In the City of Shy Hunters

by Tom Spanbauer

I raised my Hennessy snifter.

  Fuck hope! we all toasted.

  * * *

  FUCK HOPE AND all the tiny little towns, one-horse towns, the one-stoplight towns, three-bars country-music jukebox-magic parquet-towns, pressure-cooker pot-roast frozen-peas bad-coffee married-heterosexual towns, crying-kids-in-the-Oldsmobile beat-your-kid-in the-Thriftway-aisles towns, one-bank one-service-station Greyhound-Bus-stop-at-the-Pepsi-Café towns, two-television towns, Miracle Mile towns, Viv’s Double Wide Beauty Salon towns, schizophrenic-mother towns, buy-yourself-a-handgun towns, sister-suicide towns, only-good-Injun’s-a-dead-Injun towns, Catholic-Protestant-Mormon-Baptist religious-right five-churches Republican-trickle-down-to-poverty family-values sexual-abuse pro-life creation-theory NRA towns, nervous-mother rodeo-clown-father those little-town-blues towns.

  Daniel laid out three more lines and did his line first, then John, then me.

  Fuck ’em.

  Matching pickup and horse-trailer towns, superbowl Sunday towns, America-Love-It-or-Leave-It Ronald Reagan towns, the heartland, I’ Amérique profond apple-pie mashed-potatoes-and-gravy towns, grain silos-by-the-train-tracks towns, county-sheriff-black-and-white-Chevy towns, Vietnam-vet-Native-Americans-buying-beer-in-the-open-24-hour-neon-by-the-freeway towns, Paul Harvey good-day towns.

  John poured more Hennessy. I rolled cigarettes all around. Three more lines, one line each.

  Fuck ’em.

  All you local yokels. Four-wheel-drive Silverado fucking dog murderers.

  From the fuck-you town: Fuck you!

  Fuck hope, Daniel and John and I all toasted.

  And the horse you rode in on, I toasted. Fuck the scared stallion hope rides in on! I said.

  Daniel took a quick look at John. John’s smile made Daniel smile.

  And the horse you rode in on! Daniel and John said.

  Fuck it.

  We toasted.

  A DARK RESTAURANT all around. Halogen light down onto the smooth butcher paper on the round table. Café Cauchemar, Sade singing. The clock above the swinging red doors says 2:10 A.M. if you squint. I’ve drawn an orange tree next to the cornflower-blue Fuck Hope. The butcher paper is the moon, reflected light, and the moon is my table. With the pink red, I draw a moon on the paper, an image of the moon on the moon, two moons.

  Oh, hell, Charlie.

  Daniel and John are just beyond the moonlight, beyond hope, fucking New Yorkers in each other’s faces talking talking, loud, fast, smoking the cigarettes I’ve rolled. I can’t roll cigarettes fast enough, we’re smoking so much, so we’re smoking Marlboro Lights too. The Marlboro Lights are in the moonlight shadow of the Hennessy bottle, the line of Hennessy in the bottle low. With Harvest Yellow I trace the arch of Hennessy, then outline the shadow of the bottle.

  High enough to think I am New York.

  There’s the moon, my arms and hands in the light of the moon, the Crayolas, the ashtrays overflowing, the Marlboro Lights, my bow tie, my corkscrew, my pens, the rolling papers, the tobacco. Then there’s another bottle of Hennessy, and for John seltzer, and for me a can of Heineken, then John lights a joint and there’s more smoke on the moon, clouds, and then I’m rolling cigarettes again.

  The Sistine Chapel God is out there in the dark up on the ceiling, pointing. Out there, again again, is Sade’s stuck loop “Smooth Operator.”

  On the table, on the moon, into the light, I place my hand, fingers spread, and trace around my hand, cornflower blue, and my hand is on the moon.

  How I love, how I cherish this moment, this tiny moment of redemption from the ordinary, my fifteen minutes of super-cool sexy totale. My long reach to the hand of God.

  But it’s not the truth.

  It’s not God, only cocaine, and this moment in between I am so present in, a moment so full of meaning and understanding, is a moment I will forget.

  Daniel took his long-nailed pinkie finger to the next square of red paper. You hope for cocaine! Daniel said, and laughed again, so hard he had to stop with the red square and put it down. John was laughing too. John was leaning up against Daniel, laughing, Daniel’s hand inside John’s white shirt, under John’s third button, moving his hand around under the shirt, up and down, side to side.

  Champagne! Daniel screamed a little scream and threw his arms up like Rose, Rolex flash in the light, diamond ring flash-flash. John’s shirt was unbuttoned to below where I could see. Daniel took his hand from John’s nipple ring and John got up and danced out of the light into the dark, where there was the bar if you squinted. John put the flower bottle on the butcher paper next to the Hennessy bottle and three chilled tulip glasses, popped the cork with his thumb, and screamed the little scream the way the guy in La Cage aux Folls screams when the champagne cork startles him, and John and Daniel laughed and started in on La Cage aux Folles and the time when the guy screams and gives the homosexuality away.

  The little scream that gives it all away.

  John lit a joint; we passed the joint around. I rolled cigarettes, John poured the champagne. We toasted. The old joke.

  Fuck hope.

  Beyond all hope, Daniel said.

  Abandon hope, John said.

  Reach out and take what you want, I said.

  Daniel and John gulped down the champagne, threw the champagne glasses over their shoulders into the dark, tiny shatterings. Daniel first, then John, held their hands out, fingers spread out all the way, reaching out to take me. They were laughing. I laughed too.

  John walked into the dark to the bar. I rolled cigarettes. John came back with two more tulip glasses. When John sat down I saw his eyes were blue. In the light, John’s chest was white, not white like the moon but harvest yellow, and his skin, in the light, not like the table but soft. Nice kind of hair on his chest.

  THE CLOCK SQUINT showed 3:30 A.M.

  Across the table, just beyond the light, John’s head was back against the banquette and his eyes were rolled up a little, Saint Theresa Gone to Heaven.

  Daniel scraped the flakes of white from the red square onto the reflected surface of the moon. From the surface of the moon, from the third button of his pin-striped shirt, Daniel was looking at me. Under the surface of the moon, from the third button of his pin-striped shirt down, Daniel moved his hand slow up and down.

  John’s eyes were half closed like Mapplethorpe’s guy, coming, not praying. His shirt was open and the way the hairs on his chest were looked beautiful.

  I got up and walked thick arms and thick legs around the table. I sat on the other side of John. John’s pants were open and John’s cock was hard. Daniel reached over and made a fist around John’s cock. Daniel made a sound and his mouth said the word lovely at me soft and slow. I laid my head down, my ear on John’s chest, on the nice hair, against his heart.

  John smelled like Polo.

  Then: Horse dick! Daniel said. Just what the fuck is going on here? Get over here, Daniel said. I’m going to show you something.

  Daniel pushed the table away from the banquette with his feet. The scrape against the black-and-white tile was loud, glasses and bottles clinking up together. I jumped out of the light into the darkness.

  Daniel unbuttoned his shirt, kicked his shoes with the tassels off, King Lear Gypsy Rose Lee; Daniel unzipped his pants, pulled down his Calvin Kleins. Daniel bent over, pulled his one black sock off, lost his balance, went down on one knee, got up, pulled off his other black sock.

  Daniel stood in his spotlight for life poking out his hard beer-can dick, his Rolex, his diamond ring left hand third finger, waving his dick back and forth, back and forth, pumping on it.

  In the halogen light, Daniel’s soliloquy he’d never remember:

  Come take a look at this, goddammit, Daniel said. Do you work for me or not?

  All daring and courage, all iron endurance of misfortune, make for a finer, nobler type of manhood.

  Sit down, Daniel, I said.

  Next to John, Saint Teresa Gone to Heaven, Daniel sat down.

  On the floo
r, on the black-and-white tiles of the floor, I knelt down. I was so close I could smell his balls. The halogen light on his pubic hair. Polo.

  Nice one, huh? Daniel said. Big, Daniel said. Do you like it?

  Beer-can dick, I said.

  Monster cock, Daniel said. Faggots love it.

  Daniel put his third finger left hand, the diamond wedding ring finger, onto his piss slit.

  You want to suck it? Daniel said.

  All of us silent, even Sade, all of us all one thing.

  How do you get your mouth open that wide?

  Then: I want, I said, To draw a picture of it.

  Language my second language.

  Daniel’s breath in, his breath out.

  What? Daniel said.

  For posterity, I said. Postmodern totemism. Pretend I’m Andy Warhol, I said.

  On the table, I found the cornflower blue, grabbed a Heineken beer can, and I tore off a piece of the butcher paper. I put the butcher paper on the black-and-white tiles of the floor.

  Daniel leaned back and spread his legs, his cock pointing straight up.

  I handed Daniel the Heineken can.

  Hold the beer can, I said, next to your beer-can dick, I said. That way the drawing will have a proportion.

  Daniel smiled and put the Heineken can next to his beer-can dick. Daniel’s cock was as big around at the bottom as the beer can, but not as big around at the head as the beer can, and Daniel’s cock was longer than the beer can.

  In the circle of light, Daniel’s milky white bare feet, his yellow toenails, his hairy legs, bony knees, Daniel’s beer-can dick and big sagging ball sack hanging down over his dark crack.

  Pas sexy totale.

  On the butcher paper on the black-and-white tiles of the floor, I drew the outline of Daniel’s cock first and, when I got the shape and dimensions right, I colored in between the lines, using the red pink. I used a lime green for the Heineken can. The grid of the black-and-white tiles on the floor poked through.

  When I was finished, I showed the drawing to Daniel, his big pink and blue beer-can dick, his ball sack hanging down, the dark crack, juxtaposed with the lime-green beer can.

  Daniel took the drawing, pulled the drawing close to his eyes, squinted.

  Monster cock, Daniel said. Nice one, huh?

  Beer-can dick, I said.

  Only blacks got bigger cocks than Jews, Daniel said.

  What about Italians? I said.

  Now it’s your turn, Daniel said. Let’s see this big horse dick of yours.

  I stood up. Just like that, all at once, Daniel grabbed me around my waist and pulled my white shirt from out of my waiter pants.

  Just like that, I twisted out of Daniel’s grasp and was out of the circle of unrelenting brightness, outside in the darkness, looking in.

  Daniel tried to stand up, couldn’t, farted instead.

  Rule one, I said. Never touch me.

  Fuck you, Daniel said.

  Daniel took the straw and put the straw onto a line on the butcher paper and the line was one of my Crayola cornflower blue lines, and Daniel snorted up the cornflower blue and didn’t know the difference.

  Daniel took the cigarette I rolled him. Lit it.

  Daniel sat down next to John, pulled the table back into him, loud scrape, glass clink, pulled John’s head down into his crotch. Across the surface of the moon, on the red banquette, John was doing the impossible, swallowing Daniel’s cock. Vasty deep. Daniel’s restaurant smile.

  Table for three? Daniel said.

  John’s head up and down.

  This is what faggots live for, Daniel said. Faggots are so good at this. This faggot will do this for you too, Spud. Make your horse dick feel real good.

  Then: Come on, Spud, reach out and take what you want.

  That’s when John puked Hennessy, flower bottle champagne, cocaine, seltzer, cum, a red-pink splash all over Daniel’s cock, down his legs, onto the red banquette, onto the black-and-white tiles of the floor. I grabbed my bow tie, my corkscrew, my pens, the drawing of Daniel’s beer-can dick.

  Outside on 46th Street, drifting snow.

  My arm was in the air and a blast of cold wind blew up my white shirttails.

  Two-oh-five East Fifth Street, I told the cabbie. Between Second and Third.

  It was the kind of cab with greasy Plexiglas in between. Outside my window, speeding light, darkness, speeding light.

  I’m already dead, Charlie, I said, And you’re dead too.

  Where the fuck are you, Charlie 2Moons?

  Fuck hope, Charlie.

  Fuck fucking hope.

  CHAPTER

  TEN

  AyaHuaska and Chub were chomping at the bit, raring to go, neck and neck. We backed their butts up against the barn door, the way we always started. Charlie took his red T-shirt off and tied it to the saddle strings, then tied his two reins together in a knot at the end, making the two reins one rein, then placed the knot in his crotch between him and the saddle horn. I did the same thing with my T-shirt, tied my reins together the same way. Then, as close as we could to the same time, we let the reins go slack, gave the horses a kick in the flanks, threw our heads back, and raised our arms into the air.

  Flying manes, tails up, Charlie and ayaHuaska, me and Chub, galloping through the shadow tunnel of cottonwood leaves and branches, kicking up dust and horse farts, then over the railroad tracks, across Highway 30 to the sagebrush plains, the low flatland and the tall grass, into the tules, down into gullies, to the bottoms.

  I did an Arabesque, which is where you get behind the saddle and balance on one knee, then raise the other leg in the air and point your toe and arch your back, face up, and look up at the sky.

  Charlie did a Suicide Drag, where you start out sidesaddle, then you put your left foot through the strap loop that’s tied to the horn, and then you arch your back, and your whole body hangs head down over the saddle with your free leg in the air, toes pointing at the sky.

  THE WAY THE sun was, Charlie’s Grandfather Alessandro and his house seemed to be sitting in a pool of water. Alessandro was sitting out on his porch in his rocking chair, in the only shade for miles. Back and forth, the rocking chair on the old wood, the whole house a drum of Charlie’s grandfather, back and forth in his rocking chair.

  Hello! Hello! Alessandro called.

  It’s me, Charlie! Charlie yelled. And Will!

  I know who you are! his grandfather yelled. I’m old but I’m not blind!

  Charlie grabbed the reins and pulled ayaHuaska to a stop just at the two cedar posts and the old iron gate in front of the house. Charlie was tying up ayaHuaska to one of the cedar posts when Chub and I got there.

  Before walking through the old iron gate, Charlie put his red T-shirt on. I tied Chub to the other cedar post, pulled on my T-shirt, and when I walked through the iron gate, Charlie was on the porch, bending down and hugging his grandfather.

  Grandfather Alessandro looked like any old cowboy. Dusty cowboy boots sticking out the bottom of his Levi’s, his Levi’s hanging down over his skinny butt, a leather belt that had 2Moons tooled into the leather, a red Bannock Rose beaded belt buckle. An old blue shirt, sleeves rolled up to above the elbow, wrinkled elbows, rough skin, like rubbing your hand over a wall of wet weathered cedar shingles—same color too. An old straw hat totally molded to his head. Between his hat and his shirt collar, big wrinkles on the back of his neck that made diamonds on his skin.

  You boys been jerking off in the sagebrush? Grandfather Alessandro said.

  Charlie laughed. No jerking off today, Grandfather! We’ve been playing our game, Going Slack.

  Going Slack, Alessandro said. I know that game, he said. That’s a good game. Boys should play games, instead of keeping their nose in a book all day.

  Charlie smiled gap-tooth at his grandfather.

  Grandfather, Charlie said, You know I love books.

  Books are in the mind, Grandfather Alessandro said. Too many books and you forget your body is in t
he world.

  Then: I see you brought your buddy Hey-Soos, Grandfather said.

  He always called me Hey-Soos, Spanish for Jesus. Grandfather Alessandro talked funny. Half of what he said you could get, but mostly it was like Shakespeare—English, but another language at the same time. I don’t think Alessandro liked me much. Because I was white, I guess, or maybe because of my father.

  I walked up to the porch, and, like I always did with Grandfather Alessandro, I didn’t look at him, just looked down at my feet and stood where I stood until Grandfather Alessandro put his hand out and I took it.

  You boys must need some water! Grandfather Alessandro said.

  Charlie walked in the door of the square one-room house, painted white once, with only half a window. The shiny wet milk can with the water in it was right by the door. When Charlie pulled off the lid, there was a metal echo sound.

  Charlie lifted the red tin cup off the nail where the cup always hung, dipped the cup into the milk can, lifted the cup out, dripping, and handed it me. The red tin lip against my lip, I swallowed big. When Charlie drank, two drops of water fell on his red T-shirt.

  You want water, Grandfather?

  Charlie held the red tin cup out in the air between me and Grandfather Alessandro.

  No water for me, Grandfather Alessandro said. But you better get your horses some from the trough in the back.

  Then: I’m going to the Sun Dance, Alessandro said. They’re dancing over at Buffalo Lodge. You coming along?

  The metal echo sound. Charlie pushed down on the lid of the milk can with both hands, then sat his butt down on it. Hung the red tin cup back on the nail.

  We were there yesterday, Grandpa, Charlie said. Don’t you remember?

  Grandfather rocked back and forth, back and forth, the whole house a drum.

  Sundance takes three days and three nights, Grandfather Alessandro said. Today’s the last day. Why don’t you come along?

  I kept my eyes on the old gray wood of the porch floor. Grandfather’s eyes were really looking at me.

  If Einstein was an Indian and somebody took a chisel to his face and then fed him sagebrush for a year, Einstein might look like Grandfather Alessandro.