“Come on, Aimee, let’s go,” Margot whispered to her friend and for good measure got up out of the chair and followed Brooke into the lobby. Aimee came lumbering after. Alone, she would have spent the whole day there. Still, she was surprised and pleased that the other women lasted as long as they did.
They picked a café and sat close to the restroom to accommodate Aimee’s frequent need to pee and puke. Margot ordered a salad, Brooke a coffee, and Aimee a steak with potatoes, broccoli, and a chocolate milkshake.
“Why not,” she laughed. “It all comes up anyway.”
“How many times have you seen those movies?” Margot asked when the food came.
Aimee held up two fingers.
“Two times?”
“No, too many times.”
More laughter and then Brooke, who was only just starting to wake up, spoke with some concern in her voice. Hiding was not something she imagined her old friend Aimee would happily indulge in.
“Why?” Brooke said incredulously.
“Why keep seeing a movie I like?” Aimee asked, already in defense mode. “Why not? I like that the men are so heroic and the women are so beautiful and the bad guys are really evil.”
“They’re probably not really evil,” Margot said.
Brooke was staring at Aimee, trying to figure out the right way to begin her intervention against her friend’s growing movie addiction. Margot filled the space by thinking out loud.
“It’s bad press. The losers always get bad press. The story is written by a hobbit and he had obvious prejudices against Orts.”
“Orcs.”
“Whatever. I just mean that if you told the story from the other side you would see different issues.”
“No,” Aimee said. “The Orcs are evil.”
“How do you know?”
“They’re born evil.”
“That’s very un-American of you. Very undemocratic,” Margot said, enjoying the hypothetical argument. “What if they change, grow beyond the limitations of their status? What if some little Orc-girl is born in the mud and shit and wants to raise herself up higher than what is expected of her?”
“It’s not possible,” Aimee said.
“There are no Orc girls,” Brooke added helpfully. “The Orcs are an all-male race of beings.”
“Oh, well, then they’re totally fucked,” Margot laughed and speared a tomato with her fork. “Still, you have to agree that regarding the character of the Orcs, it is a rather one sided story.”
“I like the guy with no eyebrows,” Brooke said.
“What guy with no eyebrows?” Aimee asked, as her stomach began to turn sour.
“The guy who becomes the king,” Brooke said, as if it were obvious which character in the movie had the least eyebrows.
“Aragorn?”
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
“He has eyebrows.”
“Well, just barely and they’re so close to his eyes you can’t really see them, but, other than the eyebrows, a good man, I think. I mean from the parts I saw. Now that elf, he had serious eyebrows. Aimee, are you ok?”
Aimee jumped up from her chair and rushed to the bathroom.
“Is that normal?” Brooke asked.
“I think so. Being pregnant makes you sick, right.”
“Yeah. That’s true.”
In the cramped space of the bathroom, Aimee held onto the sides of the toilet and threw up more than she thought she’d eaten. She felt hot and dizzy and nasty. She wanted to die or at least be in her own bed so she could lie down. And then there were tears that felt like a physical force in her head drilling through the front of her face to get out. She swallowed them down and up came more vomit. Aimee was on her knees, begging, “no, please no” as more came up, and then again. All the food was out of her stomach and only liquid came now, a smelly yellowish fluid.
At the table, Margot and Brooke were still analyzing their friend’s obsession with the movie. Brooke kept looking from the door to the ladies’ room and then back at her watch.
“She’s been in there too long?” Margot asked.
“Yeah, I think so,” Brooke said.
Margot got up from the table, followed by Brooke.
Aimee was still on her knees in front of the toilet, her feet thrust out the front of the tiny stall. One of her sandals had fallen off and she was crying.
“Hey, Aimee, you ok?” Brooke asked gently as she picked up the sandal.
“No. I ruined my dress.”
“Is it ok if I open the bathroom door?”
“Ok,” Aimee said in a small voice.
Brook opened the door, reached in and quickly flushed the toilet. She slapped the lid down and helped Aimee to her feet. Aimee sat down on the toilet seat and Brooke wiped the tears off her face. Margot peeked in.
“You ok, honey?”
“Yeah. I just wanna go home, though.”
Margot grabbed a paper towel from near the sink and Brooke wiped away the thick yellow fluid from the front of Aimee’s blue jumper.
“Is it because of what I said about the Orts?” Aimee laughed a little, but the action was so close to crying that more tears came out.
“I’m gonna pay the check and get us a cab. We’ll take you home,” Margot said.
“I’m sorry I ruined the day.”
“Oh honey, don’t worry. The day was ruined for me the minute you suggested those stupid movies.”
Aimee whimpered a little, afraid laugher would hurt and start her puking again.
“I think you should see a doctor.”
“I will.”
“I think you should see a doctor today.”
“I have my regular appointment next week.”
Margot stuck her head into the bathroom.
“I got a cab. You need help to the door?”
Aimee leaned on her friends and waddled to the door. Margot grabbed the several bags of extra food she had bought at the takeout counter and then the three of them got into the cab and zoomed Aimee back to her apartment.
Margot remade the bed with fresh sheets and Brooke helped settle Aimee into them. Before Aimee could say “I’m starving,” Margot whipped out her shopping bags filled with the rest of their lunches, a whole chocolate cake, and dinner for Aimee to eat later, when she was alone. She also had several bottles of seltzer, not club soda.
“Thanks,” Aimee said. “Thank you both so much.”
They talked well into the night, hitting on hundreds of subjects. When they came back again to Aimee’s favorite topic “What a Freak Show That Girl Lux Is,” Brooke broke out from Aimee’s domination of the subject.
“I think she’s nice,” Brooke announced.
“Ew, you’re gross,” Aimee laughed, licking the back of a fork full of chocolate cake. “How can you be a friend of mine and her friend too?”
She would have said more but a deep cramp told her that another round of puke was coming. She didn’t want to end the pleasant comfort of her friends in her room and cake in the bed by jumping up and running to the bathroom so she sat quietly hoping it would pass and miraculously, it did.
“I don’t like her with Trevor,” Brooke said.
“She’s so wrong for him,” Margot said too quickly and Aimee laughed.
“Margot!” Aimee teased. “You and Trevor?”
“We’re friends. There was one kiss and then nothing.”
“A kiss? When?”
“A couple of months after his wife left.”
“Does he kiss good?”
“I thought so.”
“And then what happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“I guess then he met Lux.”
“That little bitch! She stole him from you.”
“Hey!” Brooke said. “She didn’t know our Margot had staked a claim on him.”
Our Margot, Margot thought. I like that.
“I didn’t stake any claim to him, Aims. I just kissed him.”
> Aimee didn’t answer. When her friends looked over at her, both thought she had turned rather pale. Aimee was fully focused on herself and the burning sensation inside her body. Something was breaking inside, literally, not figuratively. Aimee froze in pain and when it abated for a moment, she kicked her legs, pushing friends and cake and covers off the bed. Aimee was bleeding.
A cab was too risky, the ambulance would take twenty minutes. Margot called the firm’s car service; they could be there in five minutes. Margot and Brooke carried Aimee to the elevator in her nightgown. The car arrived a minute later.
“Lay down, lay down in back,” Brooke shouted. “Margot, you ride shotgun and I’ll hold her head back here.
“No, no, no, not shot, no gun. She’s just bleeding,” Margot was telling the hospital. “Yes, about six months. We’re about fifteen blocks away. Right. Ok.”
Margot snapped her phone shut and told the driver.
“The emergency entrance is on Seventh Ave.”
The driver nodded and handed her the chit for her signature. Margot signed and entered the firm’s billing code for client development.
“It’s gonna be fine,” Margot told Aimee as she signed for the car. Brooke was stroking the tears out of Aimee’s eyes and telling her the same thing as they helped her into the ER.
“It’s just way too early,” the young doctor said as he examined Aimee. “She needs at least another six to eight weeks before she can breathe on her own.”
“She?” Aimee asked. Margot and Brooke, both crowded into the examining room, looked up in surprise. Brooke clapped her hands with joy.
“Oh, sorry. Did you and your partner not want to know? I’m sorry. I didn’t read through the whole chart. Jeez, I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right,” Margot said.
“I’m sorry, I ruined it for you both,” the doctor said to Margot.
“I’m not the partner,” Margot laughed. “I’m just the friend and transportation.”
“Don’t look at me!” Brooke said because he had looked at her in that way that needed such an exclamation.
“My husband’s out of town for a while,” Aimee said smiling at the thought of a daughter.
“Well, he should come back in town because as soon as we stabilize you, you’re going to have to be on bed rest till the end.”
“And what exactly does bed rest entail?” Brooke asked.
“Nothing,” said the doctor as if nothing was really something very big indeed.
“Nothing?”
“You can’t move or get up at all. We’ll start you in here with a catheter. Next week you can start getting up to go to the bathroom, but then right back to bed.”
“And she gets up for eating of course,” Margot said.
“No. She can sit up in bed for the meal but then she lies back down.”
“But I can’t,” Aimee started. “I have to go to work tomorrow. I have cases open all over my desk. I have attorneys waiting for my paperwork. I can’t do nothing! I’ll lose my job!”
“Your desk will still be there when you get back to it,” Margot said. “And the firm covers a hundred percent salary for this kind of short-term disability. It’s in the newest benefits package. This won’t even eat into your sick days.”
“But how am I supposed to do nothing!” Aimee wailed at the very thought of it.
“You can’t take any pressure on your cervix or it will open up again,” the doctor told her. “Your baby’s only three pounds. Her lungs don’t work yet. She needs to gain at least another two or you’re gonna have trouble. Call your husband. You’re spending the night here. Tomorrow night as well.”
Aimee slept while Margot called. Then Brooke called, trying to track him down.
“He just stepped out,” said the receptionist.
“You can try him at this number,” said his agent.
“You is got the número incorrecto, idiota,” stuttered an exasperated man the third time she called the number in Tokyo that was supposed to be his cell phone.
Everyone knew where he was but no one could actually get him to come to the phone in person. For two days they left messages and waited for him to call. At the end of the second day, Margot and Brooke came back to the hospital and took Aimee home.
“He’ll call,” Aimee promised as Margot tucked her into bed. Brooke had gone home and Margot was planning to spend the night.
“You don’t have to,” Aimee said.
“I want to,” Margot smiled at her friend. She brought the TV and DVD player into Aimee’s room and almost choked when Aimee asked for all of the Lord of the Rings DVDs to be stacked into the player.
“Don’t tell Brooke, though,” Aimee laughed. “She thinks I’ve got an addiction.”
“Right now you do what makes you happy,” Margot said, kissing Aimee’s forehead. “But if that movie plays again I’m going in the other room and reading the paper.”
“Go home. I’ll be fine.”
“Guess what, I don’t have anything else to do,” Margot confessed. “It’s nice to be here with you. It’s nice for me, I mean. I’m going to sit here and read over some things I need to look at for work. In a couple of hours I’ll make us dinner. If you need anything give a shout.”
Margot turned on the machines and handed the remote control to Aimee. As she left the room, she heard the low flute playing, signaling the beginning of another trip into Middle Earth. After about a minute Aimee switched off the TV and called to Margot.
“Hey, Margot, you wanna just come in here and talk?”
18. She Busy…
CARLOS SAT IN LUX’S apartment, surrounded by cans of bright white satin paint, masturbating. He had a full technique for whacking off that involved the gel his sister used for her hair. Corn oil was cheaper and much better for him and for the skin on his dick, but it was harder to transport. The sticky hair stuff got hotter in the friction of his hand, but if used too often, it gave him a rash. However, packaged in its handy tube, it was the fluid of choice for masturbating away from home.
Lying down on the drop cloth, Carlos had one hand stroking the long shaft of his penis and the other tucked up his shirt and curled around his own nipple. As his balls started to contract, his sphincter tightened and his breath came harder and harder. Just as it got so good, he slowed down the stroking of his hand and willed himself to stop. Carlos never came when he masturbated.
“Ooooooh!” Carlos groaned and crumbled into a fetal position on the floor of Lux’s new apartment. He had been thinking about her and so it was particularly hard to control his desire to shoot sperm all over the floor. Lux, his first girl, the first one whose shoulders he had pushed down on until her knees bent and her mouth was level with his crotch, had been off-limits for four years. Joseph would cut him or cut him out if he ever messed with her again. Carlos assumed it had everything to do with Joseph’s weird quasi-Catholic disapproval of his only sister’s sexuality and nothing to do with the fact that he had twisted her pinky finger so far that it had fractured, the bone breaking through the skin.
He lay curled up on the hardwood floor of an apartment he didn’t know she owned, trying to gain control of himself and the memory of her skin. He wanted to finish painting the trim before it got too hot. Maybe he’d take her to a movie if “Old Cock,” as he liked to call Trevor, would let her out for a night.
The key in the lock made a clicking sound and Carlos jumped to his feet.
“Hey! What’s with the chain?” Lux called from the hallway.
“I’m coming,” Carlos called, even though he wasn’t in any sense of the word. Carlos gently slid his still-rigid penis into his underwear and threw on his coveralls. He carefully opened up three cans of paint and set them out on the table before sauntering to the door.
“Who do you think’s coming to get you?” Lux asked, indicating the safety chain with her cup of coffee.
“Just a habit,” Carlos said, flipping it off its hook and opening the door.
“Fuck, you lo
ok beautiful,” he said as she entered.
“Out of the frying pan and into the shit-eating fire,” Lux said to him, knowing he would have no idea what she meant. He didn’t care what she said and rarely listened to her, which had always given her the freedom to speak as she pleased.
“Do you think I swear too much?” was the next non sequitur to fall out of her mouth. She followed him down the small hallway that lead to the living room. Carlos didn’t answer. He listened to her babble waiting for the odd phrase that made sense to him. Only then he would answer.
“Fuck you, Carlos!” she said as she entered the living room.
“What?” he answered.
“It’s eleven o’clock! What did you do all morning?”
“First I got the paint. Then I had to find the keys and then when I opened the first can it didn’t look right so I opened a few more and they didn’t look right either so I was about to call you when you walked in the door.”
Lux looked at the paint.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“It’s white.”
“Yeah.”
“I thought it was supposed to be…red.”
Being the boss is weird, thought Lux. He’s lying through his ass, but what am I gonna do?
“No,” Lux said. “White is right.”
“Good. All right so, unless you want to stretch out on the drop cloth and I’ll go down on you, and you don’t have to touch me at all, baby, it’ll be all about you this time. Oh yeah, I can feel you in my mouth right now.”
Carlos showed her his tongue whipping in and out of his mouth, shaking like a rattlesnake’s tail, the very tip of his tongue accentuated and attenuated to a stiletto tip promising a dance of precision and intensity that, in Lux’s experience, could only be matched by the Shower Massage by WaterPik.
Lux watched as Carlos kept working the muscles of his tongue. Trevor had lent Lux a weird, old book called The Inferno and showed her how to understand the words. She devoured the thing, laughing through the night as she read.
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