Hell's Half Acre

by Will Christopher Baer

  The script now suggests that I fondle one of her breasts as if I’m preoccupied, distracted. I am supposed to randomly tweak and pinch her nipple between thumb and finger as if fiddling with the tuning dial on a car radio. This seems rude but I give it a whirl. Her nipples are hard. She tolerates my affection for a minute, then slaps my hand away.

  What is that, she says. Foreplay?

  I shove her off me, gently. Then pick up the orange and begin to peel it.

  Why do you have a vitamin deficiency?

  Because I never eat vegetables, she says. Because I’m anemic.

  Yeah, I say. Maybe you should lay off the coke.

  Phineas, she says. Don’t…

  I feed her a fleshy chunk of orange.

  Okay, I say. What kind of towels should I buy?

  Thick ones, she says.

  What color?

  Dark colors. Something that won’t show blood.

  Of course.

  Then you will be the perfect man.

  I feed her more of the orange. Molly nibbles at my fingers and I notice a flicker of electricity in my chest.

  By your definition, I say. The perfect man is one who has clean sheets and plenty of nice, thick towels that don’t show blood.

  That’s right, says Molly.

  She begins to giggle. I feed her the last of the orange and juice runs to my wrist. Molly licks at it, then kisses my hand, sucks at my fingers. Her mouth moves to my throat.

  Jesus, I say.

  What’s this girlfriend of yours like?

  I glance at the script, suddenly uncomfortable…She’s like a hummingbird, I say.

  Does she drink sugar water?

  She vibrates, I say. She moves so fast you can barely see her.

  And should I be jealous of her? she says.

  You, I say. You’re a blur. You’re already gone.

  This is the end of the scene but I slip my hands under her ass and lift her onto my lap again. Molly fumbles with the buttons of my jeans and I think I’m going to come any minute. I touch her through her panties and she’s wet, she’s melting. Molly pulls my cock loose and begins to run her hand up and down, barely touching me. I push her panties to the side and slip my fingers inside her and now she moves her hips, pushing her pubic bone against my hand and one of us is groaning and then suddenly we pull away from each other.

  Whoa. What the hell was that?

  Drama, she says. Her voice is bitter.

  What’s wrong with you?

  You, she says. You still haven’t kissed me.

  Bright pocket of silence.

  That dialogue, I say. What a load of shit.

  I think it’s romantic, she says. Or it would be, if it were real.

  It’s embarrassing, I say. It’s pap.

  What is pap, exactly? she says.

  I stare at her and realize I am not sure. Pap is a sticky, sweet mucus type substance the color of pus. Jesus, I don’t know. Pap is fucking pap.

  Well, she says. I think he sounds like you. Your character sounds just like you.

  Molly folds her arms across her chest. I shove myself back into my pants, rather grimly. I sit beside her, listening to my rapid heart. I want to scream. I lean over the side of the bed for the bottle of wine. I take a long, greedy drink and pass her the bottle. She lifts it to her mouth and stops, staring at the television.

  Oh fuck, she says.

  There is a picture of Sam on the screen.

  …Samwise Cody, five years old…presumed to be kidnapped… blond hair, brown eyes. Forty-nine pounds, with no identifiable scars or birthmarks…missing two days now.

  The camera cuts away from photo of Sam to footage of his father at a press conference. Distraught, unshaven. He appears to be unable to speak.

  …is the son of MacDonald Cody, popular U.S. senator from California and one of the power players in the Democratic party, figures to be a factor in the next presidential election…. There has been no ransom demand, no contact from kidnappers at all.

  I look at Molly. The bottle of wine still tucked between her legs, forgotten. One hand over her mouth. Her hair still wet and she is naked, lovely. But I feel nothing resembling desire. I feel nothing much at all.

  This is wrong, I say. So fucking wrong.

  It will be over soon, says Molly.

  I sink back and yes there is rage in me but not enough. Pale rain clouds faraway and they may not get here anytime soon. They may pass by, they may fade away. I remember nothing but ailments. Impatience, affliction, and morbid restlessness. I cut my hair last night and saw your face. I saw the uselessness of the organism, the sequence of maladies. Disorder of the stomach and love letters amount to threads. The imperfection. The difficulty in forming ordinary vowel sounds. The sleeve of the female engages threads of the male. This is the hum of empty space. This is a photograph of a boy no longer a boy. Please, don’t. Don’t interrupt me. Badly drawn stick figures and the voice of another is like a forgotten blue T-shirt on the floor. He came inside me and said he didn’t mean to. This room has such poor light. Why did you buy an orchid of all things. Because you were not home. Because the phone just rings.

  The light touch of rose petals on my shoulder.

  I am asleep, or nearly so. I’m dreaming in my own voice. This can’t be good for anybody. Molly has turned the light off and she lies half-naked beside me, not quite touching me. But I can feel her breath on my skin and the rose petals might have been her lips. The television is still on and I am grateful, because the silence can be too much to bear. I might have been dreaming but I thought I heard the rest of the news. The sports, the weather. Partly cloudy tomorrow. Partly, partly. Uncommonly hot. A train wreck, brutal traffic. Power lines down. Forest fires and earthquake weather. Followed by a story about a monkey. A monkey has apparently escaped from the Oakland Zoo. A three-year-old ring-tailed lemur by the name of Casper.

  And then in the dark hours, the following conversation. Awake or dreaming. Drunk and still dreaming and who is speaking I can’t say.

  He could be mine. He’s the right age, anyway. And he does look like me.

  Are you talking to yourself?

  But a lot of guys look like me. I have an ordinary face and god knows who else she was fucking.

  Who.

  The whore with the ruined face.

  Jude, you mean.

  You’re not the father. You’re dreaming.

  I’m not dreaming.

  Wake up. Please wake up.

  I could teach him to ride a bike, to throw a baseball. I could buy a new car, a family car. I could buy a big American car with airbags and we could take him fishing. I can see the three of us in a little boat, laughing and eating sandwiches on white bread.

  Three people in a family car doesn’t make a family.

  But it looks real. It looks like a family.

  Do you even know how to fish?

  Hah. I could teach him to be a fisher of men.

  Who am I speaking to?

  Disconnected. Drunk and still dreaming.

  I wake up and my chest is slick with sweat. Molly snores softly beside me and there’s no way I’m going back to sleep right now. I get up and pull on a pair of jeans. The clock says four a.m. but that means nothing. It would be useful, though, to explore the house a little during the wee hours. Maybe I can find something to eat in the kitchen.

  I check on the boy first. He sleeps in a fierce ball, one corner of his pillow clutched in his fist. His face is peaceful, his cheeks rosy. I can see his eyes flickering behind their almost transparent lids. I touch his hair and move on.

  I turn the corner into the kitchen and stop when I hear voices. Jeremy and Daphne are in there, making out like teenagers. Which they are, basically. Jeremy sits in a wooden chair and she straddles his lap. Her tank top is pushed up and I catch a very brief glimpse of her breasts by moonlight and they are still amazing. Jeremy is whispering sweetly into her ear and she is stroking his hair. I slip away without them noticing me and I find myself s
miling. For some reason, I feel like the world might still be okay.

  I drift down to the Lizard Room and just being in there gives me the creeps. The televisions are blank and lifeless and I am tempted to screw around with the controls to see if I can find anything on the monitors. But this idea makes me uncomfortable, like the smell of vomit. And I know that I would fuck something up and then Miller would know I was in here. Then I notice a flicker of green lights coming from a cabinet door that hangs open. I shrug and take a look inside to find stereo equipment. The green light is coming from the digital meter that indicates the recording levels. I don’t hear anything, though. I adjust the volume and fiddle with various controls and I get nothing. I find a pair of small headphones and put them on and Jude’s voice fills my head. I sink into crash position, hands over my ears.

  Jude- Don’t fucking touch me. I don’t want to be touched right now.

  Miller- You’re pathetic. You must be the only narcissist on the planet with a face that would make children run away screaming.

  Jude- You can’t hurt me. You can’t hurt me.

  Miller- I don’t want to.

  Jude- You’re such a liar.

  Miller- What do you think Poe is doing downstairs, with Molly? Do you think he’s fucked her yet?

  Jude- Doesn’t matter. His heart is his problem.

  Miller- For now, anyway.

  Jude- He won’t let you do it, you know.

  Miller- What?

  Jude- He won’t let you kill that boy.

  Miller- I’m writing this picture. He’s got no control.

  Jude- Believe me or not. I don’t care.

  Miller- What about you? Do you think he will let me kill you?

  Jude- I don’t know. He might have no choice.

  Miller- Because I will, baby. I will break you in half.

  Forever, it seems. I wait in the dark forever but she never answers him.

  twenty-eight.

  MORNING FINDS YOU, NEVER FAILS. I sit on the porch with a mug of black coffee laced with Irish whiskey. Miller may be a bastard, but he keeps a very respectable liquor cabinet. It’s early yet and the sky is white with fine threads of pink, like quartz. I light a cigarette and turn my attention to the scene unfolding in the driveway before me.

  Jeremy and Daphne are in the back seat of the silver Mustang. Jeremy is naked. Daphne wears a bright red bra, and from what I can tell, nothing else. They are fighting, or fucking. It’s violent, whatever you choose to call it. The car is trembling. Huck is crouched low on the driver’s side, filming them through the open window.

  I can see my reflection in the car window, the white sky endless behind me and superimposed upon my reflection hangs one of Daphne’s skinny legs, a pale yellow question mark dangling over the front seat. Jeremy’s dark shoulders, lunging. Now the sound of masculine grunting and a low, whining scream that must be Daphne achieving orgasm. Or Daphne’s dramatic portrayal of Daphne achieving orgasm.

  Miller comes out onto the porch, his face sliced open by a hard little smile.

  Do you mind telling me what’s going on? he says.

  I glance at him, amused. Looks like Jeremy and Daphne are shooting a love scene.

  Was this your idea?

  Nah. I came out to have a cigarette and Jeremy said he needs me to be his brother. His character just got out of jail or something. And I’m not too happy to see him.

  His character? says Miller.

  Yeah. Jeremy says it will crank the tension up a notch.

  This character of his, says Miller. He’s meant to be your brother?

  I know. He doesn’t look much like me, I say.

  Miller scowls. Yeah. He’s too good-looking.

  That’s true, I say.

  And Jeremy wrote this scene?

  He conceived it. The dialogue will be improvised, apparently.

  Miller is so irritated that his mouth opens and his lips twist speechless in the breeze and this amuses the hell out of me but I don’t get a chance to enjoy it as there is a sudden flash of gray and black fur cutting across my peripheral vision and out of nowhere there is a monkey crouched on the hood of the Mustang, a ring-tailed lemur idly chewing on one long black finger. This can only be Casper, the fugitive monkey. I open my mouth, then close it. My only coherent thought is that the monkey is probably not safe here.

  I’m a son of a bitch, says Miller. That’s great video.

  Huck turns to get a shot of the monkey.

  It’s a Disney moment, I think. Everyone loves God’s noble creatures.

  The monkey screams and leaps away as Daphne’s head comes splashing through the Mustang’s passenger side rear window with a rain of sparkling glass. It seems like it takes forever for the glass to stop falling and Daphne’s head flops hard against the side of the car.

  Thrilled. I can see by Miller’s face that he’s weirdly thrilled, and so am I.

  But I need to be angry. I prepare to improvise. Daphne’s head is bleeding but I don’t move. Huck is coming around the car to get a close-up of Daphne through the broken window but then he is distracted by me. He zooms on my face. He wants a shot of my reaction.

  What is my reaction?

  Vaguely horrified, now. I scroll through my consciousness and there is little else. Detached spontaneous compassion, perhaps. The thrill is gone. I pollute my lungs with smoke and contemplate how my behavior is affected by the presence of the camera, how I am holding the cigarette the way I imagine James Dean might hold it, if he were hungover. But upon reflection I decide I am more interested in Casper the monkey than Daphne’s bleeding head. Daphne’s not going to die and anyway she agreed to this shit, yeah. But head wounds are tricky. The blood is running freely down her neck and her hair is thick with it and she will probably need stitches but I have a feeling it’s just a minor laceration.

  Anyway.

  Huck cuts away from me, to the interior of the car. Miller stands behind me, cursing.

  Did you see the monkey? says Jeremy.

  Daphne touches the back of her head and her hand comes away red.

  Did you? he says.

  Daphne scrambles into a ball against the rear door, away from him. She makes herself as small as possible. Jeremy hops out of the driver’s side, humming to himself. He is naked and evidently pleased with himself. He comes around to the front of the Mustang and peers closely at the hood.

  Monkey footprints, he says. How fucking cool is that?

  He cocks his right hand into an imaginary gun and fires several shots into the sky, then raises both hands over his head. He does a manic little dance and stops suddenly, his face shining.

  Children everywhere will weep tonight, he cries. For Curious George must die.

  Jeremy shrugs happily and cruises around to the passenger side. Huck backs away from him. Jeremy opens the rear door and extends a gallant hand. Daphne hesitates, then allows him help her out. By now she has pulled on a pair of black silk pants and she stands in the driveway in black pants and bra, the blood still wet on her face and shoulders.

  Daphne is obviously confused. What with loss of blood and so forth.

  I glance at Miller, who stares at the sky as if he despises the sun.

  Thanks, says Daphne.

  No worries, says Jeremy.

  He stands there, nodding. Then turns and begins to knock the remaining shards of glass from the broken window frame. He glances at Daphne.

  You might want to go inside, he says. You’re bleeding pretty good.

  Daphne stares at him. You’re a fucking psycho.

  Jeremy smiles, pleased. Have a nice day, he says.

  Daphne hurries up the steps and now my humanity kicks in and I have half a mind to ask if she’s okay, if she wants me to look at that head wound, but according to Jeremy’s brief instructions, Poe had too much to drink last night and it’s got him in a bad mood, so he must leer at her instead.

  I barely notice that Miller has stepped into the shadows.

  Daphne’s breasts are fantastic.
Unreal, but fantastic. The red bra barely contains them and she is so skinny that her belly is concave. Daphne doesn’t look so healthy, when I think about it. Daphne looks like a starved junkie with a boob job. She looks like your average Hollywood actress. It may be inappropriate but I can’t help remembering that hypnotic massage she dropped on me at the Paradise.

  Despair, alienation. Loneliness and hatred, oh boy.

  There were visible threads of each of these between us but still she had the hands and mouth of a fallen angel. In that brief moment before I punked out, Daphne was divine. She could have turned my friends into pigs. But a hired blowjob is no way to start a friendship and now Daphne brushes past me, slamming the door. I finish my coffee and wait for Jeremy, who is whistling as he removes a pair of jeans from the trunk of the Mustang. I watch as he hops around the driveway, pulling his pants on over skinny legs.

  He approaches me, now.

  Big brother, he says. How goes?

  Uh-huh. When did you get out? I say.

  Yesterday. He stands on the bottom step, grinning at me.

  That’s a nice car.

  Umm, he says. It’s stolen.

  Bad luck about the window.

  Tragic, he says. Fucking tragic.

  Who’s the girl?

  Whore, he says. Asian, isn’t she. There’s nothing like yellow pussy in my book.

  Sure, I say.

  Anyway, he says. She doesn’t speak English. Don’t pay her any mind.

  I just heard her call you a psycho, I say. In perfectly good English.

  That’s strange, he says.

  It irritates me to realize that this scene isn’t half bad. And the monkey carried it.

  You can’t stay here, I say.

  Why not?

  I shrug, tired of the conversation. It’s not safe.

  Jeremy grins. Did you see the monkey?

  Jingle, jangle.

  Miller steps out of the shadows, coins jingling in his left fist, and Jeremy stops laughing as if his cord were yanked from the wall. He peers up at Miller like a kid sweating for approval, glowing and nervous at once. Miller wipes at his mouth and I see that he’s drooling slightly, he’s losing his cool and he’s losing it in a slow, dangerous boil. His eyes seem to shrink and the white trickle of drool reappears at the corner of his mouth. His face turns gray and cloudy and a single vein stands out in his forehead.