Free The New York by Bill Branger

giggling at how bad we were.
    I guess I’m saying it was like old times with Charlene, and that’s better than sunshine. But it wasn’t, too. There was still that darned secret agreement with George that stuck in my throat everytime I thought to tell her. I didn’t want her to get involved in this, but it was there, between us, and I think Charlene knew it, too.
    It wasn’t until the end of November that I told Charlene. It was just after Thanksgiving. She went to her mama’s for Thanksgiving and didn’t ask me to come along. Charlene is cautious some about men because she’s had a few bad ones. When she got that phony letter from Miss Roxanne Devon of Brunswick, New Jersey, she just figured I was another one, so I suppose there was a certain amount of suspicion in her about me all that winter. I understood it, but it didn’t make it any easier.
    I spent Thanksgiving Day in Ernie’s Cafe eating sliced turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, and string beans. And a salad, which shows I was thinking about Charlene.
    She came back on Friday because she had been thinking about me. We were lovers again, and it was so wonderful, it hurt. It’s the style now to talk about all those intimate things, but I don’t do that, never have. The only thing that’s fair game is what any fool on the street can plainly see. Not a man in East Texas wouldn’t give up his comfort for a night with Charlene, and that’s so evidently the fact that it’s hardly worth repeating.
    I don’t know what it was, the making love or just the warm and runny of being with Charlene, but I told her about Cuba around midnight or one in the morning when we were lounging around in various states of undress. I recall I was wearing her pink bathrobe with the frills on it and not feeling the least bit foolish, and she was wearing my polo shirt and nothing else. We were drinking the last of a fine bottle of Merlot, sitting at her kitchen table.
    â€œYou look cute in that robe,” Charlene said.
    â€œHell, I’ll go out and buy a dozen of them in different colors,” I said.
    â€œNo. Pink is your color, definitely.”
    It was that kind of goofy, giggly talk that led up to it. I was getting in deep with Charlene, I thought brieiy, the way you think it might be better to turn back instead of trying to swim all the way across the lake. Then you swim on If we didn’t have this instinct to risk our hides, we’d never get anywhere. And besides, I’d been buttoned up too long.
    I told her all about the George plan, the thing with the Cubans. Of course, at this time I didn’t know about Raul and Castro or any ofthat, be-cause that came later.
    When I was finished, Charlene just sat there the longest time. Just sat with her fingers on the stem of her wine glass, kind of twirling the wine glass around.
    Then she laughed.
    Damn. I was expecting anything except that.
    Maybe it was because I was wearing her pink fluffy robe, but I could see the humor in it while she kept laughing and tears started in her gray eyes.
    I cracked a smile and then let out a couple of chuckles and then it was all I could do not to laugh too, so I did.
    When we finished our giggles, we looked at each other and she grabbed my hand.
    â€œPoor old Ryan Patrick Shawn. Now you’re swimming with the sharks,” she said.
    â€œWell, I been working for old George a while, I think I can handle myself.”
    â€œGeorge Bremenhaven is in deep trouble,” she said.
    â€œWell, more power to him. I hope the ship goes down. All I know is, I got a contract.”
    â€œThat’s why you got a contract, then,” she said, talking to herself. “He gives away his best players and the other owners scarf them up at a discount and that’s why they give the go-ahead for George to follow through on his crazy scheme. It makes sense. They benefit and they figure George ends up holding the bag for