by Gore Vidal
Rusty’s back was to us now and I could not take my eyes off his somewhat square yet small buttocks as they made a slow grinding motion in response to the beat of an electric guitar. Though I tried to visualize what they must look like without the protective covering of cloth, I failed to come up with a satisfactory mental image. Happily, I shall soon know everything!
“’Course we’re both broke. I get a little something from the family in Winnipeg but poor Rusty’s only got this uncle and aunt in Detroit who don’t like him because he was kind of wild when he was a kid . . .”
“So wild that he was busted for stealing a car.” The day that I first noticed Rusty in class, I went straight to Buck’s office where dossiers on each student are kept. They are surprisingly thorough. Rusty’s three-year suspended sentence was duly noted, as well as the cogent fact that should he ever again run afoul of the law he can be sent up for a maximum of twenty years.
Mary-Ann looked frightened. “I didn’t know anybody knew about that.”
“Just Uncle Buck and I.” I patted her hand. “Don’t worry, neither of us is going to tell.”
“He’s completely changed since those days, he really is. Why, in those days he used to play around with a lot of girls. You should have seen all the photographs he used to have! But after he met me he stopped all that and now he isn’t interested in anything except working hard and being a star, which I’m sure he’s going to be.”
“He’s certainly no worse than the rest of them on television.” I was perfectly honest with her. “Of course he can hardly talk but neither can they.”
“Oh, but he talks awfully well. It’s just he has some trouble with speaking lines but that takes lots of practice. Anyway what is important is that he comes over so real, and of course so sexy. You should have seen him on the closed-circuit TV last spring when he played the part of this crazy gunman. Oh, he was something!”
It was at that point that I was given marijuana by Clem or Clint, and the rest of the evening took on a religious tone.
15
Feeling somewhat better, I gave a great deal to my Empathy II class, and though I am now exhausted, I have at least gotten over my hangover.
A letter from Dr. Montag cheered me up. He warns against depressions of the sort I have been prone to since Myron’s death and so he proposes, rather obviously, that in lieu of analysis I must keep busy. Little does he dream just how busy I am! Between my plot to entrap Rusty and my efforts to obtain my rightful share of the Academy, I have hardly a moment to devote to my life’s real work, completing Myron’s book. Fortunately the insights gained during my visit to MGM are bound to add immeasurably to Myron’s text. Meanwhile, I have had a marvelous idea for a piece on Pandro S. Berman which Cahiers du Cinema ought to eat up. After all, with the exception of Orson Welles and Samuel Fuller, Berman is the most important film-maker of the Forties.
16
I spoke sharply to Rusty in Posture today. He shows no sign of improvement and I’m afraid I was brutal. “You simply cannot walk straight.” I imitated his slouching walk which is, in its way, extremely sensual but hardly suitable for the screen.
He looked very angry and muttered something under his breath that I could not hear but assumed was uncomplimentary. Mary-Ann looked more than ever disturbed as she begged me with her eyes to desist.
“I will see you after class, Godowsky.” I was abrupt. “Things cannot go on as they are,” I added ominously.
I then gave the class a series of exercises in how to sit down, something that did not come easily to any of them. All the while observing, out of the corner of my eye, Rusty’s sullen face. My plot is working very nicely.
After class, Rusty came to my office and sat on the straight chair beside the desk, listing to one side, legs wide apart. He was not in the least nervous. In fact, he was downright defiant, even contemptuous of me, so secure did he think himself in his masculine superiority.
As usual, he wore a sport shirt with two missing buttons. Today, however, a T-shirt hid the chest from view. Faded blue jeans and desert boots completed the costume, and—as I have already noted—it is costumes that the young men now wear as they act out their simple-minded roles, hopefully constructing a fantasy world in order to avoid confronting the fact that to be a man in a society of machines is to be an expendable, soft auxiliary to what is useful and hard. Today there is nothing left for the old-fashioned male to do, no ritual testing of his manhood through initiation or personal contest, no physical struggle to survive or mate. Nothing is left him but to put on clothes reminiscent of a different time; only in travesty can he act out the classic hero who was a law unto himself, moving at ease through a landscape filled with admiring women. Mercifully, that age is finished. Marlon Brando was the last of the traditional heroes and, significantly, even he was invariably beaten up in the last reel, victim of a society that has no place for the ancient ideal of manhood. Since Brando, there has been nothing except the epicene O’Toole, the distracted Mastroianni, and the cheerfully incompetent Belmondo. The roof has fallen in on the male and we now live at the dawn of the age of Woman Triumphant, of Myra Breckinridge!
I began pleasantly, disarmingly. “Not long ago Mary-Ann told me that I have a tendency to pick on you, Rusty . . .”
“You sure do . . .”
“Don’t interrupt, please.” I was stern but pleasant, like Eve Arden. “If I have, it’s because I’m trying to help you. I think you have great potential talent. How great I can’t decide just yet, but unless you learn to walk properly there’s not a chance in this world of your ever being a major star.”
The reference to his talent pleased him; the prophecy alarmed him. “Hell, Miss Myra, I don’t walk that bad.”
“I’m afraid you do. And look at the way you’re leaning to one side right now. You look like you’re about to fall out of the chair.”
He straightened up and crossed his legs. “That better?” The hint of a sneer in his voice excited me. He must be built up in order that his fall be the more terrible.
“Yes. Now I realize that you have a physical problem. Mary-Ann told me about your back.”
“I broke four ribs and even so finished the last half.” He was inordinately proud; no doubt about it, a confident young man.
“Very admirable. Now I want you to stand up and walk first toward the door and then back here to me.”
I could hear him murmur “Oh, shit” under his breath as he lumbered to his feet. Slowly he walked, or rather slouched, to the door and then returned and stood defiantly in front of me, thumbs hooked in his belt. I noted for the first time how large and strong his hands are, hairless with unusually long thumbs.
“O.K.?” he asked.
“Not O.K.” I studied him a moment. He was so close to me that my eyes were on a level with his belt buckle. “Now, Rusty, I noticed the other night that your problem seems to go away when you dance. So, just as an exercise, I want you to do one of those stationary dances—I don’t know what they’re called. You know, like the one you were doing at the party.”
“Dance? Here? Now?” He looked puzzled. “But there’s no music.”
“To be precise there never is music with those dances, just electronic noise. Nothing compared to the big sound of Glenn Miller. Anyway, all you need is a beat. You can keep time by snapping your fingers.”
“I feel silly.” He scowled and looked suddenly dangerous, but I knew what I was about.
“Go ahead. We haven’t got all day. Start.” I snapped my fingers. Halfheartedly he did the same and slowly began to gyrate his hips. I found the effect almost unbearably erotic. To have him all to myself, just three feet away, his pelvis revolving sexily. For some minutes he continued to gyrate, the snapping of fingers growing less and less precise as his hands grew sweaty. I then instructed him to turn around so that I could observe him from the rear. He did as he was told. Waves of lust made me dizzy as those strong deep buttocks slowly revolved. Have they ever been violated? I can hardly bear t
he suspense.
Finally, I told him he could stop. He did so, with obvious relief. When he turned back to me, I noticed the curved upper lip was beaded with perspiration. In his dense masculine way, he too had felt the tension and perhaps suspected, instinctively, its origin and so knew fear. “I can’t dance so good without music,” he mumbled, as if obscurely ashamed of the display he had been forced to make of himself.
“You did very well.” I was brisk, even encouraging. “I think I may have a solution to our problem. All you need is something to remind you to stand straight. Where were the ribs broken?”
He touched his left side, below the heart. “Four was busted right here which is why I’m kind of pulled over to this side.”
“Let me see.”
At first he seemed not to understand the question. “Like this,” he said, indicating the way in which he was listing to port.
“No. No.” I was brusque. “Let me see your back. Take your shirt off.”
He was startled. “But there’s nothing to see . . . . I mean the ribs are all inside me that was broken.”
“I know where the ribs are, Rusty.” I was patient. “But I have to see the exact point where the muscle begins to pull you to one side.”
There was no answer to this. He started to say something but decided not to. Slowly he unfastened his belt and unhooked the top button of the blue jeans. Then he unbuttoned his shirt and took it off. The T-shirt was soaked at the armpits, the result of his strenuous impromptu dance and, perhaps (do I project?), of terror.
For the first time I saw his bare arms. The skin was very white (no one out here goes to the beach in January even though it is quite sunny), with biceps clearly marked though not overdeveloped; large veins ran the length of the forearms to the hands, always an excellent sign, and not unattractive since the veins were not blue but white, indicating skin of an unusual thickness, again a good sign. On the forearms coppery straight hairs grew. He paused as though not certain what to do next. I was helpful. “The T-shirt, too. I haven’t got X-ray eyes.”
Glumly he pulled the T-shirt over his head. I watched, fascinated by each revelation of his body. First the navel came into view, small and protruding. Just beneath it a line of dark slightly curly hairs disappeared inside the Jockey shorts which were now visible above the loosened belt. The shirt rose higher. About two inches above the navel, more hairs began (I had seen the topmost branches of this tree of life at the pot party, now I saw the narrow roots slowly widening as the tree made its way to his neck). When the chest was entirely bared, his face was momentarily hidden in the folds of the damp T-shirt and so I was able to study, unobserved, the small rose-brown breasts, at the moment concave and unaroused. Then the T-shirt was wadded up and dropped onto the floor.
Aware of my interested gaze, he blushed. Beginning at the base of the thick neck, the lovely color rose to the level of his eyes. Like so many male narcissists, he is, paradoxically, modest: he enjoys revealing himself but only on his own terms.
A remark about his appearance was obviously called for and I made it. “You seem in very good condition . . .”
“Well, I work out some, not like I ought to . . . used to . . .” He hooked long thumbs into his belt, causing the smooth pectorals to twitch ever so slightly, revealing the absence of any fat or loosening of skin.
“Now will you please face the wall, arms at your side, with your palms pressed against the wall as hard as you can.
Without a word, he did as he was told. The back was as pleasing as the front (no hairs on the shoulder, unlike poor Myron, who was forced to remove his with electrolysis). The blue jeans had begun to sag and now hung several inches below the waistline, revealing frayed jockey shorts. Aware that the trousers were slipping, he tried to pull them up with one hand but I put a stop to that. “Hands flat against the wall!” I ordered in a sharp voice that would not take no for an answer.
“But, Miss Myra . . .” and his voice was suddenly no longer deep but a boy’s voice, plaintive and frightened: the young Lon McCallister.
“Do as I say!”
He muttered something that I could not hear and did as he was told. In the process, the blue jeans cleared the curve of his buttocks and now clung precariously to the upper thighs of which a good two inches were in plain view. It was a moment to cherish, to exult in, to give a life for. His embarrassment was palpable, charging the situation with true drama since from the very beginning it has been quite plain to me that in no way do I interest him sexually. Since he detests me, my ultimate victory is bound to be all the more glorious and significant.
I studied my captive for some moments (the spine did indeed make an S-like curve and the thick white trapezoidal ligament was twisted to one side). Of greater interest to me, however, were the Jockey shorts and what they contained. But now I knew that I would have to proceed with some delicacy. I crossed to where he stood. I was so close to him that I could smell the horselike odor men exude when they are either frightened or in a state of rut. In this case it was fright.
Delicately I ran my hand down his spine. He shuddered at my touch but said nothing. Meanwhile I spoke to him calmly, easily, the way one does in order to soothe a nervous animal. “Yes, I can see the trouble now. It’s right here, under the shoulder blade.” I kneaded the warm smooth skin, and again he winced but said nothing while I continued to give my “analysis” of his condition. “Perhaps a brace in this area would help.”
Now my hands were at the narrow waist. He was breathing hoarsely, arms pressed so hard against the wall that the triceps stood out like white snakes intertwined, ready to strike.
I felt something warm on the back of one hand: a drop of sweat from his left armpit. “But perhaps the trouble is lower down. Around the small of the back. Yes, of course! The lumbar region—that’s just where it is!”
As I spoke, evenly, hypnotically, I gently inserted my thumbs beneath the worn elastic band of his shorts and before he was aware of what was happening, I had pulled them down to his knees. He gave a strangled cry, looked back over his shoulder at me, face scarlet, mouth open, but no words came. He started to pull away from me, then stopped, recalling that he was for all practical purposes nude. He clung now to the wall, the last protector of his modesty.
Meanwhile I continued to chat. “Yes, we can start the brace right here.” I touched the end of the spine, a rather protuberant bony tip set between the high curve of buttocks now revealed to me in all their splendor . . . and splendor is the only word to describe them! Smooth, white, hairless except just beneath the spinal tip where a number of dark coppery hairs began, only to disappear from view into the deep crack of buttocks so tightly clenched that not even a crowbar could have pried them apart.
Casually I ran my hand over the smooth slightly damp cheeks. To the touch they were like highly polished marble warmed by the sun of some perfect Mediterranean day. I even allowed my forefinger the indiscretion of fingering the coppery wires not only at the tip of the spine but also the thicker growth at the back of his thighs. Like so many young males, he has a relatively hairless torso with heavily furred legs. Myron was the same. With age, however, the legs lose much of this adolescent growth while the torso’s pelt grows heavier.
I had now gone almost as far as I could go with my inspection. After all, I have not yet established total mastery. But I have made a good beginning: half of the mystery has now been revealed, the rest must wait for a more propitious time. And so, after one last kneading of the buttocks (I tried and failed to pull apart the cheeks), I said, “That will do for now, Rusty. I think we’ve almost got to the root of the problem.”
He leaned rigidly, all of a piece, to one side and grabbed the fallen trousers. Had he slightly squatted—the normal thing to do in his position—I might have caught a glimpse of the heart of the mystery from the rear, an unflattering angle which, paradoxically, has always excited me, possibly because it is in some way involved with my passion for “backstage,” for observing what is magic from th
e unusual, privileged angle. But he kept his legs as much together as possible, pulling on clothes with astonishing speed, the only lapse occurring when something in front was caught by the ascending shorts, causing him to grunt and fumble. But then all was in order and when he finally turned around, the belt buckle had been firmly fastened. He was satisfyingly pale and alarmed-looking.
I was all business. “I think this has been a very useful session—yes, you can put on your shirt.” His hands trembled as he buttoned his shirt. “I’ll have a chat with the chiropractor Uncle Buck uses” (the “Uncle Buck” always works wonders at the Academy) “and we’ll see what he can do for you.”
“Yes, Miss Myra.” The voice was almost inaudible. Nervously, he mopped his face with a handkerchief.
“It is stuffy in here, isn’t it? I always turn the airconditioning off. It’s bad for my sinus. Well, I don’t want to keep you another minute from Mary-Ann. What a wonderful girl I hope you realize how lucky you are.”
“Oh, yes, Miss Myra, I sure do,” he gabbled. Then, with the assurance that I had only his interest at heart, I showed him out of the room. It was, in many ways, the most exciting sensual moment of my life—so far. But the best is yet to come, for I mean to prove once and for all to Dr. Montag that it is possible to work out in life all one’s fantasies, and so become entirely whole.
No sooner was Rusty out the door than I noticed he had left his T-shirt behind. I buried my face in its warm sweaty folds, a most agreeable surrogate for skin. The odor was somewhat sharp at the armpits but by no means unpleasant since fresh sweat is the greatest of aphrodisiacs as well as nature’s own lubricant.