Couples by John Updike

thumping and huffing had suspended.
    “It’s Bob Cousy!” Hanema called from the porch.
    “Looks more like Goose Tatum to me,” said Gallagher. “You can always tell by de whites ob dare eyes.”
    “What whites?” Hanema asked. He hurried over and, taking Thorne by the elbow, announced, “This man is living gin.”
    “Those are not official sneakers,” Ben Saltz protested.
    “Those are Frankenstein shoes,” Eddie Constantine said. He went mock-rigid and tottered the few steps needed to bump into Thorne’s chest. He sniffed Thorne’s breath, clutched his own throat, and screamed, “Aagh! The fumes! The fumes!”
    Thorne smiled and wiped his mouth. “I’ll just watch,” he said. “You don’t need me, you got plenty of people. Why did you call?”
    “We do need you,” Hanema insisted, handling the man’s elbow again and seeming to exult in his relative shortness. “Four on a side. You guard me. You belong to Matt, Eddie, and Ben.”
    “Thanks a holy arse-licking bunch,” Constantine said.
    “How many points are you spotting us?” Gallagher asked.
    “None,” Hanema said. “Freddy will be all right. He’s an asset. He’s loose. Take a practice shot, Freddy.” He slammed the ball off the asphalt into Thorne’s stomach. “See how loose he is?”
    From the stiff-fingered way Thorne handled the ball Foxy saw he was nothing of an athlete; he was so waddly, so flat-footed, she averted her eyes from the sight.
    Beside her, Angela said, “I suppose the house may have been broken into by a few young couples. They have so few places to go.”
    “What were the people like who owned it before?”
    “The Robinsons. We hardly knew them. They only used it summers and weekends. A middle-aged couple with pots of children who suddenly got divorced. I used to see her downtown with binoculars around her neck. Quite a handsome woman with hair in a bun and windburn in tweeds. He was an ugly little man with a huge voice, always threatening to sue the town if they widened the road to the beach. But Bernadette Ong, who knew them, says it was he who wanted the divorce. Evidently he played the cello and she the violin and they got into a string quartet with some people from Duxbury. They never did a thing for the house.”
    Foxy blurted, “Would your husband be willing to look atthe house for us? And give us an estimate or some notion as to where to begin?”
    Angela gazed toward the woods, a linear maze where children’s bodies were concealed. “Matt,” she said carefully, “wants Piet to concentrate on building new houses.”
    “Perhaps he could recommend another contractor then. We must make a beginning. Ken seems to like the house as it is but when winter comes it will be impossible.”
    “Of course it will.” The curtness startled Foxy. Gazing toward the trees, Angela went on hesitatingly, as if her choice of words were distracted by a flowering of things unseen. “Your husband—perhaps he and Piet could talk. Not today after basketball. Everybody stays for beer.”
    “No, fine. We must hurry back, we have some friends coming from Cambridge.”
    Thus a gentle rift was established between them. The two faced differently, Angela toward the woods full of children and Foxy toward the men’s game. Four on a side was too many. The court, now deep in the shadow of the barn, was crowded and Thorne, with his protrusive rear and confused motions, was in everyone’s way. Hanema had the ball. Persistently bumped by Thorne in his attempts to dribble amid a clamor of shouts, he passed the ball on the bounce to the Constantines’ neighbor’s boy; in the same stride he hooked one foot around Thorne’s ankle and by a backwards stab of his weight caused the bigger man to fall down. Thorne fell in stages, thrusting out an arm, then rolling face down on the muddy asphalt, his hand under him.
    Play stopped. Foxy and Angela ran to the men. Hanema had kneeled to Thorne. The others made a hushed circle around them.