The photo shoot was over and we went back to his place. It was late. I was tired and wanted to sleep. I slept on the floor. He got the bed. His right leg pulled the sheet up into a knot like a drunken teenager. With his arms over his head grasping the brass headboard and his eyes closed, he looked more like an autopsy photo than a guy who just did a photo session for an on-line bondage site.
Next day: it was eight in the morning. Extra hot in August. A sliver of light through a crack in the curtain ran across the table, the floor and up the side of the wall. It hit me in the eyes and woke me up. Little sparkles of grains of dust and pollen slowly rising into the room like soft clouds of cocaine woke me up coughing. I didn't have a pillow. I used my coat rolled up into a ball. No blanket. No sheet. No covers. But he had a thin sheet keeping him comfortable. I could see through it. His nipples were hard and dark like Brazil nuts with fifty percent less salt. It made me thirsty just to look at him sleeping so oblivious to me, unconcerned about me. His mouth was open, lips dry, parched, breathing through his mouth. I was glad his stuffy nose clogged his head. It was good he couldn't breathe. He sounded nasally when he talked, like country singers. I was glad he was asleep and I was awake. I didn't want to have to deal with him. No talking. No conversation. Nothing but the sound of my absence is all he'd get from me.
I pulled myself up off the floor. Looked for my boots, but gave up. Too hot. No air conditioning, but a swamp cooler made the air humid and wet, like having sex with him. Water dripped from the cooling vents to the floor. Reminded me being in school during nap time after crackers and milk. About one in the afternoon we'd put our heads down and listen to the swamp cooler dripping water into pots and pans, hypnotically sending suggestions into our mind. Music to my ears. Like steel drums. It could always put me to sleep, but not today.
Heat and humidity was unbearable. Dust and dirt was finding its way into my lungs coughing my guts out, mucus in the palms of my hands. I looked for the bathroom. Took a piss. Ran the water in the tub. Took a shower. Washed my hair. Couldn't find a towel. Brushed my teeth with his tooth brush and tooth paste. Looked in the mirror, a full length mirror naked and still dripping wet. I was sexually aroused seeing myself. I started thinking about him. I should wake him. Climb on top, wrestle him, force him on his stomach, pin his arms behind him, force his legs forward while I pushed against him to force it. Do it and get it over with! I should wake him in a way he'll remember. That's the way he liked it when we were together, before the break up. We're not even friends. Going in different directions, hanging out for convenience sake, sleeping in the same room because of my photo exhibit, "The Onion Gallery of Female Impersonators." But now it was the bed, floor, food, window, the dreamy dreary highway of life hitting all the pot holes in every small town from here to there. Both of us wanting something else, someone, anyone else, determined to get away as fast and as far as a Greyhound bus could go.
I had a backpack. He had a suitcase. I liked whiskey. He liked beer. I only had enough money to get three hundred miles, but he had friends who'd send him to California. It didn't matter to me. I was hungry and I wasn't "aroused" anymore. That irritated me. I was frustrated. So I fixed a peanut butter sandwich and a glass of soda water. French fries with mayo, a peach and a candy bar. I ate lunch and watched him toss and turn pretending to sleep. He put his body in a fetal position, I suppose to protect himself from me, or from what he thought I had become. Or maybe he was afraid of what he might do.
The phone rang. Should I answer it? There's nobody knows I'm here. It's probably for him. He's hoping I'll hurry up and run out, get sacred, ignore the phone, close the door, lock it and run away, don't look back. That's what I should've done. The phone rings again. It's annoying. I can't stand it. I pick it up and don't say anything. I just listen. There's nothing there. Silence. Nobody says anything. I can hear breathing. At first it's slow and soft, then it gets louder, faster, deeper. Sounds like a man. I hold the phone and keep listening. Should I say something or hang up?
"Who's this?" the man says finally.
"Who's this?" I say.
"Where is he? Let me talk to him!"
"He's sleeping."
"I don't know you, do I?" he says.
"Who are you? You tell me!"
"What the hell's wrong with you! Let me talk to him, NOW or else there's gonna be trouble!" He asks lots of questions and makes rapid-fire demands.
"I told you he's sleeping. That's it! You got a problem with that!?"
"Yeah, I got a problem with YOU!" he says.
I hung up. I don't just hang up. I slammed it down so hard it broke one of the little push button numbers on the phone. It fell off and hit the floor, bounced under the bed. I got on my hands and knees. It hadn't been cleaned since he moved in. I found magazines, broken pencils, a mirror, a rusty razor blade, empty cigarette packs, empty matchbooks. Finally I got it. The number Nine. I put it back on the phone. Put the phone on the table. I stood there looking and feeling stupid, angry at my cowardice, because I didn't know who it was. I didn't like the sound of his voice.
Minutes later the phone rang again. This time I saw his eyes open. Then it rang again. I grabbed it and made a gesture with my other hand the way I stroke the fires of an erection when I've got nothing else to do. I put the phone to my ear and listened. Silence. Nobody says a word. I look at him in bed with his eyes open. He yawns, plays with his curly hair hanging down around his face. He rubs the sleep out of his eyes, licks his lips like a snake. I listen to the phone. I'm getting nervous. I start breathing heavier. My heart beats faster. I hear it in my throat. I feel it in my chest. I'm getting mad. I want to do something but I don't know what.
"Hey!" His voice hits me in the stomach like an electric bass through a Marshal amp turned up to ten! "I know he's there. I know where he lives. Put him on the phone or I'll be over in fifteen minutes to kick both your asses!"
I threw the phone down. The receiver hangs over the edge of the bed banging on the floor. I hear the guy's voice on the other end yelling, screaming, threatening.
"Answer it! Pick it up!" I say.
He yawns, sits up, rests his weight on one elbow and scratches his toes. He takes the phone close and personal like he was kissing it. If he could slide his tongue inside the phone all the way into the other guy's mouth, I get the feeling he's done it before.
"It's me. What do you want?" he says.
I can't tell what the other guy's saying. I can't hear him. I look around the room for my boots. I pull my shirt over my head, finish getting dressed. He's busy on the phone. He gets my attention, points to an ash tray with a cigarette in it. Snaps his fingers for me to pass it to him with a lighter. I do it. He lights up and blows smoke in my face. This morning his face is plain looking, his eyes unresponsive, white, pale, no emotion. Then his eyes widen larger filled with anger. Deep stress lines appear on his forehead.
"Like hell you will!" he says.
He squints. Puffs on a cigarette and blows smoke so hard he spits on me. I walk away. Look through my wallet, count my money, check the room for things I might've missed. He snaps his fingers again for me to sit down. I do what he says. I sat down and waited. It seems like forever. I'm impatient. Can't sit around all day.
"You can go to hell!" he screams at the phone and slams it down.
Poor little number nine push button falls off the phone again, hits the floor bounces under a table. He kicks the phone off the bed, it hits me in the ankle. He's mad about something. He gets out of bed stark naked except for his black underwear briefs and the black forest of chest hair. He goes to the bathroom, stands up, takes a piss. He turns to me and says, "What are you looking at!?"
"Nothing. I'm leaving."
"The hell you are!"
He shuts the toilet seat without shaking off and puts on jeans. Takes a t-shirt out of a pile of dirty clothes on the bathroom floor and puts it on. It's too short. Too tight. Doesn't even come to his waist. The sleeves are short too. I can see nipples pressing through thin fabric, trying to push through flimsy material, wanting to escape a tight fit like two convicts in solitary too long. His arms are long and lean. My meds are making me imagine things. I hear voices in my head. They tell me to do it right now. They say to overpower him, knock him down, slap him around, force him to submit. The voices tell me to get it done and over with and leave him in a pool of sweat. So I get behind him, positioning myself to make my move. I see myself in the full length mirror. I'm all wound up again. I was prepared to grab my left arm around his neck to chock him, pull his hair with my other hand, yank it back as hard as I can, knock him off balance, throw him on the floor. I was one step away from taking him down. The way he dressed in front of me he deserved it. He was asking for it. I was less than a foot away from the back of his head, reaching my arm around towards his neck, ready to get it done when at that exact moment I heard footsteps on the stairs outside the door. I heard the stairs creek and crack. I had heard that same sound earlier in the day when I walked up the stairs to the front door. I made a mental note of it. I knew that sound and I knew someone was there at the top of the stairs, standing outside the door listening, waiting.
Suddenly the door kicked in. It wasn't much of a door but now it was just splinters. My friend ran out the backdoor down the back stairway toward the alley to get away and I was on my own. A man was moving towards me fast. He hit me in the face. Hit me in the head with a telephone book lying on the table. I think it was the yellow pages which was bigger than the white pages. I fell back, my shoulders slammed into the kitchen table. He kicked me in my right side and I doubled up on the floor, my nose bleeding. He kicked me in the ribs. Ripped the phone cord out of the wall and threw the phone across the room. It shattered. He took off running out the back door down the back stairway toward the alley chasing after my friend. I heard a fight, a scream. I heard garbage cans and bottles smash and break, rolling around outside the alley. Another scream. More fighting. Another scream. I heard someone getting slapped around, slugged, punched, kicked. I heard thumping sounds, like steady thumping, beating, bumping noises and then footsteps coming up the stairway, up towards the back door of the apartment. I looked up from where I was lying on the floor pretending to be knocked out cold. I saw a man dragging him by his hair, each time hitting his head on the steps as he dragged him to the kitchen. He wasn't screaming now. He dragged him to the kitchen, slammed the door shut and dropped him on the linoleum floor. His head made a thud. The guy walked over to me, picked me up by my shirt and slugged me in the stomach. I couldn't breathe. Gasping for air. I fell to my knees. He pushed me backwards with his boot on my chest. I fell back and hit my head on the floor. That's all I remember.
It was dark when I woke up. Night time. It was quiet. Not a sound. There was light coming from the street next to the alley, a light coming into the room. I could see him on the kitchen floor the same place where he was before. He hadn't moved. I looked around and saw the phone busted up. My nose had been bleeding but it stopped. I had a few cuts and bruises, a bump on the back of my head. I got up slowly and called his name. The front door was busted and the porch light went thru a crack in the frame. I could see him on the floor. He wasn't moving. I called his name and crawled to him. Touched him. I took his hair in my hands and pulled it a little to see if he'd move. I pulled it a little harder. I pulled it hard enough to lift his head up off the floor and turn it to one side to get a good look. He was pretty bloody and beat up. His teeth had been knocked out. I don't know if he was breathing or not.
A jealous boyfriend. A pimp. An evangelical Christian conservative having a homosexual affair and his wife finds out and he lost his church so he's mad enough to kill: If-I-can't-have-you-nobody-will! A frantic politician gets caught having sex with a man in an airport bathroom and a drug deal goes bad. Ex-husband decides to settle an old score. Homophobe beats up neighborhood fags.
I got some money from a local church, enough to buy a bus ticket. I didn't care about the photo exhibit anymore. I wanted to get as far away as possible. It was too late for me and I was out of time. I took a seat in the back of the bus. Pulled my coat over my shoulders, wrapped my arms around me to keep warm. Put my legs and feet over the seat next to me to make more room, stretched out the best I could. Closed my eyes and listened to the engine of the big bus roaring down the highway. Conversations subdued. It was night. It was late. It was quiet. People were sleeping and we had a long way to go before the next rest stop.
THE END
Next day: it was eight in the morning. Extra hot in August. A sliver of light through a crack in the curtain ran across the table, the floor and up the side of the wall. It hit me in the eyes and woke me up. Little sparkles of grains of dust and pollen slowly rising into the room like soft clouds of cocaine woke me up coughing. I didn't have a pillow. I used my coat rolled up into a ball. No blanket. No sheet. No covers. But he had a thin sheet keeping him comfortable. I could see through it. His nipples were hard and dark like Brazil nuts with fifty percent less salt. It made me thirsty just to look at him sleeping so oblivious to me, unconcerned about me. His mouth was open, lips dry, parched, breathing through his mouth. I was glad his stuffy nose clogged his head. It was good he couldn't breathe. He sounded nasally when he talked, like country singers. I was glad he was asleep and I was awake. I didn't want to have to deal with him. No talking. No conversation. Nothing but the sound of my absence is all he'd get from me.
I pulled myself up off the floor. Looked for my boots, but gave up. Too hot. No air conditioning, but a swamp cooler made the air humid and wet, like having sex with him. Water dripped from the cooling vents to the floor. Reminded me being in school during nap time after crackers and milk. About one in the afternoon we'd put our heads down and listen to the swamp cooler dripping water into pots and pans, hypnotically sending suggestions into our mind. Music to my ears. Like steel drums. It could always put me to sleep, but not today.
Heat and humidity was unbearable. Dust and dirt was finding its way into my lungs coughing my guts out, mucus in the palms of my hands. I looked for the bathroom. Took a piss. Ran the water in the tub. Took a shower. Washed my hair. Couldn't find a towel. Brushed my teeth with his tooth brush and tooth paste. Looked in the mirror, a full length mirror naked and still dripping wet. I was sexually aroused seeing myself. I started thinking about him. I should wake him. Climb on top, wrestle him, force him on his stomach, pin his arms behind him, force his legs forward while I pushed against him to force it. Do it and get it over with! I should wake him in a way he'll remember. That's the way he liked it when we were together, before the break up. We're not even friends. Going in different directions, hanging out for convenience sake, sleeping in the same room because of my photo exhibit, "The Onion Gallery of Female Impersonators." But now it was the bed, floor, food, window, the dreamy dreary highway of life hitting all the pot holes in every small town from here to there. Both of us wanting something else, someone, anyone else, determined to get away as fast and as far as a Greyhound bus could go.
I had a backpack. He had a suitcase. I liked whiskey. He liked beer. I only had enough money to get three hundred miles, but he had friends who'd send him to California. It didn't matter to me. I was hungry and I wasn't "aroused" anymore. That irritated me. I was frustrated. So I fixed a peanut butter sandwich and a glass of soda water. French fries with mayo, a peach and a candy bar. I ate lunch and watched him toss and turn pretending to sleep. He put his body in a fetal position, I suppose to protect himself from me, or from what he thought I had become. Or maybe he was afraid of what he might do.
The phone rang. Should I answer it? There's nobody knows I'm here. It's probably for him. He's hoping I'll hurry up and run out, get sacred, ignore the phone, close the door, lock it and run away, don't look back. That's what I should've done. The phone rings again. It's annoying. I can't stand it. I pick it up and don't say anything. I just listen. There's nothing there. Silence. Nobody says anything. I can hear breathing. At first it's slow and soft, then it gets louder, faster, deeper. Sounds like a man. I hold the phone and keep listening. Should I say something or hang up?
"Who's this?" the man says finally.
"Who's this?" I say.
"Where is he? Let me talk to him!"
"He's sleeping."
"I don't know you, do I?" he says.
"Who are you? You tell me!"
"What the hell's wrong with you! Let me talk to him, NOW or else there's gonna be trouble!" He asks lots of questions and makes rapid-fire demands.
"I told you he's sleeping. That's it! You got a problem with that!?"
"Yeah, I got a problem with YOU!" he says.
I hung up. I don't just hang up. I slammed it down so hard it broke one of the little push button numbers on the phone. It fell off and hit the floor, bounced under the bed. I got on my hands and knees. It hadn't been cleaned since he moved in. I found magazines, broken pencils, a mirror, a rusty razor blade, empty cigarette packs, empty matchbooks. Finally I got it. The number Nine. I put it back on the phone. Put the phone on the table. I stood there looking and feeling stupid, angry at my cowardice, because I didn't know who it was. I didn't like the sound of his voice.
Minutes later the phone rang again. This time I saw his eyes open. Then it rang again. I grabbed it and made a gesture with my other hand the way I stroke the fires of an erection when I've got nothing else to do. I put the phone to my ear and listened. Silence. Nobody says a word. I look at him in bed with his eyes open. He yawns, plays with his curly hair hanging down around his face. He rubs the sleep out of his eyes, licks his lips like a snake. I listen to the phone. I'm getting nervous. I start breathing heavier. My heart beats faster. I hear it in my throat. I feel it in my chest. I'm getting mad. I want to do something but I don't know what.
"Hey!" His voice hits me in the stomach like an electric bass through a Marshal amp turned up to ten! "I know he's there. I know where he lives. Put him on the phone or I'll be over in fifteen minutes to kick both your asses!"
I threw the phone down. The receiver hangs over the edge of the bed banging on the floor. I hear the guy's voice on the other end yelling, screaming, threatening.
"Answer it! Pick it up!" I say.
He yawns, sits up, rests his weight on one elbow and scratches his toes. He takes the phone close and personal like he was kissing it. If he could slide his tongue inside the phone all the way into the other guy's mouth, I get the feeling he's done it before.
"It's me. What do you want?" he says.
I can't tell what the other guy's saying. I can't hear him. I look around the room for my boots. I pull my shirt over my head, finish getting dressed. He's busy on the phone. He gets my attention, points to an ash tray with a cigarette in it. Snaps his fingers for me to pass it to him with a lighter. I do it. He lights up and blows smoke in my face. This morning his face is plain looking, his eyes unresponsive, white, pale, no emotion. Then his eyes widen larger filled with anger. Deep stress lines appear on his forehead.
"Like hell you will!" he says.
He squints. Puffs on a cigarette and blows smoke so hard he spits on me. I walk away. Look through my wallet, count my money, check the room for things I might've missed. He snaps his fingers again for me to sit down. I do what he says. I sat down and waited. It seems like forever. I'm impatient. Can't sit around all day.
"You can go to hell!" he screams at the phone and slams it down.
Poor little number nine push button falls off the phone again, hits the floor bounces under a table. He kicks the phone off the bed, it hits me in the ankle. He's mad about something. He gets out of bed stark naked except for his black underwear briefs and the black forest of chest hair. He goes to the bathroom, stands up, takes a piss. He turns to me and says, "What are you looking at!?"
"Nothing. I'm leaving."
"The hell you are!"
He shuts the toilet seat without shaking off and puts on jeans. Takes a t-shirt out of a pile of dirty clothes on the bathroom floor and puts it on. It's too short. Too tight. Doesn't even come to his waist. The sleeves are short too. I can see nipples pressing through thin fabric, trying to push through flimsy material, wanting to escape a tight fit like two convicts in solitary too long. His arms are long and lean. My meds are making me imagine things. I hear voices in my head. They tell me to do it right now. They say to overpower him, knock him down, slap him around, force him to submit. The voices tell me to get it done and over with and leave him in a pool of sweat. So I get behind him, positioning myself to make my move. I see myself in the full length mirror. I'm all wound up again. I was prepared to grab my left arm around his neck to chock him, pull his hair with my other hand, yank it back as hard as I can, knock him off balance, throw him on the floor. I was one step away from taking him down. The way he dressed in front of me he deserved it. He was asking for it. I was less than a foot away from the back of his head, reaching my arm around towards his neck, ready to get it done when at that exact moment I heard footsteps on the stairs outside the door. I heard the stairs creek and crack. I had heard that same sound earlier in the day when I walked up the stairs to the front door. I made a mental note of it. I knew that sound and I knew someone was there at the top of the stairs, standing outside the door listening, waiting.
Suddenly the door kicked in. It wasn't much of a door but now it was just splinters. My friend ran out the backdoor down the back stairway toward the alley to get away and I was on my own. A man was moving towards me fast. He hit me in the face. Hit me in the head with a telephone book lying on the table. I think it was the yellow pages which was bigger than the white pages. I fell back, my shoulders slammed into the kitchen table. He kicked me in my right side and I doubled up on the floor, my nose bleeding. He kicked me in the ribs. Ripped the phone cord out of the wall and threw the phone across the room. It shattered. He took off running out the back door down the back stairway toward the alley chasing after my friend. I heard a fight, a scream. I heard garbage cans and bottles smash and break, rolling around outside the alley. Another scream. More fighting. Another scream. I heard someone getting slapped around, slugged, punched, kicked. I heard thumping sounds, like steady thumping, beating, bumping noises and then footsteps coming up the stairway, up towards the back door of the apartment. I looked up from where I was lying on the floor pretending to be knocked out cold. I saw a man dragging him by his hair, each time hitting his head on the steps as he dragged him to the kitchen. He wasn't screaming now. He dragged him to the kitchen, slammed the door shut and dropped him on the linoleum floor. His head made a thud. The guy walked over to me, picked me up by my shirt and slugged me in the stomach. I couldn't breathe. Gasping for air. I fell to my knees. He pushed me backwards with his boot on my chest. I fell back and hit my head on the floor. That's all I remember.
It was dark when I woke up. Night time. It was quiet. Not a sound. There was light coming from the street next to the alley, a light coming into the room. I could see him on the kitchen floor the same place where he was before. He hadn't moved. I looked around and saw the phone busted up. My nose had been bleeding but it stopped. I had a few cuts and bruises, a bump on the back of my head. I got up slowly and called his name. The front door was busted and the porch light went thru a crack in the frame. I could see him on the floor. He wasn't moving. I called his name and crawled to him. Touched him. I took his hair in my hands and pulled it a little to see if he'd move. I pulled it a little harder. I pulled it hard enough to lift his head up off the floor and turn it to one side to get a good look. He was pretty bloody and beat up. His teeth had been knocked out. I don't know if he was breathing or not.
A jealous boyfriend. A pimp. An evangelical Christian conservative having a homosexual affair and his wife finds out and he lost his church so he's mad enough to kill: If-I-can't-have-you-nobody-will! A frantic politician gets caught having sex with a man in an airport bathroom and a drug deal goes bad. Ex-husband decides to settle an old score. Homophobe beats up neighborhood fags.
I got some money from a local church, enough to buy a bus ticket. I didn't care about the photo exhibit anymore. I wanted to get as far away as possible. It was too late for me and I was out of time. I took a seat in the back of the bus. Pulled my coat over my shoulders, wrapped my arms around me to keep warm. Put my legs and feet over the seat next to me to make more room, stretched out the best I could. Closed my eyes and listened to the engine of the big bus roaring down the highway. Conversations subdued. It was night. It was late. It was quiet. People were sleeping and we had a long way to go before the next rest stop.
THE END
