of guilt and unease.

Across the street, a bunch of kids who would soon be back in school came out of the Red Apple armed with candy bars and Slurpies.

As Ralph watched them mount their bikes and tear away into the bright eleven o’clock heat, he thought what he always did when the memory of Dr. Litchfield’s eyes surfaced: that it was most likely a false memory.

The thing is, old buddy, you wanted Litchfield to look uneasy, but even more than that, you wanted him to look guilty.

Quite possibly true, quite possibly Carl Litchfield was a peach of a guy and a helluva doctor, but Ralph still found himself calling Litchfield’s office again half an hour later. He told the receptionist with the sexy voice that he’d just rechecked his calendar and discovered next Tuesday at ten wasn’t so fine after all. He’d made an appointment with the podiatrist for that day and forgotten all about it.

“My memory’s not what it used to be,” Ralph told her.

The receptionist suggested next Thursday at two.

Ralph countered by promising to call back.

Liar, liar, pants on fire, he thought as he hung up the phone, walked slowly back to the wing-chair, and lowered himself into it.