The Bust

Susan McNally 

I’ll get this over with first. Buck, my husband, had sex with my roommate, Sallie, in college, long before he met me.  Once, maybe twice.  And she had famously bragged that she was so flexible she could get her legs over her head.  Big deal.  Centuries ago.  We laughed about it.  Sometime afterwards, she had gifted Buck a bust of Lenin, because he was majoring in Russian Studies.  I kept wondering where, back then in the boonies, she could have acquired such a bust.  But Buck had no idea.  He said he had it still, somewhere.

            Sallie and I exchanged occasional cards and heard of each other from our other roommate, Fran.  But we hadn’t seen each other in at least twenty years when I got the call.  She and her husband, Rowan, were headed to the Washington Coast and did we want to meet up?  They had rented a spacious house and we could stay a couple of nights.  They had plenty of good food and wine and we were just to bring ourselves, if we could come. 

            I was curious to see how she was.  There’s something about living with someone, however briefly and however long ago, that makes that person stick in your life.  My memory of her was that underneath all her bluster and chatter was a deeply hurt little girl.  So, I agreed, a little warily, because I hadn’t seen her in so long and had never met Rowan, her third husband.  Buck was always up for the Washington Coast and so we loaded the car and drove to Edmonds where we caught a ferry to the peninsula.

            The house was on the road to the beach at La Push along the Quileute River.  After some difficulty – there is no cell service in those parts – we located the house and Sallie came running out in her Uggs and a flannel shirt, just beaming. 

            “Jean!” she shouted with glee.  “You look great.”

It struck me immediately how much prettier she was than I had remembered her.  In school she had long hair that dragged down her rather square-jawed face and she was stocky.  The twenty-five years that had passed had been kind to her.  She was youthful, with short shiny brown hair, playful green eyes, and a dancer’s build.  She told me she’d been dancing again, and it showed.  I felt positively dumpy in comparison. 

            Rowan, on the other hand, looked much older than Sallie.  He wore a man’s retro hat - think beatnik - and was already quite gray.  He had a crisp manner and was a man of few words.  I could feel Buck was struggling to make conversation with him as Sallie and I prattled on about life, people from college, and funny, crazy shit we got up to in the apartment in High Rise.  I kept one ear on the Rowan/Buck situation, but all I heard was that Rowan was there to fish and that he whittled flutes and sold them at the Renaissance Fair near their Salem home.

            We settled in while Rowan made Pasta Puttanesca.  Sallie opened some wine and followed me about as I unpacked, set up my sound machine, alarm clock and lined up my nighttime water glasses.  She talked of her yoga, dance, and water aerobics.  She laughed gaily when I reminded her of the time we took acid and got so freaked out that we had to crawl out of the party at DKE and all the way home.

            Dinner went well.  Rowan talked a bit more than before but mainly it was Sallie, Buck and I who held up the conversation.  Afterwards, Rowan played his flute, and more wine was drunk.

            “Rowan’s getting up at the crack of dawn to go fishing,” Sallie said near the end of the night.  “But I’d like to walk on the beach.”

            “Hole in the Wall,” Buck replied.

            I explained that was a sea stack on the beach with a literal hole in it.  You walked through the hole to a series of tide pools with all kinds of cool creatures.

            “OOOOH!” Sallie exclaimed and clapped her hands.

            The bed was procrustean.  Our feet hung off the ends.  I had trouble sleeping and I had to pee a lot.  The wine made me pee but also the knowledge that I had to get dressed and risk encountering one of them.  It was a long night.

            We woke to a glorious day.  Rowan was long gone, and we made sandwiches and put our packs together and set out for Hole in the Wall.  The beach walking was tough at first as we sank deep into the sand which was more like crushed pebbles than actual sand.  As experienced beach walkers, we had our rubber boots, but Sallie had only hiking boots that she declared could get as wet as could be, she didn’t care.  Still, crossing Ellen’s Creek she had to use a log and Buck walked alongside her, he in the water holding her hand as she danced across it.  Seemed to me she didn’t need the hand and again I admired her fitness and grace.

            Hole in the Wall delighted her.

            “Oh my God!” she yelled to us from up ahead.  “That’s the biggest starfish I’ve ever seen.”  But soon she realized they were everywhere - red, orange, pink, purple starfish clinging to the sides of rocks or spread out at the bottoms of little pools.  And there were the sea anemones, deep bowls of fleshy green surrounded by tentacles. 

            “It’s all so … sexual!” Sallie said, laughing. 

            “They sting their prey with the tentacles and paralyze them.  Look that one is sucking out a clam.”  Buck pointed, full of energy.

            Sallie picked up a shell and poked one of the anemones and it closed quickly around it.

            “Tidal pool porn,” Sallie giggled.  Then she screamed.  “Oh my god, I got squirted right up my shorts.”  And indeed, her leg was dripping.

            “There are tons of squirters.  Clam feet.”  Buck put his finger into one of the tube-like feet that stuck out of the sand.  The clam instantly withdrew.

            “Did it suck on you?” Sallie asked with her big smile.

            Something of the High Rise Sallie was coming back to me now.  In truth, I never knew her that well.  Fran was my friend.  Fran had asked me to go in with them for the lottery for the room.  Sallie back then had struck me as a little forced - her laugh was too much, her flirting too much, her chatter too much.  She slept with half of DKE, or so I thought.   But there was also that sadness that tinged everything she did.  While I had a regular boyfriend, Fran and Sallie did not and often ending up hooking up with some guy at one of the booze-filled parties.  I usually stayed home and read.

            I walked apart for a while, watching them as they poked about in the pools.  Behind them pinnacles of rock rose straight out of the sea and an occasional oyster catcher flew by, flashing its red bill and shrieking.   I crunched over mussel shells, inhaling the salt air, and wondered whether Sallie had bought busts for the other guys she slept with or just for Buck.

            “Tides coming in,” I warned.  Tides were serious business out here.

            “Shit,” Buck said as he looked at how far we had come out.

            The water was rising fast and Sallie, true to her word, marched through the water when necessary, soaking her boots.  I struggled in my big rubber boots as the water came rushing in.  I fell behind and tried to run, but I started sinking in the sandy muck and soon I was stuck fast, the water lashing at me and cascading down the back of my boots.  I couldn’t move.  I tried pulling my foot out of the boot, but I’d sunk so far, the pressure of the muck held both feet down.  I started to lose my balance.  Swaying and trying to stay upright, I screamed for help.  Sallie and Buck were ahead of me, and the roar of the surf drowned out my voice.  I screamed until I was hoarse.  I would fall, rooted to the spot, and break both legs, then drown face down in the muck while Sallie and Buck chatted away.  I screamed again.  Nothing.  But in a moment, Sallie turned to look for me and when she saw me waving frantically, she ran to me, fast.

            “Grab my hand,” she shouted, bracing herself against a rock.  She heaved and I yanked out one muck covered boot at a time.  Buck ran up to help but I was already free.  I shot him a look but didn’t say a word.

            The tide pushed us further up the beach in even deeper sand and we trudged home, weary.  Again, Buck helped Sallie across Ellen’s Creek.

            “God, won’t a beer taste good?”  Sallie said as we dragged ourselves across the parking lot to the car.  “And a soak.”

            “A bath?” I asked.

            “No, the hot tub!”

            “Oh shit, I didn’t bring a suit.”

            “Suit and tie not required,” Sallie looked at Buck and laughed.  He looked at me and laughed with her, at me.  Just like my mother used to do sometimes with my brother when they ganged up on me. 

            Rowan had the fish all cleaned and ready to cook when we got home.  He’d made a salad of sprouts and radishes and cherry tomatoes.  Tonight, he wore a beret.  We got some beers and recounted our day, and everybody lounged about as Rowan pan seared the Steelhead.  The fish was delicious.  I’d never eaten fish just caught.  Rowan was magic in the kitchen.  More wine was shared and after dinner, Rowan brought out a pipe with some hashish.

            “I haven’t had hash since college.” I exclaimed.  And I knew Buck hadn’t either.  I was wary of it but wanted to be game, so I took a few hits.  Buck had more, a lot more.  And Rowan and Sallie also took quite a bit.

            The next part of the night is somewhat blurry.  For the first hour I was so high I didn’t trust myself to speak.  My heart was pounding and my mouth dry.  The flames from candles on the table extended nearly to the ceiling and everything looked slightly sinister in the dim light.

            Then everyone was outside.  The cool night air revived me. 

            “Hot tub time!” Sallie declared and right there and then she stripped down naked and climbed in the tub.  Rowan went inside for some towels. I assumed Buck would have nothing to do with the tub.  But to my utter horror, he pulled off his T-shirt and unzipped his pants and climbed somewhat unsteadily in after her.

            “Come on in, Jean,” Sallie said to me.  Her breasts bobbed right on the surface of the water and her green eyes glowed from the reflection of the tiki lanterns on the deck.

            Rowan returned, stark naked, still wearing the beret and smiled at me.  I felt nauseas and went inside.  When I returned, I was wearing my underwear and a t-shirt, and I climbed in like that.  Everyone roared laughing at me and I blushed.

            “When was your first time?” Sallie asked Buck and I realized they’d been talking about sex.

            “Mandy,” Buck answered. “At camp, in an old school bus.” 

            I’d never heard of Mandy.

            “How old were you?” Rowan inquired, sipping his wine.

            “Twelve.”

            “Twelve!”  I was horrified.

            “Well, it was August, so almost thirteen.”

            “Jesus, you never told me about that.”  My T-shirt clung unpleasantly to my body.

            “You never asked.” 

            Rowan turned on the jets and Sallie’s boobs bounced up and down.

            “Mine,” said Rowan softly, “was on a red sand beach in the Galapagos.”

            “Rowan’s parents were nomads.”  Leslie said with a beaming smile.

            “Wanderers,” Rowan corrected.  “And your first, Jean?”  Rowan lit a pipe and passed it my way, but I declined.  Everyone was waiting to hear my answer.

            “My first college boyfriend.  I fell asleep during it.” 

            Sallie guffawed.  Rowan shook his head in wonder.

            Sallie offered hers.  “A little arbor surrounded by pricker bushes behind the school football field.  Captain of the rugby team.  Oh my, what a specimen.”

            I averted my eyes as Rowan pulled himself out of the hot tub.  I heard a champagne pop in the kitchen and clinking of glasses.  He returned and poured bubbly all around.  I hardly wanted more alcohol, but I was parched so I took the drink.

            “Cheers!”  Rowan said.

            “Cheers,” Sallie chimed in.  “To flexibility,” she added. 

Addled as he was, this last line cut through to Buck and his eyes widened and met mine.  Sallie caught the glance and laughed. 

“What?  I mean you guys being flexible to come see us out here.”

            “Cheers,” I said, feeling myself blush again.

            It was nearly midnight, and the hash and wine were now acting as a soporific on me.  I tried to catch Buck’s eye, but he was babbling away quite unlike himself. 

            “I think I’ll hit the hay,” I finally said, looking at Buck.  But he just smiled, nodded, and went back to talking.

            “Buck, we need to get home on the early side tomorrow.  Remember?”

            “No, why?” he replied.  I shot him another look, but nothing was landing.

            I shifted my weight and reached out my leg to give Buck a little underwater kick. 

            “Ow!” he said loudly.

            “Oh, sorry,” I said, shooting more darts at him.  I’d had enough. “Well, I’m going to bed.”

            “Oh, don’t be a wimp,” Sallie protested.

I gave one final, futile look at Buck then I pulled myself out of the water and tried to wring out of the T-shirt before I dribbled throughout the house.

            “You were always such a prude, Jean,” Sallie said in a playful tone.

            “Somebody had to be,” I returned, trying to sound equally playful.

            Sallie just laughed.

            I turned and went inside, my underwear dripping down my legs.

            I was out like a light, and when I awoke, I saw 1:30 AM on my alarm clock.  I gulped some water from the night table, then turned to look at Buck.  But he wasn’t there.  My first reaction was worry but then anger flashed in.

            I threw on some clothes and walked out to the living room.  The lights were still on outside and as I crept around in the dark, I saw Buck and Sallie alone in the hot tub, her breasts glittering in the light.  They were laughing and passing the hashish pipe.  I was about to burst out there and have it out with Buck when I heard his voice.

            “I was wondering, Sallie,” he said all slurry, “where the hell you found a bust of Lenin in Hamilton, New York back in the day?”

            “Oh my!” Sallie said, “you remember that?”

            “Sure, I do,” said the man I married.

            “Funny, why do we call those things “busts?”

            “It’s from the Latin bustum, which may come from combustus, the combustion of the funeral pyre, then later it meant tombs, and I assume, the statues on tombs, but I’m not sure.”

            “Nicely done after all the hash!  It was my Dad’s.”

            “Your Dad’s?” and by the way he said it, I knew he knew about her loss back then, though we never discussed it.  “Why would you give me that?”

            “Cause I liked you, I guess.  But … things didn’t work out that way for me that way back then.”

            A pang for the High Rise Sallie rose in me, always pursuing, never pursued.  But my sympathy stopped there.  What was she up to?  For that matter, what was he up to?  Furious, I went round to the window, where only he could see me and flicked on a light.  Buck looked up foggily and I shook my fist at him, then I doused the light and waited for him in the bedroom.  He stumbled in and muttered “hash,” then fell on the bed and slept.

No one felt good the next morning and breakfast was a somber affair.  Sallie and Buck were the worst for wear, and I simply wanted to get out of there.   I suspected nothing of Buck and was only angry for the unseemliness of his sharing a hot tub with Sallie, naked, until nearly two in the morning.  And then I wondered too, at her behavior.  Was it a dig at me?  Had she harbored a secret love for Buck all these years?  Did she resent what she considered my judgement of her behavior way back when?

“You two stayed up late,” Rowan said to the two offenders over a bowl of granola.

“You’re not kidding, I feel like crap,” Sallie replied with half of her smile power.

Buck said nothing, ate nothing, just drank tumbler after tumbler of water.

That was it.  We threw our gear in the car, hugged goodbye and took off.  I drove because Buck could barely keep his head up. 

“I hope your ashamed of yourself.” I offered as I drove.

“I’m so ill.”  Buck’s normally ruddy complexion had turned a greenish grey.

“Serves you right.  What were you thinking?”

“I wasn’t thinking.  I was wailing high.  Never been so high in my life.  I’m sorry.”  He shook his hanging head.

On the ferry, he threw up over the side.  I let him alone because he was already being punished.

A couple of days later, we were having dinner in our chairs, watching the tube.

            “She liked you so much back then she gave you a treasure from her dead father,” I said.

            “Who, what?”          I figured he wouldn’t remember.

            “The bust.  Sallie.  I think she was in love with you back then.”

            Buck didn’t look up from his risotto.  “No way.  I was just another conquest.  She had a prodigious number of fuck-mates.”

            Could he really be that clueless?  But I didn’t bother to enlighten him or come to Sallie’s defense.  I mean, after all, she just flirted madly with my husband.

            “Well, you made yourself rather ridiculous.”

            “Uggh.  We don’t have to ever see them again, right?”

            I left it at that.  But it ate at me, both the bust and her bust bouncing in the churning water.  I constantly heard her lusty laugh, saw her bobbed hair and her slim figure. As the days wore on, I began to feel she had her revenge, on me, on Buck, on all the boys at DKE, on the nasty sex culture of college life.  I saw myself in the wet T-shirt, saw Buck’s unsteady hand taking the pipe from hers and felt our humiliation complete.

            About a month later, I was scrambling around in the upstairs junk closet, and I came upon the bust.  It was a handsome object; a three-quarter profile of Lenin in bronze, his goatee-covered chin jutting out and his eyes narrowed in concentration.  The more I stared at it, the more I saw the square jawed Sallie - proud, imperious, conquering.   Soon I could only see Sallie, not Lenin.  I took it downstairs wrapped in a towel, walked it right past Buck, and out into the trash can.  It sank to the bottom with a thud. 

            “Whatcha doing?”  Buck asked without looking up from his computer when I came back inside.

            “Nothing,” I said, “Just cleaning up.”