South of Bixby Bridge

by Ryan Winfield

  She bites her lower lip, pouting. I say,

  What’s wrong?

  She kicks up her foot and says,

  Now my shoes don’t match.

  Well, just grab some other shoes.

  She runs her hands down to my crotch, cups my balls. She says,

  But I don’t have any shoes that match.

  I swell against my new jeans. I say,

  We’ve got enough time for a detour I guess.

  I HAVE STAGE FRIGHT and can’t pee. The Ukraine Train is pissing in the stall next to my urinal. He’s six-foot-ten, his head sticks up over stall wall, and he’s singing the folksong “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?”. I didn’t know that courtside seats share a bathroom with the players. I flush the toilet, wash my hands, and step out of the bathroom. An old usher waddles up with his yellow arena shirt tucked tight into tan Dockers. He says,

  Two minutes until tipoff, sir. We need to hurry along now.

  The Edward & Bliss seats are still empty. In front of the empty seats, Kari sits beside the court with her legs crossed, the steel-gray Cavalli dress riding up her thighs, her new strappy silver Gucci platforms glimmering like jewels at the end of her smooth, dark legs shimmering in the stadium lights. Her breasts hang full and ripe and her dark hair waves down over her shoulder. The players from the visiting bench are checking her out. It feels good to be back on top.

  All 17,000 fans in Arco Arena seem to watch as I walk to my seat. I hope the game is televised tonight and Stephanie sees me on TV sitting next to Kari. I take my seat. Kari kisses me. She says,

  Why do you keep looking back at those empty seats?

  Ah, just an old friend.

  What’s her name?

  His name, honey. Just a guy I used to work with.

  You would think that for almost a grand per ticket the seats would be leather recliners with built-in back massagers, but they’re just padded metal-folding chairs lined up on the sideline. Even so, courtside is the only way to see basketball. Tipoff is right in front of us. We’re so close, I could stick out my leg and trip a passing player.

  The courtside crowd is too cool to cheer with the rest of the fans when the home team makes a basket, and the guy slinging beer offers our section red wine in plastic cups. I buy us two each, so we won’t have to wait for him to come around again.

  We skip the halftime show and head to the courtside club bar. We order lemon drops and chase them with Coronas. Every guy in the bar eye-fucks Kari. Whenever she catches them, she flicks her tongue at them, then leans in and kisses me. Then she checks to see if they’re still watching.

  It’s well into the fourth quarter when we amble from the bar back to the game. I plop down in my seat and pull Kari onto my lap. She leans against me, her tits pressing into my chest, and we make out as the players run back and forth.

  I can feel the usher standing over me even before I see him. He leans down to my ear and says,

  She’s a beautiful companion, sir. Can’t blame you being eager. Nevertheless, season-ticket holders don’t cotton to public displays.

  I reach in my pocket, pull out a $100 bill, and hold it out to him. Run and get us two glasses of red will you? I say. Keep the change.

  The usher stiffens. He says,

  I think perhaps you’ve both had enough already, sir.

  Kari climbs off my lap. She plunks down next to me in her seat. I look up at the usher. I say,

  Screw you, man.

  Do I need to call security, sir?

  You need to call whoever sold you those Dockers and tell him they went out of style 10 years ago.

  The usher smirks. I guess you can’t buy manners, he says.

  I stuff the $100 bill into his shirt pocket and say,

  Why don’t you see if you can buy a personality?

  Then I take Kari by the hand and lead her across the court right in the middle of a home-team offensive drive. I hear the referee’s whistle stopping the play as we blow out the back of the stadium.

  ON THE ROAD BACK to San Francisco, the driver checks the game score on the radio. The Kings beat the Golden State Warriors 119 to 96. I ask him if the game was on TV. He says,

  I don’t think so.

  Between $1,800 for two tickets, $500 for the towncar, almost $1,000 for Kari’s dress, and another $600 for her Gucci platforms, I’m out $3,900 and Mr. Charles didn’t even show.

  Kari kicks off her new shoes. She leans into the car door and puts her bare feet in my lap. She rubs me with her toes. She says,

  I feel like partying.

  I scroll through the seven numbers programmed alphabetically into my BlackBerry—Barbara, Chinese Palace, Escort Service, Kari, Paul, Stephanie, The Doc. I dial the Doc. He answers. I say,

  Hey, it’s Trevor. Can you meet us with an ounce of candy?

  The line is quiet for several seconds. Then he says,

  An ounce is a felony, man. You sure?

  I’m sure.

  Runs 12 bills.

  Kari’s feet work in my lap, she flicks her tongue at me. I say,

  Money’s no problem.

  28 The Plain of Oblivion!

  I open the yacht door wearing my boxers. Paul wears a tuxedo, a Louis Vuitton garment bag draped over his arm. He hands me the bag. Get dressed, sport, he says.

  I slide the zipper open—my tuxedo is inside.

  Aren’t you gonna invite me in? Paul says.

  You don’t have to ask, I say, it’s your yacht.

  Paul pushes past me and looks around the yacht. It feels strange to see him here in my space. He picks up an empty bottle of Jack and stands it upright on the coffee table. He chuckles. He says,

  This is how I lived before I got married.

  Then Paul walks over and peeks in the stateroom. He sees Kari passed out naked on the bed. He laughs and says,

  I used to knock the ladies down like bowling pins too. Not bad, sport, not bad. But aren’t you gonna get dressed.

  Do you mind if I shower real quick? I say.

  We got time, go ahead.

  I grab my Ferragamos, fresh socks, clean boxers, and dive into the bathroom. I hang the tuxedo on the door. Turn on the shower. Brush my teeth. Wash my face. Run a razor across my cheeks. Jump in the shower. Lather up with soap and rinse off. Kill the water. Towel dry my hair. Step out of the shower.

  I hear moaning coming from the stateroom. I cup my ear to the door—Kari. I crack the door and look out. Kari facedown on the bed, naked. Paul mounted on her from behind, gripping her hair, pants around his ankles, his pale, hairy ass pumping up and down.

  I don’t know whether to burst out and stop him or hide in the bathroom until he’s done. I close the door. It’s not like she’s my girlfriend. And she is an escort. But I bought her. She’s mine.

  I focus on getting dressed. I pull the tuxedo pants on. Slide the shirt on. Button it. Tuck it in. Tie the bow tie. Crooked. Tie it again. Still crooked. I give up and lace my Ferragamos. Pull the vest over my head. Slip the jacket on. Look in the mirror.

  Senior prom was the last time I wore a tuxedo and it was rented. The one Mr. Lussier made for me makes me feel like a film star.

  I put my ear to the door again. It’s quiet. I step out in my tuxedo. Paul zips his pants and walks over to me. He grabs my neck, pulls me to him, and reties my bow tie. I say,

  How long did you take?

  How long did I take for what, sport?

  How long did you take with Kari?

  Is that her name? he says. Just three minutes.

  Well she’s $400 an hour so you owe me 20 bucks.

  Paul laughs. He squeezes my neck and says,

  Bill me okay, sport.

  Paul finishes adjusting my tie. He holds me at arm’s length and inspects me. I Look down at Paul’s high-polish tuxedo shoes. I say,

  Are my Ferragamos okay?

  Paul smiles. Kid, he says, you could wear purple Crocs and still win the prize tonight. Then he nods to Kari on the bed. Get rid of the whore. We gotta go.

>   Kari throws a shoe at Paul. He ducks and it hits the stateroom wall. Paul laughs. Kari jumps out of bed and pulls her dress on. She stomps around the stateroom plucking her things off the floor and mumbling something about dirtbags. Then she stands in front of me with her left breast falling out from steel-gray dress and her silver Gucci platforms cradled in her arms. She says,

  How am I getting home?

  I look at Paul. He grins and shakes his head. He says,

  Give her a hundred.

  I hand Kari a $100 bill. Guess you’ll have to catch a cab, I say.

  Her jaw drops. She slaps my face. You rotten bastard! she says. Then she storms off the yacht, slamming the door. Paul laughs. We both watch out the window as she pads up the dock shivering in the Cavalli dress and carrying her new Gucci shoes.

  IN THE LIMO, Paul lights a joint and hands it to me. Just to prime the pumps a little, he says. I take a hit and blow the smoke out my cracked window. Now tell me about Benny Boy, Paul says.

  Benny Wilson?

  Yeah, Benny Wilson. How’d it go?

  He threw me out.

  So you gave him the photos.

  You told me to give him the photos.

  Paul laughs and slaps his knee. He says,

  He threw you out, eh? God, I’d pay to see the look on his face. Did that vein at his temple swell? I bet it did. Just like when he’s fucking that boy of his. Did he say anything else?

  Said he’d get in touch with you after the holidays.

  Paul reaches over and pinches the joint from my hand. He sucks it a quarter-inch down, holds in the smoke and then blows out a cloud. We lock down CalTEARS, he says, and the money will pour in faster than you can spend it, boy. You’re gonna be rich.

  Then he hands me back the joint.

  I don’t say anything about Benny making a pass at me.

  I ASK PAUL WHY the other couples are staring at us. He says they’ll look anywhere as long as it’s not at each other. Tara laughs and says it’s the marijuana.

  Tara met us at the restaurant. She walked in and her sequined dress caught the light from a thousand bulbs in the great crystal chandelier. I heard a wake of clinking silver dropped on china behind her as she floated through the room toward us and, like a fish caught in a net, I couldn't look away.

  The Fleur de Lys restaurant has no private booths and the tables sit in the middle of one big space with the grand chandelier hanging overhead. Pink brocaded walls suck the sound from the room and everyone sits on straight-backed chairs and talks in hushed voices.

  A squadron of uniformed servers emerges from a hidden door. They swirl around the room delivering miniature crystal dishes of lemon sorbet. I pick up my tiny silver spoon and look at Paul. What’s this, I say, dessert already?

  One of the servers leans over from the next table and whispers,

  A palate cleanser before your next course, sir.

  Paul laughs and when he doesn’t stop, I laugh too. Then Tara joins us. Now we’re all laughing in the quiet restaurant and people are not only staring, they’re pointing, they’re whispering. Paul stands up and throws his linen on the table. Fuck this place! he says. Let’s go.

  We spill from the restaurant laughing and duck into the waiting limousine. Tara slides next to me on the seat. Paul sits across from us. He instructs the driver to take us to south of Market, Ninth and Mission. The driver looks concerned and asks if he’s sure. Paul just rolls the privacy window up.

  Tara opens her clutch and pulls out a crystal-cocaine bullet. We each snort a bump. Paul pours us whiskeys. He offers me a little yellow pill. I shake my head. Paul smiles and says it’s a palate cleanser before my next course. I laugh and swallow the pill. I say,

  What the fuck is a palate cleanser anyway?

  Tara climbs onto my lap, straddling me. She says,

  I’ll show you.

  Then she kisses me.

  THE LIMO GLIDES to a stop in front of a huge, windowless warehouse on a dark street. A beefy bouncer wearing a beanie blocks the door. His hot breath makes ghosts as he talks down to a short companion. The short guy clutches a clipboard and hops from foot to foot. The cold air bites my skin as I step from the limo.

  At the door, the bouncer asks for the watchword. Medusa’s Mother, Paul says and the bouncer opens the door. As I pass, he puts his meaty hand on my chest. He says,

  Sorry, pal—no solo dicks. Couples or extra ladies only.

  Paul turns back and says,

  He’s with me.

  Not anymore.

  Paul points his finger in the bouncer’s face. He says,

  I’m Paul Valombrosa and this is my fucking party!

  The bouncer looks down at his short companion who doesn’t even consult his clipboard—he just swallows and nods fast.

  Removing his hand from me, the bouncer straightens my collar. Yes, then—sorry, sir, he says. Then he touches a microphone sticking out beneath his beanie and says,

  Two Adams and one Eve coming up.

  We walk down a blood-red carpet toward the mouth of a freight elevator. A dwarf wearing a pirate’s hat waves us aboard. He says,

  Aye, for your behoof, step in!

  The dwarf stretches onto his tiptoes, grabs the cage door and slides it closed. Then he looks at me with a knowing grin and starts the elevator moving up with a jerk. There’s no light in the elevator and once we leave the first floor it’s pitch black. Bass music throbs in the dark distance above and as we rise, black lights leak in and Paul’s shirt glows white-blue. As we approach the final floor, red light spills through the elevator cage and Tara’s sequin dress sparkles like the scales of a bloody koi.

  Sliding the cage open, the dwarf removes his hat and says,

  Who is for the Plain of Oblivion!

  I step into a shadowy cavern the size of an indoor soccer field. Abbreviated walls cut a maze of semiprivate rooms along the edges of the warehouse and a dim kaleidoscope of light casts shadows of writhing bodies against the ceiling. A naked server, coated in red body paint with huge hanging breasts and rings in her nipples, steps in front of me with a tray of blue Curaçao shots. She says,

  How ’bout a drink, handsome? Maybe something for your other hand there too.

  She takes my hand and places it over her nipple. I look over to see if Tara is watching but Tara’s not there. My right hand on her breast, I grab a shot with my left and gulp it down. She grabs my wrist, scoops her breast in my hand, and pushes it up to her mouth. She slurps up her own nipple and sucks it. Then clamping the nipple ring between her teeth, she pulls my hand away and her heavy breast falls, pulls against the ring stretching her nipple a thumb’s length, and when she releases the ring from her teeth, her breast bounces and swings. I grab another shot and watch her sashay away with her tray.

  Glass in hand, I push farther into the room.

  I pass a group of bored-looking models lounging on a couch taking turns on a bong. A thin, vampire-pale Euro chick offers the pipe to me but I keep walking. Two young men built like Olympic swimmers and wearing only Speedos make out against a pillar. As I pass, one of them reaches out and grabs my ass.

  I walk farther into the shadows, farther into the maze.

  Primal beats pound in rhythm with the blood pumping through my veins. My feet go numb, my hands part the crowd, and as I swim through the lustful brine, a cacophony of images crashes into my consciousness and capsizes my mind.

  A pasty fat man wearing a bird-beak mask has his hands tied behind a chair while an Asian transvestite gives him head.

  A black woman with nipples the size of griddlecakes lies naked on a chaise longue and a leathery-skinned old man snorts thick white lines of cocaine from her firm pregnant belly.

  A blindfolded man lies naked on a table and a couple take turns sucking him off while a shy woman who looks like his Midwest housewife snaps pictures.

  A woman suspended from a ceiling swing, her legs in stirrups, leans her mane of red hair back and opens her mouth in ecstasy as another woman pushes a glo
w-in-the-dark King Kong vibrator into her. Men circle her head masturbating into her mouth.

  More painted women come by with trays of even stranger drinks and a man in drag offers me candy-colored pills from a crystal dish and trance music pumps through the room from hidden speakers and the sweet smells of marijuana and sex fill my lungs and then I pass through a hall of staggered mirrors and fracture into a dozen selves—

  I hold a lit joint I’ve never seen before.

  I’m dancing with sharp-footed long-necked flamingos.

  Soft swollen sounds tangle like kelp around my ankles.

  I sink deep into a foreign world.

  A stranger pulls her tongue from my mouth.

  Her breath smells like oranges and cigarette smoke.

  A sweaty strongman shakes me awake.

  He says it’s almost time.

  An invisible demon voice counts—

  Six—five—four—three—two—one!

  Tara’s mouth clamps onto mine.

  Her tongue tastes like sweet milk in my mouth.

  One hundred thousand voices cheer.

  Tara pulls her lips away. She says,

  Happy New Year!

  She takes my hand and pulls me through the crowd until a giant naked African guarding a private door stops us. The African is aglow with white-blue tribal tattoos jumping off his dark skin and his height registers me at eye level with his huge endowment and through the head of this anomaly pierces a thick silver bullring with gold hanging cowbells. He takes himself in both hands, shakes the clanking bells at me and says,

  It’s so they can hear me coming.

  He’s with me, little man, Tara says, tugging me around him.

  Once past, Tara grips the door handle, pushes it open, and pulls me into the private room. A stiff man-in-waiting greets us with a golden tray of Viagra and poppers. Tara plucks a Viagra from the tray and holds it above my mouth. I open. Take the pill. Swallow it dry.

  The man-in-waiting steps aside and I see two gorgeous female models lying naked in the center of a vast, round floor-bed—one brunette and one blonde, beads draped around their necks, metal bracelets clamped on their wrists, their long, sleek bodies a tangle of hair and legs floating on a rust-colored sea of soft furs.