It Came to Pass

She missed her period just about the same time Kohoutek first appeared. Marty had never used any form of birth control. She hadn't thought she needed to. True, she was engaged, but her relationship with Joe was unusual. He was an older man devoted to his art. Forms, shapes and textures were his release. Most times he wrestled with abstraction, but after he met Marty he had tried often to (continued on page 165)It came to pass(continued from page 91) to find her form in his work: in marble (too cold), in clay (too crude), in metals (too stern) and in warm, pale woods. But nothing was adequate, not even alabaster.

He had led the life: balling on the Left Bank in the old days, then bread and grass and a jug of whatever with several thous, singing, etc., in the wilderness of Cambridge and the Back Bay. He'd seen it all and been through two wives and three recalcitrant kids in the course of it. He was ready for something different; for this young, fragile girl-woman with whom everyone he knew had fallen in love. And she had only loved him back. He would marry her in the spring among flowers. And until then, he almost relished the waiting. She would be untouched.

Marty's background was sophisticated but rarefied: father head of the classics department, mother a clinical psychologist, European schools. She was known among the Cambridge set for the way she asked questions at poetry readings, screenings and showings--as if she really were reluctant to say anything, and suspected she ought not, but she really had to know or she'd sleep unsoundly. You would do anything to spare her such unpleasantness. And the questions she asked were always so much sharper than anything you had thought of. It was crushing. You fell in love with her despite yourself. She'd got the best of everything.

And then she got pregnant.

Normally none of us would have thought anything of it. It was either a beautiful thing or there were ways now to take care of it. But with Marty, especially when everything was irrevocably done and finished, it was like the water running out of our beds.

Joe told me about the whole scene a few days after it was over. I suppose I was one of the first to know. We'd had lunch late in an underground eatery and just stayed there talking. He was crying into his Hu-Kwa. I wanted a drink, but I listened to him force the words out between his teeth.

"What could I say to her, Peter? She couldn't have told me at a worse time. I wasn't finding the form. All I wanted to do was look at her. Peter, you know how she is. You look at her and anything, everything seems possible. Is possible. And she started to talk and then went very quiet and I didn't want to look at her, because I knew she was crying and I didn't know how it would affect me."

"But you did look."

"I did. And you can guess--no, maybe you can't. Seeing her like that made me feel helpless but like there was the potential there for me to be all-powerful. You know? No. I could be father, lover, child to her, if only...." He swung his head back and forth and swirled the leaves around in the bottom of his cup.

"It would have excited me."

"Excited you?" Joe just looked at me and sipped at his tea. And in my mind I damned myself for a fool and supposed I had put an end to his story. But then he started talking again and I resolved to listen and take it all in. That was all he wanted or needed.

He asked her what was the matter. And he put his arms around her. She looked up at him.

"I've been to a gynecologist," she said.

"Yes." He wasn't surprised. He'd told her to. She'd been feeling sick; her periods had been irregular. "What did he say?"

She couldn't speak.

Joe tried to speak the worst to save her doing it. "Is there some reason we won't be able to have ... ?"

She pushed her head against his shoulder and, completely quietly, it was strange how quietly she cried. Then, "I'm pregnant," she said.

Joe let go of those last words in a rush. I sat forward and listened aggressively.

"My whole body went cold. Peter, I didn't know what to do. I got my first wife knocked up and that was no scandal then, God knows how many years ago. But. But, Peter, I never--"then he shut up suddenly. He kept that thought to himself. And then he began again abruptly. He had asked her, "Who?"

"No--nobody," she said.

"Marty, please. Please. I can learn to live with anything, I--but, Marty, I have to know who. Why."

She tried to clutch him to her, to cry on him again, but he held her back so he could look into her eyes. "Just tell me," he said. "I can accept the truth."

"I'm telling you the truth."

He blew up. "Come on! You don't catch clap from the can and you sure as shit don't get pregnant from the stork. Now, who the hell made that little thing growing inside you?"

Joe belted down the last of his tea as if it were 90 proof and stared at me as if there were something I could do. He put his hands over his eyes and shivered for a moment. Then he laughed. "Marty said, 'I'm telling you the truth.' She seemed mad. I don't just mean angry. And all of a sudden, she looked trapped, you know? 'Nobody,' she said. 'Nobody. Nobody! Nobody!' I started to shake her, but I didn't have any strength. I let go of her. I sat down. It was obvious I couldn't say anything. Hell, I felt sick. I couldn't say anything."

Joe's fingers were white from clutching his cup. He couldn't look at me anymore. He fell silent. He couldn't talk to me anymore. He managed to cough out, "I wonder who it was. I really thought...."

I tried to change the subject. I looked desperately among the batik hangings and wall cracks for something to give me an idea. A greasy astrology chart on the kitchen door. "Boy, Kohoutek really has been a fizzle." Joe just looked up at me. His face seemed too old ever to have thought about marrying someone like Marty. Marrying? Why was it she seemed like a girl you would have to marry? But I tried to continue with the astronomy. I looked at my watch. "It might be visible just now."

We went outside to see. Both of us lacked much enthusiasm. We couldn't find it. That topic died.

Joe looked ancient and exhausted in the evening light. He must have seen this reflected on my face. "I'm sorry, Peter. I haven't slept since this started. I haven't even tried."

"You should, Joe. Things would be clearer." We stood there for a few seconds. "Well," I said, "I've got to be off. But ... but, Joe, what's going to happen?"

"I don't know. I still love her and I think...."

"I know she still loves you."

"Maybe we'll still get...."

"You should."

"Yes. I think we may try living together first."

It sounded like the right thing to do. We were about to walk off in different directions. I had to ask, "What about ... ?"

"We went to the clinic together yesterday. They were very nice, of course. I mean, thank God it's legal. It was all very clean and modern."