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The Evening Star
A Novel
Larry McMurtry
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The Evening Star
A Novel
Larry McMurtry
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The earthy humor and the powerful emotional impact that set McMurtry's Terms of Endearment apart from other novels now rise to brilliant new heights with The Evening Star. McMurtry takes us deep into the heart of Texas, and deep into the heart of one of the most memorable characters of our time, Aurora Greenwayâalong with her family, friends, and loversâin a tale of affectionate wit, bittersweet tenderness, and the unexpected turns that life can take. This is Larry McMurtry at his very best: warm, compassionate, full of comic invention, an author so attuned to the feelings, needs, and desires of his characters that they possess a reality unique in American fiction.
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Auroraâs Project
1
âYou sure do own a lot of gowns,â Jerry said, rolling over. âI donât think Iâve ever seen you in the same gown twice. Youâre sort of a Scheherazade of gowns.â
Aurora pulled the gown of the moment back down over her hips. It was a pale peach gown she had bought in Paris some ten years back.
âIâd like to think that means Iâm going to get a thousand and one nights out of you,â she said, stroking his stomach. She had become too fond of him to conceal many of her feelings, although she knew her feelings disturbed him. He would have been more comfortable if she concealed nine-tenths of her feelings, and she knew it, yet she couldnât conceal themâor, at least, she refused to. She felt them, she wanted to feel them, she let them go on and brim overâit seemed unlikely that she would ever brim again in quite that way, and she had no intention of slapping a lid on what she felt, bleak though the ultimate consequences might be.
Jerry said nothing. It was at such moments, after lovemaking, when he felt most strongly that life would have been more comfortable if he had followed his instincts and headed out to Elko. There were probably some cute, skinny waitresses in Elko.
âI do have some very nice gowns.â Aurora said. âIn my day nice gowns were thought to be a necessary accouterment to seductionâIâm sure that view has long since gone by the way. Somehow I doubt that Iâm going to get anything like a thousand and one nights out of you despite my well-chosen gowns.â
They were lying in his bed at dusk, with no lights onâthe sun had set, but birds were still chirping in Jerryâs backyard. Theirs was not an affair of brilliant mornings or sunny noonsâtheirs was an affair of dusk and gowns. Aurora managed it that wayârelentlessly, but with a nice tact.
Just when Jerry was beginning to feel surly, resenting her, telling himself it was time to dig in his heels and not let her make it happen again, she arrived and somehow made it happen. She would bring over a good bottle of wine or a thermos of margaritas of her own making. He liked good wine and good margaritasâthey helped him get his mind off a long day of patients whose miseries were endless and ineradicable. He was pleasantly fuzzy from the wine, or pleasantly tipsy from the margaritas; Aurora would materialize in her gown and bite his neck or something. Even when he was at his stiffest, determined not to allow her to surprise him, she would quickly worm her way around his resistance and surprise him.
At such moments she somehow wiped out the age gap and all other gaps, just with sheer appeal. Sometimes she was delicate and sometimes she was bold, sometimes she got him a little drunker than other times, but always, little by little, she dissolved his resistance. She made him forget that she was a lot more fleshy than the slim, trim exercise addicts he usually had for girlfriends. The slim, trim beauties went to no such trouble. They assumed heâd break his neck trying to seduce them, and if he didnât, they could always race-walk away and some other guy would. Their bodies were exactly the kind of bodies he liked, and Auroraâs wasnât at all, and yet, again and again, she coaxed him into bed.
Once he had allowed it to happen yet again, Jerry felt half annoyed, but also a little flattered. Who else had ever put that much thought, or that much tact, or anything like that much skill, into seducing him? Aurora never let it become just the same old thingâat least, she hadnât so far. She took some pains with her preludes, bringing him tasty things to eat, or books and records she knew he wanted. She didnât call too often, she stayed clear of him during working hours, she spaced her visits, she was responsive to anything he wanted to do, and often had things she wanted to doâerotic thingsâthat took him by surprise.
It was odd to think of a woman her age as his mistress, but the word âgirlfriendâ didnât work either for a woman her age. He didnât quite know what to call her, but he had to admit that if a mistress was what she was, she was pretty nearly an ideal mistress. Once his resistance dissolved on a given occasion, he sometimes suddenly felt that he loved Auroraâloved her very much. He felt touched emotionally in ways that he had not been touched before.
Still, the fact remained that he was sleeping with someone he indeed might love but didnât really want to sleep with. Sometimes he would spend half a day trying to rehearse a nice way to tell Aurora that he didnât want to sleep with her anymore, but he never came close to actually telling her such a thing. Half an hour after rehearsing things to say that would help him get rid of her, she would show up and make him forget all his plans. There would be moments when he even felt that he was in love with herâreally in love. Several times he felt it so strongly that he told her he was in love with her. Aurora usually received these declarations lightlyâso lightly that it annoyed him.
âI donât say that very often,â he complained. âI donât tell just anybody that Iâm in love with them. Doesnât it matter to you?â
They were standing by the bedâthey had been kissing, but Aurora moved back a step. She looked inaccessible, and less fond of him than she had seemed only a moment earlier.
âThatâs flattering to hear, I suppose,â she said.
âYou suppose?â Jerry said, startled. âDonât you want me to love you?â
âWhy, yes, I suppose,â Aurora said again, with a cool little smile.
Jerry began to feel tight in his chest. He also felt a sense of dĂ©jĂ vu. it was to avoid just such scenes or just such moments that he mainly kept on the move. He had been afraid one might develop with Aurora, which was why he had been planning to get rid of her. Now the ground between them was splittingâa crevasse had just opened between them, and it was widening, all because he had suddenly felt himself in love with this devilish, aging woman, and had said so.
âWhat are we doing here, then?â he asked. âWhy do you come to my house, if you donât want me to love you?â
âTo get laid,â Aurora said.
Jerry flinched, not so much at the statement as at her tone, which was still light. She wasnât angry or hardâmoments ago they had been kissingâbut she didnât seem to take his declaration of love seriously. Nothing very strange had happenedâfeeling had risen up in him and he had said, âYou know what? I love you.â Why had that made her step away?
âYouâre joking,â he said. He decided that must be it. She was always teasing and joking, making remarks that were ironic, or sarcastic, or vulgar, or silly. Often her joking took him off guardâhe was aware that she was quicker than he was, that he could never get quite in sync with her humor. Maybe instead of a widening crevasse, all that was going on was a leg pull. Maybe she was pulling back in order to suck him in a little deeper.
âAm I joking?â Aurora asked. She came back closer to him and put her arms around his neck.
âTell me,â she said. âAm I joking?â
âI think youâre crazy,â Jerry said. âAll I did was tell you I love you. Most women like to hear that.â
âHere we go, a generalization,â Aurora said. âI expect itâs a true one, of course, for once. Most women do like to be told theyâre loved, but only when itâs true, my dear. Only when they can believe itâotherwise it can be rather off-putting, as you have just discovered.â
âYou donât believe me?â Jerry said. It had not occurred to him that his âI love youâ would be disbelieved, although his own words, in this instance, took him by surpriseâhe had not really planned or expected to say it.
âNope,â Aurora said, moving even closer. Then she bit his neck so hard he tried to jerk away. But she didnât let him. For a moment he felt like shoving her through the windowâwho was she to disbelieve him so casually? But he didnât shove her through the windowâthere was a rather hostile wrestling match that led to a sweaty, sticky embrace. When it was over Jerry still felt aggrieved that Aurora was so skeptical of his feelings at the moment when he felt so strongly.
âI suppose I was rather hard on you,â she said, rubbing the bite on his neck. She had broken the skin just slightly.
âYou were horrible,â Jerry said. âI do love youâI wouldnât even still be in this town, if I didnât love you.â
Aurora didnât look inaccessible anymore, at least. But her look now was a little sad.
âPlanning to leave soon?â she asked.
âNo, not really planning,â Jerry said. âBut you are a big factor in my life, even though you donât believe it.â
âWhat about your patients?â Aurora asked. âWere you planning on chartering a bus and taking them with you?â
Jerry didnât answer. Actually, when contemplating Elko, he did feel guilty about his patients. He wasnât really curing any of themâhe was just sort of maintaining them, listening a lot, advising a little. Patsy had been right to call him the neighborhood priest. He wasnât making anybody wellâhe was just providing a kind of consistent reassurance. Still, his parishioners did depend on him. A little reassurance was better than none.
âSay something,â Aurora demanded. âWere you just planning to run out on me and your patients too, and if so, why did you profess such shock when I made free to disbelieve your little declaration of love?â
âIt wasnât so little,â Jerry saidâher immediate step back, when heâd said it, still hurtâand so did the bite on his neck.
âThatâs for me to judge, and I judge it to have been modest,â Aurora said. âYour patients all sound rather crushed. I imagine they think of you as a doctor. I doubt many of them realize what a trifler you are.â
âI havenât actually gone anywhere,â Jerry said. âHow am I trifling?â
âYouâre the psychiatrist,â Aurora said. âIâve done my best not to start explaining you to yourself. That would be quite presumptuous, since Iâm not a psychiatrist. Iâm just a picky woman.â
âYou are picky,â Jerry said.
âYes, I know,â Aurora replied. âMen have been complaining about my pickiness since I was fifteen. Iâve heard my flaws described hundreds of times over the years.â
She fell silent. Jerry wished sheâd go home, but on the other hand he knew that if he let her go home looking so sad heâd be miserable and feel guilty all night, although he really hadnât done a thing to feel guilty for, that he could remember.
âPicky or not, I recognize that youâre a very sweet man,â Aurora said in a subdued voice. âItâs because youâre so sweet that Iâve developed this awkward crush on you. Because youâre sweet youâve even let me indulge my crushâa generous thing for you to do. It may well be my last crush, and itâs meant a lot to me. But Iâve never been fool enough to assume it could mean much to you. I suppose thatâs why I have a tendency to withdraw when you suddenly decide you love me. I feel youâre only saying it for your own benefit.â
âYou mean you think I only love myself?â Jerry asked.
âNo, no,â Aurora said, getting off the bed. She picked up her dress rather wearily and went into the bathroom to change. Jerry sat up, but he didnât get out of bed. He felt it was likely to be a night he would mainly spend being depressed. Maybe heâd walk to the video store and rent a kung fu movie, as good an antidote as any to certain kinds of depression.
Aurora soon emerged from the bathroom, buttoning her dress.
âWhere were we in our debate?â Jerry asked pleasantly. There was still hope that he could work her out of her low mood before she left.
Aurora sat down in a chair across from the bed and picked up a stocking. She had been to see Pascal before coming to see Jerry, and she tried to keep up certain dress standards when seeing Pascal. He had been extremely surly with her since leaving the hospitalâhe never failed to point out that she had dropped him for a younger man after he had cracked his skull while coming to her rescue.
Still, there was no tellingâPascal might yet be her lot in life, so she tried to keep up her standards. She wore stockings when she went to see him, and despite his surliness they managed to have a certain amount of fun.
But at the moment, with the day waning and gloom in her heart, she didnât feel like getting back into stockings. Instead of putting them on, she wadded them up and stuffed them in her purse.
âWell, we were discussing your career as a trifler,â Aurora said. She transferred herself to the edge of his bed and turned on the bed light so she could see him better. Trifler or not, he was appealing, and never more so than when he was feeling aggrieved, or misunderstood, or pouty at the thought that he was not being taken seriously. She touched his face fondly to show that she bore him no hard feelings.
âThanks to your indulgence Iâve become profoundly fond of you, young man,â she said. âYou allowed me to take an interest in you, and now I have.â
âIâve taken an interest in you, too, although you donât seem to believe it,â Jerry said.
âIf you donât stop being so defensive Iâm going to bite you again, and this time it will really hurt,â Aurora said.
âIâm not defensive,â Jerry said defensively. âI just donât have any idea what you want.â
âI want you to be good,â Aurora said. âIâm having my fun and thatâs fine, but I donât like to think that Iâm having it with someone who wonât bother to be good.â
Her remark was so unexpected that Jerry didnât know quite what to say. At least she was not looking so sad. He took one of her hands and she let him hold it.
âExpense of spirit,â she said. âRemember the line? Most of the men Iâve loved havenât been much, professionally. Hector was a minor general. My husband, Rudyard, was a minor executive. Pascal is a minor diplomat. Trevor, my most dashing beau, was a minor yachtsman. Vernon Dalhart was a minor oilman. The only first-rater Iâve ever been involved with was Alberto, my tenor, and he was only first-rate for a few years in his youth. He ended his days running a music store.â
She pursed her lips, looked away, then looked back at him. âI thought Iâd do better, but when allâs said and done I didnât do better,â she said. âNow Iâve flung myself at you just because youâre cute.
âIâm continuing my pattern of not doing better,â she added with a wry grin.
âI seeâI fit right in with the rest of your guys, donât I?â Jerry saidâhe liked her wry grins. âIâm as minor as the rest of them.â
âYes, but you can still be good,â Aurora said. âYou started out as a fake shrink, but now, like it or not, youâre a real shrink. People become what they do, and you are treating your patients. I like that. In fact I like it a lot. But now you have to live up to it, donât you? I donât mean with me. You can cast me out any day and go back to your working girls. Iâve never exactly been a working girl, but I respect them. You can have as many of them as you want, once this is done.â
âPlease stop talking like that,â Jerry said. Although he knew very well that he wanted the affair to be over, he didnât want to admit that fact to Aurora. Instead, he felt a need to deny it, even to make it sound ridiculous. He knew that Auroraâs way of looking at their situation was a good deal more honest than his own. That was no novelty, eitherâwomen were always more ho...