Last Night at the Telegraph Club(94)
She had nowhere else to go.
She climbed the three steps and found the button labeled JACKSON and pressed it. She heard it ring. Just when she was about to try peeking through the crack in the window curtains, the door opened.
There was Lana, her blond hair pulled back in a ponytail, dressed in slim blue checkered pants, a pink sweater, and a pair of red-and-gold Chinese slippers.
Her penciled eyebrows rose in surprise. “You’re that girl from the club—Lily, isn’t it? My goodness, you look like a drowned kitten!” Lana glanced behind her at the empty street. “Well, you’d better come in.”
42
Take off that sweater—you’ll catch a cold,” Lana said. “And leave your shoes there. I’ll bring you a blanket.”
There was a gently compelling quality about Lana, and Lily felt a sense of relief in surrendering to her orders. She peeled off her cardigan and took off her wet shoes and socks, putting them in front of the electric heater. Lana returned from the bedroom with a crocheted purple-and-white blanket, which she wrapped around Lily’s shoulders. She stepped back and gave Lily an appraising look, as if she were examining a rather sad work of art, and said, “Take a seat. I’ll make you something hot to drink.”
“You don’t have to,” Lily said.
“I’ll just reheat some coffee.”
Left alone in the living room, Lily sat down on the rust-colored sofa, tucking her cold feet under the edge of the blanket.
“Do you want cream and sugar?” Lana called from the kitchen.
“Yes, please.”
A pile of unopened mail on the coffee table bumped against a dinner plate stained with the remains of what looked like scrambled eggs. A half-filled ashtray squatted nearby, along with a smudged wineglass, a half-empty bottle of wine, a table lighter in the shape of a nude woman, and a pack of Lucky Strikes. The record player was standing open on the octagonal table in the corner, and a few records were leaning against it on the floor. Only one lamp was turned on, giving the living room a warm, golden glow. It felt different than it had the night of the party—cozier, more like someone’s home—and when she remembered Sal and Patsy dancing together in the small open space between the bench and the kitchen door, it seemed like a strange fantasy.
Lana emerged from the kitchen carrying a mug of coffee, and when she handed it to Lily, she said, “I added a little whisky. I think you need it.”
“Thank you.” Lily sipped the coffee hesitantly. It was hot and sweet and left a pleasant warmth in her stomach.
Lana took a seat across from Lily. She reached for the Lucky Strikes and pulled one out, holding it between her lips while she thumbed the lighter. A flame shot out of the nude woman’s head. “This was a gag gift from one of Tommy’s friends,” Lana said. “It’s awful, isn’t it? At least you don’t have to squeeze her breasts to get it to work. I’ve seen one of those too.” She put the lighter back on the table and pulled the ashtray closer to herself. “Sorry for the mess. It’s been quite a day. But I think it’s been one for you too.”
Lily cupped her hands around her coffee mug. “I’m sorry to barge in on you uninvited.”
Lana waved her hand, the cigarette trailing smoke. “I have a feeling you wouldn’t be here unless you had to be.” She leaned forward to pour some wine into the smudged glass, then sat back, kicking off her slippers to tuck her feet up beside her, and took a sip. “Do you want to tell me what happened?”
It turned out, to Lily’s surprise, that she did want to tell her. The living room felt so intimate, and Lana seemed like someone who had heard everything and would be surprised at nothing. Lily found herself spilling out the whole story, from the moment she left Kath at the Telegraph Club to her confrontations with Shirley and her mother, to her chilly trek through the city to Lana’s front door.
“Do you think I should have done what my mother wanted?” Lily asked when she came to the end. “She kept saying that it was a mistake—as if everything would be fine as long as I called it a mistake. But that would be a lie. I don’t want to lie about it, but I can’t help thinking it would be easier if I did.”
Lana had listened quietly the whole time, smoking while Lily talked. Now she stubbed out the end of the cigarette in the ashtray and said, “If you lie about it, it’ll make it easier in the beginning, but your mother will never trust you again. Because she’ll know you lied to her. And every time you speak to her she’ll wonder if you’re lying—even if you’re talking about what you had for dinner, and especially who you went to dinner with. It’s better to be true to yourself than give her a reason not to trust you.”
Lily took another sip of her coffee. Maybe the whisky was working because she felt more at ease now, as if the clenched fist inside herself were loosening. “But she doesn’t trust me anyway,” Lily said.
“No, she trusts you. She’s having a hard time right now because you’re not what she expected. But we’re never what our parents expected. They have to learn that lesson.” Lana gave a short laugh. “My brother and I both taught our parents that lesson, and they didn’t like it with either of us. He was supposed to grow up and become a lawyer, just like Daddy, but instead he decided to go to New York to become an actor. They thought for sure it meant that Russ—my brother—was a homosexual, but it turned out I was the homosexual, and they didn’t like that either.”