Women

93

The reading in Vancouver went through, $500 plus air fare and lodging. The sponsor, Bart Mcintosh, was nervous about crossing the border. I was to fly to Seattle, he'd meet me there and we'd drive over the border, then after the reading I'd fly from Vancouver to L.A. I didn't quite understand what it all meant but I said all right.

So there I was in the air again, drinking a double vodka-7. I was in with the salesmen and businessmen. I had my small suitcase with extra shirts, underwear, stockings, 3 or 4 books of poems, plus typescripts of ten or twelve new poems. And a toothbrush and toothpaste. It was ridiculous to be going off somewhere to get paid for reading poetry. I didn't like it and I could never get over how silly it seemed. To work like a mule until you were fifty at meaningless, low jobs, and then suddenly to be flitting about the country, a gadfly with drink in hand.

Mcintosh was waiting at Seattle and we got in his car. It was a nice drive because neither us said too much. The reading was privately sponsored, which I preferred to university-sponsored readings. The universities were frightened; among other things, they were frightened of low-life poets, but on the other hand they were too curious to pass one up.

There was a long wait at the border, with a hundred cars backed up. The border guards simply took their time. Now and then they pulled an old car out of line, but usually they only asked one or two questions and waved the people on. I couldn't understand Mcintosh's panic over the whole procedure.

"Man," he said, "we got through!"

Vancouver wasn't far. Mcintosh pulled up in front of the hotel. It looked good. It was right on the water. We got the key and went up. It was a pleasant room with a refrigerator and thanks to some good soul the refrigerator had beer in it.

"Have one," I told him.

We sat down and sucked at the beer.

"Creeley was here last year," he said.

"Is that so?"

"It's kind of a co-op Art Center, self-sufficient. They have a big paid membership, rent space, so forth. Your show is already sold out. Silvers said he could have made a lot of money if he'd jacked the ticket prices up."

"Who's Silvers?"

"Myron Silvers. He's one of the Directors."

We were getting to the dull part now.

"I can show you around town," said Mcintosh.

"That's all right. I can walk around."

"How about dinner? On the house."

"Just a sandwich. I'm not all that hungry."

I figured if I got him outside I could leave him when we were finished eating. Not that he was a bad sort, but most people just didn't interest me.

We found a place 3 or 4 blocks away. Vancouver was a very clean town and the people didn't have that hard city look. I liked the restaurant. But when I looked at the menu I noticed that the prices were about 40 percent higher than in my part of L. A. I had a roast beef sandwich and another beer.

It felt good to be out of the U.S.A. There was a real difference. The women looked better, things felt calmer, less false. I finished the sandwich, then Mcintosh drove me back to the hotel. I left him' at the car and took the elevator up. I took a shower, left my clothes off. I stood at the window and looked down at the water. Tomorrow night it would all be over, I'd have their money and at noon I'd be back in the air. Too bad. I drank 3 or 4 more bottles of beer, then went to bed and slept.

They took me to the reading an hour early. A young boy was up there singing. They talked right through his act. Bottles clanked; laughter; a good drunken crowd; my kind of folks. We drank backstage, Mcintosh, Silvers, myself and a couple of others.

"You're the first male poet we've had here in a long time," said Silvers.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, we've had a long run of fags. This is a nice change."

"Thanks."

I really read it to them. By the end I was drunk and they were too. We bickered, we snarled at each other a bit, but mostly it was all right. I had been given my check before the reading and it helped my delivery some.

There was a party afterwards in a large house. After an hour or two I found myself between two women. One was a blonde, she looked as if she was carved out of ivory, with beautiful eyes and a beautiful body. She was with her boyfriend.

"Chinaski," she said after a while, "I'm going with you."

"Wait a minute," I said, "you're with your boyfriend."

"Oh shit," she said, "he's nobody! I'm going with you!"

I looked at the boy. He had tears in his eyes. He was trembling. He was in love, poor fellow.

The girl on the other side of me had dark hair. Her body was as good but she wasn't as facially attractive.

"Come with me," she said.

"What?"

"I said, take me with you."

"Wait a minute."

I turned back to the blonde. "Listen, you're beautiful but I can't go with you. I don't want to hurt your friend."

"Fuck that son-of-a-bitch. He's shit."

The girl with dark hair pulled at my arm. "Take me with you now or I'm leaving."

"All right," I said, "let's go."

I found Mcintosh. He didn't look as if he was doing much. I guess he didn't like parties.

"Come on, Mac, drive us back to the hotel."

There was more beer. The dark girl told me her name was Iris Duarte. She was one-half Indian and she said she worked as a belly dancer. She stood up and shook it. It looked good.

"You really need a costume to get the full effect," she said.

"No, I don't."

"I mean, I need one, to make it look good, you know."

She looked Indian. She had an Indian nose and mouth. She appeared to be about 23, dark brown eyes, she spoke quietly and had that great body. She had read 3 or 4 of my books. All right.

We drank another hour then went to bed. I ate her up but when I mounted I just stroked and stroked without effect. Too bad.

In the morning I brushed my teeth, threw cold water on my face and went back to bed. I started playing with her cunt. It got wet and so did I. I mounted. I ground it in, thinking of all that body, all that good young body. She took all I had to give her. It was a good one. It was a very good one. Afterwards, Iris went to the bathroom.

I stretched out thinking about how good it had been. Iris reappeared and got back into the bed. We didn't speak. An hour passed. Then we did it all over again.

We cleaned up and dressed. She gave me her address and phone number, I gave her mine. She really seemed fond of me. Mcintosh knocked about 15 minutes later. We drove Iris to an intersection near her place of work. It turned out she really worked as a waitress; the belly-dancing was an ambition. I kissed her goodbye. She got out of the car. She turned and waved, then walked off. I watched that body as it walked away.

"Chinaski scores again," said Mcintosh, as he headed for the airport.

"Think nothing of it," I said.

"I had some luck myself," he said.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I got your blonde."

"What?"

"Yes," he laughed, "I did."

"Drive me to the airport, bastard!"

I was back in Los Angeles for 3 days. I had a date with Debra that night. The phone rang. "Hank, this is Iris!"

"Oh, Iris, what a surprise! How's it going?" "Hank, I'm flying to L.A. I'm coming to see you!" "Great! When?"

"I'll fly down the Wednesday before Thanksgiving." "Thanksgiving?"

"And I can stay until the following Monday!" "O.K." "Do you have a pen? I'll give you my flight number."

That night Debra and I had dinner at a nice place down by the seashore. The tables weren't crowded together and they specialized in sea food. We ordered a bottle of white wine and waited for our meal. Debra looked better than I had seen her for some time, but she told me her job was getting to be too much. She was going to have to hire another girl. And it was hard to find anybody efficient. People were so inept.

"Yes," I said.

"Have you heard from Sara?"

"I phoned her. We had had a little argument. I sort of patched it up."

"Have you seen her since you got back from Canada?"

"No."

"I've ordered a 25 pound turkey for Thanksgiving. Can you carve?"

"Sure."

"Don't drink too much tonight. You know what happens when you drink too much. You become a wet noodle."

"O.K."

Debra reached over and touched my hand. "My sweet dear old wet noodle!"

I only got one bottle of wine for after dinner. We drank it slowly, sitting up in her bed watching her giant t.v. The first program was lousy. The second was better. It was about a sex pervert and a subnormal farmboy. The pervert's head was transplanted onto the farmboy's body by a mad doctor and the body escaped with the two heads and ran about the countryside doing all sorts of horrible things. It put me in a good mood.

After the bottle of wine and the two-headed boy I mounted Debra and had some good luck for a change. I gave her a long slamming gallop full of unexpected variables and inventiveness before I finally shot it into her.

In the morning Debra asked me to stay and wait for her to get home from work. She promised to cook a nice dinner. "All right," I said.

I tried to sleep after she left but I couldn't. I was wondering about Thanksgiving, how I was going to tell her that I couldn't be there. It bothered me. I got up and walked the floors. I took a bath. Nothing helped. Maybe Iris would change her mind, maybe her plane would crash. I could phone Debra Thanksgiving morning to tell her I was coming after all.

I walked about feeling worse and worse. Perhaps it was because I had stayed over instead of going home. It was like prolonging the agony. What kind of shit was I? I could certainly play some nasty, unreal games. What was my motive? Was I trying to get even for something? Could I keep on telling myself that it was merely a matter of research, a simple study of the female? I was simply letting things happen without thinking about them. I wasn't considering anything but my own selfish, cheap pleasure. I was like a spoiled high school kid. I was worse than any whore; a whore took your money and nothing more. I tinkered with lives and souls as if they were my playthings. How could I call myself a man? How could I write poems? What did I consist of? I was a bush-league de Sade, without his intellect. A murderer was more straightforward and honest than I was. Or a rapist. I didn't want my soul played with, mocked, pissed on; I knew that much at any rate. I was truly no good. I could feel it as I walked up and down on the rug. No good. The worst part of it was that I passed myself off for exactly what I wasn't-a good man. I was able to enter people's lives because of their trust in me. I was doing my dirty work the easy way. I was writing The Love Tale of the Hyena.

I stood in the center of the room, surprised by my thoughts.

I found myself sitting on the edge of the bed, and I was crying. I could feel the tears with my fingers. My brain whirled, yet I felt sane. I couldn't understand what was happening to me.

I picked up the phone and dialed Sara at her health food store.

"You busy?" I asked.

"No, I just opened up. Are you all right? You sound funny."

"I'm at the bottom."

"What is it?"

"Well, I told Debra I'd spend Thanksgiving with her. She's counting on it. But now something has happened."

"What?"

"Well, I didn't tell you before. You and I haven't had sex yet, you know. Sex makes things different."

"What happened?"

"I met a belly dancer in Canada."

"You did? And you're in love?"

"No, I'm not in love."

"Wait, here's a customer. Can you hold the line?"

"All right…"

I sat there holding the telephone to my ear. I was still naked. I looked down at my penis: you dirty son-of-a-bitch! Do you know all the heartache you cause with your dumb hunger?

I sat there for five minutes with the phone to my ear. It was a toll call. At least it would be charged to Debra's bill.

"I'm back," said Sara. "Go ahead."

"Well, I told the belly dancer when I was in Vancouver to come down and see me some time in L.A."

"So?"

"Well, I told you I already promised Debra I'd spend Thanksgiving with her…"

"You promised me too," Sara said.

"I did?"

"Well, you were drunk. You said that like any other American you didn't like to spend holidays alone. You kissed me and asked that we might spend Thanksgiving together."

"I'm sorry, I don't remember…"

"It's all right. Hold on… here's another customer…"

I put the phone down and went out and poured myself a drink.

As I walked back into the bedroom I saw my sagging belly in the mirror. It was ugly, obscene. Why did women tolerate me?

I held the phone to my ear with one hand and drank wine with the other. Sara came back on.

"All right. Go ahead."

"O.K., it's like this. The belly dancer phoned the other night. Only she's not really a belly dancer, she's a waitress. She said she was flying down to L.A. to spend Thanksgiving with me. She sounded so happy."

"You should have told her you had an engagement."

"I didn't…"

"You didn't have the guts."

"Iris has got a lovely body…"

"There are other things in life besides lovely bodies."

"Anyway, now I have to tell Debra I can't spend Thanksgiving with her and I don't know how."

"Where are you?"

"I'm in Debra's bed."

"Where's Debra?"

"She's at work." I couldn't hold back a sob.

"You're nothing but a big-ass crybaby."

"I know. But I've got to tell her. It's driving me crazy."

"You got in this mess by yourself. You'll have to get out by yourself."

"I thought you'd help me, I thought you might tell me what to do."

"You want me to change your diapers? You want me to phone her for you?"

"No, it's all right. I'm a man. I'll phone her myself. I'm going to phone her right now. I'm going to tell her the truth. I'm going to get the fucking thing over with!"

"That's good. Let me know how it goes."

"It was my childhood, you see. I never knew what love was…"

"Phone me back later."

Sara hung up.

I poured another wine. I couldn't understand what had happened to my life. I had lost my sophistication, I had lost my worldliness, I had lost my hard protective shell. I had lost my sense of humor in the face of other people's problems. I wanted them all back. I wanted things to go easily for me. But somehow I knew they wouldn't come back, at least not right away. I was destined to continue feeling guilty and unprotected.

I tried telling myself that feeling guilty was just a sickness of some sort. That it was men without guilt who made progress in life. Men who were able to lie, to cheat, men who knew all the shortcuts. Cortez. He didn't fuck around. Neither did Vince Lombardi. But no matter how much I thought about it, I still felt bad. I decided to get it over with. I was ready. The confessional booth. I'd be a Catholic again. Get it on, off and out, then wait for forgiveness. I finished the wine and dialed Debra's office.

Tessie answered. "Hi, baby! This is Hank! How's it going?"

"Everything's fine, Hank. How are you doing?"

"All is well. Listen, you're not pissed at me, are you?"

"No, Hank. It was a little gross, hahaha, but it was fun. It's our secret, anyhow."

"Thanks. You know, I'm really not…"

"I know."

"Well, listen, I wanted to speak to Debra. Is she there?"

"No, she's in court, transcribing."

"When will she be back?"

"She usually doesn't return to the office after she goes to court. In case she does, is there any message?"

"No, Tessie, thank you."

That did it. I couldn't even make amends. Constipation of Confession. Lack of Communication. I had Enemies in High Places.

I drank another wine. I had been ready to clear the air and let everything hang out. Now I had to sit on it. I felt worse and worse. Depression, suicide was often the lack of a proper diet. But I had been eating well. I remembered the old days, living on one candy bar a day, sending out hand-printed stories to Atlantic Monthly and Harper's. All I thought about was food. If the body didn't eat, the mind starved too. But I had been eating damned good, for a change, and drinking damned good wine. That meant that what I was thinking was probably the truth. Everybody imagined themselves special, privileged, exempt. Even an ugly old crone watering a geranium on her front porch. I had imagined myself special because I had come out of the factories at the age of 5 o and become a poet. Hot shit. So I pissed on everybody just like those bosses and managers had pissed on me when I was helpless. It came to the same thing. I was a drunken spoiled rotten fucker with a very minor minor fame.

My analysis didn't cure the burn.

The phone rang. It was Sara.

"You said you'd phone. What happened?"

"She wasn't in."

"Not in?"

"She's in court."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to wait. And tell her."

"All right."

"I shouldn't have laid all this shit on you."

"It's all right."

"I want to see you again."

"When? After the belly dancer?"

"Well, yes."

"Thanks but no thanks."

"I'll phone you…"

"All right. I'll get your diapers laundered and ready for you."

I sipped on the wine and waited. 3 o'clock, 4 o'clock, 5 o'clock. Finally I remembered to put my clothes on. I was sitting with a drink in my hand when Debra's car pulled up in front of the house. I waited. She opened the door. She had a bag of groceries. She looked very good.

"Hi!" she said, "How's my ex-wet noodle?"

I walked up to her and put my arms around her. I started to tremble and cry.

"Hank, what's wrong?"

Debra dropped the bag of groceries to the floor. Our dinner. I grabbed her and held her to me. I was sobbing. The tears flowed like wine. I couldn't stop. Most of me meant it, the other part was running away.

"Hank, what is it?"

"I can't be with you Thanksgiving."

"Why? Why? What's wrong?"

"What's wrong is that I am a GIANT HUNK OF SHIT!"

My guilt screwed inside me and I had a spasm. It hurt something awful.

"A belly dancer is flying down from Canada to spend Thanksgiving with me."

"A belly dancer?"

"Yes."

"Is she beautiful?"

"Yes, she is. I'm sorry, I'm sorry…"

Debra pushed me off.

"Let me put the groceries away."

She picked up the bag and walked into the kitchen. I heard the refrigerator door open and close.

"Debra," I said, "I'm leaving."

There was no sound from the kitchen. I opened the front door and walked out. The Volks started. I turned the radio on, the headlights on and drove back to L.A.