When She Was Bad

2

Lilah comes awake. Her mind is blank at first-no recollection of having gone to sleep, no memories from the preceding day.

This is how it’s always been for Lilah, living as she does in a more or less permanent present. No immediate past, no long-term future, just an ongoing now, the by-product not of meditation, but of an imperious, bonobo-like sexuality that informs Lilah’s every thought and action from the moment she wakes up to the moment she retreats back into the darkness of her mind.

The first thing she does upon awakening is ground herself by rubbing the pad of her right thumb against the pads of the first two fingers of her right hand, as though she were trying to roll a little dough into a tiny ball. She hears a buzzing sound, feels around under the pillow, finds the telephone handset, and replaces it in the cradle. Immediately, it begins to ring; she lifts the receiver and slams it down again, then unplugs the phone from the jack in the wall, strips off her nightgown, and pads naked into the bathroom.

After a steaming hot shower with the spray set on needle-fine, Lilah rubs herself dry with fluffy towels until her creamy skin is pink and tingly from head to toe. She shaves her legs, paints her finger-and toenails, trims her dark pubic hair to the shape of a heart while waiting for her nails to dry, anoints her body with moisturizing lotion, and finishes off with a dusting of lilac-scented body talc.

As often happens, when Lilah returns from the bathroom she can’t find a thing to wear. The drawers and closets are filled with T-shirts, jeans, sweaters, and oversize sweatshirts, but nothing suitable for the Saturday evening Lilah has in mind. It’s almost as if somebody keeps throwing her good stuff out and replacing it with more modest wear.

Eventually she finds her streetwalker outfit-thong, hot pants, midriff-bearing tube top, and of course her red fuck-me pumps with the three-inch stiletto heels-crumpled into a hatbox in the far corner of the closet. It occurs to her she may have stashed it there herself a few days or weeks ago-if so, the event is lost in the cement sea of her memory.

After dressing, Lilah steps out onto the fan-shaped bedroom balcony, with its low curved parapet and potted cacti in terra-cotta urns. Below her, the wooded hills of Pebble Beach fall steeply toward a dark slice of ocean, barely visible through the trees. It’s a cold summer night on the central coast. Cutting wind, no stars. She shivers, glances down at her body. Through the formfitting top, she can see her wide round aureolae have gone all pebbly and her nipples are making little thimble-shaped bumps against the Lycra. Gonna freeze them titties off, girl, she warns herself, turning back into the bedroom and closing the French doors behind her.

Lilah rummages through the walk-in closet until she finds a long Mexican sweater she can belt around her for warmth, or open when it comes time to flash the goodies. Leaving the previously pin-neat bedroom strewn with discarded clothes and towels, she clatters down the wide stone staircase carrying her beaded handbag.

The huge kitchen is immaculate. From the stand-alone, double-doored freezer Lilah selects a so-called gourmet TV dinner at random, nukes it, scarfs it down at the kitchen table while watching a Mexican game show on the maid’s little countertop TV. Lilah doesn’t speak much Spanish, but she loves the overheated atmosphere of the Mexican shows, the garish colors, the exaggerated sexuality, the blowsy women with their wobbly Charo boobs overflowing spangled halter tops, the smolderingly handsome Latin boy toys in tight trousers with the crotches stuffed to bulging and pirate shirts open halfway to the navel.

The telephone directory is on the counter under the wall phone. Lilah opens it to the yellow pages, calls a taxi, then waits for it out on the veranda, which is tiled and stepped like the balcony, but with even larger succulents in even larger terra-cotta urns.

Twenty minutes later, a yellow cab pulls into the circular driveway. The driver hurries around to open the rear door as Lilah descends the wide marble steps. She knows without looking that he’s giving her the once-over, so she lets the sweater fall open as she brushes past him and slides into the backseat.

The horny bastard doesn’t know where to look first. When he closes the door behind her, Lilah notices a gold wedding band on his hairy ring finger. He may fuck his wife tonight, she tells herself, but he’ll be thinking about me.

“Where to?” he inquires, when he’s behind the wheel again.

“Just take me to Seaside-I’ll tell you where to drop me when we get there.”

“Seaside?” He does a double take into the mirror-that’s a mostly black town, definitely the wrong side of the tracks.

“Yeah, Seaside-you got a problem with that?”

“Not me.” He drops the flag to start the meter; the tires crunch gravel as the cab circles the driveway, then turns onto Paso Condor Way. Lilah catches the driver’s eyes glancing at her in the rearview mirror. With a sly grin she tugs her tube top out and down, reaching underneath to heft her boobs, as if adjusting the cups of the bra she isn’t wearing. The taxi veers dangerously across the winding road.

Seaside is booming on Saturday night. Drunks and music overflow from the clubs and bars out onto the sidewalks. Lilah’s taxi cruises slowly up the street, bringing the hos sashaying to the edge of the curb; they turn away in disgust at the sight of the tarted-up white girl in the backseat.

But Lilah knows better than to stake out a position on an occupied block-she waits in the warm cab until she sees a sistah in an outfit similar to hers, only vinyl, climbing into the front seat of a beige Camry. Even if it’s only for a hummer, the girl won’t be back for at least fifteen minutes, which is usually long enough for Lilah to attract a john. (One will be plenty-Lilah’s only here for the sheer gutter thrill of it; afterward she intends to head for an upscale pickup joint in Carmel to find herself a one-night stand.)

“Lemme out here.”

“Here?”

“Yeah, here-is there a fucking echo or something?”

Lilah tips the cabbie better than he deserves out of the clutch of bills in her little beaded handbag. There’s a dire wind whipping down the sidewalk; she pulls her sweater tighter and flattens herself against a mural of a blues band painted in black silhouette on the wall of a beer joint.

The strains of “Sweet Home Chicago” waft out through double doors with small, diamond-shaped windows. Lilah is seriously thinking about heading inside to check out the band when a big old Harley comes belching up the street and pulls over to the curb directly in front of her. Chopped and stretched, black leather seat studded with rivets, fringed leather saddlebags.

Lilah clomps across the sidewalk for a closer look at the chopper. “Nice bike,” she calls over the pulsing beat of the engine. “How about a ride?”

The driver flips up the face-plate of his helmet. White guy, bearded, good-looking. “I got a lifelong rule-I don’t pay for pussy.”

“That’s okay, I don’t sell it,” says Lilah.

He looks her up and down. “Could have fooled me.”

“I just did. How about that ride?”

He twists around, opens a saddlebag, hands Lilah one of those Nazi-looking helmets, the kind that always reminds her of the head of a circumcised penis. Lilah pulls it on, tightens the strap, grabs the guy’s shoulder for support, and throws a leg over the long, narrow leather seat. Feeling the thrumming of the engine between her legs, she presses herself up against the back of his black leather jacket. “What’re you waiting for?” she yells. “Let’s get this fucking show on the fucking road.”