Hot Night in the City Read online

  "Yes." Her voice had a minor key fade of failure.

  "But hey, wait a minute! You did meet someone! Not much of a someone, maybe. Just your common garden variety drifter. But you talked to him for hours over coffee. And now... here we are."

  "Yes, here we are," she echoed. "And I'm afraid."

  "Of course you're afraid. That's only natural. It isn't every day that a virgin sits in the dark with a bad boy she hardly knows." She didn't respond, so he pursued. "Even though you're a virgin, I suppose you know about how two people... love, and all?"

  "Yes. Well, sort of. Girls used to giggle about it in the school locker room. They talked about how people... did it. I didn't believe them at first."

  "I know just what you mean. To a kid, it seems such a silly thing to do. Putting your peeing equipment together. How could that be fun? And when you think of your own folks doing it...! It's enough to gag a maggot, as a folksy old tramp might say."

  "The girls at school used to make up terrible stories about... it. Just to see me blush. I was easy to tease because I was shy, and I didn't know anything. My mother never told me anything. Once the girls played this joke on me? They gave me a folded piece of paper and asked me to write down my favorite number, then on the next line my favorite color, then my second favorite color, then—oh, I don't remember all the things; but the last question was whether I bit ice cream cones or licked them. Then they unfolded the paper and read it out loud. And there in my own handwriting I had written how many times a day my boyfriend and I did it, and what the color of his... thing... was when we started and what color it was when we ended, and stuff like that."

  "And finally, your confession that you licked it."

  She nodded miserably. "I didn't go back to school for the rest of that week, I was so embarrassed. I pretended I was sick. And then I really did get sick. I mean... that's when my periods started."

  "But, of course, that couldn't have had anything to do with the girls' teasing."

  "Oh, I know that, but still... coming right after and all..."

  "Yeah, I understand. Kids can be rotten to one another."

  "That was years ago, but I still get tears in my eyes when I think about it."

  "Yeah... tears of rage. I have that sometimes. The rage just wells up in me and I blub like a kid."

  "You do? Really?"

  "Sure. So you saw all those embarrassing things written in your own handwriting, and now you're learning to write in a different way. In shorthand."

  She frowned. "That's not why I'm taking shorthand."

  "Could be part of it. Psychology is a screwy business. Like me playing all sorts of roles because I don't want to be—" He shrugged. "So you've never made love. Gee. Still, I suppose you've necked with boys. Been caressed and... you know... touched."

  "No, never. I've never had a... boyfriend." She said the word in a tone of gentle awe. "Boys never found me attractive in that way." She made a dismissive half-chuckle. "Or in any other way, really. My mom used to say it was a blessing, me being plain. At least my looks wouldn't get me into trouble."

  "But you've had dreams about lovemaking. That's only normal."

  She didn't answer.

  "And I suppose you've made love to yourself."

  She didn't speak.

  "I mean, you've... you know... played with yourself and caressed yourself. There's nothing more natural."

  "My folks wouldn't think it's natural. They'd say it was a sin."

  "Well, of course they would. But do you think it's a sin?"

  After a moment she said, softly, "...yes."

  "But you do it anyway?"

  "...yes..."

  "Hm-m. Well, that's mostly what our making love would be like. Only I'd be doing... you know... what you do for yourself. I'd be touching you and caressing you and bringing you pleasure. Unless, of course, you don't want me to."

  She concentrated on the fingers she was twisting in her lap.

  He took her hands and kissed them. They were rough and cold. He lifted her face by her chin and gently kissed her closed lips. They were thin and dry and tasted of cheap lipstick. When he drew back he saw that her eyes were closed, and there was a teardrop in the corner of one, so he shifted to his W. C. Fields voice. "The hardest part, my chickadee, is getting started. If we were already in bed and I was holding your dee-lightful chassis in my vee-rile arms, everything would just happen naturally." Then he changed to a gentle, understanding voice with a smile in it. "I know exactly how you feel. Even with us worldly bad boys it's always awkward. In the beginning."

  "It is?"

  "Yup. Look, I'll tell you what. Why don't I go stand out in the hall for a few minutes while you slip into bed. Then I'll come back and look around." He donned his Lionel Barrymore voice. "Great land o' Goshen, who's that under those blankets, Dr Kildare? Why, I do believe it's June Allyson. I'd better just slip in and keep her warm. It's my medical duty."

  She sniffed the tear back and waved away his nonsense with that flapping gesture of hers.

  "I'll be back in a couple of minutes." He made a broad burlesque of shushing her with his finger to his lips as he tiptoed across the room and eased the door open. Out in the dark hall, he took long, slow breaths while he listened at the door. At first he heard nothing. Then there was a sigh. Anticipation? Resignation? The springs of the iron bed twanged softly as she rose. He heard the faucet run. Then there was the rustling of her crinoline underskirt as she stepped out of it. Another silence. Then the soft twang of the bedsprings again.

  "This is so..." she sought just the right word to describe the beautiful moment, "...so nice. Lying here like this... talking... being close." He had guided her hand to his soft penis, and she was holding it tentatively, dutifully ('politely' might be more exact) while her mind fondled the words: 'boyfriend... my first boyfriend'. Her hand on his penis was the only place their bodies were in contact because it was so hot. After bringing her to climax first with his hand, then with his tongue, he had lifted his head to find her belly wet with sweat, so he had blown across it gently to cool her. And now they lay side by side, looking up at the splayed shadow of windowpanes cast onto the ceiling by the streetlight.

  "That was just wonderful," she said dreamily.

  "Hm-m, I could tell it was from the way you moved. And the sounds you made."

  "Gosh, I hope the neighbors didn't hear." She pulled her shoulders in and laughed silently into her hand.

  "How many times have you...?" She didn't know how to put it.

  "Have I what?"

  "How many women have you... you know?"

  "You really want to know?"

  "No, don't tell me!" Then, after a moment, "Yes, tell me. How many?"

  "You're my fifth."

  "The fifth time you've made love? Or your fifth woman?"

  "Both."

  "Both? You mean you've made love only five times and each time with a different girl?"

  "Exactly, Watson," he said in Basil Rathbone's arch drawl. "Five girls... five times. Curious business, what?"

  "Were they like me, your other girlfri— These women?"

  He squeezed his temples between his thumb and middle finger to ease the pressure. "No, nothing like you. The first one was when I was in college. She was old. About as old as my mother. I met her in a bar that was off limits to college kids. She was always there, sitting at the end of the bar, drinking gin. Her thick makeup and fake, ritzy voice were sort of a joke. People called her 'the Countess'. We drank and she talked about when she was a young woman in high society, and how all the men used to be crazy about her, but they were not of her social standing—crap like that. The bar closed, and we went walking down along the railroad tracks. I was pretty drunk. I suppose I thought we were going to her place. She had trouble keeping her balance because the ground was rough and broken. She fell against me, and I caught her, and she kissed me, a big wet kiss, and I laid her back on a muddy bank. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was my introduction to the splendors of roma
nce! That night I quit college and joined the army to defend American Democracy and apple pie against the menace of International Communism and borscht. After basic training, I was given leave before being shipped over to Korea. It was Christmas, and I took a bus to Flagstaff, Arizona. Why Flagstaff? I had to go somewhere, and Flagstaff counts as somewhere... well, nearly. Not far from the bus station, I saw a girl in this all-night coffee joint, and from all the way across the street I could tell she was lonely. I have an instinct for loneliness."

  "Like you could tell I was lonely?" she said softly into the dark.

  He was silent for a moment. "Yeah, like I could tell you were lonely. Well, I joked with this girl, talking in one actor's voice after another, and the next thing you know we were walking towards her place. She was an Indian, and an orphan, and lonely, and just about as far as you can get from pretty, and... Well, anyway." He pressed his thumb into his temple, hard. "I decided not to return to the army. That meant I had to go on the drift. Casual pick-up jobs here and there, following the fruit crops north, flophouses, stoop labor, freight trains. Then there was this woman in Waco, a born-again fanatic who wanted to save me. And later a black hooker in Cleveland who'd been beaten up by her pimp. I couldn't kiss her while we made love because she had a split lip. And that's it. My total love life. Not much of a Romeo. But then, people don't like to get mixed up with someone like me. Damaged boys end up damaging other people. You understand what I'm saying?"

  "Sort of. Well... no, not really."

  They were silent for a time, then she said, "I thought it was going to hurt, but it didn't."

  He tugged himself from his tangled thoughts. "What?"

  "When we... you know. The girls at school said it hurts the first time, and you bleed."

  "Well, we didn't do the part that hurts."

  "Yes, I know. Didn't you... don't you want to?"

  "Do you want me to hurt you?"

  "No. No, of course not, but, I want you to have... you know... pleasure. I wish I knew how to..." She shrugged. "I'll do whatever you want." She snuggled her hot body to his and whispered into his ear. "How can I make you feel good? Tell me. Please."

  He was silent.

  "I'll do anything."

  He chuckled. "Lick me like an ice cream cone?"

  He felt her tense up, so he quickly said, "I'm sorry, I was just joking. No, there's nothing I want you to do. There's nothing you can do."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I suppose you've seen drawings on bathroom walls in school. Do you remember what the men's penises looked like?"

  She shook her head.

  "Oh, come on now. Of course you remember. Describe them to me."

  "Well... in the drawings they're always huge. As big as arms. And sometimes there are drops of sap squirting out of them."

  "Sap?" He laughed. "Sap?"

  "Well, whatever it is. The stuff that makes— Oh, I see! You were afraid I'd have a baby. That was why you didn't..." She hugged him.

  "No, that wasn't why. I didn't do the part that might hurt you because I... can't."

  "You can't?"

  "My penis can't get erect."

  "Oh." Then, after a longish silence: "Were you hurt? Wounded or something?"

  "No, I wasn't wounded." Then, after a moment: "But yes, I was hurt."

  "I don't understand."

  He drew a sigh. Here we go. Here we go. Here we go.

  "When I was a kid (actually, it started when I was a baby) my mother used to... she used to play with me. Mostly with her mouth. That's the earliest thing in my memory, her playing with me. Of course I didn't know there was anything wrong with it. I thought it was just the way things are with mothers and their little boys... Kissing and cuddling and all that. Then one night she told me that I must never, never tell anyone what she did, because if I told, then mean people would come and spank me hard and put me into a deep, dark hole forever and ever. That's when I realized that we were doing something wrong. And being a kid, I naturally thought that it was my fault somehow. I used to have nightmares about being thrown into that deep, dark hole, and I..." He stopped short and shook his head.

  "You don't have to tell me about it if you don't want to," she whispered.

  "No, I want to. In fact, I have to, because that's the only way..." He shrugged, then he took several calming breaths before telling the shared darkness above them the things he needed her to know. "While my mother licked and sucked me, she would play with herself, and after a while she'd moan and squirm, and she'd suck faster and harder, and sometimes it would hurt, and I'd whine and tell her that it hurt, but she'd keep on until she was gasping and crying out! Then she'd lie back on the bed panting, and I'd be cold down there where I was all spitty with her licking and sucking. And sometimes it hurt real bad. Inside."

  "Your mother...! She was crazy."

  "Yup. She was always drunk when she did it. To this day, the smell of gin reminds me of being a little kid, and I can feel the pain inside, behind my penis."

  "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." She slipped her hand away from his soft penis, as though to avoid hurting him more.

  "Then, when I was about five or six—I don't know exactly how old, but I hadn't started school yet—she was playing with me this night, tickling and sucking, and suddenly she lifted her head and smirked—I can still see the smirk—and she said, 'Well, well! Aren't you the naughty little boy! You want it, don't you, you bad, bad boy?' You see, my penis had got stiff. That can happen, even when a boy is too young to... well, too young to know what's happening. And from that night on, for the next couple of years, she'd make me stiff, and that would drive her wild, and she'd suck me hard while she played with herself, and she'd say I was a bad boy because I wanted it. I wouldn't get stiff if I didn't want it, she'd say, and she'd suck me until it hurt down in my testicles. Then this one night... this one night the hurt didn't go away after she stopped. It got worse and worse. And the next morning I couldn't go to school because it hurt so bad. She told me it was nothing. The pain would go away pretty soon. But I could tell she was scared. She said that if anyone found out what we did, they'd put me in that deep black hole and leave me there forever and ever. And everyone would know it was all my fault, because I got stiff, and that meant I wanted it, and they'd know I was a naughty, bad boy. By the time night came, my side was swollen and I had a fever. All night long I tossed in my bed with pain. The next morning, I found myself all alone in the house. My mother had gone. I had to pee real bad, but I couldn't because it hurt too much. I was afraid I was going to die. So I called the emergency number I found on the back of the phone book. It was the first time I ever used a phone. An ambulance came and took me to the hospital. I had ruptures. Two ruptures. There was an operation, and they kept me in the hospital for a long time. When I was feeling better, a social worker visited me in the children's ward. They couldn't find my mother anywhere. She'd run away. Abandoned me."

  She turned onto her side and looked at his profile. He could feel her eyes on him, could feel the weight of her pity, and it felt good. "What about your father?" she asked. "Why didn't he stop your mother from... Why didn't he do something?"

  "There was no father."

  "Oh." After a silence, she asked, "Did you tell the doctors what your mother had done to you?"

  He shook his head.

  "Why not?"

  "Because I didn't want to get her into trouble. After all... she was my mom." His jaw muscles worked, and she could hear the grinding of his teeth.

  "It isn't fair!" she said.

  "No, ma'am, it's not," his Gary Cooper voice agreed. "Not even a little bit fair." Then his own voice continued, "The doctor told the social worker that I had damaged myself by masturbating, and she told me I'd done a terrible thing and I would hurt myself badly if I didn't stop."

  "So... what happened then?"

  "They put me into an orphanage run by Catholic brothers. I got long lectures about how sinful masturbation was, and my earlobes would burn with embar
rassment... and rage... at the injustice of it. Kids have a painfully keen sense of injustice. The brothers made me take cold showers, even in winter. They said it would keep me from abusing myself. The cold showers gave me an ear infection that put me back in the hospital, and that was the end of the cold showers. But not of the lectures." He fell silent, and he lightly rubbed his stomach to quell the gnawing. Then he used his Bela Lugosi voice. "And there you have it, my dear. The bloodcurdling tale of... The Limp Penis!"

  "I'm awful sorry."

  Something in the depth of the silence outside told him they had reached that last dead hour before dawn. He'd have to leave soon.

  "You must have been a real smart kid. I mean, you got into college and all." She was determined to find a silver lining in all his troubles: a Hollywood happy ending.

  "Yes, I was smart. A bad boy, but a smart one. But I quit college and joined the army. Then I quit the army to become a full-time drifter."

  "But a person can't just quit the army, can they?"

  "Oh, the army wasn't all that happy about my taking off. They're out there looking for me even as we lie here, sharing secrets."

  "Aren't you afraid they'll catch you?"

  "I'm afraid of all sorts of things."

  She drew a sympathetic sigh and said, "Gosh."

  "Gosh, indeed. While I was in the army, I sort of went wild this one night. I ended up sobbing and screaming and beating up this Coke machine. I might have gotten away with it if it had been a Pepsi machine, but Coca-Cola is America, and beating one up is a matter for the UnAmerican Activities Committee, so they put me in the hospital. The loony bin. This doctor told me..." he slipped into his Groucho Marx voice "...Your problem isn't physical, son. It's psychological. That'll be ten million dollars. Cash. We don't take checks. For that matter, we don't take Poles or Yugoslavs either."

  "And now you can't feel any pleasure? Like the kind you made me feel?"

  "Yes, I can feel pleasure. And sometimes I need it very badly. But it's not easy for me to get pleasure. It's difficult and... sort of complicated."

  "Is there anything I can do? To help you, I mean?" Her voice was thin and so sincere.