HOLLYWOOD
by ScriptWriter
“You just never know with women, you know?” Luis said.
Shaking his head, his mouth pursed to look wise and thoughtful. Introspective.
Wearing his beige sport coat. Still tall and slim. Good jeans. Black T-shirt. All spiffy, his gold bracelet dangling down, his rings sparkling in the sun, looking sharp, like always.
Been a year or more, but he hadn’t changed a bit.
“You can’t TELL, you know? I mean there’s no TELL on it, man. None! No code man, no decoder ring ,you see what I’m saying?”
His expression wise. Light, smiling.
Nodding his head gently up-and-down.
Sipping his drink.
Proving a point.
“You just can’t TELL, man,” he repeated, softly, moving his slender brown fingers around his thick black mustache.
Wearing his Ray-Bans like always, I think he’d been born wearing them, probably slept with them on, his soft brown eyes wide behind the dark lenses, all animated.
“No?” I said, puffing my thin cigar under the open air screened-in patio of the bar.
“No tell, man. No clues,” he repeated softly, smiling, shaking his head.
Good old Luis.
Both of us sipping our ice-cold Margaritas. Smoking.
Him taking a puff too, on his little thin cigar.
His was a Dominican you had to go to the Smoke Shop for.
Mine was three-for-a-buck at the market that sold Lottery tickets.
Fucking Luis. Been awhile.
Sipping now. Both of us. Catching up. Smoking and sipping on this hot sunny LA day.
You only gulp the first one, I thought. This certainly wasn’t the first one. We’d been here a while.
“I tell you man…” he trailed off.
Both of us talking against the endless sounds of the thick grinding afternoon traffic in the street in front of us.
Used to it. Just another day in LA.
“No man. You juuuust gotta inVESTigate man! Hah! You know?” he said smiling.
Nodding and smiling.
“Sure man, yeah yeah,” I said. Smiling too. Nodding along with him.
“You gotta inVESTigate man,” he said, giggling a little.
“Gather CLUES, ma bruthuh, you see what I’m saying?” he said, laughing. His tongue sticking out between his teeth as he laughed.
I laughed with him.
Good old Luis.
Taking his time to make his point.
Well hey he was buying, and time was what I had plenty of.
Like any guy without a job anymore, laid-off for too long.
My girlfriend gone a week after my last paycheck, her new boyfriend worked for the phone company. Hell even my cat had run away.
Time was noooo problem.
“Follow the CRUMBS man,” he said, laughing harder.
Me laughing with him.
We’d been drinking all afternoon in his favorite open air patio bar, under a screen ripped in many places, a part of it dangling above us.
The sun hot and the air thick in Hollywood today. The other tables empty, a fan twirling above us, the smoke wafting up.
Mexican music playing inside where some guys we didn’t know were playing pool.
“Neeever know,” he said again.
I just nodded.
Sure, Hollywood, but we might as well have been back in the barrio where we’d grown up together.
My brothers and his brothers.
Selling each other weed and watching each others’ backs. Sharing the action when we could find it.
Smoking and drinking.
High too, all the time back then, selling it in school, high like now, when we had any, like the old days.
Luis’ new girlfriend—I was about to meet her—had just given him some killer smoke, he’d spotted me a little too, for later, knowing I couldn’t afford it right now.
Fucking Luis. Gotta love him.
Stuff was phenomenal, I was high as a kite.
Doing little jobs for his uncle for pocket money, back then.
Wandering the ramps for easy cars that would be easy to jack, his uncle in the tow truck a block away.
That’s why he liked this place. Good Mexican food. Cheap strong Margaritas.
The old days. The smells, the tastes, the accents.
“Fuuuuck man, you gotta be Columbo, right?” he said, gulping the rest of his drink and signaling the little Mexican girl for another.
Holding four fingers up, signaling her.
Like the old neighborhood. The bars like this one, the liquor not as good, but the bars the same.
Hanging with the boys near his Uncle’s chop-shop.
Leaning up against his uncle’s prize red Caddy convertible with the white ragtop.
Passing the joint, whistling at the women walking by, seeing how far we could spit, sipping our beers out of little hand coolers so the cops wouldn’t see the cans and have a reason to stop.
A million just-another-nights, way back.
Good old Luis.
Drinking now too, in the screened-in open air of LA, like always.
“Fuuuck man,” he said dreamily, “ the devil is in the DEtails man the DEtails!”
He laughed. I laughed with him.
Sure you can’t smoke in bars in LA anymore, but we weren’t in that part of Hollywood. Not the part you see in the movies.
We were down below the Hills, the big famous Hollywood sign visible in the distance.
Nobody gave a shit here, if you smoked.
The part with the chop shops, pawn shops, the check cashing places and the sex shops with bars across the windows when they’re closed.
The little markets that all had action of some kind on the side. Business- is- business in the back.
The front all about Lottery tickets and candy bars, but business is done in the back, unless you’re some immigrant fuck who just eats what he can’t sell off the dusty shelves.
Just like the old neighborhood.
The smell of LA all around us on this hot, sunny afternoon.
A good neighborhood to drink in all afternoon. Talk about women. Watch the cars roll by.
Hear the occasional rap music thumping when somebody was playing it loud. The rev-rev scream of an occasional motorcycle.
That acrid stench of car exhaust that smelled like home, all around us.
If you wait long enough, as the day wears on, LA is always that smell, the acrid fumes settling across the buildings like paint made of soot.
“Nope. Let me tell you man….” He said, voice trailing off.
It wasn’t our first round.
Wasn’t our third either, I thought, as the pretty Mexican girl with her hair in a bun wearing a lime-green apron brought four fresh ones, her eyes dwelling for a moment on Luis as she set them down.
“Sure man sure,” I said softly.
A bum had just walked past us pushing everything he owned in an old supermarket shopping cart.
That broken, hobbling wino fuck can afford these drinks better than I can, I had thought.
Hell if Luis weren’t buying, I’d have had to scrape under my floor mats to buy the first round.
Lucky for me Luis was buying.
And this wasn’t our first round.
“I mean,” he said now, wise, eyebrows arched, “you get down IN there, right? I mean you get down IN there man, you know?”
His hands moving around in the air.
Animated. Good liquor- all day long- on a hot day-animated.
“Right,” I said, sipping, nodding.” Sure.”
“And I mean it’s alllll working, right?” he said with that slight Mexican accent. Taking his time, to prove a point. Smiling. Nodding.
“I mean all cylinders, right?”
“Sure Luis, sure.”
“She’s squirming around, all squirmy underneath you, all snaky, all WANTing it, moaning and giggling, and you got it GOin’, right?”
“Yeah.”
“And SUDDenly man…SUDDenly….” he said.
He paused, leaned closer, to make sure I was listening.
“You got her legs spread out…she all squirming around below you, all hot and ready, all juiced up, right?”
“Yeah?”
“And BAM!” he said.
“Yeah?”
“Suddenly,man? You got something in front of you that looks like it should be living at the bottom of the God DAMNED ocean!”
He threw his head back in a belly-laugh and I tried not to let any drink go into my nose as I burst out laughing.
Shaking my head and laughing hard now, loud, clapping my hands together, Luis laughing with me. Laughing at me laughing.
“Jeeez-us Christ man…” was all I said, laughing hard, my belly splitting.
“Riiiight?” he said, laughing with me.
Fucking Luis.
“Riiiight?”
“You are something, man,” was all I could say as our laughter trailed off. Me shaking my head.
“You are something.”
“But not Estelle, man,” he said, his smile disappearing to a knowing look, his eyes softening more, his face taking on a reverent, appreciative look.
“No?”
“Ohhh no, man, you’ll see,” he said, nodding like he was sharing a secret.
“Ohh no man, not Estelle,” he said again.
“No?” I said again.
“Ohhhh no, man. A place for everything and everything in its PLACE, ma bruthuh,” he said, laughing softly and nodding.
“Uh-huh, uh-huh,” I said.
He stuck his tongue out in the air and wiggled it.
“A,b,c,d,e,f,g,you KNOW what I’m SAYing,man?”
We laughed hard again, me shaking my head, him nodding his, punching me in the arm.
Luis. That’s all you can say.
It had taken me a long time to understand how Luis made his living off of women.
I mean, he was good looking but no movie star. Like me, he could talk to a girl, shake and bake when the stars lined up, but he was no hunk.
In fact his features were a little effeminate. Tall with aquiline, angular features. Jet black hair, thick mustache. Good cologne, if he didn’t use so much.
Took me a long time to understand.
Because he’s fussy.
That’s why, I’d suddenly realized one day.
Everything about him a little fussy, almost prissy.
The kind of guy who picks lint off his beige sport coat standing on a corner.
Whose mouth turns up at the sight of dogshit on the sidewalk.
Shines off the scuff-marks on his shiny black boots when he sees one. Wipes the restaurant chair with a napkin before he sits down.
Fussy.
“You’ll see, paco, in a minute man…ohhh no,not Estelle,” he said again with a loving reverent sound now. All dreamy.
“Yeah? Allll- riiiight,” I said, nodding and smiling with him. Curious.
Because women know he’ll be fussy with them, that’s why, I had realized.
That’s what they see. What they like.
He was massaging his Rolex now, watching the front.
A real one.
A wristwatch one of his women had bought for him, her Doctor husband out of town a lot.
Friggin’ Luis, I thought. One of a kind.
They knew he’d bring the same fussy attitude to them, in bed.
Took pride in the details. Took pride in his lovemaking.
He wouldn’t be sloppy. He’d know what to do. Know how to take his time.
Fucking Luis.
“Here! Here!”
I saw a sparkling-blue Mercedes pull in front of the bar.
He straightened up. Checked himself in the mirror on the back wall real fast, popped a breath mint in his mouth, handed me one.
“And, paco,” he said with a wink, in a whisper, “I got a surrrrprrrrise for you, my friend,” he said, nodding, squeezing my arm.
I saw.
Two women were in the car.
“Taking care of you man,” he said with a wink and a smile, squeezing my arm, punching my shoulder.
Good old Luis.
I checked myself in the mirror too.
This day was turning out all right!
And I thought that times ten when they walked in,
I could not believe how incredibly beautiful they both were!
“Hey hey,baby,” a tall, gorgeous woman—my God, Estelle???—said as we both stood and, yes, Estelle all right.
She and Luis embraced. She gave him a long kiss as her friend, a little shorter, stood back a little.
She was stunning!
They were BOTH fantastic!
Wow, man, I thought, through my alcohol haze, almost sorry now that I was so stoned,
Luis has DEFinitely moved uptown, I thought, delighted at this little gift.
“Hi Peter, nice to meet you,” she said, extending long perfectly-manicured fingers with shiny red nails and white tips toward me and we shook hands.
I took in her long lustrous jet-black hair. Striking blue eyes. Smooth flawless tanned skin, perfect smile, sweet perfume.
Tall, slim, spectacular.
Wearing some sort of silky pantsuit with high heels, her lovely breasts showing plenty of cleavage.
Lots of expensive jewelry. Diamond earrings.
Her friend emerged from behind her, not as tall, shorter black hair, also perfectly tanned in a sexy white miniskirt and red top.
Awesome legs. Pretty white heels. Less jewelry, her hands folded in front of her. A little white purse dangling off her arm.
Hanging back a little, behind Estelle.
Like shy, I thought.
Sweet. Shy.
Awesome, I thought with anticipation. Giving them my best smile.
Major awesome.
I love shy.
I love sweet.
More the nice girl next door. Nails also red.
“Everyone, meet my friend Maria,” Estelle said and Maria gave us all a sweet teeth-whitened smile as we all said hellos and sat down.
Holy shit, I thought again, not believing my luck!
Or Luis. Wow, Luis had it the jackpot.
Estelle reminded me of that famous actress who also has long black hair and sharp, very pretty features. Brash and outspoken.
The one married to that famous actor, adopts babies, her father was also a famous actor. She’s always on those magazine covers in the drugstore.
But Estelle looked like whatshername did ten years ago.
Feline and sassy, tall and sexy and earthy with those ruby-red lips…jeeeez what a stunner. Could be an actress herself.
As the conversation flowed, I noted Maria had the right name too.
Shorter black hair around her face, a little rounder, more voluptuous, with her low-cut red blouse showing round verrry edible titties, oh man, I won the damn Lottery here, I thought….she reminded me of the Maria in that old famous movie-musical about the gangs that my parents would always watch when it was on.
The song called that.
That actress who got killed drowning, fell off a boat, married to the famous guy also an actor, she had played Maria in that musical.
She looked a lot like that actress in the old movie, when she’d been young, in her prime.
Had the perfect name. Looked like that.
They were both knockouts!
I was far gone into the haze as we all laughed and talked.
Fuzzy, I felt all numb as the time whizzed along, the sun dropping down, the traffic easing up.
I would talk and not even really know what I was saying, my numb lips moving, and everyone would laugh…or say, ‘Right? I KNOW!’…or something, so I knew I was making sense, I guess.
But I felt strangely faraway. Three sheets, but it was okay.
“It’s a beautiful night,” Maria said to me at one point, and I felt her hand on mine.
Her lovely soft features. Deep brown eyes. So open. So sweet.
More like the kind of girl I would talk to in a bar.
I would never talk to Estelle, light years out of my league.
Damn glad Luis would. Did.
And I figured as I gazed at her that they were real. Estelle, definitely.
Maria too.
We had four real ones in front of us, I thought.
I mean in LA, you never know.
Me and Luis and the boys used to hang at the malls in the Hills and as the women would walk by we’d go, “fake, real, fake, fake, real, fake, real….”
Of course in LA you never know ‘til you find out.
And I was HOPING to find out!
She was a doll, and those perky little titties with the slight cleavage showing sure looked mighty fine, hey, products of science or not. Damn fine.
We laughed and talked and it all flowed from far away, the drinks flowing.
“Maria, dear, get me a napkin,” Estelle said at one point, and I noticed Maria’s eyes diverted to the ground as she meekly said, “Yes, Estelle,” and got up.
I noted from my spaceship a mile out that it was always like that. Maria never looked right at Estelle except for brief moments.
Whenever Estelle would say something to her, Maria would be all meek, her eyes diverting down. Her lips pursing sweetly.
Hmmmm, I thought.
Led to all kinds of fantasies as the night wore on…the music got louder, the place more crowded, night fell…Estelle moving her finger down Luis’s cheek before kissing him. Kissing him a lot. Whispering and then they’d laugh.
Poking him in the chest, the two of them very touchy and intimate.
Luis not his usual self either. More meek too. Guess he didn’t want to blow it and I didn’t blame him!
Maria and I talking and laughing but me strangely forgetting what was actually being said.
Just bullshit small talk, I knew, but it all seemed like a shadow was in the room talking.
I’d never felt so on auto-pilot. But all she did was get more affectionate.
At one point I held her chair and she kissed me. Pushed her body into mine. My dick so suddenly rock hard I had to sit down quickly.
Heaven!
Suddenly, the skin-a-max movie fantasy playing in my head kicked up a notch.
“Why don’t we go back to my place for a nice night swim?” Estelle said, and they all brightened up at the idea.
“Sure thing,” I said, and we all got up.
Man, right out of a Playboy fantasy, I thought, Maria and me holding hands now as Luis and Estelle, also arm-in-arm, headed for the car.
Feeling Maria’s lovely body moving, her hips moving in concert with mine.
Luis held Estelle’s door in the front, I held Maria’s in the back.
She let her hand stay in mine longer than it had to, squeezed, as she got in.
Luis drove.
I smelled that familiar smell and saw the hot coal, as Estelle handed the joint to Maria.
She held it to my lips and, even as I inhaled, I realized again that it didn’t smell like any weed I’d ever tried.
I’d thought that this afternoon too, with Luis.
More herbal. Like sage burning…odd.
“You work out, huh?”Maria said as she exhaled and moved her hands up and down my upper arms.
I did. What else does an unemployed guy do all day?
Maria smiling. Not shy at all, now.
It was all sweet soft kisses as we drove…Maria all different now, not meek at all, stroking my hard cock through my pants….moaning softly, soft, wet, tongue-filled kisses as I buzzed a million miles out…
Soon I saw we were on a narrow road.
Too narrow, I thought. A One-Way?
Suddenly Luis was parking in the circular front drive of one of the most beautiful houses I’d ever seen.
Big stones, stone masonry all around. Flood lights, beautifully landscaped grounds.
“Home alone,” Estelle said and she and Luis laughed as we all got out.
What a place!
In LA, even nice homes are stacked on top of each other. Everyone knew the famous story of the rich guy who’d bought four mansions just to tear down three so he could have a real backyard.
But this place was a castle!
A huge castle with nothing around it but park-like grounds. Trees.
“Pool’s around back,” Estelle said as we all walked, Maria squeezing my hand. Luis floating along with Estelle, arm-in-arm.
“You guys change… Luis, help me mix drinks baby,” Estelle said as we went around to a huge kidney-shaped pool with little lights on all around.
So quiet. The houses on the Hills sparkling below, the headlights on the freeway moving along.
The only sound was the crickets in the bushes beyond.
Maria and I went into the change room. I saw trunks hanging on a hook.
When I came out, all of my amazement vanished into sweet lust as I saw Maria, looking irresistible in a string bikini, laying on a lounge chair.
I had to steady myself to keep from falling, wishing I’d eaten earlier, so high…floating in a daze….
I didn’t see Luis or Estelle.
“Time for a workout,” she giggled, pouring me a drink from a pitcher of martinis and pulling me next to her.
Her body was glorious in the moonlight and neither of us had any intentions of swimming as I stroked her luscious softness, reveled in her soft moans, massaged and teased her beautiful breasts as she giggled.
Her hands were under my trunks again and again…I was in orbit, higher than ever, the whole world spinning out as I stroked her pussy through the red bikini bottom….
“Come on,” she whispered, pulling me up.
“There’s a guest room off of here,” she said.
“I need to make a pit stop first,” I said softly, kissing her.
“Hurry…I’ll wait,” she said.
I went down the hall, found the bathroom, swirled toothpaste on my teeth, splashed water on my face…I didn’t even know how I was still walking…my whole body hungry, weirdly floating.
I’d never smoked anything like this! Was this real?
As I walked back out down the short hall, I saw a light flashing from what I guessed was another poolside guest room.
Flash. Flash. Like a TV was on?
Flash. Flash.
A camera?
I tiptoe’d over. The door was open just a couple inches.
“Are you a good boy for me, Luis?” I heard Estelle say.
I peeked in.
Luis, naked, was sitting on the edge of a large four-poster bed, his dick sticking straight out.
A strobe was flashing behind Estelle, standing there in just heels.
Jesus what a body.
She was dangling a chain with a purple and lavender-colored crystal in front of Luis.
So strange, how it sparkled in the light…I wanted to focus on it…so beautiful…..
“Yes…yes, Estelle…” he was saying dreamily.
“You love to please me, don’t you?”
“Yeeessss…”
“You live to make me happy…to worship me…you worship me, don’t you, boy bitch? You dream of only me, there is no woman but me is there Luis?”
“No…only you…” he said mechanically.
“Luis, my voice is your song…you feel sweet endless soft pleasure when you hear my voice…”
“Yes, Estelle….”
She reached down and held his massive, hard cock.
Stroked it. Squeezed it.
“Like a song Luis…a sweet melody, a cool breeze on a hot day baby…so good to hear, soooo goooood….”
Yesssss…” he said, as she bent to kiss him.
The strobe flashing. Flashing.
I watched it too.
And her.
She was such a goddess!
Luis always liked the kinky ones. Kinky games. I couldn’t help but watch it….all floaty….
“Such a good boy,” she said, the crystal dangling back and forth in front of his eyes…the strobe flashing…
“Do you want to please me, little man? Is it good to make me happy? Is it good to…o-b-e-y your beautiful Estelle, my little slut?”
“YES!” Luis cried, moaning like he was having an orgasm.
Flash…. Flash….
I couldn’t help but watch it too, as she repeated over and over, “is it good to please me…?”
Him gazing up at her in adoration.
“Hey!” I suddenly heard from behind me.
Maria!
“I…”
“Shh! Don’t let her see!” she whispered as she grabbed my arm and pulled me away.
The flashes of the strobe were still in my mind’s eye as she wheeled me into another guest room, decorated with cheerful flowery prints on a large double bed.
“This is OUR room,” she giggled, pulling me close. I smelled that sage smell, saw the smoke floating in the air.
“I…I don’t..I didn’t mean to…” I muttered.
I felt so weird! Something in my head beckoning me to flee.
“It’s just a fun game they play, honey,” she said, pushing into me.
“Let’s go….” I said, “my place…”
Something wanting me to take her somewhere else.
Not be here.
“Go?” she giggled, pulling off her top.
She slid on to the bed, swung her arms behind her….
Looked absolutely irresistible in the dim light.
A vision.
All I could see now was Maria, floating a million miles away…her below me.
“Come on,” she whispered, crooking her finger.
“It IS time to gooooo,” she whispered.
I was on her before I even knew I was moving, feeling her pull off my trunks…
My tongue swirled into her waiting mouth, sucked her nipples ravenously as she wrapped my hard cock between her soft thighs.
Her sweating body twisting below me…her soft sighs, lilting sing-song little-girl giggles….deeper throaty laughs….her beautiful breasts, so soft and delectable….
I heard a sound behind me. Light briefly flashed into the room.
“Your friend Luis is passed out, Peter,” I heard Estelle say softly, as Maria and she both giggled.
I shuddered as I heard her voice. But my cock got even hungrier, the strobe flashing in my mind.
“And Maria and I share EVERYthing, don’t we honey?”
I turned and Estelle, naked, slid on to the bed.
“Ready for the double jeopardy round, Peter?” she laughed.
They both did, and I plunged into a world of the sweetest softest girl-flesh anyone ever could.
They drove their tongues into each other’s mouths, grinded their soft bodies all around mine.
They each kissed each other with my cock in between them, Maria licking it like a candy cane then kissing Estelle, Estelle tickling my balls, swirling their tongues around as I moaned and screamed… and then kissed each other, deep and hard.
I moaned again in glorious abandon as Maria swung up and her pussy came down on my face, and I licked greedily, loving her loud cries as she swirled over my face.
Estelle moved the tip of my cock across her moist pussy—I was an animal, them too, we cried out in joy—and then I launched straight out as she plunged down.
They kissed and ground their bodies into each other’s as Estelle rode my cock and Maria came and came in glorious abandon on my face.
It went on forever, I wasn’t even in the room I was so so far away, hearing my voice screaming from far away…the lights from the strobe still flashing in my mind’s eye as I came and came.
As all of us exploded. Together…..Glorious…endless….exploding together…..
And as I came and came and came, I heard a loud popping sound.
Muffled, my ears covered by Maria’s legs….
But still… very loud.
Like fireworks. Like a car backfiring.
Pop. Pop.
Was it here? Was it real? In my head?
Like fireworks for real!
Pop. Pop. Pop.
I came and came and we were all moaning wildly, thrashing, twisting, I launched into the sky, bucking and thrashing, coming coming coming….all of us screaming……
…I dreamed I was at the circus.
Pretty colored lights flashed all around me….I was never happier, a little boy walking, eating sweet treats, watching the pretty lights….
…”MOVE!!!!” I heard a male voice yell.
I started to awaken, shaking my head.
Cold. It was cold…was I outside? Why was I outside?
“What the…” I mumbled...
“DON”T MOVE!!”
I roused up…and wasn’t in the bedroom!
Wasn’t with them!
It was cold.
“What the…”
“I said FREEZE! DON’T FUCKING MOVE!!!!”
“I…”
I was outside! I could feel the soft earth underneath me. Saw the stars, above.
Flashlights blasted into my eyes.
And I was dressed!
Where were they? Where was I????
Suddenly three male bodies bashed down on me.
“HEY!” I screamed as I felt a knee go down on my back.
“Don’t move fuck-wad you’re UNDER ARREST!”
They pulled my hands hard behind me and handcuffs snapped on to my wrists.
“What IS this??” I managed to say, squirming, as they pulled me up.
“Shut the FUCK UP!” a male voice said as they pulled me up.
I was outside! Dressed in all my clothes!
And those lights weren’t the circus…there were a thousand cop cars lined up in front of Estelle’s house!
Lights flashing all around me, voices…WTF?
“Come on, asshole,” someone said.
Cops were pulling me up. I was just fifty feet down the driveway, the Mercedes parked in front of me.
Another, smaller car behind it. A little white Chevy.
“You have the right to remain silent….” I heard a voice intone as they pulled me.
I was still half in a dream.
“What IS this!” I yelled out as they pulled me roughly up the walk.
“THAT’S HIM!!!” I heard Estelle scream. “Oh dear GOD That’s HIM!” I heard her scream through tears.
She was crying.
“Come on,” the cop said, pulling me toward a patrol car.
“LUIS!” I yelled.
They were all there. All three of them, dressed.
Estelle was sobbing and crying wildly, standing with a policewoman and a woman in plainclothes with a badge on her jacket.
Maria was sobbing on to Luis’s shoulder, Luis holding and comforting her.
“LUIS!! LUIS PLEASE!! HELP ME!” I cried.
Luis just looked at me. Cold. Dead-eyed…just stared, stroking Maria’s hair, holding her.
“HE”S AN ANIMAL!” Estelle screamed, shrieking a loud scream and then crying and sobbing louder, the two women and another detective comforting her.
“LUIS!” I screamed.
“SHUT the FUCK UP!” the cop pulling me toward the patrol car said into my ear, my head all buzzed out.
He popped my elbow with his nightstick. MAN did that hurt!
I cried out, my whole arm inflamed in pain.
“Shut up!”he said again, disgusted with me. Ready to pop me again, I knew. Wanting to.
“Luis…” I said quietly, shivering, cold, as we moved toward the car.
We were on the path right at the edge of the cliff, heading into the flashing lights.
I guess I was so messed-up and pathetic that they let their guard down for just a moment.
In one magic moment that happened faster than thinking about it, somebody yelled, ‘hey sarge!’ and the grip on my elbow loosened just enough.
The other cops around me all got distracted too, for just a moment, as Estelle let out another wail.
And that’s when I moved like lightning!
I didn’t think about it, I just felt the opening and BAM!
And goddamit…I jumped!
Right off the side of the hill! Just LEAPED over that little safety-fence with my hands handcuffed behind me so I had to twist, and MAN I couldn’t believe it was happening!
I jumped!
I didn’t even believe this was happening I just DID it!
I just DID it!
Jumped!
“HEY!” one of the cops screamed and I could feel his hand on my shoulder but too late and I could hear Maria scream, “Oh my God!” and then lots of loud voices as I leaped for dear life straight over the little fence and dived RIGHT off the side of that hill!
Yeah sure, like anybody would do that, you say, but I’m telling you I saw the cops get distracted for just a second and the whole set-up just flashed in my mind and god DAMN I just DID it!
It’s not that I’d rather die, I thought, sailing down now, no going back.
I just did it without thinking; I jumped off the damn cliff!
It looked like e hill but the flimsy fence was actually protecting from a sheer drop, and I was going down without hitting ground!
MAN it was crazy!
The cold night air whooshing in my face as I plummeted in freefall with my hands tied behind me. Damn!
All I could see in my mind was the look on those cops’ faces…the deep sadness of Luis, looking at me, looking through me…like some empty-headed zombie, some vampire, the fucking murderer, the assassin, kill for her and split the old man’s money.
Set me up to take the fall, Jeeeesus Christ…Luis staring straight through me, holding Maria, that little fake.
And her.
Her.
Estelle.
She’s a better actress than the one she looks like, I thought with boiling anger, venom.
They’d set me up! A frame! For capital murder! The bastards!
Fucking Luis! He was the assassin for her!
Pop,pop,pop. I’d heard it!
I plummeted through cool swooshing air, grass and scrub and the stars of the clear sky wheeling all around, the scrub grass on the cliff-face in front of me speeding by, plummeting, plummeting, in total freefall, the dark of night all around me, the flashing lights from the cop cars receding…their cries and voices, receding above into nothingness as I floated…down, down, the air cold….
I’m going to die.
I trembled…I really am….
It’s been a good life, I thought, plummeting down, my arm in pain, all of me cold, shivering——I was really thinking that, all stoned and shivering in the cold, and coughing and scared and fucked- up- as-can- be, as I sailed down…down…
Felt a wave of love for my parents. Friends, family, women, all flashing through my mind.
Somehow I was able to get my manacled hands in front of me, not behind, pulled them under my legs…felt better….
Like they say, it all flashes through your head as you die.
Well guess what? It does.
JUST like that, it really does. Time just stopped as I floated down…
I thought of my dog, from when I was a kid, you say that’s corny but I’m telling you those are the thoughts you get, the pictures whizzing through my aching head, death a moment away.
Down…down…cold air…down….
Barney.
Little golden Lab. The runt of the litter like you, my folks would say, laughing.
Barney was my dog.
I started really crying now, hard, sailing down into the cold black nothing…all of this happening in a split second that went on forever…
Thinking of Barney. Is he waiting for me?
He was my DOG, man…
Barney, ma’ man, ma’ bud… He was my DOG, man….…he was MY dog, you know?
Took him to the park every day, he’d be waiting for me after school with my aunt, we went to my aunt’s house after school ‘til my Mom got out of work…my aunt’s house always smelled like cleaning stuff and Barney would start to cough and I would laugh.
”Barney!” I’d yell.
Sure, yes, yeah, I’d yell that, and yeah like a Disney dog running right at me, Barney was my DOG and I’d be laughing…rolling around with him on the grass, getting all dirty, my books flying. Laughing…laughing…..
And he’d jump up and slobber on my face, his breath smelled like dog food, my aunt would shake her head, smiling, walking slow toward us, picking up my books, letting us enjoy the moment…….him running toward me, big happy dog-smile, knock me right down…
I’m going to die.
Death….splat….
Man, it’s dark and cold….
That time the little kids in the neighborhood were poking him with sticks, even my own cousin, laughing, getting too close to his eyes, the little bullies, him cornered, barking, them poking at him.
And I beat the shit out of them! You’re goddam right I did.
You fuck with HIM, you fuck with ME, and I popped and bolted over and I beat the ever-loving shit out of them and, boy, did I get in big trouble for it too!
My dad all bent, freaking out when I got home. Mom, too.
But let me tell you, those runts never messed with him again.
My dad flipped.
“What are you doing! Beating up on kids littler than you, your own cousin, JEE-zus! What the hell!”
“Peter,” my mom would say softly, as dad ranted, all bent and pissed off.
Cuz he’s my DOG, Dad! That’s what I thought, but I knew better than to talk. At moments like this, any talking would just get Dad crazier.
I didn’t say it. They got all bent. I just took it, shut up and took it.
But my mom understood, I could tell.
She pretended to get all bent too, the other parents calling on the phone, dad rolling out of that recliner coming at me like a freight train with that angry face, and I knew the stern lecture that was coming, but I didn’t care.
Cuz he’s my DOG, dad, don’t you GET it??
But my mom understood. I could see it in her eyes…she knew…
She was proud of me, secretly, proud of me too, I knew. Our secret, mom, cuz Barney’s my DOG.
I could see it in her smiling eyes….
I took care of him when he got old too, and my friends would want me to go out and I’d say no, dudes, gotta take care of Barney, like when he got too old and my mother would look down at us, all sad, and I’d hold him tighter and clean him all up, lift him into his bed. Feel his frailty, see the gray whiskers.
I watched after him, took care of him, when he got old.
“Son,” my dad would say gently, face close, squeezing my shoulder, my mom next to him, holding my hand, smoothing my hair, “he’s getting senile, Peter. He doesn’t move because of arthritis, it hurts to move. He doesn’t even know us.”
Bullshit, I thought then. He knows me. Even if he doesn’t, I know him. He needs me. He’s Barney, he’s my dog.
Is he waiting for me? With my aunt that got cancer a little while ago, she waiting there too, with him, like when I was little? Full circle? Are they still all gray, or young again?
I cried hard now, sailing down to my death.
My head swimmed…plummeting down, cold air, blackness….gonna die….gonna die…
I was getting closer now.
Splat time.
I don’t care, the cops aren’t EVER taking me….
I could hear it roaring up, the ground below…the car sounds, the rumble of trucks….warmer air…
I’m dead, I thought.
Dear God for real, I’m fucking dead.
But I wasn’t!
Every bone in my body screamed pain as I hit hard!
My whole body flailed like a doll, smashed in searing ripping agony and BAM!
BAM!
Yes!
On to the top of something soft….something moving fast….like covering, like a cover….a covering fabric, with something metal underneath it that I HADN’T hit!
And we were flying down the road! Suddenly I was alive and moving!
Moving!
I’d smashed down on to the top of a moving truck!!! JEEZUS!
I was fast sliding off too, off the top of a tractor-trailer screaming down the highway at 70 miles an hour!
Jeeeez-us, save me!
I’d landed on top of a moving truck!
A MOVING TRUCK!!
I’m alive!
I giggled even as I felt myself sliding off, almost slid off, but there was some sort of strap.
And in the wind, with screaming pain ripping my body apart, all through my body, the roar of the night and the air in my ears, eyes….That truck had saved me!
I grabbed that strap and squeezed as tightly as I could and hung on for dear LIFE!!
The roar of the cold air in my ears, I squeezed it with everything I had!
I’m alive!
Pulled up, wind and wind-noise blasting into my face, cold wind, my hair flying…. hugging the strap into the screaming night, wind in my face, the wind almost sliding me off.
You think it only happens in movies but I’m telling you it happened just like that!
I was alive!
Wind screamed into my face, the night sky wheeled above me, the stink of the diesel, the sound of passing traffic, do they see me?
I hunkered down tight and flat. I didn’t want to be seen!
Pain…pain….
Gulping for air.
I only heard occasional traffic…maybe I’d make it? Jeez it was cold.
I grabbed for dear absolute goddam life onto that strap, bouncing in ripping pain over some sort of soft covering, some kind of machinery underneath me, but lots of air, like an air cushion, saved my life, and in screaming ripping pain I held on for dear life as we roared down that winding black highway.
Dear God thank you I’m alive!
Oh man, oh man, oh man…
We went a long time. Then the truck suddenly started slowing down and I got ready.
I pushed up, ignoring the pain, trying to stay low so no one would see me, shivering in the cold….
When we hit the red light, I jumped. No cars behind him at the intersection, no one around.
Bone crushing agony ripped through me—I suddenly realized I must have cracked a rib or two, I couldn’t breathe without knife-cutting pain, I hadn’t stopped gasping for air since I’d hit, and my eyes hadn’t stopped gushing tears since I‘d hit the damn truck.
But GOD DAMN I’m ALIVE!
And then it was quiet.
Just as suddenly, quiet.
Just the sound of the bugs, traffic in the distance. Smell of greenery, trees. Laying on hard cinders. Gulping air.
Felt the wet of blood under my shirt, the copper smell. I’d gotten cut up, could feel it. Cinders in my skin at my waist…blood, bleeding.
Could hear an airplane, far away in the quiet night.
I was lying on the side of the road—plain to anybody to see if they’d passed by—just laying there, gulping air, crying, stars blasting above me in the dark night, never ever knowing that pain and hurt could be this total.
Broken.
And in plain sight!
I pushed up, ignored the pain, the sense that everything-is-broken, to not want to move—and forced myself over into a patch of trees.
The night was cool and thankfully there was no traffic.
The cops would be looking for my body by now, I knew.
I peeked out, still gulping air. Breathing hard through my mouth, can’t get enough air.
The cops could be here any minute.
Turns out I didn’t even have to jump.
I saw the truck flip its left-signal and pull across less than a hundred yards ahead.
Saw the sign.
A truck-stop. Some trucker-heaven place!
Suddenly realized through the blur that there were big streetlights, a parking lot.
Just some other strip malls around but everything closed. Quiet.
I knew the cops would come after me like an army—fucking dragnet—once they knew I hadn’t splattered all over the side of the bitch’s cliff…the evil killer bitch who’d set me up to spend my life in jail.
The angry venom in my veins is what drove me as I started running…her face in my head, standing over naked hard Luis with that flashing strobe blasting out, his bugged-out eyes gazing up at her.
Her voice…her naked body…Maria pushing her glorious body into my back…”Hurry! She’ll see you!”
Yes, that’s what she had purred from her cold-hearted bitch mouth, to keep me from running, getting out of there, part of the set-up.
They’re both better actresses than the ones they look like, I thought. Those tears and screams as the cops took me, man, all planned…a set-up!
Twisting even my best friend Luis against me…and all for the money.
Thanks, friend, I thought. Thanks asshole. Never a day in your life you didn’t do your thinking with your dick…..
Even now, running and broken and half-dead…I could see that flashing strobe in my mind’s-eye.
And Her.
Estelle.
Her naked body….
The flashing light….
Luis’ face….
Put the pain in a box, I thought, running slowly, softly, dodging behind the trees…like you learn in all those martial-arts books.
Don’t ignore the pain. Drink it in, let it pass through you. Put it in its box in your head, and keep moving….
There were lots of trucks parked and idling along both sides, big streetlights blasting down.
I’d be seen if I wasn’t careful.
A fake-log-cabin-looking place, open all-night, signs in the window with pictures of food, big pictures of burgers and chicken, Lottery-Sold-Here signs.
I dodged between the trucks, saw a little metal storage shed behind the restaurant.
Staying low, I dodged through the trees behind the trucks—so loud! The trucks idling, so loud!
My head was screaming, head aching enough to push my eyeballs right out, but I kept moving, staying low.
I gasped air—grabbed a small tree to keep from falling, I was pouring sweat now, every breath a new agony—and tried the back door.
Open!
No shit!
But it was!
Not locked! Wide open. The damn door was wide- fucking-open!
I pushed in, slammed the door. Locked it.
Felt the floor—nothing below me, floorboards, smell of cardboard, cleaning stuff, stale—and collapsed.
I fell like a bag of bones.
I drifted, gulping for air…put the pain in its box….
I lay flat on my back and drifted into dizzy unconsciousness…..
I’m alive.
It was late morning when I woke up, I could tell from the air, the heat, I’d slept a long time.
I managed to push myself up, everything stiff, brutal broken pain in every fiber of my being, but I could move okay. Stabbing pain in my side was the worse…
I took a look around. Boxes. A work area. Tools. Food storage. A sink.
I went into a smelly bathroom in the corner behind an old whitewashed wooden door that didn’t move, stuck open, used this bathroom that hadn’t been clean in a very long time.
Threw up, heaved, spit up some blood, flushed it, just let it happen….
Found generic aspirin in a big bottle sitting on the tank, swallowed six of them, stuck the bottle in my pocket.
Swirled mouthwash into my mouth, poured peroxide on my cuts.
Found a case of cheap-o cola back out in the main room, quaffed five cans of it.
I heard a car pull up. I stiffened.
Cops!
I hobbled to the wall, the aspirin helping a lot, I gulped down six more with another cola, pain receding mercifully now, and peeked out.
To total shock.
No.
No.
It can…not….be…..
I’m dead. Dreaming…Or I’m in a hospital bed, hallucinating!
Because there it was, right out front… not a thousand cops, not the restaurant workers, but…
Maria.
Maria!
I pulled back…looked again.
It was!
“Peter!” she said softly from outside. She’d seen me at the window.
She knew where I was!! How could that be??
I rolled along the wall to the door, stepped out.
We were in the hot sun, facing each other, her little white Chevy convertible from yesterday behind her.
Nobody else around, fewer trucks, quiet. No cops. No helicopters.
She was all dressed for work. Pretty short white skirt, low-cut green satin top, pretty white sandals. Gold jewelry, makeup.
Gorgeous as ever…. and an accomplice to a killer!
The cops wouldn’t be far behind now, would they?
“Peter,” she said with deep pity, her eyes soft, as she walked toward me. Then past me, she smelled nice…jeez, even now, I thought she was beautiful. Even now, I wanted her, wanted it to be so different.
She was inside the shed.
“Come on!”
I stepped in, locked the door behind us.
To my surprise, she sat right on the floor in the middle of the room and leaned on some boxes, looking up at me, filled with sadness and pity.
Pity?
“Help me,” I said as I lowered down. “How the hell did you find me?”
She said nothing, just helped me down and we were now facing each other.
Her face, so filled with sympathy, became very lucid.
Suddenly, too. Instantly. Lucid and clear, staring at me with doe-eyes. Like an actress changing facial expressions instantly.
That’s all she is, I reminded myself. An actress. An evil cold-hearted bitch who’d send me to jail for life just for money.
Intent, like she was trying hard to concentrate, now, as she stared at me.
“Keys… purse, trust me,” she hissed through tight lips.
I just stared.
“What?”
“Keys… purse!” she said again, straining, neck veins bulging, like something was caught in her throat..
And then, suddenly, her face contorted. Her whole body changed, her posture, her countenance.
But especially her face. There was a sudden, wild, hungry look on her face. Like that movie with the woman with the split-personalities, just like a different person was emerging from inside of her. Right in front of me!
WTF!
Her skirt rode up her thighs and she leaned back.
“YES!” she cried as her head fell back.
Her legs spread wide, and she started unbuttoning her blouse!
“Oh GOD yes!” she moaned, moving her fingers across her glorious breasts, now hanging free, pinching her nipples. No bra.
This isn’t happening, I thought…but it was! Damn!
The woman was pleasuring herself right in front of me! As if I wasn’t even there!
“Oh sweeet Jesus yes!” she said, sweating now, breathing hard, grinding her ass into the floor, giggling, sliding one of her hands up her skirt, which was pushing up around her thighs, licking her lips, moaning, her legs spread out, no stockings, panties visible…
“Maria!” I yelled.
She stopped and looked at me, huffing and puffing, mewing a little as she still fondled her breasts…gazing intently at me, like she’d just noticed I was in the room.
“How did you find me, Maria?”
She stared.
Suddenly her body went frozen, as if she were commanding it to not move.
The lucid look came back. Intent. Even sweet. The sweet, pitied look was back.
Some young actress playing parts in the mirror, it was like she was two people and I was watching them both in the same body.
So pretty, sweet and pretty now flashed across her face.
Caring.
Who the hell ARE you, I thought, unable to speak.
“Shhh…” she breathed. Breathing hard still, gulping air.
I stared.
“Shirt! Find shirt find shirt!” she said intently, staring into my eyes.
“GOD!” she screamed and her head suddenly fell back and I noticed her face changed again!
Went to seductive and sultry, just that fast.
As fast as flipping a light switch, her face went from sweet and intent and filled with sympathy, to seductive hungry dangerous enticing little bitch, the way she’d look at me in the bar yesterday. That hungry wicked dangerous look that had flipped my switch, had it really been just hours ago?
Alluring….seductive and hungry and possessive and haughty…bitchy and hungry, staring at me.
Doing herself again now, too.
“YES!!” she cried as her fingers dove under her panties, thighs grinding, pleasuring herself, her face all twisted in ecstasy, her legs splayed out, her eyes closed, taking her pleasure.
I just stared. I had to get the hell away!
Suddenly I got it. The light bulb went off.
The homing device was in the shirt! And her car keys were in her purse! That’s what she was trying to tell me. Like it was a struggle to tell me but she’d gotten it out….
I grabbed the keys, took a blue workshirt off a hook behind me, and hobbled outside as fast as I could, as Maria writhed in moans of ecstasy on the floor, pleasuring herself wildly.
I left behind a writhing girl-animal with her breasts flying free and her skirt around her thighs, wildly pleasuring herself and moaning loudly and twisting around on the stinking wooden floor of a work shed in the middle of the goddam desert with cops all around ready to storm at me any minute.
I tossed the old shirt with the homing device into the breeze, noted how stained with blood it was, stumbled behind the wheel of her little white car.
Suddenly there she was, opening the side door as I buttoned the workshirt.
Her panties in her hands, clothes all rumpled, she dived into the back seat.
“Go!”
I did, floored it out of there. Spit gravel as the car took off.
I could see in the mirror she was driving her fingers between her legs furiously, back at it, breasts swaying, head flailing, ass grinding into the car seat.
Then just as suddenly, she stopped.
Lucid. Frozen.
Our eyes locked as I watched it all in the rearview mirror, watched as I drove, drove fast, glancing at the mirror, blasting through a red light at one point as we booked down the commercial strip, weaving around the few other cars. Did they see her in the back?
“Cops!” she said through clenched teeth.
“Trap!”
Her hand dug into my shoulder. It hurt.
“Don’t!” I cried.
Man it hurt!
She bent her mouth to my ear.
“Trust me,” she hissed out, in the lucid voice, face calm, body frozen.
“Yes,” was all I said.
Trust you? Yeah, right. But what could I do?
Part of me said, toss her out, but part of me said don’t. So I didn’t, just kept driving.
“Oh GOD!” she cried and suddenly the sultry seductress crossed her face as she fell back.
She cried and moaned and writhed in furious hunger as she came and came and I drove and drove. No cars around us, civilization receding as we headed deeper into the desert, the only sound her cries of orgasm.
“Turn!” she suddenly yelled, in the lucid voice, breathing hard.
“Cops!” she added.
I knew what she meant. Roadblocks near the freeway for sure.
Then, “Oh GOD!” and she fell back again.
“OH God oh God oh God,” she screamed, riding her fingers and pinching her nipples.
As she came and came, she started chanting in a little-girl voice:
“The light never stops…Mistress is All…the Light never stops….Mistress is All…..”
Madness!
A goddam freak show, man, in the backseat.
It hurts so bad I just want to pass out, I thought, popping four more aspirin.
I’m caught in a nightmare freak show, driving down some empty road in the desert….a road she guided me to, a trap for sure.
“The Light is always, Mistress is All…Mistress, ohhh sweet Mistress….” she intoned, over and over, gazing out dreamily.
Languid now. Satisfied. Chanting it almost.
“Sweet Mistress,” she hissed softly now.
Total nutjob.
But she might save me, too. Why did I think that? But I did, I just went with it.
Why did I hold out hope for that? But I did.
I could see her slick with juices between her legs, still spread wide, saw in the mirror as she breathed deeply, her head back, eyes still closed, hips still grinding a little, panties tossed across the seat.
She was making little mewing sounds, satisfied now.
“Did I please you, Mistress?” she said softly to herself, turning to gaze, glassy-eyed, out the window.
“Please…please Mistress…I’ll be good….”
“Please you,” she kept saying softly, “Please you Mistress….”
Finally I’d had enough of freak-central. I pulled over and stopped to pee, hobbled over to a tree.
Dropped six more aspirin, I was glad I’d grabbed the bottle and shoved it into my pocket earlier.
My stomach burned, but the pain in my ribs and torso and head receded. I could function, though goodness-knows what damage I’m doing to myself. I couldn’t even stop to think about the bruises, swelling, how it would goddam hurt again soon enough.
By the time I got back, she was leaning against the car, languidly smoking a cigarette, staring at me. She was dressed again, clothes all rumpled up.
The siren-seductress face. The sweet Maria was gone again….the bitch was back.
She just looked at me as we both got in, her in the front seat this time, next to me.
After we drove silently for just a couple of minutes, she said, “Here.”
I saw it.
The first house we’d seen in miles. A nice-looking teak-colored ranch-style house, with nice landscaping out front, all by itself, in the middle of nowhere.
“Here,” she said.
Haughty again. The evil side. Nothing sweet about her now.
The sultry, seductive face. The bitch was back. Had never left, really, except for those few lucid moments…
She touched my face after I parked, and when I opened my door, she beckoned me to close it.
Yes I know it’s a trap, I thought, resigned.
I need to face this, I knew.
Run instead? Run where?
Trust her?
“Peter,” she said softly now, sexy and alluring, looking intently at me, moving her finger down my chin.
Naughty little girl look. Enticing. Hot.
“Peter,” she said, leaning up and kissing me, the smell of sweat and sex coming off her.
A soft stroke across our lips, a light kiss.
She started moving her fingers down my chest.
“Peeeeee-terrrrrrrr…”
“Don’t,” I said, wincing. Hurt like hell!
“Hurts,” I said.
“Yes,” she said, not stopping.
“Does it hurt, Peter?” she said sweetly, still moving down.
“Ask me nice to not hurt you, Peter…ask me nice,” she said, all coy, twirling her fingers on my bruised chest, giggling a little.
Slutty-sweet.
“Yes! Please! It hurts!” I was squirming to get away from her.
She quickly pulled her hands away. Put a finger on each of my nipples, pushed a little. Her face showing she was enjoying it, playing with me, being a little sex-machine.
Suddenly I just blurted the next thing out of my head. It just came to me.
I just said it. It came into my head, and I said it.
I blurted out:
“You can be what you want to be, Maria! This isn’t who you are! You can BE who you are!”
She looked shocked—I’d reached her—went frozen quickly, the lucid look replacing the sultry siren-seductress in a split-second flash.
Clear and lucid now.
“I can be what I want to be?” she said in a questioning little-girl voice, gazing quizzically at me, as if seeing me for the first time.
“Yes!”
Our eyes locked. So sweet, hers, so soft….
Then, just as suddenly, she pulled away.
Her eyes shifted.
Jumped out of the car, ran around, opened my door, pulled me out roughly by my arm.
“Hey!” I yelled. “That hurts!”
Grabbed me, twisted my arm behind me, pushed me toward the house.
The sultry seductive alluring bitch was back in her eyes, back stronger than ever.
I’d lost her!
She pushed me up the walk, hard, twisting my arm so I couldn’t run…and I had no resistance in me, I felt like a cripple, as she opened the front door and we stumbled in, suddenly down some little steps into some sort of sunken living room.
I wouldn’t run even if I could. Go where? I had to face this.
The room was dark, except for the blast of the strobe light, just like yesterday.
The strobe light was blasting across a dark room, sending bright white light in regular intervals. I could see furniture in the bright flashes, but I couldn’t really see anything.
Flash…dark…flash….black….
I smelled that sage smell too. That sage smell, like from the weed last night, the stuff they’d used to mess me up.
I swooned, dizzy, in some pain still…the light, the smell, my head swimmed….
Just the light.
Flash... Flash…I stared into it, not a natural light, not just a regular light bulb, a richer, more shimmering light, wonderful to watch, I couldn’t look away…
She quickly grabbed my arm and chained my wrist to a hook in the wall, so I wouldn’t fall, capturing me, like it was all planned out.
“I have him!” she cried out, in a voice looking for approval.
Soft carpeting…all dark….light…dark…
The strobe light was blasting, flash…flash….in the dark room.
“I have him Mistress! I HAVE him!!”she cried.
Estelle—there she was, like I knew she would be—Estelle came out from around the corner and strode into the room like a big mean cat.
Naked.
Wearing just black high-heels, her dark body as magnificent as any woman’s body can be.
Even now, I could only think, man, what a beautiful woman!
The long mane of jet-black hair, the piercing green eyes, eyes now staring at me with smug malevolent satisfaction.
The bitch!
“Well, well, well,” she said with a soft chuckle. “Look who dropped in.”
Flash…flash…it was blinding!
She was holding something. It looked like a stick? No, crop. It was a riding crop.
She poked my stomach with it, as Maria tore her clothes off and fell naked before Estelle.
“Mistress!” she cried, gazing up in eerie adoration.
Estelle turned toward Maria.
“You’ve done well, my love,” she said softly, moving a finger down Maria’s face.
Maria hugged Estelle’s legs, pushed herself into her, gazing up.
“You’ve pleased me.”
Maria mewed a soft sound of satisfaction, and began softly kissing Estelle’s legs, thighs.
Suddenly, in the flash-flash of the strobe, I saw a man enter the room from the hall!
There was someone else here!
He was middle-aged, Italian or Mexican-looking. Salt-and-pepper gray hair, wearing a baggy suit and a beige trench coat, not very tall.
“Why are you dressed!!!???” Estelle screamed at him, turning away from me and looking at him angrily, pushing Maria away.
Flash…flash….
“I didn’t tell you to get dressed!”
He just stood there, buttoning his shirt.
Flash…flash….
That sage stuff was sending me into orbit, I was so dizzy I had to grip the chain I was bound with just to stay standing.
She angrily pointed to me with her crop.
“HIM!” she screamed at the man in the trench coat.
In the madness of the flashing strobe light—flash…flash—I saw her pointing her crop at me.
“Arrest him! It’s HIM!” Estelle screamed.
“Okay,” the man said.
She smiled an evil smile and pointed at me with her crop.
“Take him! Put him in jail!” she said with that smug, evil grin.
Maria had retreated to a corner, still on her knees, still gazing at Estelle in total adoration.
“Hope you’re all ready to spend your life in cell-block B, dipshit,” she said snidely, smirking at me, giggling a little, poking my stomach with the crop.
“Come ON!” she said loudly, to the man. “Arrest him!”
“NOW!” the man yelled, very loud.
Suddenly, the lights came on! Everything was bright and the doors bashed open!
I turned away, and I heard Maria scream as she covered her eyes.
She and I had been drawn into the strobe, I suddenly noticed how we were both gazing.
I was, too. It had only been a couple of minutes but I, too, had been drawn into the rich flashing light….
But now the room lights were on!
Six police officers in blue uniforms, all wearing funky-looking tinted goggles, came bursting into the front and side doors!
The place was suddenly swarming with cops!
I breathed a sigh of sweet relief. But…are they here for me too?
“NOOOOOOO!!!” Estelle screamed as she bolted for the front door, pushing them away hard, pushing past them.
“NO! NO!!” she cried as she tried to pull away from the cops.
She couldn’t. In a quick moment, they had a big thick white robe around her and were cuffing her wrists behind her, as she struggled against them.
It took all six to subdue her, as they pulled her toward the door.
“FUCK you! Damn you!” she kept screaming, struggling.
“Turn that thing off and take her downtown,” the man said, pointing at the strobe device.
“Yes, Lieutenant,” one of the cops said.
As she still struggled against them, cursing wildly, they finally got her out of the room.
It was suddenly quiet and the flashing had stopped. I heard more cop cars pulling in outside.
The cop—the Lieutenant—reached over and unhooked me. We could hear Estelle in the distance, screaming and cursing, yelling “I want my lawyer!” as two cars started and her voice finally receded.
I fell against the wall. It hurt more to sit, I stood.
“It’s okay, son,” he said softly, with a disarming smile. “You okay?”
Not very tall, late 50’s, early 60’s maybe, but youthful for his age, wearing a crumpled brown suit with a wrinkled white shirt and a wrinkled beige trench coat, I noticed a big brown gravy stain on one lapel.
“I’m okay,” I said, nodding.
Two policewomen and a male cop came back in. I saw all the cop cars in the driveway when they opened the door.
“Get her to the hospital, psych unit, fast,” he said, pointing to Maria.
“Yes, Lieutenant,” one of the women said.
I wanted to run over and hold her.
Maria was curled up in a fetal position, shivering and hugging herself, crying…looking like a cornered animal, eyes darting back-and-forth.
Terrified.
My God, I thought, she’s absolutely frigging terrified.
I wanted to hold her.
I just stayed where I was and the policewomen gently lifted her, put a robe around her, and walked her out.
She looked at me as they passed, and for a moment—just a second—I saw that lucid look come back into her eyes.
“It’ll be okay,” I said softly to her. She just nodded. They took her out. A car started and pulled out, others arriving. Someone was putting yellow-tape all around the outside.
It was just the two of us now.
The Lieutenant stared at me, pushed his fingers through his thick salt-and-pepper hair, smiling a very disarming, reassuring smile, nodding at me.
He sure didn’t look or act like a cop, looked more like a guy who runs a produce stand at the farmer’s market downtown, or a harmless absent-minded professor, wouldn’t hurt a fly.
Reached into his pocket, and pulled out a short cigar.
Took a moment to unwrap it, smelled it as he looked at me, savoring it, still smiling, and lit it with an old-fashioned silver lighter, the metal kind with lighter fluid and a flip-top.
I noticed his faded brown dress shoes could use a shine. He smile contentedly and puffed away.
Walked around the corner for a moment, and came back out holding a cheap-looking shiny blue tie.
I held on to the wall to keep from falling, but I was okay. Damn, I’d made it!
“She didn’t figure two things,” he said to me cordially, finally talking, putting the tie under his collar, filling the room with cigar-smoke.
“One, the old man had clearly suspected, had recently put hidden cameras all over the house, and never told her,” he said softly, looking in the hall mirror and tying the knot. Was that a slight New-York accent in his soft voice?
“Cameras?” I said.
“Yup,” he said, nodding. I liked the smell of his tobacco.
“It’s all on video. You’re clear.”
I breathed another sigh of relief. I was free.
“We got your buddy in custody, the shooter.”
Luis.
I just nodded.
“Second thing,” he said, enjoying himself now, unraveling the case, not really talking to me anymore, just staring dreamily out the window, tying his tie badly, struggling with the knot.
“Yeah?” I said.
“Some guys…” he said, trailing off.
His head dropped down and he poked at his eyes, moving the cigar back and forth.
I saw two little dark-colored contact lenses fall into his palms. He placed them in a little container.
Then he lowered his voice, leaned toward me.
“The other thing she didn’t count on…” he said, taking a puff, trailing off again….
I just nodded.
“Well, some guys my age, we can’t exactly fly the flag no more, you know?”
I didn’t know what to say. I just stared, nodding.
“You know?” he said, tilting his head toward mine, as if revealing a great secret.
“Age, diabetes,” he said, “high blood pressure, smoking, prostate issues, you know…”
“Yeah,” was all I could think to say.
He gently put his hand on my shoulder. Cordial, enjoying himself as he carefully spoke.
“For some of us, even the little blue pill don’t work,” he said softly.
“Right.”
“You try creams, vacuum pumps, herbal stuff, that fucking inject-it-with-a-syringe bullshit,” he said, as if talking to himself.
“Yeah,” I said again, commiserating.
“All bullshit. All a waste,” he said.
“Sure.”
“Nothing works. Deader than a doornail,” he said quietly, shaking his head.
I said nothing. Felt for the guy, nice guy.
“Ohhh, you get into, you know, gourmet foods, good books, fine wines, to pass the time, but,” he said, “you don’t remember about girls after a while, you know…”
“Right.” What could I say?
He whispered in my ear, “She didn’t count on that….guys like me….”
He chuckled and nodded his head.
I chuckled, and nodded my head, because he did, so I did too.
“She didn’t count on that,” he said with finality, wrapping up the case.
“She couldn’t get her hooks in me. I let her try, incriminating herself along the way, but….truth is, with me, she never had a chance.”
We just stood there for a minute, him nodding and smiling reassuringly, me nodding and smiling back.
“But the incense stuff, this light thing…” I said.
“Well,” he said, “these, for one”—he pointed to the case with the contact lenses—“and I was psyops in the army, this stuff’s pretty rinky-dink if you know about it.”
I just nodded.
“Child’s play,” he added.
“And,” he continued, “you should know that it was your little girlfriend there who sent us the contractor bills from installing the cameras.”
“Maria?”
“Yup. She knew about it from paying the old man’s bills, it was her writing on the envelope, left it at on my desk, that’s how we knew where to look for the video.”
Trust me, she had said. How ‘bout that?
“We saw it all on video early this morning.”
“Wait,” I said, “This morning?”
Then I stopped. I suddenly understood.
He knew what I was thinking. I was sorry I’d said it.
“Well, you know, she is beautiful, that Estelle, I mean, you know…” he said in a self-deprecating way, the sound of apology in his voice.
“I mean, an opportunity presents itself, right?” he said sheepishly.
He just kept smiling, looking very apologetic now, humble, puffing away.
I understood.
I bore him no animosity. None. I got it immediately, I was cool.
So I didn’t bother to say:
Okay, Lieutenant, while I was racked with horrible pain, amazingly lucky I wasn’t dead, riding around in the desert with a two-headed nutjob playing with herself in the car, who was luring me into a trap and not being very smart about it, and possibly could have turned me in or even killed me and called it self-defense at any given moment, me thinking I’d be on the run in hiding for a crime I didn’t commit for the rest of my life….while all that was going on, you were just trying to get LAID?????
I didn’t say all that, because I understood. I was cool. I bore him no ill-will. I was totally cool with it, given the circumstances.
“Didn’t happen, anyway, couldn’t get there, you know,” he said softly, almost sounding perplexed.
“Well, Lieutenant,” I said, “she is a sociopath, a cold-blooded merciless killer.”
“Yeah,” he said with a thin smile, his eyes amused, “but did you see those legs?”
Point taken, I had seen those legs.
“It’s like trying to bend a spoon with your mind, you know?” he said, sounding frustrated and perplexed and melancholy, shaking his head slowly, looking past me and out the window.
More like unbend a spoon, I thought, I said nothing.
“But you figure, you know, maybe this time, just maybe, just maybe…”
“Sure, sure,” I said. “I got it Lieutenant.”
I smiled and put my hand on his shoulder, like saying, no hard feelings, about him taking his time.
He got it.
“No worries man,” I said.
We both did that chuckling-and-nodding thing again.
I wasn’t angry. I bore him no ill-will, only gratitude.
Poor bastard/ I understood completely, and, strangely, had no real anger about it.Hey you gotta take your shot when the opportunity presents itself, of course…No harm, no foul, man…
So what if some dumb innocent fuck dies in the desert, chick’s got legs ‘til tomorrow, I thought sarcastically…..I was giddy, edgy, sure, but yet giddy with relief…and I bore him no anger…only gratitude and no, no anger…I just couldn’t be anything but relieved and grateful to this disheveled smiling little man who’d taken his god DAMNED time rescuing me, but it was okay, jeeez-us, what a world we live in, was all I could think in my dizzy delirium…...man, what a world…..
“Thank you,” was all I said, quietly.
He just nodded and gave me a thumbs-up sign as he turned to the door.
Four paramedics suddenly burst into the room, pushing a gurney.
I looked over and noticed an ambulance had pulled into the driveway.
“Get him to the hospital,” he said to them.
“Yes, Lieutenant,” one of them replied.
As they wheeled me out into the hot afternoon sun, the blue sky above me, I watched him walk over to a very old-fashioned little round car.
What the hell is THAT thing, I thought, so filled with the joy that I was free. I’d make it!
Probably had been brown or gray at one time, all sun-faded now. An old round car, like some foreign car from the fifties, or sixties, but not all restored and cool. Hardly! Looked like he drove it straight out of the junkyard!
Faded, ratty, total junker. A bumper was hanging down, major clunker. Some brand they don’t even make anymore but I couldn’t remember the name.
The engine made a hideous noise and a huge plume of blue smoke sputtered out the back as he started it.
He waved at me and I waved back as they wheeled me past. I noticed he was firing up the cigar. Wished I’d asked him for one.
As I lay in the ambulance, I dreamed of Maria.
We’ll get together, I knew. Knew it like my own name. We’ll get together.
Dreamed of the girl with the soft eyes, the lucid one. The sweet lucid Maria.
My mind swiftly moved to the hot little slut Maria.
Yeah I dreamed of that side just a little more, of course I did, what do you think?
Thinking of her in that pool-house just yesterday—man, was all that just yesterday?
In that back seat earlier….her cries, her body, her fingers grinding, head flailing.
Damned straight I dreamed of that too!
And when we do live together, I mused, the ambulance rolling along, I’d better make DAMN sure that she NEVER buys a strobe light!
I forced a smile, laughing at my own joke, laying there, being wheeled and lifted, smiling.
Hearing Luis’s voice too, in my head, too, over and over:
“You just never know with women, you know?”