We All Love the Beautiful Girls

by Joanne Proulx

  “Feel this,” he’d said and placed Michael’s hand on his chest. Michael had pulled back quickly, but what he’d felt during those few seconds of contact, well, he doesn’t know a lot about diabetes, but he does know no heart is meant to beat that fast. It had been his fear that the kid was going to go into some sort of low-sugar shock, have a diabetes-induced heart attack right there on the dock, that had pushed him up to the house.

  Michael turns the handle—unlocked. A warning beep sounds. He strides up the hall to a glowing keypad, punches in a 2, a 0…his own heart as wild as the boy’s, he doesn’t know what he’ll do if the alarm goes off. Grab some food, race to the dock, shove it at the kid and get the hell out of here, with or without the boy…another 0, a 5…the year they bought the house.

  The beeping stops. Michael’s heart eases back to a life-sustaining rhythm. The bastard, he thinks as he finds the switch and dims the hall lights, the bastard hadn’t even bothered to lock the garage door or change the code on the security system. Peter believes Michael to be that harmless. He is that immune to guilt.

  He walks to the back of the house, toward the kitchen, but is drawn to the living room’s big picture window. They’re definitely getting their money’s worth tonight—and his—with the moon-lit river view. The dock’s the brightest wedge on the silvery plate of water, the trees climbing the far bank a ghostly still of shadow and light. It’s easy to forget the moon. Everything outside—even the squat un-beauty of the pitching machine—looks to be glowing of its own accord. Like the snow the night he found Finn. The whole backyard. Tonight, it’s Dirk collapsed on a dock chair, his running shoes a bite of red in the monochrome.

  Mia blames him. She withdrew. Lied to him about the prosthesis. Is probably fucking their lawyer.

  On his way to the bathroom—he has to take a piss and has no plan to flush—he passes Frankie’s room. The music from the river pounds in through the open window. When the curtains billow back, he sees the boy flat out on the dock. He rushes into the room, neat and white, and with one knee on the bed, yanks back the curtain. He’s picturing flashing lights and paramedics, police with pencils and notepads, a dying diabetic boy.

  The kid lifts an arm, brings his hand to his lips, and in the grey glow, a small, orange ember shines.

  Christ! The asshole’s smoking a joint. Michael pushes away from the window. As his foot hits the floor something sharp catches him low on the leg. He reaches down, grabbing for his ankle, but instead his hand meets metal, curved and cool and poking from under Frankie’s bed. He wraps a finger around, what?—the prong of some garden tool?—and pulls.

  His life. He no longer understands his life.

  From beneath the bed, he drags a two-pronged hook, a bloodless metal hand trailing a bloodless plastic sleeve.

  —

  HONESTLY? IN ALL my fantasies, in every single one, I imagined the Aberdeen Gentlemen’s Club would be more fun. A lot more fun. Not once did I imagine banging a handless arm into a bar. Not once did I imagine Eric Kelly shoving an engagement ring in my face. Not once did I imagine being eighteen and in love with my twenty-three-year-old babysitter who was going to marry some douchebag for his money. Not fucking once.

  I was right about one thing. The washroom smells like piss. The door slams shut behind me as I wander up the hall. I’m not sure where I’m going, not back to the VIP room, not home—I’m too drunk to go home, have no money to get there—not anywhere near Eric and the blue velvet bulge in his pocket. Or his brother, the little fucking psycho. Open it. That crazy fucking voice. No wonder my dad never liked him. He is a bad influence.

  I’m almost at the main room when the girl from the stage swings around the corner. Hips, hair, long gold chain, everything swinging now. She’s got on a little white minidress but it’s see-through, so it doesn’t really count. Her face lights up when she sees me. Big, gleaming smile. Big, gleaming eyes. A swoop of black at each corner so up close she looks kind of Egyptian.

  Hey, she says, I’ve been looking for you. A hand reaching up to finger one of Eric’s buttons. With the high-jumper legs and shin-slitting heels she’s a couple inches taller than me. Jess is shorter. I have to bend down to kiss her.

  Aren’t you the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen, she says. You old enough to even be in here?

  Yeah, I say. No.

  She laughs, her breath like cinnamon gum. I slip my arm behind me, try to make it look casual.

  I saw it, she says. Before. Trust me. The shit I’ve seen in here, it’s no big deal.

  My fake smile frozen in place.

  You want to go back? I’ll give you a dance. Or we could go upstairs where it’s private. See what happens. Eric’s treat. Although you’re so hot I’d take you up there for free. What do you think? You wanna go? I’ve got half an hour before I have to go back on. Hey, you okay? she says. You look a little pale.

  I feel a little pale. I lean up against the wall. Close my eyes and let myself die a little right there in the hall. There is nothing good about dying in a strip club, nothing beautiful or expansive, no love or fearlessness anywhere nearby. Just my lungs collapsing and the reek of men and a nameless stripper reaching for my arm.

  Shit, she says. Come with me. You look like you’re gonna pass out. Don’t pass out in here. The bouncers will freak. You have ID, right? Tell me you have ID.

  She leads me through the main room and down a narrow hallway, pushes open a black metal door, and we’re outside.

  It’s better outside. I can breathe outside. The un-pissy air. The un-Eric’ed space. Little waves slapping around a tiny pool. A concrete rectangle and a couple of lounge chairs around it.

  She parks me by a potted plant. A tree, I guess. The leaves dark and waxy. A mini version of an actual tree. I hang my head and concentrate on dragging oxygen into my lungs.

  The girl comes back with a glass of water. I drink it fast. The ice cubes frozen to the bottom let go and crack into my teeth.

  Too much booze? she says.

  Tequila, I say. Beer. Tequila.

  You look better. She looks like a mirage, a porn-star Cleopatra. She has a bikini on under the dress, three tiny triangles of white cloth, a couple pieces of string.

  I was worried there for a minute, she says. I thought you were going to drop.

  My girlfriend broke up with me, I tell her. I guess it kind of hit me. I think it was kind of that.

  Oh, poor baby. Well, you know what they say. The best way to get over a girl is to get under another one. Or on top, she says, taking my glass. I’ll let you pick.

  The curves of her body filmy under her dress. Those legs. The dark gap.

  She was just fooling around with me, I say. Just using me, I guess. She didn’t, you know— I reach over and puncture a leaf with my thumbnail, an ooze of whitish sap.

  Bitch. She takes a step closer. I take a step back so we’re both behind the plant, her body bumping against mine. Let me cheer you up. I still have time. Tab’s basically open so we can do whatever you want.

  Whatever I want.

  I gather her hair in my hand, inhale. Christ, it even smells like Jess’s. I want to run my other hand over her body, that’s whatever I want, but I have to let go of her hair to touch her leg, that long, lean thigh. The brush of her dress on my wrist, her ass curving into my palm.

  I want this. This easy thing, not love, not love, just this girl’s ass in my hand and her body pressing into me and nothing else ever again.

  You like to bang? she says.

  Yeah, I like to bang.

  I lift her leg and settle her foot on the planter. Her gold spiked heel right beside my hip, the same position we were in in the bathroom that first time. I pull her closer, watch her little G-string move against the outline of my dick, her ass rocking in my hand, she’s reaching for my belt when something smashes into my face, the taste of blood in my mouth and a shriek from the girl and three of us stumbling around behind the planter. Me and the girl and Eli, fuck, Eli looking insane, panting, with
blood on his knuckles—I don’t even know how he did it, how he punched me so hard with the girl right in front of me.

  You knew I fucking liked her, he hisses, drunk as shit and swaying, his fists up. His eyes swing between me and the girl, I can’t tell which one of us he’s going to hit next, and I’m pretty sure there’s blood running out of my nose and I’m holding both arms out, like some perverted Jesus, holding Eli off, from the girl who got out of the way fast, a splatter of red on the shoulder of her dress.

  Eli. What the fuck? Eli.

  You guys are going to get thrown out, the girl says. You better fucking stop.

  You knew I wanted her and you didn’t fucking care. Eli all messy and pathetic and mean.

  She’s a stripper, okay. She’s just, like, some, some prostitute.

  The girl throws her shoulders back so she’s about seven feet tall. You—she gives me and my missing hand and the rod in my pants a cold warrior glare. And you—she pushes past Eli and his fists, completely unafraid in her see-through dress. And your fucking perv brother. You’re all cavemen. I hope you beat each other to death. Or the bouncers do it for you.

  Through the leaves, the tick tock of her ass, the snap of her heels, the silent swish of her hair. The pull and slam of the metal fire door as she disappears inside. I’m still staring when Eli comes at me again. And because I can’t quite believe Eli, my best friend, is actually going to hit me again, he manages to hit me a couple more times. Quick, hard punches, all on the one side of my face.

  I finally get my arms onto his shoulders and wrestle him back, my stump pushing hard against another human being. I force him backwards, slam him into the planter until his knees give and he’s deep in the branches, the snap of twigs and his body surrounded by leaves, his butt pressing into the dark, damp soil.

  It takes him a good thirty seconds to fight his way out—it would be funny if he hadn’t just punched me in the face. He doesn’t even clear the twigs out of his hair before he throws the next thing at me.

  I saw the way you were looking at her, he says.

  Oh my god, Eli, she’s a strip—

  Jess, he snaps. I saw how you were looking at her. The whole time. In the car. In our kitchen. At your birthday. I don’t know what the fuck you think you’re doing, but Eric will rip your fucking heart out. I’ll rip your fucking heart out.

  Eli. I say his name firmly, loudly, so I don’t sound scared. He’s hunched up, panting over his fists. There’s a slash of blood across his cheek. From a branch, maybe. A twig. We shouldn’t even be here. We’re not old enough to even be here. We should be in the forest. Cruising down hills on our boards past real trees. Sturdy trees. Owls flying overhead.

  You think, Eli says, you think you can come into our house and steal our women.

  Steal your women? Can you just lis—

  Did you fuck her that night? In my house? Did you fuck her in my house?

  No. What? No.

  You’re a piece of shit, Finn. His face is all twisted up, his eyes runny. You’re a fucking piece of shit.

  I didn’t. It’s harder now not to sound scared, with him crying and everything.

  I saw you.

  I swear to God, I di—

  I saw you. He sways in front of me. His chest heaving, his fists dropped. And I turned out the light.

  The air sizzles around us as if lightning has just struck close by. What?

  You knew I liked her, he sobs, and you didn’t fucking care. You can have any girl but you took the one I wanted, you took her into the laundry room and you fucked her in there and then you went into the backyard and I saw you and I turned out the light.

  Eli says these things to me.

  The branch behind him is broken. Dangling down. Dog-legged left. The leaves on it will die. Because I pushed him into the tree. Because he punched me. Because of what I did to Frankie. The leaves will die because of what I did to her. What Jess did to me. What Eli did. What we all did to each other.

  You turned out the light?

  I was mad, he says. I was wasted. He stumbles forward and takes another swing, weak and pathetic.

  I go sit by the pool. Dangle my legs in the water. My jeans wobble. My Vans go extra-large. Carefully I roll up the sleeve of Eric’s shirt, right up to my elbow.

  My friend did this, I tell myself. Eli did this to me. But it doesn’t make sense. I can hear him crying behind me. Can see him floating over me in the pool. My stump wavers on the water beside his wavering head. I lean forward. Watch the blood drip from my nose, dirtying up the blue.

  —

  DESPITE EVERYTHING—THE FIGHT with Finn, the sex-scented close-up with Mia’s thong, the diabetic meltdown on the dock, the unplanned B&E, the goddamn hand that crawled out from under Frankie’s bed—when the first window breaks, a thrill rips through Michael. Amped-up. High-voltage. And Dirk, or Bunner, or whoever the hell the boy is beside him, lifts his head to the sky and howls.

  The kid is back to cocky after smoking a fatty, draining a glass of orange juice and wolfing down a piece of bread that Michael had slathered with peanut butter in the kitchen, his hand shaking so badly the knife had knocked out a tune on the inside of the jar.

  “You get jumped by a ghost in there, or what?” the kid had asked when Michael handed over the food. And when the boy held out the roach, he hadn’t argued. The wind swept the smoke downriver. Beside the dock, beneath twenty feet of water, two chairs buried in muck and weeds.

  Before he’d smoked, Michael had actually been thinking of getting the hell out of there. Plan C, he’d say to the kid. Pack up and go home. The boy would freak, but Michael didn’t care. He was that rattled by what he’d found under the bed. And his anger, or bravado or whatever it was that had brought him and his pitching machine this far, was gone. He hadn’t even been able to look at the thing on his way back to the dock. Pointed at the house, its hopper choked with balls. Christ. It suddenly seemed so obscene. This was Helen’s home, for god’s sake. This was Frankie’s home. Not to mention, this whole thing? Was pretty fucking illegal.

  But now, now he can see the justice of blowing the windows out of a thieving partner’s house. Now he can appreciate the power of the Arm and the rush that comes from breaking something beautiful, undefended, something that isn’t yours but should be.

  The boy nudges the back of the machine left so the next ball punches a second dark-holed sun through the glass just right of the first. It takes another blast before the pane shatters completely and slices of living room window starburst onto the flagstone below.

  “Sick,” the kid says. “So fuckin’ sick.”

  Together they jimmy the machine this way and that, destroying all the windows on the upper level. They whoop, high and wild, after every direct hit. It’s become a game of destruction. It’s nobody’s home, it’s nobody’s property, it’s a shooting gallery of glass, their shooting gallery of glass. The music from across the river is still going strong, but it’s been stripped back, it’s all drums now, a frantic tribal beat, quick in Michael’s chest, it makes him think sacrifice, a sacrifice going on upriver, an orgy, virgin blood being swallowed by sand, swept away by fast-moving water. He lines up the throwing arm with the sliding doors and punches the on-off button in sync with the bang of a drum. The arm ticks back, springs forward. There is a millisecond delay between the ball hitting the door and the glass blooming aqua green, another millisecond before it explodes into a million jagged pieces.

  “Awesome,” Michael says. “So fucking awesome.”

  “That bitch is tempered,” the kid laughs. “That bitch knows how to blow.”

  —

  THREE GUYS IN black shirts and jeans gyrate to “Pour Some Sugar on Me,” one tall and skinny, one short and stocky, one built and buff. At the chorus, they rip open their shirts, revealing slatted ribs, wobbly man boobs, darkly oiled skin. Mia finds herself cheering along with the crowd. The men end on their knees, one behind the other, asses on heels, hips thrusting forward on beat.

  F
our gorgeous Middle Eastern women do an erotic belly dance without taking off a stitch of clothing. A crooner in an old-timey suit and a drawn-on beard sings a slow, sweet ballad. Male or female Mia can’t tell, and the instant she stops trying to figure it out it becomes irrelevant. People, just people, of every shape and size flaunting their stuff on stage, flesh wobbling, whips snapping, genders blurred. Mia can’t help but laugh. She feels glowy and bright-lit, with what? Amazement? Possibility? A spark of another kind?

  She remembers how uncertain she’d felt standing naked, alone in David’s bathroom. How critical she’d been, then defiant, then angry, hateful even. There is none of that here tonight. Even the S&M acts seem playful. And who is she to judge, anyway? Mia liked her husband tying her up in the closet, at least until he decided to be nice.

  On stage, the Asian woman in the velvet bustier dances in the feathery shade of two Vegas-styled fans. The girl beside her leans in, green eyes glittering, devil horns strobing red. “Sexy, right?”

  Mia shouts over the music. “They’re all so confident. And uninhibited.”

  “I know! It’s so empowering!” she says, as the next dancer steps on stage.

  From beneath the hem of a leopard print coat, too large and hot for the season, come a pair of skinny legs, clad in knee-high gold boots. On top, honey hair teased to a froth, two feet wide and two feet tall. The dancer’s makeup is all parody, sky blue shadow raccooned round big blue eyes, lashes drawn on like a Raggedy-Ann doll’s, red lipstick lopsided, sexuality askew. Fast, plucky guitar chords twang from the speakers, turn snarly, the hard bang of a drum, and the performer begins lurching around the stage.

  “Oh my god!” the girl beside Mia hollers. “PJ Harvey! Fifty Foot Queenie. I love this song.” The act, the music, so different again from the rest. Raw and howling, this performer is a punk amidst coquettes, aggressively out of control, staggering like a drunken fawn. Metallic flashes from beneath her ill-fitting coat, the music a muddy, unrelenting rip of sound. The girl starts spinning, the tails of her coat fly out, only a shimmering miniskirt beneath, skin bronzed, a huge silver peace sign hanging from neck to navel, her tits riding its upper curve.