Wake Up, Sir!: A Novel

by Jonathan Ames

  After receiving my diploma in the mail, I coated myself with the stinging cream, which upon contact with water would turn to shampoo, but I had to leave it on my person for fifteen minutes before rinsing myself. Then after rinsing I was to comb the hairs in question over the toilet bowl, removing nits and nymphs and trolls and spotted owls, and then rinse again.

  So it was a very long fifteen minutes waiting for that RidX cream to do its job. They were fifteen of the longest minutes of my life. I thought of Jeeves's lecture on time. At the end of those fifteen minutes, I was going to be eligible for Social Security.

  As I stood about, I examined my armpits in the mirror. The educational materials had made mention that once in a while pubic lice enjoy taking vacations in the armpit. I didn't see anything up there, but then I looked again, and I saw one of those embedded brown creatures! This was too sickening. I realized that the little bastard had followed the tributary of hair that ran up my belly to my chest, and from there it had swung on a few chest hairs, like Tarzan, until it had made it to my pit, where it had taken sanctuary.

  So now I soaked my pits with the cream, but this was a few minutes after I had started the cream in my groin, and I worried about the timing being off, but said to hell with it, figuring it wasn't an exact science.

  After twenty minutes I showered off the cream and then did the work with the comb. I regarded myself in the long mirror that was on the back of the door. I got the bright idea of shaving the tributary that ran up the middle of my torso. This way if any crab lived, it wouldn't have transit. So I shaved that off, and then a kind of mania took over, and the next thing I knew, I was hacking away at every hair on my body, except for the hair on my head, which the materials had said was not appealing to pubic lice, having something to do with air temperature.

  I slathered shaving cream all over myself; no area felt safe from crabs, and in part I was driven to this shaving frenzy because I didn't fully trust the medication; the directions said that the whole process might need to be repeated several times, which didn't exactly fill one with confidence.

  Thus, if I removed every hair—as Ava had done—the little buggers would have nowhere to hide! I went through five disposable razors.

  I even bent over and shaved where I had never considered putting a sharp object. But I did it and was more ready than ever for my prison fantasy to come true. I was as hairless as young Kenneth must have been when he was first happily defiled.

  I looked in the mirror at my bare legs, groin, belly, chest, and armpits. Except for the bruises the Hill had given me, I was confronted with a body I hadn't seen in many years. It was like a reunion with the past, with my younger self. I felt a sad affection for the young boy I was who didn't know yet how much trouble there was going to be, how much he would lose. It was different from nostalgia: by shaving my body, it seemed as if I had physically gone back in time, not just mentally.

  Then I regarded my mustache. That would complete this strange Dorian Gray shaving trance, and also I couldn't risk keeping it. Maybe a crab, as a last resort, would hide in there. Off the mustache came. After the scarring of my legs, the removal of my thin lip hair was just a moment's handiwork.

  “Good-bye, Douglas Fairbanks Jr.,” I said in a maudlin voice. “It's been nice knowing you. And good-bye to you, too, Mr. Errol Flynn.” I sounded like an Oscar telecast, during that moment when they worship dead stars.

  Then I took a long hot shower and it soothed my raw body. Dripping wet, I dashed to my room. I dried myself with a crab-free towel and got dressed in crab-free clothing—khaki pants and a dark blue shirt from Brooks Brothers. I told Jeeves that I had shaved off every hair on my body.

  “I had grown fond of your mustache, sir, but you look more youthful without it. I do hope you won't be too uncomfortable elsewhere.”

  “I already am, I can tell. But I deserve it. It's my penance. Kind of the opposite of a hair shirt, but with the same effect.”

  Our next task was to spray my mattress and pillows and the whole room, and then the writing room. We held handkerchiefs over our mouths, and I had some sense of the sadistic power that exterminators must enjoy. We opened the windows, though I hoped that wouldn't nullify the effects of the Agent Orange. Then we sprayed and cleaned the bathroom. Finally, our labors were over.

  I felt violated underneath my clothes, but I was also quite relieved. No crab could possibly have survived. They had taken my girl from me; they had taken my mustache; but their attack on me had come to an end, I felt. We put all the elements of the crab kit in a plastic bag and planned to dispose of it off-campus. If the kit was discovered in the colony garbage, a witch hunt could ensue. What kind of note would Hibben leave on the mail table then?

  “Well, thank you, Jeeves, for all your help.” We were back in the writing room. “I couldn't have killed these crabs without you.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  It was a few minutes past six. Out the window, I could see that people were gathering on the back terrace.

  “I'm going to go get drunk, Jeeves.”

  “I understand, sir.”

  CHAPTER 36

  A possible explanation as to why dogs are so belovedA recap of dinnerMangrove's coed is at the door?I'm going to play both rô les in a Cole Porter song—the top and the bottomI'm no Philip Marlowe

  “I think dogs must have a lot of free-flowing serotonin,” I said. “More than humans, anyways. I wonder if scientists should be studying their brains for depression cures. I think their high serotonin levels might be why we like to have them around. When I pet a dog, I get some kind of contact euphoria. I may be getting extra serotonin subcutaneously or however things are transferred through the skin.”

  Mangrove didn't respond to my comment; he said, just noticing, “Hey! Why'd you shave your mustache?”

  “Yeah, I thought you looked different,” said Tinkle.

  “It was getting too itchy,” I said.

  We were in Tinkle's room having another skull session with a freshly opened bottle of whiskey and a new packet of medicinal cannabis. It was around 10 P.M. I was drugged and intoxicated, but I hadn't yet blacked out, though I wish I had earlier in the evening.

  Dinner, you see, had been a total nightmare. The gods had really laid it on thick, even for them.

  We had been served, of all things, crab cakes. It was too macabre. We were also served corn. Corn on the macabre.

  Naturally, I thought some kind of conspiracy was at play. That the staff knew someone had crabs, but didn't know who, and they were trying to push the guilty party over the edge and force out a confession.

  But I didn't crack. I ate the things, though it was like being the royal taster for Hitler or Caesar, except I was Hitler and Caesar. So it was like being my own royal taster.

  All the colonists were thrilled with the entrée and there was a happy buzz of talk and laughter. A grayish light came through the windows; the day, after its promising start, had been steadfastly overcast. The large chandelier was lit.

  I was at a satellite table with just Mangrove and Tinkle and was doing my best, while gumming the crab cakes, to bludgeon all available nerve endings with a lot of white wine, taking more than my usual dosage.

  I was halfway through my third bottle when Ava arrived late, just as she had my first night at the Rose six months ago, though according to Jeeves's bookkeeping that was probably three nights ago.

  I saw her blanch when she approached the buffet line. Then she made eye contact with me as she went to find a seat at the big table. I saw that her plate only had salad and a piece of corn. No crab cakes. She smiled just a little at me, enough to make my heart pause, and then she sat down.

  I drank two more glasses of wine and then Beaubien came to our table and addressed me: “When are you going to return my slippers?”

  I had spent the day battling crabs and had now gone through three bottles of the thin white wine, and the combined effect of the trauma and the booze was a sort of plastic surgery on my persona
lity. I didn't cower. I had guts. If I could face crabs, I could face anything. I was sitting down, but I stood up, so to speak, to Beaubien. I said, “Just be patient. I'll have them for you in the middle of the week. They're at Tiffany's getting bronzed.”

  Her eyes widened and she walked away, and Mangrove and Tinkle laughed. She turned back and said, “I expect better of you, Reginald,” and then she left the dining room.

  Reginald was a little wounded by this, but not terribly. After dinner we three then went up to Tinkle's room to see how his whiskey was doing. It was doing fine, and after two hours of reacquainting ourselves with it, Mangrove brought out the marijuana. Under the influence of the cannabis, conversation had worked its way back to the failed mission to find a serotonin spring, and that's when I brought up the possibility of dogs being serotonin carriers, which for some reason had triggered Mangrove to perceive with his one eye that I had removed my lip hair, as recorded above.

  “And you're not in jacket and tie,” said Mangrove. “What's gotten into you?”

  “You're only just now noticing this radical transformation of my person?”

  “Well, this side of my brain isn't that fast yet.”

  “I understand,” I said. “But what's your excuse, Tinkle?”

  “I don't know,” he said. “I don't really look at anybody too closely.”

  “That's honest,” I said. “But a science officer should be a master of close observation.”

  Just then there was a knock at the door. We were all startled. Yet again, we three shared the same telepathic thought: Mangrove's coed?

  Tinkle went to the door.

  It was Ava. She asked to speak with me. I got up from my chair and was a little wobbly. I was rather drunk and stoned but was thinking and speaking clearly.

  “Let's go to my room,” she said, seemingly not caring that Mangrove and Tinkle would infer some intimacy between us.

  “See you later,” said Tinkle.

  “Okay,” I said.

  I submissively followed Ava to her room. Maybe Jeeves was right. She was already softening. She shut the door and sat on her bed. I sat at her desk chair, thinking that was my proper place.

  “Are you doing okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah, I washed everything. I think it's going to be all right…. You didn't tell Reginald and the other Alan, did you?”

  “Of course not,” I said.

  This seemed to please her. Then she said, “Can you believe they had crab cakes?”

  “Do you think they were trying to force our hand?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I thought maybe they somehow knew that someone had crabs and were letting us know they know.”

  “Don't be nuts…. But you could be right in some crazy way; those cleaning ladies see everything…. Did you wash all your clothes?”

  “Yes, I boiled all my clothing, and I bought a kit with the shampoo and stuff, but then I went a little berserk and shaved my whole body.”

  “Oh, God,” she said and laughed.

  I smiled at her. This was going very well. She was being very nice to me! I said, “My kit came with a spray; you might want to spray your room.”

  “All right,” she said.

  “You want me to get the spray right now?”

  “No … there's a favor I want to ask you.”

  “Anything. I'll do anything for you. I feel so bad about this crab craziness.”

  “I'm going through a really bad time financially,” she said, suddenly very serious. “Friday, when I went to the track, I lost almost fifteen hundred dollars…. I had never really gambled before and I lost control; it was a real rush. I got lucky and won the first two races, and then I lost eight straight times and went to a cash machine … and the rent is due on my studio in Brooklyn and I don't have any money—” She stopped a moment. She must want a loan. This I could do! “And I went to my gallery yesterday. There's a buyer who likes my stuff. But there's only one piece he wants. He saw a photo of the bust I gave to Dr. Hibben. He wants that. The price is two thousand dollars. Selling that would solve everything. But I need the bust.”

  “Just ask Hibben for it back,” I said. “He'll understand.”

  “No, I can't do that,” she said. “It would look really bad. He's on the board of a lot of things, like the Pollock-Krasner, which gives a ton of money to sculptors. He really likes the piece, and if I ask for it back, I'll look like a flaky artist…. I want you to steal it.”

  This was like her punch in the stomach and her discussion of African lovers. She was volatile and unpredictable. I didn't know what to say. She wanted me to commit a crime.

  By giving her crabs, had I put myself that much in her debt? I couldn't think straight. The booze, the pot. I can't think straight when I'm not on booze and pot.

  “I don't know…. I'll be caught…. Can I give you two thousand dollars? I'll be happy to. You don't have to pay me back … it's a gift.”

  “I don't want your money,” she said. “And I've thought this out … I want this collector to have my piece. It will look good for me. He'll buy others if he gets this one.”

  “But Hibben will report it stolen. This collector will think it's stolen.”

  “No, it will come from me. I can always tell Hibben there was one more copy I made from the original, if he somehow heard this collector had it…. And the piece will have greater mystique if a copy of it is reported stolen; even though there is no copy.”

  Ava was nuts. I had suspected as much when she'd unfurled that story about the therapist from the Utne reader, though her personality was deceptive. She was capable of appearing sane, but I could now see that she was mentally ill. But this was par for the course. Everyone at the Rose was mentally ill. In fact, most everyone I meet is mentally ill. It's just all too hard. We can't handle being alive.

  “I'm sorry … I don't think I can do it,” I said. “Why don't you do it? I'll stand lookout, if you like.” I wanted to help her; I hated letting her down, but I was too much of a coward.

  “I want you to do it. If I got caught stealing my own piece, it would just look absurd. You have to do it. You gave me crabs! You know how disgusting that is?”

  “But what if I'm caught? I could go to jail….” Then I thought maybe that wasn't such a bad idea. What the hell, this was my chance. Either way I came out on top or on bottom, and both were appealing. If I was successful, I'd have my fantasy girl back, and if I failed, then I'd have my defiling fantasy come true, and then afterward I could hang myself in my cell. Hanging one's self in one's cell is perfectly reasonable. For once my suicidal tendencies could be justified.

  “It'll be easy,” she said, “the Hibbens don't lock their door.” She came over and kissed me hard on the lips. She put my hand on her full breast. She knelt in front of me. “Please,” she said.

  I weakened and strengthened at the same time. Morally, I was collapsing, but my capacity for stupidity and bravery was increasing. I squeezed her breast, and then I said boldly, with masculine intensity, “I'll do it.”

  Why not? For Ava! Don Quixote would do it for La Dulcinea!

  “Get it tonight,” she said, smiling. “Then I'll take the head to New York tomorrow; the collector will have it before Hibben even notices that it's gone…. I know it's crazy, but I think it will work.”

  “I'll do it around two A.M. The Hibbens should be asleep by then,” I said, signing my own death warrant or suicide note, or whatever you call it when you know that you are being willfully irrational.

  She gave me another delicious kiss, then led me to her bed. I lay on top of her. “Is there anything else you want me to steal, while I'm there?” I asked.

  She responded by putting her tongue in my mouth. I was a novice, but a life of crime was showing that it had its attractions.

  We quickly stripped down to see each other's naked, hairless bodies.

  “I guess there's no chance that we could recrab each other?” I asked.

  “I don't think so.”
>
  Below the waist, she looked perversely like a prepubescent young girl, and I looked like a boiled chicken with an erection.

  I got to suck her nose again a little, but she said she didn't want us to make love, that she was worried that Alan and Reginald would guess at the truth if I was gone too long. But she promised me that if I came back with the head, we could again lie down together. I got dressed, kissed her good-bye, and said, “I'll be back with the head in a few hours.” I went up to the third floor and rejoined Tinkle and Mangrove. They were eager to know what Ava had wanted, and I said, “She wants me to sit for a sculpture. She's intrigued by my broken nose.”

  Along with several other less than admirable traits, I was becoming a very good liar.

  CHAPTER 37

  A code wordWe almost have enough for a minyan, but not quiteI said, she saidA walk in the darkNavy scores a touchdownA social gathering of sortsA transposed headWhat happens if there is a gun in the last act, but not the first act—does it still go off?

  Mangrove left Tinkle's room around midnight.

  “Good night, Commander,” I said.

  “Good night, Commander,” said Tinkle.

  “Carry on!” said Mangrove, and made his exit.

  I wanted to keep fueling myself with Tinkle's whiskey to help me commit my felony appointment at 2 A.M.

  I had bravely not said a word to either Federation member; I was, of course, going to have to do this alone. Also, I had to protect Ava, and furthermore, I didn't want to implicate Mangrove and Tinkle in any way—knowledge could make them accomplices.

  I was worried, though, that I might black out and not go through with the thing. I said to Tinkle, “Please check every now and then to see if I'm blacked out.”

  “How do I do that?”

  “Ask me if I'm blacked out.”

  “But even if you're blacked out, you might tell me that you're not blacked out.”