It's like this, cat Part 10

"No, no-he wrote the music. It's about some kids in two gangs, and there's a lot of dancing, and then there's a fight and this kid gets-well, it isn't a thing you can tell the story of very well. You have to see it."

This gives me a very simple idea.

"Why don't we?" I say.

"Huh?"

"Go see it. Why not? We got money."

"So we do," she says slowly. "You think they'll let us in, I mean being under sixteen?"

You know, this is the first girl I really ever talked to that talks like a person, not trying to be cute or something.

We walk around to the theater, and being it's Wednesday, there's a matinee about to start. The man doesn't seem to be one bit worried about taking our money. No wonder. It's two dollars and ninety cents each. So we're inside with our tickets before we've hardly stopped to think.

Suddenly Mary says, "Oops! I better call Mom! Let's find out what time the show is over."

We do, and Mary phones. She says to me, "I just told her I was walking past _West Side Story_ and found I could get a ticket. I didn't say anything about you."

"Why, would she mind?"

Mary squints and looks puzzled. "I don't know. I just really don't know.

It never happened before."

We go in to the show, and she is right, it's terrific. I hardly ever went to a live show before, except a couple of children's things and something by Shakespeare Pop took me to that was very confusing. But this _West Side Story_ is clear as a bell.

We have an orangeade during intermission, and I make the big gesture and pay for both of them. Mary says, "Isn't it wonderful! I just happened to meet you at the beach, and then I meet you at Goody's, and we get to see this show that I've wanted to go to for ages. None of my friends at school want to spend this much money on a show."

"It's wonderful," I say. "After it's over, I'm going back to buy the record."

So after the show we buy it, and then we walk along together to the subway. I'll have to get off at the first stop, Fourteenth Street, and she'll go on to Coney, the end of the line.

It's hard to talk on the subway. There's so much noise you have to shout, which is hard if you don't know what to say. Anyway, you can't ask a girl for her phone number shouting on the subway. At least I can't.

I'm not so sure about the phone-number business either. I sort of can't imagine calling up and saying, "Oh, uh, Mary, this is Dave. You want to go to a movie or something, huh?" It sounds stupid, and I'd be embarra.s.sed.

What she said, it's true-it's sort of wonderful the way we just ran into each other twice and had so much fun.

So I'm wondering how I can happen to run into her again. Maybe the beach, in the fall. Let's see, a school holiday-Columbus Day.

The train is pulling into Fourteenth Street. I shout, "Hey, how about we go to the beach again this fall? Maybe Columbus Day?"

"O.K.!" she shouts. "Columbus Day in the morning."

"Columbus Day in the morning" sounds loud and clear because by then the subway has stopped. People snicker, and Mary blushes.

"So long," I say, and we both wave, and the train goes.

9

[Ill.u.s.tration: Dave and Tom sitting on front steps with Cat.]

FATHERS

That operation didn't make as much difference to Cat as you might think. I took him back to the clinic to get the st.i.tches out of his leg and the bandages off. A few nights later I heard yowls coming up from the backyard. I went down and pulled him out of a fight. He wasn't hurt yet, but he sure was right back in there pitching. He seems to have a standing feud with the cat next door.

However, he's been coming home nights regularly, and sometimes in the cool part of the morning he'll sit out on the front stoop with me. He sits on a pillar about six feet above the sidewalk, and I sit on the steps and play my transistor and read.

Every time a dog gets walked down the street under Cat's perch, he gathers himself up in a ball, as if he were going to spring. Of course, the poor dog never knows it was about to be pounced on and wags on down the street.

Cat lets his tail go to sleep then and sneers.

Between weathercasts I hear him purring, loud rumbly purrs, and I look up and see Tom there, stroking Cat's fur up backward toward his ears. Tom is looking out into the street and sort of whistling without making any sound.

"Gee, hi!" I say.

"Hi, too," he says. He strokes Cat back down the right way, gives him a pat, and sits down. "I just been down to see your dad. He's quite a guy."

"Huh-h-h? You got sunstroke or something? Didn't he read you about ten lectures on Healthy Living, Honest Effort, Baseball, and Long Walks with a Dog?"

"No-o-o." Tom grins, but then he sits and stares out at the street again, so I wait.

"You know," he says, "you give me an idea. _You_ talk like _your_ dad is a real pain, and that's the way _I_ always have felt about _mine_. But your dad looks like a great guy to me, so-well, maybe mine could be too, if I gave him a chance. Your dad was saying I should."

"Should what? You should go home?"

"No. Your dad said I ought to write him a long letter and face up to all the things I've goofed on. Quitting NYU, the cellar trouble, all that.

Then tell him I'm going to get a job and go to night school. Your dad figures probably he'd help me. He said he'd write him, too. No reason he should. I'm nothing in his life. It's pretty nice of him."

I try to digest all this, and it sure is puzzling. The time I ran down that crumb of a doorman on my bike, accidental on purpose, I didn't get any long understanding talks. I just got kept in for a month.

Tom slaps me in the middle of the back and stands up. "Hilda's gone back to work at the coffee shop. I guess I'll go down and see her before the lunch rush, and then go home and write my letter."

"Say 'Hi' for me."

"O.K. So long."

The weather cools off some, and Pop starts to talk about vacation. He's taking two weeks, last of August and first of September, so I start shopping around for various bits of fis.h.i.+ng tackle and picnic gear we might need. We're going to this lake up in Connecticut, where we get a sort of motel cottage. It has a little hot plate for making coffee in the morning, but most of the rest of the time we eat out, which is neat.