“All right. But aren’t you drinking a lot?”
“No. I never take too much.”
There really isn’t much to say. You don’t want conversation; she knows
you don’t. She does—or does she? She doesn’t know what she wants, just
now. You’ve flustered her and upset her and started her thinking and you
aren’t doing anything to help her out. She wonders why you don’t say
something. She can’t think of anything to say. She’s thinking too hard
of something which you have evidently forgotten. It is almost a relief
when you put your arm around her again. Something definite, anyway. Even
when you kiss her she doesn’t protest. She thinks that it wasn’t bad
anyway; in fact it was a nice kiss—not too long nor too enthusiastic.
And as a matter of fact, this particular subject should not be a
connoisseur of kisses. She would like to discuss it. Whenever she has
been kissed before, the occasion seemed more momentous, with prelude of
conversation and aftermath of protestation. Your absolute indifference
intrigues her. You’ve evidently forgotten all about it already.
8. And then you yawn. Yawn and burrow your head in her breast in an
affectionate, friendly manner; dropping off to sleep immediately. She
sits very still and straight, hoping that you’ll wake up, hoping you
won’t, hoping no one is watching you from the porch, wondering why she
isn’t objecting, wondering why she should, wondering about life in
general.... It’s all because she drank so much of that whiskey. She
really doesn’t feel so well. Sort of mixed up. Why don’t you wake up?
She wants to go in and dance; it must be late. How did this get started
anyway?
9. She stirs a little at last, for her arm is going to sleep, and this
wakes you. Open your eyes and pull her face down to yours—it’s the most
natural thing to do under the circumstances. “Sweet thing.”
She is reassured. You are thinking of her, then. You’ve become once more
a person, a man, instead of an abstract problem. And she knows how to
deal with people, even with men. It’s this other thing that worries her;
this horrible impersonal wondering; this feeling of enmity that lurks in
the air when people forget you and go to sleep. Although she couldn’t
put it into words....