by C. D. Payne
“Man, I wish she’d keep quiet about that.”
“I found a condom by the pool, Rick, but it was empty.”
“That’s not surprising.”
“I don’t think it counts if you didn’t come.”
“God, I wish I could believe that, Fuzzy.”
“I’m Lana’s first real boyfriend, Rick. Sonya got jealous when Lana lost her virginity, so I guess you got drafted to even the score. Chicks are pretty competitive about stuff like that. But I don’t think Sonya likes you that much.”
“That’s a relief,” I said, sipping my beer.
“Sonya’s stuck on this guy Trent Preston, but he’s married. Lana says she walks by his house about five times a day.”
“Really? That’s sick.”
I’ve never walked by Sheeni’s house more than four times in one day.
“What do you think of Lana?” Fuzzy asked.
“She’s very nice, Fuzzy. No offense, but I could stare at your girlfriend’s naked body all day long.”
“I feel the same way. She’s not dumb either. She just talks that way because she’s from West Virginia. I hear you’re putting the moves on Sheeni Saunders.”
“We pal around together.”
“I better warn you a good friend of mine is totally stuck on that chick.”
“You mean that kid who’s wanted by the cops?” I asked.
“Yeah, Nick Twisp. He looks harmless, but the guy is pretty devious. If he finds out you’re messing with Sheeni, he could make your life miserable in ways you haven’t even dreamed of.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I replied, flattered. “So what’s the latest on this Twisp guy?”
“Not much, Rick. I got a call from him a few weeks ago, then zip. The cops haven’t found him, I know that. Vijay Joshi thinks he might be dead.”
“Sounds like wishful thinking to me.”
“You kind of look like him, Rick,” commented Fuzzy. “Your body, I mean.”
“I’m sure I’m much more muscular than that wimpy guy.”
“Maybe a little. It’s funny, Nick had this mole on his left nut, and—not that she was checking out your package—but Lana says you got one there too.”
“Oh, moles like that are very common,” I insisted.
“Really? I never seen one besides Nick’s—not that I spend much time gawking in locker rooms. But I am the manager of the football team.”
“Oh, well, dumb jocks rarely have them. Moles on the scrotum are a sign of intelligence. That’s a proven scientific fact, Fuzzy.”
“You can call me Frank if you want. That’s what Nick called me. I kind of miss that guy.”
“He probably misses you too, Frank. Good friends are hard to come by.”
Damn. I wonder how much a doctor would charge to take an acetylene torch to that incriminating blemish?
• • •
MONDAY, April 19 — The big story in today’s paper was the $8.8 million wrongful arrest suit filed by indignant lumber executive George W. Twisp. If Dad wins, he’ll have dinged every taxpayer in the county over a hundred bucks. Sure he may bankrupt local government, but what a valuable lesson for those rabid law-enforcement officials.
No sign of My Love in school today. I hope she’s OK. I managed to dodge a certain chatty non-virgin and actually went to all of my classes. Some of my forgetful teachers had to be reminded who I was. In study hall I penned a nasty letter to my sister impugning her integrity and demanding an additional $1,250 in cash. Better late than never, we hit the road again in driver’s ed. Apurva complimented me on dodging another logging truck, then reminded me of this evening’s dinner engagement at her house.
“Would you like to bring your friend Sonya?” she inquired.
“I better not, Apurva. She’s still madly in love with your husband.”
“Oh, he has that effect on everyone, Rick. My boy is remarkably lovable. Even my father is starting to like him!”
That’s odd, he never did a thing for me.
9:45 p.m. Wonderful aromas were wafting from Carlotta’s kitchen when I arrived promptly at six to be greeted by a hug from Apurva and hostile growls from Albert and Jean-Paul. I bet it would surprise Fuzzy’s late grandmother to know that her old yellow stove was now being used for the preparation of Red Lentils and Rice Khichadi. Many changes had been made in our former home. Furniture was rearranged, new pictures brightened the walls, an ornately patterned Indian cloth had been draped over my expensive sofa, Trent’s sports gear was much in evidence, and Granny DeFalco’s unsettling crucifix had disappeared from the bedroom wall. Her sanitized quilt remained on the double bed, which lately had witnessed so much after so many decades of so little.
I was helping Apurva grate cucumbers for the raita when Trent came in the back door from his after-school job. We shook hands, as this was his first formal meeting with my latest personality. The guy sure radiates a healthy glow. He must be in the 99th percentile of poets now for muscles. Maybe Rick S. Hunter should get a part-time job heaving around 80-pound bags of concrete-mix on sunny loading docks. Nah, I have enough trouble just doing Dogo’s laborious exercises.
Dinner was delicious, not too spicy, and completely vegetarian. Apurva has decided that although she is married to an American, she can at least be true to her roots by eschewing meat. I’m sure it would discourage America’s cattle ranchers to know that such ostentatious virility as Trent’s could be sustained on a diet of lentils and sprouted mung beans.
As we sat down to dinner in the dining room, I couldn’t help but feel more than a little envious. Here was Trent Preston, a guy with no marital ambitions, who was now enjoying blissful wedded life and dining on exotic cuisine with Ukiah’s second sexiest teen in a nice comfortable home furnished at my expense. Meanwhile, I, who have forthrightly pursued an honorable marriage with the woman of my dreams, was hiding out from the cops under an assumed name and cooking my own budget glop in a slummy bachelor’s apartment. Now I ask you, is that fair?
“I’ll never understand you Americans,” Apurva commented, passing me the basket of warm, aromatic naan. “I enjoyed the dancing last night, but don’t you think it was cruel to make sport of less fortunate peoples?”
“That wasn’t the idea, darling,” replied Trent. “Miss Najflempt, the world cultures teacher, suggested that theme to the dance committee as a way of helping students realize that not everyone in the world is as fortunate as we are.”
“All those students jeering at the beggars didn’t seem very understanding,” Apurva replied. “And someone deliberately stepped on my brother’s foot.”
“How deplorable,” I said. “I saw Vijay limping today. He must be excited about becoming an uncle.”
Apurva blushed. Perhaps that wasn’t considered by Indians a proper subject for polite dinner conversation.
“We’re all very excited,” smiled Trent. “Of course, it was a great shock to discover I’m going to have a son.”
“Not to mention a daughter,” added Apurva.
“Oh, are you expecting twins?” I asked.
Faux pas by Rick. That comment by Apurva was a surprisingly sarcastic allusion to her husband’s other acknowledged paternity. I was rescued by a vibration in my pants.
“Mind if I take this call?” I asked. “It might be important.”
“Not at all,” replied Trent, stifling a blush and not looking at his wife.
“Hello?” I ventured.
“Rick, you must really despise me!” declared My Love. “First you have sex with Sonya. And now you’re having dinner with Apurva!”
Even for Sheeni she seemed remarkably well informed. Did my phone contain some undisclosed eavesdropping function?
“Call me back in a couple of hours,” I said. “I can’t talk now.” Click. “These cellular phones are such a nuisance,” I chuckled, returning it to my pants.
“Apurva wants one, but I think they’re dangerous,” said Trent. “The antenna generates a strong output right next to your ea
r. You can get a brain tumor!”
“Yes, but usually it’s just a small attractive one you can work into your hairdo,” I joked. “Have you thought of any names for your baby?”
“We are having a slight disagreement about that,” said Apurva. “I think our son should have an American name, but Trent favors an Indian name. What do you think, Rick?”
“Well, you could compromise and give him an American-Indian name. How about Geronimo? You could call him Gerry for short.”
My phone vibrated again. God knows what kind of tumor I’m getting from the signal down there. This call I took in the privacy of Carlotta’s old bathroom.
“Sheeni, can’t this wait one goddam hour!” I hissed.
“I suppose it can, Rick. I just thought you’d like to know our trip is off.”
“Off? But why?”
“My mother intercepted my passport at the post office. My perfidious friend Vijay snitched on my escape plans.”
“That’s terrible, Sheeni,” I said, feigning distress. “But we still have the U.S. and all its territories to run away in.”
“I don’t think so, Rick, not now. That’s not all my mother intercepted. She also got my latest bank statement. She called my father and had him fly back from Palm Springs. They’re making me sign over my money to them.”
I gasped as an electric thunderbolt short-circuited my nervous system.
SHEENI’S PARENTS HAVE THEIR FILTHY HANDS ON MY MONEY!
TUESDAY, April 20 — I didn’t stay for dessert last night. I excused myself as soon as possible and wandered home in despair. I had a terrible night. It didn’t help that the “painless wart remover” I got at Flampert’s and administered to my privates started hurting like hell. It felt like my living testicles were being dissolved in strong acid. Big alarming sore down there this morning. Now my genes are even more insistent that Sheeni have our baby. It could be my one and only shot at a gifted child.
I taped up my bleeding part, but it was excruciating torture to walk, sit, or stand. I felt like staying home, but I forced myself to go to school in order to confer with My Love. No sign of her by her locker or outside her homeroom. I asked Coach Hodgland to be excused from gym, but he said I’d need a note from Nurse Filmore. No way I was going to have that woman poking around down there. I endured 40 minutes of relentless ball agony, then some towel-snappers in the shower spotted my sore and started chanting, “VD! VD! Rickie’s got an infected wee-wee! Hee-hee, VD, he’s gonna loose his pee-pee!” Real mature, guys. And these cretins are juniors?
I bailed midway through lunch when I concluded Sheeni was not on campus. I re-bandaged my now-swollen part, and spent the rest of the day flat on my back in bed. No calls from anyone. Life once again had reached a nadir. Things suck royally, but I’m not going to say they can’t get any worse. I learned my lesson on that score.
WEDNESDAY, April 21 — My nut case is a little better. The swelling went down some overnight, and it stopped bleeding. Now I have a big gross scab. It still hurts to walk though. I went to school, but decided to cut gym without consulting Coach Hodgland. I was easing down into a booth at the Beaver Lodge cafe with my scone and latte when My Love walked in the door. Surprisingly happy to see me, she planted a juicy passionate one right on my needy lips. She ordered her usual virgin latte, then rejoined me in the booth. We kissed again and I clutched her warm hand under the table.
“You’re not mad about Sonya?” I asked.
“Of course, I am, Rick. But I’m also a realist. French men are notoriously uncommitted to monogamy. This moral ambiguity is the foundation of French Literature. But remember, promiscuity is a double-edged sword.”
“Uh, I’ll keep that in mind, Sheeni. How’s it going with your parents?”
“Terrible, Rick. But I’ve got it all planned out. We’re running away together tomorrow night—assuming you can tear yourself away from Sonya and Apurva.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll be ready to go.”
“Good, Rick.” She lowered her voice. “I found out what my father did with my passport. You’ve got to help me get it out of his office safe.”
“Sheeni, why don’t you make your father turn over the passport by threatening to inform on him to your mother about his affair?”
“I already tried that, Rick. He got very offended and said I was imagining things. He admitted that he saw Mrs. Krusinowski in Palm Springs, but claimed it was only to advise her on her marital difficulties.”
“What a liar!”
“Well, he is a trained lawyer, Rick. And I have no evidence against him. We’ve got to get my passport.”
“Why do you need a passport, darling, if we don’t have the money to go to France?”
“Well, I’m not entirely destitute. And I thought we could use some of your motorcycle accident settlement money to get there, then we could both get jobs or live with your father’s family. Rick, I’m desperate. I’ll do anything you say.”
“Anything?” I asked, thinking it over. Desperation in loved ones is often a very useful quality.
“Well, virtually.”
“OK, Sheeni, I’ll help you get your passport—on one condition.”
“What, Rick?”
“That you agree to marry me.”
“Marry you! Rick, you never impressed me as the marrying kind.”
“Those are my terms, Sheeni.”
She kissed me. “Of course I’ll marry you, darling. Do you imagine I’d actually let you enter France without insisting you marry me first?”
“Really, Sheeni?” I asked, stunned. “Why’s that?”
“Because it’s the only hope I have of keeping my darling away from two million screaming French girls.”
At that moment, a desperate-looking Vijay Joshi limped into the cafe. “Sheeni!” he called, spotting us. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere! I’ve got to talk to you!”
“Let’s go, Rick,” said My Love, standing up and cutting him dead. “The atmosphere in here has become quite intolerable.”
The odious knave tried to block our way, obliging me to trod once again on his injured foot.
6:05 p.m. Sheeni wanted to go back to my place to celebrate our engagement, but my intimate injuries obliged me to decline. Even if my balls weren’t painfully disabled, I knew I’d have trouble explaining that all-too-apparent (even in the dark) scab. My Love would suspect I’d picked up something contagious from Sonya and make me wear a condom for the next 150 years. What a drag to be officially engaged and celibate to boot. It was almost like we’d found religion or stepped back into the 1950s.
Sheeni returned to school to recruit Trent for her plan. I hope she’s right about that poet’s trustworthiness. I went to Flampert’s and found an Easter Bunny mask on closeout. I’d prefer something more intimidating, but that was all they had. I also picked up some strong nylon rope and budget pigskin gloves for fingerprint prevention. I’m trying to concentrate on the incidentals and not think about what I’m supposed to do tomorrow night. I just hope these upcoming events don’t put a permanent crimp in my relationship with my future father-in-law.
10:15 p.m. Sheeni just phoned from the laundry room. Trent is set for tomorrow night. He’s going to tell Apurva he has to work late at the cement plant. To secure his cooperation Sheeni had to promise him that she wouldn’t get an abortion.
“And do you intend to keep that promise?” I asked hopefully.
“Certainly not, Rick. Promises made under duress don’t count.”
“But haven’t you promised under duress to marry me?” I pointed out. “How can I believe you’ll keep your word?”
“Because you’re making a very big sacrifice by helping me, Rick. I couldn’t go back on my promise after you did something that selfless and brave. Besides, I want to marry you.”
“Do you love me, Sheeni?”
“Of course, Rick darling. Do you love me?”
“Yes, I do. With all my heart.”
Connie wouldn’t approve o
f such a confession, but I feel honesty is important in a relationship.
THURSDAY, April 22 — Sheeni and I agreed we’d both skip school today to get ready for our escape. I found a backpack at a thrift shop to replace the one I’d lost to the L.A. cops. I went to my bank and sucked all the cash out of my safe-deposit box. The thousand bucks in my bank account I left as a reserve in case I need to write a check for some reason. Then I went around to more banks to change the $20s and $50s into $100s, so it would all fit in my money belt. People have started married life on much less, I suppose, but my imposing wad of hundreds is a big comedown from my former fortune.
2:15 p.m. Sheeni just checked in to coordinate the details of operation Flight to Marriage. She has packed her grip and hidden it in their old coal cellar. I am to leave for her father’s downtown office (four blocks south) at 7:00 p.m. sharp. At 7:10 Sheeni is to sneak out of the house and make her way to my apartment, which I will leave unlocked. At 7:30 Trent will pull up and park in the alley behind the donut shop. If all goes well, we should reach Willits with plenty of time to catch the 9:30 bus to Grants Pass (with connections to Portland).
“Don’t be nervous, Rick,” said Sheeni, encouragingly.
I gulped. “You know, Sheeni, I know a fellow down in L.A. who could make you a first-rate counterfeit passport for only a few hundred dollars. And I’ll pay!”
“How long would it take, Rick?”
“Just a few days, once he receives your color photo and the cash.”
“I can’t wait that long, Rick. I’ve got to get out now. There have been some ominous phone calls and whispered conversations. I think my parents are up to something. God knows they’re capable of anything.”
9:30 p.m. I am lying low in my apartment with the lights out and the curtains drawn. The only illumination is my laptop screen. I am typing this in a desperate attempt to keep from going insane.
As planned, I left here at seven o’clock. First hitch: the door to Mr. Saunders’s office building was locked. I loitered by the entry for a few minutes hoping someone would come out. No such luck. So I walked around through the parking lot to the back of the building and tried the rear door. It opened. I scuttled up the back stairs to the second floor and located the door to suite 207. I slipped on my gloves and tried turning the handle. It appeared to be unlocked. So far so good.
