Urgently, he looked back, straining to search the street.
It couldn't be! That woman hurrying along in a long black coat or shawl—she couldn't be the woman who had come to the confessional today about her son. Was she the reason why Angel had fled? Was she searching for him? Father Norris started his car, to follow her, confront her, tell her she must leave this to him, that she must abandon the street, that he must find Angel first. By the time he had maneuvered the car against oncoming traffic, the woman had hurried on along Santa Monica Boulevard, becoming an apparition within swirls of dusty wind, her black shawl whirling insanely.
Something terrifying will happen tonight, Father Norris thought.
Za-Za and the Cast of Frontal Assault
AFTERNOON
“That is not in Mr. Smythe's script!” Za-Za shouted as Tony Piazza pounded into Rex Steed's big ass.
The winds had calmed down for now—only whistling as if at the scandale occurring just ahead—but Mr. Smythe clearly was not calm. He was standing, and Za-Za could only imagine his expression of outrage. From here, he looked frozen, the way he probably intended to be, she thought—if he ever died. She must assure at all costs that before he was frozen, he would have the opportunity to launch her career in cinema nouveau verité. The challenge in this “rehearsal” was clear. So she must adjust, adjust, adjust.
How?
Huck Sawyer sidled up to her. Clearly unsettled by startling events. Almost crying, he pled with Za-Za, “What do you want me to do, Za-Za!”
“Go fuck yourself!” She had no time for this.
“With what?”
“Find something!” Za-Za pushed him away. She must plan, control, adjust—
How?
Oh, God! Not possible! Jim Bond was advancing with a hard-on toward—
Lars Helmut!
Face down, that mound of muscles had propped his elbows on the ground, his butt as high as it could go, his legs spread as wide as they could be spread, his asshole as eager as—as eager as Jim Bond's cock, which found its way easily into—was welcomed warmly by—former top man and muscular wonder Lars Helmut's ass!
Another top toppled! Za-Za considered drowning herself in the pool But no one would attempt to save her. Would anyone even notice? Were these sluts aware of the fire in the hills? Jesus Christ, was she imagining all this?
And now this?
Sal Domingo was fucking Dak Boxer, all tough tattoos and hairy chest, and his legs split wider than God intended. Yet another top brought down!
Only Huck Sawyer was remaining true to his calling as a bottom. Following her earlier barked instructions, he kept poking himself with several fingers and miming ecstasy—"Ooo-ooooo-eeeee.”
Za-Za surveyed the vista of upturned macho-bitch asses with cocks grinding away at them. Those were not virgin asses. Oh, what that goddamned Rex Steed had started. This was the most depressing part of it all, that if she dropped her pants and added her butt to that chorus line, no one would do her the courtesy, especially not the fabulous Tony Piazza—that ingrat! Za-Za's anger raged like the distant fire. All those times—when she was grooming him for stardom as the top bottom in the business—all those times that she had harbored him in her own home—feeding him the Tootsie Rolls he said he required for energy while she begged him to put it into her ass, all those times that he had said, “I'm a bottom, Za-Za, remember?”
Za-Za touched her darkly outlined eyes, sure that there would be copious tears. Not yet, but soon.
Was it beyond salvaging? Za-Za looked at the pages of Mr. Smythe's script, now crumpled and still wet in spots. Should she grab one of those water hoses and hose those bitches apart? Rush at them and turn them upside down? Lord Jesus, and all His disciples, grant me a miracle, this once, let me think of something.
Too late. Mr. Smythe had descended one step, was descending another—
“Clarence Butte!”
Clarence Butte? Mr. Smythe had shouted that odd name over an invading vortex of wind that had sent the bougainvilleas into a mad dance. Who the hell was Clarence Butte? Oh, God, it was her real name—well, the name she was born with, but how did Mr. Smythe know it?
She kicked off her shoes and walked barefoot toward the veranda, the altar where her career would be sacrificed. “I'm coming, I'm coming,” she called out to the looming form on the veranda.
Thomas Watkins
AFTERNOON
He remained looking at himself in the mirror. The longer he looked, the more incongruous his image became in the clothes he had tried on. He discarded the denim shirt, the tight black pants, the hiking boots. He dressed in his good clothes—and proud of them! He sipped the last drops of scotch in his glass and sat down facing the vast Canyon, shifting silhouettes. If Herbert laughed at him now, it would be because he was envious of him, a man with dignity, a man who didn't lurk in dark tunnels, a man who didn't buy flesh.
Fixing himself one more drink—mostly ice, really—he decided that he would drive down the hill. The friendly handsome young man would be working on his car, although late now, because he had been waiting for the winds to calm down and had given up. The boy would be grateful to see him. He would walk up to the car and introduce himself. Then they would come back here and gaze out together at what would surely be a calm, starry night.
A calm, starry night.
Thomas stood, staring out the window, trying to penetrate the gray slashes of dust. When night came, the wind would have stopped. The sky would be clear. Stars would be visible, stars so rare now in the City. Obsolete.
Orville
AFTERNOON
Maybe the black guy on the path was cruising someone else. Orville scanned the area. No one but them.
“Hi.”
The guy had approached. He was tall, very dark. Lots of guys would go with him. But there was something about him that wasn't “right.” “Hi.”
“Wanna get together?”
No. But why? Oh, that was it! The guy had a mustache, that was it. Something about mustaches, though a lot of guys had them, turned Orville off. Too bad, because otherwise—
“Uh—” He looked at his watch. “I'm late, I'm meeting someone.”
Orville hurried away, got into his pickup, and proceeded out of Griffith Park.
Paul
AFTERNOON
The garage next to the porch seemed to be waiting for Stanley's car—his new Chrysler. So did his own Alfa Romeo—both waiting for Stanley. But he would not be. Paul felt released—yes, really—from all those years of bondage. That's what it had been, bondage.
He showered, dressed in cruising clothes—tight scoop T-shirt, tight faded jeans, short boots. When he considered himself in the mirror, he looked ready for the hunt.
With the mixture of arousal and exaltation he had always felt when he was about to go cruising before he met Stanley, he got into his car, to drive into the City.
Into the sexual arena. Again.
The song on the radio, Gino Vanelli's “Living Inside Myself,” and the awareness of his destination, added another sensation to the arousal—terror at reentering the world he had wanted Stanley to save him from.
Nick
AFTERNOON
Just when you thought the fuckin’ wind had stopped and only the heat remained, there it came, man, shoving like it was coming right at you, no matter how you dodged. That's what was making the street so crazy today, Nick thought. Now that the strange woman was gone—he'd looked around for her several times—he could stay on his corner—at least near it, where he was now, in front of a shaded gap between two small closed buildings. If the cops cruised by, he could wedge himself into the dark space until they were gone.
“Weird day, huh?” Another hustler had just walked up.
“Sure is,” Nick agreed. “Over there, the sky looks like it's burning.” He pointed toward the edge of the sky, flushed by fire. Overhead, the sky was clean, brilliant.
The guy was Chicano, or real tanned, like him. Real good-looking, too, like him.
Obviously hustling, because this was hustling turf. Along the farther part of Santa Monica Boulevard, gay guys cruised each other, going for sex, not for pay. Nick had found that out when a man who picked him up drove him to an apartment in West Hollywood. Nick had decided to hitchhike back, maybe make a few more bucks. A good-looking young guy had given him a ride, and when Nick mentioned getting paid, the guy braked, opened the door, and almost threw him out. “Fuck yourself,” he'd said. Well, hustlers weren't queer, and that was a fact. Still, every now and then when someone good-looking approached him, he'd be wary until he was sure the other guy was hustling, too.
They were both evaluating cars moving by, drivers leaning to study them. “Queers, man—they're weird,” Nick said.
“Just people like us,” the other guy said.
Oh, oh. Nick was about to split, but the guy said, “I know what you mean about weird on the street. This guy I went with earlier, man, he wanted me to call him ‘Uncle.’ So I kept saying, ‘Suck my cock, Uncle.’ A hundred bucks for fifteen minutes.”
Shit. More like twenty bucks. Still, Nick fell easily into the familiar street exaggerations. “This one old guy, man, he picked me up, you know what he wanted? He wanted to shave my balls.”
“Did you let him?”
“Shit, no. With that knife so near my cock? But he still paid me, hundred bucks for like ten minutes.” The man had given him twenty.
“This guy,” the other hustler said, “had a collection of hustlers’ short hairs, bunched up. Looked like a big spider. Gave me two hundred bucks for mine.”
Maybe thirty “The worst, though, man, is when guys pretend they didn't know you were hustling,” Nick said.
“Yeah—just cruising for another guy.”
“They just wanna sound you out, man, I guess, cause they know farther up is where that shit happens for free.”
“West Hollywood, yeah. Not easy to hustle, but I did, one night, just off Santa Monica, man, in this small park, under some baseball bleachers, right there, man. Even went back.”
That's how he knew about it, cause he'd managed to hustle there, Nick figured. He saw the other hustler studying him, looking at his chest, no, down, to where his pants were open one button.
“That's sexy,” the other hustler said.
“Gets queers hot,” Nick said quickly.
“I think I'll try it.”
The guy was just learning the ropes. “Go ahead,” Nick said.
The other hustler pulled his jeans about an inch down his lean torso.
“Lower, man. Whoa! That's too low.”
The other hustler adjusted his pants, just low enough.
“Now open your shirt.”
The other hustler did. “You're right—this does feel sexy Thanks for the tips.”
“Sure, man, sure.” He didn't often make friends on the street—he was a loner—but he liked this guy. “Hey, I bet you like that song “Cheatin’ Heart,’ huh, man?”
“Uh, what?”
“Yeah, ‘Cheatin’ Heart'—ole Hank Williams sings it.”
“Uh, yeah—”
“I knew it. It's my favorite song, too—”
“There's a squad car coming!” the other hustler said, but he didn't move.
Nick pushed himself into the shaded space between the closed buildings.
The guy moved back, against Nick's body.
“I don't see no squad car—” Nick jerked away.
“I guess I was wrong.”
What had he meant by that? Oh, shit, what the hell was he making so much out of the guy's thinking he'd seen cops? Playfully, he nudged the other hustler with his elbow. Then he recognized the car that drove by, almost stopping. “Talk about weird,” Nick said, “that guy's the weirdest.”
“Yeah? I was about to get into his car just a while ago. He was waiting for me. But he didn't look right to me, like a cop. So I split.”
“He's no cop, man. Know what he wanted? To see my back, man, just to see it, that's all—”
“Sure, I bet that's all he wanted, yeah,” the other hustler laughed.
“—and he wanted me to tell him my name is ‘Ain-heel'—something like that.”
“Angel?”
“That's it. Ahn-hel. I said I was him, and then he didn't believe it, got real mad.”
The car had stopped on a side street.
“What's the matter, man?”
“My name's Angel,” the other hustler said.
“Why's he lookin’ for you?”
The other hustler shook his head. “Uh, well, we'd better split so we can make out. You'll be around later? Maybe we can hang out after we're through, huh?”
“Yeah.” Nick would welcome ending this weird day early. Maybe even now “Where you goin'?” he questioned.
“To find out what that guy wants.”
Nick watched the hustler who said he was Angel walking toward the waiting car. Maybe he wanted to pick up some easy bucks by pretending that he was the guy the weird man was looking for. Maybe—
He saw the hustler about to approach the car parked under the dark shifting shadows.
Don't get in! Nick shouted silently.
Clint
AFTERNOON
Even with the air conditioner on, he was increasingly hot. He remained standing naked looking out at the City. In the far distance, streetlights were coming on, confusing smoke from the burning hills with dusk.
NEW YORK
Last Weekend
Pulled back by the dark energy it exuded, Clint returned to the area of the parked meat trucks, wholesale butcher shops, to enter the familiar cavities of the Mineshaft, where he had often thrived and where, earlier, the leatherman who had stopped to stare at him had entered with two chained men.
Clint walked up the same stairs.
Before an American flag and under a rim of light, two rough guards enforced strict rules of entry—rejecting undesirables, the effeminate, those not in masculine gear.
The two men nodded Clint in.
Heat, cold heat—
Clint thought that as he lay back down on the bed in the air-conditioned hotel room, the cool air battling with the day's heat.
What have I left behind? What have I brought with me?
Ernie
AFTERNOON
Big dick!
He kept singing those words in his mind, the words the guy who had fucked him had said so long with. Big dick!
As he walked back to his car, Ernie felt so good that he began looking around, at the park itself, for chrissakes. God, it was beautiful, this great park, miles and miles of it, like a forest smack in the middle of the City. Flowers, purple, orange, sputtered out of the brush.
There was no place like LA!
All that sun always here and great beaches.
Never mind these spooky Sant'Anas. Look how they cleaned the sky, so clear, so blue.
If you stood on the crest of that hill over there, you could see right to the ocean, he'd bet.
Hey, what was wrong with feeling so goddamned good? Now he could go home, watch television, go to bed early, let the coming Sant'Ana night pass by without him.
Mitch
AFTERNOON
Once the exhilaration of their mutual discovery, his and Heather's, had abated—and finally they had only laughed to the point of tears—Mitch felt abandoned in a new world he belonged in but had to still find.
He drove to a section of the beach he remembered, recognized only now. He parked in a lot, and walked onto the sand. Beach crowds had thinned early as the wind whipped up stinging sand. Here, with Heather, Mitch had seen lone men slipping under a discarded pier. Beyond this stretch, the pier waited to be destroyed, crushed by machines or by waves that pounded its rotting props. Jagged shadows created a lingering dusk underneath it, a strip narrowed by a deep inward curve of the ocean.
Mitch walked there now In one moment he passed from sunlight to dark twilight. The wind jabbed through only in hot humid gasps, allowing pockets of stillness. Men,
perhaps a dozen, most in trunks, stood about or drifted as if in a slow dance, or melded, becoming one shadow.
Walking past him, a man in trunks brushed his hand along Mitch's thighs, fingers pausing at his crotch before he moved on, looking back, tilted head beckoning Mitch to follow into a pool of shadows. Mitch felt a clutch of dread. He could not move, as if he was caught in a spell that had been cast over only this portion of the beach. Didn't that man—and the others drifting about—know that he was “new"? But he didn't feel entirely foreign here. It was as if, in a dream, he had explored this world, and that was why he could move, now—finally, and he did—within its flow.
The man who had touched him earlier stood under slashes of darkness. He had removed his trunks. Only when he approached closer did Mitch realize that there was someone else there, a man cramming himself against the naked man. Mitch halted. The naked man pushed away the man behind him, who now squatted before him to take his cock in his mouth, one hand reaching out for Mitch's groin, goading him forward. Parting his own ass with his hands—and staring back at him—the man standing offered himself to Mitch to enter.
Mitch ran along the sand, stumbling out into the eery glow of sunlight and ocean smeared by smoke and orangy reflections of faraway flames.
He stood on the scorched beach. Whorls of wind clutched at him, pushing grains of sand into his eyes, his mouth.
Could he exist in that world?
He wiped perspiration, his head and cock throbbing.
Dave
AFTERNOON
The kid clung to Dave's waist as they rode along the streets of West Hollywood, gathering admiring looks, the kid laughing and clinging tighter, sliding his hands up and down Dave's chest and gathering the sweat there, then rubbing it on his own chest, and then Dave would park near a gay bar to let everyone see them. Like now.
Look at that guy standin’ in front of them, staring and workin’ himself up through his pants, imagining what he and the kid would be doing later, Dave knew, and what they'd be doing was everything, dude!
He'd start now—slowly
Revving the bike, he swerved off into a shadowy alley. He got off, leaving the kid still mounted on the machine. He popped an ampule of amyl—real amyl, dude, not butyl. Bolt, Rush, Locker Room, all that shit was okay, but not like this. He held the ampule to his own nose, inhaling the vapor, which raced to his head and exploded in his groin—and then he pressed the ampule against the kid's nose, until the kid pulled away, almost reeling for a second, stumbling off the bike. They faced each other within the heated command of the popper. Dave reached roughly for the kid's head, forcing it down onto the leather chaps, toward his crotch but not onto it.