In the City of Shy Hunters

by Tom Spanbauer

  Rose’s hand stopped. The washcloth stopped in my hair. Then Rose wasn’t touching me. The sound of water dripping into water. Rose’s bracelets clack-clack.

  The cool washcloth on my buttocks. When the cool hit, I pulled my ass in tight.

  Rose, I said. I fucked my sister!

  Around and around on one butt cheek, then the next, the muscles stretching, loosening, opening up the crack. The cool washcloth down my crack.

  My breath in.

  The sitar music had stopped. Only silence.

  Rose’s voice was deep. It was always deep, but right then Rose’s voice was deep.

  Most people, Rose said, Remain stuck in Fatum, believing they are who they are because of the childhood they had.

  The sound of water dripping into water. The washcloth down my one thigh, then the next, smooth and slow and cool.

  The Shy Hunter, Rose said, Has emerged into his life as a character in a play. The only way out of his pain is polemical. He has to change the role he is playing.

  Instead of Polynices, Rose said, He’ll play Antigone. Instead of Anne Frank, he’ll play Mother Theresa. Instead of Clark Kent he’ll play Superman, Rose said.

  My body was part of the bed. My hands, fists in the pillow.

  Rose touched my shoulder, put his open palm firm on my curve of arm, pulled steady.

  I closed my eyes, rolled over.

  Silence. Only silence.

  Then: William of Heaven? Rose said, Are you still with us?

  Through my eye slits, Rose was an outline of Rose in front of the Italian chandelabra. My legs were spread. Rose was kneeling between my legs, his hands on my calves, holding on.

  My mother’s nerves.

  Yes, I said.

  Rose’s breath, deep, in and out.

  And now my dear William of Heaven, Rose said, You said you are my friend. You said I can trust you.

  Rose’s hands went down my calves to my ankles, his hands gripped my ankles, pulled.

  And I believe you, Rose said. But it’s not that easy with me. And so I propose a little test.

  Test? I said. What kind of test?

  Rose let go my ankles and got off the bed, the bed bouncing. He opened a drawer, pulled something from the drawer. When Rose sat back on the bed, he sat by my thigh. When he spoke he leaned over close.

  You must trust me, Rose said.

  Rose wrapped the ends of a red silk scarf around his hands, pulled the scarf tight. He placed the red silk scarf on the sheet, a gash of red on the white. Rose picked up my left hand, laid my wrist on the red silk scarf, and tied a bow around my wrist like a Christmas present.

  I was smiling. Stopped smiling.

  Rose, I said. What the fuck?

  A Shy Hunter is a warrior, Rose said. The key to being a warrior is not to be afraid of who you are.

  Rose tied the red silk scarf onto the bedpost.

  In my forearms, up to my shoulders, then up into my left wrist.

  Or who you are, I said.

  Exactly, Rose said.

  When Rose went for my right wrist, I jumped myself up off the bed. My body ran smack into Rose, extra-lovely brick shithouse. Our bellies, our chests, our necks were naked, and we were touching.

  Rose’s lips at my ear: Lie down, Rose said. How can you have a friendship if you can’t trust?

  I don’t want to trust, I said. I don’t want a fucking friendship.

  Rose pushed me back, took my right hand, pushed my hand down into the pillow.

  Just like that, I pulled my left leg up, put my leg between my chest and Rose’s. Then brought my other leg up. My feet were against Rose’s hips.

  I pushed with everything I had.

  Between me and the chandelabra light, Rose was a flying body off the back end of the bed.

  Silence. Only silence.

  My right hand was busy undoing the bow on my left wrist. I almost had the bow undone, when Rose laid his hand, open palm, on my back.

  My elbow into Rose’s chest.

  Fuck you, Rose, I said. How fucking long do I have to take this Shy Hunter shit? Jesus Christ, I said. Why the fuck should I trust you to tie me up? Fuck trust. Bring out your designer gun, I said. Maybe I can trust you even more if you bring out the designer gun.

  The red silk bow fell off my wrist. I turned to jump off the bed, but there he was again, all two hundred and sixty pounds of him. Brick Shithouse Rose.

  Naked chest to chest, Rose’s lips at my ear.

  The hero gains the substance of himself, Rose said, By struggling against his fate.

  That’s when Rose kissed me. The inside color of his lips, his tongue, the sunset color flowing into my mouth, down my throat, through my heart, splash down into stomach, cattle prod to cock.

  THE RED SILK scarf was around my left wrist, the yellow silk scarf around my right wrist. Rose tied the Christmas-present bows, then tied the scarves to the bedposts.

  In all the world, there I was, naked and tethered to a bed.

  My face turned toward Buddha.

  Rose lit a pyramid of incense and turned the sitar music back on.

  The scarves got tighter the more I pulled.

  The fates lead those who will; who won’t, they drag.

  Rose’s hand touched my chest, the cool wet washcloth across my nipples, down my sides to my hips, over my heart, down my middle.

  The Shy Hunter, Rose said, Knows he is not only the prey but, in fact, he’s also the vicious totalitarian asshole.

  Vicious Totalitarian Assholes ‘R’ Us, Rose said.

  Rose’s hand, the washcloth slowly down, down, down to the base of my cock, down the shaft, up the sides of it poking up, around the helmet head, down under along the cord of stretched muscle. The washcloth cool on my ball sack, Rose rolling my balls in his extra-lovely hands.

  But, I said.

  Nice butt, Rose said.

  Rose rubbed his Sahara Desert palm across my butt.

  Then: There is nothing, Rose said, There is no thing but you regarding the thing, and there is nothing left to do but regard the thing that is you, as prey.

  It’s all drag, Rose said.

  Stalking yourself gives you something to do, Rose said. An existential project. There is no greater project, Rose said, Than trying to connect with your heart. And then showing the pathetic little thing to someone else.

  Rose’s hand cupped my balls, the soft white wet washcloth around my cock up, a slow massage, up and down, up and down.

  That’s when I saw the stars.

  All over on Rose’s bedroom ceiling were planets and stars. Gold sun, silver moon, red Jupiter, purple Pluto, Saturn with its rings. The whole Milky Way. The light from the candle flickers, tiny illuminations up there in the dark.

  The Known Universe.

  Just like that, down low, down deep in my loins, the known universe was twisting onto itself, sore and soft, hard and dense.

  The scarves were stretched to the max.

  I was levitating, I swear, my pointed toes so pretty, my body two feet off the bed, sucked out the window to the Con Ed building.

  Good thing I was tied down.

  The sensation, a finger drawing a circle around my heart.

  Friendship, trust, Rose said. Tenderness in sadness. We must believe in love, Rose said.

  Rose knelt on my feet so I wouldn’t fly off. My back arched and arched, Rose’s firm grip on my cock slow and steady.

  Perfect, just perfect.

  Just keep dancing, Rose said, And cop an attitude.

  Rose pushed my legs up, his smooth head against my inside thighs. Rose’s breath right up against my balls. His voice inside my balls.

  The known universe, the soft sad hard dense funnel of wind inside me, was blowing out fast.

  Some people like to bitch, Rose said. Bitching is OK. But for me, I choose a kind of joy—a lucid compulsion—a polemical kind of fuck-you-motherfucker joy.

  We are the mess, Rose said, So we might as well enjoy it.

  Enjoy, my lip
s said. Enjoy.

  Deep down deep, up hard through ancient pathways, old highways, labyrinths, haylofts, my raw heart, sweat sperm and pigeon shit, the cum in me, cumming not praying, the wad of life burst out of me, slap into the air, a fist, flying flying, a falling star, a meteor, a tiny illumination across the universal sky.

  ROSE WAS A smooth black stone on the white sheets. We weren’t touching. We were smoking Sho-ko-lat rabbit turds in the lovely erect pink penis. I rolled cigarettes, one for Rose, one for me. Rose got up, pulled back the red velvet curtain, and opened the window, and early morning, entre loup et chien, was coming in through the window. Mel Tormé, Bom to Be Blue, on Rose’s stereo.

  It was on the second toke that Rose leaned back and put his hands behind his head, the big muscles of his arms flowing down into his arm-pits. Rose blew out smoke, took another toke, held the smoke in. Blew smoke slow out of his black nostrils.

  You, my dear William of Heaven, Rose said, Are very strong.

  Did I hurt you? I said.

  I deserved it, Rose said. Did I hurt you?

  Yes, I said.

  How’s that? Rose said.

  I ain’t ever going to be the same, I said.

  Rose’s fingers touched my fingers when he handed the erect pink penis to me. His fingers went down my arm and wrapped around my bicep.

  You know, Will, Rose said, You’re in a unique situation.

  My situation wasn’t as unique as it had been only minutes earlier, tied up to the bedposts, my cock hitched to a star, shooting sperm all over Rose’s clean white bedsheets. But I didn’t say anything. Rose had taken his fourth toke, and I knew I was in for a story.

  The Greeks, Rose said, Believed that when incest was vertical—that is, Rose said, Father with daughter, mother with son—that the child of this union was born a hero.

  In my forearms.

  Rose toked again, held his breath, and talked the way you do holding smoke in. Hero, Rose said, in the sense that the child’s task is to restore order to the universe, since his or her own birth, because it was incestuos, destroyed the Golden Mean and brought chaos into the cosmos.

  Rose let out the smoke and handed me the lovely erect pink penis.

  Antigone is a good example of a hero, Rose said. She was Oedipus’ daughter.

  Outside the window, in the street, another New Yorker gone to hell.

  On the other hand, Rose said, If the incest was horizontal—that is, brother with sister—the child of this union was born a monster, a creature who could bring about the twilight of the gods.

  Up my arms, to my shoulders.

  Fucking like that, Rose said, Was reserved only for Zeus and Hera. And when they did it, she was a cloud and he was a mountain.

  I sat up in bed, put my feet on the floor, my head between my legs. Cum on my inside thighs.

  And your situation, my dear William of Heaven, Rose said, Is unique because actually you were your mother’s boyfriend—psychically speaking, weren’t you? Plus then you fucked your sister.

  Through my heart, splash down into stomach.

  Vertical and horizontal, Rose said.

  Ergo, Rose said, You are both the hero and the monster. The hunter and the prey. Vicious Totalitarian Assholes ‘R’ You.

  The monster your hero has to slay, Rose said, Is within you.

  That’s when Rose reached around me, put his hand on my stomach, rubbed my stomach, then rubbed up to my heart, touching me where it hurts when I smoke.

  Then: You know, Rose said, You white people can be fucking spooky.

  WE TOOK VALIUMS because we were so jacked on the Sho-ko-lat. Plus the sound in my head. My mother my sister my mother my sister. So Chinatown my mother’s nerves in my head.

  Warm and dark and soft on Rose’s bed.

  Then, out of the dark, Rose’s deep voice.

  Will?

  Yeah, I said.

  Like Antigone, Rose said, I too must follow my heart.

  The way the candlelight hit Buddha, the Buddha was floating.

  I’m going to nail these motherfuckers for giving me this disease, Rose said.

  I pushed myself up, put my hands on Rose’s face, on his ears, on his shaved head.

  AIDS? I said.

  The word that hurts.

  HIV positive, Rose said.

  My heart, the broken pieces scratching against my chest. I put my chest against Rose’s chest.

  You know who gave it to you? I said.

  Yes, Rose said, I know.

  Who? I said.

  The horrific whisper: God, Rose said.

  God? I said.

  You’ve got to liberate yourself from your concept of God, Rose said.

  Rose’s face in his hands, the candlelight on Rose’s shaved head.

  The God who gave me this disease is the God of Taken as Given, Rose said: Ronald Reagan, and Nancy, Margaret Thatcher, George Bush, the Pentagon, the CIA, the FBI, Oliver North, Bernhard Goetz, Ed Koch, and Cardinal O’Henry, the whole fucking hierarchical gaggle of White Paranoid Patriarchs.

  AIDS is the shadow of Christianity, Rose said.

  He sat up. His right eye was almost closed, his left eye one hard ebony stone rolled smooth.

  I am the hero, Rose said. And I am queer, and I am here to restore natural order. And believe me, Rose said, the jig is up. There is a new order and these honky white heterosexual motherfuckers are going to pay.

  Antigone made of herself a sacrifice, Rose said. There must be a sacrifice, Rose said, To restore order.

  In all the world, in Rose’s apartment, just like that, out of the blue, the huge footfall of the monster, breaking glass, crushing buildings, darkening the sky.

  Everywhere dogs barking, wolves.

  JUST BEFORE WE slept, my body spooned into Rose. I put my lips to Rose’s ear. Rose, I said, Rose, you got to get rid of that gun.

  BOOK THREE

  CHAPTER

  EIGHTEEN

  After work one night, when I grabbed the newel post of 205 East Fifth Street and swung myself up the stairs, there in one of the garbage cans were a couple of two-by-fours and a black plastic bag filled with plaster, and Fiona was banging away inside Stranded Beings Searching for God.

  I put my face to the glass under the poster of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and put my hands around my eyes. Fiona was knee deep in rubble. Her bushel of black hair was tied under a red scarf and she was wearing cutoffs and a white T-shirt that were covered in the thin black dust that’s everywhere in the city. She was trying to pull a big nail out of a two-by-four.

  Fiona unlocked the door and I said something nice, like, Hi, Susan Strong, would you like a beer? or something really simple, and just like that Fiona’s arms were around my neck and she was crying. Not just crying a little bit but an all-out wail.

  All I could think about was how was I going to get my white shirt clean again, but there was no getting away from her. Plus, the last time anybody held on to me like that was Charlie 2Moons.

  So I held Fiona.

  After she settled down, I went upstairs and got two beers and brought them back down. I kicked the Sheetrock and plaster and crosshatch out of the way, and Fiona and I sat down. My black waiter pants were covered in white dust. I rolled a cigarette for Fiona, one for me.

  When I asked, What’s wrong? Fiona snuffed up and wiped snotty black off her nose with her arm.

  Everything, Fiona said. Every fucking thing is fucking wrong. My father and my mother are giving me such shit about Stranded Beings Searching for God. Mom’s trying to convince Dad not to give me anymore money. My mother is such a bitch! I can’t find anybody to do the work, and all my clothes and my computer and everything I own is covered in this fucking black dust. And how can you have a performance space if you don’t have anybody to perform? I can’t even pull this fucking nail out of this fucking board, let alone open a performance space!

  And then, Fiona said, To top it all off?

  Fiona’s bottom lip started shaking and her whole face seemed to
cave in to the scar under her nose. Fiona grabbed on to me again, her body against mine, the big sobs in her against me.

  Fiona’s body against mine was jerks back and forth, back and forth, waves of in and out. How much like cumming it was, Fiona crying like that.

  My hand on Fiona’s scarf on her head. I touched her shoulders, put both arms around her. She was so tiny.

  You’re going this way and then shit happens and then you’re going that way.

  My brothers, Fiona said, lips against my ear. My twin little brothers, Fiona said, The Hyannisport Homos, the YUFAs—both of them are in the hospital. Intestinal flu, Fiona said.

  Both of them? I said.

  They can’t stop shitting, Fiona said.

  After a couple more beers and more smokes, I got Fiona to come up and take a shower. We called out for Chinese. Fiona came out of the shower wrapped in my big white towel, rubbing her hair with my blue towel, her skin so white against the white towel. Fiona sat down on my futon, I lit a cigarette, put the cigarette in my green-dish ashtray, drank from her can of Budweiser. The Chinese came and I paid for it, and I got some dishes and paper towels and sat down next to Fiona. Fiona Garlic Chicken, me Szechuan Shrimp. Just my wagon-wheel lamp on, WBLS on my boom box, low jazz at the end of the dial, her white legs in the lamplight, the white towel wrapped around her, Fiona cross-legged sitting on the futon eating Chinese, talking talking.

  You know, Fiona said, Sometimes I just go shit-spray thinking about it: Argwings Khodek, the essence of performance art, the master of complete presence, just up the stairs from me. If I could get him to perform at Stranded Beings Searching for God, it would be a big help.

  I was ripping open the soy sauce with my teeth. Fiona laid down her fork and took a drag on the cigarette.

  I’ve contacted Alien Comic, Fiona said, But he hasn’t got back to me. Holly Hughes might be interested, but she’s in Minneapolis. And Ethyl, Fiona said. Ethyl Eichelberger! And can you imagine getting John Kelly?

  I need a microphone system, an amplifier, a curtain. Where the fuck do you buy a stage curtain, Pottery Barn? And chairs, Fiona said. And I’ve got to sell beer and something to eat. What do you serve at a performance space? Do you microwave corn dogs or make little sandwiches? I don’t have time to make little fucking sandwiches. I hate little fucking sandwiches. Maybe soup?