Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl

by Andrea Lawlor

  PANEL 5: Close-up of Moray eel swimming by, getting doused in mysterious fluid.

  CAPTION: The MORAY EEL, a species of marine fish in the family Muraenidae, is a nocturnal, cave-dwelling carnivore known for its evolutionary cleverness—in a pinch, the Moray eel can CHANGE its SEX. The Moray is thought to be vicious but is, in reality, shy & only attacks when provoked.

  PANEL 6: Moray eel swims to undersea cave near shore to hole up. Hotel sign in distance.

  PAGE TWO

  PANEL 1: Establishing shot. Medium shot. Paul arrives at the airport in Paphos, Cyprus, as guest of his friend Justin’s rich family.

  CAPTION: That same day, at the Paphos airport…

  DIALOGUE:

  Justin’s dad: What a flight! My head is killing me. I think that stewardess put something in my drink.

  Justin’s mom: Stop it now, David. We’re on vacation! Lighten up for once in your life.

  Justin: [whispers] I’m so glad you’re here, Paul. My parents are driving me crazy.

  THOUGHT BUBBLE:

  Paul: I can’t believe I finally got out of TROY!

  PANEL 2: Later that night, Paul & Justin sneak out of their hotel room.

  CAPTION: That night…

  DIALOGUE:

  Justin: [mooning after Paul] I can’t believe we’re in Paphos together—did you know this was where Aphrodite rose from the sea foam?

  Paul: Yeah, I know. My mom used to live here. Come on, I think the party’s this way! [pointing to the beach]

  PANEL 3: Medium shot. Bonfire on a beach. Paul tries to chat up Handsome College Boy while Justin looks miserable & twee.

  SFX: Music notes.

  DIALOGUE:

  Paul: We’d love to come see your dig tomorrow! Right, Justin?

  Justin: Yeah, sure.

  PANEL 4: Medium shot. Morning. Archeological dig. Handsome College Boy takes Paul & Justin to see a recently uncovered mural of Orpheus & the beasts.

  CAPTION: At the dig site where archeologists have recently uncovered an early mural of Orpheus singing to the beasts.

  DIALOGUE:

  Handsome College Boy: In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Orpheus was not only the best musician in the world, but he also brought the love of boys to Greece. You guys should really read it.

  Paul: I will totally read it.

  Justin: [rolls his eyes]

  PANEL 5: Close-up. Architectural dig. Handsome College Boy gives Paul a small trinket from the site (what should this be?), as he leaves with arm around Pretty College Girl.

  DIALOGUE:

  Handsome College Boy: Here you go, kid. A souvenir of Paphos.

  Paul: Thanks! Maybe we’ll catch up with you later.

  Justin: [squiggly line? something to denote being bummed out] What a…

  PANEL 6: Medium shot. Paul puts the trinket in his Jams’ pocket as he & Justin walk toward the beach.

  DIALOGUE:

  Justin: Let’s go swimming. The water looks so pretty!

  Paul: Sure, whatever.

  PAGE THREE

  PANEL 1: Close-up. Justin & Paul in the water, Justin looking at Paul, Paul looking away.

  DIALOGUE:

  Justin: [small voice] Paul, there’s something I really want to tell you…

  Paul: Oh, look over there! Are those dolphins?

  PANEL 2: Medium shot. Paul swims away toward cove, trinket falls out of Jams’ pocket & down…

  PANEL 3: Medium shot. Underwater. Trinket falls down into a pocket of sand/undersea cave.

  PANEL 4: Close-up. Underwater. Paul, diving down, sticks his hand in the cave to retrieve the trinket, is bitten by eel.

  SFX: Ow!

  PANEL 5: Medium shot. Beach. Paul shows Justin his hurt hand.

  DIALOGUE:

  Justin: Let me kiss it.

  Paul: [annoyed but feeling a little strange] Dude, I’m fine.

  PAGE FOUR

  PANEL 1: Medium shot. Hotel room, later that night. Paul & Justin sleeping in twin beds. Paul falls asleep holding the trinket [?]. Dream bubbles to next panel…

  CAPTION: Later that night…

  PANEL 2: Wide shot. Dream bubble. Handsome College Boy asks Paul to prom, Paul turns around & sees self in mirror = girl in dress.

  DIALOGUE:

  Handsome College Boy: Would you like to come to prom with me?

  Paul: I’ll check my schedule. I’m kidding. Of course I’ll go to prom with you.

  PANEL 3: Close-up. Paul’s bed, morning. Paul wakes up, touches his body, he IS a girl.

  THOUGHT BUBBLE: What the!?! Justin? Can this really be happening? Must…change…back…Got to…hide…

  PANEL 4: Medium shot. Hotel room, morning. Justin asleep in other bed. Paul panics [how to show?], changes back [not sure how to show—maybe motion lines?].

  CAPTION: TO BE CONTINUED…

  * * *

  ×

  Paul threw his keys on the futon and went up to the kitchen to get a glass of water.

  “Someone’s really trying to reach you,” said Ruffles, stirring eggs and tamari and garlic very slowly in a cast-iron pan. “Someone’s pursuing you, my dear.”

  Paul decided not to tell Ruffles about the bike yet; he’d get it fixed first. He glanced at the answering machine. He took a bottle of beer from the refrigerator, forgetting entirely about the glass of water, and retired to his room to drink, which was both cheaper than going out and less likely to end in trouble. He put Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. in the boom box he’d borrowed from the living room. He took out the bottle of Bushmill’s he kept for guests in his dresser drawer and poured himself a shot to go with his beer, then another.

  He knew what was on that answering machine. He’d heard Tony Pinto’s voice in his head all week. There was only one thing Tony Pinto could want with him, had ever wanted with him.

  One more shot, then he’d play it. Maybe two more shots. The other side of Greetings was Joni Mitchell’s Blue, Diane’s doing, a time-release intensity bomb of feelings. The whiskey went straight to Paul’s eyes and leaked out. He wiped his face and licked the salt off his finger.

  He needed the exact right message-listening outfit. He chose a pair of tight navy blue Levi’s cords with a slight bell and a beige striped wide-collar shirt in a sort of thin suede, left open to the third button across his flat chest. He found his wide tan leather belt, the one with two rows of grommets which reminded him of childhood, the closest he’d come to the wide white rough leather belt which would transport him back to 1974, that perfect year. He took off the cords, removed his underwear, and put the cords back on, admiring his lines. He drank one more shot, the burn like cock-gagging—a means to an end, yet so sexy in and of itself. He padded back upstairs to the living room. He felt bridal in anticipation.

  Paul was ready; he hadn’t thought he was ready, but he was ready. He spread his naked toes into the shag carpet, steadying, steadying against the fulgent whiskey warming his chest.

  He pressed play.

  “Hey, Paul,” said the pinholes of the machine. “This is Tony. Can you please call me?”

  That was it, the whole message. That and a 212 number that Paul didn’t recognize, but then he hadn’t talked to Tony Pinto in months. Well, more. Seventeen months? Eighteen? He pressed play again.

  “Hey, Paul, this is Tony again. Call me back, okay?”

  Paul listened to the message again. The voice was different in the second message, maybe a little colder? Was he having second thoughts about asking Paul to come back?

  There was another message. Maybe it said Forget it, Paul. I don’t know what I was thinking, don’t bother to call.

  Paul pressed play again. Better to rip off the band-aid.

  “Hey, Paul, listen, you have to call
me back. I can’t talk to your machine. This is Tony.”

  There was only one more message. Paul pressed play without breathing. Ruffles’s friend Tyrone boomed an invitation for the whole house to a Reclaiming Beltane ritual, whatever that was.

  Paul tried to figure out what time it was in New York but his math skills were weak. He knew it was pretty late to call casually and he wasn’t about to show his hand first.

  He padded back downstairs to his room. He decided to get his nipples pierced next paycheck. Tony would like that. He preened in the mirror, trying on different outfits and finishing the bottle of whiskey to brake the race cars zooming around his head. He fell asleep to Bruce Springsteen singing sweetly to him of the times he and Tony Pinto used to have, would have again.

  * * *

  ×

  When Paul awoke, fully clothed, it was still night. The whiskey had worn off, replaced by coursing, unlocatable panic. He brushed his teeth, donned his tight Levi’s jacket and his boots, and left the house as if chased. Just to the corner store, he thought. Just going to get a beer.

  But the corner store was closed, so he walked a few more blocks of the sleeping city, then a few more. All the gay bars were closed by now; by this hour all gays had paired off or grouped off or decamped for secret after-bars whose locations changed nightly. Paul was the last little kid in Hamlin. He walked and walked but could find no gays.

  He found a bar on Haight still serving and ordered a well bourbon. “I have to work in the morning,” he said over and over, which seemed to result in more laughter and fellowship with every repetition. He didn’t have to be at work until early afternoon, but he’d said “morning” the first time by accident, then repeated it for poetic effect. Paul drank with the real drinkers now, accepting a gratis whiskey sour from the rickety barmaid, accepting first a cigarette then a bump of medicinal coke from the liver-spotted fist of a retired cop in the bathroom, accepting an invitation to a party on Capp Street from the crusty punks who showed up at last call begging for sixes to go.

  The crusty punks now comprised his escort through the night. They clapped him on the shoulders and encouraged him to fuck his job.

  “Just quit,” they said. “Come live with us!”

  At the Capp Street party, they introduced him around as Bob, which he found unnerving. Did he look like a Bob? Heaven forfend.

  He escaped into the bright kitchen, where a clean-looking tough girl in a flannel shirt offered him a jelly glass of tequila from a stash in her backpack. Her boyfriend had just left her for a lesbian who danced at the Gold Club, she told him, and now she was smoking again.

  “That’s lousy,” Paul said. He liked that word, felt noir-ish saying it.

  “They’re getting married,” said the girl.

  “Lousy,” repeated Paul. “Of all things.”

  She nodded glumly.

  “I don’t know any of these people,” Paul confessed, gesturing loosely at the doorway.

  “Me neither,” said the girl, smiling a tight little smile. “I live downstairs.” She started a new cigarette with her old one.

  “This lighting is bringing me down,” said Paul. “It’s so Bukowski. Do you want to get out of here?”

  “I love Bukowski,” said the girl. She slumped on the fake wood of the table.

  “What’s up, Gay Bob?” shouted one of the crusty punks from the living room. “Who’s your friend? We should play Hi Bob with her!”

  “What’s Hi Bob?” said the girl. “Who’s Gay Bob?”

  “You need to go home,” Paul said. He had been in his bed and now he was in this appallingly lit parallel universe.

  “Yeah,” she said, without sitting up. “Home.”

  “Okay,” said Paul. He tugged her up by her flannel and scooped up her backpack. “Let’s go.”

  The girl was steady enough to walk downstairs, which was good because she was significantly bigger than Paul and he didn’t think he could carry her. When they arrived at her locked door, she became very helpless and Paul had to fish around in her backpack and then her pants pocket to find the keys.

  “Roommates,” she mumbled angrily. “Shhh!”

  Paul lay her down on the living room couch and she began to snore. He felt his good citizenship keenly and finished off the bottle of tequila. He took stock of the impersonal living room, with its impersonal black pressboard shelving unit and impersonal Calvin and Hobbes omnibus on the impersonal fake wood coffee table. He felt sick at the thought that a city as beautiful as San Francisco could contain this kind of placeholder apartment. How could the girl stand it? She had seemed human enough, with human needs for beauty and goodness. He ran out of the apartment and down the stairs, smiling wildly at the sex workers flicking their long nails on the corner by the warehouse. The air! The air! He sucked it all in as he walked the dark streets, his head clearing with every footfall. Maybe things were going to be okay.

  * * *

  ×

  Paul turned onto Mission and stopped outside a shut-up dollar store. Light was coming up on the world through a misty sky, and hark, what was that? A man wearing only a leather utilikilt was playing a mournful bagpipe song on actual bagpipes.

  Paul tried to remember all the substances he’d ingested: no hallucinogens, he didn’t think. He was pretty sure this was really happening, in consensus reality, happening in such a way that other people could also see and hear a barefoot man playing bagpipes. Yet there was no one else on the street, as far as he could see. No people or cars. Paul watched the bagpiper walk toward the 24th Street BART station—in the middle of the street, no less—playing his funeral song. Paul considered following the piper, but to what end? You don’t chase an oracle.

  He stared across the street at Magic Donut. Were the donuts within magic? Maybe things were what they claimed to be; maybe magic hid in plain sight, mystical bagpipers only Paul could see, etc. He crossed the street and used all the change in his pockets to buy two Boston cremes. He leaned on the counter, eating his donuts out of the bag. Paul liked any food that exploded into his mouth: grapes, Freshen-Up gum, soup dumplings. There was something pleasing, something orderly, about swallowing a mess.

  Paul finished the donuts and scrounged futilely in his pockets for more money. He had seven dollars in the bank, last time he’d checked, and he knew of a bank machine on 25th that gave five-dollar bills, but that was the wrong direction. He walked instead to Dolores Park to watch the rest of the sunrise. He could watch in Alamo Square, but no one interesting would be up at this hour. Maybe an adult walking a dog. The magic people were in the Mission or the Castro, more likely. Magic could be anywhere, Paul knew, but the odds were better in certain places.

  Paul stretched out on a bench at the top of the hill, watching the sky, the rosy light underneath the clouds. The rosy fingertips, he thought. Down by the fat-trunked palm trees, a few homeless guys had set up a little pioneer camp inside a circle of shopping carts. He didn’t see anyone lurking up by the J Church, but he couldn’t be sure. His buzz was wearing off, and he was too tired to check the bushes for desperadoes.

  A white guy with disorderly blonde dreads under his rasta cap leaned over Paul.

  “Can I sit here, man?” he said.

  Paul looked at him; he was weirdly maybe cute. He could be cute to somebody, at any rate. Paul sat up. He noticed, as he made room, that the next bench over was empty.

  “What’s in it for me?” Paul said, dropping his voice a register and modulating the obvious come-on with surliness. This was standard defensive cover with trade, when he could pass as trade.

  The hippie guy smiled a big-toothed smile, the smile of someone with a history of good dental work, sat down with legs akimbo, and produced a slender joint. Paul patted his pockets for his Zippo and lit the joint, cupping his hands to protect the guy’s hands from the wind. When the guy passed P
aul the joint, their fingers touched. Paul left his a second too long, playing chicken. The hippie guy moved his hand just quickly enough for plausible deniability, and Paul relaxed into knowledge. Or maybe that was the pot.

  “This is really good shit,” he said. He knew hippies liked to be complimented on their weed, not that he cared or could even tell kind from unkind.

  “Mos’ definitely,” said the guy.

  Paul cringed inside, but he knew hippies were sexually promiscuous and he needed ease, something to help him regain his confidence, something to laugh about later or turn into an impressive tale of derring-do or fetishism for Ruffles. He took another big hit, and coughed.

  “You okay, little buddy?” said the guy. Paul wondered how old the guy was, how old he thought Paul. Paul knew he looked pretty young, but the guy seemed like he was Paul’s age. He knew looking girlier meant looking younger, but hadn’t thought he looked that girly right now.

  “I’m good,” Paul said. “You don’t cough, you don’t get off, right?”

  They laughed, the easy laughter of comrades. Paul checked out the guy’s loose worn army pants, which were definitely bunched at the fly. Maybe a half-chub, Paul thought, getting himself into hippie guy mode. He decided to be bold, maybe just say his move. He could run to 18th pretty fast if the guy was not amenable.

  “Do you—”

  “Do you—”

  They laughed again.

  “You go first,” the guy said. He reached down, picked a blade of grass, and stuck it in his mouth.

  Paul thought of all the dogs who peed in the park. The moment was gone.

  “No, you,” he said.

  “I was just going to say, do you like nature? I was thinking about going up to the park in the Upper Haight.”

  “Oh,” said Paul. He was pretty high. “I’m pretty high. I was thinking we could just go up to the bushes by the train and you could suck my cock.”