bitch? Right up my ass with the ice cube."
"Are you all right, Ernie?" she said.
"Are you all right, Mr. Miklos?" the bartender called.
"You want someone should take you home?"
"Is he some kind of a nut?" the waitress whispered.
"It's all right, Benny," Gillian called back. "I live near Mr. Miklos and I'll see him home."
Ernie felt her hand on his arm, felt himself being led toward the door.
"Yeah," he was saying, "right up my ass."
It was a patio but it wasn't his patio. Next to him there was a cold Bud and he reached for the can. He could see the Sound through the trees. He could see the umbrella. He could see Gillian sitting in the next chaise.
"Drink it," she said, "you'll feel better."
"Why did you let me drink that shit at the Plaza?" he said.
"I didn't know what would happen," she said.
"Well, aren't you the hot shit," he said, drinking the beer. "You know it all now."
"Yes," she said, "even about the Japanese lieutenant."
"Fuck you," he said.
Ernie threw the empty beer can onto the patio and listened to it clatter. Gillian moved over toward him and sat on the ground beside the chaise.
"It might be more comfortable in the bedroom," she said.
"I'm too smashed," he said. "I'm bombed out."
"Not for me," she said. "Not for what's waiting for you." Ernie felt himself coming apart. He could feel the martinis in his stomach like hot coals. He followed her through the plate glass doors to the poolside bedroom. Unglued. He fell onto the bed and managed to reach up for her. Her hair was still up. Like some goddam Egyptian princess. Like Liz Taylor in that movie. She wasn't even looking at him as she reached down and began stroking him. He could feel it happening again, even this drunk, goddam!
Ernie Miklos was beyond effort and he made no effort. He just lay there and let it happen to him. And as it was happening, it was different, lazy. He didn't know it could be that way, goddam.
"I'm going to come," he said.
"Come on," she said. "Come on all the way home, Ernie."
"Oh, God, no, no," he was screaming again.
He knew what was happening, knew somehow that it was going to happen. And then Ernie felt it. She shoved the ice in, the big rock candy mountain, the fucking iceberg, and then his scream died and his whole being oozed forth and he felt he would drown in what was happening.
"Oh my God!"
Together, like garden snakes, they contorted, moaned, gasped, clenched and throbbed. Fucking eternity, Ernie thought, fucking-A eternity! Ernie found what Cervantes and Milton had only sought. He thought the fillings in his teeth would melt. And even afterward, the throbbing went on.
"Are you all right?"
"God, God, God," he said.
"Ernie…."
"Get me home," he pleaded. "Get me home."
"Are you sure you're all right?"
"Home," he said.
Gillian managed to dress both of them, managed to half-carry him to the car. It was only three blocks. Ernie felt the fire burning from his stomach to his head. He stumbled from the car and watched Gillian pull away. He staggered to the back of the house, fell blindly against the portable bar. He heard the bottles crack against the brickwork and the sound of the ice bucket hitting. The fire burned in his chest and he felt he was falling.
Laverne heard the splash and turned on the pool lights. She saw the bar turned over and the broken glass, and then she saw Ernie floating face down in the deep end of the pool. From that distance she didn't notice the ice cubes floating in the water beside him.
EXCERPT FROM "THE BILLY & GILLY SHOW", OCTOBER 19TH
Billy: Later today, Gilly, we'll be talking to an especially interesting guest, Creighton Schwartz, the editor of Hammer and Nail. That's the country's leading do-it-yourself magazine.
Gilly: It should be fascinating, Billy. Especially to all our listeners in suburbia.
Billy: No question about it.
Gilly: I know that our neighborhood is an absolute beehive of home projects.
Billy: When you think of it, it's incredible the way do-it- yourself has taken hold in this country in the last few years. And it's not just the men. There are lots of women who can paint and hammer with the best of them.
Gilly: I know. Some of my best friends do it themselves. Billy: Of course, lots of couples do it together.
Gilly: That's true, Billy. Actually, that's part of the American tradition.
Billy: Yes, it's genuine togetherness. Not pseudo togetherness but the real thing.
Gilly: Right.