Free Imaginary Men by Enid Shomer Page A

be able to fake the passion of your argument, and you had to know what the opposition was going to say. Paul would make a fine lawyer. His poverty gave him an appetite for justice in the world.
Things at home improved. His father had returned after a spree in Florida and was driving his cab every day. A couple of mornings he had slipped Paul a five spot at breakfast.
Paul left for Texas on a Thursday evening at the end of April. He called Riva twice. On Saturday, he sounded ecstatic. He praised Tex-Mex foods she had never heard ofsauces concocted of chocolate and hot peppers, cactus fruit and cabrito and tequila. He had gone to a nightclub where a Mexican mariachi band with huge guitars played until dawn. He cursed the afternoon tour-bus driver and called one of his debate opponents a "pubic hair" in Spanish. He had made dozens of friends, he said, despite the pressures of the competition. Everyone was so friendly. He loved the Lone Star State. It was southern and western at the same timethe best of both worlds. The weather was perfect. He'd even been swimming at the hotel pool. He didn't worry about the chlorine ruining his new madras shorts. He was having too good a time to worry about anything. His joy confirmed what Riva had long believed about Paulthat given half a chance in life he would be a raving success. He would know how to work hard and play hard. He would achieve what Pop Goldring hadthe happiness of the self-made man.

 

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"What about your debates?"
"I'm doing great. I'm here, I'm having fun. For the first time in my life, I'm really having fun. You know," he grew wistful, "now I see what I've missed all my life."
"You mean a vacation?"
"Some people's lives are vacations," Paul said. "I've got to go. I'm on early tomorrow morning again."
A huge storm front lashed the mid-Atlantic states that weekend. It rained in Washington and Virginia and Maryland and Delaware and even in Atlantic City, New Jersey, where Barry and Olivia huddled, no doubt, against the dampness in their hotel suite. Riva missed Paul. She watched her parents moving past each other all weekend and thought what a waste it was that they were in the same house yet kept their bodies completely separate. She walked from room to room, staring out at the rain. She imagined herself inside a paperweight, a raining paperweight. Beyond her windows, it wasn't raining. The sun was beating down everywhere else on shining streets, giving off that summery odor of heat and growth, especially in San Antonio, Texas.
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Olivia and Barry brought back saltwater taffy twisted in waxed paper like party favors for everyone in the family. Paul brought Riva a silver pin from Mexicothe figure of a peasant in a serape drowsing under a huge sombrero, kind of like the Frito Bandito, he said, describing it over the phone to her late Sunday night when he returned from the airport. Paul finished seventh out of two hundred in the competitionnot in the money but close enough for a special certificate of Honorable Mention. "'Know Ye by These Presents,'" he read to her. "Well, you can imagine the rest."
"I'm dying to see you. I really missed you. I love you so much."
"I know. I want to see you, too. Tomorrow," be promised.
Would she ever say these words to any other boy or man? She had nothing to go on but movies and the books she'd read. If her parents traded endearments, they did it when they were alone, never in front of the children.
She and Paul kissed outside of school the next morning, before the first bell rang, but he was busy after that. He was a celebrity, with

 

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tall tales to tell. She let him shine in his glory. This is what it would be like when they were olderRiva behind the scenes, modest, sure of his unswerving love. Maybe a couple of trusted servants to buffer them from the clamoring world. Deep, knowing looksa raised eyebrow, the slightest inclination of the head. They would hardly need words at all. And Riva would take pride