Crazy Night (A Mulholland / Strand Magazine Short) by Williams Tennessee

Author:Williams, Tennessee [Williams, Tennessee]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: Fiction / Coming Of Age, Fiction / Romance / General
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Published: 2016-06-07T04:00:00+00:00

A while later we were lying against the old barn that stood in another part of the lot. I was tired, strengthless, but brimming with peace. Anna Jean’s hand lay in mine, motionless and cool. I lay looking up at the stars and my happiness was such that it was hard to breath. These stars were the same that I had gazed at an hour or two before from the window-sill of the second floor bathroom. But now how different they seemed! No longer cold and aloof, but so near and friendly that I felt I could almost brush them with my finger-tips and find them as soft and faintly pulsing in the dark as the palm of Anna Jean’s hand! Everything that had been broken to pieces, shattered into the final chaos of this night, was now woven together more perfectly than it had ever been before.

I began speaking these thoughts aloud, less to Anna Jean than to myself:

“It isn’t the end,” I whispered, “It’s just the beginning!”

The cool fingers suddenly twisted loose from mine.

“Don’t!” she whispered. “Please don’t!”

“Why not?” I asked with rising eagerness. “We’re going to get married, Anna Jean! Yes, we’ll get married tonight! Don’t you see, it’s not the end for us anymore, it’s only the beginning!”

Her fingers, still cooler, touched mine again.

“You’ll hate me when I tell you…”

“What?”

“I married Harry tonight.”

The crumbling within me was almost a physical thing.

“You couldn’t have done that,” I answered slowly, “and then done this!”

“I married Harry tonight,” she repeated. “He’s waiting for me down at the hotel. I told him I had to go home and pack up a few things. He said he would wait in bed. He’s probably expecting…”

She started laughing hysterically, her cold fingers clutching mine.

“He’s probably expecting a virgin!”

“You couldn’t have done that!” I whispered again.

She rose from the weeds and started brushing her skirt.

“I couldn’t have done it last night. I guess I couldn’t have done it any other night. But tonight I did it, all right! Tonight I did it!”

Still laughing, she started slowly toward the House. I followed her numbly as though drawn by a chain. Waiting for me a moment, she clasped my arm. We continued toward the House together. All the windows were closed and now that the Federal scare had fizzled out everyone had gone back inside and weird shadows were flickering across the yellow blinds, bottles and glasses were clinking, voices were crazily shouting as if from a long way off.

“God, but it’s crazy!” I whispered.

Still laughing, she answered: “God, yes, but it’s a crazy sort of a night!”

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