Forget about elevators.
The full-length mirror in the bathroom screwed to the door that whanged out my body in bulges, I hung my blue towel over.
The only other place, besides my apartment, where I felt safe at all was on the green bench near Ruby’s Home Sweet Home in Dog Shit Park.
Not enough air. My breath in, my breath out could not bring in enough air. A high ringing of bees in my right ear. The strange sense of an otherness about me. Even myself, there was some other self of me hanging on my bones. Something about myself I’d never recognized before that was with me, that was on the objects of my world, on my body, the way after a hot shower fog gets on the mirror.
Rose’s apartment was too too too much. But sometimes I’d go up there and turn on Maria Callas’s Norma real loud and touch his brass coffee table from Kenya, the purple-velvet overstuffed chair, the blonde-fainting couch, the Randolph Scott lunch box, the Dwight D. Eisenhower ashtray, his red lava lamp, Joey Heatherton bed; touch Buddha; touch the fuchsia bathtub and sink, the fuchsia walls; touch the photographs of Elizabeth Taylor. Elizabeth Taylor as Cleopatra in the deco frame I gave Rose. The Italian crystal chandelabra.
The E.T.-phone-home guy got married. Across the courtyard, one night there was a party, and I stood in the dark and watched the E.T.-phone-home guy in a tux and a woman in a white dress and veil and a bunch of white guys and white chicks drink and dance all night. Just before it got light, E.T.-phone-home guy lay down on the couch. In the rose-colored light, with just his starched white tuxedo shirt on, he spread his legs and, still in her veil, his bride put his cock in her mouth. The up and down, up and down, of the white veil, his hand milky white against the white of the veil, the black hairs on the back of his hand, his gold watch. His argyle socks, the garters on his calves, his calves around his bride, his scream, the scream we all live for, a tiny sound in the big Manhattan dawn.
Mrs. Lupino died of heart failure. She was in her apartment with her cats for four days before they found her. I smelled her death but thought I just needed a bath. The morning they hauled the dishonored putrefaction of her flesh out of 205 East Fifth Street, there was a knock on my door. I opened my door and it was Ellen’s Uncle David’s secretary in a blue outfit with matching espadrilles, red frizzy hair, and half-glasses that hung around her neck by a strand of pearls. All I was wearing was my underwear. She didn’t even blink. She asked me why I had never reported to the office that Mrs. Lupino had twenty-seven cats.
I started at her blue-espadrilled feet and looked up, looked back down again, both times stopping my eyes just below her middle.
New York drop-dead fuck-you.
Speak up, honey! I said. Can’t hear you!
I said, she said, Why did you not report to the management office that Mrs. Lupino had twenty-seven cats?
I pulled the front of my underwear down.
She looked at my cock, then back up at me.
It’s a cowboy dick, I said. Suck on it.
Slammed the door.
MY LAST DAYS at Café Cauchemar just about everybody was new. Daniel, the boss’s brother, was on vacation, and Davey Dearest was in the hospital, and Walter was in the hospital, and Mack Dickson was in Florida on some sort of shoot. Nobody knew anything about Joanie.
I kept my head down, did my job. Hardly spoke to anybody but my customers. I walked home after work, never took the subway, couldn’t bear it. I was afraid of cabs, so I walked. Didn’t care if it was WALK or DON’T WALK; I just put one foot in front of the other. Everybody else had to move.
I was dead and everybody else was too.
THE FIRST POSTCARD from True Shot was from somewhere in Pennsylvania. A photo of the Lazy Dutchman Motel on the card, the big neon sign LAZY DUTCHMAN red-white-and-blue, the kind of one-story white wood-framed U-shaped motel where you park your car in front of your room.
True Shot’s handwriting was shaky like his eyes had been and all the sentences sloped down:
Me and Plastic Virgin Mary and Brigitte Bardot are moving forward into the unknown disgracefully. Door of the Dead van is eating a little oil but otherwise doing fine. Had to disconnect the heater altogether. My feet were melting. Travel mode’s the key!
Love, Peter Morales
The second postcard was from Peoria, Illinois. A photo of a bunch of high-rises alongside a dirty river, WELCOME TO PEORIA in red letters. True Shot wrote:
It’ll never play here. Travel mode’s the key!
Love, Peter Morales
The third postcard was from Wall Drug in South Dakota. A big green dinosaur.
It is this way. Had me a Green Date with this here Green Dinosaur. Travel mode’s the key!
Love, Peter Morales
THE SECOND MONDAY, when I went to work, Chef Som Chai asked me back into the kitchen. With his chef’s hat on, he was as tall as me. He was cutting lamb shanks with a meat cleaver. Blood all over on his apron.
The chef slammed the meat cleaver into the butcher table. He wiped his hands off on his apron. The kitchen was loud and bright and full as ever, but when I looked around, no one was working, everyone in the kitchen was looking at the chef and me.
Chef Som Chai’s breath in. His breath out.
So sorry to tell you, Chef Som Chai said, But I must tell you. Walter the waiter has died. AIDS, Chef Som Chai said.
The next Wednesday, in the employees’ dressing room, when I was taking off my Levi’s, the Kung Fu salad guy came in the door, walked up to me, took off his white cap, and put his hand on my shoulder.
So sorry to tell you, Kung Fu salad guy said, But I must tell you. Davey Dearest died last night.
The next Monday, the chef waited until after work. I was sitting with my Heineken, where Fiona’d always sat with her Southern Comfort two rocks, on the banquette right under the Sistine Chapel God, when Chef Som Chai set the Flower Bottle into the ice bucket and set the ice bucket next to me. He sat down and Darin, one of the new waiters, opened the bottle for us.
Such hard times, Chef Som Chai said, So much death. We learn many things in hard times.
The chef and I clinked glasses to learning new things in hard times.
So sorry to tell you, Chef Som Chai said, But I must tell you. Daniel, the boss’s brother, was not on vacation, and Mack Dickson was not in Florida on a shoot. Unfortunately, the chef said, Both of them died yesterday. Same day, different hospitals.
Where’s Joanie? I asked.
Dead, the chef said, She shot herself.
Mack Dickson’s memorial service was on Staten Island in a white house with a wide porch. The porch roof was painted swimming-pool-blue. A wisteria growing on the porch.
His mother and father were old, old-country old, all in black. Big old black shoes. They sat on folding chairs, holding hands.
On the Dicksons’ mantel, next to Christ hanging on a horizontal vertical, surrounded with carnations and roses, was a photo of the three of them: Mack Dickson, Walter, Davey Dearest. Three young men in soccer drag, their arms about each other, male friends, mates, healthy young Americans.
Such a small photograph. Such a large room.
A HOT AND humid day in August, sitting on my safe green bench next to Ruby’s Home Sweet Home.
When I closed my eyes what I saw was red. In the red was another pair of eyes looking at me, my own eyes looking at me that I was looking back into. I was holding one hand tight around the buckskin bag around my neck, my other hand, palm cool against Dr. Brown’s Celery Soda, in all the world August in New York, only criminals left in New York City in August. In Dog Shit Park, next to my green bench, just looking back at the other me looking at me.
Heat rash. I reached down and scratched my balls.
The sound of her knees against the plastic as she walked, the plastic sliding against the sidewalk. I opened my eyes.
Standing in front of me was Umbrella Red Shower Curtain.
Green Date on the green bench? Fiona said.
Fiona? I said. Where have you been? I said.
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William of Heaven, Fiona said, I knew I’d run into you.
You did? I said.
My inner voice, Fiona said.
I jumped up, ran over to Umbrella Red Shower Curtain, ripped open the shower curtain.
Jesus! Fiona yelled.
The Sacred Heart himself! I yelled. Where the fuck have you been? I’ve been looking all over for you! Why did you fucking leave last time? You promised you’d stay and wait for me!
I tossed what was left in my can of Dr. Brown’s Celery Soda into Fiona’s face. Fiona’s dirty face slick with sweat and Celery Soda.
Just like that, Fiona kneed me big time in my heat-rash balls.
My knees immediately down onto hot cement.
You fucking fool! Fiona yelled. I had to go! It wasn’t safe here! The police, you know, and the war and all.
Bent over, kneeling, holding on to my balls.
And the FBI and the CIA, I said.
Go fuck yourself! Fiona yelled.
No, fuck you! I yelled. You and your fucking Famous Blue Raincoat!
No, fuck you! Fiona yelled.
Jesus! I yelled. A woman will never know how it feels to get kicked in the balls!
True friends, Fiona yelled, Stick by one another through thick and thin!
True friends, I yelled, Tell fucking true friends when they’re acting like complete fucking idiots!
I’m not a fucking idiot! Fiona yelled. You’re the idiot! Can’t you see what’s going on here?
Fort Detrick, Maryland, Fiona yelled, The Center for Biological Warfare—as far back as 1968, the CBW has been studying Vervet Monkey Disease, the disease that caused seven deaths in Germany. Infected material was sent to four laboratories in the USA and one each in Germany, Panama, South Africa, Uganda, and the USSR.
You’re nothing but a fucking hick, Fiona yelled, And too fucking gullible to fucking comprehend this whole disease has been manufactured. Can’t you see? Fiona said. I know I’m walking around under an umbrella surrounded by a shower curtain. I know I’m lost in a game called Walk/Don’t Walk. Believe me, I’d much rather be watching this on TV. But I’m not! It’s here! It’s now! And it’s me!
And how dare you not trust me? Fiona yelled. You want mediocrity go back to fucking Poontang, Idaho, man! Goddammit, I know I’m fucking crazy. But the grief and the rage are real! And the disease is real and the war is real! You just mark my fucking words!
Fiona’s fist doubled up straight and hit me hard as any man.
On the cement, I wasn’t kneeling anymore, I was sprawled, bleeding.
Fiona knelt down beside me, reached into her huge red leather purse. The shower curtain bent up funny. She brought out a roll of toilet paper, wound some around her hand, touched my bleeding lip.
Who knows how long she touched my lip.
Jeez, Fiona, I said, When you going to brush your teeth?
You ain’t exactly Mr. Irish Spring, Fiona said.
Fiona smelled her armpit. It’s like I want to go back and shower, Fiona said, And put on clean clothes and take the subway to a movie, go shopping, but just as much I’d like to slit my wrists and find the tallest building and jump off.
The piece of toilet paper was blood-soaked, so I reached for the toilet paper roll, ripped off another wad, put the wad of toilet paper to my lip. More blood.
But I stay dirty, Fiona said, And I don’t slit my wrists. Showering and suicide are both such impossible acts. I’d like to be Madonna too, Fiona said, But I’m not. Never will be.
Fiona sat up—crinkle plastic sound—leaned her body weight against her hand, her hand on the hot sidewalk. Her dirty cuticles and fingernails.
My open palm on the top of her hand.
And the cure? I said. Are you any closer to finding the exactly right perfect person to give the cure to?
Fiona turned her hand up, open palm into mine.
No, Fiona said, I’m just wandering around and around. The Walk/Don’t Walk circle is getting tighter and tighter, though. I always end up back here in Dog Shit Park by late afternoon.
I put my arm around Fiona’s shoulder, she put her arm around my waist, and we walked that way, both of us all one thing, umbrella poking me in the head, sliding red plastic along the sidewalk, the plastic sticking to my skin. I sat down on my green bench. Fiona sat down on red plastic and white wolves on my green bench.
Isn’t that thing uncomfortable? I said. Doesn’t it hurt your head?
It’s cool, Fiona said.
She pulled the edges of the plastic away from her legs.
Your neck must be killing you! I said.
Fiona moved her neck side to side.
It’s cool, Fiona said.
You’re awfully skinny, I said.
New diet, Fiona said.
Daddy’s Visa still works, Fiona said, Although Daddy doesn’t.
Then: The war, Fiona said. It’s close, Fiona said. Any fucking day now.
My arm on the back of my green bench, I pulled my leg up, turned my face to Fiona. We buried Ruby Prestigiacomo under that arborvitae, I said. I nodded at it with my head.
Fiona had to stand up so she could turn around and look.
I always felt something special about that arborvitae, Fiona said. And the elms, the graceful English elms. Aren’t they beautiful?
I love those trees, I said. I love you, Fiona, I said. I just want to help, but I don’t know how.
Fiona put her hand on my neck, then her open palm on my chin.
Her blue eyes, her filthy white skin.
I know, Fiona said, But I don’t know what to tell you what to do.
Fiona, I said, How pregnant are you?
Did I tell you how to dance the Dance of the Wounded Male? Fiona said.
Fiona, I said, How pregnant are you?
Stand up and I’ll show you, Fiona said.
Goddammit, I said, Fucking New Yorkers! Listen to me! Read my lips! How. . . fucking. . . pregnant. . . are. . . you?
Then: Is the child mine?
Fiona folded her arms in front of her. Her lip curled up into a big blue scar.
It’s a maybe, Fiona said. A maybe not. I’m not sure.
What are you going to do? I said. You should see a doctor.
I’m waiting, Fiona said.
For what? I said.
My inner voice, Fiona said.
Oh, shit!
Fiona reached over, grabbed me by the T-shirt at my neck. If she hit me again I was going to hit her back.
Listen up, Fiona said, And listen good! Because this is the last time I’m saying it. This is my body. Do you understand?
I understand, I said.
Now, Fiona said. We were talking about the Dance of the Wounded Male.
You were talking about the Dance of the Wounded Male, I said.
Fiona doubled her fist, right hook. I ducked.
You can’t hit a pregnant woman.
I held my hands up in front of me, palms out.
The Wounded Male, I said. What’s that?
Fiona was standing on the sidewalk the way those Asian kick boxers stand.
You know! Fiona said. At the end, when the exactly right most perfect person appears.
The exactly right most perfect person, I said, Who you give the Extra Strength Tylenol to.
Fiona raised her leg, kicked her kung fu foot out, barely missed my ribs.
Don’t fuck with me, Will! Fiona said. I told you. It’s not Extra Strength Tylenol, it’s only the bottle. The cure is in the bottle.
Gamma something or other, I said. A neurotransmitter.
Right, Fiona said.
That you discovered with the doctors at Silver Lake, I said. And Silver Lake is an insane asylum.
Believe me or don’t believe me, Fiona said, I could give a flying fuck! In my heart I know it’s true.
Do you want to see the movements or don’t you? Fiona said.
Can you do the movements with that thing on your head? I said.
Fiona’s New York drop-
dead fuck-you was back.
So I stood next to Fiona, on the sidewalk in front of my green bench.
The belly dance always tells a story, Fiona said, Revealing truths through discreet gestures.
How was the Wounded Male wounded? I said.
Fiona pushed the red curtains as wide open as they could get.
The Wounded Male entered the underworld, Fiona said. Dionysus was a Wounded Male. He had to fuck himself with a fig bough before the gods would let him enter the underworld. That’s his wound.
You learned all this in a belly dance class? I said.
My teacher was queer, Fiona said. A beautiful Greek man named Ajapo. Ajapo was the absolute authority on the belly dance.
And crazy? I said.
Very cool guy, Fiona said. Few who enter the underworld return, and those who return walk with a limp. The limp, Fiona said, Is the first step of the dance we call the belly dance.
Fiona stepped out with her left leg. The leg collapsed under her and she fell a bit. Fiona caught herself, then leaned her body forward, swaying out her hip, swaying and straightening her back with the power of her shoulders, then stepped with her right leg, raising herself to her full height, swaying her hip out, then dragged her right leg next to her left.
Now, Fiona said. Do it with me.
So I stood next to Fiona, on the sidewalk in front of my green bench.
I stepped with my left leg as she stepped out with hers. I let my leg collapse and I fell a bit. Then, as Fiona leaned her body forward, I leaned my body forward, swaying out my hips with hers, swaying and straightening my back with the power of my shoulders; then Fiona stepped with her right leg, and I followed, and we raised ourselves to full height, swaying hips out, then dragged our right legs next to our left.
What do you do with your hands? I said.
Pretend they are swans, Fiona said, Or serpents. Whatever. Just let the arms move because the waist has moved and because you’ve stepped out and your leg has collapsed.
Fiona and I together swayed our hips, stepped out, moved our arms like swans or serpents.
This is the point, Fiona said, This point here! Fiona nodded her head down at her position.
When everybody starts singing, I said.
Yes, Fiona said. “The Song of Bernadette.”