The Virgin Couple

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It was a small party-ten couples and a few unattached men and women-and it was, to Kim Sutton’s mind, rather a stuffy affair. Everyone seemed to be standing in little clusters, talking inanely of topics typical to cocktail parties: local and national politics, current fads and fashions, the Viet Nam war, ad nauseam.

The hostess, a tall, statuesque blonde whose name was Gerry Tatum, circulated amongst the guests with a tray of various preferential drinks-and her long-side burned husband, Roy, sat next to a slim redhead on one of the living room’s two couches, putting his hand on her knee almost possessively when he thought his wife wasn’t looking.

Kim stifled an involuntary yawn, knowing that Barry and she should never have accepted the Tatums’ invitation. Barry had quit the San Francisco Sentinel three weeks ago, and everyone in the paper knew why; as a consequence, minor reporters like Roy Tatum thought it socially impressive to invite Barry Sutton and his wife to their drab little parties. Yes, that was certainly the reason they had been invited; but they’d accepted anyway, knowing this, just to get out of their own house, to see some other faces, to talk with someone besides one another.

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