Run With the Hunted (37 page)

“Lemme have a smoke,” said George.

She handed it to him and as she leaned near, George put his arm around her, pulled her over and kissed her.

“You son of a bitch,” she said, “I missed you.”

“I missed those good legs of yours, Connie. I've really missed those good legs.”

“You still like 'em?”

“I get hot just looking.”

“I never could make it with a college guy,” said Connie. “They're too soft, they're milktoast. And he kept his house clean. George, it was like having a maid. He did it all. The place was spotless. You could eat beef stew right out of the crapper. He was
antiseptic
, that's what he was.”

“Drink up. You'll feel better.”

“And he couldn't make love.”

“You mean he couldn't get it up?”

“Oh, he got it up. He got it up all the time. But he didn't know how to make a woman happy, you know. He didn't know what to do. All that money, all that education—he was useless.”

“I wish I had a college education.”

“You don't need one. You've got everything you need, George.”

“I'm just a flunky. All the shit jobs.”

“I said you've got everything you need, George. You know how to make a woman happy.”

“Yeh?”

“Yes. And you know what else? His
mother
came around! His
mother!
Two or three times a week. And she'd sit there looking at me, pretending to like me but all the time treating me like I was a whore. Like I was a big bad whore stealing her son away from her! Her precious Walter! Christ! What a mess!”

“Drink up, Connie.”

George was finished. He waited for Connie to empty her glass, then took it, refilled both glasses.

“He claimed he loved me. And I'd say, ‘Look at my pussy, Walter!' And he wouldn't look at my pussy. He said, ‘I don't want to look at that thing.' That
thing!
That's what he called it! You're not afraid of my pussy, are you, George?”

“It's never bit me yet.”

“But you've bit it, you've nibbled on it, haven't you, George?”

“I suppose I have.”

“And you've licked it, sucked it?”

“I suppose so.”

“You know damn well, George, what you've done.”

“How much money did you get?”

“Six hundred dollars.”

“I don't like people who rob other people, Connie.”

“That's why you're a fucking dishwasher. You're honest. But he's such an ass, George. And he can afford the money, and I've earned it … him and his
mother
and his
love
, his
mother-love
, his clean little washbowls and toilets and disposal bags and new cars and breath chasers and after-shave lotions and his little hard-ons and his precious love-making. All for
himself
, you understand, all for
himself!
You know what a woman wants, George …”

“Thanks for the whiskey, Connie. Lemme have another cigarette.”

George filled them up again. “I've missed your legs, Connie. I've really missed those legs. I like the way you wear those high heels. They drive me crazy. These modern women don't know what they're missing. The high heel shapes the calf, the thigh, the ass; it puts rhythm into the walk. It really turns me on!”

“You talk like a poet, George. Sometimes you do talk like that. You are one hell of a dishwasher.”

“You know what I'd really like to do?”

“What?”

“I'd like to whip you with my belt on the legs, the ass, the thighs. I'd like to make you quiver and cry and then when you're quivering and crying I'd slam it into you in pure love.”

“I don't want that, George. You've never talked that way before. You've always done right with me.”

“Pull your dress up higher.”

“What?”

“Pull your dress up higher, I want to see more of your legs.”

“You do like my legs, don't you, George?”

“Let the light shine on them!”

Constance hiked her dress.

“God Christ shit,” said George.

“You like my legs?”

“I love your legs!”

Then George reached across the bed and slapped Constance hard across the face. Her cigarette flipped out of her mouth.

“What'd you do that for?”

“You fucked Walter! You fucked Walter!”

“So what the hell?”

“So pull your dress higher!”

“No!”

“Do what I say!”

George slapped her again, harder. Constance hiked her skirt.

“Just up to the panties!” shouted George. “I don't quite want to see the panties!”

“Christ, George, what's gone wrong with you?”

“You fucked Walter!”

“George, I swear, you've gone crazy. I want to leave. Let me out of here, George!”

“Don't move or I'll kill you!”

“You'd kill me?”

“I swear it!”

George got up and poured himself a full glass of straight whiskey, drank it, and sat down next to Constance. He took his cigarette and held it against her wrist. She screamed. He held it there, firmly, then pulled it away.

“I'm a man, baby, understand that?”

“I know you're a man, George.”

“Here, look at my muscles!” George stood up and flexed both of his arms. “Beautiful, eh, baby? Look at that muscle! Feel it! Feel it!”

Constance felt one of his arms. Then the other.

“Yes, you have a beautiful body, George.”

“I'm a man. I'm a dishwasher but I'm a man, a real man.”

“I know it, George.”

“I'm not like that milkshit you left.”

“I know it.”

“And I can sing too. You ought to hear my voice.”

Constance sat there. George began to sing. He sang “Old Man River.” Then he sang “Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen.” He sang “The St. Louis Blues.” He sang “God Bless America,” stopping several times and laughing. Then he sat down next to Constance. He said, “Connie, you have beautiful legs.” He asked for another cigarette. He smoked it, drank two more drinks, then put his head down on Connie's legs, against the stockings, in her lap, and he said, “Connie, I guess I'm no good, I guess I'm crazy, I'm sorry I hit you, I'm sorry I burned you with that cigarette.”

Constance sat there. She ran her fingers through George's hair, stroking him, soothing him. Soon he was asleep. She waited a while longer. Then she lifted his head and placed it on the pillow, lifted his legs and straightened them out on the bed. She stood up, walked to the fifth, poured a good jolt of whiskey into her glass, added a touch of water and drank it down. She walked to the trailer door, pulled it open, stepped out, closed it. She walked through the backyard, opened the fence gate, walked up the alley under the one o'clock moon. The sky was clear of clouds. The same skyful of stars was up there. She got on the boulevard, and walked east and reached the entrance of The Blue Mirror. She walked in, looked around and there was Walter sitting alone and drunk at the end of the bar. She walked up and sat down next to him.

“Missed me, baby?” she asked.

Walter looked up. He recognized her. He didn't answer. He looked at the bartender and the bartender walked toward them. They all knew each other.

—
S
OUTH OF
N
O
N
ORTH

the droll noon

where squadrons of worms creep up like

stripteasers

to be raped by blackbirds.

I go outside

and all up and down the street

the green armies shoot color

like an everlasting 4th of July,

and I too seem to swell inside,

a kind of unknown bursting, a

feeling, perhaps, that there isn't any

enemy

anywhere.

and I reach down into the box

and there is

nothing—not even a

letter from the gas co. saying they will

shut it off

again.

not even a short note from my x-wife

bragging about her present

happiness.

my hand searches the mailbox in a kind of

disbelief long after the mind has

given up.

there's not even a dead fly

down in there.

I am a fool, I think, I should have known it

works like this.

I go inside as all the flowers leap to

please me.

anything? the woman

asks.

nothing, I answer, what's for

breakfast?

god I got the sad blue blues,

this woman sat there and she

said

are you really Charles

Bukowski?

and I said

forget that

I do not feel good

I've got the sad sads

all I want to do is

fuck you

and she laughed

she thought I was being

clever

and O I just looked up her long slim legs of heaven

I saw her liver and her quivering intestine

I saw Christ in there

jumping to a folk-rock

all the long lines of starvation within me

rose

and I walked over

and grabbed her on the couch

ripped her dress up around her face

and I didn't care

rape or the end of the earth

one more time

to be there

anywhere

real

yes

her panties were on the

floor

and my cock went in

my cock my god my cock went in

I was Charles

Somebody.

Henry poured a drink and looked out the window at the hot and bare Hollywood street. Jesus Christ, it had been a long haul and he was still up against the wall. Death was next, death was always there. He'd made a dumb mistake and bought an underground newspaper and they were still idolizing Lenny Bruce. There was a photo of him, dead, right after the bad fix. All right, Lenny had been funny at times: “I can't come!”—that bit had been a masterpiece but Lenny really hadn't been all that good. Persecuted, all right, sure, physically and spiritually. Well, we all ended up dead, that was just mathematics. Nothing new. It was waiting around that was the problem. The phone rang. It was his girlfriend.

“Listen, you son of a bitch, I'm tired of your drinking. I had enough of that with my father …”

“Oh hell, it's not all that bad.”

“It is, and I'm not going through it again.”

“I tell you, you're making too much of it.”

“No, I've had it, I tell you, I've had it. I saw you at the party, sending out for more whiskey, that's when I left. I've had it, I'm not going to take any more …”

She hung up. He walked over and poured a scotch and water. He walked into the bedroom with it, took off his shirt, pants, shoes, stockings. In his shorts he went to bed with the drink. It was 15 minutes to noon. No ambition, no talent, no chance. What kept him off the row was raw luck and luck never lasted. Well, it was too bad about Lu, but Lu wanted a winner. He emptied the glass and stretched out. He picked up Camus'
Resistance, Rebellion and Death
… read some pages. Camus talked about anguish and terror and the miserable condition of Man but he talked about it in such a comfortable and flowery way … his language … that one got the feeling that things neither affected him
nor
his writing. In other words, things might as well have been fine. Camus wrote like a man who had just finished a large dinner of steak and french fries, salad, and had topped it with a bottle of good French wine. Humanity may have been suffering but not him. A wise man, perhaps, but Henry preferred somebody who screamed when they burned. He dropped the book to the floor and tried to sleep. Sleep was always difficult. If he could sleep three hours in 24 he was satisfied. Well, he thought, the walls are still here, give a man four walls and he had a chance. Out on the streets, nothing could be done.