A Dangerous Game

by Rick R. Reed

  Linda tittered. “I don’t think you guys have ever met. Harry, this is my son, Wren. And Wren, this is my boss, Harry.”

  The man, besides having a body like a gorilla’s, had no hair on his head, and his deep brown eyes were piercing. “Charmed.”

  Wren nodded. He turned back to Linda. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know that screwing your boss was part of your new job description.”

  “Wren! I oughta slap your face. Apologize to Harry.”

  Wren just shook his head, not removing his gaze from his mother. Like him, her skin was fair and pale, and he watched the line of scarlet move up from her chest to envelop her face. It felt good. She should be embarrassed.

  Linda pulled her robe tighter. Harry got up, keeping the sheet around him, and went into the bathroom, then closed the door behind him.

  “What’s going on, Ma?”

  “Oh, I’ve been meaning to tell you. Harry and I have been seeing each other for a couple of weeks now. It just happened. I know he’s kind of hairy, but I think he’s cute. And he’s good to me.”

  “And you’re good to him. Is this how you earned your promotion?” Wren sneered.

  Linda leaned her face in close to her son’s. She was smiling, but there was nothing cheerful about her words. “Don’t you dare talk to me that way. I don’t deserve it. All I’ve done, my whole life, is take care of you and make my share of sacrifices so you could be happy. And I’m not complaining. I did it out of love, expecting not a damn thing in return. So don’t you barge in here and judge me for maybe going after a little bit of happiness myself. Is that too much to ask from my son? My son who I thought, by the way, was a grown man?”

  It was Wren’s turn to redden. He could feel the heat burning his face.

  Linda went on. “And for you to insinuate that I got my promotion by screwing the boss, well, that really sucks. Do you know how hard I’ve worked? How many overtime hours I’ve put in? How much I volunteered for stuff no one else wanted to do just so I could get ahead? How dare you say that to me! It would make me nothing more than a common whore. Is that what you think?” Linda grabbed Wren’s chin, forcing him to look at her. “You think your mother’s a whore?”

  For the second time that day—and it wasn’t even 7:00 a.m. yet—Wren felt on the verge of tears. He’d been a shit to talk to Linda the way he had. His voice came out as a quivery whisper. “I’m sorry, Mom. I wasn’t thinking. I had a rough night.” Wren bit his lip, wondering if he should tell Linda the truth about what happened during the night but decided against it. She didn’t need the heartache, and she could never understand. Or maybe she would understand, and it was that second option he feared subjecting Linda to.

  No, he was a grown man, as she had said, and he should take care of himself.

  “Things didn’t work out with Devin. And I’m feeling kind of homeless right now.”

  As if to underscore the impossibility of Linda taking him in, Harry emerged from the bathroom, followed by the sound of a flushing toilet. He must have left his clothes in there, because he was now dressed in old man jeans and a light blue Oxford shirt. He was strapping a gold watch on his hairy wrist. Eyeing the two of them, he sat down on the edge of the bed and slipped on a pair of loafers, sans socks.

  Wren wondered what on earth his mother saw in this man. But that was a conversation for another time.

  “I better be getting downstairs.”

  He paused in front of Linda and smirked at Wren. Wren stepped aside, and Harry gave Linda a quick peck.

  “See you down there?”

  Linda smiled, and Wren didn’t miss the way her eyes lit up when she looked at Harry.

  “Give me an hour.”

  They both waited until Harry closed the door to move. Once he did, Linda moved to the bed and began making it up. While she worked, she talked.

  “So, you’ve seen the place. If I had my druthers, your first visit would have gone a little different, but what the hell.” She finished making the bed, went into the bathroom, and closed the door behind her.

  Wren sat down on a little floral-patterned love seat positioned at the foot of the bed and listened to the sound of his mother moving around—the toilet flushing, water running, finally the hiss of the shower.

  When Linda emerged, she was just about ready for the day. She still wore the robe, but her face was made up and her auburn hair was pulled back into a damp ponytail. She looked like a teenage girl. Wren bit his tongue to prevent him from telling her that she could do a lot better than Harry.

  “As you can see, there isn’t much privacy. If you’re gonna stay in the room, you have to close your eyes.” Linda had paused in front of her closet, moving hangers back and forth.

  “Never mind, Mom. I’ll use the bathroom if you’re done in there.”

  “Sure.”

  When Wren came back out, Linda was dressed for the day in a black pencil skirt, white blouse, stockings, and black leather pumps. To add some color, she had wrapped a green, lavender, and blue print silk scarf around her neck.

  She looked beautiful.

  “I’m sorry I had to talk to you that way, but you were way out of line, buster.”

  “I know.”

  Linda came up to him and put her arms around him. “You wanna stay here? I can manage for a bit. Harry will understand.”

  Wren struggled out of her embrace. “Where would I sleep?”

  “There’s the love seat,” Linda offered.

  “That would be great if I was a little kid. Or a contortionist.”

  “You could sleep on the floor. I could fix it up real nice with pillows and blankets. Maybe we could get one of those air mattresses.”

  “Aw, Mom. You’re too nice. There’s no room for me here.” As Wren said the words, true, he felt engulfed by sadness. He didn’t know where there was room for him. In the space of a mere few days, he had gone from having a job and a home to completely displaced.

  Linda said, “Honeybunch, there’s always room for you. Wherever I am.”

  “I know, Mom. Thanks.” But he didn’t know. His mother deserved her space, and two people in this tiny room—to call it an apartment would be being overly generous—would be cramped. They would be at each other’s throats within a day. Hell, one could hardly even get dressed in private. “I’ll find a place.”

  “Well, if you don’t, you come back here. No son of mine will ever have to sleep on a bench or some crap like that, not if I have anything to say about it.”

  Wren hugged Linda. “I’ll remember that. And I don’t think it will come to that. You need to be getting to work, huh?”

  “Yeah. I don’t wanna be late on the first day of my new job.”

  “Good luck, Mom. I love you.”

  “Aren’t you sweet? I love you too, Wren. Just lock the door behind you when you leave.” She pecked him on the cheek.

  And with that his mother was gone, leaving the faint smell of her perfume, Miss Dior, in her wake.

  Wren stared at the closed door for a long time. That door, the small apartment, everything that had happened all coalesced into one fine point in Wren’s mind.

  The answer awaited him, but he wasn’t sure he was ready to make that leap. For one, Linda would be so ashamed if she knew the truth. For another, Wren didn’t know if he could abide his own self if he took the track that was front and center in his mind right now.

  But what was the alternative? Sleeping on the street? Working at yet another dead-end job that would leave him exhausted and living paycheck to paycheck?

  He groped around in his duffel, hoping he had lost the simple white engraved business card, praying to himself that fate would intervene and yank the choice he was contemplating out of his hands, but his fingers closed around the piece of cardboard in short order, after moving aside just a few articles of clothing.

  It had sunk to the bottom of the bag.

  Much like I am sinking to the bottom, Wren thought.

  He stared at the card for a long time. Whole mi
nutes passed, and then he pulled out his phone and punched in the digits.

  Mr. Davidson Chillingsworth answered on the second ring. His voice had the careful modulation of a news anchor. His demeanor, telegraphed through the phone, was polite, deferential, and businesslike. The aural image he presented did not jibe with the word “pimp.”

  “Davidson Chillingsworth here. How may I be of assistance?”

  Wren rolled his eyes. A voice within instructed him to just hang up, but another voice reasoned that these days, there was no such thing—almost—as an anonymous call. He knew that when he spoke he would be sealing his fate, even though at this point, he was telling himself he was just “checking things out.”

  “Hey, Dave. It’s Wren Gallagher. We met on Friday—at Tricks?”

  “Wren! Of course. I was hoping you’d phone.”

  Chapter Seven

  WREN TOLD himself that by meeting with Dave, he was simply exploring his options. He didn’t have to actually decide anything today, and he certainly would not feel compelled to do anything he didn’t want to do.

  These were the kinds of things he was thinking as he left the “L” station at Belmont and headed eastbound down the street at eleven forty-five. The street, now that rush hour had passed and the evening revelers who tended to clog it were probably still asleep, was relatively quiet.

  Heat fairly shimmered up from the dirty concrete, and in the air was the smell of exhaust fumes, garbage, and underneath it all, a briny, fishy smell—Lake Michigan, just a few blocks away. The “L” train rumbled behind him as it pulled out of the station.

  It was another beautiful, sunny summer morning in the city. Already the white button-down shirt clung to Wren’s back and the jeans he wore felt too heavy and warm for the day, as though they weighed twenty pounds or more.

  Wren noticed all these things because he felt like he was on a precipice, a line of demarcation, that his life was about to change from one phase to the next. His conscious mind told him that the lunch appointment he had set up with Dave was nothing more than two guys getting together for a bite to eat and to talk. That same voice nattered on about how nothing would change unless Wren wanted it to and that he—or his soul—was in no danger by meeting with the redoubtable Mr. Chillingsworth.

  But his subconscious was more like instinct, Wren’s id as opposed to his ego. That being, or whatever it was, didn’t speak in a clear voice, didn’t make its wants known through words but through feelings. And Wren had the feeling his life was changing, and even though he thought what Dave had to offer would be a bad choice, a choice he would regret, he also knew it was better than what he had right now.

  What he had right now was nothing.

  Dave had suggested they meet at a little Greek diner just south on Broadway, a few doors down from Tricks. Wren knew the place. It was open twenty-four hours, and he and his friends had often wandered into the spot for omelets or burgers after a night of imbibing. It would be kind of interesting to see what the place was like during the day.

  The air conditioning in Venus’s Café hit him like a blessing as soon as he walked through the plate glass door. Inside it was hard to see after the sun’s brilliant light he had just left behind. He could make out a woman behind the counter. She had a shock of black hair, dark eyes, and a big, comforting bosom. Her face was welcoming as she took in Wren from behind tortoiseshell-framed glasses. Not stopping her task of wiping down the counter, she said, “Hiya, kid. Counter or table?”

  Wren stepped a little farther into the blessed coolness, reveling in how quickly it was drying the sweat from his brow. “Actually, I’m supposed to meet someone.”

  As he spoke the words, his eyes adjusted more, and he spotted Davidson Chillingsworth as he stood up in a booth near the back of the restaurant.

  “Right here, Wren.”

  The woman behind the counter looked from Wren to Chillingsworth and back again. Wren thought some of the light went out of her dark eyes. Her smile definitely vanished.

  “Okay,” she said softly. “Go on back and I’ll bring you a menu.”

  Seated, Wren smiled at Chillingsworth and tried to play it cool, as if he met with professional pimps every day to discuss the possibility of working for them. Dave, not surprisingly, looked every bit the televangelist, as he had the night they met. Today he wore a pair of cream-colored slacks, loafers, a blue-and-white-pinstriped shirt, and a blue blazer, in spite of the temperature already hovering around ninety-five outside. Wren noticed he had even put a brightly patterned orange and cream handkerchief in his front breast pocket, folded almost origamically into three neat triangles.

  “Venus, my dear, how are you today?” Dave said to the woman Wren had seen earlier when she showed up with menus and a coffeepot.

  “Fine, Mr. C, just fine.”

  She set down menus and poured coffee for both men. There was something about her demeanor that was different from when Wren entered. When he had first come in, she had a big grin. She was open. Now all that had shut down. Wren felt as though she’d rather neither of them be there. He shrugged; it was just a feeling.

  Because he was hungry, and to delay the forthcoming conversation, Wren ordered quickly. “I’ll have the Greek omelet, a side of bacon, crispy, and rye toast. Hash browns too.”

  Dave smiled, but it came out more like a grimace. “Hungry?”

  Wren wanted to say he wasn’t sure where his next meal would come from so he might as well get while the getting was good. But instead he just smiled at Dave. “Growing boy.”

  Dave nodded and ordered only black coffee.

  While they were waiting for Wren’s food, Dave launched into what Wren supposed was his pitch.

  “Wren, I’m so glad you could find the time to come see me. I wasn’t sure you’d call, so you can imagine my delighted surprise when you did.”

  “Yes, I can just imagine.” Wren busied himself pouring three packets of sugar and two containers of cream into the steaming liquid, maybe because he didn’t want Dave to see him rolling his eyes.

  “You’re being sarcastic.”

  “No. No. I’m sorry. I didn’t have a very good night, and I’m just tired.”

  “Anyway, I wanted to say that a young man such as yourself can have limitless potential in my business. Limitless potential for money and the leisure time in which to spend it. Most people go through life wishing they could somehow figure out a way to marry that particular combination. Most never figure it out. But I can give it to you, Wren.”

  “And all I have to do is fuck?”

  Wordlessly, Venus set the plates down before Wren and refilled their coffee. She hurried away.

  Dave shook his head. “I wish you would refrain from using such crude language around me. It offends me, and it doesn’t become you at all.”

  Wren didn’t apologize. He took a bite of his omelet, which was a delightful blend of spinach, egg, and feta.

  “Whatever. I can see you need a little work. The phrase ‘diamond in the rough’ comes to mind when I look at you.”

  Maybe because he was tired and his tolerance for bullshit was low—he’d had more than his fair share the past several days—Wren cut to the chase. He figured he had nothing to lose. Part of him very much wanted to destroy any possibility of a deal.

  “You know, Dave, all the rosy talk and blue skies in the world doesn’t change what we’re here to talk about, so why don’t you just put your cards on the table and let me know what I’m expected to do and how much I can expect to make.”

  “I can see you’re a brass tacks sort of fellow.”

  “That’s me.” Wren drank some coffee and contemplated just getting up and leaving. The whole idea of what they were discussing was stupid, immoral, illegal, and would most likely be very bad for his health. But what Dave opened with stopped him cold.

  “So we’ll just cut to the chase, as you say. For starters, I could offer you a small dwelling. That would only be temporary, of course, but until your earnings would allow
you to find your own place, you are welcome to stay in one of the apartments I have as a business investment. I believe there’s a studio in a high-rise on Lake Shore Drive near Addison currently. Fully furnished with a lovely lake view.”

  Wren was ready to sign up, imagining himself going from homeless to a Lake Shore Drive high-rise just like that. And all he had to do was blow a few guys, maybe get fucked? What was the problem? He’d be doing that anyway and not improving his life circumstances.

  But what would his mother think? How would he explain to her his sudden good luck? “Hey, Mom, I know you’ve just gotten used to the gay thing. Now I’ve got a new twist for you….”

  “Being cautiously optimistic, I would say a man of your charms could expect to earn—” Dave shrugged, and his eyes rolled up a little as he calculated. “—somewhere in the mid-four figures your first full month.”

  “You mean, like, five thousand dollars?” Wren laughed. The guy was pulling his leg.

  But Chillingsworth’s face betrayed no emotion, humorous or otherwise. “Yes. I think that’s reasonable and quite possible, actually.”

  Wren didn’t say anything. His heart pounded out a tribal tattoo from within his chest. To cover up the silence and his amazement, Wren busied himself spreading grape jelly on his last piece of toast. With a shaking hand, he lifted it to his mouth and took a bite, then chewed slowly. He had never felt less hungry in his life.

  He had to admit to himself he was torn. On the one hand, he couldn’t kid himself. While he could certainly be described as being down on his luck, he was far from destitute. Later today he could go to the unemployment office, get the paperwork filled out, and money would start coming in. He might have to live at the Y or someplace like that for a little while. And if he wasn’t proud about the kind of position he took, he could get a job. Yes, the economy was not exactly the best, but even Wren, young as he was, had seen it worse. There were jobs out there for him, maybe not doing the kinds of things Wren had dreamed of as a little boy, and certainly not with the kind of paychecks that would allow him to do much better than eke out a meager existence, but he could still take pride in not striking some sort of deal with the devil. Becoming a whore—why sugarcoat it?—was doing just that. Wren feared he’d be giving up his very soul.