“What’s that there word, narruh-mindud, ’r something like that—what’s it mean?” she asked.
“It means when you don’t see nothing except what’s right in front of your eyes,” he answered, delighted at the chance to show his wisdom. “That’s what ails most of us, all right. When you’re narrow-minded, you see, you want everybody to be like you are and you go right up in the air when people don’t act the way you do. That’s what it means.”
“But you’ve got to be like other people ’r else you’ll never get anywheres,” she said, uncertainly.
“Well, yes, in lots of things,” he answered, “but just the same you can’t be arrested for what’s going on in your head. You c’n have all the ideas you want to, ’s long as you don’t pull off any crime, ’r bother anybody.”
She liked the queerness of his words, for no discernible reason other than that he seemed to be in favor of “standing up for yourself,” and not always believing what people told you. Not so bad at that, only—try—and—do—it! Oh, well, what did all this have to do with the night ahead of them? This funny boy was her escort for the night, and she was a desirable woman, and she wished that he would “cut out” all of the heavy stuff and make love to her, or pay her some compliments, or do something that men did when they were “gone” on a girl.
“Say, you never kill yourself paying any attention to me,” she said, after a pause. “It’s always them i-i-deeuhs uh yours. Why, I know piles uh men that would jump all over themselves just for the chance to sit ’longside uh me here.”
He had been looking away from her, and now he turned his head, stung, and sorrowfully hungry, and much more upset than he dared to confess to himself, as he took in the appetizing, fresh sauciness of her face, and the suggestive witchcraft of her pent-up breast. There was a come-and-get-me-if-you’re-able, and an almost smiling expression on her face. Without realizing it, he always made an additional effort to talk about “deep things” when he was with her, to escape from the unsteadying influence which she had upon his emotions. The other girls whom he occasionally took to moving-picture theaters and dances, were more or less inviting to him according to the shape of their faces—he was fond of very plump cheeks and lips with a large fullness to them—and whether they had ample but not too corpulent forms—but otherwise he did not differentiate them, except in the light of whether they were “good kidders” (brightly loquacious about nothing in particular) or unduly silent and tiresome. Blanche, however, incited within him a quick-rhythmed trouble and respect which he could not explain, outside of his desire to embrace her. She never seemed to have much “brains,” but still he felt that there was something to her that life hadn’t given her a chance to develop—something honest and undismayed.
He had no actual ability at clear thinking, in spite of all of his poor little defiances and boldnesses abstracted from this book and that, but he did have a questioning, dissatisfied spirit—a spirit prone to quick melancholies and even quicker hopes, and always trying to “find out what it all meant.” He had the desire to make Blanche worthy of him, and to give her the knowledges and bystandish rebukes toward life on which he prided himself. He told himself that he was an idealist in sexual matters and that he was waiting for a girl who could show him a clean, aspiring, beautiful love, free from all coquetries and hagglings, and he used the impressive adjectives to serenade his sense of sexual frustration. In reality, he was oversexed, and not bold enough to capture the girls whom he secretly desired, but that was not the whole of it—far beneath him he really did long for a physical outlet that would be much less sordid and common than the ones within his reach. At rare intervals he would visit some professional woman, whose card had been given to him by one of his more rakish friends, and go away from her with a relieved but downcast mood.
While he felt that he was in love with Blanche, he didn’t want to be too quick about telling her—you had to wait and be sure that some other girl, even more alluring, wouldn’t come along—and since she didn’t seem to be in love with him, his pride made him silent at the thought of a probable rejection. Often, when he kissed her good-night, his longing to “go farther” would be close to overpowering him, but at this moment she always slipped efficiently out of his arms and said her last farewell. To Blanche, kisses of any length were equivalents to saying “yes.”
As Rosenberg sat beside Blanche now, after her girlishly taunting words, he lost control of himself for the first time, and his hand dropped tightly on one of her knees, but she rose instantly from the bench. She wasn’t angry at his having become “fresh” because she blamed herself for it, but at the same time she didn’t want to encourage him. He was a nice enough kid, but somehow when he touched her she didn’t get any “kick” out of it.