Being Invisible by Thomas Berger

Author:Thomas Berger [Berger, Thomas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4804-0094-8
Publisher: Open Road
Published: 2013-01-28T19:23:00+00:00

7

SANDRA WAS MOST RELUCTANT TO let him escape. It appeared that her original invitation to dinner had tacitly comprised plans for breakfast as well, for which she had provisioned her larder with crumb cake and sticky caramel rolls. But though Wagner had been docilely led to bed, his panic on learning of her assumption that he would spend the night there, wearing the late Miles’s striped pajamas, as well as the golden terrycloth robe and heelless calfskin slippers—these garments were handily laid out on the nearby chair, demonstrating a shameless premeditation—gave him the strength to be very firm in insisting he must return to his own apartment and remain there till morning. You see, he expected a late phone call from his sister, who was in transit someplace, unreachable. His situation must be known and fixed, since hers could not be. There could be no argument against him at this point, and as to his returning to Sandra after the call, Nancy was an inconsiderate nightowl: she might phone anytime at all, and he had to go to work next day.

An extraordinary thing happened: what had been said as a polite and somewhat elaborate lie became truth: Nan did indeed telephone him, and furthermore at 2:15 A.M.

It had been ever so long since he had spoken with his sister, and her voice was now contorted with rage, but he knew no other female who would have called him in the wee hours and therefore recognized her immediately despite her failure to provide identification or, for that matter, greeting.

“You’ve really done it now, haven’t you?”

“Hi, Nan,” said Wagner. “How are you and Steve and all?” He could never remember all the names of her children and had to look up this information at Xmastime, when he sent each a piece of paper money enclosed in one of those cards made for the purpose, with an oval cutout through which the engraving of the appropriate President can be seen: in the case of those sent to extremely young people, he included in the holiday wishes a suggestion that the money might be banked for later use.

She now ignored his attempt to be civilized and more or less repeated, “You’ve gone and done it, haven’t you?”

“You received my letter?” She had not awakened him, for as yet he had been unable to get to sleep, what with the amount of food in his stomach, not to mention the session in bed with Sandra.

It was typical of Nan to say nothing of his letter and not so much as acknowledge any of the argument within.

“Apparently she finally had it up to here, is that it?” she was asking, and because it was hardly a sincere question, went immediately on. “It might interest you to know, and if it doesn’t, I’m going to tell you anyway: I saw this coming from the first. Carla was obviously too good for you, Freddy. I’m not being cruel: you know me too well for that. I wouldn’t be

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