Memoir

Memory is a scourge, unless conflated, synthesized and expressed. All memoirs are fiction. Initials are only used to protect the not-so-innocent.

This must have occurred in 1978, I suppose. NunnaYerBizness was still a working musical concern, and S. and I were winding down from a gig. He was driving me home in that robin’s-egg blue Chrysler product of his. We’d had an early (or late) breakfast with the rest of the boys at a Denny’s or Pancake House or some such purveyor of grease for the drunk and disorderly. It must have been 3AM. And suddenly, I had a bright idea.

This is hard to explain. I knew that K. lived around the corner. I also knew that she’d recently acquired a new roommate, D. (These initials make this more and more like a late Victorian porn tale; forge on, gentle reader.)

Now, D. and I had a history. I’d first encountered the sixteen-year-old prodigy taking advanced placement foreign language exams as an entering freshperson at the dear old alma mater. This was probably in the summer of 1975. I was no more than a stripling myself, having entered as a sixteen-year-old quasi-prodigy myself, by that time older and no wiser. But I had a job, one of those late-college-career jobs, administering advanced placement tests to incoming students. She had a way about her, and I remembered it.

That fall, as a woefully under-prepared grad student, I was assigned to teach Latin 101. D. was in the class. I, as is my wont, had no idea what I was doing, but they, being students, had no more. We all winged it and muddled through the quarter just fine, and no one was hurt and some of us even learned something.

The academic year ended; I was living in a little house north of the campus with my then wife. I was already embarked on the affair that would end that marriage, and I distinctly remember that I was listening to Frank Zappa on a late summer’s afternoon when there came a knock on my door. It was D.

How she knew where I lived, I have no idea. Hadn’t talked to her or seen her since the last class. I was surprised, but pleased, to see her. She told me that she was leaving for Japan; a language scholarship, a year abroad. I really had no idea why she’d come to tell me that, but it soon became apparent. She wanted to jump my bones, and she did, and we whiled away a most pleasant afternoon reciprocating.

So that’s the back-story; she left for Japan; I got divorced, broke up with my paramour a year later, took up with another gal, blah-blah-blah…. And then heard that D. was back in town. And living with K.

Now, I’d known K. for a long time, too. When we were fledgling little English majors, I’d dated her best friend for a brief bit. We were all part of the hippie scene, fighting the power, protesting the war, listening to folk music. I’d taken a class from her Dad. We were long-time acquaintances.

And so, approaching my house, I says to S., “S., let’s swing round the corner, just in case.” And he obliges. And sure enough, the lights are on. It’s 3AM. We are undeterred.

We pull a U-turn, park the car. S. is saying, “Sure this is OK?” I’m pushing on. I knock on the door. K. opens it and I say “Hi.”, as if dropping by at 3AM is the most natural thing in the world. And she says, “John, it’s so good to see you. It’s been so long.” (She is nothing if not gracious.) Although then she did say, “What are you doing up so late?” And I mumbled the explanation, introduced her to S., and then, heart a’thumping, asked “Is D. here?”

“Yes, but she’s asleep, I think.”

“Well, I’m sure she’d want to see me.” Already I’m drifting to the center of the apartment, checking it out. Flagrancy will sometimes out. “Where’s her bedroom?”

And K. said something that changed history. “First door on the left, in the hall there.”

So, I opened the cheap bi-fold plastic first door on the left, closed it behind me, said, “D.?”, and as she roused herself from sleep, sat down on the edge of the water bed. As her eyes focused, she said “Who is it?” and I said “John” and I’ll never, ever forget the sleepy smile on her face as she stretched out her arms to encircle my neck and pull me into her sleep-warmed bed.

Three hours later, as dawn was breaking, I slipped out of her bed, dressed, and popped out to the living room to find S. and K. engrossed in a rousing conversation. S. asked me if it was time to go; I said, “No, I can walk from here.” and I left.

I got home to find that my girlfriend had moved out since last I was home.

S. and K., who’d never met before that night, have been married for, what, 30 years now.

The next time I saw D. was at their wedding, and haven’t seen her since.

At least that’s how I recollect.