10.

AFTER Del had been working awhile, he started hanging out with the guys he crewed with at Traut's. They were all older-in their twenties and thirties and forties-and I think they saw Del as a little brother. They usually went out for a beer after work, and for some, the thing turned into a binge that lasted the whole evening. I worked night shift and didn't get home until midnight or one, so it didn't really affect the time I had to spend with Del, but I did know what was going on. A lot of nights, he and I got home around the same time-me from work and him from the bars. I listened to his drunken stories as we ate a late meal, and then we showered, screwed, and slept. Or, in my case, lay waiting for sleep.

Along with all the other wives and girlfriends, at times I got invited to the crew parties. While I came to know the other women, I never really became friends with any of them. I don't know why. Maybe it was the difference in ages, maybe it was something else, but I never really let loose around those people. That made the other women think I was a sn.o.b, when all I really felt was shy. I did become kind of friendly with one woman, named Vicki, the wife of a guy named Len. She was in her late twenties and she was unlike anyone I had ever seen around Mahanaqua. She had this different way of dressing, and she gave me an idea of what I wanted to look like when I got older. The main thing about her look was she wore jackets-blazers, I guess you'd call them -with no shirt under them. The blazers looked normal at first, but when Vicki moved her hand to sweep back her hair or reach for a gla.s.s, the neckline shifted and plunged. The look showed off her chest and her lace bras and the pretty gold chains she wore. I figured when I got a few years older, I'd put away my tight jeans and lace-up shirts and go for Vicki's look.

Del knew how shy I felt around those women, but he still could not understand why I couldn't get along with them. The night of one particular kegger, I told him, "Go and have a good time without me."

"Come on. Vicki is going to be there. You can talk to her and get deep."

That made me laugh, because that's how Del described any conversation I had with a woman, yet he was right, too, because when Vicki and I got talking, it was about when we got our first periods, and how Vicki got together with her husband, and all that kind of thing. For as good a time as I had talking to Vicki, though, it was never like talking to June, and all those "deep" conversations made me miss my friend.

"All right, I'll go," I said. "But I don't want to stay long."

"We'll leave whenever you want."

Of course Del headed off to the keg as soon as we got to the party, and I looked around for Vicki. It turned out she wasn't there, and I got stuck standing on the edges of a lot of conversations, smoking and nursing my beer. I did that for about an hour and a half, but then I couldn't take any more conversations about kids and who was getting divorced, and I went looking for Del. I felt like a dog sniffing for its owner.

He was drinking shots of Southern Comfort there at the keg. When I came near, I heard one of his friends, a guy named Kutz, say, "Here comes your woman, Pardee. Drink up."

When I got up to the keg, Kutz said to me, "What, don't you drink?"

"I drink."

"You look stone-cold sober to me."

"I'm fine."

"You ought to loosen up. Good-looking woman like you ought to have a good time."

"I'm having a good time. I have to work tomorrow."

"h.e.l.l, you'll be working your whole life! You don't see that stopping us, do you?"

I saw Del stick one finger in the air at Kutz, and as soon as I saw that, I knew Del was drunk. He speechified a lot when he was drunk, and a lot of times it started with a finger pointed in the air.

"Kutz," he said. "My woman's the hardest-working b.i.t.c.h you'll ever meet."

I let that one wash over me for a few seconds, and then I turned to Del and said, "Come get me when you're ready." And I went back to where some of the women were, and I sat down on the edge of a conversation and I made myself listen and smile.

In a little while Del came over and handed me his keys, and I took the both of us home.

I knew Del had to be a different kind of person at work, too. I knew he had to act tough, and I also think he had to act crazy because he was the young one. But I couldn't believe he would use a word like that to talk about me.

I never told him I was hurt. I probably should have, but I didn't want him to know. If he could hurt me with words, it meant the smallest things could injure me, and I didn't want to be that vulnerable, not even with him.

I pretended everything was normal between Del and me, and in a little while, it was. Three weekends later, though, when there was going to be a party at Laban Wolfe's house, I told Del I wasn't going. He thought I was bulls.h.i.tting, though, because around nine he said, "Come on, I want to be leaving soon."

"I told you I didn't want to go."

"You'll go," he said, smiling. "Smoke a joint and you'll be fine."

"No, I deal with rude people all day. I don't need to deal with them at night."

Del looked at me for a long second after I said that, but he didn't say anything. He stood there in the living room, watching me, and at first I did not want to meet his eyes, but then I thought, why shouldn't I meet his eyes? I thought about the way he headed for the keg as soon as he got to a party, and the way I got ditched off to spend time with the "girls"-and of course that line of thinking led me right back to b.i.t.c.h night. I just didn't want to have anything to do with it.

"Go have fun by yourself," I said, looking straight at him. "Leave your dog at home."

I gave him credit. He waited awhile, trying to figure out my words, and when he couldn't, he gave up.

"Suit yourself," he said, and he walked out the back door.

THAT NIGHT when Del came home, he laid into me. I don't mean he hit me-I mean he laid me open. We f.u.c.ked in about four positions, and he slammed into me in each one. He didn't talk at all, just pulled at my hips when he wanted me to move. In the end I was on top so he could have my b.r.e.a.s.t.s in his mouth and hands, and I was working hard to make him come so it all could stop. Then-and the two things happened almost together-he slapped me hard on my a.s.s, and squeezed and bit my right breast so hard I thought he'd gone through skin.

The slap surprised me more than it hurt, but my breast felt like a knife had gone through it. I cried out. And I don't know if he thought it was a sound of pleasure or what, but a little bit after that he came.

When I climbed off him, I said, "Jesus Christ, Del, that hurt."

"Sorry," he said, but I heard the way he said it and knew from his voice he was still drunk. I didn't say anything else.

After he rolled onto his side, I waited until I heard his breathing change, and then I slipped out of the bed and went to the bathroom. When I checked my breast, I could see a bunch of the little specks of blood just under the skin from the last bite. The skin looked bubbly, like it was blistered, and blood was gathering in the blistered places. Even though no skin was broken, my breast felt like it was on fire.

I went downstairs to the kitchen, filled a plastic bag with ice from the freezer, and brought it back up to the bedroom. I lay with the ice on me, and even though I still did not sleep easily or well beside Del, I made myself sleep that night because I could not stand to be awake.

IN THE morning when the alarm rang, Del said, "What the h.e.l.l?"

I opened my eyes and saw him touching a place on the bed with his hand.

"What is this from?" Del said as he touched the wet spot on the bed.

"I slept with an ice pack. I guess it melted."

"What, are you sick?"

"Maybe you could lighten up," I said, and I turned in the bed so he could see my b.r.e.a.s.t.s. The last place where he bit was even a darker purple-black than before. The black blood that filled the blistery places looked thick under the skin.

"I don't care if you slap me on the a.s.s, but this is too much," I said. I watched him, but I didn't know what I saw in his face when he looked at my body. "You were so drunk you probably don't even remember doing it."

"I remember it, Vangie," he said, but by then I had turned away from him in the bed.

I did not get up to make him breakfast or pack his lunch. I didn't do anything for him. Before he left for work, he came back upstairs and stood in the doorway of our room.

"I'm sorry," he said from the doorway.

I did not open my eyes.

"Vangie, it'll never happen again."

I heard him move into the room then, and I figured he was going to try to kiss me or some s.h.i.t, but then I heard him move away and go back down the stairs. When I did open my eyes, I saw why he'd come back into the room: he'd made me another bag of ice, wrapped it in a towel, and left it on the edge of the bed.

11.

I wanted to talk to June, but when I called out to the house, the telephone rang and rang. I figured she was with Luke, so I didn't try to go out there. While part of me wanted to talk to her about Del and about what was going on, I also didn't want her to know. I wouldn't know how to launch into all the things I had on my mind-I couldn't even picture myself really saying the words. So I stayed away.

That week Del and I did not talk about what had happened, but he was on his best behavior. He bought me new wiper blades for my truck and changed the oil, he put a hook on the screen door that I'd been wanting ever since we moved in, and he brushed out my hair every night when I came home from Dreisbach's stinking from grease and sweat. He was so well behaved that it was hard to even act natural with him, and I felt self-conscious and quiet. After a while, things mostly went back to the way they were before, but there was still a little place in me that was walled off from Del. I knew it would be that way for a while. Even though I could not stand having hurt feelings or being so self-conscious, I couldn't change everything I felt.

I worked the next Friday night, and a little after eleven, I saw Del waiting for me there in the hallway of Dreisbach's, next to the bread rack.

"I came to see if you'd go out with me," he said, and just the way he said the words, I knew he'd already had a drink or two.

"I don't think so. I'm supposed to work until midnight."

"It's not what you think," he said. "I won't drink anymore if you don't want me to."

I stood looking at him a long time. He never showed up at my work like that, and I guess it touched me. Something must have showed in my face, because he took my hands and pulled them up to his chest. When he kissed me, it was exactly the kind of kiss I liked best: a little hard, a little biting, but also soft.

"Go see if you can get off early," he said.

For whatever reason, Earl decided to be nice to me, or maybe he took one look at Del-who came to stand just outside the kitchen doorway-and thought it had to be something pressing if he was showing up for me like that.

"You serve this burger, you can go," he said.

When I left, the last customer was eating in near darkness, because Earl had turned out nearly all the lights in the dining room. Out in the parking lot, Del made me leave my truck there and ride with him.

"Where to?" I said.

"The Ruby. Want to?"

"I'm ready."

As soon as we got in his car, Del slipped his hand between my legs and I let him. We hadn't had s.e.x all week, and I knew Del was wondering if later I'd let him slip in that way, too. Part of me was still thinking about the bruises, and another part of me couldn't wait to push it all away from me. I could feel myself getting the shivery feeling with just his hand outside my pantyhose and underwear.

We still weren't legal, but the Ruby would serve anyone who could reach the bar. There were a good number of people in the place when we got there, but it was not as exciting as it seemed the times I'd been there before to buy packages to take out. No one was playing the jukebox, no one was playing mini-bowling or darts. People were just drinking and talking. Del and I sat down at one of the tables, and even though no one was looking at us, I felt self-conscious about being there in my waitress uniform. At least it was a black one, and not all white like I sometimes wore.

"I wish you would have told me at home we were coming here," I said. "I would have brought clothes."

"Would you have come if I asked?"

"I don't know. Maybe."

"Maybe," Del said. "You hardly talked to me all week."

"Do you blame me?"

He squirreled around in his pocket until he came up with four quarters.

"Go pick some songs." He waited a second before he handed them over to me. "I don't blame you," he said.

"You want to help me pick?"

"Naw, you go ahead." He moved his head in the direction of the bar. "What should I get you?"

"A screwdriver."

It took me a while to find ten songs I liked on that juke-box. By the time I got back to the table and the drink Del had waiting for me, one of his cronies from Traut's was parked at one of our extra chairs. I sat down, and though Del slipped his hand over my nyloned knee as soon as I pulled in my chair, he did not stop his talking or introduce me to the guy sitting with us.

The guy was talking to Del about hunting. Buck season was about to open, and all of Traut's had the day off from work for the opener. Like most places in Mahanaqua, including the schools, Traut's closed down for the first day of buck season because it wouldn't have paid to run the factory with so many guys taking vacation or calling in sick. The guy Del was talking to had his stand all built, his area staked out, and he could not believe Del's plans to kill a deer were not as elaborate as his own.

"I'll probably just go on out with my dad and brother," Del said.

What the guy couldn't know, what Del didn't say, was that Del didn't hunt anymore. Not at all. He'd started hunting when he was ten, he got his first buck when he was twelve, and he puked when he had to skin that dead buck. After, his father beat him for getting sick over it. I was the only one who knew that story-along with his brother Frank and his old man, who liked to use his fists so much to decorate his boys' faces.

But I did not say anything as I sat and listened. After a long time, the guy finally seemed to understand that while Del might go strolling out in the woods with a gun over his shoulder, he had no real plans on how to kill a deer, or how to get the buck with the biggest rack, or anything like that.

"So you don't want to try to get yourself a ten-point buck?" the guy said.

"I got one already," Del said. "She's my ten-point buck."

For the first time in the conversation the guy had to look over at me. Del took his hand from my thigh and slipped it around my back, touching my shoulder blades through my uniform. The guy didn't stay too long after that.

After he walked away, I said to Del, "He doesn't know what to make of you."

"What?"

"You just told him you like p.u.s.s.y better than hunting."

Del did not say anything, but he narrowed his eyes, studying me.

"What if I do?" he said after a while.

"I guess it would be a first in this town."

When we got home, the night was all about me. I knew it was still part of the be-nice-to-Vangie campaign, but I didn't care. Del was careful in how he touched me-cupping my b.r.e.a.s.t.s only and not kneading them, kissing them but not sucking. He did not try to get inside me, just used his fingers and his tongue until he made me come. He was going to do it a second time, but I stopped his hand.