Greta was a classic Swiss mountain girl with long brown hair and the body of an Olympic shot-putter. I’m not kidding about this. She could have been on the cover of Swiss Female Bodybuilder magazine, if such a publication existed. She must have been fifteen years younger than Rudy, at least. The thing that really got me about her was her insecure, imperfect smile. She had one little fang tooth on the side which stuck out from the rest and you could tell she was self-conscious about it. It looked great though. She could have been a supermodel, at least that’s what I thought.
Rudy and Greta had a young daughter, a small tank of a child named Trudi who all day long ran across the sharp rock cliffs of Resort Tik Tok with no shoes or clothing. One time I saw her trip and tumble thirty feet down the rock ledge and land in a bush. Then she got up and ran along on her way. No tears or even a whimper! She was amazing, that Trudi, but it was her mother I was most interested in.
My plan had been to hole up inside my seaside shack and write for hours and hours each day. I’d build up a portfolio and then take the publishing world by storm. I got little writing done during my first month there, however. Knowing I’d likely be without electricity, I had made what I thought was a very clever purchase back in Bangkok: a solid little manual typewriter with stylish metal keys. It sat unused for weeks though, gathering dust on a table inside my hut. All I could muster on that island was a few weak sentences scribbled in pencil in a wrinkled notebook which I later lost in a café. Whatever motivation I’d had to write or generally work for a living had ebbed away. I was reasonably content to pass my days simply lying in the hot sun watching Greta in her bathing suit chasing Trudi around.
Rudy, I feared, had caught on to my admirations, but they had few paying customers and he tolerated my presence with cautious reserve. Rudy had some Chinese characters tattooed on his forearm and one day I asked him what they meant.
“Peace,” he told me.
“That’s it?” I said. There were four or five different characters there. I thought they must say more than that.
“That’s it,” said Rudy.
I watched him walk away, this angry hulking Swiss man, and tried to picture the young hippie he might have once been, the man who wooed beautiful Greta, and asked to have “Peace” carved into his arm.
I had been there nearly a month and accomplished nothing. Then an attractive Israeli woman checked into the resort with her French boyfriend and they quickly got in a bickering fight. He left the next morning and she proceeded to smoke hashish and drink rum punch all day long out on the veranda. I joined her in the afternoon and by nightfall we were both naked, pressed together on the single cot in my shack. She was a wet kisser and kept calling me “Jacques,” the name of the boyfriend who had just left her. I tried to imagine that she was Greta but it was no use. I awoke the next morning terribly hungover, with the Israeli woman sprawled asleep on the sandy floor below me.
I watched her sleeping there for a little while. She really was quite pretty, and sophisticated too, despite the way we’d spent the previous day. Back home such a woman would have avoided the likes of me, but the rules were different here on this island. Her eyes opened and she looked at me.
“What’s your name?” I asked her. If she’d ever told me I’d forgotten it instantly.
“Malka,” she said. “My name is Malka. Who are you?”
“We met yesterday,” I told her. “My name is George.”
She rubbed her eyes and looked around. Her body heaved and she jumped up and made for the doorway, where she puked outside on the rocks. Little Trudi happened to be playing nearby and laughed at this.
Through the thin walls of my hut I heard Greta’s gentle voice. “Shhh, Trudi,” she said. “It’s not nice.”
Malka stuck her head back inside my shack and said, “I’ll see you later.”
I assumed I wouldn’t actually be seeing Malka later but in fact I did. She was eating an omelet at one of the small restaurants down on the beach and asked me to sit with her.
“You feel better?” I asked her.
“A little,” she said.
We became friends, me and Malka, bonding over the mutual failures that mired us at Resort Tik Tok. Later I confessed to her my longing for Greta.
“That woman is a lesbian,” she told me.
“No, she’s married to Rudy,” I said. “They have a daughter.”
Malka gave me a pitying look.
“Why do you think Rudy is so upset all the time?” she said. “He married a lesbian.”
I thought about this and could see that Malka had a point. There appeared to be little chemistry between Rudy and Greta. On the one hand this realization made me happy, because it meant that Greta didn’t actually love Rudy, but on the other hand it made me sad, because now she wasn’t going to end up loving me either.
Malka and I fell into a routine, sleeping together until late in the afternoon, eating omelets, and then getting drunk throughout the evening. We were both trying to avoid something, me with my writing, and her with whatever was going on with Jacques, that Frenchman who’d left her there. I chose not to ask about it, and in turn she didn’t mention the dusty typewriter on the table.
One afternoon we were lying asleep on my cot and something crashed into the outside of my shack. It was Trudi. She got up, of course, but then Rudy started yelling at her. He shouted vile German curse words which I couldn’t understand, but made Trudi cry. I got up and stuck my head out the door just in time to see Greta come along, scoop Trudi off the ground, and give Rudy an angry look.
“Shame on you,” she said to Rudy. And then she added a few words in German which made him really blow his top. Rudy’s face turned red and he picked up a wooden bench and hurled it down the rocks, where it splintered apart and landed in the ocean. He screamed and spit flew out of his mouth as he rattled off German insults at his wife. Greta appeared unmoved.
That night at the resort restaurant Greta cooked a fish for Malka and me and we ate it with a bottle of cheap white wine.
“I’m running out of money,” I told Malka. “I haven’t planned well. I thought I could stay here and write for months, but I’m nearly broke already.”
“Well, you’re not writing anyway,” said Malka.
“I know,” I said. “I know that, thank you.”
When we were through eating Greta came for our plates and Malka said to her, “That fish was delicious.”
“Thank you,” said Greta.
Malka put her hand on Greta’s and left it there. Greta stared down at her and smiled.
“You’ll join us this evening?” said Malka.
Greta nodded and walked away.
“What just happened?” I asked.
“She will be joining us,” said Malka.
“Us? Where?”
“In bed. At your hut.”
I couldn’t believe it. Malka had never discussed this possibility with me. My heart began to flutter and my throat got tight. Greta! A threesome!
After dinner I hustled back to my shack to get things in order. The little cot would not do. I flipped it over, pushed it against the wall, and spread blankets on the floor. Then I lit some candles and decided to do some push-ups. I was excited. I felt I needed to get my blood flowing properly, perhaps puff up my pectoral muscles so as to appear more attractive. Malka walked in as I was doing this and told me to stop.
“Don’t be an idiot,” she said.
Greta arrived at the shack around midnight. I was surprised to see that she was carrying Trudi in her arms. The little girl was asleep. Greta laid her down in the corner and looked around at my candles and the overturned cot.
“Okay,” she said.
We drank some Thai beer and smoked hashish with tobacco and everyone tried to relax. Finally Malka leaned over and kissed Greta on the lips. Right before it happened Greta gave this little smile, flashing the crooked tooth. She kissed Malka back tentatively and I sat there watching. What was I supposed to do?
Malk
a removed Greta’s shirt and then took off her own. I felt stupid watching them and considered leaving the hut, a coward’s move, I knew, but I’d be damned if I was just going to sit there and watch them like a monkey. Then Malka grabbed my leg and pulled me closer. Suddenly we were three people all groping one another, a desperate pile of humanity. I couldn’t tell whose hands were doing what. We all got naked and Malka began licking me. I looked over at Greta and she smiled again. I ejaculated on Malka’s face. It was terrible timing. I couldn’t help it.
Malka wiped herself off and turned her attention back to Greta. They looked amazing, the two of them gliding against each other in the candlelight. Greta began to moan and then Trudi woke up.
“What are you doing, Mother?” she asked.
Greta said, “Shhhh…” and Trudi lay back down to sleep.
I joined back in with Malka and Greta but it was hard to find my rhythm. I wanted to be with Greta yet I suspected she wanted to be with Malka, and Malka, I knew, would have preferred her man Jacques over either of us.
Eventually we all fell asleep in a confused heap. In the early morning twilight I felt a hand brushing slowly across my stomach. It was sturdy and different from Malka’s. I was scared to open my eyes. I slid my hand over and touched Greta’s firm side. Greta! We rolled together slowly and began to kiss. I couldn’t believe it. She grabbed hold of me and I ran my hands all over her muscled back and wonderful Swiss breasts. Oh yes! We lay together side by side, trying not to wake the sleeping bodies around us.
I remember telling myself, You must savor this moment. It will not last or happen again.
I let out a sound, a groan or a grunt, and woke Trudi up. She stared at us with wide, calm eyes and again I ejaculated at an inopportune moment.
“Your daughter’s awake,” I told Greta, once I had caught my breath.
Greta wrapped herself in a blanket and picked Trudi up off the floor. They left the shack.
Malka lay asleep against the wall. Perhaps she was just pretending to sleep. I wrapped my arms around her and dozed off.
That next day it was cloudy. It had been sunny and hot for thirty straight days and now it was cloudy and cold. Malka and I walked to get our morning omelets and as we ate she told me it was time for her to go.
“I’ve waited here long enough,” she said.
She went back to pack her bag and I hitched a ride to the post office over the hill. When I got there I found a small bundle of mail waiting for me. Two letters from friends, a book which I’d ordered, a bill, somehow forwarded to me all the way out here, and finally, a check. It was from a magazine. Five hundred dollars. I could live another three months on that, at least. I flipped the check over and over in my hands, making sure it was real.
When I got back to Resort Tik Tok, Malka was gone. She’d left a note on my cot. As I began to read it Rudy burst through the door and socked me very hard in the face. I felt a crushing pain in my skull, blacked out for a second, and woke up with him standing above me, his two huge fists ready for more.
I rolled myself up into a ball and said, “Please stop.”
“You took Greta,” he said to me.
“I didn’t take her,” I replied. “I didn’t take her anywhere.”
“You took Greta,” he said again, and kicked at my ribs. This time I did not reply.
Rudy picked up the rickety cot which had been leaning against the wall and threw it down upon me. I let it stay there as a frail shield. Then he took all my clothing and flung it out the door.
I thought of something clever to say at that point, still hiding under the overturned cot. “Hey, what about ‘peace’?” I said, pointing to his tattooed arm.
Rudy grabbed my manual typewriter from the table and slammed it against the wall. Then he stomped upon it, crushing several of the keys.
“Fuck you,” he said to me, and then he left.
I had this urge to just go to sleep, to just stay there on the floor and sleep for a long while, but my head throbbed and there was blood dripping from my lip. A couple of my teeth felt loose. I got up and examined the typewriter. It looked like a wounded animal, a creature run over by a car. Several of the little letter-stamp hammers were bent out to the sides. Most of the keys still worked though. I could still make words with them. I found a blank piece of paper, rolled it inside the mangled machine, and began to type. I typed out a letter to a friend back home, the person with whom I’d left my belongings for when I returned. In the halted language of that messed-up typewriter, I told my friend I’d be staying in Thailand for a while longer and he didn’t need to hold on to my belongings anymore.
“ZEll my Ztuff,” I wrote to him, “or don8tE it plEEZE. The RRiting’Z RElly coMMin Elong now…”
217-POUND DOG
I drifted into New York City and signed a lease on a damp basement apartment in an inconvenient section of Brooklyn. It was a Polish neighborhood made up of three-story brick houses and a waste transfer station which spilled refuse out onto the streets when the wind blew hard. There was a creek too, somewhere, and it was said to be full of oil. That basement apartment had one redeeming feature, a small private backyard, and in the springtime I planted tomatoes there. My landlord, a hirsute woman named Rosie, warned me not to eat them though, because the oil from the creek had permeated the soil. But I ate them anyway, and they tasted fine.
Across the East River loomed the hustle and commerce of Manhattan and I found a job there sorting books and making copies in the library of a large law firm. It was simple, tedious work, but it paid fairly well and I quickly learned how to slip away for long stretches of time undetected by my supervisors. Three nights a week I worked a late shift and remained there until 4:00 a.m. The big firm was nicely quiet then and often I would escape to my favorite back hallway and sit contentedly with a book or magazine.
It was there in that hallway that I first met Jim Tewilliger, the rotund, fidgety lawyer who would come to alter my life. It was nearly 2:00 a.m. and I was sitting on the floor reading when he walked by and glanced in my direction. A minute later he returned and gave me a more careful look. It was unusual to see anyone up there at that hour, especially a lawyer, so I jumped to my feet. Jim was perhaps fifty years old and had lost most of the hair on top of his head. The hair that was left he combed straight back, in thin wisps. He wasn’t bad-looking, though his nervous demeanor caused him to sweat a lot, and I suppose this made him unattractive to some. I had seen him around, marching through the hallways in his gray suit, acting harried and important. He was a partner in the firm, with his name printed on the impressive letterhead. This, as I understood it, meant he had a lot of money.
“I’m sorry,” Jim said to me. He peered down the hallway as if something there were of interest to him.
I held up my magazine. “I’m taking a break,” I said.
“Of course,” he said. “Of course you are.”
He knitted his plump fingers together and shifted about in his leather shoes. Then he turned around and left. I stood there wondering if I had just lost my job, or at least lost my ability to slack off while at it. I was about to go back to the library and pretend to be busy when Jim returned once again.
“Excuse me,” he said. “I’m Jim Tewilliger.” And with that he stepped forward and held out his soft, moist hand.
“I’m Georgie,” I said, trying to look him in the eye as we shook, a practice I was told businesspeople admired.
“Nice to meet you, George,” said Jim. He appeared to relax a little now that we had formally met.
We had a short, pleasant exchange during which he explained that he was a partner and had worked there for eighteen years. I told him I lived in Brooklyn, was new to the firm, and worked in the library.
“Very good,” said Jim. “Excellent.”
And then he looked around cautiously and said, in a hushed, uneasy voice, “I don’t suppose you would know where I might purchase some … a small amount of … um, marijuana? Just a little bit, of course. For persona
l use.”
I did in fact know where some marijuana might be purchased, but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to tell him that.
“I’m sorry,” said Jim quickly, sensing my unease. “I shouldn’t have asked that. Forgive me.”
“It’s okay,” I said.
“I haven’t used the stuff in years,” said Jim. “I just think, well, it might help me to relax, to unwind a little. I used to enjoy it when I was in college.”
I looked at Jim standing there in his fine-cut wool pants and sweat-stained shirt. He seemed very tired, desperate somehow.
“I’m not a dealer,” I told him.
“I know. Of course. I know that. I just…”
“I could bring you some in a few days,” I said.
“Really?” said Jim. “Fantastic.”
“A small amount.”
“Right, of course.”
It seemed a strange business to be conducting within the confines of that stately law firm, but I decided then that it would be done. I suppose I could easily have said no to Jim that night and he would have said, “Of course,” and we would have gone our separate ways. It wasn’t that I was looking for favors from him, financially or otherwise. To be honest, I felt sorry for him. Something in his weary eyes and drawn-out face made him hard to refuse. Standing before me in that fluorescent-lit corridor of the twenty-third floor, Jim Tewilliger seemed like a human I could help.
* * *
Three days later I brought three joints to work with me. I placed them in a sturdy, sealed manila envelope and delivered the package to Jim’s office myself. His secretary, a wily older woman named Roberta, looked me over and said, “What is this regarding?”
I said, “It’s the materials he requested from the library.”
Jim came racing out of his office and snatched the envelope. “Thank you,” he said to us both, and then he darted back inside.
Roberta said, “Jim’s very busy these days.”
“Of course.”
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