Hold Tight

by Christopher Bram

  “I guess it’s where that creep hangs out.” Hank carefully set the matchbook and the folded money on his dresser. “You want some of this?” he asked, tapping the money. It was as if he wanted to hide what had happened with a few bills.

  “Ain’t you forgetting?” said Juke. “I was paying you. One dollar. You want it now? You think I might stiff you? Again?”

  Hank looked at him, turned away and said, “Screw you.” But he said it without anger. He stood at the dresser, then gingerly picked up the pitcher there, poured some water into the knicked bedpan, wetted the stiff washcloth that hung from a nail on the wall and began to dab at his front.

  Juke hesitated. He knew he had gotten himself where he wanted to be: under Hank’s skin. But it was a dangerous place to be. There was no telling what the man might do to shake him out. Juke had to be very careful, or he was going to get hurt. And, despite all his wishful thinking, the sex had only gotten Hank deeper under Juke’s skin.

  “You might not like admitting it,” said Juke, “but your body sure had one hell of a party here.”

  “Yeah,” said Hank. “I’d be lying if I didn’t say part of me enjoyed that.” He mopped himself with the washcloth, as if to get rid of the evidence.

  “And I’d be lying if I didn’t say part of me enjoyed it, too. You sure know how to have a good time, Blondie.” Juke didn’t want to go too far, so he went at it from another angle. “That circus queen was sure one sick woman. What was all that shit about spies and FBI? Sounded to me like she was out to screw your head up.”

  Hank slowly, absently nodded. Then he shyly turned around, holding the washcloth over his genitals. “I’m sorry I did that to you, Juke.”

  “Did what? I did it to you,” Juke said with a laugh.

  But Hank stayed serious. “Did it with you. For that creep.”

  “Would you have done it without the creep?”

  “No.” But Hank said it softly, as if he was sorry. “Only I don’t know what I’m doing anymore. Everything’s so topsy-turvy right now.” He looked down at himself while he rubbed himself clean, then stopped rubbing. “I just never thought of you that way, Juke.”

  “What way?” Did he know? Had Juke given himself away during the sex? If Hank knew Juke was in love with him, then that would give Hank the upper hand. The possibility frightened Juke, and yet he found he was hoping Hank knew.

  “For sex. As someone good for a lay.”

  “Whadja think I was? Potatoes and gravy?”

  “No. Just that you people have your sex with each other, and we have ours. I’m sure dogs never think about sex when they think about cats.”

  Meow, thought Juke, but kept it to himself. No, it was better this way. The cracker was confused enough by lust. Talking to him about love would be like talking about Santa Claus. “Well, you know what they say,” said Juke. “It’s all pink on the inside.”

  “Yeah. I guess.”

  “But you do know how to enjoy yourself. For a white boy.”

  “Yeah. Well…” Hank hung up the washcloth and quickly rubbed his front with the hand towel. He walked around the foot of the bed to where his clothes lay on the floor. He wouldn’t look at Juke while he pulled things on.

  “You know,” said Juke. “I wouldn’t mind doing that again someday. Next time that john comes back wanting another show.”

  “No. I don’t think we’ll see him again.”

  “Some other creep then. The woodwork’s full of them.”

  Hank buttoned up his white bellbottoms and could then look back at the bed. “Juke. I plain don’t know. That was real good, only…I don’t know if we should do it again.”

  Juke sat up with his knees against his chest, so Hank wouldn’t see he was getting hard again. The man hadn’t said no. And after sex, even good sex, many people talked like they were never going to need sex again. Hank’s confusion was as good as a yes.

  “No sweat, Blondie. It’s not like you’re the best I’ve ever had. But it’s good keeping in practice while we’re waiting for the real thing.”

  Hank wiggled into his blouse. He was dressed again, but Juke would always see him naked whenever he looked at him now, for better or for worse.

  “Hey,” said Juke. “You wanna go to a party? Night after tomorrow night.”

  “You mean…a party party?”

  Juke laughed. “You think I plan the other kind of party that far in advance? Just some of the girls. And boys. Be fun. Get you out of this hole for a night. You never go anywhere, Blondie. No wonder you feel crazy all the time.”

  “Yeah. Maybe. I should do something to celebrate.”

  “Celebrate what?”

  “Nothing. Not celebrate. Just have a good time.” Hank looked like he’d said too much. About them? “Uh, this party all your people?”

  “All our people, honey. And all flavors. Neapolitan. But mostly vanilla, if that’s what’s worrying you.”

  “All right. Let me think about it.” He nodded, tried to smile, then said, almost apologetically, “I better get down the hall now. To the head.”

  “Sure thing, baby. You have a good douche. But think about that party.”

  Hank opened the door, checked the hallway and stepped out.

  Juke waited a moment, listening. Then he threw his back against the mattress and groaned, “Alpheus! You stupid little queen!”

  Erich flicked off the amplifier. He peeled the headset from his head. He had no business listening to any of that. It had nothing to do with spies. Fayette and the houseboy seemed to be in love with each other, although neither wanted to admit it. At least that’s what it meant when a man and a woman danced around each other in that manner. Maybe it meant something different when it was two men. Erich no longer attempted to argue with himself that these were degenerates, creatures with utterly foreign emotions and thoughts. They were men and human. Distressingly human.

  He packed everything into the suitcase with the amplifier. Someone would have to come back tomorrow for the microphone upstairs and the outside line. Erich carried the heavy suitcase out to the street. The Ford was gone. Sullivan’s assistant would be following Sullivan in the car, moving in to pick up his boss only if their prey caught a taxi or had his own automobile parked nearby. Erich felt very alone walking through the dark streets to the subway.

  In his narrow room at the Sloane House, he slid the suitcase under the bed, changed his clothes and combed his hair. He immediately went out again, walking uptown towards Times Square. He wanted to meet a woman tonight, a soft body with long hair, breasts and a womb. He needed to direct all his raw turbulence at someone who could give him back his moorings.

  13

  IT WAS ALMOST NOON THE next day when Anna left her lover’s apartment. She floated down to the street in the lovely oak-paneled elevator, enjoying the respectful smile in the elderly attendant’s eyes. She knew she was glowing; the man had to see her happiness. Down in the lobby, a young man in a rumpled suit and cream fedora looked up from the newspaper he read on the sofa when she walked past. He uncrossed his legs, as though he had to have both feet on the floor when he saw someone so happy and beautiful. Anna enjoyed having men see her like this. When she glanced back from the revolving door out front, the young man quickly looked away, embarrassed to be caught admiring her.

  Park Avenue looked richer and less forbidding this morning, now that she had been inside its austere stone walls. The morning was beautiful and Anna decided to cross the city through Central Park. There was still a trace of coolness in the shadows beneath the trees. Her cotton dress felt light and airy against her skin. She had never been so conscious of the naked wholeness beneath her clothes.

  It had been wonderful. The late night taxi ride across town, the doorman paying the driver, the enormous rooms upstairs, the new furniture, the wide fragrant bed. Blair had his own apartment. His mother and father lived on another floor in the same building, but they were away for the summer and there had been no fear of unexpected visitors. The help ha
d been given the evening off. There had been strangeness at first, kissing and touching in complete privacy, knowing there was no one around to stop Blair, or Anna, from doing anything. Blair became uncomfortable when she did too much, and he was horrified when she impulsively gave his thing a quick kiss. So she let him lead, and that was fine. He had loved her breasts, gratefully kissing and handling them, and was fascinated by her privates, his fingers constantly combing the hair between her legs even when they were done. She was sorry it had not lasted longer, but it was the doing that was important, not the feeling. Blair looked distressed this morning when he saw the dark-edged spot of blood on the sheet, which surprised Anna. She thought men were supposed to be proud of being the first.

  Anna slowly walked through the park among the children, nannies and great black perambulators. She stopped by Bethesda Fountain, set her hands and white purse on the stone balustrade and looked down at the plaza and fountain. She wanted Blair to ask her to be his wife, but she wasn’t going to spoil today’s happiness by thinking too much on that. Out beyond the rainbowed spray of the fountain, a weekday scattering of rowboats milled about on the lake. In one, a young man in shirtsleeves pulled on the oars while an elderly woman sat in the stern holding a white parasol with ruffles. The couples in the three or four other boats were all male, sailors, or a sailor and civilian in one. Anna felt sorry for them. Every man deserved a woman. Without women, they looked like little boys out there and Anna felt sorrier than ever about what their Government was doing to them. She was sorry there had not been time for Blair to take her for a ride on the lake today, but she needed to get to the Lyric soon and tell her father what Blair had learned.

  Walking away from the fountain, back into the shade and toward the bandshell, Anna noticed a man in a cream fedora talking to a peanut vendor. It looked like the young man with a similar hat from Blair’s lobby. He had a newspaper under his arm. He turned away slightly when she saw him, tugging down the brim of his hat so she couldn’t see where he was looking.

  Anna continued walking, straight toward the wide promenade tented with elms. She stayed calm. She adjusted her own hat as she drew level with him—he was ten feet away—and saw that it was the same man, the same rumpled suit. During the first month of helping her father, Anna had learned not to be upset by coincidences or wolves. But a wolf would have attempted to cross her path, even tried to speak to her and this man simply let her pass.

  The promenade was long and lined with benches. Anna could not leave it without drawing attention to herself. She walked its full length, without once looking behind her. She stopped by the statue of a poet at the foot of the promenade and took a cigarette from her purse. She turned around while she lit it, as if shielding the flame from a draught: the cream fedora was gone. Of course. What detective or agent would follow her from Blair’s building? Blair was above suspicion with the police. Nobody knew either of them. Still, one couldn’t be too careful. The cigarette lit, she went ahead and smoked it. Anna frequently felt she had an audience out there, somewhere, although the spectator in her mind’s eye was always her father.

  There were few horse-drawn carriages on the park drive this summer, as if even horses had been drafted. Anna followed the path away from the drive toward the playground, its squeaking swings and squealing children. Her father used to take her here when she was little. After last night, she wasn’t little anymore. Anna felt a brief tug of sadness over that. The benches around the playground were lined with black and white: all nannies and sailors. There was a solitary whistle as she walked by, but any sailor who came to watch children was going to be on his best behavior. She circled the playground and climbed the path up the hill, stopping to take one last look at the children down below. Then she saw him again, bent over a water fountain a hundred yards away, his cream fedora pushed to the back of his head.

  She resumed walking, more quickly now. She set off for Columbus Circle, thinking she might lose him in the crowd there. As she approached the street, the park grew thicker with men and women on their lunch break. The white monument and green newsstand at the entrance were mobbed. Anna was short. The man following her—if he were following her—would not be able to see her in this sea of heads and hats. She went down the stairs to the subway but, through the bars, saw that the platform was empty. A train had just come and the man might see her if she stood on the platform alone, waiting for the next train. She went back up the stairs and passed the man in the cream fedora, racing down the steps. He did not lower his head fast enough to hide the startled look on his face.

  The jolt of seeing him up close panicked Anna. She ran up the last steps and pushed her way through the crowd until she reached the curb, then stepped into the street and raised her arm to hail a taxi, until she realized no cab could stop here. She stepped back into the crowd. She told herself to stay calm. Her heart was racing. She would not run. If the man saw she knew he was following her, he would follow more closely and be impossible to lose. She firmly clutched her purse and started to walk up Broadway.

  Three blocks up, she abruptly stepped into a drugstore. She went past the crowded lunch counter to the pack of people waiting to use the bank of telephone booths in the back. An emergency, she told them and asked to use the next available phone. The men promptly agreed; the women required a little story. Finally, she sealed herself behind the folding glass doors of a booth, sat on the wooden seat and dialed the Lyric Theater. She asked for the projectionist and said she was his daughter.

  Outside the fingerprinted glass, beneath the rotating fans, there was no sign of the man. But he wouldn’t stand where she could see him once she was in the booth.

  Simon’s voice came on. “Yes? Anna?”

  “Papa?” Her thoughts instantly cleared. “I wouldn’t be calling you, except—Papa, I think I’m being followed.”

  “Where were you last night?”

  Her mouth went dry. “With Blair,” she said. “At his apartment.”

  Simon was silent a moment. “And you were followed from there?”

  “Yes, Papa.” And she told him about the man and each place she had seen him.

  “You are certain it is the same man and not just the same hat? It is not an uncommon hat.”

  “No. I’m sure, Papa. I’ve seen him up close. I’m sorry I messed things up, Papa. I really am sorry.” She was close to tears.

  “Stay calm, dear. You must stay calm. Nobody is blaming you. What did you learn from your boyfriend last night?”

  There was his usual contempt in his mention of Blair, and Anna had to think twice before she realized what Simon meant. “August. He spoke to his sailor friend and the friend has good reason to think it’ll be in August. He did well, didn’t he?”

  “August. That is good to know. If our friend isn’t working for the police.”

  “You think Blair…?” All through her panic, Anna had never considered the possibility. “No! That’s impossible.”

  “Then why were you followed from his apartment?”

  “I don’t know. But Blair’s one of us. I’m sure of that. I know him too well. I couldn’t be in love with him if I didn’t know him through and through.” She hadn’t meant to confess her love. She waited for her father to react to that.

  “How much money do you have?” Simon asked.

  She told him.

  “Very good. Listen to me. You must go to a hotel for women, a clean hotel, and take a room. You are to stay there tonight. You cannot come to the theater. You must not come home.”

  “Papa! Please! I was wrong. It’s all my fault. But don’t punish me like this. I need to see you.”

  “I am not punishing you. If you are being followed, it’s too dangerous for you to see me. Not to worry. Maybe the man is only a masher. If so, it will only be for tonight. This hurts me as much as it hurts you, dear.”

  “Yes. You’re right.” But Anna still felt he was punishing her. She felt she deserved to be punished.

  “Find a clean room in a nice pla
ce. Do not, under any circumstances, go back to your Blair’s apartment. You are not to see him again. Ever.”

  “But Blair’s not with the police, Papa. I know he’s not.”

  “Even so. He is arrogant and inept. Somebody must suspect him of something, or that man would not have followed you from his apartment. We have learned what we needed from him. We must now wash our hands of him. He is a danger to both you and me.” Simon paused. “I am sorry you feel so strongly about him, Anna. But there is your family to think of. This boy endangers all of us.”

  “Yes, Papa.”

  Simon closed by telling her not to telephone home, but to call him at the theater at noon the next day. He would explain her absence to Aunt Ilsa. “Everything will be fine again. I promise. Do not fret, dearest. Goodbye.”

  Anna hung up, her stomach tensing. Talking to her father, she felt she could put aside her love for Blair. Alone, she was painfully in love with him again.

  She pushed the booth door open and stumbled out, remembering to glance back at the other booths, looking for the pale hat. She didn’t see the man anywhere in the drugstore. Out on the sidewalk, she burrowed into the crowd and let the current of people carry her uptown. He was sure to be somewhere behind her. It was his fault she was now cut off from her father, his fault and Blair’s.

  The crowd began to thin out up toward Sixty-sixth Street, where rows of mud-colored tenements pressed against the grimy hotels and pawnshops along Broadway. Aware of where she was, Anna was suddenly aware of something else she should do. There was a bar with a pink-gray neon palm tree in its sunlit window. Anna went inside. The place was quiet, with a handful of men her father’s age picking at the free lunch that came with their beer. She went into the ladies room and splashed water on her face and neck. She came out and went straight to the lone phone booth wedged in the corner. She closed the door, thought a moment, then slipped a nickel in and dialed Blair.

  Blair was still in his robe, sitting in a wing-backed chair, slippers on the oriental carpet, cup of coffee at his elbow, pretending to read the good, gray Times while he floated in his dream of success and love—love was so much clearer now that he was alone with it—when the telephone rang.