“Plowed. Finally a bedroom fuck.”
“Finally a boudoir screw,” he said, trying to say it as fast as he could. “Finally a boudoir screw. Silently we go at it in the hay.”
“I’m drunk enough to talk tonight.”
“Do you want to bet?”
“I’ll talk,” she said, running ahead of him, doing a little backward-forward kick and skip. “I’ll rap away.”
He followed her, carrying her drink and another MJ Marlboro. “If you don’t talk,” he said, “when I write a book about us, my sex scenes will be very short.”
“Shit on short sex scenes,” said Estelle.
“I’ll write things like ‘they performed twice in the kitchen’—no dirty details.”
“Once against the refrigerator,” said Estelle, leaping onto the bed.
“The second time with Estelle across the kitchen table, Sydney standing,” he said, diving into the mattress after her.
“Shit on short sex scenes. Try to say that very fast,” said Estelle.
“Shit on short sess scenes.”
“Shit on short shess sheens.”
He was suddenly engulfed by a wondrous wave of affection for Estelle Kelly. He grabbed her and held her firmly by the shoulders. “Listen. Dear.”
“What?”
“Dearest. Are you leaving me? Don’t.”
“Unlock the hangar doors, us birds is gonna fly.”
“No.” He wanted to be serious, to kiss her passionately. He brought his mouth down hard on hers and heard the crack of their teeth hitting together before he felt the ache in his gums.
He sat back rubbing his finger across his teeth like a toothbrush.
“Go down on me,” she said.
“I can’t.”
“Why can’t you?”
“Not tonight.”
“Why not?”
“Because I read—I read—” and he began to laugh.
Estelle began to, too. “What?”
“Cup-cup-Couples.” He got it out finally, pulling his knees to his stomach, howling. “I read Couples.”
“If you keep on reading we’re not going to be able to do it at all, Sydney Skate, not at all. Not even a fourth of a fuck, if you keep on reading those books,” said Estelle.
“John Updike,” he said, convulsed.
“Wh-wh-what’d he write?” Estelle was hilarious. Both on their own highs.
“I can’t go down on you because I’d laugh.”
“I get it, I get it, but what?”
“This. Listen,” but he couldn’t get it out.
“What?”
“Wait.”
“All right, all right.”
“Okay.” He sniffled and caught hold of himself. “Okay. Here goes and this is a direct quote. He licked her willing slipping tips, the pip within the slip, wisps—”
“He did not.” Estelle had a hold of her stomach.
“Yes, yes, but wait—wait—more!” Shockproof was set off again, rolling, holding onto himself so it would not hurt to laugh hard.
“I can’t bear more.”
“More. Listen, more.”
“No. It’s too painful. I can’t.”
“This is a direct quote.… The pip within the slip. Wisps. Sun and spittle set a cloudy froth on her pubic hair.”
“Stop! Stop! Please! I’m a human being!” Estelle Kelly was holding onto the bedpost.
“Listen!”
“Help!”
“Listen!… A cloudy froth on her pubic hair. Now. Here. Here. Listen. Piet pictured a kitten learning to drink milk from a saucer.”
“Oh God, I’m dead and in hell.”
“Here kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty,” Shockproof giggled.
“Meow.”
“Here kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty.”
“It all comes down to pussy in the end,” Estelle Kelly was panting. “Oh! Oh! Please. Sydney, would you run through that pip within the slip thing again?”
“Talk about a tongue-twister,” Shockproof said, and off they went again, shaking up their insides in helpless wailing fits.
Shockproof woke up in a fetal position, staring at the luminous dial of the electric clock on the tripod table. Frank Sinatra was singing “Let’s Take a Walk Around the Block.” It was eleven-fifteen. Next to the clock was a picture of the Captain. He was standing arms akimbo on a beach, wearing flowered trunks and a lei around his neck. Shockproof remembered the inscription. “Ha wa ya from Hawaii. Keep your wings straight. Love, Dad.”
The window was open. There was a cold breeze blowing up from the river.
Even if Estelle Kelly, half asleep, would let him sleep over, he would have to get up and call M.E. to tell her he would not be home. By that time, Estelle Kelly, fully awake, would renege on the invitation anyway. He decided not to attempt it.
He curled around her for a moment to get warm, and to wait until he was down just a little more. He was falling; he could feel the burden of reality beginning to press. He smelled a strong odor emanating from Estelle Kelly’s armpits and feigned an interest in it as a musky smell of sex. He saw himself ending up as someone people brought their cats and dogs to for him to worm.
Then Estelle sent a stiletto elbow sinking into his liver.
“I wasn’t doing anything,” he said, clutching himself.
She jerked away from him, far over to her own side of the bed.
“I was just getting warm for a minute,” he said.
She heaved a huge sigh of exasperation and bolted from the bed, zapped into the bathroom, and slammed the door.
He went into the kitchen, retrieved his clothes from the various appliances, and dressed.
He went back and knocked on the bathroom door, even though he knew it was more of the same since she had sat him out in the Ladies all the way to Grand Central. “Are you all right?”
He waited and then he said, “Estelle?”
“We give at the office,” she said.
He said, “I’ll be going then, I guess.”
Silence.
“Estelle?” he said. “I’m leaving now.”
“Don’t make a New England boiled dinner out of it—leave!”
He put the matchbooks he had brought her on the table, and left.
By the time he reached home, his heart was racing and he realized he was going to have an attack of rejection diarrhea.
There was a light on in the den.
Fighting back a wave of stomach cramps, he went by the door and peered in. Peggy Lee was singing “Is That All There Is?” There was a bottle of J&B in the center of the rug, next to an ice bucket and a large, smoking ashtray. Stretched out face down on the rug beside the couch, wearing the same splotchy pink and white Pucci she had arrived in, shoes off, a pile of jewelry beside the bottle, was Ellie Davies, passed out.
Under the bottle was a note:
Ellie. Dear.
Liz and I tried to get you to undress and sleep on the couch to no avail. I have a very early appointment with my gum people tomorrow, might miss you.… You know I want the best for you. Whatever, whoever it is. Shep.
He dropped an ice cube into the smoking ashtray, then rushed back to the bathroom, turning on the tub water to drown out the noise, and endured the ultimate earthquake from his intestines.
Afterward, he crept in and covered Ellie with a blanket.
M. E. Shepley Skate’s door was closed; M.E. was a sound sleeper.
He went back and sat on his bed and thought about his evening and the predictable finale. He thought of Jason’s love for Christa in Ivan Gold’s book Sick Friends. He thought of Christa writing those letters to Jason with the melodramatic openers, Dear Jason it’s high noon, and finishes like
I kiss you
And six or seven,
And love,
Christa.
The very same Christa who complained in her diary: Gagging, rushed to the bathroom. Couldn’t, wouldn’t swallow it. Didn’t feel loving enough.
Jason had called it the
self-poisoning pursuit of that which puts you down.
Shockproof ripped off his clothes as though he were ripping away all vestiges of the evening, promising himself he would get straight for Alison. That was where his summer was at: A.A.G.
Four
THE SNAKE / THE SHRINK
Erik Satie was running furiously around the treadwheel behind Bela Bartok. Shockproof whistled, held up a grape, and called his name. The hamster jumped off, scampered across to him and up his arm. He fed him the grape.
“Very nice,” a woman’s voice said, “very, very nice.”
She was shorter than he was, wearing a blond wig this time with dark glasses. Near her right dangling earring was the tiny, telltale mole with the black hair growing out of it.
“What’s his name?” she said.
“Erik Satie.”
“He knows his name, too.”
“Yes.”
“Oh, I think that’s marvelous,” she said, “simply marvelous.” She would butter him up for a while before she worked up to any mention of the snakes. It was Lorna Dune’s illusion that her disguises fooled him. He wondered in what sleazy joint she had lost the snake she was now shopping to replace, whether she had just forgotten to unplug it after her act, or if the damage had been done during the act, while it wound around her as she gyrated to the bumpy beat of some freaky quartet.
She wanted to know why “the mouse” was called Erik Satie, if they made good pets, where he had learned so much about animals, on and on.
Then: “I happened to notice that beautiful creature in the glass case, to the left of the door.”
“The snake.”
“What a beauty he is, all black and white.”
“She’s not for sale.”
“Why not?”
“She’s someone’s pet.”
“I see, I see.”
“She’s a King.”
“And your name is what?”
“Sydney Skate.”
“Yes, well, Mr. Skate, I’m Mrs. Dunn.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And I’d be very interested in a snake like that. Do you ever fill orders for snakes like that?”
“She wouldn’t suit your purpose,” said Shockproof.
“I beg your pardon?”
“A King wouldn’t be right.”
“Right for what?”
“You have other snakes, don’t you?”
“My son loves snakes.”
“Yes. Well. What other kinds of snakes does your son own?”
“He owns two bull snakes.”
“A King would eat them.”
“We’d keep them separate.”
“No,” Shockproof said. “It’s too risky.”
“Does that mean you refuse to order a King for me?”
“I know who you are, anyway.”
“It’s none of your business who I am. I know who you are, and I’m about to report you to the manager.”
“You’d just turn your back once and the King would get your bull.”
“Absolutely none of your business. Where is the manager?”
“Up front,” Shockproof said.
Lorna Dune made a beeline for Mr. Leogrande up near the cash register. Her appearance at Zappy Zoo five minutes before closing time was bad news. Now there would be a minor hassle with Leogrande. Shockproof wanted to be at Alison Gray’s with the King by five-thirty. The sooner he got there, the longer he stayed. She had told him over the phone that morning that she had a dinner date. There would be just time to deliver the snake, get the cage set up, and explain to her what she needed to know about her care.
He put Erik Satie back and cringed at the sound of Lorna Dune’s angry voice complaining to Leogrande.
So far it had been a good day, too. His Thunderbird had been delivered that morning by its ex-owner, and after that Ellie Davies, who had been too hungover to go to work before noon, had taken him to the Gramercy Park Hotel for a huge breakfast. Both had had Bloody Marys; he had one to Ellie’s four. Ellie became vaguely confiding. She said that at one time she had thought rather highly of Liz Lear as an intellect, but she was now of the opinion she was mediocre, though she would withhold comment on Liz as a person, since Liz was still one of M.E.’s close friends.
On and on.
She seemed also to be bordering on tears several times. If she was the one leaving, why was she the one crying? He had never thoroughly understood all these nuances in what he had heard M.E. call “dividing dishes.” When Corita Carr had broken up with Ann MacReynolds years back, they had gone to court over custody of a blue-point Siamese. Corita won, then moved back in with Ann for another year. Finally Corita had run off with someone allergic to cats, and now Ellie was complaining to Shockproof that she should have the cat who was currently boarding with Ann.
“If she wants a King, we get her a King,” said Leogrande, behind Shockproof.
“She’s got bulls.”
“That’s her problem, Sydney.”
“Why do we have to sell her snakes? Business is good, isn’t it?”
“She’s a customer.”
“What you might call a steady customer.”
“That’s her business, Sydney.”
“It’s ours, too.”
“We’re not the SPCA.”
“Not even close,” Shockproof agreed.
“There are a dozen kids who’d like this job.”
“And wouldn’t be any good at it.”
“Sydney, I’m warning you: if she wants a King, we get her a King.”
“She wants one. Right?”
“That’s what she wants.”
“All right,” Shockproof said. “All right.”
“You’re not St. Francis.”
“Neither are you.”
“I’ll lock up. You make a note of the order and put it through tomorrow, and I’ll lock up.”
“Both new rabbits have ear canker,” said Shockproof.
“Did you do anything for them?”
“I put camphorated oil in their ears, but they might need a vet.”
“The vet will charge more than we charge for them,” Leogrande said. “If there’s no improvement tomorrow, we ship them back.”
“I’ll read up on ear cankers. Don’t panic.”
“They arrived with fleas, too.”
“I’ll bet we’re the only animal dealers in New York who’d sell her a snake,” said Shockproof.
“Write up the order and stop dreaming. We’re the only animal dealer in the United States who’d give it a second thought.”
Shockproof made a note to write up the order.
Then he carried the wooden cage with the glass front down to the parking lot on Fourteenth Street, placed it in the back of the Thunderbird, and returned to Zappy Zoo for the King.
He was on Gramercy Park by five-thirty after all.
The living room was ornate with thick carpets, antique furniture covered in velvet, a crystal chandelier, a marble fireplace, and a bay window with panes of blue glass, looking out on a garden containing a gaslight lamp near a fountain with water flowing from it.
Shockproof had set the cage near the balcony.
Alison was holding the snake.
Alison did not have piano legs. Her legs were long and thin. She was wearing a very short white linen mini-skirt, a pink sleeveless sweater, and pink sandals with short square heels.
“I still can’t think of a name for her,” she said.
“She’ll only need to be fed once a week.”
“Would you mind doing that?”
“You just drop it in really.”
“Drop what in.”
“A mouse. Mice.”
“Oh no.”
“We have frozen ones we sell.”
“Would you mind doing it?”
“I’ll do it.”
“Is it going to be expensive?”
“I told you I’d get the mice free.”
“Neat. Because my family forces me to live li
ke a miser.”
“It doesn’t look it.”
“This isn’t my place, it’s their place.”
“I know,” he said. “You told me.”
“I have to live on next to nothing. If Raoul didn’t give me pot, I wouldn’t even be able to afford to smoke.”
The telephone rang and she handed him the King. “I want to get that in there,” she said.
She went into the bedroom.
He heard her say, “Oh, hel-lo! May I pick you up? I have my car. Oh, no?” Then the door was pushed shut by the toe of her pink sandal.
On the table there was a bright blue spiral notebook with Bryn Mawr College stamped across it in silver, and a silver and blue seal beneath that. In the top right corner in black ink was Alison A. Gray. Erdman Hall.
Across the bottom was printed ORGANIC CHEMISTRY.
Alison had been writing in the notebook when he arrived.
He thought she had told him she was taking a course in psychology at the New School. Why was she still studying her old organic chemistry notes from Bryn Mawr?
He opened the notebook to the first page.
I’m so excited and happy! Raoul sent me a huge bouquet of flowers. All I want to do is sit and contemplate them, but I’m going over to Haverford to smoke with Doug. I feel very guilty when I’m with Doug, because I pretend he’s Raoul and show him the love I feel for Raoul. It’s unfair to Doug, but I can’t hold myself back, since I’m a Scorpio, and always super-horny. If only Raoul attended Haverford, but then he would never be the excellent doctor I know he can be!
Shockproof felt guilty and elated.
The notebook was very thick. The entry Shockproof had just read was written over a year ago.
Shockproof looked at the entry under it.
How can I make some extra money? All the calls for baby-sitters are on weekends when I want to date. It is too late to sign up for waiting on tables. There is a chance I could push, since the girl who sold me mescaline last week is transferring next semester to Michigan, but I need money super-fast since I have practically no new clothes!
Shockproof flipped to the last page, and read the entry she had been working on when he arrived.
Last week a big 8-hr. argument-conference with my parents. The thing began over their suspicion that I smoke and drop and am closed to them. The fact is I am, if it comes to telling them everything. I don’t intend to tell them everything. Just to be able to sort of spontaneous talk with them would be nice, but they get me too uptight with their fluctuation. One minute they are all for me and understand my scene, and the next minute mother says she wished she had raised me differently and that she wonders where the lack was in her. Great! To be formed by another’s faults! I really appreciated that one.
Shockproof Sydney Skate Page 4
