by D. J. Herda
In the year of my 21st birthday, I left home for good in order to pursue a career in journalism. I went to school days and spent most of my evenings covering city council sessions, school-board meetings, and other crap that everyone, particularly my editor, told me would help turn me into a bona fide reporter. It wasn't very glamorous, but it wasn't bad, either, as my work often ended before ten, giving me a chance to write my story, slip it under the Journal's door on my way home, and still catch a couple hours for myself.
One Friday night I covered a particularly interesting school-board meeting in the 17th District. It was interesting because of this fantastically attractive woman seated next to the speaker's podium on stage. After the meeting, I worked particularly hard at getting an interview with her, which I did, purely in the line of duty. Still, some types of duty, not coincidentally, turn out to be more pleasurable than others, and so, it happens, did this.
We adjourned to a nearby pub, where I discovered her name was Christina Faulkner. She was a bit older than I, unmarried, with no children and a 38-inch chest. The latter I discovered for myself at her apartment later that evening. We were alone and had grown very well acquainted with one another over our mutual admiration for Hemingway and gin.
"David," she purred, sinking softly into the plush foam of the sofa, "I think it's time we ... laid our cards on the table."
"Okay," I said. "I like cards. What did you have in mind?"
She pulled herself forward and very slowly began unbuttoning her blouse, interrupted momentarily by a long, languid kiss, her silvery tongue darting in and out of my mouth. "I don't want you to think I'm a sex-crazed woman," she said, reaching behind to unsnap her halter, "but I knew before our first drink that I'd just have to have you."
"What a coincidence," I said as I helped her out of her bra. "I was thinking the very same thing."
She folded her hands across her chest as the garment fell to the floor and turned away from me as I settled back against the cushion. It wouldn't do to appear too anxious. After all, she was a woman of the world, traveled, refined ... and I was twenty-one and in my prime but still willing to take my time, to let things develop slowly, to show the tender, sensitive, feminine side of my nature. My eyes followed hers. Her eyes devoured mine. She wriggled her way closer to me, kissed me lightly on the lips, and looked deeply into my soul. I could see the delicacy in her, feel the hesitation she felt in the situation. I could respect that. I would take my time and be certain to move gently over her body, softly, caringly, stopping to kiss her on the lips and whisper sweet somethings into her ear. I would ...
Suddenly, she dropped her arms to her sides.
"Ohmahgawd!" I said softly before hurling myself savagely against her, my mouth ravaging first one cherry-red nipple and then its animated twin. "Ohmahgawd, you're ... fantastic!"
I pushed forward again, my lips raging, realizing that it had been so very long since I'd known a woman in the biblical sense. As in never! I pulled my head back, took in the beauty of her heaving bosom, looked up at her face—angelic and wanton at the same time, flushed and fired with heat, her breath coming in short, quick pants—and then fell forward on her again when she let out a groan, slipped off the sofa, and while I clung to her tits, we fell over backwards onto the floor with a thump.
"Oh, my God!" she cried. "Oh, yes. Oh, my God, don't stop. David, don't stop!"
Well, I know the value of being compliant, but I also know the value of breathing; so, I did stop—long enough to rip off my shirt and wiggle out of my pants and down to my shorts, ready for Round Two. Before I could mount my next offensive, she struggled to her feet, removed the last of her clothes, and took me by the hands. "Let's go to bed."
My kind of woman, I thought, saying instead, “I’m ready.”
She smiled at the bulge in my boxers. "So I see."
She led me up the stairs to the second floor, her ass wiggling seductively, her long thighs and soft scent guiding my every step. I sank deep into the satiny coolness of the bed and watched in the mirror as she fondled first one mammoth breast and then the other. Her head rolled back, and her long, golden hair hung nearly to her waist. She smiled an open-mouthed smile, all the while her tongue flitting in impatient little circles, a deep, throaty, gurgling sound spilling from her lips.
My mind flashed. Gurgling sounds. Long, light swirls of golden-blonde hair. Another flash, like the flickering cries of some cavernous monster.
"You're so deep in thought," she said, crossing the floor and climbing into bed next to me. Her breasts swung seductively as she leaned forward to kiss me. "I hope it's something good."
I sat upright and looked down at her legs. "You're ... limping."
She flushed suddenly, as though I'd unlocked some magic Pandora's Box in the very ill-timed ignorance of youth. "Most people don't notice."
"It's my job," I replied in my best, most casual journalese. I hoped I hadn't offended her. Prayed I hadn’t offended her.
"It's just a little stiffness. It'll go away. Whenever the weather turns suddenly, my left leg gives me a little trouble."
"Kind of like arthritis or something?"
"I'm not that old," she quipped, poking me in the ribs. "No, it's from my childhood. A type of paralysis I had as a kid. In fact, I might have been confined to a wheelchair for life if it hadn't been for a friend helping me out. He gave me the money I needed for an operation and corrective braces."
"Nice friend."
"Well, actually, he was more than a friend. If you know what I mean."
I thought I knew what she meant. "And is he still ... more than a friend?"
She shook her head. "He died several years ago. Besides," she said, smiling faintly, "he was married."
My mind whirred. The music box, the long, golden hair, the Poster-Girl braces leering out at me from the dark. Could it be? All the while the steady rat-a-tat-tat crying out louder, calling me closer.
Can it possibly be? Was there any conceivable way?
"David? What's the matter?"
"It can't be," I said, the words slipping out past unwilling lips. My heart beat wildly as I leaped up from the bed and quickly slipped back into my shorts. Christina's full, wet lips parted questioningly. Her eyes peered deep into my soul. Could I find the strength to ask her? It all fit. It had to be. It had to. Yet, it couldn't be. "Oh, my God."
"What is it? What’s the matter?"
"It's just ... something ... I was thinking of asking you."
“What?”
“How old are you?”
She laughed. “How old am ... are you kidding? Why?”
“Please. It’s important.”
Her face faded to chalk. “My age is that important?”
“Please.”
She hesitated before reaching for a cigarette, slipping it between two provocative lips, and setting it off. “Okay, then, how old do I look?”
I felt myself blush. “Sorry.”
She paused, shaking her head. “No, I mean, it’s okay. A little weird, but okay.” She hesitated before adding, “Let’s just say I’m old enough to be your ... older sister.”
“And your mother? What’s her name?”
She paused, furrowing her brow. “Susan. Faulkner. Why?”
“Did she have ... did she wear braces, too?”
“Yes. She had polio as a child and never quite grew out of it. Medicine wasn’t as far advanced back then as it is today. Why? Why do you ask? Did you know her?”
I felt my palms growing clammy. “I think ... I saw her a time or two.”
“Oh? That must have been a long time ago. You must have been just a child.”
I nodded. “And this ... former lover ... the one who paid for your operation ...”
Her nose crinkled up, and she let out a sudden laugh. “He wasn’t my lover, silly. He was my mother’s.”
“Your mother’s ...”
“Mom passed when I was six, and I went to live with my aunt. She was a spinster who never had any
children, so she raised me like her own daughter. Jim used to stop by occasionally to visit.”
“Jim?”
“Uh-huh. That was my mom’s friend’s name. He always brought us something whenever he stopped by. Candy usually. Occasionally flowers or some little trinkets he picked up somewhere along the way. And then, one day, he said he had come into some money and wanted to hire a doctor to operate on my legs. And that’s what he did. I went in to Mercy Hospital for an operation, and after that, I was fitted for crutches for six months. I’ll never forget when I could walk for the first time on my own. Without limping. Without falling.”
“What was Jim’s last name? Do you remember?”
“Of course I do. He was like a father to me. The only one I ever knew. Jim Blasdell.”
My eyes popped open.
“Oh, come on. You mean you knew him, too? How? Where?”
I sighed. “Chicago, remember? The great South Side? Everyone knows everybody on the great South Side.”
She laughed. “I guess so. Small world, though, you have to admit.”
“Except for one thing that still puzzles me. The Jim Blasdell I knew was always broke. He lost his savings on some bad investment, and he took to drinking. I can’t recall a time when I’d seen him sober or at least not smelling like booze. I wonder how it was that he managed to come up with enough money for your operation.”
“Oh, I can answer that. He stole it.”
“What?”
“He used to work for the Chicago Parks Division, Gage Park I think. Anyway, they had an audit one day, and the department came up four thousand dollars short. They traced the theft back to some guy in accounting who said he’d taken the money and given it to Jim. After the guy was found out, he claimed he didn’t know what happened to the money. Jim died before they could investigate. My aunt told me the story.”
“So, he was never charged.”
She took a quick breath and exhaled before shaking her head.
Oh, my God. What if? What if? Oh, Lord, I have to ask. I have to know.
“This Jim ... He wasn’t your ... I mean, biologically, he wasn’t ... What I mean to say is ... I mean, was he ...”
“My biological father? No. My real father was a sailor. Mom met him at the canteen one evening, and they just hit it off. He went off to sea on active duty shortly after I was born. We never heard from him again. Mom thinks he might have been killed in action and his body never found. I’m not so sure.”
I let out a breath.
“Why all the questions? What’s this all about?”
I sat down on the edge of the bed, embarrassed that I’d let the moment slip away. She looked down at my shorts and shook her head before patting the bed by her side. I wiggled up next to her, and she took one hand and ran it over her full, swollen breasts. "Lover," she purred, pulling me slowly back down to her side, "let’s talk later. Let’s make love now.”
And, as she pulled my lips to hers, forced my mouth down her chin to her throat, smothered first one breast and then the other against my face—I felt all the passion building all over again as my shorts swelled with life once more.
“Take them off,” she whispered, “and do me.” She rubbed my erection firmly, kneading me, needing me. I quickly slipped out of my boxers and tossed them to the floor as she smiled. “That’s more like it, don’t you think?”
Suddenly, that was exactly what I thought. And as my mind raced quickly past the last twenty years of my life and the fortuitous turn of events, I couldn’t help thinking one more thing.
Jim Blasdell was a great man.
FOUR: The Tenants
CARTEL SQUINTED AT the paper before him. Was it East 67th Street ... or East 76th? He crushed out a cigarette in the cup on his desk and closed his eyes. The butt hissed, spit a puff of dying smoke skyward, and expired.
Shit. I hate growing old.
"Tell Mrs. Rasci," he spoke absently into the report, "there's no sign of her three skips yet. We'll call her when we get something."
"That's just it," the gray-haired man standing behind the papers said. "Now, there's four."
Cartel's eyes popped open, and his hands dropped to his desk. He peered up over his glasses. "What?"
"She just called in to report another one."
He lay his pencil down and slowly squeezed his 200-pound frame as far back into the chair as it would go. "When?"
Meyers sighed. "I just got off the phone with her. She found out last night. Thought you'd wanna know."
Cartel paused. "Don't tell me. He owes her back rent."
"Same as the others."
"How much?"
"She says four hundred."
He shook his head. "Four hundred dollars. That's a hundred more than the last one."
Meyers turned toward the door, stopped, and peered back over his shoulder. "You want me to send someone over to take the report?"
He thought for a second, looked down at the cup he was swirling in his hands, the butt swooshing softly from one side to the other. "No. No, this time, I'll do it myself. Something's not right here. Nobody rents an apartment to four different people, and they all skip out owing money. Nobody would be that unlucky. Or dumb."
"I don't know," Meyers said. "The way she sounds on the phone ..." He made a whirling motion with his finger. "A little ditzy, you know?"
Cartel grabbed his coat from the chair. "If the captain asks, tell him I'll be back in an hour. But don't tell him where I've gone, understand? I don't want him to know where I'm headed. I just wanna check this out for myself. This just can’t happen. Not to anybody."
Meyers turned back toward the door before stopping and peering back over his shoulder. "Okay, but if he finds out, he ain't gonna like it." He thought for several seconds. "You know the address?"
"Yeah," Cartel said. "Better than I know my own."
The lieutenant groaned as he goaded first one leg and then the other out from behind the wheel. He ached all over. Fuckin' flu. When he'd finally pulled himself from the car, he looked up the side of the weathered, three-story brownstone on East Chestnut. The chiseled bricks, once painted gleaming white, radiated an eerie gray-green beneath a gloomy Chicago sky. He wondered if it might rain. That would solve one of his problems. He wouldn't have to go over to his ex-wife's house, his house, to dig up some stinking strawberry plants she had so generously consented to donate to him.
He mounted the concrete steps slowly, pausing at the aging wooden door standing guard to the palace. Ornately carved and fitted with beveled glass, its mossy green jacket showed the wear of too many years, too many battles waged and lost. The knob, once shimmering brass, had been painted and worn clean, painted and worn clean again until it glistened like the domed head of a dozing eunuch. No hint of its original finish remained.
Cartel huddled against the wind slicing down Chestnut, the icy blasts sweeping in across the city on the back of Lake Michigan, rolling in and funneling down the concrete canyons of the Near North Side. He thought for a moment that it was starting to snow. He looked up at the paint peeling off the side of the building, the wind stripping it like bark from some ancient white birch, settling to the ground in layers around the structure's roots. The building even smelled like an old birch—dank and musky. The smell of age. The smell, he thought, of death.
The wind reared up again, sending leaves and dust swirling down the center of the street and slicing through his slicker. When the hell am I going to start wearing a fucking hat? He lifted his fist to strike again against the thin, wrinkled skin of the door. When the hell am I going to buy a fucking hat?
He hunched his back against the fury of the wind until the lock on the door jiggled. The knob turned. The lock jiggled again. Come on, come on! Cartel danced from one leg to the other, staring anxiously at the knob.
Slowly the worn, weathered door opened to a worn, weathered face. The face exposed itself slowly. "Oh, it's you, Mr. Cartel, darlink. I'm so sorry I kept you waiting, no? But I tell you, I'm so surpris
ed to see you are here, and not that other dumbbell who came last time."
Cartel stared into her dancing eyes. Set in a face nearly indistinguishable from the stone, they looked strangely out of place, the lively baby blues of someone a quarter her age, still filled with the passions of life, the exuberance of youth.
"Come in, come in to my little place. It's so cold outside. You know, I was cleaning my little flat on the third floor and it takes me a little time to walk down all those steps."
"That's okay, Mrs. Rasci. I understand."
"Come in and I'll make some coffee to warm you."
"No, please. Don't go to any trouble. Besides, I don't have the time." He pulled the door shut against the wind, surprised at the weight bearing down on the sagging brass hinges. "I got the report you called into the precinct, and I came right over."
She turned and stood before him, motionless. She had a way of standing so close to him that it made him uneasy. A way of invading his personal space, as if she were after something from him and not about to leave until she got it. He shifted one foot awkwardly back.
"Now, what do you think of that. Did you ever hear of such a thing? This makes the fourth one who just ran off owing me money. Can you imagine, Mr. Cartel, darlink? The fourth one!"
"Can you give me his name, Mrs. Rasci, and tell me a little about him, what he looks like, maybe his age, things like that?"
"Back in the Old Country, you never saw a thing like this. People was careful with their money, and when they made a word with you, you could depend on them to keep it. This little fellow here," she motioned toward the basement flat where he guessed the tenant had been staying, "I should never have rented to him. You know, Mr. Cartel, darlink, I have nice people living here. Two nice girls on the first floor and Mrs. Fougherty on the second floor in a little flat. So nice. You never hear a peep out of them. But that dumbhead!"