Fickle

by Peter Manus

  webmaggot @ February 25 06:11 am

  Gag me. I don’t even like thinking about sloppy seconds cause it involves getting my bod too close to where some other guy has been.

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 06:12 am

  SHUT UP, you HOMOPHOBIC CLOSET FAG. Pearle was a lot more kinky that just being a VOYEUR. And FICKEL was a lot more kinky than HE was.

  chinkigirl @ February 25 06:13 am

  More kinky than two guys at once? Does it get much kinkier than that?

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 06:15 am

  It does if one of the guys is…?

  i.went.to.harvard @ February 25 06:18 am

  …the Mysterious Hottie?

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 06:19 am

  YES. And WHY would that be so KINKY, my THICK-WITTED INNOCENTS?

  chinkigirl @ February 25 06:21 am

  Because he’s rough. He makes a woman feel almost abused, almost like she’s been taken.

  36-D @ February 25 06:23 am

  Or…(and I cringe to say this) because he reminds fickel of dickel?

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 06:24 am

  FIGURE IT OUT YOU TWITS. REMEMBER HIS NAME IS “GUY.”

  chinkigirl @ February 25 06:25 am

  As in anonymous male?

  marleybones @ February 25 06:27 am

  I need to sleep! We’ve pulled an all-nighter on this. All I can say is tgiSunday. Okay, the one Guy I can think of from “our” kind of lit is Guy Haines from Patricia Highsmith’s Strangers on a Train. Favorite of mine. There is some heavy stuff going on there about identity and double lives. Does that have some bearing on where you’re taking us, proudblacktrannie?

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 06:30 am

  “My brain a tumble of rage…” WHY?

  “You drank me in without conscious reaction…You half smiled…Were you apologizing?”

  WHY, WHY, WHY???

  i.went.to.harvard @ February 25 01:22 pm

  Okay, proudblacktrannie, I might be with you. Frankly, I am not proud to say that I have already meandered down this rather dark path of reasoning. But this is where it gets all gummed up:

  If fickel met Stephen Pearle through the Peacock and the Mysterious Hottie also met Stephen Pearle through the Peacock, then fickel got together with the Mysterious Hottie and somehow Stephen Pearle ended up “in the way” and dead, why would this necessitate the Peacock’s death? What could she know about them being a pair, except if they were together from before and her bringing them both to Stephen Pearle is one major coincidence…I am totally gummed up.

  chinkigirl @ February 25 06:07 pm

  Hi, back and refreshed… Coincidences do happen and Boston is a very small city.

  roadrage @ February 25 07:24 pm

  You know what the pulp dicks say: where there’s a whopper of a coincidence there probably is no coincidence at all.

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 07:31 pm

  OH GAWWWWWWD, YOU NINNIES…THE BITCH SET THE WHOLE THING UP.

  LOOK, SHE COMES ACROSS PEARLE IN THE CITY ONE NIGHT—SHE RECOGNIZES HIM AND BEGINS STALKING HIM. WITH PRECIOUS LITTLE TROUBLE, SHE FINDS OUT HE’S A JEWELER AND IT DON’T TAKE MUCH MORE EFFORT TO FIND OUT WHO SOME OF HIS CUSTOMERS ARE. THEN SHE DOES HERSELF A LITTLE WEB RESEARCH ON SOME OF THEM AND FINDS OUT THAT SOME JEWELER’S WET DREAM (THE PEACOCK) HAS A RICH OLD HUSBAND (THE COLONEL) WHO USED TO WRITE MYSTERIES. FICKEL WORKS AT A MYSTERY MAGAZINE. SO SHE’S NOW GOT SOMETHING TO WORK WITH!!!!!

  SHE MAKES UP A WAY TO GET TO KNOW THE COLONEL (THE NOIR READINGS AT HARVARD), TALKS HIM INTO HAVING THE PEACOCK’S PORTRAIT DONE BY THE MYSTERIOUS HOTTIE, INSTRUCTS THE M.H. TO PAINT A FANCY NECKLACE ON THE BITCH, AND HONEY IT AIN’T MUCH WORK AT ALL FOR FICKEL TO SUGGEST TO THE PEACOCK THAT SHE HAVE HER JEWELER GET TOGETHER WITH HER PORTRAIT ARTIST TO DISCUSS HAVING THE THING MADE UP.

  THAT LEAVES THE EASIEST STEP OF ALL: HAVING THE PEACOCK INTRODUCE FICKEL TO PEARLE AT A CONCERT. LITTLE TRAMP MOVES IN ON PEARLE, AND BEFORE LONG SHE SUGGESTS A THREE-WAY WITH “THE ARTIST GUY,” WHO PEARLE HAS YET TO REALIZE SHE ALREADY KNOWS VERY, VERY WELL.

  YES, IT’S ALL A MERRY REUNION, A GODDAM CHRISTMAS SPECIAL, UNTIL…

  roadrage @ February 25 08:02 pm

  Okay (cringe in anticipation of being called stupid in all caps) I’m kind of following, but I don’t get the last bit. It’s a “reunion?” Until what?

  chinkigirl @ February 25 08:04 pm

  I’m not quite getting it either. Please don’t leave me to speculate, because you have no idea of the rather unsavory things I’m imagining.

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 08:05 pm

  EXACTLY. IMAGINE AWAY.

  marleybones @ February 25 08:10 pm

  I think that I get it and want to make sure I’m not alone. It was all a merry reunion, as proudblacktrannie says, until Pearle finally recognized fickel, and maybe the Mysterious Hottie as well. Since she’d recognized Pearle all along, maybe she’d even been telling herself that they all knew what they were up to and that they were just not mentioning the unmentionable?

  roadrage @ February 25 08:11 pm

  Wait. So now the Mysterious Hottie is also a blast from the past?

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 08:13 pm

  Well, FAT BOY, YOU are the one who pointed out that Hottie reminds you of…

  webmaggot @ February 25 08:16 pm

  REMINDS HIM OF WHAT?

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 08:45 pm

  You all are THICK.

  webmaggot @ February 25 08:46 pm

  You know what? LICK ME GAY BIRD. SEE WE CAN ALL HIT THE CAPS LOCK AND SOUND LIKE TOTAL DICKS!

  i.went.to.harvard @ February 25 09:07 pm

  Look, who is Pearle? How could fickel recognize him and have him not recognize her?

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 09:10 pm

  HE wouldn’t have recognized HER the way SHE would have recognized him because SHE had been a little girl and HE had been already a grownup so SHE would have changed a lot and HE would not have changed.

  marleybones @ February 25 09:11 pm

  Let me put something out here that I’ve been researching fruitlessly: Carreau is French for diamond, in some contexts, like playing cards.

  36-D @ February 25 09:15 pm

  We know that fickel’s mother’s name was de Carreau, but…?

  chinkigirl @ February 25 09:16 pm

  And the jewelry shop that fickel dubbed The Blue Pearl actually turns out to have been called Blue Diamonds, but…?

  i.went.to.harvard @ February 25 09:17 pm

  But how, according to X, did she and Mr. Suicide come up with a name for the jewelry shop?

  roadrage @ February 25 09:20 pm

  They named it after Pearle, right? Egad—the ultimate doppelgänger.

  36-D @ February 25 09:37 pm

  OMGGGGGGGGG. Uncle Steven and the twins, back to playing doctor as grownups. For once I am like SO proud to be the last one to get it.

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 09:38 pm

  AH THE DAWN LIGHT HAS BROKEN!!!

  chinkigirl @ February 25 09:40 pm

  But all of this is pure speculation. Please, let’s remember that!

  marleybones @ February 25 09:43 pm

  Actually, it’s not just speculation. I’ve had so many ugly thoughts these past days I can’t sleep. Like proudblacktrannie has undoubtedly done, I’ve reread the E diary from the perspective of a young female writer complaining about Stephen Pearle—or should I say Etienne de Carreau. I’ve also done web research about a Canadian inkmaker named Gustafson living in western Mass who attempted suicide by dropping himself in front of a train while his wife looked on and his twin daughter and son sat on a bench in the station waiting room. There’s stuff out there, although all of it sketchy, highly circumstantial, and in no way reliable. I don’t know if I want to find any more of it.

  So, now that we all think what we think and don’t think what we don’t think, want my advice? Let’s none o
f us take this any further.

  i.went.to.harvard @ February 25 09:55 pm

  Whether or not we’ve hit on the truth, I consider myself fickel’s friend and will offer her any aid she may ask of me. She knows how to contact me offsite. Until then, I will think of her riding rails, anonymous, physically safe, emotionally recuperating. Until then, my friends.

  proudblacktrannie @ February 25 09:59 pm

  …and a hush fell over the blog…

  39

  GIVE IT TO ME STRAIGHT

  marleybones @ February 28 02:01 am

  Hey, big void. Just woke from this vivid dream and realized that I wanted to get it down in writing and also that only you guys would appreciate it like I am doing right now. Don’t know if any of you will check in (is this blog even functioning at this point?), but here it is:

  I’m a detective in this dream—in fact, I’m highly aware of myself and of how odd it is to think of myself as a detective, but it’s one of those dreams where you realize you’re dreaming and just go with it—(do others have these or is it just me?)—and, anyway, I am trailing fickel and this is a big moment because I believe that I have located her.

  I am on some tropical island, having just landed in one of those tiny prop planes, and I am walking around, squinting at the ocean through palm trees, etc., all the time feeling rather uncomfortable because I’m wearing wool pants and a stiff shirt and patent leather dress shoes, almost like a man (and, I know what you’re thinking but all lesbians don’t dress like men—in fact I am an old flower child and so this is a very peculiar outfit for me). I believe that I know where I am going but at the same time I am wondering if I am lost.

  After not walking very far, I focus in on this man near the beach. He is built and wearing a barely-there bathing suit and he is lying on one of those striped lounge chairs with a big tropical drink in his hand. I can’t make him out very well because the sun is causing a terrible glare, but I start walking through the sand toward him (awkward in my dress shoes), and I come to realize that my excitement is not over him, but over the girl I can hardly see at all who is lying on a matching lounge chair, just beyond him. I can see the girl’s feet. She’s on her stomach, but she turns over, and then I see her hand reach for the man’s drink and she kind of half sits up so I get a tiny bit of her profile and hair. First of all, she is topless, with smallish, pointy breasts. She has thick disheveled hair, very black as if it’s dyed and cut in a sort of Raggedy-Ann style, which looks quite cool on her because she’s thin and lithe with sharp, almost disdainful features. She has large sunglasses on that hide a lot but somehow I am filled with this sense of triumph because I know that I have found fickel.

  I start churning through the sand toward them, and fickel lays herself down again, disappearing from view, but then the man notices me and sort of half sits up to get a look at who is coming and this is the really weird moment—he’s not a man, turns out, but is instead a middle-aged, big-shouldered African American woman.

  I am, at that moment, frozen in place at the sudden, rather massive revelation that fickel and X were in it together, from the start. And then it occurs to me—flashes before me, if thoughts can do that—that they were in it to steal the Peacock’s necklace. Insert your own wazzup-esque exclamation points.

  Anyway, in this dream I have these two revelations, and then, rather than continuing to hurry toward them, I start thinking about this discovery, what it means and what I can ask them to learn more. Understand that I don’t consider myself a threat to them at all—for me, this detective work is totally fact-finding. Unfortunately, my thinking about why I’m there and how I should approach them makes me increasingly aware that I am dreaming, and I struggle like hell to remain in the dream, on the tropical island, approaching fickel and X to question them…cross-dressing private dick that I am. But it’s no use. I’m awake, and I lie in my bed, fully conscious, hoping against hope that sleep will return and I will manage to do what I’ve never managed before in my entire life, which is to resume a dream at the point it left off.

  I lie there in bed. My dog snores. My S.O. grinds her teeth—this is news to me and I start thinking about what it might signify. Eventually I realize I’m not getting back to that tropical island. Then I get scared that I’ll forget some or all of what I dreamt. So here I sit. Well?

  roadrage @ February 28 07:14 pm

  Wicked cool dream, marleybones. Anyone think we’d better set up an alternative site where we can continue this in case fickel ever surfaces and shuts our shit down?

  chinkigirl @ February 28 07:19 pm

  Hi, guyz. I’ve thought of that, too. Part of me is scared to lose you guys, your voices, your humor, your views. But another part of me thinks that this is the only place where we’ll work like this, and that the best way to go is to let it run its course and evaporate, as all great stages in friendship do.

  On marleybones’s dream, I really have no view about where that comes from and how it may pertain to what’s gone down with fickel, but, well, I, too, have something I might as well report. I can’t say it’s any more “fact-based” than the idea that fickel’s run off to a tropical island with X to live off the blue diamonds they dug out of a priceless necklace, but here goes:

  I have a friend who works in admissions at Dartmouth, and she’s in contact with college advisors from a bunch of prep schools. So during that period when we were all wildly “sleuthing away” and trying to figure out the truth about fickel, I contacted Connie and told her a little of what we were looking into: twins who would have been in and out of a number of private schools, and probably not the best of them, about ten years ago, one of whom might have had some trouble with a young teacher named MacLean Jared. Of course Connie had nothing for me, but months later she got back to me. She said she’d totally forgotten what I’d asked her until she found herself sitting down with this guy from one of the name prep schools, and he makes this little joke about his name being MacLean Jared and everyone sticking a comma between, as if his name were Jared MacLean, and how his students get confused and call him Mr. MacLean. The guy is about thirty-five, and Connie realizes that ten years back he’d have been a newbie who might have gotten hit on my some ballsy young teacher’s pet wannabe.

  So she asks him, point blank, if he ever had trouble with a female student when he first started teaching. I’m just going to paste in her email to me below:

  I asked about “trouble with female students,” as if making light of it, but instantly the guy went white as an Irishman’s tush. Truthfully, Prissy, he looked so shaken I was afraid to let my glance drop for fear of spotting a stain growing down his chinos! I made every effort to assure him that I knew nothing except that a friend of mine knew a woman who regretted having made some sort of “trouble” a few years back for a boarding school teacher with his name.

  I think my tone reassured him, but later in the interview he couldn’t help getting back to it. My impression was that he was concerned that some deep dark secret had somehow surfaced. So thanks, my friend, for setting me up to get a poor nerd in touch with his inner-paranoia! :) And he was cute, too, in a kind of pre-balding way. Not my type, but Occom Pond is frozen and I wouldn’t have said no to an evening of ice skating followed by a little warming up in front of the fire in his room at the Inn. They do a sweet in-room continental breakfast, too. ;)

  Anyway, doc, he managed to stutter out a tale about how in his very first semester of teaching, a student had pulled a Lolita number by rather artfully arranging herself—naked and undulating—across his bed in his “dorm-master’s studio” while he’d been showering before dinner, and that when he’d come out he’d gotten the distinct impression, somewhere in and among clamping his hands over his privates and running out his back door, that there had been another person hidden in the closet! It seems luck had been with young Mr. J, as he’d found his across-the-fire-stairwell neighbor, another single male teacher, at home and willing to lend him a towel before returning with him to the scene of
the non-seduction, which they’d found vacant. I asked him what had given him the impression that there’d been a person hiding in his closet, and he said he’d lost his recollection of that detail but that the impression remained firm in his mind, and that it could have been something as simple as the fact that he’d left the closet door open and when he’d emerged to find the Klayne School Mata Hari writhing on his bed, the closet had only been cracked, as if to allow a peeper just enough of a view! You begin to see, as I did, why the incident haunts him to this day?

  That’s all I got, doc—MacLean claimed to have forgotten the girl’s name (unlikely) and also said that she’d disappeared from the school after the incident. No one ever questioned him, and he decided (unwisely, in my view) against reporting it himself. It rather amazes me, actually, that men feel so vulnerable to false accusations of sexual wrongdoing!

  So I don’t know if that adds anything to our knowledge. It does seem to verify that fickel crawled through various boarding schools and “experimented” at the art of seduction. Of course, she herself admitted as much, so it’s a point in favor of this blog’s veracity. Plus, it’s not the first time a teenage girl would have tried something with an “older man.”

  roadrage @ February 28 07:36 pm

  Although someone hiding in the closet kicks the whole thing into its own kinky zone. Is that for, like, blackmail pictures or a three-way?

  chinkigirl @ February 28 07:40 pm

  The teacher might have imagined that. A naked female student gyrating on your bed must be very alarming for a single male teacher.

  marleybones @ February 28 07:57 pm

  I don’t know. If he walks out of the bathroom in the altogether and sees this girl on his bed, his first instinct is to get some pants on. That means the closet, but when he turns in that direction the door is propped just so. Instinct—not conscious thought—tells him to get the hell out, which is how he finds himself outside in the altogether. Now that makes sense to me, while if it were only the girl herself he thought he had to deal with he would have backtracked into the bathroom.

  36-D @ February 28 08:20 pm