All the Dirty Parts

by Daniel Handler

  I flunked a test, a big one. Rain makes me cranky anyway, angry even. Alec acted like a dick all day. I know my mom’s going to give me shit. I am telling Grisaille these things lying on her floor, for her to get down from the bed and make me feel better. Days like today, I am telling her how much I really need to come.

  • •

  When I come on her belly she lounges and dips one finger in, moves around like a skater. We name the babies that have not happened. Mildred. Helga. Skippy. Nobody we’ll ever know.

  • •

  —Would you pose for me?

  —Like naked? No way, Cole.

  —But I’m looking at you naked now.

  —One, I have a sock on. And for two, you couldn’t draw me. You’d just pounce on me in five minutes.

  —No I wouldn’t.

  —Yes you would, look. You’re hard talking about it.

  The word pounce, that was hot.

  • •

  I am playing with her hair. Of all the girls, hers is my world’s favorite to play with.

  —Out of all the girls—

  —Ssh, ssh, don’t say anything, don’t spoil it.

  —I was just always looking for you.

  She sighs a little. She puts a shirt on. She’s right, I wrecked it.

  • •

  —We can’t do it standing up if we’re not the same height, Cole. Not really.

  I stop and need to process how offhand she is, knowing this. Some experience in Germany, up against a wall with some other boy. Kind of hot, kind of sickening. She looks at me and misreads it.

  —Cole, you know I’m taller, right? A little taller. Other fucks. Better fucks than me.

  • •

  —So you pose for me, Cole.

  I’m already up. —OK.

  —Let me get my sketchbook. This pen sucks. OK, put your arm up.

  —What? Why?

  —Because it changes your belly, see?

  —Don’t draw my belly.

  —I’m drawing …

  The pen busy, her eyes hungry with it —everything, Cole.

  • •

  Birds fighting on a tree out my window. Really fighting, not cute, flutter and feather and weird soft hoarse noises. She’s not worth it, I want to tell them, but she probably is.

  • •

  —If we start down low on the bed, your head won’t end up against the wood.

  —I don’t care.

  —Doesn’t it—

  —I don’t care, Cole, if it hurts sometimes.

  • •

  Because I don’t feel safe with her I guess. It feels, not dangerous, but with no seatbelt, no helmet, hanging onto her on that roaring motorcycle day after night after day. I feel endangered a little, probably looking at her the way, Alana was it, Abby, used to look at me when I realized her brother wasn’t around and we could go up to her room. Safe, everyone says about sex. Everyone says everyone should feel safe. I always did, but they never, not quite, I think, I know. My turn, with Grisaille. I can’t always say I like it. But it’s very, don’t-touch-that, hot.

  • •

  —Make me spaghetti.

  It’s a rainy afternoon. We are under a blanket with both our pants pushed down but not off. Everywhere is sticky with it.

  —Is that a euphemism?

  I am hoping. She pokes me. —Spaghetti.

  —I can’t cook at all, ever.

  She elbows herself up to look at me like a cheap broken something, not worth the money to fix. —Look it up on a phone. Boil water. Put it on a plate. Make me spaghetti and Cole, I will show you a new trick I do—

  But I’m already in the kitchen, pulling my pants up.

  • •

  —I really,

  She’s rolling off me with an enormous smile.

  —I really enjoy fucking.

  I feel the flushiness on my face. I stumble out the word, —Good.

  —I mean, I really enjoy it as an activity.

  —Well, that’s good.

  —It is very good. Don’t you like it?

  I raise my hands. —Eh. It’s OK.

  She crawls back and nips me on the face. —Then I! Must! Fuck! You! Better!

  • •

  —There’s gum in my bag I think.

  A girl’s bag is an abandoned warehouse. Stupid people in horror movies are the only ones to venture in. I plunge anyway, a tattered pursey thing with old thick buckles and the lining frayed like a mongoose tried to get out. Rise above the tampons. Wallet, pen, here’s the gum and then the thing small and plastic in my hand like a ring of shivery light.

  —I was going to tell you.

  —You’re on the pill?

  —Just started.

  —How did you, um?

  —How did I what? They’re pills. You put them in your mouth. Every day, there’s a schedule. See, little days of the week on the thing. If you’re not diseased—

  —I’m not. My doctor checks, without telling my mom, which is cool.

  —The clinic’s like that.

  —The clinic.

  —It’s on, what’s the street, near the overpass.

  —There’s protestors sometimes. Guys yelling.

  She shrugs a little, her mouth wrestly on her gum. —There’s another entrance. If you call ahead.

  I didn’t know, slightly, at all, what I was saying. —Isn’t it, but why—

  —It’s OK there. I mean, not my idea of a good time, an exam.

  —So why,

  It was a smile, I guess, but mostly it was—determined, is what she is like, looking at me. —Because, Cole, it’s worth it.

  • •

  It’s one thing to write love poems.

  • •

  She moans face down like a devout prayer, naked with her bra on. My tongue moves all over her legs and her hand cheats up to masturbate. I mean, this is something I never even thought to search for online.

  • •

  —Show me the porn you look at.

  —No absolutely no never no.

  —C’mon. Here? Tell me what site.

  —I am not doing this.

  —A lot of pigtails here. You like this?

  —No.

  But she was already pigtailing herself. It was our first fight, my first fight ever that left me still mad after the sex.

  —I was just curious. I just wanted to know how it is for you. It’s OK you masturbate.

  —I. Do. Not. Want. To.

  —Talk to me, Cole.

  —Talk. About it.

  • •

  She can draw, and she can dress well, and she can make me come so hard with her mouth, but holy fuck she cannot sing. It is like a joke about a puppet show when the song comes on she likes. I turn it up. The song’s OK but so loud it drowns her out.

  • •

  Saving me money and shame she says —Can you believe some girls, at this school, get from their boyfriends, stuffed animals?

  —I know, right?

  I am trying not to be astonished when I say this. So many girls, so many, cooing at the little kitten or whatever. The money for bunnies I have spent, and Grisaille, so beautiful rolling her eyes. This isn’t that.

  —It’s pervy how little kid it is. Look Anna, Daddy got you a teddy bear.

  • •

  —I have my period.

  I force nothing onto my face for her. I know enough what not to say, but the right thing I haven’t learned.

  —OK, we can just—

  —No, I want to do it, Cole. But we need two things. We need a towel, and for you not to freak out.

  • •

  —Who? Maddy?

  —No …

  —Tell me. I’m new here. There is so much, you would not believe, gossip about you. So, Kaitlin?

  —Yes.

  She squealed.

  —We didn’t go all the way.

  —Alice?

  —Alice White or Alice Davenport?

  —Both.

  —Yes. Stop s
quealing.

  —Anne-Marie.

  —Yes.

  —Amber.

  —No. Well, once.

  —Why don’t you list them all?

  —Why don’t you?

  —OK.

  She curled up against me. We both had our socks on, the weird texture of it, cotton and jealousy.

  —OK, first was Marco. He was very hairy.

  —Please let’s do something else.

  • •

  She’s at the bus stop typing to me. —Nothing personal Cole but guys are assholes. Three dudes here with hip-hop so loud, shouting over and over, suck my nuts, suck my nuts.

  —Well, are you going to do it?

  She snaps a picture of her middle finger which even like that looks gorgeous to me.

  • •

  Kristen wants to ask me something.

  —OK.

  She sighs, rattles her fingers on the desk. Mark went and got her a ring, clacky and blue. Not what I like, but if you like that sort of thing. —Forget it.

  —What?

  —Forget it.

  —OK, I forgot it. But what did you want to ask me?

  She pokes me, then sighs. Takes off the ring for a second. If I was Mark seeing this, I would uh-oh. —You’re a guy.

  —That’s what’s on your mind? Yeah, I am. Thought you’d never ask, Kristen.

  —Shut up. But do you, I can’t believe I’m asking.

  —What what?

  She looks away from me and then looks at me and away and a few more times before she exhales, and, —Do you love them?

  —What?

  —Did, I mean. Did you love them. All the girls, and now Grisaille. When you say I love you, and I know you do sometimes, is it real, did you mean it—

  —Kristen—

  —or is it just a thing to say?

  I start to answer, but it’s an answer for the team. Then I see her look. In her eyes is a kid too old for a magician, not knowing how it’s done but wise to the trick that the coin is not, of course, plucked supernaturally from her ear. So the truth, is what I decide, OK yes, to spill. —Both.

  —Both? It can’t be both, Cole. Either you love a girl, a person, or you don’t, and you’re just trying to stay, I don’t know. Coupled. Laid.

  —You’re going to call me perv if I answer this,

  Kristen laughs. —Probably.

  —or worse. But coupled and laid, this is love, right?

  —It’s just a part of it.

  —OK, but a big part.

  —For guys maybe.

  —Yeah, but Kristen, that’s like half the world.

  —What about my half?

  —You don’t like coupled and laid? I’ve known you for what, we met the first day of school. You are happiest now. With that guy. Coupled and laid. It’s a very big happiness. So, yes, we say things. To keep happiness going.

  She’s chewing on her sleeve. —You don’t mean them.

  —Of course we absolutely mean it. You don’t accidentally buy a girl a ring. You mean to do it. You go to the store, you open your stupid wallet. Believe me, he means it, your boyfriend. He wants you both to be happy. And, yes, sorry but not really, not really sorry, laid.

  She’s looking at me, this girl, and boy do I know this look. There are nicer ways to put it, what this look is, the way buying a shiny ring could be called generosity instead of keeping Mark laid. The look is disillusioned, maybe. Disappointed. Kind of very sad but just a little. But the way I think of this look, and it’s dirty, is that she’s sorry she ever opened her legs.

  • •

  —But you’re leaving at the end of the year, right?

  —Cole. This is February.

  —But you’re leaving then. Going back.

  —Cole, you’re pouting.

  —I’m not …

  —How many girls are you with in what, five months?

  —This is different.

  —Maybe, maybe it is. Five weeks.

  —I’m just asking.

  —Don’t miss me already when I’m right here. Next year when you’re lonely you can find me and we’ll wave to our little cameras.

  Another girl on a screen. I’m glad she can’t see me freak out a little.

  • •

  Umpteenth rainish day. Water from a branch drips slow and hits my cheek as I run, quick and cold like thinking about something suddenly. Alec.

  • •

  I prep myself. You’re not supposed to ask. You’re supposed to plan it out. I walk up and tell her. —Valentine’s Day.

  She wrinkles up. —Oh, Cole, do we have to? Could you just come over and we’ll roll around or something? What are you doing? You’re on the ground.

  —I’m thanking the universe for the perfect girlfriend.

  • •

  We snap out of it together, a warm drooly doze in her room. She reaches up and slides the window shut, very beautiful. Right there, on her arm, the sort of beautiful spot like what made pioneers think, let’s put a town here.

  —I want to tell you something important.

  My stomach dips into an uh-oh. I try to keep my eyes, my whole mind, just on the angle of skin across sky in my view of her arm and the window. Finally: —What is it?

  It’s a soft sigh she sighs, but substantial. —I just wish I had something, more or important, to say. Sometimes, you know? After the sex it’s just nothing in my head with you.

  Her arm moves and the sky is all I can see. But I have to say something. —A good nothing?

  —Yeah.

  If I moved my head maybe I could read it better, see where I am and where this is going. But it’s so calm in my eyes, the blue so vacant, for once not a cloud in the sky. A good nothing.

  • •

  —What does it taste like?

  We’re talking in the dark, a lot lately, easier and sexy.

  —You know what it tastes like, Cole. Your body squirts it out all the time and you can’t tell me you haven’t been curious.

  I decide not to think about Alec.

  • •

  Her mom had a tea going, some sweet flowers she got sent from a town with a market in wherever they used to live. Rosy but not roses, some old wives’ remedy tonic, poured into a jar with a tight metal lid to carry with you.

  —Can I have some too?

  Grisaille laughed. —It’s for cramps.

  —It smells good, though.

  —Well, sure. I mean, it’ll definitely work on you.

  We sat on the drizzly steps a bit and I listened to her through a gossipy tangle she was having with two friends miles away onscreen. The steam steamed. The taste made my stomach noisy. I did not in fact have cramps all afternoon. She kicked her flats off talking, bare feet getting dirty and cute in the mess of leaves and weeds unmowed. Something stupid was on in the living room, and maybe it was the tea mixture, but we fell deep truly asleep for an hour and woke up in magic dusky light when it was over. We’d both dreamed something we couldn’t remember all of, and we got giggly over how boring it was to hear the other one’s dumb drony dream summary, all the spacey sentences reaching toward nothing. We made up better endings. Her mom came back home, ravioli with butter, red wine with don’t tell your mother, Cole. Grisaille’s sleepy face, one kiss on the mouth and a pat on the hair, not sorry to go, just sorry to see it over. So, that day. That was as good as fucking, for sure I guess.

  • •

  Halfway through the movie, Grisaille says it’s boring. We make out a little and lose the thread of the plot. She pulls her jeans down, underwear, but keeps them around her ankles, lifts her legs up so my head just fits. I do my new trick of holding her ass, pressing her against my mouth when she comes, until she can’t stand it and almost kicks me away. She says no when I unbuckle for my turn. —That wore me out. You can do it yourself and I’ll watch you.

  I do it quick, my mouth full of her and my chin sticky like I’m done with a peach. Did this with other girls but it was a show, slow to let them see. Here I
just do it, come hard into my own hand grunting like it’s happening, which it is, for real.

  You’re making me, Grisaille, into myself with you.

  • •

  OK, we tried it, and now we know. It’s not a good way to have sex. And also it’s a bad way to eat hummus.

  • •

  We have lunch, real lunch in a restaurant, and I tell her I love her. She doesn’t talk for a bit. The waiter already hates us; she ordered red wine forgetting we weren’t in Europe. I think some other guy, maybe at some European place with a bottle of wine between them, must have said it to her better.

  —I don’t know, Cole. I think you have said this to a lot of girls.

  —I mean it.

  —I know. That’s what I mean. Every time, don’t you, Cole, you mean it.

  • •

  The songs where they say you drive me crazy I’m finally really getting. Her hips rising on the floor and her hands so busy there.

  —Wait. No.

  —I can’t stay on my knees like this. She keeps pulsing.

  —This one isn’t. For you. Cole.

  • •

  My head in her armpit almost, half asleep, looking at the hairs there and when I inhale the smell for a second I think I’m with Alec and startle straight up like a nightmare.

  —What?

  —Nothing,

  And I shake, make something up. —Foot fell asleep.

  • •

  That was a very short game of Truth or Dare we just did.

  • •

  She is laughing. My face is buried in her. It’s not tickling and it’s not eating her out. It’s a thing I am inventing, so happy, talking right to her beautiful cunt. Goddamn delicious, I say, or something, out loud. C’mon juicy, so wet I love you, love everything, pucker up inside fuck.

  —What are you even saying, crazy?

  —Stay with me. Let’s keep at it. Tastes so good.

  • •

  She asks it again, after I say I didn’t hear her. —Would you do something with a guy?

  —No.

  —For me?

  —Like, it turns you on? I don’t know. Depends on what, depends on guy.

  —Let me think.

  —No, the answer is no.

  • •

  —Did you ever do anything with a girl?

  —Last year my boyfriend was into that. He invited over this friend of his cousin. The cousin had this crazy motorcycle and was so fucking hot, Cole.

  —Could you? Talk about the girl, or, maybe let’s not talk about it.

  • •

  —It’s OK, you look at other girls,