Whores for Gloria

by William T. Vollmann

  Home again

  Hello, Pearl, Jimmy said.

  Pearl raised her upper lip and put lipstick on it. I've had it with you, she said. You never make any effort with me. Don't think I'm gonna give you any more breaks around here. Just pay your fucking rent.

  25

  Code Six

  After Code Six had failed in his mission of persuading Jimmy to return to the paths of full-cocked righteousness, he ambled slowly home to Sixth Street. He did not like the Tenderloin because it was not his area. Bad things could happen to him here. Back home he could take care of himself. He crossed Market Street whisding sadly. For a week or so he'd been wearing a black eye. He didn't even remember who'd punched him. He now wandered in search of a pleasant corner, shrugging shamefaced as he looked people in the face who avoided looking back because he was Code Six whose greasy hair fell across the bridge of his nose, borne down by the weight of the filth it carried, Code Six with his stubbled wobbly chin that could still look pugnacious when he threw his head way, way back, Code Six with his great hairy jelly-belly that hung over his belt absorbing sunlight on this mild morning as Code Six took off his shirt and began to beat it like a carpet against the steel shutters of a hardware store—whooh, you stink! he shouted crossly at the shirt, at himself, and then he started laughing because no one would look him in the eye. None of you stink as much as me! he shouted proudly. You can shit your pants all day and you still wouldn't bear a candle to me! Haw! Keep the flag flying high, streaming and flapping like thunder!

  Viet Cong

  Later, when he'd panhandled two dollars and was bombing along on the Night Train with such power and speed that the sidewalk was a blur beneath his tightrope feet so agilely lurching, he saw three Indochinese children sitting on the steps of a hotel, holding bundles of some grasslike herb in their hands. Each was chewing on one of the stalks, looking at him alertly. The little girl's blue-black hair was drawn back from her forehead by a headband. She sucked and sucked on her stalk, wrinkling her forehead. Her brothers stared at him unwinkingly.

  Code Six cleared his throat. You know, I once killed slopes, he said haltingly. I was ordered to. But it made me feel real sorry.

  The children looked at him. He ducked his head and hurried away.

  As soon as he was around the corner he began punching himself.—Am I out of my fucking mind to be talking to SLANTS? he shouted into a Vietnamese market. Nobody looked at him.—Was I talking bullshit or batshit or dogshit or was it just ratshit? he said. Jeez oh jeez Jesus. I better stop hanging around James. He's wearing off on me. Goddamn.

  Shit, he sighed. Every last one of us betrayed by the VC. Jimmy brainwashed, the Wrecking Crew all dropped dead, Riley God knows where, and me left to fend for myself here in the middle of motherfucking Hanoi, USA. Nothing to do, nothing to do. Wanna kill those Chinese Charlies! Come out and fight! he shouted.

  Nobody came.

  Guess I won that one, said Code Six, and he lay down on the sidewalk and went to sleep . . .

  26

  The Black Rose

  It was another early morning afternoon at the Black Rose for Jimmy, when everything seemed quieter and slower— even the lights around the mirrors seemed to be blinking more slowly—and a slow snowstorm went on inside the popcorn machine, with a rich smell of butter blowing across the bar in hot and oily waves, and two men sat at the end of the bar with their caps pulled down and an old man sat halfway to the bathroom with his head in his hands and a Budweiser in front of him, and Jimmy ordered a Budweiser and stared down at the old popcorn and dead beer bottles on the bar, and there were crumpled napkins with lipstick on them in the ashtrays and Jimmy's beer tasted like rotten hay.

  Jimmy said have you seen Luna today? and Regina said making a face no I have NOT seen Luna and a couple of the Transformers begged her to turn on the stage lights (but not Phyllis because Phyllis was in jail) and so Regina flipped the switch and the Transformers started dancing to the music of the jukebox with the light-bubbles from the disco ball whizzing through them and Jimmy sat looking at a bottle behind the bar with a giant die on top of it and then Luna came in and all the Transformers yelled Luna! Luna! and Regina said well you asked for Luna there she is she'll manipulate you to death and Jimmy said politely I'm looking forward to it and Regina said if that's what you want and Luna danced and came and hugged Jimmy and she was wearing a wig that he had given her and she felt his pocket and saw that he had her sunglasses and said oh you kept them how sweet and Jimmy said yes I'll keep them forever unless of course you want them back and Luna said yes let me borrow them for fifteen minutes and Luna said now come home with me baby and we'll smoke a little pot together and Luna's dick was very big in the crotch of her leotard and Jimmy said OK but before Luna was ready he got restiess again . . . These days he couldn't do any one thing.

  In the park across the street it was hot and stinking, but finally a breeze came to liven up the flies, and pigeons showed up and pecked at stains, and a tired old woman in red sat cleaning her glasses with a dirty tissue. The earpieces hung limp, like the legs of some dying crustacean.

  Code Six's Lincoln had finally been towed away.

  Jimmy walked up the street to Geary and Jones and stood looking at the High Tide bar with its sign-lights spilling out of a neon cocktail glass. He stumbled and shook his head. Then he went back to the Black Rose and ordered another beer.

  Jack and Dinah

  There's the bastard, said Jack.

  Beat his ass! shouted Dinah. Knock him down and give it to him!

  Jimmy looked around thinking he was still in the Black Rose but he had somehow gotten to Hyde Street where he was all alone except for men leaning up against the walls and Jack hit him once lightly to knock him to the ground and Jimmy remembered as if it were just last night the time when he had had to defend all women from the fat boy at the dildo store on Turk and Larkin and he was strong from giving up Nicole for Gloria so that he lifted the fat boy easily a foot or two off the floor and punched him, but now for some reason he had no strength left as Jack knelt down on his chest looking both ways like a child about to cross the street before he began to hit Jimmy in the face and for Jimmy it was as if he were rocking and rattling with the motion of a train and then Dinah was bending over him too and doing something to him and something in Dinah's hand went click-click and Dinah was doing something else to him and it was like being in one of the little dark theaters on Larkin Street that he used to go to where a whore would sit on his lap and ride him up and down so that he rocked and rattled painfully trying to look around her hair that smelled like phony strawberries and hear around her grunting breaths as she cut the crotch of his jeans and Jack was saying come on come on look at him he's pissed his pants but for Jimmy the screen in that theater curved like the inside of a woman's breast and the curtain swept aside showing a film about a train ride which he thought at first was a Western the way the boxcars rolled through the desert but then Louisiana began to flash by and Jack said come on and Dinah said I have to get his money now or I'll get vi'lent. I have to cut his wallet out of him. I have to.

  Remembering the porno message

  Later, a week later, when he came out of San Francisco General with a pair of hand-me-downs and a bag lunch, it was beginning to get dark as Jimmy walked down Ellis Street scuffing his feet and kicking old newspapers and he saw a black couple who smelled of innocence kissing in a doorway so seriously and he thought how sad the way men can talk to women with such calm deep love in their voices like steady rivers and then they forget the beauty of the river like I did he said to himself and now I can only hear it roaring all the time in my ears like gravel of static; and he remembered how once when he kicked the broken pay phone that he used to call Gloria from, two dollars in quarters came spewing out of it like puke and he used the money to call a lesbian porno message and the phone clicked and licked like a girl unsnapping her dress and Jimmy held his dick in his hand listening and the message moaned Biting your tongue off . . . but
there was a bad connection and so after that Jimmy heard only a long crackle of static until finally he heard a thousand people are WATCHING . . . and then came more static and then Jimmy heard I lift up your skirt, and you're kissing me and telling me: SUCK ME, SUCK ME, SUCK ME . . . and then there came another crackle of static and Jimmy was frantic, thinking that he was missing all the best parts.

  The Coral Sea

  They called him Scarface now, like he was in the movies. Jimmy said well boys I was decorated in the service of my duty and they said yaah the Purple Pecker Award! and Jimmy leaned against the bar rocking and blinking stupidly. A guy said aw leave ole Gramps alone. At the Black Rose they said Jimmy's not the same anymore but at the Coral Sea they hadn't noticed anything so Jimmy liked the Coral Sea better.

  Gloria

  Then one day it came to him and he said well now if everything is upside down you can't have what you love if you have to have what you can't ever love if happy stories are sad then sad stories must be happy. That's all there's left to get: sad stories.

  Candy

  Jimmy got a beef stick and leaned up against a building chewing it and watching the whores. He saw one whom he had fucked and for a very long time he said to himself now what was her name? I remember how the cop called her Chrissy when he pulled her over but she was going by some other name oh hell what's it matter the names change almost as fast as the people around here. He saw a fat old whore standing between two cars, and every time a car slowed down or hinted in any way that it might be preparing to park she walked out into the street smiling with her hands on her hips. Jimmy watched her for about half an hour. He decided that he sort of liked her. Every couple of minutes she ducked down and checked her make-up in the side mirror of a parked car and then spread it like syrup upon the fat pancake of her face and Jimmy almost loved her because she was such a loser. Finally she decided to move to another corner and turned toward him and Jimmy said well how's it going and she said not bad you wanna date and Jimmy said sure and she said well I thought you was waiting for a bus or something and Jimmy said yeah you were so beautiful I was just standing watching you.

  How much you wanna spend? the whore said practically.

  I'll give you twenty dollars to take me up to your place and tell me some sad stories and then later I'll buy your panties off you you're just my wife's size she's been looking for a pair like yours not that I've seen them yet of course but I can tell you have good taste I know my wife will be very happy.

  My name's Candy, she said. What's yours?

  Jimmy.

  Well Jimmy let me have the twenty right now 'cause I kind of owe a guy some money.

  Here you go, said Jimmy, thinking shit well there goes that.

  But she actually came back, smiling at him and saying see you can trust me I'm people.

  I guess so, said Jimmy. He didn't really want to say much to her on the street.' There were too many people around.

  Now listen Jimmy said Candy I don't want to hurt your feelings or anything but I have to tell you what I tell all the elderly gentlemen: my time is VALUABLE so if you can't get it up I'm not gonna wait forever you see what I'm saying?

  I can't do that anymore, said Jimmy. All I want's sad stories.

  They started walking down to Turk Street, and Candy swung by an alley and looked in a paper bag behind a parking meter to see if her emergency stash was still there and it wasn't and Candy said shit and then Jimmy said shit because he saw the black-and-white rolling up. The cop talked to Candy for a while and Candy was loud and earnest, and then the cop motioned Jimmy over.

  Jimmy pretended not to see.

  C'mon, c'mon, Candy said. He wants to talk to you.

  Well I'll be, said Jimmy. He ambled up to the black-and-white with mild surprise in his eyes.

  Who are you, partner? the cop said, leaning on his hand and grinning.

  Jimmy.

  Where are you from?

  Around here.

  The cop looked at him in the eye for a long time. Get back on the sidewalk, he said in disgust.

  Candy laughed and laughed. You know what he said to me he said well I've heard the expression robbing the cradle but now seeing your date Candy I'm gonna coin a new one robbing the grave!

  I'm so grave said Jimmy (keeping up the spirits of the world to the last) that sometimes I'm even serious.

  You sure you can still get it up? said Candy anxiously. You look like you been through some rough times.

  Candy and Jimmy went down to the Hotel Tony and stood outside the grating until a pimply-faced blonde came out and then Jimmy rattled the bars a little and she opened the door and said say do either of you have a dime for the phone why hello Candy! and then Candy pressed the buzzer on the inner door and there was a click and she pushed the door open and they were in the lobby of the world-famous Hotel Tony where Lonnie and Mason sat with arms folded behind the table and other men stood watching on the shabby stairs and Lonnie said three dollars to get in and Jimmy said with pleasure Lonnie and peeled three ones out of his wallet and Lonnie said thank you brother and Jimmy said how much to stay here for a week? and Lonnie laughed and said we only rent by the hour and Jimmy said aw come on and Lonnie said well since you're with Candy you must be all right you can stay for sixty-five a week and Jimmy said how many rooms can I rent at once and Lonnie said as many as you want and Jimmy said OK Lonnie I'll take a thousand rooms with maid service now where's the swimming pool how many goldfish swim in it? and Lonnie laughed heh heh heh and all the men on the stairs laughed and Candy said come on Jimmy we have work to do and Lonnie showed off his silver Liberty dime and his Indian head penny and Jimmy gave Lonnie a Canadian two-dollar bill and they both talked about rare coins laughing and laughing and trying to see who could say the stupidest things about old money and Mason and Lonnie passed a jug of Night Train back and forth and offered some to Jimmy but he said winking thanks anyhow fellas the lady says we have work to do and went upstairs with Candy to a room where Candy knocked and a woman said we're busy so Jimmy and Candy walked up and down the corridor three times and Candy knocked again and there was no answer and she said now when we come out there's gonna be someone waiting and you gotta give him five for the room and Jimmy didn't like that much but what could he do about it so Candy turned the knob and in they went. Candy bolted the door.

  It was the usual kind of room with a double bed and stacks of Playboy and old record albums and the smell of incense, a punching bag over the bed, a pin-up of Farrah Fawcett, a refrigerator, and dozens of leather jackets hanging on the walls for quick conversion into cash for still other alchemical conversions whose results could at that very moment be heard out the window in the smash of a bottle against the sidewalk.

  If anyone knocks on the door do not answer it, said Candy, going into the bathroom. She closed the door and was very quiet in there for a very long time and the TV said the Pope was careful when he praised Bolivia's efforts to curb the thriving drug trade and a bus went loudly by outside and Candy was quiet in the bathroom, shitting corncobs or shooting up probably as Jimmy had half-suspected she would be when he first saw her because she was dressed in a sweater and long pants as if she did not want to show any needle tracks (although later that night he saw her working in a black miniskirt) and children were laughing in the hall outside.

  When at last she came out Jimmy said well now Candy tell me some stories. Sad stories. I need 'em sad so I can make 'em happy.

  You meet a lot of different kinds people in this work, said Candy, staggering and wandering. Automatically, she started to strip. Her breasts were long and brown and covered with black sores. She stripped down to her panties and then remembered that Jimmy was not flatbacking her and stood confused for a second and then said well I wanna try on this skirt my sister gave me this is the kind of shit I wear, and she began to model herself for him, wiggling her fat paunch and shaking her tits from side to side and saying yeah lots of strange people out here.

  That's for sure, yeah, sai
d Jimmy noncommittally. He had already unzipped his pants.

  You meet them psychos, you meet them people that like to be tied up, chained up, handcuffed from one end of the bed to the other and good god I'm talkin' about torture and you meet men that bring like them backpacks that have different equipment in 'em that they can hang shit from the ceilings. And they like to be hung up by their ankles and they like to be whipped.

  That's right, said Jimmy with his dick in his hand, that's right.

  Now me I'm a nice person and I lose a lot of money that way, because a person can look at me that way and tell that I'm not one of 'em. Some broads they can pull it off; I can't.