Black Neon

by Tony O'Neill

  Randal had little doubt that setting foot in one of those hell-motels that he had once frequented regularly would be a difficult experience. He imagined himself laying on one of those typical half-collapsed twin beds, the black and white TV bolted to the wall, the busted drawers, scuttling cockroaches and threadbare carpets… and to top it off, this strange Frenchman demanding an audience with junkies, drug dealers, hookers… Randal reflexively felt for the bottle of Adderall in his pocket. He was seeing Dr Titov tomorrow to up his dose. Focusing his attention on the twenty thousand dollars at hand he hoped that an adequate dose of pharmaceutical amphetamine would provide enough of a cushion to help him survive the next two weeks without relapsing.

  Jacques looked at Randal, very seriously, and said, “Randal. I have a question for you.”

  “Shoot.”

  “Have you ever taken a two-thousand dollar shit?”

  “I can’t say I have…”

  Jacques shook his head, and took a long, thirsty gulp of his cocktail.

  “Well I just did, and I am not too happy about it. It necessitates a slight change of plan. We must score drugs, Randal. Heavy drugs, yes? Immediately! The whole project depends upon it…”

  Jacques grinned maniacally at Randal. “Oh Jesus,” Randal said, thinking about his twenty thousand dollars, “Look Jacques, I’m not one to be giving lectures about drugs, but…”

  “Everything that follows but is meaningless, Randal. If you are not one to be giving lectures about drugs, then spare me. I need drugs. You know where to get them, yes?”

  “Yes Jacques. Of course I know where to get them.”

  “Perfect!” Jacques suddenly relaxed, and gave Randal a friendly slap on the back that nearly knocked him off his seat. He bellowed, “Drink with me!”

  He ordered another martini for Randal, and proposed a toast: “To that vile, demanding bitch – art!” For the first time – but not the last – that day, Randal had the suspicion that maybe, just maybe, this whole deal might not have been as good an idea as he’d first supposed.

  ELEVEN

  “It was the only time I’d ever lived outside of Reno. I was in LA for a year and a bit. I was working at Jumbo’s Clown Room… I’d just turned twenty. This musta been… what, eight years ago?”

  Genesis lit a Virginia Slim and tossed the smoldering match out of the window. Lupita’s 1970 Cadillac Eldorado tore through the desert somewhere between Yerington and Shurz. The dry heat gushed in through the open window for a moment, like the scorching blast of a hair dryer. She rolled the glass up again quickly.

  Genesis and Lupita had been talking for two hours straight, snorting meth out of a small plastic bullet as they sped toward their destination of Laughlin, Nevada. They were due to meet a connection of Lupita’s who had agreed to buy the excess pills from the Friendly’s job. Plus, Lupita said, the bigger the distance between themselves and Reno the better. For the first time in years Genesis felt truly free. For once there was no need to worry about money, no tricks to turn, no drug dealers or irate landlords to pay off. Lupita was her protector, her teacher, and her liberator. Ever since they had met there seemed to be an abundance of everything: of drugs, of time, and best of all there was an abundance of Her. This sense of liberation – sudden, total liberation – made Genesis euphoric. For once in her rotten life she was actually living in the moment, and the limitless possibilities of the road turned her on. She didn’t know where they would head after Laughlin, but Genesis was excited to find out.

  “I had a boyfriend back then,” she carried on, “his name was Jack. He was real handsome. Square jaw, dark hair. Looked like he mighta played football back in high school, you know? Like he’d walked straight out of a J Crew catalogue.”

  Lupita laughed. “He sounds like a real cocksucker,” she said, turning down Amos Milburn singing “Bad, Bad Whiskey”. They had a bottle of Wild Turkey stowed under the passenger seat, which Lupita would occasionally take a long slug from while she drove. When Lupita held the bottle, Genesis would reach across and hold the wheel steady. The booze, speed and painkillers made them feel invulnerable and holy, and their conversation weaved and danced along with the thunderous roar of the Eldorado’s engine.

  “No… no, he was a nice guy. Totally polite and respectful. Treated me good. Didn’t drink, didn’t do drugs or any of that stuff around me.”

  “What were you with him for?”

  Genesis shrugged. “He liked me. He had some good payin’ job that he tried to explain to me once… he was in mergers and acquisitions, he said. He’d come over to my place most nights in his suit and tie, carrying that silly briefcase of his. You know, he was the first guy I ever knew who owned a briefcase. I actually met him at Jumbo’s; it was a party for one of the guys at his office. He seemed kinda shy, but he asked me for my number and… and he called. We just kinda hit it off. It was real secretive because of his wife… so we had this little routine worked out. He’d be done with work around seven. He’d come over most nights so we could fuck, or talk or whatever. Then he’d go back to his wife’s place. Sometimes he’d bring take out, and we’d have dinner together. Maybe a bottle of wine, but he wouldn’t drink. Went on like that for six months, or more.”

  “He sounds like a real sweetheart. How was the sex?”

  “Good. I know you don’t like dick none, but it was good. He was a little… predictable, I guess is the word.”

  “Honey, it’s not that I don’t like dick, I just don’t like what they come attached to. Anyway, so you said it was predictable?”

  “Yeah, not bad or nuthin’… it was good I suppose, just nuthin’ mind blowing. I mean, I wasn’t complaining. I was getting off three, four times a week. It was just…”

  “Dull.”

  “Right. When we were done we’d lay around talking about this and that, just lay there bullshitting y’know? He didn’t have too much to say for himself, tell the truth, and that’s why I was already getting itchy feet. I was still seeing other people, but it was getting to be a commitment with him. I didn’t see any future there. I was thinking about cutting it off when it happened.”

  “When what happened?”

  “Well that’s what I’m getting’ to. Hey, you want some of this?”

  Genesis pulled the bottle out from under the seat, pulled out the cork, and took a long hit. It burned like hell, but somehow with the crank burning in her nostrils and head it seemed bearable. She was drunk but alert. She smiled at Lupita. Lupita looked beautiful today, Genesis thought. Smiling and carefree, the desert sun made her profile look like a faded Polaroid of some long-ago summer love. She passed it over.

  “Thanks hun,” Lupita said, taking a hit and passing it back without dipping below 80mph. “So go on, I’m intrigued – what happened between you and Mr. J. Crew?”

  “Well, that’s the funny part. One night he comes over as usual, and he’s got a present for me. All wrapped up in pretty paper, with a bow, the whole bit. I figured it was clothes, from the way it felt, you know? It felt kinda soft, and bulky. I went to open it and he tells me no, he wants to take me out to dinner first. This is weird, because like I told you if we ate together he would always bring the food. He was too weirded out about getting seen out with me, what with his wife and all. Apparently she was some big hotshot bitch in the movie industry, a producer, or an agent, or some shit like that. Everybody in town knew her an’ she knew everyone. But this night, he wants to take me out. I could tell it was a big deal for him, because he was acting as sketchy as hell the whole time. But whatever, right? I understood. I thought it was sweet that he was even gonna take the risk.

  “So he takes me out to some fancy-ass French place in Venice, and I notice that he’s drinking wine. When I saw that I started to figure that maybe he’s trying to work up the nerve to tell me that it’s over, or something.”

  “Hmm. What did you do? Were you upset?”

 
“Nah. Like I said, I was thinkin’ about calling it off myself, so I wasn’t too bothered. I just made sure that I ordered the most expensive shit on the menu, you know?”

  “Thatta girl.”

  “I ain’t no fool. You ever eaten steak tartare?”

  “No, can’t say I have.”

  “Well don’t bother, unless the idea of eating a plate fulla raw chuck with a side salad appeals to ya. The snooty little bastard waiting the table didn’t tell me that they don’t even cook that shit.”

  “Girl! You actually ate raw meat?”

  “I could only manage a coupla bites. After that I started hitting the wine, hard. Jack didn’t even notice. He was too preoccupied. He was hitting the wine pretty hard himself. We got through three bottles in all. After that we split back for my place. He didn’t say a word to me the whole way over. Just kept looking at me with these moony eyes, like some dopey teenage kid with a hard-on.

  “When we get back to my place, we’re barely inside the door when he jumps me. Grabs hold of me, spins me round, and starts kissing me. Really kissing me, like he was trying to eat me alive. I gotta say, it was pretty nice. I’d never seem him that… passionate before. He was normally one of those reserved types, you know? He practically drags me into the bedroom, and then he tells me – in a real serious voice – he tells me that he wants me to tie him up.”

  There was silence in the car for a moment.

  “That’s it?” Lupita finally said, “All that buildup, and he just wants you to tie him up? Damn, even this motherfucker’s kinks were boring.”

  “Shhh! I’m not done, baby. I had this bed back then, a real nice one. Solid oak, four-poster, the whole bit. It was the first expensive thing I bought when I started making serious money stripping. When I was a kid I slept on this shitty, thin mattress and I always promised myself that when I made some decent scratch, I’d buy myself a real nice bed.”

  “Okay. So Mister Wonderful drinks a coupla bottles of wine and tells you he wants you to tie him up. Did you do it?”

  “Well, that’s the thing. It was no big deal, right? Seemed like a lot of fuss over nothing. I told him that I figured I had some scarves or something around the place that we could use. That’s when he starts looking real sheepish, you know? Shakes his head and says – real businesslike – That won’t be necessary. So he goes and gets his briefcase, puts it on the bed. It’s one of those nice leather ones, with a combination lock, the whole bit. He puts in the combination and pops it open. Lupita, I ain’t kidding, my jaw just about hit the floor.”

  Lupita grinned. “Oh yeah? What was in there?”

  “Okay, dig this. He’d had this briefcase along with him every time he’d come over for the past six months, yeah? ‘Cos he’d always come over after work. I’d never really thought too hard about it, but I guess I’d figured it would be full of a bunch of shit like papers, and fuckin’ rolodexes or whatever people put in those things normally. Planners, shit like that? I’d never been interested enough to ask, to be honest. It was a fuckin’ briefcase, you know? Hold on.”

  Genesis took another long snort from the bullet. “God,” she said, “That’s some good ice. Feel like I’m snorting broken glass.”

  “Uh-huh. Top-notch shit. At least old Paco was good for something. So, go on…”

  “Okay. The inside of the case was a custom job. Red velvet, with, like, sections cut into it. All the right size and shape, so nothing moves around in there. And he’s got all of this shit laid out there. Handcuffs. A gag, one of those ones with a rubber ball that fits in your mouth. A bottle of lube. And to top it all off: dildos.”

  Lupita laughed her deep, throaty laugh. She motioned to the bullet. Genesis held it to Lupita’s nostril. She inhaled deeply as they flew through the remorseless desert, the methamphetamine burning its way up her nostril and deep into her brain, sending her head buzzing with a delicious jolt of electricity.

  “You say dildos? Plural?”

  “Uh-huh. Four of them. Each one bigger than the last. The biggest one was this brutal-looking black rubber number that looked like you could beat someone half to death with it.”

  “Shit. So what was his deal?”

  “Well. He sees the look on my face. So he tells me to open my present. And god damn it, instead of some nice underwear or a dress or something, it’s a fucking belt, a harness thing with an attachment for the dildos. Like a strap-on thing. I got the picture real quick after that, what he was working his nerve up to ask me to do. Jack wanted me to cuff him to the bed, gag him, and fuck him in the ass with the strap-on. And when he starts talking, suddenly he’s real calm and businesslike. He’s telling me, First you’re gonna use Ringo, you gotta start with Ringo, ‘cos that’s the smallest one and then you can work your way up to George. If things are going okay, we can go all the way up past Paul to John, but we gotta be careful with that one ’cos if you force it in I won’t be able to walk straight tomorrow. That’s what he called them, John, Paul, George and Ringo… I gotta tell ya, I wasn’t expecting that.”

  “I’ll say! Fuckin’ hell, so old Jack liked it in the ass, huh?”

  “Sure did.”

  “Did you do it?”

  “Yeah! Of course. I’d never got to fuck a guy in the ass before, so I was all into it…”

  “So wait – what happened with Jack after all of that? So you fucked him in the ass. Did you still cut him loose?”

  “Actually, no. After he laid that whole trip on me, I started to get interested in him again. Made him seem more… I dunno, interesting, or alive or something. I started to figure that maybe Jack had some other hidden depths to him, and he wasn’t as plain and boring as I’d figured before he pulled out the cuffs and the strap-on, you know?”

  “I can see that. So what did happen with you two?”

  “Ugh.” Genesis rolled her eyes, and lit another cigarette. “Two months later, it’s my birthday. I made the fuckin’ mistake of telling him. He stops over the day before with a present for me. Says he told his wife that he’s gonna be away on a business trip over the weekend. So he can spend some real time with me, you know? He says he has something planned for us, and hands me an envelope. You know what that cocksucker gave me?”

  “Nah, what?”

  Genesis exhaled a cloud of cigarette smoke and rolled her eyes.

  “Tickets to see the fuckin’ Dave Matthews Band. Backstage passes, the whole bit. Says he spent hundreds of dollars getting them, the show was sold out or some shit. Apparently, some people actually pay to see them.”

  “Fucking hell.”

  “I know, right? I mean, I went along with him. To be polite. But after that… I dunno, I just didn’t look at him the same way no more. He went down in my estimation so much, I just couldn’t even find him attractive after that.”

  Lupita nodded, smiling sadly. “Well, I can understand that Genesis, hun. It’d be a deal breaker for me, too.”

  They drove in silence for a while after this, lost in their own thoughts. Lupita scanned the arid landscape, looking for a place to pull off. Genesis reached under her seat, and had another long pull on the bottle.

  “I mean, the Dave Matthews Band?” she said again, mostly to herself, “What was that motherfucker thinking?”

  Lupita pressed harder on the accelerator, and they tore down Highway 95, kicking up a storm of sand and gasoline fumes in their wake.

  TWELVE

  “So this your first time in LA?” Randal asked, as they crawled down the 110 toward Los Angeles. The traffic was bumper to bumper, a sea of gleaming chrome stretching off further than the eye could see. The cars crept toward the city like an army of asthmatic turtles reluctantly dragging themselves toward the grave.

  “Unfortunately no,” Jacques said, flicking through the channels on the digital radio. He settled on an oldies station playing Surfing Bird by The Trashmen. “They dragged me out h
ere when Dead Flowers was released. It was dreadful. A bunch of boring parties with slow-witted movie executives and their wives with the face like this…” Jacques placed his meaty hands on either side of his face and pulled the skin back. It gave his face an obscene, leering effect. The sight of Jacques’ fat, wet lips pulled tight over his skull reminded Randal of some bottom-feeding undersea creature. “And the movie stars! What a lousy lot! Dull and stupid, all of them talking to each other and craning their necks in case someone more important entered the room…” Jacques shook his head. “Putain.”

  “Not a fan of the city of angels, huh?”

  “Los Angeles is the end of civilization.” Jacques said. “I am fascinated and repulsed by it in about equal measure.”

  Randal smiled a little. “That sounds about right. Goddamn, this is a great tune.” He turned the radio up, nodding his head slowly to the beat of the music. “Okay Jacques, well I guess we’d better get the formalities out of the way. I’d better tell you upfront that I’m in recovery. I’ve been clean for six months. That’s the most clean time I’ve had in as long as I can remember. And I aim to keep it that way.”

  “Totally clean?” Jacques raised an eyebrow, theatrically. “No drugs at all?”

  “Nope. Nothing except the medication my doctor prescribes, that’s it.”

  “Ah, oui. God bless doctors. They have all the best shit, anyway. And, uh, what about alcohol? I seem to remember that you took a drink with me, did you not?”

  “Well, yeah. I mean, I might have a glass socially or some shit… I don’t really see booze as a problem. I was a speed freak, you know? Booze was never my vice.”