"Bite me!" Boca squeaked. "Chinga!"
He spoke to the caller while looking around the smoke-filled room, from the nautically blinged wall (fishnet, cork, brass and glass) to the far one near Cap's table, with its cheesecake painting of a buxom mermaid, and said, "No, Senor. Sam the Rickshaw Man? He ainta here. You too. Adios."
Boca was a gossip, a busybody, who coveted information. Being the man-in-the-know was a power-trip. It eased his rat-brain mind. When the poop was worthy he phoned it in to the re-write man at the Daily Gleaner, and earned a bob or quid.
"Boca!" Cap shouted above the Wurlitzer din. "Who waz dat?"
"Some crazy fucker looking for another crazy fucker."
Cap chuckled. Rat Mouth was such a reliable news source!
Look at those rodent teeth gnawing on that swizzle stick. Chee-chee-chee.
He began to truly worry about Johnny Luck.
*
Midway through the half-hour black and white movie "Rules of the Road" Pirate Jenny reached the limit of her tether.
"I need to leave," she told Kit, zonked in his comfortable chair.
"Where to, honeychile?"
"Dunno. I'm sick with worry."
"Well--"
"Hey look, I've had a swell time. Tell Speedo that I'll be at Johnny Luck's cabana all day tomorrow."
"What're you gonna do now?"
"Call the island taxi."
"I can drive you anywhere you wanna go."
"No. No, you can't."
"All right. All right."
Kit was lovingly stoned. "Gimmee a hug."
They hugged.
Monday, February 28, 2011
stag night
"Stag night!" Speedboat shouted and plunged into the cushy depths of a well-worn sofa with a well-oiled armrest. She had changed to a khaki vest and cargo pants ensemble, and a gray cotton gym shirt, all emphasizing her flat bosom and hard body. In her fifties she remained slim and buff, muscled like an athletic man.
She shoved Kat aside, claiming shotgun.
"Damn you, Speedo!"
Lounging long-legged in his leather recliner, Kit was firing up a small clay pipe loaded with Moroccan kif. He winked at Pirate Jenny and said, "Sometimes I think I have two bobbysoxer daughters instead of two lovers."
"I heard that," snorted Speedboat. "Jen, you stay away from that man."
Kit grinned wickedly. To Pirate Jenny he added, "That hoodlum and I go way back."
"Get the lights, old man." Kat smirked.
Kit reached up to a drawstring and turned off the table lamp and clicked on the little projector.
As host Kat announced the first flick. A short one called "Central Park."
"This will set the mood."
"What kind of mood?" Pirate Jenny quizzed.
"Well, we'll just have to see."
*
Pirate Jenny found a seat in the other recliner. It afforded her a view of poor McEwan's lithograph. There was Stanley and his simian friends. One man fetches a longneck bottle of beer from a wood crate and another man stares dully at the discarded poker cards, his elbows resting on the tablecloth. Stanley and Mitch are on their feet, heatedly aware of the women secluded behind a privacy curtain, preparing for bed. Blanche's supple body can be seen clearly through her flimsy nightgown. Nipples upon rounded breasts, navel upon rounded belly. Her sexually battered sister cowers in subconscious fear. Pervading the entire scene was this miasma of wistful despair and lust.
"How're you doing over there?" Speedboat asked Kit, who wore a bemused smile.
"I have slipped the surly bonds of earth."
The projector chattered.
A 16mm black and white movie about two women in a rowboat lasted about ten minutes. By the end of it Pirate Jenny understood what Kat had meant. Kat was petting with Speedboat in a very velvet way.
Pirate Jenny was positioned so that she could view the movie as well as the lithograph. "A Streetcar Named Desire" interested her the most. But she found it difficult not to watch Speedboat twiddling Kat's rosy tit.
Bloody hell! I'm jealous!
She couldn't believe herself. So she decided to phone home. Maybe Johnny Luck had returned from the Dutchman's.
Using the pantry phone, no answer.
*
Midway through the half-hour black and white movie "Rules of the Game" Speedboat and Kat were hotly engaged. Suddenly the cellphone in Speedboat's cargo pocket chimed.
"The fuck is that?"
"My phone, you dimwit."
Speedboat squirmed to her feet and dug out the device. She looked down at her rumpled lover and pointed it at her. "Set phasers on stun, Mister Spock."
"Answer the frigging thing!"
"Hello. Just a moment. Jen, it's for you. The Jolly Roger."
Speaking to Cap, "This is Jen."
"Got some bad news, missy."
*
When Cap sat at his private table with a soccer magazine and a bottle of Matusalem gold rum he did not wish to be disturbed. He drank slowly by the tumbler because the booze was smooth and sweet. It had once been a product of Cuba before Castro snuffed much of his indigenous business opportunities, settling for a piece of Soviet utopia. The Matusalem people moved to Puerto Rico and continued to sell most of their product in the States.
A ratfaced man called Boca Raton chewed on a swizzle stick with rodent teeth. His stool at the end of the bar was near the phone on the wall. The beast rang and Boca jumped as if it threatened to devour him.
She shoved Kat aside, claiming shotgun.
"Damn you, Speedo!"
Lounging long-legged in his leather recliner, Kit was firing up a small clay pipe loaded with Moroccan kif. He winked at Pirate Jenny and said, "Sometimes I think I have two bobbysoxer daughters instead of two lovers."
"I heard that," snorted Speedboat. "Jen, you stay away from that man."
Kit grinned wickedly. To Pirate Jenny he added, "That hoodlum and I go way back."
"Get the lights, old man." Kat smirked.
Kit reached up to a drawstring and turned off the table lamp and clicked on the little projector.
As host Kat announced the first flick. A short one called "Central Park."
"This will set the mood."
"What kind of mood?" Pirate Jenny quizzed.
"Well, we'll just have to see."
*
Pirate Jenny found a seat in the other recliner. It afforded her a view of poor McEwan's lithograph. There was Stanley and his simian friends. One man fetches a longneck bottle of beer from a wood crate and another man stares dully at the discarded poker cards, his elbows resting on the tablecloth. Stanley and Mitch are on their feet, heatedly aware of the women secluded behind a privacy curtain, preparing for bed. Blanche's supple body can be seen clearly through her flimsy nightgown. Nipples upon rounded breasts, navel upon rounded belly. Her sexually battered sister cowers in subconscious fear. Pervading the entire scene was this miasma of wistful despair and lust.
"How're you doing over there?" Speedboat asked Kit, who wore a bemused smile.
"I have slipped the surly bonds of earth."
The projector chattered.
A 16mm black and white movie about two women in a rowboat lasted about ten minutes. By the end of it Pirate Jenny understood what Kat had meant. Kat was petting with Speedboat in a very velvet way.
Pirate Jenny was positioned so that she could view the movie as well as the lithograph. "A Streetcar Named Desire" interested her the most. But she found it difficult not to watch Speedboat twiddling Kat's rosy tit.
Bloody hell! I'm jealous!
She couldn't believe herself. So she decided to phone home. Maybe Johnny Luck had returned from the Dutchman's.
Using the pantry phone, no answer.
*
Midway through the half-hour black and white movie "Rules of the Game" Speedboat and Kat were hotly engaged. Suddenly the cellphone in Speedboat's cargo pocket chimed.
"The fuck is that?"
"My phone, you dimwit."
Speedboat squirmed to her feet and dug out the device. She looked down at her rumpled lover and pointed it at her. "Set phasers on stun, Mister Spock."
"Answer the frigging thing!"
"Hello. Just a moment. Jen, it's for you. The Jolly Roger."
Speaking to Cap, "This is Jen."
"Got some bad news, missy."
*
When Cap sat at his private table with a soccer magazine and a bottle of Matusalem gold rum he did not wish to be disturbed. He drank slowly by the tumbler because the booze was smooth and sweet. It had once been a product of Cuba before Castro snuffed much of his indigenous business opportunities, settling for a piece of Soviet utopia. The Matusalem people moved to Puerto Rico and continued to sell most of their product in the States.
A ratfaced man called Boca Raton chewed on a swizzle stick with rodent teeth. His stool at the end of the bar was near the phone on the wall. The beast rang and Boca jumped as if it threatened to devour him.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
babalu
A ghostly aroma of burnt sugar arose from the parched earth east of the forest. A dilated sun spun into a torrid tint of tangerine. With a final exaltation it fell into hell. Pomegranite blood seeped deeply into that purple haze behind the cane field and the piedmont known as Spyglass Hill. The bitter perfume wafted seaward toward Daddy Doc's lagoon. Born and raised in his father's house, he lived in it now. The pinewood house was built upon stilts and painted with pastels of azure and rose. Its roof was Joseph's Coat of Many Colors. His father had bought a zillion kinds of shingle at an odds-and-ends close-out sale at the Old Jew's hardware downtown. The house was littered with nautical gear. There was a defunct diving suit. His father had been a salvage man and a Christian, honest and hardworking. A two-bit Welsh son-of-a-bitch let him drown twenty fathoms down inside a worthless wreck during a devil's squall.
The Church of England consoled the stoic African widow, saying a good man had gone to his Final Reward. Glory! Glory!
*
A motley assortment of conch shells, cowry shells, driftwood, ancient beer and rum bottles, brown and green, lay to the lee of easy notice. In the midst crawled a mangrove spider.
Secluded and feared by locals, his humble ancestral estate was a magician's workshop. There was no doubt that a sentient wickedness awaited anyone daring tresspass. Daddy Doc promoted the self-fulfilling myth that he was a powerful magus. Legend had it that he could control storms as adeptly as a Hawaiian kahuna, animate and direct clay men as stolid as a Kabbalist's golem, and send forth thought-forms much like the tulpas of Tibetan lamas to do his bidding. It did not matter to him whether there was a Supreme Deity who divined Everything. He himself could channel the Cosmos, and that was far and away enough.
Daddy Doc favored only one white person.
Pirate Jenny.
A true child of earth, fire and water, she was welcome anytime.
*
Today at dusk she sat at the end of his ramshackle pier. She wore a khaki baseball cap from Gap. a blue chambray shirt from Burdines, and a black bikini bottom from God-knows-where. It was scarcely larger than her eyepatch!
Daddy Doc noticed whispy blond curls of pubic hair extending beyond the fabric borders. The fabric was so shear that he could discern the contours of her gorgeous vulva.
A vision of Izaak Walton's "compleate anger," she patiently coaxed that elusive nibbler.
*
"Tell me about Babalu-Aye," she said, near him now.
"He is the artful patron of the sick."
"I remember when I was a kid and we watched "I Love Lucy" on TV and Desi always hollered Babalu! when he led the orchestra."
Daddy Doc laughed heartily, basso-profundo. "I loved that crazy Cuban."
"Was it the same Babalu?"
Shrugged. "Can't really say."
"Do you remember Mac's wife? Bernice. She had AIDS."
"Yes. She came to me one night. I remember her very well."
"Babalu-Aye helped her. She wrote me from Vancouver."
"Indeed."
"I never thought she would embrace magic."
It was a wild star-tossed night. With her red hair writhing like braided serpents, she strode gaunt and fever-eyed from the rattling grove of coconut palms. She wore a necklace of beads, red and white, in homage to Santa Barbara, also known as Chango, mighty god of thunder and lightning. Bernice climbed the steps to his herbal veranda like a zombie. He commanded her to lie down with him, and suddenly the storm was upon them.
*
"Time for one last dip," Pirate Jenny said, doffing her shirt and cap.
Daddy Doc removed his mirrorshades and observed her petite breasts.
She allowed him to touch her belly. His black-polished nails traced the taut ridges of her tanned abdomen. She tingled, went electric. Then she dove into the placid lagoon and disappeared beneath a deep blue indigo. With no thought of sharks.
The Church of England consoled the stoic African widow, saying a good man had gone to his Final Reward. Glory! Glory!
*
A motley assortment of conch shells, cowry shells, driftwood, ancient beer and rum bottles, brown and green, lay to the lee of easy notice. In the midst crawled a mangrove spider.
Secluded and feared by locals, his humble ancestral estate was a magician's workshop. There was no doubt that a sentient wickedness awaited anyone daring tresspass. Daddy Doc promoted the self-fulfilling myth that he was a powerful magus. Legend had it that he could control storms as adeptly as a Hawaiian kahuna, animate and direct clay men as stolid as a Kabbalist's golem, and send forth thought-forms much like the tulpas of Tibetan lamas to do his bidding. It did not matter to him whether there was a Supreme Deity who divined Everything. He himself could channel the Cosmos, and that was far and away enough.
Daddy Doc favored only one white person.
Pirate Jenny.
A true child of earth, fire and water, she was welcome anytime.
*
Today at dusk she sat at the end of his ramshackle pier. She wore a khaki baseball cap from Gap. a blue chambray shirt from Burdines, and a black bikini bottom from God-knows-where. It was scarcely larger than her eyepatch!
Daddy Doc noticed whispy blond curls of pubic hair extending beyond the fabric borders. The fabric was so shear that he could discern the contours of her gorgeous vulva.
A vision of Izaak Walton's "compleate anger," she patiently coaxed that elusive nibbler.
*
"Tell me about Babalu-Aye," she said, near him now.
"He is the artful patron of the sick."
"I remember when I was a kid and we watched "I Love Lucy" on TV and Desi always hollered Babalu! when he led the orchestra."
Daddy Doc laughed heartily, basso-profundo. "I loved that crazy Cuban."
"Was it the same Babalu?"
Shrugged. "Can't really say."
"Do you remember Mac's wife? Bernice. She had AIDS."
"Yes. She came to me one night. I remember her very well."
"Babalu-Aye helped her. She wrote me from Vancouver."
"Indeed."
"I never thought she would embrace magic."
It was a wild star-tossed night. With her red hair writhing like braided serpents, she strode gaunt and fever-eyed from the rattling grove of coconut palms. She wore a necklace of beads, red and white, in homage to Santa Barbara, also known as Chango, mighty god of thunder and lightning. Bernice climbed the steps to his herbal veranda like a zombie. He commanded her to lie down with him, and suddenly the storm was upon them.
*
"Time for one last dip," Pirate Jenny said, doffing her shirt and cap.
Daddy Doc removed his mirrorshades and observed her petite breasts.
She allowed him to touch her belly. His black-polished nails traced the taut ridges of her tanned abdomen. She tingled, went electric. Then she dove into the placid lagoon and disappeared beneath a deep blue indigo. With no thought of sharks.
nietzsche and santeria.
The lobby of the North Miami General Hospital glowed with a glitter of glass and a gleam of tile, muted with soothing earth tones. Mocha and Flan. A cozy gift shop lent a friendly sparkle to the total ambience. Sharing a sofa with Pirate Jenny, McEwan wryly concluded that the upholstery and carpeting had the same color scheme as a Whitman's Sampler box. He figured the lobby was doing its part to create a mood of optimism, as if it wanted to be the lobby of a small resort motel on nearby Biscayne Boulevard.
Double doors occluded contact with the hospital's true reality. Beyond them ran a hall down to ER and its blood and horror. Another hall led to the elevators. Death lurked in upstairs rooms. Doctor Benjamin Singer pushed through the doors and strode straight to where McEwan and Pirate Jenny were sitting. His face was grim.
Since McEwan took on Doctor Singer ten years ago, the physician had lost most of his wavy brown hair and gained some bearded jowels. Same golf course tan and watery blue eyes. Same Brooklyn accent. He always began with I'll be frank with you. This time he simply glared at McEwan.
McEwan shuddered. "How bad?"
"It's not a strain we commonly see. Pneumocystis carinii. It crops up when the immune system is drastically down."
"Immune system? Does that mean--?"
"We 're running tests right now."
"Oh, God."
"We need to test you for HIV. I'll be frank with you. Bernice has admitted that the both of you have been sexually active with diverse partners. So permit me to asky you a few tough questions."
*
"Good morning, Bernice."
It was Doctor Singer in a Deep South seersucker suit. Crisp, not wrinkled yet. It was his country club favorite. She was not a morning person. Her room faced the East. The diurnal sun cast cruel lances of blinding light. Galaxies of dust motes whirled and collided. God, she was fragged! "Just making my rounds," Doctor Singer continued, smiling kindly. "Brought you a book."
He handed her a new copy of "When Bad Things Happen To Good People."
"Please, no," she croaked.
"Take it. Rabbi Kushner re-examines Job. Now there's a great story. As you might guess, I'm of the school that views it as literature. The lesson in it is helpful to us all. Even existentialists."
"Thanks."
She had read Jung's treatise on Job. Didn't care to discuss it. Didn't care to discuss anything.
"I understand you don't believe in God."
"Voltaire said if God did not exist than we would have to create Him."
I'm so fucking tired. Have to be nice. Have to be nice. Oh God--
"A wise man, Doctor Singer replied warmly. "I think he was quite correct. I'll leave you now."
*
A mountainous big-busted old nurse came in to carry out Doctor Singer's instructions. With her came a diminuitive flat-chested aide to check vitals, change the linen, and give Bernice a bath. She was olive-skinned and Hispanic. Beads of sweat appeared in her faint moustache as she lifted and sponged Bernice. The extra careful and fearful way the aide handled Bernice made it clear that she knew Bernice was an AIDS patient.
As the sponge glided over her breasts and into the hollow of her belly, Bernice wept.
"Please don't cry, Senora," the aide whispered. She could not avert her eyes from the bracelet on the patient's wrist. Who, she wondered, permitted this?
It was obviously home-crafted of gold and ebony and coral. Its uniqueness was significant. It meant that Yoruba magic was at work protecting this woman.
"Your bracelet, Senora. It is the gift of a santero, si?"
Bernice nodded, then closed her eyes.
Moving into Bernice's vagina and anus, the aide, "I must wipe you here."
With her mind focused upon tactile sensations, Bernice engaged her imagination, hoping to gain pleasure from the bath. She remembered a hot tub party with Maurice and Mac. What a threesome! Each man took a turn at licking her clitoris. The two cocks were huge, stiff and slick in her hand, and she rewarded them with her tongue. The men sponged her, kissed her, and fucked her. But instead of becoming erotic, the memory of it all merely depressed her now.
*
"Bern?"
It was Pirate Jenny. In the doorway. Sad-faced, yet resolute.
"Jen! Come in. Love God, it's good to see you!"
Oddly Chaplinesque, Pirate Jenny shuffled into the room. Her baggy khaki uniform swished noisily in the dead air. Filling the room. Her tanned weather-beaten had developed more crow's feet, and a smile line. She resembled her daddy the Skipper, a saltwater Florida Cracker with eyes that changed color to match the color of the sea. He would be placid or stormy, depending upon the mood of the water, wind and sky. His biological barometer sang the same song as did the atmospherical barometer that was nailed to his dockside tackle shed.
She took Bernice's hand and squeezed it gently and fondly. "Hello, old chum."
"Read any good books lately?" Still croaking.
"Nietzsche. How does it go. If it doesn't kill you then it will make you stronger."
Double doors occluded contact with the hospital's true reality. Beyond them ran a hall down to ER and its blood and horror. Another hall led to the elevators. Death lurked in upstairs rooms. Doctor Benjamin Singer pushed through the doors and strode straight to where McEwan and Pirate Jenny were sitting. His face was grim.
Since McEwan took on Doctor Singer ten years ago, the physician had lost most of his wavy brown hair and gained some bearded jowels. Same golf course tan and watery blue eyes. Same Brooklyn accent. He always began with I'll be frank with you. This time he simply glared at McEwan.
McEwan shuddered. "How bad?"
"It's not a strain we commonly see. Pneumocystis carinii. It crops up when the immune system is drastically down."
"Immune system? Does that mean--?"
"We 're running tests right now."
"Oh, God."
"We need to test you for HIV. I'll be frank with you. Bernice has admitted that the both of you have been sexually active with diverse partners. So permit me to asky you a few tough questions."
*
"Good morning, Bernice."
It was Doctor Singer in a Deep South seersucker suit. Crisp, not wrinkled yet. It was his country club favorite. She was not a morning person. Her room faced the East. The diurnal sun cast cruel lances of blinding light. Galaxies of dust motes whirled and collided. God, she was fragged! "Just making my rounds," Doctor Singer continued, smiling kindly. "Brought you a book."
He handed her a new copy of "When Bad Things Happen To Good People."
"Please, no," she croaked.
"Take it. Rabbi Kushner re-examines Job. Now there's a great story. As you might guess, I'm of the school that views it as literature. The lesson in it is helpful to us all. Even existentialists."
"Thanks."
She had read Jung's treatise on Job. Didn't care to discuss it. Didn't care to discuss anything.
"I understand you don't believe in God."
"Voltaire said if God did not exist than we would have to create Him."
I'm so fucking tired. Have to be nice. Have to be nice. Oh God--
"A wise man, Doctor Singer replied warmly. "I think he was quite correct. I'll leave you now."
*
A mountainous big-busted old nurse came in to carry out Doctor Singer's instructions. With her came a diminuitive flat-chested aide to check vitals, change the linen, and give Bernice a bath. She was olive-skinned and Hispanic. Beads of sweat appeared in her faint moustache as she lifted and sponged Bernice. The extra careful and fearful way the aide handled Bernice made it clear that she knew Bernice was an AIDS patient.
As the sponge glided over her breasts and into the hollow of her belly, Bernice wept.
"Please don't cry, Senora," the aide whispered. She could not avert her eyes from the bracelet on the patient's wrist. Who, she wondered, permitted this?
It was obviously home-crafted of gold and ebony and coral. Its uniqueness was significant. It meant that Yoruba magic was at work protecting this woman.
"Your bracelet, Senora. It is the gift of a santero, si?"
Bernice nodded, then closed her eyes.
Moving into Bernice's vagina and anus, the aide, "I must wipe you here."
With her mind focused upon tactile sensations, Bernice engaged her imagination, hoping to gain pleasure from the bath. She remembered a hot tub party with Maurice and Mac. What a threesome! Each man took a turn at licking her clitoris. The two cocks were huge, stiff and slick in her hand, and she rewarded them with her tongue. The men sponged her, kissed her, and fucked her. But instead of becoming erotic, the memory of it all merely depressed her now.
*
"Bern?"
It was Pirate Jenny. In the doorway. Sad-faced, yet resolute.
"Jen! Come in. Love God, it's good to see you!"
Oddly Chaplinesque, Pirate Jenny shuffled into the room. Her baggy khaki uniform swished noisily in the dead air. Filling the room. Her tanned weather-beaten had developed more crow's feet, and a smile line. She resembled her daddy the Skipper, a saltwater Florida Cracker with eyes that changed color to match the color of the sea. He would be placid or stormy, depending upon the mood of the water, wind and sky. His biological barometer sang the same song as did the atmospherical barometer that was nailed to his dockside tackle shed.
She took Bernice's hand and squeezed it gently and fondly. "Hello, old chum."
"Read any good books lately?" Still croaking.
"Nietzsche. How does it go. If it doesn't kill you then it will make you stronger."
Saturday, February 19, 2011
mango's story
Dawn first appeared as a rosy slash in the belly of darkness. Then like pig guts more blushing brilliance tumbled forth. Sight of it caused Mango to shudder as he sat perched in the catbird seat overlooking Cabo Verde. Wadded paper contained attempts at poetry. All he had accomplished during his watch, he felt, was a laundry list of island color. Palm wine had contributed thirty minutes of ecstasy and hightened self-esteem, but then he was betrayed by it. And he was left with confusion, despair and a head-ache.
He put away his writing tools and took out the things he would need to service the enormous lantern and its mechanism. Mango lovingly maintained the lighthouse with holy lubricant and polish.
Work absorbed his misery like a sponge.
It gave him a sense of purpose.
Thank you, Master Johnny! (singing in his heart) Thank you for awarding me this responsibility.
Once again Mango swore off palm wine.
At the end of his chores he clambered down to the floor. He would walk the labyrinth and meditate upon the glory of mankind.
There had been a dreamy time of innocence, growing up with his mother and two older sisters in a pinewood house painted with pastel rose and aquamarine and cradled within a warren of red hibiscus. His mother brewed a tea from the hibiscus, and he matured like a songbird.
One evening as she sat on the front step Mango came to his mother.
"Mama, something happened to me last night."
"Tell me."
"I wet myself."
"You peed?"
"No."
She placed her brown hand upon his shoulder and inhaled the descending perfumes of jasimine and honeysuckle. The moment had finally arrived, and now she needed to explain some things, beginning with his nocturnal emission.
"It was a manly essence, Mango. Meaning that you are growing up fine. We call it semen, and this will require some understanding."
His chest swelled with pride. I am becoming a man.
"Tell me more about last night," she commanded.
Mango related this strange vision he'd had of his sisters visiting his room and how one of them had climbed in with him while the other sat on the edge of the bed. Their ghostly hands explored his body. Cool fingers combed the black angel-hair of his groin. Before leaving, each sister kissed his head.
He woke to the cock's crow and discovered this strange new substance coating his foreskin like warm mucilage. In the dark it frightened him. He could only imagine that it was blood.
*
As artfully as she could, his gentle mother explained fertility and birth.
Her daughters returned from having beer with soccer boys from down the road. They were tipsy, hee-hee. They tiptoed up and greeted her.
"Eve'nin, me-mah."
"Hello, girls."
They sat with her on the step and marveled in the lavender air. Their mother asked, "Have either of you ever visited Mango in bed?"
"Nooo--" They warbled.
One day Segundo Navidad fell asleep beside his shoeshine bench and quietly died. The sun went down and the neon sign for the bail bondsman's office came on. In garish crimson and cherry the words: HAD YOUR DAY IN COURT? NOW IT'S TIME TO SEE ME! The body lay illuminated by the Coca-Cola machine that sold drinks to folks getting a shine.
Segundo had Down's Syndrome. In the cruel island argot he was Saxby's Idiot. No one knew him. They saw only a mottled gray gnomish man with harsh mongoloid features. Mango was first to discover Segundo in death. He examined the corpse with morbid curiosity, and then stole the shine box.
He later converted it to a portable field desk for writing poetry.
Mango's first poem was about Segundo Navidad.
Written while drunk on stolen palm wine.
A demonic voice within Segundo's head ranted hideous blasphemy that no one could hear. Imprisoned inside the brain of an idiot a self-aware mind suffered a torment so exhaustingly painful that no mortal could endure it.
Mango had several working titles.
His favorite was "God's Special Son." He visualized a soul scourging itself through eternity.
He put away his writing tools and took out the things he would need to service the enormous lantern and its mechanism. Mango lovingly maintained the lighthouse with holy lubricant and polish.
Work absorbed his misery like a sponge.
It gave him a sense of purpose.
Thank you, Master Johnny! (singing in his heart) Thank you for awarding me this responsibility.
Once again Mango swore off palm wine.
At the end of his chores he clambered down to the floor. He would walk the labyrinth and meditate upon the glory of mankind.
There had been a dreamy time of innocence, growing up with his mother and two older sisters in a pinewood house painted with pastel rose and aquamarine and cradled within a warren of red hibiscus. His mother brewed a tea from the hibiscus, and he matured like a songbird.
One evening as she sat on the front step Mango came to his mother.
"Mama, something happened to me last night."
"Tell me."
"I wet myself."
"You peed?"
"No."
She placed her brown hand upon his shoulder and inhaled the descending perfumes of jasimine and honeysuckle. The moment had finally arrived, and now she needed to explain some things, beginning with his nocturnal emission.
"It was a manly essence, Mango. Meaning that you are growing up fine. We call it semen, and this will require some understanding."
His chest swelled with pride. I am becoming a man.
"Tell me more about last night," she commanded.
Mango related this strange vision he'd had of his sisters visiting his room and how one of them had climbed in with him while the other sat on the edge of the bed. Their ghostly hands explored his body. Cool fingers combed the black angel-hair of his groin. Before leaving, each sister kissed his head.
He woke to the cock's crow and discovered this strange new substance coating his foreskin like warm mucilage. In the dark it frightened him. He could only imagine that it was blood.
*
As artfully as she could, his gentle mother explained fertility and birth.
Her daughters returned from having beer with soccer boys from down the road. They were tipsy, hee-hee. They tiptoed up and greeted her.
"Eve'nin, me-mah."
"Hello, girls."
They sat with her on the step and marveled in the lavender air. Their mother asked, "Have either of you ever visited Mango in bed?"
"Nooo--" They warbled.
One day Segundo Navidad fell asleep beside his shoeshine bench and quietly died. The sun went down and the neon sign for the bail bondsman's office came on. In garish crimson and cherry the words: HAD YOUR DAY IN COURT? NOW IT'S TIME TO SEE ME! The body lay illuminated by the Coca-Cola machine that sold drinks to folks getting a shine.
Segundo had Down's Syndrome. In the cruel island argot he was Saxby's Idiot. No one knew him. They saw only a mottled gray gnomish man with harsh mongoloid features. Mango was first to discover Segundo in death. He examined the corpse with morbid curiosity, and then stole the shine box.
He later converted it to a portable field desk for writing poetry.
Mango's first poem was about Segundo Navidad.
Written while drunk on stolen palm wine.
A demonic voice within Segundo's head ranted hideous blasphemy that no one could hear. Imprisoned inside the brain of an idiot a self-aware mind suffered a torment so exhaustingly painful that no mortal could endure it.
Mango had several working titles.
His favorite was "God's Special Son." He visualized a soul scourging itself through eternity.
Monday, February 14, 2011
jenny and mac
Pirate Jenny wore an eye-patch. She told inquisitive strangers, tourists, idiots and fools that she lost her eye in a Key West bar-brawl. Truth is she was struck by flying debris in the prop-wash of her daddy's seaplane when she was fourteen. Piddling around the dock. Fishing a little. Reading his Hemingway books and smoking his Lucky Strikes. Ensconced among steel drums and glass carboys. Loved to be near her Skipper.
*
Barometers were falling and the wind off Indigo Bay made her khaki trousers flap like gale warning flags. She wore the Skipper's peaked military cap with its 50-Mission crush (dented by earphones) anchored firmly on her head. She tugged its visor down. Her refitted Coast Guard Albatross was gassed up and ready to go. If McEwan and his wife hurried, they could take off before the storm hit.Waiting on the dock and screwing her eye to the tropical tree line, giant mahogany way back in, she tried to force by sheer will-power of thought McEwan's arrival.
She cut a rakish figure.
Looking like an aviatrix from the days of Pancho Barnes. Sandy flaxen hair and a hide tanned to a deep hickory. Cerulean eyes and crow's feet.
People assumed her name was lifted from George Wunder's Sunday comic strip "Terry and The Pirates," with its soldier-of-fortune character with an eye-patch. But they were wrong.
She was Pirate Jenny from The Three-penny Opera!
*
A skeletal road of bone-white sand crooked out of the lush primeval forest of coconut palms, tall and bent according to dictates of sun and wind. The road continued around a corner, beneath drooping lantana and shady ficus town trees. Then it morphed into a hardpan of crushed seashell, and wound past chicken-scratch shanties with faded picket fences and humble yards rearing mango, avocado and banana.
Daddy Doc's taxi lumbered into view. It left the road and rattled onto the dock.
"Yo, Daddy!" She saluted the seventy-year-old man known best for his Yoruba magic and herbal medicine. His uncanny affinity with both Oreshas and Saints gained him unwanted notoriety.
He gave her a nod. Mirrorshades shielded his eyes. He often said that eyes are windows to the soul.
To McEwan she snapped, "C'mon! Let's go!"
"OK OK," he muttered, assisting a grotesquely thin and wan Bernice. "Two suitcases, rear seat."
"Gottem! Get aboard. I'm right behind you."
She did not mention to anyone that taking off could be dicey. Her passengers looked commited to the flight. She herself was always up to a challenge. Made life worth living.
"Kind of choppy," McEwan interjected, seating himself beside her. "Might be a rough ride."
She glanced sideways. Noticed his brown leather World War 2 facsimile bomber jacket and his feathered early-frost hairjob. One hundred percent yuppie, right down to his irritating know-it-all attitude.
"You're not co-pilot, Mac," she said dryly. "Please sit aft with your wife."
The Albatross was a heavy bird. During a past life it had performed rescues on the high seas. Pirate Jenny grinned, lips pealed back, baring her teeth.
All right, girrrl. It's showtime!
*
The Albatross climbed slowly, resolutely, with dauntless finesse, skimming over Cabo Verde low enough for McEwan to count the trees. Almost. He glimpsed the fire-gutted lighthouse, stone wounds open to the sun. As they gained altitude the verdant panorama of Saint James passed beneath as if in a
dreamy silent movie. He felt a zooming in his stomach. Once again he felt like a kid on his first airplane ride.
His pride had been stung.
Stung in that tender secret place where he remained an adolescent. Damn her!
During the five years he had known her Pirate Jenny treated him with brusque contempt. He was clever not to mistake it as garden-variety feminist male-bashing. He knew the problem went deeper. The source of her dislike, he felt, was rooted in his duplicity. He was a gay playwright and his friends in the theatre were of the same feather. Bernice was his beard.
Aware of the complexity of his guilt, he enjoyed status quo. Preferring not to be outed.
He loved Bernice in his undefined way. Thus the abuse.
Pirate Jenny would have none of him.
Well, fuck her! Fuck her in the ass!
*
McEwan was born in Victoria, British Columbia. His first lover killed himself after they had quarreled over a poem. McEwan and Sam McLeod had written a poem together. Two voices shared within a romantic villanelle. Sam submitted the piece to a literary magazine and it was published with no credit going to McEwan. The spat resulted in a slap to Sam's blushing face. McEwan stormed from the chintzy flat, never to see his beloved again. He wrote a play.
*
Ten years later he found a narrow niche of success in New York. Critics found his dramas embarrassingly derivative, lurid as Tennessee Williams and gonzo as Sam Shepard. He had yet to find himself. One day he wrote this way, next day he wrote that way. He worked with a catty old queen in New York, a rapacious wit who fancied herself as a mistress of ridicule. She coveted the talents of young men, earning their loyalty by being an adept dramaturge. A wax museum Tallulah Bankhead, she edited and produced their raw works in exchange for raw adulation. Unbeknownst to them she was an energy vampire. McEwan slept with her once and the result was an amicable mindmeld. They cavorted painting the town, ending up at Elaine's.
When away, writing in the Caribbean, he burned votive candles to the good queen.
*
McEwan first met Pirate Jenny at his Carnival party. She arrived with Maurice and Jaime, and was introduced as the seaplane pilot who had shuttled in most of his guests, from Key Biscayne, Key Largo and Key West. Drunkards all. He assumed she was a bull dyke costumed as someone from some pulp magazine with cover art by H.S. Ward.
They shook hands. Her grip was crushing. His was mincing, almost Middle Eastern. Styled after Alec Guiness in "Lawrence of Arabia."
He recalled how she would be smitten with Bernice. The brassy bitch evidently viewed his wife as a vicitm of mysogyny. Sisterhood, bah humbug!
*
Pirate Jenny broke into this mental tempest. She hollered above the roar of the engines, "Hey, back there! Mac, how's your wife doing?"
Bernice had slumped over, fastened by her safety belt.
He groaned, "Oh, God."
*
Barometers were falling and the wind off Indigo Bay made her khaki trousers flap like gale warning flags. She wore the Skipper's peaked military cap with its 50-Mission crush (dented by earphones) anchored firmly on her head. She tugged its visor down. Her refitted Coast Guard Albatross was gassed up and ready to go. If McEwan and his wife hurried, they could take off before the storm hit.Waiting on the dock and screwing her eye to the tropical tree line, giant mahogany way back in, she tried to force by sheer will-power of thought McEwan's arrival.
She cut a rakish figure.
Looking like an aviatrix from the days of Pancho Barnes. Sandy flaxen hair and a hide tanned to a deep hickory. Cerulean eyes and crow's feet.
People assumed her name was lifted from George Wunder's Sunday comic strip "Terry and The Pirates," with its soldier-of-fortune character with an eye-patch. But they were wrong.
She was Pirate Jenny from The Three-penny Opera!
*
A skeletal road of bone-white sand crooked out of the lush primeval forest of coconut palms, tall and bent according to dictates of sun and wind. The road continued around a corner, beneath drooping lantana and shady ficus town trees. Then it morphed into a hardpan of crushed seashell, and wound past chicken-scratch shanties with faded picket fences and humble yards rearing mango, avocado and banana.
Daddy Doc's taxi lumbered into view. It left the road and rattled onto the dock.
"Yo, Daddy!" She saluted the seventy-year-old man known best for his Yoruba magic and herbal medicine. His uncanny affinity with both Oreshas and Saints gained him unwanted notoriety.
He gave her a nod. Mirrorshades shielded his eyes. He often said that eyes are windows to the soul.
To McEwan she snapped, "C'mon! Let's go!"
"OK OK," he muttered, assisting a grotesquely thin and wan Bernice. "Two suitcases, rear seat."
"Gottem! Get aboard. I'm right behind you."
She did not mention to anyone that taking off could be dicey. Her passengers looked commited to the flight. She herself was always up to a challenge. Made life worth living.
"Kind of choppy," McEwan interjected, seating himself beside her. "Might be a rough ride."
She glanced sideways. Noticed his brown leather World War 2 facsimile bomber jacket and his feathered early-frost hairjob. One hundred percent yuppie, right down to his irritating know-it-all attitude.
"You're not co-pilot, Mac," she said dryly. "Please sit aft with your wife."
The Albatross was a heavy bird. During a past life it had performed rescues on the high seas. Pirate Jenny grinned, lips pealed back, baring her teeth.
All right, girrrl. It's showtime!
*
The Albatross climbed slowly, resolutely, with dauntless finesse, skimming over Cabo Verde low enough for McEwan to count the trees. Almost. He glimpsed the fire-gutted lighthouse, stone wounds open to the sun. As they gained altitude the verdant panorama of Saint James passed beneath as if in a
dreamy silent movie. He felt a zooming in his stomach. Once again he felt like a kid on his first airplane ride.
His pride had been stung.
Stung in that tender secret place where he remained an adolescent. Damn her!
During the five years he had known her Pirate Jenny treated him with brusque contempt. He was clever not to mistake it as garden-variety feminist male-bashing. He knew the problem went deeper. The source of her dislike, he felt, was rooted in his duplicity. He was a gay playwright and his friends in the theatre were of the same feather. Bernice was his beard.
Aware of the complexity of his guilt, he enjoyed status quo. Preferring not to be outed.
He loved Bernice in his undefined way. Thus the abuse.
Pirate Jenny would have none of him.
Well, fuck her! Fuck her in the ass!
*
McEwan was born in Victoria, British Columbia. His first lover killed himself after they had quarreled over a poem. McEwan and Sam McLeod had written a poem together. Two voices shared within a romantic villanelle. Sam submitted the piece to a literary magazine and it was published with no credit going to McEwan. The spat resulted in a slap to Sam's blushing face. McEwan stormed from the chintzy flat, never to see his beloved again. He wrote a play.
*
Ten years later he found a narrow niche of success in New York. Critics found his dramas embarrassingly derivative, lurid as Tennessee Williams and gonzo as Sam Shepard. He had yet to find himself. One day he wrote this way, next day he wrote that way. He worked with a catty old queen in New York, a rapacious wit who fancied herself as a mistress of ridicule. She coveted the talents of young men, earning their loyalty by being an adept dramaturge. A wax museum Tallulah Bankhead, she edited and produced their raw works in exchange for raw adulation. Unbeknownst to them she was an energy vampire. McEwan slept with her once and the result was an amicable mindmeld. They cavorted painting the town, ending up at Elaine's.
When away, writing in the Caribbean, he burned votive candles to the good queen.
*
McEwan first met Pirate Jenny at his Carnival party. She arrived with Maurice and Jaime, and was introduced as the seaplane pilot who had shuttled in most of his guests, from Key Biscayne, Key Largo and Key West. Drunkards all. He assumed she was a bull dyke costumed as someone from some pulp magazine with cover art by H.S. Ward.
They shook hands. Her grip was crushing. His was mincing, almost Middle Eastern. Styled after Alec Guiness in "Lawrence of Arabia."
He recalled how she would be smitten with Bernice. The brassy bitch evidently viewed his wife as a vicitm of mysogyny. Sisterhood, bah humbug!
*
Pirate Jenny broke into this mental tempest. She hollered above the roar of the engines, "Hey, back there! Mac, how's your wife doing?"
Bernice had slumped over, fastened by her safety belt.
He groaned, "Oh, God."
Sunday, February 6, 2011
the affair
Bernice enjoyed her sunsets on the terrazzo patio, sipping demitasse espresso, and waiting for her husband. By twilight she would be sharp and smart and ready to start anew with the booze. Today she sat in the shade of the frangipani. She strummed her folk guitar in the bossa-nova style of Luiz Bonfa and Charlie Byrd. Samba triste.
Blue notes, in melancholy chords.
Waiting for Mac was like waiting for Godot.
She grew bitter.
She put away the guitar. Klick-klacked in canvas-top wooden clogs, over to the al fresco bar.
Bombay gin and Rose's lime juice with crushed ice. A most excellent tonic for the sagging spirit.
*
Footfalls beyond the garden gate. Not an idle carefree gait. Not McEwan's. Whose?
Maurice. "Where's the Guv?"
"Somewhere."
"Returning soon?"
"Maybe."
"Splendid. I came to visit you."
"Ah. Hah."
*
Leisurely they smoked their own. Maurice relished his Cuban cigar, blowing neat rings toward Bernice. She responded with coquettish exhalations of Player's Navy Cut. She wore a cotton print blouse with a rain forest motif and stone-washed blue denim shorts. He wore a rumpled safari jacket with sleeves pushed up. No shirt. Genitals abundantly packaged within a black Speedo. She arched her spine so that her breasts rose and her nipples pressed against the fragile cloth. Her voluptuousness achieved the desired effect. His eyes were taking copious notes, causing her to blush and her nipples to grow hard. She leaned forward to pick up her drink. The glass was beaded with icy sweat. Her freckled bosom swung and came to rest with a jiggle. She saw that he had an erection.
She giggled.
Maurice grinned. "What?"
"Tit for Tat."
"What a child you are. Teasing a man like me."
"What kind of man?"
Her green eyes zinged like summer lightning.
Together they laughed and blew more smoke.
*
Night-blooming floral vaginas opened langorously in the dark. Their perfumes invaded the patio. The torrid jungle crept closer. Bernice imagined jaguars posing passively as shepherds, with monkeys and wild pigs in placid repose. A tableau from Rousseau. Then as her visualization reconstructed itself in a cascade of pixals she saw the same animals in a greasy nightmare from Bosche. Her mind quivered. Incandescent jelly on a knife.
"Are you still with me?" He was massaging her warm thigh.
"Just thinking."
"About Mac?"
"No."
"Let me fix you a fresh drink."
"While you're up, turn on the colored lights."
"Christmas bulbs!"
"They hang all year. I've thrown away the boxes."
Maurice found the switch. The lights were strung overhead in a canopy of small nebuli. And others tracked along the stucco wall. They reminded him of those cheerful Texas ice-houses (beer-joints along the highway) where every day and night there was fiesta. Outdoor wooden tables and benches. White-flour tortillas crammed with spicy beef stew. On the side chipotle and chorizo. Nachos con queso. And bottles of beer so cold that when he ordered, Dos cervezos, por favor!, the barman inside the dusty shack had to yank the frosty bottles apart. With dramatic flourish: Muy frio!
Lots of laughter.
On road trips Maurice preferred the company of women. Saucy farmgirls and spicy students away from Mami and Papi for the first time in their budding lives. Cinnamon-hued lilies of the field, their conversations were artful, lilting, and playfully devoid of that tiresome machismo he found in peckerwoods and truckstop heros.
Sexual encounters were fluid and come-what-may.
If the chicks liked beer, then so much the better.
At the ice-houses Christmas lights were strung overhead and glowed all year. He thundered across the prickly pear wasteland in a huge Dodge Challenger. British green with racing stripes. It dominated the road. Redline was an existential drug. Riding in that car actually gave him a hard-on.
Those were the days!
His infant business struggled to stay alive. He could not pay someone to distribute his stuff. So he did it himself. He drove from Texas to California, all routes leading to Sedona and Santa Fe.
New Age shoppers listened to his mojo spiel. He awakened their totem spirits. Flirting and fucking. It was all salesmanship. Baubles, bangles and beads.
He learned to sell in bulk to gurus, faith healers and professional shamans. In time he became very well connected. His sixth sense allowed him to intuit market trends. He found answers not in the crunching of dead numbers, but in the sniffing of sagebrush at dawn. Whenever his journey hit a snag and he was beset with frustration, misery and fatigue, there was always a Texas ice-house glittering in the desolation.
*
The colored lights caused Bernice to smile.
"Thank you so much."
"You are welcome."
Maurice removed his sweaty safari jacket.
Touching his third nipple, she asked, "Is there a story to go along with this?"
"As a matter of fact, there is. According to Daddy Doc."
"The witch doctor."
"I can introduce you."
"We've met." She shivered and folded her arms, hiding her breasts.
*
Like most affairs it began with a caress and a loss of control. For months they had been tantalizing each other. Experienced epicures, they savored moments of heightened attraction. Discussing art, music, philosophy and literature, each would become aroused to the threshold of sublime madness. Controlled sexual energy enhanced the pleasure of their company. So went their tantric theory. It was a fool's game.
*
Bernice placed a CD on the Bose system, spread some sheet music upon the Byzantine rug and fired up a dozen candles in a haphazard glut throughout Mac's library. Then she brought forth a volume of Frederico Garcia Lorca.
Candlelight glinted in her fiery pubic thatch and in the hurricane swirl about her impish face. Booze had brought a waxy blush to her pixie nose. The light also shone in the sweat of her heavy breasts, hips and thighs. She was enticingly zaftig and Maurice loved to stroke her paunch.
She smiled upon the lust he still displayed.
It had been an hour since she took in hand his quaking rod and kissed the nappy curls that trekked into the badlands of his groin. She recalled the slapping of their bellies, the savage rutting.
"Tonight," she announced. "We have a program of Crumb. Voices Of Spanish Children. Based on poetry by Lorca."
Music began playing and Bernice traced the notes on the page as they heard them. His eyes followed her fingertips. He knew deeply that he would never forget this exquisite romance.
His mind drifted into the moment.
This was absolute sensual euphoria.
All of his romances had been peak experiences. All had been pyrotechnic, but brief. He did not rue this. Nor did he rue the future of this thing with Bernice.
Suddenly he wished to ask, what did she ever see in that self-absorbed scatter-brained twit McEwan.
"Can I ask you something?"
"No," she replied with the softness of rapture. "We are busy with the music."
Blue notes, in melancholy chords.
Waiting for Mac was like waiting for Godot.
She grew bitter.
She put away the guitar. Klick-klacked in canvas-top wooden clogs, over to the al fresco bar.
Bombay gin and Rose's lime juice with crushed ice. A most excellent tonic for the sagging spirit.
*
Footfalls beyond the garden gate. Not an idle carefree gait. Not McEwan's. Whose?
Maurice. "Where's the Guv?"
"Somewhere."
"Returning soon?"
"Maybe."
"Splendid. I came to visit you."
"Ah. Hah."
*
Leisurely they smoked their own. Maurice relished his Cuban cigar, blowing neat rings toward Bernice. She responded with coquettish exhalations of Player's Navy Cut. She wore a cotton print blouse with a rain forest motif and stone-washed blue denim shorts. He wore a rumpled safari jacket with sleeves pushed up. No shirt. Genitals abundantly packaged within a black Speedo. She arched her spine so that her breasts rose and her nipples pressed against the fragile cloth. Her voluptuousness achieved the desired effect. His eyes were taking copious notes, causing her to blush and her nipples to grow hard. She leaned forward to pick up her drink. The glass was beaded with icy sweat. Her freckled bosom swung and came to rest with a jiggle. She saw that he had an erection.
She giggled.
Maurice grinned. "What?"
"Tit for Tat."
"What a child you are. Teasing a man like me."
"What kind of man?"
Her green eyes zinged like summer lightning.
Together they laughed and blew more smoke.
*
Night-blooming floral vaginas opened langorously in the dark. Their perfumes invaded the patio. The torrid jungle crept closer. Bernice imagined jaguars posing passively as shepherds, with monkeys and wild pigs in placid repose. A tableau from Rousseau. Then as her visualization reconstructed itself in a cascade of pixals she saw the same animals in a greasy nightmare from Bosche. Her mind quivered. Incandescent jelly on a knife.
"Are you still with me?" He was massaging her warm thigh.
"Just thinking."
"About Mac?"
"No."
"Let me fix you a fresh drink."
"While you're up, turn on the colored lights."
"Christmas bulbs!"
"They hang all year. I've thrown away the boxes."
Maurice found the switch. The lights were strung overhead in a canopy of small nebuli. And others tracked along the stucco wall. They reminded him of those cheerful Texas ice-houses (beer-joints along the highway) where every day and night there was fiesta. Outdoor wooden tables and benches. White-flour tortillas crammed with spicy beef stew. On the side chipotle and chorizo. Nachos con queso. And bottles of beer so cold that when he ordered, Dos cervezos, por favor!, the barman inside the dusty shack had to yank the frosty bottles apart. With dramatic flourish: Muy frio!
Lots of laughter.
On road trips Maurice preferred the company of women. Saucy farmgirls and spicy students away from Mami and Papi for the first time in their budding lives. Cinnamon-hued lilies of the field, their conversations were artful, lilting, and playfully devoid of that tiresome machismo he found in peckerwoods and truckstop heros.
Sexual encounters were fluid and come-what-may.
If the chicks liked beer, then so much the better.
At the ice-houses Christmas lights were strung overhead and glowed all year. He thundered across the prickly pear wasteland in a huge Dodge Challenger. British green with racing stripes. It dominated the road. Redline was an existential drug. Riding in that car actually gave him a hard-on.
Those were the days!
His infant business struggled to stay alive. He could not pay someone to distribute his stuff. So he did it himself. He drove from Texas to California, all routes leading to Sedona and Santa Fe.
New Age shoppers listened to his mojo spiel. He awakened their totem spirits. Flirting and fucking. It was all salesmanship. Baubles, bangles and beads.
He learned to sell in bulk to gurus, faith healers and professional shamans. In time he became very well connected. His sixth sense allowed him to intuit market trends. He found answers not in the crunching of dead numbers, but in the sniffing of sagebrush at dawn. Whenever his journey hit a snag and he was beset with frustration, misery and fatigue, there was always a Texas ice-house glittering in the desolation.
*
The colored lights caused Bernice to smile.
"Thank you so much."
"You are welcome."
Maurice removed his sweaty safari jacket.
Touching his third nipple, she asked, "Is there a story to go along with this?"
"As a matter of fact, there is. According to Daddy Doc."
"The witch doctor."
"I can introduce you."
"We've met." She shivered and folded her arms, hiding her breasts.
*
Like most affairs it began with a caress and a loss of control. For months they had been tantalizing each other. Experienced epicures, they savored moments of heightened attraction. Discussing art, music, philosophy and literature, each would become aroused to the threshold of sublime madness. Controlled sexual energy enhanced the pleasure of their company. So went their tantric theory. It was a fool's game.
*
Bernice placed a CD on the Bose system, spread some sheet music upon the Byzantine rug and fired up a dozen candles in a haphazard glut throughout Mac's library. Then she brought forth a volume of Frederico Garcia Lorca.
Candlelight glinted in her fiery pubic thatch and in the hurricane swirl about her impish face. Booze had brought a waxy blush to her pixie nose. The light also shone in the sweat of her heavy breasts, hips and thighs. She was enticingly zaftig and Maurice loved to stroke her paunch.
She smiled upon the lust he still displayed.
It had been an hour since she took in hand his quaking rod and kissed the nappy curls that trekked into the badlands of his groin. She recalled the slapping of their bellies, the savage rutting.
"Tonight," she announced. "We have a program of Crumb. Voices Of Spanish Children. Based on poetry by Lorca."
Music began playing and Bernice traced the notes on the page as they heard them. His eyes followed her fingertips. He knew deeply that he would never forget this exquisite romance.
His mind drifted into the moment.
This was absolute sensual euphoria.
All of his romances had been peak experiences. All had been pyrotechnic, but brief. He did not rue this. Nor did he rue the future of this thing with Bernice.
Suddenly he wished to ask, what did she ever see in that self-absorbed scatter-brained twit McEwan.
"Can I ask you something?"
"No," she replied with the softness of rapture. "We are busy with the music."
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