Bodies and Souls

by John Rechy

  “Why don't you really kill yourself and leave him be?”

  Orin uncovered Teddy's ears. The woman wrapped her bandaged hands about the boy's neck, fingers interlocked.

  They drove along the craggy Malibu Coast, into the sinuous road along the forested hills of Topanga Canyon. Bands of aging young people remain like abandoned gypsies from an ancient time of protest.

  “Mildred Pierce was such a good mother.” Lisa wanted to cry, Teddy's presence lingered. “She actually confessed to a crime her daughter committed, can you imagine loving your daughter that much?” In the movies, yes, there, she recognized “love” and devotion. “And Joan Crawford was not a bad mother!” she said with some franticness, sitting Pearl up peremptorily. “Look what she had to do in Rain—because that preacher was so mean to her he raped her! And in A Woman's Face! Sacrificed, sacrificed! She wasn't a bad mother!”

  From the crest of the road, the night city smashed into bits of lighted glass below and away.

  At a market on Franklin Avenue, they stopped to buy a barbecued chicken, potato salad, cold drinks. This time at the checkout stand, Orin waited for Jesse's and Lisa's equal share of the cost.

  What had become distanced in their minds throughout the cluttered day assaulted them as they entered the motel room: the events of last night. At least they seized Jesse and Lisa, who felt suddenly awkward. Orin just turned on the television. Then he spread the chicken on paper plates on the round table. Orin always ate very formally, as if he had been carefully taught to do so. At the beginning of each meal, Jesse and Lisa would try to match his formality, but by the end they always gave up. Now they all ate hungrily.

  “…—controversial visitors,” Kenneth Manning was saying. The dark woman next to him said, “I understand, Ken, that Cardinal Unger was heckled by a group chanting, ‘Our Bodies Belong to Us.’ “ “Yes, Eleanor,” Kenneth Manning said, “and later in the program we'll have footage on that. After this brief message, I'll be back with Eleanor Cavendish and more on the—…”

  “How did it feel when you pretended to be dead, Lisa?” Orin asked her.

  Lisa frowned. “I just pretended.”

  “What did Pearl feel?”

  “I just pretended, Orin!” Lisa said.

  “Tell us, Lisa,” Orin said gently.

  “Pearl Chavez felt relief that her mother was dead,” Lisa said—just to end this, “but she only pretended to die.”

  Jesse was annoyed by the confusing moment—which Lisa and Orin seemed to understand. “Sometimes you talk like ole Pearl's you!” he aimed carelessly.

  Lisa looked quickly at Orin, actually expecting that he would answer Jesse, and then ask her a very important question, about Pearl, about herself. Who is she, Lisa? she expected his words. But his eyes were on the screen again. “Oh, you, Orin!” Lisa broke her own mood, a child again. “All morbid and everything, Orin!”

  There was a new look now and then on Lisa's face, Jesse was beginning to notice. She seemed to be changing—really changing. And the cuteness was firming into beauty. But that wasn't all. Hard to believe they'd been together only a few days.

  “… —reaction to last night's segment on the sleazy world of pornography in Mandy Lang-Jones's continuing investigation into The Lower Depths’,” said Eleanor Cavendish. The camera pulled to one side to reveal Mandy Lang-Jones now seated at the table with Kenneth Manning and Eleanor Cavendish. “Tomorrow we'll take you to the night streets of Hollywood for a look at male prostitution, young bodies for sale to the highest bidder; high stakes for high money— …”

  Orin consulted his pocket watch. He turned off the sound on the newscast. Again he seemed to hesitate before shifting the channels—as if withholding a moment he had to experience. Other times he seemed to be extending the anticipation. Lisa turned away from the screen.

  Sister Woman's diaphanous sleeves glided before the imitated sky. Without sound, she seemed to be performing a seated dance with her hands. The telephone number appeared across the bottom of the screen.

  Orin's hands reached for the telephone. He raised it to his ear, his mouth. He dialed once, twice— …

  Dave Clinton: “Slave Auction”

  “He's ready for combat! Ready to shoot! Tough, mean, and ready—and just for you! Ladies! The Combat Sniper!” The femmish older man in a tuxedo introduced the new act at Tiffany's, the city's most popular male-exotic-dancers nightclub for ladies only.

  Bloused battle-camouflaged pants streaked brown, dark green, orange, army fatigue cap cocked over dark eyebrows, ammo belts criss-crossed on his chest, heavy-booted feet spread, imitation rifle at a diagonal before him, Dave Clinton thrust his hips out within the lighted sphere of the stage. More sexual than handsome, he had an uneven-featured virility, emphasized by a thick but trimmed moustache and a solid natural build. Under the cap, his dark hair was shortish, just beginning to thin.

  “Wow!” screamed the middle-aged woman who sat nightly in one of the front tables of Tiffany's, just feet from the stage. “Wow!” echoed her daughter next to her. Others among the two hundred or more women filling the club to capacity added their approval—hollered, applauded, whistled from the darkness. They were all types—young, old, plain, pretty, fat, slender, even beautiful. They sat in tables closely arranged in ascending tiers about the round, just barely elevated platform.

  “And you thought nothing could top—… Oops!” A naughty hand flew to the lips of the emcee. “And you thought nothing could surpass our Construction Worker in his hard, hard … hat!—and he used his drill just for you!… Now shoot at them, Sniper!” he said to Dave and he waltzed away.

  Now a fattish woman with a coiled sculpture of bleached hair and a mask of makeup—“the hostess”—replaced the emcee; she was dressed in a long blue dress, cut in a wide V to expose heavy propped breasts. During each performance, she stalked throughout the audience, the wire of the microphone she held to her mouth trailing behind her as she rasped insults at the women, who greeted her with enthusiastic applause. “You're a bunch of savages!” she screamed at them now. “Horny savages! Shove it at them, Sniper! Assault ‘em with your deadly weapon!”

  From the glassed coop over the circular stage, slurred, taped words and music groaned:

  Ya say ya got a body!

  “I'll say you got a body!” a woman moaned. She ran up to Dave and clasped one of his scuffed boots. A bare-chested male attendant restrained her. She surrendered dramatically but easily. The hostess shouted at her, “Now don't you go and drown in all that wetness of yours, sweetie, cause the dancers might slip on it!” The women howled their appreciation.

  I say if I can put a hole

  right through ya—…!

  “Through me, soldier boy!” screamed another woman. “Put it through me!” The hostess whipped at the electric wire, moving toward the screaming woman: “Honey, your case would require the Construction Worker's drill and an interior decorator!” The assaulted woman squealed with delight.

  In the lighted globe within the staring darkness, Dave unbuttoned his shirt and froze into a sexy pose.

  An’ if I can shoot into your

  heart—…

  “You got it, honey! Shoot, Sniper! Shoot!” a voice exhorted. Echoed approval greeted her words.

  The hostess yelled into the microphone, “What a roomful of disgusting tramps!”—arousing laughter.

  In several gyrations, Dave tossed his body forward, back, forward—removing the fatigue shirt, slipping it off under the ammo belts, exposing his dark-furred chest.

  “Whattaya want him to do, girls?” the stalking hostess yelled.

  “Take! It! Off!” pled the women, on cue.

  Then you ain't go no soul!

  “You don't need one, Sniper!” growled a throaty voice.

  “Show us what you have got!” another screamed.

  “Like him to set up house in you?” the hostess aimed at the woman, who nodded, “Yes, yes!”

  Dave tossed his shirt to one side; grasping finge
rs rose out of the darkness demanding it. Holding the imitation rifle in one hand, he floated the other over his groin. As the women shrieked, he closed his eyes, dredging private images, beginning a hard-on to increase the mound under his pouch. It grew.

  The roar increased.

  To make sure he could strip without removing his boots, he had slit the sides of the bloused pants. Even so, they tangled on one of the boots. He had to hop awkwardly on one foot to secure the stance. Laughter punctuated the lighted globe of the stage. The laughter from the women was spontaneous, natural. For these moments it seemed to render the early hoots of delight forced.

  “Clumsy damn fag!”

  Defiantly, Dave stopped his movements.

  From the darkness the same woman's voice said heatedly, “This clumsy waiter! Spilled my drink on me! He was watching the strip—and it's supposed to be for ladies! Fag!” she hurled again at the waiter.

  “Cunt!” the shirtless waiter, with bow tie and starched cuffs, hurled back at her.

  Shuffling sounds, protests, shouting voices muffled.

  The hostess took quick action: “Whattaya want the Sniper to do?” she incited the expected command.

  “Take it off!'’ Screams of encouragement aimed at the stage shoved away the incident. “Cummon, Sniper!” “Off!” “Off!”

  Dave removed dark green briefs—he waved them over his head as if they were a lasso. Stripped to brown-dyed jockstrap, boots, fatigue cap, ammo belts, he thrust the rifle out, withdrew it, thrust it again.

  “Uh, uh, uh!” a woman's gasps punctuated each thrust as if she were coming.

  “Rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat!” a woman gunned back with her bumping hips. Another ran to the edge of the lighted arc and grabbed Dave's legs before an attendant pulled her back. There was little resistance from the women—as if they counted on being stopped.

  Dave held the rifle pointed out from his groin. He shoved his pelvis out and “fired.” Hips jerking in spasms of simulated orgasm, he moved about the edge of the stage, then onto the main floor, gyrating his body along the tables, his crotch almost, almost brushing the shoulders of one woman; almost, almost connecting it to another's lips—as he reached for the bills of money they held out to him. The women's hands tantalized with the tips, luring him to them. A woman tucked a bill into the cleavage of her lush chest.

  Dave's body bent, still dancing. His head inched toward the woman's breasts, the money peeking out between them. With his mouth, he fished out the bill. And he closed his eyes, releasing this image on the screen of his mind: a beard-stubbled man in a low-dipped tank top, dark-flecked bare legs over lowered pants—…

  Other hands reached out, trying to stuff bills into Dave's jockstrap, the elastic band about his hips and buttocks. Gathering the bills, Dave removed the jockstrap, naked now except for an olive green pouch at his groin. With a flaunted tip, a woman “purchased” the jockstrap. Another raised her dress, held out her leg, and stuffed a bill into the top of her stocking. Dave squatted, legs spread. Arcing slowly toward the woman's thigh, he clenched the money between his lips and closed his eyes again, releasing another carefully gathered image: a blond youngman in faded torn jeans, the crack of his taut ass showing—…

  A woman clasped a bill between her teeth. Dave's lips connected with hers. She released the money, pushing it with her tongue, as—eyes closed—he unleashed another memory: a lanky, shirtless man leaning against a van, his cock exposed—… Bills fell to the floor, at his feet; he reached for them and others with his hand. Kissing women at random now, he flushed out all the erotic male images of this afternoon's incursion into the cruising area of Griffith Park, images gathered to give him the hot charge he needed for his performance.

  “Take it all off, let's see it all!” a woman growled, and there was real frenzy in her voice.

  The hostess held out her microphone to the woman. “You'll have to settle for this!” The women applauded and laughed.

  Dave danced back up the steps, back to the circular platform. The emcee floated out as Dave began to move beyond the cone of light.

  “Too much! Wasn't the Sniper too much, girls?” the emcee camped. “Whew! … And now, for your further delectation, we present the ever-popular Lumberjack-off—… I mean, jack!”

  The dressing room was full of lights, mirrors, sweaty male bodies when Dave entered it. The Muscleman had already gone on—but he was oiling his body again, obviously for the benefit of the Sailor. The Cowboy was testing different angles for his hat. The Construction Worker was practicing removing his pants without stumbling—always a problem. The Marine was preparing to go on.

  “Get the girls hot enough for me?” the Marine drawled at Dave. Dave disliked him, and so did the Construction Worker and the Sailor—both open homosexuals. The Marine was always talking about how glad he was they didn't let “fags” in this place and about all the women he fucked for big money; the Muscleman would say, “Yeah,” deepening his voice. It was true several of the women included their telephone numbers with the tips, and that some of the men hustled them. It was also true that not all the dancers—and probably not all the cute shirtless waiters—were homosexuals—but most were, or would be, or went—claimed to go—“both ways.” Dave had made it with several of the performers and the waiters—and, yes, at times he suspected they were all “gay.” He saw no contradiction to his “gay pride” in stripping for women; like most of the others, he played a role and played it convincingly.

  “Man, if you can't turn them on yourself—…” Dave tossed at the Marine.

  “Shee-it,” the Marine said. “I got this Bel Air woman so hot after me—ask her if I'm a fag!”

  “Great act, Dave.” Jay, the owner, walked into the dressing room to congratulate him. “It's real today.” This was Dave's first night as the Combat Sniper; before, he had been the Telephone Lineman. Gray-haired and squat, Jay resembled a wrestler past his prime. “I'm thinking of moving it up for the last act next week. Terrific response from the girls!”

  The Marine glowered at Dave.

  “The rifle's gonna become too obviously fake, though.” Jay had provided it, and the ammo belts—his son's. He gave Dave the name of a place that specialized in “realistic” toy weapons. Then he told everyone: “Oh, and we're having a new act tomorrow, real daring, real today.”

  Jay liked to create suspense, even, at times, seemed to encourage fierce rivalry among the “macho” dancers—this resulted in even more sexual performances.

  Soon all the dancers would gather on stage for the “finale.” Now that the Marine had finished his act—winking relentlessly at the women as he stood almost naked for moments on the stage—the hostess was introducing some of the shirtless waiters.

  “It would take all of these to satisfy you,” she hurled at a conservatively dressed woman, “and there'd still be room to serve tea—and what do you think of this muscleman?” She touched the shirtless waiter's round pectorals. His waist was just slightly thickening, and, like some of the others, he did not appear nearly as young as he had in the subdued lights; careful erasing makeup almost concealed the creased edges of his mouth and eyes as he stood among the other shirtless men, all acting very masculine, not always succeeding. The hostess's fingers outlined the muscleman's abdominal muscles—but pulled away from the fleshier part. “You know who he is when he's not waiting on you hungry cannibals?” She licked the microphone. “He's a star, girls, a famous star of the cinema—that right, Oklahoma?” she asked the flexing man, who nodded. Then she brushed the waiters away. “I'm tired of all of you. Bring out the dancers!”

  Now in abbreviations of their costumes, wearing just enough to suggest their earlier fantasy-identity—Dave and the other performers invaded the clearing. To the shrieks of women and the moans of loud music, the men stripped quickly to their pouches.

  The hostess ended this night's performance: “All right, ladies, and now we wish you all pleasant—I mean, wet—dreams!”

  Dave left quickly. In the parking lot,
he got into his open jeep—the tough vehicle's ruggedness augmented his own. He loved the sense of “rough freedom” that driving it fast on the freeways gave him.

  In his late, very late, thirties, Dave Clinton almost always appeared much younger. But there were those times—after a long, active weekend especially—when the disguised years ganged up, each day attacked. In the “gay world,” few types survive the short erotic demarcations of cherished youth; Dave was the epitome of one of those: rugged, a “man's man,” attractive to the young and the older. Earlier this year, in a contest that drew tough competition from the city's many cruising bars, he was chosen “Mr. Macho of the Year.” He had no problem at all getting into the most desirable “private” bathhouses and orgy rooms in the city, even those that post signs—or have men guarding the door—to keep out “undesirables—fats, femmes, and over 35's.”

  Now Dave entered an area where sex occurs at night in the alleys of a dark two-block stretch of garages and parked trucks. His “combat” fatigues would blend well in any cruising area.

  Often pointed out as an example of a “truly liberated gay man,” Dave loved what he called his “real world.” Not only was he desired in it, he was well liked—a rare combination in an arena where potential lovers are potential rivals for the same body. He was proud to call himself a “political activist” —organizing and participating in fundraisers for “worthy gay causes”—not the radical ones, though, which created the dreaded “negative images—the stereotypes we have to overcome,” he would point out with conviction.

  He had had several affairs, which ended after a few months, usually with mutual accusations of “infidelity.” Now he was satisfied to live alone—in a tasteful, masculine apartment in an attractive building with a flower-spattered garden about a pool that shimmered like tinfoil.

  Years ago he had aspired to be an actor; he had had a bit part in a movie by a famous closeted director. As a lifeguard in the film, he had warned a beach bully: “Careful with the ball.” That was his only line. As “Clint Dave,” he had posed nude for Stud Studios and appeared in Party girl magazine.