Reborn

7

The Back Fence, Greenwich Village

Carol watched with relief as Jim returned from a quick trip to the rest room. She and Bill had had the table to themselves for a few moments and the atmosphere had become strained. Bill seemed so uptight when he was alone with her.

"How about another round?" Jim said.

Carol didn't want another drink—she had switched to Pepsi a while ago—and she didn't want Jim to have another, either. She wanted to say something, but not in front of Bill— anything not to sound like a nagging wife in front of Bill. So she held off.

Besides, he hadn't mentioned warts yet.

"One more," Bill said. "Then it's time to go."

They've both got hollow legs! she thought. Where were they putting it all?

"Carol?" Jim said, pointing at her glass.

She glanced down at the flat brown liquid that was nearing room temperature now, at the thin oily scum on its surface— Who's their dishwasher?—and decided to stick with what she had.

"I'm fine. And so are the two of you, I'd think."

"Nah!" Jim said with a laugh. "We're just getting started!"

He ordered two more beers, then turned back to Bill, pointing a finger at him.

"Quick! 'Theology is anthropology.' "

"Uh…" Bill squeezed his eyes shut. "Feuerbach, I think."

"Right. How about, 'We are proceeding toward a time of no religion at all.' "

"Bonhoeffer."

"I'm impressed!" Jim said.

"Do I detect a common thread in those quotes? Is the Village Atheist trying to make a point?"

Carol let her mind drift off. She might as well have been home in Monroe for all the attention they were paying her. It was quieter here in the Back Fence, at the corner of Bleecker and something. No live music, just records. "Boogaloo Down Broadway" was thumping softly in the background at the moment. The relative quiet had got Bill and Jim talking and they'd been going at it like two college freshmen debating the meaning of life, of everything!

Maybe it was a male thing. Male bonding—wasn't that what they called it?

Bill looked at her and smiled beatifically, obviously more comfortable with her now that Jim was here. He seemed to be at peace with himself. A man who knew himself, an idealist who was sure that he was doing exactly what he wanted with his life. She was certain there were ambitions and dissatisfactions bubbling under the surface there, but she detected none of the wild turmoil she knew to be raging within her husband, James the Skeptic, skewerer—was there such a word?—of Current Wisdom and Common Knowledge.

Oddly enough she found both extremes appealing.

She said, "I'm just glad to hear the two of you stop arguing for ten consecutive seconds."

"Didn't you know, Carol?" Bill said, poising the mouth of his Budweiser an inch from his lips. "Jim and I agreed long ago to disagree on everything."

"The hell we did!" Jim cried, and the two of them cracked up like schoolboys.

Jim suddenly stopped laughing. His face grew stern. "Wart's so funny about that?"

"Wart?" Carol said, immediately alert. "Did he say 'wart'?"

"Of course," Bill said. "Haven't you been listening? We've been talking about the wart in Vietnam all night."

"I'm thinking of going to business school," Jim said. "I wonder if Warton will accept me?"

"A good place to make love, not wart," Bill replied, nodding vigorously.

"That does it!" Carol said. Two of them! "No more for either of you. The bar is closed as far as you two are concerned. It's late and we're going home as soon as you finish those! And I'm driving!"