*
2017. Call him whatever the fuck you want just don’t call him Golden Boy. Eternal, A color you can’t see, 6’, 125, lbs., 10.5 inches, uncircumcised (Naturally).
He’s not golden. He is the root and the leaf and the yearning sap that links and loops between the men who nightly come to the park, fellow vessels waiting to fill or be filled. How they shudder and gasp as he works them open. Many grunt and push off him and stumble out of the brush, buckle knocking knuckle. Few, a sacrosanct few, his whimpering choir of the chosen few –they stay and surrender and nestle down into the dirt, one cheek flat in a puddle, eyes reaching back like desperate hands trying to grab the steering wheel of a car going over a cliff and he pushes so far into them that they stop wanting. And he’s learned to take so much more from them, and so much more slowly, more completely, to take in ways so that they think they are giving what they didn’t even know was theirs. No, he’s not golden. Not brown. Something wild and green and growing and his hair rustles in the wind like new leaves whenever he enters the Ramble, resilient, the personification of spring in the truest sense of the word, how his being had been poured into this shape, not willed but cultivated by demented dimensions, poured and pouring, pouring into the mouths of sheepish accountants and retail clerks and mad garbage men and German tourists and drunk college boys following a rumor and memories of summers in the boat house, of older brothers showing them the ropes and the ropes are wet and thick with celestial seeds hanging off the chins of old men with monogrammed handkerchiefs and the presence of mind (and experience, forget the songs of experience, they crave the sighs) to put down a sheet of newspaper before kneeling so their wives won’t question again the grass stains on their trousers.
From his apartment in the Time Warner Center overlooking the park, Golden Boy pulls an iPhone 6 Plus out of his Bathing Ape camouflage sweat pants pocket. He licks a finger to wipe away a smudge from his Nike SB X Diamond Dunks while looking at his phone –and wills his other hand to grow multiple spidery appendages so he can type and swipe faster; he has every app and multiple accounts and he knows how to be demure, to come on hard, to please, to tease, to entice. And once you’re hooked he always types the same thing.
LOL let’s meet in the park.
Murder on the Prurient Express
David Nickle
1
A light shone at the station... just one, but one was enough to assist young Martin as he made good his escape. It glared a beacon across the midnight-black meadow, the weed-choked tracks over which Martin loped and stumbled and, when he forgot himself and tried to sprint, limped.
One, singular bulb. Housed in a conical metal shade dangled by a chain from the awning, that focused illumination in a bright circle on the platform—encompassing an old bench with a missing slat, and crucially for Martin, a window looking in to the station master’s office. He could see himself in that glass. Martin sidled closer and squinted.
Once he had checked his hands, and found that yes, they were bloody, he rubbed some of the dirt off that window and looked at his face. It was not that good but better than it could have been. His left eye was dark and swollen: the tender spot on his jaw was dark too, but not as bad as the eye. His whole face was freckled with blood. He tried to wipe it off with his hand but it just smeared everywhere. Not, he remarked silently, ideal.
He found his way inside, the way one does when locks are involved.
The little station house was dark and Martin had to feel his way around, past the bench and across some garbage and into a little restroom. The light didn't work, and the water wasn't on, but he felt around, pulled the top of the toilet tank off and found it was full, or full enough. He slopped some of that into his mouth—not too much, it tasted awful, and he figured he'd puke if he had more than a sip—and then splashed more of it on his face, scrubbed away with his bare hands. He needed to get that blood off. It didn't look good. It made him look like a maniac, a killer, that's what it did. That look wouldn't get him far.
Face dripping, Martin came back out of the restroom and looked through the station. If it weren't for that light outside, Martin would say the whole place was a ruin. The floor was scattered with newspapers, magazines and old paper files, which spilled out from the office. Broken glass crunched under Martin's shoe as he made his way into the office. There was an old black rotary phone on the sheet-metal desk.
Martin lifted the receiver and put it to his ear, almost perfunctorily, and nearly set it back in its cradle. There was no dial tone, but as he pulled it away from his ear he heard a faint crackle.
“Leave a message at the tone.”
It was a man's voice. It sounded American. Low, and gravelly.
There came a tone.
“Um,” said Martin, and thought again about his circumstances. “Is anyone actually there? No? Okay. Fu--” he stopped himself from cursing. Who knew who was on the other end of the line? “Sorry. Look, there's been trouble. My name's... never mind that. But I got... kidnapped. He kept me for days... I think eight days... in his place. I don't know where it was, I just got out of there fast as I could when I could. I fu--” a breath “--I need help. I'm here at this train station. Don't know where it is. Everything's dark, it's near a farm I think. Maybe you do. Know where it is. Maybe you can call the cops. Or call back here. Fu-- fuck, I don't know.”
The line disconnected.
Martin wanted to say more. He hung up and picked the phone up again, rattled the cradle. He wanted to say a few more details: the name of the town where he lived, the name of the bar in that town, a description of the man, how big he was... how long Martin thought he'd been in the back of the van...
But the time for that was past. The phone line was dead now—even when he pulled it from his ear and waited...
He set the phone back in place and thought about what to do next. He had not really been thinking about 'next,' when he made his escape. He knew he had to get away—and get away he did. But he was starving, and injured, and dehydrated, and he had no sense of where he would be escaping to. He had assumed that once outside of the house, there would be a town, a highway—help.
He thought about walking along the rails—at some point, even in the dark, that would lead him to those things. He thought about letting his ankle rest—waiting for whoever had received that phone message to pick it up and piece together his location. He peered out the window, into the shadows beyond the lamp—shadows where anything could be waiting. Or approaching. Those shadows seemed to be moving.
Martin blinked and looked again and understood the shadows weren't moving. Shadows don't move. Light moves. The light on the platform was going side-to-side as though a gust of wind had arisen, or someone had whacked it.
Martin slid out of the chair and to his knees, so he peered over the desk. The square of light from the window was scanning the office like a search lamp. Through his knees, Martin felt a low vibration—something coming from the earth—and he crouched lower, and as the vibration turned into an encompassing rattle, of paper and furniture and bones—and then into a hellish screaming sound of hot metal on rail—he pushed lower still, and his breath quickened, and his eyes squeezed, as the great, ancient locomotive pulled into the station in a black cloud of smoke and steam.
The quality of light changed and shifted, as the air cleared and the lights from the passenger car windows leaked a soft gold. There was a dull clattering sound as steps dropped, and then the duller sound of footfalls. With abundant caution, Martin peered out. He counted three figures who had stepped off the train: a woman and two men. They embraced, the three of them in turn, and two of them stepped out of view. The one who remained—a man, very tall, wearing a cap that might have indicated status as a porter—stood and examined his wristwatch. Then he stepped close to the window, and reached up to touch the light. He twisted twice, and it went dark. He tossed the hot bulb from hand to hand before setting down on the bench. Then his shadow loomed in the window frame, as he rapped on the glass
with a thick-knuckled hand.
“All aboard,” he said.
2
The tea-drinking man had made a room in his cellar for Martin. It was windowless, and there was no light. There was a chemical toilet bolted to the floor near one wall. No bed. No other way to clean himself. That space was small—but Martin thought it might have been a little bigger than this sleeper compartment.
“You may wash here.” The porter indicated a small sliding door to the lavatory. “The bed is up here.” He touched a lever and pulley system, and a narrow bed lowered from a bulkhead near the ceiling. Having demonstrated, he pushed it up again until it clicked shut. “Do you need a glass of water? No? I will bring one in any event. And I daresay a sandwich.” He stepped into the hall and slid the door shut.
Martin eyed the bulkhead and thought about pulling the bed down again. It was a dubious prospect; he didn't fancy climbing that high with his bad ankle. So instead he slid open the lavatory door. It was a tiny room, with a wee sink not much bigger than a soup bowl and a small mirror over top.
There was graffiti on the wall next to the toilet, about eye level if one were sitting. It looked to Martin like a drawing of a long, uncut penis, with ARTURO scrawled upper case on the length of its shaft; and below, what looked like a poem: one, two... fourteen lines, Martin counted... but not in English. Italian? Martin thought so.
The train shuddered as the engine engaged and it left the station. Martin turned on the spigot in the sink—and as water dribbled from the tap, he cupped it in his hand and dipped his face into it. It was ice-cold, and before it touched his face Martin thought he detected a whiff of perfume. This time he scrubbed, and then wet his hair down and pushed it to a part. He looked at himself again—his thin fluff of beard, his smooth pale cheeks, the blond hair now at least parted—and he wondered if he might frame his story properly this time.
As the porter had brought him from the platform and onto the train, Martin had scarcely been able to begin. “I'm in trouble,” he'd said, “I escaped from a crazy motherfucker and I had to—“ and the porter scarcely listened. “All aboard,” he said, and when Martin said “Listen, really—“ he just said “Hush,” and lifted the steps, shut the door to the platform, and pointed to the fourth compartment down the car.
He was a tall man, olive-skinned with a dark hair in need of clipping and heavy brows, a mouth cricked in a permanent, lazy smile. His voice had a meandering purr to it that seemed a good match. It was nothing like the tea-drinking man's voice—which had struck Martin as unnaturally high, and almost had an astringent quality to it, if one could say that of a voice: Oh, you are older than your photograph. Probably just as well, heigh ho?
When the porter came back with his water and sandwich, it wouldn't be laced—not like the steaming cup of poison that the tea-drinking man had handed him before carrying him away...
There was a sharp knock at the door, and before Martin could reach it, the porter slid it open. He had a small tray balanced in one hand at shoulder-height, with a frosted glass of water and a triangular sandwich wrapped in waxed paper. His nostrils flared as he ducked and stepped inside, and set the tray down on the small table that extended from beneath the window. As he did so, he revealed a slim red cloth-bound volume. He handed it directly to Martin.
“Should sleep elude you,” he said, “later. Would you care to clean up before you eat?”
Martin thought he had, but as the porter looked him up and down he understood what a poor job he'd done. His nails were filthy; grime and blood mingled on his knuckles. His shirt was torn and likewise encrusted. The floral scent of the water barely masked the stink of sweat and urine that he carried with him.
The porter nodded to show he apprehended the difficulty. “The lavatory is not sufficient,” he said. “Of course.”
He stepped around and unwrapped the sandwich. Martin could catch a whiff of barbecue from the cold chicken crushed between the thick white bread slices. The porter held it as though offering it to Martin, but pulled it away when Martin reached for it.
“You're hungry,” said the porter, “but your hands are dirty. Take a bite. I'll hold it.”
Martin hesitated, and reached for the glass of water. This time the porter didn't interfere, as Martin drank deep and set the now half-full glass back on the table. The porter took a step forward, and held the corner of the sandwich underneath Martin's nose.
Martin opened his mouth and took the corner in his teeth. The porter withdrew just enough that Martin was able to tear a small mouthful. Martin shut his eyes and chewed the cold chicken, the bread, the pat of hard butter that was there too. “Good,” said the porter when Martin chewed and swallowed. “And again.”
They repeated this until the porter popped the final morsel of sandwich into Martin's mouth, and then watching Martin chew delicately licked the fat from his own fingertips. He lifted the tray and excused himself, head crooked so as to avoid Martin's eye, and slipped into the corridor again. Martin made certain the door was closed, then stripped his shirt off and his trousers, pulling off his shoes in the meantime and favoring his damaged ankle. He wondered again how he would manage with the high bed and that rotten ankle. But he was naked and cold and a warm bed was impossible to resist, and once he pulled it down and hoisted himself with his arms and good leg, it wasn't nearly as bad as he feared. As he settled in between the crisp warm sheets, he noticed the book the porter had given him, and opened it to the beginning.
3
The book, or what Martin read of it, likely informed his dreams that night. It had neither title nor author, and in the first few pages had a narrative that seemed to be leading toward a coming-of-age tale. It was the story of a young aristocrat born of an earlier age, attending the home of a wealthy tutor from whom he hoped to learn the discipline of natural philosophy. The aristocrat, Phillipe, soon lost interest in his lessons, and within a chapter had taken up with the tutor's black-haired daughter Hermia, who Phillipe (and also Martin) was surprised and delighted to learn was in possession of a fully-functioning penis.
Martin dreamed of the house, or a place like the house where the tea-drinking man lived. It was not a precise copy of it. The cellar of his dreams was much larger, and cluttered with things that he might have recalled from other times of his life: a tool bench that his uncle kept at his house at Riverside—the small television set that was always on on the breakfast bar in his mother's kitchen—the old computer tower that he shared with his roommates at the Detroit house, propped on a glass-covered coffee table with silver pillars for legs, next to a crooked line of cocaine...
It was not pitch black, but illuminated by the flickering of unseen flames—the same way as Hermia's own secret dungeon was described.
Did something else occur in that dream? He thought it might have, that there might have been a flurry of motion, a man who mumbled prayers, an animal of some sort—a great, ferocious animal—but the narrative of dream is gossamer and so often ungraspable even an instant after waking.
“Oh,” said the porter, “I've disturbed you.”
He had evidently slipped in quietly while Martin slept, and was nearly finished unfolding what transpired to be a portable bathtub. He snapped the last pair of braces into place, and stood tall, gesturing voila! toward it with two open palms.
“When you're ready,” he said, “I will hook up a hose to your sink and use that to fill the tub, and you'll be able to clean yourself before breakfast.”
Martin stretched and sat up on his bunk, feet dangling and back of his head brushing the ceiling.
“I've taken the liberty of removing your garments for laundering,” continued the porter, “and left you a robe and pajamas that will be suitable in the meantime.”
The porter disappeared into the lavatory for a moment, trailing the hose and presently re-emerged. He pushed the end of the hose over the edge of the bath, then stood and made another voila! gesture with his hands, and smiled as his gaze flickered up and down.
�
��If you like, I can leave you alone for a moment,” said the porter, and when Martin asked why, the porter indicated Martin's cock, which in recollection perhaps of certain details of the dream, was standing to.
“You can bathe when you're finished,” said the porter, and nodded to himself, and turned. “Yes, I think I will leave you alone.”
He paused only to turn the faucet in the lavatory before letting himself out and leaving Martin to himself.
4
A bloody dawn stained vast fields of wheat as Martin stepped out of his cabin. He stood by the window and regarded the fiery vista a moment. The sun was rising on the other side of the train, so its shadow darkened the field closest. Beyond, it extended a great distance, although not to the horizon: at the edge of sight, Martin could make out tufts of trees. No buildings, though. No roads.
Martin decided then that if he saw the porter again, he would not try to report the situation with the tea-drinking man. He had weighed the matter quite seriously during his long, deliciously hot bath. There were strong reasons to do so, which Martin needed not enumerate, but in the end, what decided it for him was the man's steadfast refusal to hear his story at the station house.
This—combined with the realization that at no point had the porter or anyone else demanded a ticket—caused Martin a degree of worry. The unquestioning, indeed, disinterested charity of one railroad employee might carry Martin so far, but at a point, the police would arrive...perhaps some time after the... the situation at the tea-drinking man's home had been discovered. Would the porter be willing to deliver honest testimony, on the state of the bloody young man that he brought onto the train, established in a costly berth, fed by hand, offered pornography, and then saw dressed in these silky pajamas, this plush, pleated robe?
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