In the quiet of Rich and Gynnie’s bedroom, one could hear the whole house listening. One could hear a sneaker flung at the bedroom door when the door had blown open. Everybody knew that pretty soon they’d be fighting again, and whatever came after that would be hard enough; Aunt Patti, who’d been though a divorce, thought this looked like her first one. So the bride and groom were screwing. Rich and Gynnie went on with the house’s good wishes. When they got tired Rich fell over and they did it sideways. After a while, they rested, and then resumed. It was a fine time, when the gist of the fuck had already happened and they were on to higher stuff. Bliss had been achieved. They were riding horse and sulky, through Bliss’s pasture. The coming still on hold, prolonged to make them both nuts. There was some moaning. It was a lonely gasping, a gratified finish, soothing, placating. Their own moaning was exciting to both of them and to their aunts and mothers and relatives who were still up drinking wine—who should’ve been asleep—wondering about love. They sat there after, warm bodies against the old cold wall. At the end they’d done it so hard—Rich fucked Gynnie so hard he forgot he was marrying her.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I NEED TO acknowledge the great debt of gratitude I owe to Daniel Menaker, who made this book happen. Thanks also to: St. Albans School in Washington, D.C.; the Schlesinger Writer-in-Residence at St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire; American University; the Fine Arts Work Center; and the Hill School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania.

Copyright

FIRST VINTAGE CONTEMPORARIES EDITION, MAY 2001

Copyright © 2000 by Matthew Klam

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States of America by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Random House, Inc., New York, in 2000.

Vintage is a registered trademark and Vintage Contemporaries and colophon are trademarks of Random House, Inc.

This is a work of fiction. The characters and events in it are inventions of the author and do not depict any real persons or events.

The stories in this work were originally published in The New Yorker.
“Issues I Dealt With in Therapy” and “European Wedding” were published in different form.

The Library of Congress has cataloged the Random House edition as follows:
Klam, Matthew.
Sam the cat and other stories / Matthew Klam.
p. cm.
Includes stories previously published in The New Yorker, 1993–2000.
1. United States—Social life and customs—20th century—Fiction. 2.
Young adults—United States—Fiction. I. Title.
2. Young adults—United States—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3561.L22 S26  2000
813′.54—dc21  99-052862

eISBN: 978-0-307-76598-7

Special thanks to Marcia and to Paul.

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