She said, “Ain’t I never going to be nothing but a bitch to you? Call me Phyllis the whore, or Runt the fool. You’d never believe it but I’m human. That scratch I made tonight ain’t bad. These streets are new to me. I gotta feel my way and get hip to the tricks.”
That cocaine was blowing a frosty blizzard through my skull.
I said, “Bitch, when your funky black ass is in the grave you’ll still be a bitch; Bitch, one of these nights you’re going to shoot your jib off, I’ll curtsy and call you Runt the corpse. You stinking bitch I’m hip you’re human. You’re a human black slop-bucket for those peckerwood swipes.
“You gutless idiot, I’m going to throw you out that window if you don’t get the kinks outta your ass an hustle some real scratch. Don’t get hip to the tricks, Bitch. Get hip to what I’m rapping. If you don’t stop your bullshit, I’m gonna kick your heart out and stomp on it. Now don’t crack your jib unless I rap to you, Bitch.”
I started to take my clothes off. She just lay there staring at me. Her eyes were gleaming like a crazy Voodoo Doctor’s. I got into bed. I turned my back to her. I could feel the freak inching toward me.
She stroked the back of my neck. I felt the hot tip of the lizard on the back of my neck. I felt the scab on her brow scrape the tip of my ear. I pulled away toward the edge of the bed.
She said, “Daddy, I’m sorry I bugged you. I love you. Please forgive me.”
The bed creaked when I rattlesnaked to strike. I hooked my right heel under the bed springs. I raised myself on my right elbow. I drew my “ved” left arm back so the back of my left fist touched my right cheek. I grunted for velocity and blackjacked my left elbow into her gut-button. She groaned and wrapped and unwrapped her legs. She chattered her teeth like she was freezing to death.
I could feel that yellow drawing a heavy black curtain inside my dome. Just before I went under I thought, “I wonder if the runt can lug a hundred and fifty pounds to that window.”
7
MELODY OFF KEY
The blast of the phone woke me. The pad was dark as hell. I flung my left hand out for the runt. She wasn’t there. I fumbled the receiver to my ear.
I said, “Hello, this is Mary’s brother.”
He said, “I wanta speak to Mary. Put her on, yeah?”
I said, “She just went out. She’s taking a walk.”
He hung up. I cradled the phone on the bedside table. I switched the table lamp on. I checked Mickey. It was seven-thirty P.M. I wondered if I had blown the runt.
I got up and checked the closet. Her clothes were still there. I went to the dresser. I checked the forty slats. Two were missing. There was a note beside the scratch.
It read, “Daddy, I took a deuce for the street. I’m gonna hump my ass off. Please try to be a little sweet to your little bitch dog, huh?”
I thought, “I’m stumbling upon some pimp answers. It looks like the tougher a stud is the more a whore goes for him. I’ll sure be glad when those four days pass and I go with Top to the Sweet cut in. I gotta watch that the runt don’t get hip I’m banging stuff. Gee, I’m starved. I gotta eat before I bang some girl.”
I went to the phone. The broad who should have been a wrestler picked up.
I said, “Anybody down there to get me bacon and eggs?”
She said, “Wait a second, I’ll let you talk to Silas, the elevator man.”
The old Maggie and Jiggs fan said, “Yeah, Big Timer, what is it?”
I said, “Silas, can I get bacon with eggs over light, and toast?”
He said, “Yeah, there’s a greasy spoon right across the street I’m going now.”
I hung up and went to the closet. I got the spy piece. I went to the window. I saw the old jink hobble across the street toward the Busy Bee Cafe.
I made a sweep up and down the street to spot the runt. I didn’t see her. I zeroed the spy into the greasy joint. The runt was draining a cup of coffee at the counter. She came out. Her eyes flashed whitely up at our window.
She walked down the street twisting her rear end at the passing cars. I saw her round black ass hook a white trick in a black Hog. He skidded to the curb. She got in. I wondered if it was the same joker that called.
I ducked into the shower. I was toweling off when I heard a rap on the door. I saronged the towel. On the way to the door I scooped the can of gangster off the dresser and stuck it behind the mirror.
I heard Silas outside the door whistling “When the Saints Go Marching In.” I opened the door. He had a tray in his hands. I took it. A paper napkin fluttered to the floor. He stooped for it.
I looked into the big brown eyes of a pretty yellow broad coming out of the door across the hall. The scar-faced stud who tooted at the Roost had walked out in front of her. He had a saxophone case under his arm. She rolled her lustrous eyes at me. They rocketed to that lump on the sarong. Her sly hot smile made a flat statement, “Please, try it for size.”
I skull noted her. Silas finally tore his eyes from her rear end floating down the hall. He had squeezed the paper napkin into a damp ball.
He said, “That’s a buck.”
I put the tray on the dresser. I took three slats to the door and gave them to him.
I said, “Silas, that’s quite a package with Mr. Hyde. Give me a rundown, huh?”
He said, “Yeah, she’s stacked tough enough to make a preacher lay his Bible down. The horn blower ain’t had her but a coupla years. She’s done rammed her cat scent up his nose and got him hooked. She was a whore until he squared her up.
“He’s got it bad. He don’t allow her outta his sight. Any club he plays she hasta be right there stuck in his ass. If I was thirty years younger I’d steal her.
“Thanks, Big Timer, for the deuce. Any time you want something, call old Silas. Sit the tray outside your door when you finish.”
I sat on the side of the bed and wolfed down the bacon and eggs. I felt better. I wanted to feel wonderful. I put together everything for bang time. I held the end of a necktie in my teeth. I coiled it and tightened it around my arm. On first stab I hit a perfect bullseye. I did Top’s jackoff bit. I threw up. I just made it to the john. The kick was greater than the one at Top’s.
I thought, “What if my black face like magic turned white. Shit, I could go out that hotel front door and sneak through the barbedwire stockade. I’d be like a wolf turned loose on a flock of sheep. That white world wouldn’t tumble that I’m a Nigger. I could pay ’em all back in spades, the Dummy, the White Bull, that bastard judge that crucified me on my first rap. Once I escape this black hell I’ll find a way all right. Well Nigger, you’re pretty, but a bleach cream will never be invented that will make you white. So, pimp your ass off and be somebody with what you got. It could be worse, you could be an ugly Nigger.”
I dressed and powdered my face. That sure was one pretty sonuvabitch in that mirror. I saw a roach scouting the tray’s rim. I shoved the tray out into the hall.
I thought, “I gotta start stalking that fine bitch across the hall. Maybe I’ll decoy the runt to get past that scarfaced watchdog. I guess I’ll take a walk. Maybe I can cop my second whore. I feel hard and lucky as a horseshoe.”
I put the can of reefer and the other sizzle into a paper bag. I locked the door and went down the hall toward the elevator. On the way, I stopped at the porter’s broom closet. It was unlocked. I tiptoed and shoved the bag of sizzle behind some junk on a shelf.
The cocaine had me froggy. I saw the floor indicator stop at floor number two. I took the stairway to the lobby. I dropped the key on the desk and glided to the street. The cocaine had fitted wings on my feet. I felt cool, breathless, and magnificent. It was a balmy eighty degrees. I was glad I’d left the benny.
I walked toward a rainbow bouquet of neon maybe ten blocks away. My senses screamed on the razor-edge of cocaine. It was like walking through a battlefield. The streaking headlights of the car arcing the night were giant tracer bullets. The rattling crashing street-cars were army tanks. T
he frightened, hopeless black faces of the passengers peered through the grimy windows. They were battleshocked soldiers doomed forever to the front trenches.
I passed beneath an El-train bridge. A terrified, glowing face loomed toward me in the tunnel’s gloom. It was an elderly white man trapped behind enemy lines. A train furled by overhead. It bombed and strafed the street. The shrapnel fell in gritty clouds.
I was too nervous for the combat zone. I whistled at a general in a yellow staff car to halt. He whisked me to that oasis of neon. It turned out he was a mercenary. He shafted me a slat and a quarter for the evacuation.
I got out and mothed toward a Haggling flash. The “Fun House.” It was a bar. I opened the door and stepped inside. It almost busted the gaskets in my bowels. A phosphorescent green skeleton popped up out of the floor in front of me. It screeched a hollow howl and then dived back into the floor through a trap door.
I just stood there shaking. I couldn’t figure why those crazy jokers at the bar were yukking like pickaninnys. To stay with the program I mastered a King Fish grin. I went to the bar and sat between “Amos” and “Andy.”
I saw a tall stud with a Frankenstein mask on behind the log. He darted his hand in a sneaky way under the log. There was a wooshing noise like a tire going flat. My stool descended beneath me. I looked up at Amos. My nose was an inch from the log. Amos was grinning down at me.
Amos said, “You sho nuff ain’t been here befo, is you Slim? You frum de big-foot country?”
Andy said, “Wait til he ketch his win. He gonna buy us a pitchuh suds. We gonna lurn ole home boy bout dis big city rigamaro.”
Everybody at the crowded log yukked in a deep South accent. Frankenstein pushed his mercy button. I felt the stool stretching up. With the cocaine kangarooing me, and this booby-trapped nest of low-life suckers I stumbled into I had more than a frantic yearning for maybe four-twenty at the Haven.
He walked down the log to me.
He said, “It’s all in fun. Welcome to the ‘Fun House.’ What’ll it be?”
I ignored him. I got off the stool. I looked down at it. Its metal legs were tubular and anchored to the floor. It had to be a compressed air gizmo. I stepped back and looked at the two ex-cotton pickers. I twitched my nose. I looked down and around them, then the length of the log. I fingered the button on that sling shot in my raise.
I said, “King Fished, Holy mackul, boys. You smell dat? I’se wunder iffen some po stupid Nigger’s funky-ass, nappy-head Southern Mammy ain’t dose shit out anuther square-ass, ugly bastard turd?”
Amos and Andy dropped their jibs like plantation idiots. They shot an anguished look at the white joker behind the log. I walked out the door. They didn’t dig my humor. Maybe it was too “in.”
I slammed into a perfumed line-backer. In reflex, I threw my arms around her soft shoulders. She had the flawless face of Olivia de Haviland. She was bigger and prettier. I felt the fabric of her tailored black suit petal stroke across my fingertips. She was the finest broad I’d seen since my last movie. I wondered if she was a whore. I decided to hit on her.
I said, “I’m sorry. Ain’t it a bitch, baby the first time we meet it had to be in a collision like two-square? Sugar, were you going into this tramp joint? Believe me there’s no action inside for a package like you. I just stopped in to make a call. My name is Blood. What’s yours?”
Her big curvy legs were wide tracked. I saw the fabulous shadow of her rear end on the sidewalk. Through the filmy orange blouse I saw a pink mole on her milk-white midriff. She brushed back a wayward lock of silky black hair from one of the big electric blue eyes. Her even choppers gleamed like rare china. Her crimson tongue doodled across the cupid bow lips. She was doing a bit that would have shook up a eunuch.
She said, “Blood! How quaint. Your idiom is fascinating. My name is Melody. I don’t drink in bars. Occasionally I go to a supper club. I am not looking for action. As a matter of fact my car is disabled. I was going inside to call for help when our heavenly bodies collided. Is it possible that you’re not oblivious to the esoteric aspects of car repair? Mine is there at the curb.”
My eyes followed her manicured finger to the sparkling new Lincoln sedan. Everything about her hollered class and affluence.
I thought, “This beautiful white bitch has class. She sounds like an egghead. With wheels like that she’s probably got a bundle in the darner! Maybe she’s got some rich sucker in her web. I’ll nut roll on her. I’ll stay outta the pimp role until I case her. I’ll go Sweet William on her. Maybe I can string her out and get all that scratch she’s got, then make a whore outta her. With her rear end, this bitch is sitting on a mint.”
I said, “Darling, I’m not a mechanic. I did learn a little about cars from a buddy in a prep school I just finished. You get in. I’ll raise the hood and have a look.”
She got in. I raised the hood. I spotted the trouble right away. A battery cable had jarred loose. I put it back on. I looked around the hood and signaled for the starter try. She did and smiled happily when the engine throbbed to life. She waved me to her. I stuck my head through the open window.
She said, “Are you driving? If not I should love to take you wherever you want to go.”
I said, “Honey, I’m not driving and it’s a long sad story. You don’t want to hear my troubles. If you drop me off at some nice bar, I promise not to bore you with it.”
I got in. She pulled out into traffic. We cruised along. For two minutes we were silent. I was busy trying to think of the opener for that long sad story. I had read a cellhouse full of books. I knew I could rise to a smooth pitch. That old philosopher convict had told me I should forget the pimp game and be a con man.
I said, “Melody, doesn’t fate puppeteer humans in a weird way? There I was coming out of that joint, I had just called a garage a hundred miles away. The engine of my car burnt up on my way here from Saint Louis a week ago. I was depressed, lonely, and hopeless in a big, friendless city.
“The mechanic had just dropped the bad news. The charge to get the car is a hundred and fifty dollars. I have fifty. I was blind with worry when I came out that door.
“My elderly mother has to have a pancreas operation. I came here to work for a contractor in the suburbs. I’m a talented carpenter. I need my car to get to work. I’m committed to start work the first of next week. Mama’s going to die sure as the sun rises in the East unless I get that money for her operation.
“The strange wonderful thing is, Darling, with all these problems I feel so good. See those garbage cans glittering between the tenements? To me they are giant jewels. I want to climb up on those rooftops and cry out to the stars, I have met, I have found the beautiful Melody. Surely I’m the luckiest black man alive. Convince me you’re real. Don’t evaporate like a beautiful mirage. I’d die if you did.”
Out of the side scope in my eye I saw those awesome thighs quivering. She almost crashed the Lincoln into the rear end of the gray Studebaker ahead of us.
She cut in sharply and grated the Lincoln’s wheels against the curb. She shut the motor off and turned toward me. Her eyes were blue bonfires of passion. The pulse on the satin throat was maniacing. She slid close to me. She zippered her scarlet mouth to mine. That confection tongue flooded my mouth with sugar. Her nails dug into my thighs. She gazed at me.
She said, “Blood, you sweet black poetic panther. Does that prove I’m real. No, I know I don’t want to evaporate, ever. Please, let’s don’t go to a bar. You can’t solve your problems with alcohol. My parents are out of the city until tomorrow noon. Settle for coffee and conversation at my place. Will you Blood? Perhaps we can find solutions to your problems there. Besides, I’m expecting Mother to call me at home later this evening.”
I said, “Angel of mercy, I’m putting myself in your tender hands.”
She lived a long way from the black concentration camp. She drove for almost an hour. I could smell the pungent odors of early April plant life. This white world was like leaving H
ell and riding through Heaven. The neat rows of plush houses shone in the moonlight. The streets were quiet as maybe the Cathedral in Rheims.
I thought, “Ain’t it a bitch? Ninety-eight percent of the black people back there in Hell will be born and die and never know the joys of this earthly Heaven. There ain’t but two passports the white folks honor. A white skin, or a bale of scratch. I sure got to pimp good and cop my scratch passport. Well, at least I get a Cinderella crack at Heaven. This is good. It’s hipping me to what I’m missing.”
We turned into her driveway. I saw the soft glow of a table lamp behind blue drapes in the front room. She parked the Lincoln in a pink stucco garage that matched the house. The garage was connected to the house. We went through the back door. We passed through the kitchen. Even in the dimness it sparkled. We moved like burglars through the half-darkened house. We walked on deep-pile carpet up a stairway. We got to the top. She stopped.
She whispered, “Blood, I was born in this house. Everybody in the block knows me. If some friend passed and knew someone was at home, we might get an unwelcome visitor. We’ll go to my bedroom in the rear.”
I followed to her bedroom. She flipped on a tiny blue light over a mirrored dressing table. The bedroom was done in pale blue and off-white. The queen-sized bed had a blue satin canopy over it. I sat down on a white silk chaise next to the dressing table. She switched on an ivory radio. Debussy’s “Clare de Lune” sweet-noted gently through the room.
She kicked off her tiny black calfskin shoes. She was even more beautiful here than she had been in the street. She stroked my ear lobes with her fingertips.
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