by Gore Vidal
Mary-Ann was most depressed.
I took her hand in mine. “Don’t worry,” I said. “What will happen will happen. Meanwhile, all I ask is that you be happy . . . and you, too, Rusty.” I gave him a beautiful yet knowing smile like Ann Sothern in the first of the Maisie films. “But to be truly happy, I think you must both begin to think a little bit about changing your sexual attitudes, becoming more open, less limited, abandoning old-fashioned stereotypes of what is manly and what is feminine. As it is, if you, Rusty, should ever find a boy sexually interesting, you might or might not do something about it but whatever you did do or did not do you’d certainly feel guilty because you’ve been taught that to be a man is to be physically strong, self-reliant, and a lover of girls, one at a time.”
“So what’s wrong with that?” Rusty gave me a cocky grin.
“Nothing.” I was patient. “Except modern man is not self-reliant and as for making love to girls, that is only one aspect of his nature . . .”
“It’s my only one. Why, just the thought of boffing some hairy boy makes me sick all over.”
“Not all boys are as hairy as you,” I said gaily, recklessly. Mary-Ann looked surprised while Rusty looked uneasy at this reminder of our old intimate encounter. I turned to Mary-Ann. “It’s positively coquettish the way the top two buttons of his shirt are always missing.”
She was relieved. “Men are so vain,” she said, looking at him fondly.
“But in America only women are supposed to worry about their appearance. The real man never looks into a mirror. That’s effeminate . . . .” I teased them.
“Well, that’s changing, I guess.” Mary-Ann brought Rusty’s hands to her lips. “And I’m just as glad. I think men are beautiful.”
“So does Rusty,” I could not help but observe.
“Oh, shit, Miss Myra,” was the boyish response. Soon. Soon. Soon.
BUCK LONER REPORTS—
Recording Disc No. 777—
18 March
Flagler and Flagler have come up with dynamite or they think its dynamite but you never know with that woman apparently the Monterrey Mexican marriage certificate is a phony and there is no record from what they can find out of her being married down there but weve been burned before I said to Flagler Junior who is working on the case shell just go out and prove they lost the records or something and then that doctor friend of hers will swear he was a witness which is what it sounded like on the long distance telephone call that was bugged and what do we do then I ask you question mark well Flagler Junior seems to think they are on solid ground with the Mexicans though he admits that our little brown friends are not only kind of confused in the paper works department but if Myra thinks of it and shell think of it the bitch they can be bribed to say that there was a marriage when there wasnt so meanwhile I am biding my time until tomorrow when there should be a full final report from Mexico that there really isnt a record of this marriage in question period paragraph Flagler Juniors New York man has already met once with Doctor Montag and his report is on my desk now as I dictate while being massaged by Milly who is the best masseuse in the whole business I mean that Milly you little angel thats right rub good and hard it takes time but when it comes the Buck Loner Special strike that period paragraph interesting conversation with Letitia who thinks that Mary Ann Pringle properly handled could make it as a recording star and she will make some appointments all this is Myras doing she is meddling into everything trying to force the kids out into the cold world when their place is here protected and looked after I know how well I know showbiz and all its heartbreaks and Mary Ann will end up like all the others which is nowhere a waitress some place assuming she doesnt get lucky and marry some guy who will take care of her and cherish her the way Buck Loners Academy does that guy certainly wont be Rusty whos a wild number the Sheriffs office just asked me to keep an eye on him and I told him so yesterday told him that he would have to watch his step or it was the hoosegow for him he was real shook up and asked me not to tell anybody about his scrape in Mexico and I said nobody knows but me and Myra who happened to be checking into his file and read the Sheriffs last letter to me that woman is into everything Rusty seemed upset by this I guess be cause he thinks Myra will tell Mary Ann well its no business of mine and thats for sure Milly you are the best ever and if you keep that up theres a big surprise coming your way strike that period paragraph Myra asked permission to use the infirmary tonight God knows why I suppose she is mixing up some poison which it is my prayer she takes Jesus Milly dont stop Milly Jesus Milly
28
I am sitting in the infirmary, a small antiseptic white room with glass cabinets containing all sorts of drugs and wicked-looking instruments. Against one wall is an examination table which can be raised or lowered. It is now some four feet above the floor and tilted at a slight angle. Next to it are scales and measuring instruments for both height and body width. I am seated at a small surgical table, making notes while I wait for Rusty.
It is ten o’clock at night. The Academy building is dark. The students are gone. No one will disturb us. I am astonished at my own calm. All of my life’s hunger is about to be fed. I am as serene as a great surgeon preparing to make the necessary incision that will root out the problem.
This morning, after Posture class, I took Rusty to one side. He has been friendly and smiling ever since our dinner at the Cock and Bull and now treats me in the confident condescending way that the ordinary young man treats an ordinary girl.
I put a stop to that. His grinning face went pale when I said coldly, “There’s been no improvement, Rusty. None at all. You’re not trying to walk straight.”
“Honest to God I am, Miss Myra, why I even practiced last night with Mary-Ann, she’ll tell you I did. I really am trying.” He seemed genuinely hurt that I had not recognized his effort.
I was somewhat kinder in my manner, sharp but in the Eve Arden way. “I’m sure you have tried. But you need special attention and I think I can give it. I’ll expect you at the infirmary at ten o’clock tonight.”
“The infirmary?” He looked almost as puzzled as James Craig in the sixth reel of Kismet.
“I’ve arranged everything with Uncle Buck. He agrees with me that you need extra help.”
“But what kind of help?” He was still puzzled but, as yet, unsuspicious.
“You’ll see.” I started to go.
He stopped me. “Look, I’ve got a date with Mary-Ann for dinner.”
“Postpone it. You see her every night after dinner anyway.”
“Well, yes. But we were invited some place at ten.”
“Then go at eleven. I’m sorry. But this is more important than your social life. Alter all, you want to be a star, don’t you?”
That was always the clincher in dealing with any of the students. They have been conditioned from childhood in the knowledge that to achieve stardom they might be called upon to do anything, and of course they would do anything because stardom is everything and worth any humiliation or anguish. So the saints must have felt in the days of Christendom, as they burned to death with their eyes on heaven where the true stars shine.
I spent all afternoon making my preparations. I have the entire procedure worked out to the last detail. When I have finished, I shall have achieved in life every dream and
29
I must write it all down now. Exactly as it happened. While it is fresh in my memory. But my hand trembles. Why? Twice I’ve dropped the yellow ballpoint pen. Now I sit at the surgical table, making the greatest effort to calm myself, to put it all down not only for its own sake but also for you, Randolph, who never dreamed that anyone could ever act out totally his fantasies and survive. Certainly your own guilty longing to kill the nerve in each of Lyndon Johnson’s twenty-odd teeth without the use of anesthetic can never in this life be achieved, and so your dreams must feed upon pale surrogates while mine have been made reality.
Shortly after ten, Rusty arrived. He wore the usual checked shi
rt with two buttons missing and no T-shirt, as well as chino trousers and highly polished cowboy boots. He looked about the infirmary curiously. “I never been in here before.”
“That explains why there’s no physical record of you.
“Never been sick a day in my life.” Oh, he was proud! No doubt of that.
“But even so, the Academy requires a record. It’s one of Uncle Buck’s rules.”
“Yeah. I know. And I’ve been meaning to drop in sometime and see the Doc.”
“Perhaps that won’t be necessary.” I placed the physical examination chart squarely in the middle of the surgical table. “Sit down.” I was pleasant. He sat in a chair so close to mine that our knees touched. Quickly he swung his legs wide so that my knees were now between his and there was no possibility of further contact. It was plain that in no way do I attract him.
We chatted a moment about Mary-Ann, and about Letitia’s interest in her career. I could see that Rusty was both pleased and envious, a normal reaction. Then, delicately, I got around to the subject of Mexico; he became visibly nervous. Finally, I told him that I knew what had happened.
“You won’t tell Mary-Ann, will you?” That was his first response. “It would just kill her.”
“Of course I won’t. And of course I’ll give a good report to Mr. Martinson, your parole officer.” He was startled. “You know him?”
“Oh, yes,” I lied—actually I happened to come across a letter from him to Buck. “In fact, he’s asked me to keep an eye on you, and I said I would.”
“I hope you tell him that I sure as hell am reformed.” He was vehement.
“I will—if you really are, and behave yourself, and let me try to help you with your problem.”
“Of course I will, Miss Myra. You know that.” He looked entirely sincere, blue eyes round as a boy’s. Perhaps he is an actor after all.
“Now then, about your back. I’ve talked to the chiropractor who will arrange for a special brace. He couldn’t be here tonight but he asked me to take an exact tracing of your spine and then he’ll know what to do. So now if you’ll just slip off that shirt, we’ll get to work.”
Resignedly, he got to his feet. Automatically his hands went to his belt buckle in order to loosen it but then, obviously recalling our last encounter, he left the belt as it was, pulling off the shirt with a certain arrogant ease.
The belt just covered his navel; otherwise he was in exactly the same state as he had been at the beginning of our first session. I was pleased that my visual recollection of him was so precise. I remembered in exact detail the tracery design of bronze hair across the pale chest, as well as the small roselike inverted nipples.
“Stand on the scales, please.” I imitated the chilliest of trained nurses. “Face to the wall and we’ll measure you.” He put one foot on the scales, when I stopped him. “Take off those atrocious cowboy boots! They’ll break the machine.”
“Oh, no they won’t, why . . .” He started to argue.
“Rusty!” I was sharp. “Do exactly as I tell you. You don’t want me to tell Mr. Martinson that you’ve been uncooperative, do you?”
“No . . . no.” Standing rest on one foot and then the other, he awkwardly pulled off the boots. He wore white cotton socks; one had a large hole in it through which the big toe protruded. He grinned sheepishly. “Guess I’m full of holes.”
“That’s all right.” The small room was now full of the not unpleasant odor of warm leather.
Obediently he got onto the scales exactly as I directed, face to the wall. In a most professional way, I measured the width of the chest, and then allowed myself the pleasure of running my hand down the smooth warm back, tracing the spine’s curve right to the point where it vanished, frustratingly, into the white chinos as they swelled just below my hand, masking those famous inviolate buttocks.
“All right,” I said, marking down figures on the physical examination chart. “Now we need your weight which is one seventy-four and your height which is six one and a quarter. The chart’s filling up nicely. All right, you can get down.”
He stepped off the scales. He was surprisingly at ease: obviously our dinner at the Cock and Bull had given him confidence. “This doctor can really fix me with something that will work?” He was genuinely curious.
“He thinks he can, yes. Of course, he’ll have to fit you himself. This is just the preliminary examination which, while we’re at it, Uncle Buck said I should turn into an ordinary physical and so kill two birds with one stone, as he put it in his colorful way.”
“You mean like height and weight and that stuff?” As yet he showed no particular alarm.
“Exactly,” I said, ready now to begin to shake his self-confidence. I took a small bottle. “That means a urine specimen.”
The look of surprise was exquisite as he took the bottle. “Go behind that screen.” I indicated a white screen in one corner of the room.
“But . . .” he began.
“But?” I repeated pleasantly. Without a word, he went behind the screen which was waist-high. He turned and faced the wall; he fumbled with his trousers. Then there was a long moment of complete silence.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“I . . . don’t know. I guess I’m what they call pee-shy.”
“Don’t be. Just relax. We’ve got plenty of time.”
The thought of “plenty of time” had a most releasing effect. Water passed into the bottle with a surging sound. He then rearranged his clothes and brought me the specimen which I took (marveling at the warmth of the glass: we are furnaces inside!) and carefully placed on it a white sticker inscribed with his name. The entire affair was conducted without a false note.
“Now then we’ll just do a drawing of the spine. Loosen your belt and lie face down on the table.”
For the first time he seemed aware that history might repeat itself. He stalled. “Maybe we better wait till I see the doctor.”
“Rusty,” I was patient but firm. “I’m just following doctor’s orders and you are going to follow my orders, or else. Is that understood?”
“Well, yes, but . . .”
“There are no ‘buts’ for someone on probation.”
“Yes, ma’am!” He got the point. Quickly he undid the belt buckle; then he unfastened the catch to his trousers and, holding them firmly in place, lay face-down on the table. It was a delicious sight, that slender muscular body stretched full length as sacrifice to some cruel goddess. His arms were at his sides, and I noticed with some amusement that he was pressing the palms hard against the table, instinctively repeating his earlier performance.
I covered his back with a large sheet of paper. Then with an eyebrow pencil, I slowly traced the spine’s course from the nape of the neck to the line of his trousers.
“This is going very, very well.” I sounded to my own ears exactly like Laraine Day, an all-time favorite.
“It sort of tickles,” came a muffled voice. Triceps muscles writhed beneath silk-smooth skin.
“Are you ticklish?” This suddenly opened an unexpected vista. Fortunately my program was so designed as to include an occasional inspired improvisation.
“Well, no, not really . . .”
But I had already taken one large sweaty foot in hand (again marveling at the body heat through the thin sock) and delicately tickled the base of the toes. The effect was electric. The whole body gave a sudden twitch. With a powerful reflex, he kicked the foot from my hand, exclaiming “Cut that out!” in a masterful voice, so entirely had he forgotten his place.
I was mild. “Do that again, Rusty, and I will punish you.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Myra.” He was conciliatory. He looked at me over his shoulder (the tracing paper had fallen to the floor). “I guess I’m more ticklish than I thought.”
“Apparently. Or perhaps I hurt you. You don’t have athlete’s foot, do you?”
“Oh, no. No. Not for a long time . . . in the summer, sometimes . . .”
&nbs
p; “We’ll just take a look.” With some difficulty, I slipped off the damp socks. If I were a foot-fetishist like poor Myron, I would have been in seventh heaven. As it was, what excited me was his profound embarrassment, for he has the American male’s horror of smelling bad. Actually, he was relatively odorless. “You must have just had a shower,” I said.
He buried his face in the table. “Yeah . . . just now.” Carefully I examined each toe, holding it tight as though I feared that, at any moment, one of the little piggies might decide to run all the way home. But except for a certain rigidity of the body, he did not show, in any way, distress; not even when I examined each pink toe.