by Sandi Tan
So many churches. Not too many, just so many. Raymond didn’t have anything against them personally—they’d been good to him. His last relationship had been with a married man—father of two and husband to a movie publicist shrike—and the only place they could rendezvous without the risk of running into anyone they knew was a church. Like Abelard and Heloise who tiptoed into a musty refectory to rut like minxes, or Matthew Lewis’s monk who ventured down to the crypt to ravage his love, Raymond found his neighborhood Presbyterian church, with its neo-Gothic nooks and crannies and cornices and curlicues, sympathetically disposed to urgent romance.
It also looked like a swell place for a funeral.
He thought about this as he drove. He’d always believed that endings should be quiet and full of champagne, assemblies as awkward and giddily meaningless as what had come before. But even on a speculative level he couldn’t summon up a list of those who’d come to commemorate his. Lena Ozova would fly in from New York maybe, if she wasn’t stuck in a love-in with some hot new memoirist, and perhaps one or two of his former editors, if their fond memories outnumbered their foul ones. He had no siblings, no close living relatives that he could name, and he couldn’t imagine any of his former lovers being sentimental. What about his neighbor Kate, that strange, elusive soul? Not likely—they weren’t real drinking buddies. This left only his faceless fans—with their depressing single-use cameras—and his energy-vampire father.
From the beginning, his father never had the inclination to understand him, and had never made any effort to feign it. It wasn’t Raymond’s sexuality that was the problem, though it did have its problems. His father had a congenital mistrust of anyone who toiled only with his fingertips. He was the original enemy of fiction.
The on-ramp was fast approaching. He accelerated and merged. Zen driving.
In high school, Raymond had to justify why he’d skip dinner for an Ingmar Bergman marathon at the film society. “Don’t get artsy,” his father warned him. And Raymond would say: “Swedish movies, Dad. Blondes. Titties.” He used to be good at that kind of doubletalk. But what euphemisms were there for limb-tearing, butt-fucking, heart-eating zombies? How did you explain that blood wasn’t blood?
He wished he’d had the clarity to write his father into his fiction as the ultimate monster, whose special power was spiritual Chinese water torture. Drip, drip, drip. To my Dad, without whom I would never have gained such insight into one man’s ability to drain the life out of another.
He glanced at the clock. Seven minutes late. He cut into the carpool lane and a glossy Latina in a Lexus SUV gave him the finger. He knew, he knew—to younger people he registered as a seedy old creep. But he did his best against the merciless wear of gravity; that woman driver would know it too in a few years, when her arms grew thick as jamon and her boobs sank like papayas. If she could see through to his true self, the one underneath all the wrinkles and balm, she might feel pity for him instead of spite—she’d be moved, for instance, that he was a man who kept a prescription for Cialis just so he could have sex with himself.
He’d never cruised for tail, oh, no; yet he hadn’t banked on being romantically alone this early in life either. He’d even wanted children, at different points. Vital, wholesome boys with trampoline feet, pecs covered in varsity letters. They’d outrun him, outwit him, outlast him.
The best candidate for co-father had slipped through his fingers years earlier. That was Fletcher, the Brit who audited him during his flush New York years in the mid-eighties. The only man Raymond knew who could look sexy in a cardigan. While the going was good, it was great. They were both tall, lean, and often mistaken for brothers. They test-ran fatherhood on dates to Broadway with Fletcher’s teenage son. But Fletcher discovered that America was such a conformist country that even its deviants cleaved to convention. And so he, too, fell in line. He never advertised his sexuality and avoided all the souks where AIDS had cast its pall; his preference was to act as if he belonged to a separate caste, if not species, from those he called “the gays.”
Several years after Fletcher’s departure, Raymond left Manhattan too. As he packed his bags, Lena sent him off with her peculiar form of fare-thee-well: “The bad thing about Cullifornia is that you’ll be surrounded by ee-juhts. The good thing about Cullifornia is that you’ll be surrounded by ee-juhts.”
Raymond’s Jaguar sluiced through Eagle Rock, once a scraggly enclave of flag-waving blue-collars but increasingly home to vegan “creatives” and the offspring they in full sobriety named Axel or Tito. In spite of—many would say, because of—these new migrants, some of the ugliest new architecture in LA County had sprouted in and around Eagle Rock, clinging to the hillsides like Bauhaus dingleberries.
There, on the main boulevard, Raymond found free street parking. It was less of an LA miracle once he realized where he’d parked—nobody wanted their car jacked in front of an adult video duplicating service; just imagine going in there asking for help. He sprinted the half block down to The Green Man, and was baffled to find that it had the stained glass windows and rustic oak door of an old-school tavern. He checked the address on the printout in his hand.
Inside, the place reeked of old cigarettes, but it was unmistakably a vintage gun store. Old-fashioned firearms of every kind were displayed behind glass on every wall. Minding the cash register was a jowly lady with gray-blond hair. A T-shirt cheetah stretched across her ample chest and tail-eating serpents circumnavigated her arms.
“What can I do for you, sweetheart?” she said.
“This is The Green Man, isn’t it?”
“You mean the old Irish pub? That’s long gone.” She blew a puff of Lucky Strike at him. “I kept the exterior just to fool suckers like you inside so I can sell you an 1889 Winchester.”
He humored her with a smile. He knew words like “harridan” were retrograde, but sometimes the right words were necessary. “I’m looking for Duckie.”
The woman bellowed to a chunky teenage boy dusting off revolver-shaped candybars at the back of the store.
“Zeke? Would you go and tell Duckie that her boyfriend’s here?” The boy nodded and lumbered to an Employees Only door. “My daughter will be with you in a minute.”
On the wall behind her were dozens of faded celebrity photos, eight-by-tens like the ones displayed braggingly at dry-cleaning establishments all over Los Angeles. But these were entirely of children. Little girls, in particular.
“Customers?” he asked, while he waited.
“No, no. See here’s Tracey—and her big sister Missy. They peaked in the early eighties. Missy made it first, then Tracey won that part on Growing Pains. But they were both cursed with what I call ensemble face.” She sighed. “Here’s Jodie, circa Taxi Driver, look at those cute little freckles! . . . And here’s Heather, remember her? She was the little one in Poltergeist. Passed away when she was twelve . . . Well, she watches over me now.” She trailed off on that note. Raymond privately noted the bottle of Jack Daniel’s behind the counter. “They’re all my children. My little babies.”
“How exactly are they your children?” He tried not to sound too judgmental.
She bristled. “What d’you mean how are they my children? I watched them grow up before my very eyes. Followed their ups and downs through the years.”
A teenage girl with magenta hair ambled over unhurriedly. She wore her stars and stripes tank top with great significance, but Raymond couldn’t tell how ironic it was supposed to be, if at all.
“Bryce? I’m Duckie,” she said to him. “Follow me.”
In the dank stockroom behind the Employees Only door, Duckie pulled out a metal briefcase and opened it out to Raymond. In a dell carved out of gray foam was a pistol engraved with clichés—roses, vines, thorns. He flinched when she took it out and pointed it at him.
“Relax, man!” Harridan-in-training. She clicked open the cylinder for his inspection and sp
un it. “Just letting you see this beauty from every angle.”
Six empty chambers, making it a handsome holder for cigarillos. There was something about this thing that made it too unserious for the business of bullets.
“Pretty, huh?” She pulled out a thick catalog, opening it to a dog-eared page. “It says here that this is modeled after the pistols used by real vampire hunters in Transylvania.”
“I highly doubt that.”
“I’ll give it to you for a thousand bucks, fully loaded.”
In the kitchen, Mrs. Park slid over something slick that sent her tumbling on her ass. The puddle was clear and thick, like mucus, and she gasped in recognition.
She heard the creaking of floorboards directly overhead. She looked up, and as she did, a drop of goopy, clear fluid fell from a crack and landed in her left eye.
“Ssi-bal!” Shit. It didn’t sting, but its cool, jellylike contact came as a shock.
More creaks from above. Mrs. Park ran to the hallway where, sure enough, her suspicions were confirmed. A ladder perched under the open attic hatch.
“Mira!” she screamed. “Mira, what for you steal my eggs?”
She grabbed a flashlight and started up the ladder, and as soon as she neared the opening, an odor as pungent as fish sauce rushed through her nostrils. She shone her light into the black. There, a frantic shuffling began. Eventually the beam of light found Mira, crouching in the darkness, her arms bent like shields against the glare.
“Mira!”
The girl had eggshells in her hands. When Mrs. Park moved the spotlight around, she saw little maggot-looking pods everywhere. Some were perched in the centers of cobwebs, their tiny feet hanging onto the weave. They were her dried shrimp, which she used—very sparingly—to flavor soup. There was more: Little firecrackers dangling from the rafters? No, wait, they weren’t firecrackers at all—they were tampons, at least ten of them, stained with use, hanging from their strings like crimson party lights.
“Mira! What are you doing!”
“Stay outta my Kool-Aid, ho.”
“Speak English! Why you no going to school?”
“You’re making us move to Korea so what does school matter?” Mira showed her the empty bottles of Thai fish sauce. “Every white person’s nightmare.”
“Why you do this? Why you steal my eggs?” Mrs. Park sounded more hurt than angry. “Why you keep tampons?”
“I’m feeding my termites.”
Mrs. Park started down the ladder solemnly. “Quellie Soo is coming today. She helping me sell this house.”
Without a further word, Mrs. Park shut the hatch to the attic and bolted it from the outside. Once she got back to ground level, she squeezed the two legs of the ladder closed and carried it out to the garage.
Arik led Rosemary into his room and engaged the clumsily installed dead bolt, forcibly tilting down the clasp so it would catch. He lunged toward her for a kiss, grinning so wide that her tongue smashed into his wall of teeth.
There was a pungent, sterile odor in the place. She looked around for its source. His room was slightly smaller than hers, even with the bed pushed against the wall to make space. Posters of baseball players she couldn’t name lined the walls, limited edition Beanie Babies sat on a shelf above his bed, strangely dust-free; Arnold Schwarzenegger watched over everything from a faded Terminator 2: Judgment Day one-sheet.
“Why’s it smell like rubber in here?”
Arik reached into the trash bin under his desk and fished out a crushed-up wad of notebook paper which he unpeeled to expose three oily condoms.
“I’ve been practicing.” He pulled off her sweater and her bra and nuzzled her boobs, but earned no reciprocation.
“I think condoms are overrated.”
He did an irony-scan of her face. “Unless you’re on the pill or whatever, I don’t see how I could . . . you know.” He pulled off his jeans and his cock poked out of his boxers. “I’m so addicted to you. I need to have you, every day and night . . .” He laughed. “Four, five times a day if I could. I want to tie you to my bed, never let you leave, and come all over your gorgeous face till you beg me to stop.”
He lashed his tongue inside her mouth, bracing her face tight in his hands, until she felt a beautiful kind of suffocation, and weakened. They remained new to the game; each kiss still had the power to amaze. They gave each other bedroom eyes—dark-rimmed, shadow eyes that looked relaxed and ravenous at the same time. He locked his hands around her buttocks and rubbed himself against her so her jeans rode down her thighs, releasing soft, taut flesh. He helped himself to her panties, pulling them down her legs, pushing two fingers inside her slickness, planting kisses on her bush.
“Arik, being with you is like the only beautiful thing there is . . . in all of this darkness.”
“You know, Rose, you’re real different. There’s something so mysterious about you that’s just so . . . fucking addicting.”
She wanted to correct him—addictive—but held her tongue. Some of his beauty faded.
He sat up and peeled off his clothes. The hickey she’d left on his collarbone from their last time came level with her eyes. She reached to feel if it was bumpy or smooth—it was smooth. She wished she could be marked like that but every bite he gave her vanished within seconds into her sand-colored flesh. He probably had blunt teeth.
Suddenly he disappeared and returned with a metallic square in his hand. His boner hadn’t waned.
“Arik, I don’t want us to use them.”
“What do you mean?” He ripped open the foil packet and exposed the rubber disc. “I’m not letting all my practice go to waste.”
“I don’t like the way they smell.”
“Well, fuck . . . Maybe you should’ve said something before I wasted all my money on, like, a box of fifty . . . I mean, how am I going to come inside of you?”
Rosemary said nothing. She massaged the small of his back and licked his neck, culminating at the depression just behind his left earlobe, a spot that always drove him to the edge. He whimpered, and dropped the half-opened rubber.
“Rose . . . you scare me.”
She raised her hips so that her crotch met his, then opened her thighs so he could enter her. With one leg hooked over his butt, she reeled him down on top of her.
“Rose . . . wait . . .” He jerked up and reached for the condom.
“No, don’t . . .”
“What do you want?” There was frustration in his voice. This was new.
“I want you to come inside me.”
“That’s really fucking insane . . .”
“I won’t mind . . . if we had an accident.”
“What exactly do you mean?”
“I mean . . . I’m not going to object if I had your baby.”
When she looked up again, Arik was standing at the foot of the bed, cramming on his boxers. His penis dangled like a wet sock.
“What’s wrong?” She was nauseated.
He shook his head in bewilderment, as if he was about to say something, then held it back. He slipped his T-shirt over his head roughly.
“Come back.” Her words wavered. She reached out nonetheless.
“Don’t touch me!” He slapped her hand away. “Are you fucking kidding me?” He stared at her with such contempt.
“I just meant, if it happened . . . You wouldn’t even have to take care of it . . .”
“God! That is such a lie! You’re trying to trap me!”
He circled the bed like a wounded lion. All his boyish reserve was gone. His face was wracked in teary spasms and the rage that came from his inability to control them. Rosemary felt naked all of a sudden—and reached for her clothes.
“My dad was right.” The tears streamed down Arik’s cheeks. “Some girls will try to hook you in and destroy your life. My mom trapped him by getting pr
egnant and she completely wrecked his life.” He yanked the tear-stained Green Day shirt off his chest and flung it across the room. “Fuck you! You’ve forever cursed this shirt for me!”
He picked up a stool and hurled it hard at the bed, missing Rosemary by inches. Then he grabbed books, CDs, anything he could snatch off his desk and began pelting her. She took cover behind his pillows, holding back her screams in case his brother or mother heard. Item after item flew at her. A Nick Cave CD case, Jude the Obscure. When he ran out of things, he crumbled into a shuddering heap on the floor, his joints all gone soft. He tucked his feet under his buttocks and curled into a fetal ball, rocking himself back and forth with his eyes pressed shut. His lips had turned purple and he was shivering. The explosion of rage had sucked all the heat from his body.
Rosemary went to the door and undid the bolt. She let herself out quietly, watching as he swayed to some intimate, primal beat. He never turned to see her go.
“Hello . . . ?” she said. “Is this . . . Bryce?”
After a pause, a petulant reply. “It is.”
“I’m Rose.”
“I can see that. I have caller ID.”
“Why did you cancel Workshop?”
“It was obvious to me that your hearts weren’t in it.”
“That’s so not true!” Her voice was still thick from crying. “It’s the only thing I have left that’s worth living for!”
“That’s a little melodramatic. Even for an actor.”
“Mr. Z, I’m sorry . . .” She was going to start crying again.
Another pause.
“Please,” she said, “just say something.”
“I don’t see how that would change anything.”
“I want to go back to before. When we could talk. When you said I could call you to talk about anything.”
“And you appreciate that now? In retrospect?”
“I could come to your house.”