The Mammoth Book of International Erotica

by Maxim Jakubowski

She says I was just thinking you know like we used to do.

  I say it was nice the just-like-we-used-to-do – and then it stopped and there was no more just-like-we-used-to-do.

  Kathy says maybe I was dumb to stop our just-like-we-used-to-dos.

  I say yes you were yes you were.

  There are two bottles of wine on the floor. One empty, one full. I pick up the full one, which isn’t all that full, and take a drink.

  Kathy says well you aren’t supposed to say that, that’s not what you’re supposed to say. What you’re supposed to say is: no, Kathy my dear Kathy, you weren’t being dumb you were just confused so there’s a difference.

  I say I was angry.

  She says you didn’t show it.

  No?

  Maybe I wasn’t watching.

  Watching?

  She says you acted – I dunno. You didn’t seem all that angry; or hurt; I wasn’t sure if you cared or not.

  I say no I guess I didn’t show it; I never do; I should have; I think I could have; if I had set my mind on it.

  She says I didn’t know you were mad at me.

  I say well not real mad.

  Good.

  I didn’t understand, that’s all.

  She says there’s nothing really to understand.

  I drink.

  She says maybe I was afraid.

  Afraid?

  She says you used to make me nervous.

  I say I don’t know what nervous is.

  She says I think you still do.

  What?

  Make me nervous.

  What?

  She laughs and takes the wine bottle from me and says just kidding.

  I hope so.

  Don’t look at me like you’re hurt.

  Maybe I am.

  She drinks some wine and says are you?

  Sure.

  She says well oh well a lot of men make me nervous you know what I mean?

  A lot of men?

  Men in general.

  General men?

  She says you don’t make me nervous anymore.

  No?

  Nope. Awww contrary . . . she smiles and drinks wine and I light another cig and she looks around her room and she says to me I don’t know why I feel that way; I mean about men. Most of my friends have been men. Are men. Boys, men, guys, you know. The opposite sex and stuff. I’ve never really had any girlfriends, any close women friends. Female bonding! I don’t think I have ever been able to identify with women. Other ladies. Girls. They’re all strangers to me. Don’t have anything to do with them, except for a few obvious parts.

  She adds to this by saying I’ll never make it as a feminist, Mike.

  I say to her but you were telling me about your roommate.

  She says Cynthia, yes, we met at work.

  I say I thought you said school.

  She says school, work – the job I had on campus; the campus work.

  I nod.

  She says we are pretty good friends. Much more than just roommates. We talk; we even talk about men.

  I say well there you go: female bonding.

  She says I was telling you about that bar Cynthia and I went to last week? was I saying that? was I telling you that?

  I think so.

  She says the same bar we went to six months ago.

  I say well we’ve been to a lot of bars.

  She says it was that 50s revival bar; all the guys in there looked like James Dean.

  Yeah; okay.

  She gives me back the bottle and says I went there last week but it has changed style, has changed clientele; it’s turned into a gay bar. Not discriminatory: men and women. We didn’t know this at first; we just went in. I wondered what happened to all the James Deans. Anyway, Cynthia and me were sitting and drinking some beers and we started to play some pool, just minding our own beeswax, when this drunk woman, in her late forties or so, comes up to us and she starts talking to us and her hair’s really dirty and she kinda stinks, she has on this funky dress and ratty old coat, and she smells like vodka or something, and she just stands there watching us and she says real loud-like I’m a dyke and I’m proud of it! I wanted her to go away. Cynthia gives me a funny look and this lady says wanna go have some reeeeealll fun, honey? So I tell her well I’m not your type and she says not my type and I go no and she goes don’t you lie to me I know a bitch dyke when I see one and I can tell that your sweet mouth has been muff-diving aplenty.

  I say you’re messing with me. I say that didn’t really happen did it?

  She says it did! Kathy says to me this is what she said I swear to you! I told her to please just go away please and leave us be we’re trying to play some pool here and this lesbian old drunk says to me I know what you do with your friend here; I know what you do with her in secret behind closed doors! I told her to die and go to hell and she just laughs at me and goes you think it’s all a dream but one day you’re gonna wake up, sweetie. That’s what she said, honest Injun.

  I say weird.

  She says I’m never going back to that bar again.

  I hold out the bottle to her and ask if she wants more.

  She says I think I’ve had enough to drink tonight.

  I say so well that lez made a move on you – it’s just like that one time –

  What time? Oh, at the club?

  Yeah.

  Kathy says I remember that now. We were dancing. It was late but we’d been doing coke. I was feeling very very good, this I do recall. Cocaine always makes me feel good. You went into the bathroom. This girl came up to me. She was wearing a polka-dotted dress. She comes up to me and says hi my friends and I were wondering and she points to the corner of the club where there’s these two other girls, looking over at us, and they were also wearing dresses with polka dots, and she says to me, she says we were wondering: are you gay or bi? and when I told her I was straight, quite straight, she just laughed like she didn’t believe me or something. Now that was weird too.

  I say it is.

  She says why do some people think I’m gay? I don’t understand this. I don’t look like a lesbian, do I?

  I say I dunno.

  She says I’m not.

  I sit up from the bed.

  She says I know I am not.

  I am naked and standing up.

  She says I’m not.

  I say are you sure?

  I should know!

  I say have you ever had an experience? with another female?

  She says have you ever had that kind of experience?

  I walk about her room and I talk, I say to her look, here is your bedroom window; this is your window; you look out your window and you see things; you see outside; you see things outside; the things you see: you can hear them but they cannot hear you; you strain for certain thoughts; these thoughts elude you, these thoughts you thought you thought; your notions ask do you know me? And here is your desk, your small desk, the desk you have had since you were a child. A desk of memories. Who can say what used to be in these desk drawers, other than what is in them now; past things used to inhabit: objects of girlhood. And what do you have here now – old magazines, notes for college classes. Here is your word processor, an old model but still trustworthy. It gets the job done; floppy disks: slow&sloppy. A printer that prints dot-matrix. It prints the things you write. And what do you write, little girl, hmmmn? Poems? Stories? Belles lettres? What are you writing now, what is here on the screen, these paragraphs&words, these words&sentences, what could it be, eh? Not a poem or story, no, that is not you; that is not what you do; it’s – lemme look – it’s a research paper on marine biology. You are on page five. So here, Kathy, here we have a college term paper, one of them anyway. How long have you been working on it?1 Is it important?2 Is all the time and effort worth it?3 How much actual research did you do?4 Do you have your footnotes straight,5 your bibliography,6 do you have an MLA Manual of Style?7 Look here, this is your chair. How many times have you sat in it? How many times have you p
lopped your bottom in this chair and thought about things, looked at the things on your desk? How many words were in your thoughts? What did you look at on your desk? Did you look at the computer, at the screen, did you look at this camera sitting on the desk? Do you have film in this camera? You do. How many pictures have you taken? Do you like to take photos? What if I took a photo of you, sitting against the bed, naked and smiling at me? What if I did? What if I put this camera up to my eye and take a photo of you? Here are your clothes, now, your dirty clothes, all piled up in a hamper as well as on the floor, shirts&socks&panties&bras&jeans&skirts, you need to do your laundry, girl, these clothes smell. And here, here, here is your closet; more clothes; more clothes. Clean clothes. They all look the same. Here is your carpet. A rented carpet, actually. Like this apartment, this rug does not belong to you. Here is your bottle of wine that I drink from (and I do take a drink, a pause in my monologue, and when I am done I continue, she looks at me, sitting naked on the edge of the bed, and I say:) here is your bed, the bed you have slept many nights in; the bed, in fact, that we have made love in, that we have screwed in, balled in, banged in, fucked in. I wonder how many other men you’ve had on this bed? Over the years. No, don’t answer. This is your room; your rented room; this room does not belong to you; and you have to ask yourself well what the hell does belong to me? We own very little. But your body is yours; you own your body; this here is your body; this body that I have fucked twice this evening; this body I used to make love to until you stopped wanting to see me – but now, here we are, here we are again; again, here is your body. But what is in a body, what’s in a face? Nothing at all that death won’t soon erase. For a second there, I almost believed that your body was special, and just for me.8 But here, here, here we have two bottles, here are two bottles of wine; one empty, one still filled with the divine. We drank all of this other, this poor, sad, stupid bottle. We also drank a lot at that bar: beer beer beer. But I think we need more – we need something else. Need something to keep us going. How I ask do you feel now?

  She says a little tired, and a little tense, too.

  Still?

  She says yes.

  I tell her lie down. She does, on her stomach. I sit on her butt, gently, and start to rub her neck and back. She goes ummmn and I ask if she likes and she says she likes and please do go on and I say that we are still-lives, time and everything else has stopped here: this moment we find ourselves in. She says that she has been thinking about her family, her mom&dad thinking about how they are all different, yet alike, I say yeah: the ingredients of a family.

  She says take my sister for example; she’s a good example; she’s a year younger than I am. We look alike; she tends to be more feminine in nature than me. This is what I think, anyway. No one has actually come out and said this but I think they think – well, maybe I’m just paranoid, maybe I have an inferiority complex or something. My sister goes to a different university, one back east. Here I am going to a university on the west and she’s back there with all those silly-ass New Englanders. Natch, she joined a sorority. She’s probably having a great time. I know she is. She has all the good-looking, shallow-brained guys she could ever want. All she cares about is buying things: clothes&jewellery&make-up. A new car. She’s always talking about how she needs cars, new cars, all cars, cars cars cars. If a guy has a nice&fast car, you bet she’ll go out with him, no matter what he looks like or what kind of personality he has. Is she easy? Dunno. Does she put out for these car guys? Who can say. I’ve never asked; I suspect she does; she does. And she’ll go out and spend forty bucks on a new make-up kit she doesn’t need with the money our parents give to her and all I can think of is that forty bucks could have bought groceries for the week. My sister gets this from my mom. My mom is just the same: always buying things that aren’t necessary; talking about buying things; wishing she had more money so she could buy more things. The desire for the material – but I’m sure this subject is mundane. Mmmmn, you have a good way with your hands, you know. I dunno – I guess I also like material objects, but not in the same way as my sister&mother. I like computers, or TVs, VCRs, anything electronic&exciting. I have this fascination with technology. My father is the same way. I get it from him. Dad is always taking things apart and putting them back together, just to see how they work; he likes to know how things tick; tick-tock like a clock. That’s how I am. Those are the differences and samenesses in my family. But we are very close.

  I say you’re lucky; I don’t think much about mine; I don’t like to compare and analyze. I hate it; just would rather not think of it, thank you sir. One Christmas I went hungry and I was alone and I thought – well, that’s a different story for later on in this text and it is really depressing. Promise.

  I keep massaging her and asking do you like this and she says you bet and I move my hands down even more, I spread the cheeks of her ass, looking at the openings of both her ass and vagina; I rub a finger over her asshole, my finger to her cunt and ask if she likes that and she says you’re a nasty boy do you know that? do you know how naughty you are? and I tell her I do, moving mouth down, licking asshole, licking cunt lips, feeling myself getting hard, stroking my cock as I lick&suck, moving up, entering, Kathy gasping like film noir, and when we are done, when we are done fucking for the third time tonight, I see that there is no more wine; I want more to drink; so I get up, leave the bedroom. I go into the kitchen and open the fridge where I find a six-pack of beer. I open a beer, drink, turning to see Cynthia, Kathy’s roommate, sitting on the living room couch. She’s wearing a light lavender suit with black pumps and a white blouse, gold-rimmed glasses; she’s looking at me, I’m standing naked, my cock still half-hard, cock coated with the products of fuck, and I’m drinking a beer. I smile and say hello to her and she says hello back and I return to Kathy’s room.

  I tell Kathy about it.

  She says shit.

  She says get dressed.

  I put on jeans, shirt.

  She slips on a long nightshirt.

  We both go into the living room.

  Cynthia is still on the couch, watching TV.

  Kathy & I sit on the opposing loveseat.

  Kathy says what are you watching?

  Cynthia says nothing really; the news; something about the economy; always the economy and how it sucks. It does suck.

  Kathy says sorry about Mike, he didn’t know you were here.

  I drink beer.

  Cynthia says I’m sick of all this economy bullshit. The recession. And all that bullshit.

  Kathy says I said I was sorry about Mike.

  Cynthia says sorry? why? I’m happy for you. You’ve been complaining lately about not getting any. I don’t know why you dumped him in the first place. You should keep him; keep him like a pet, like a dog with a wagging moist tongue.

  Kathy says I mean about him walking out like that because we didn’t know you were here. I thought you were at work, I thought you had to work until nine or ten.

  Cynthia says maybe I’m too quiet when I come in; I’ll make more noise in the future.

  Kathy says he was embarrassed and she says to me isn’t that right, you?

  I go yes.

  Cynthia goes why?

  Kathy goes you know.

  Cynthia says you don’t think I’ve never seen a naked guy before? I’m glad for you, Kathy. But are you? Are you glad for yourself?

  Kathy says sure.

  Cynthia says he’s a good lover, right?

  I drink beer.

  Kathy says probably the best I . . . and she looks at me and adds but I don’t want to inflate his ego, you know.

  Cynthia says you like him a lot; you kept saying to me, these past weeks, why did I dump him? I like him a lot. Why did I treat him like dirt?

  Kathy says I said that?

  Cynthia says you sure did.

  I probably did.

  So how did he wind up back here?

  I asked him.

  Oh.

  We w
ent out for a few drinks.

  Well that does it every time.

  Kathy says so I said to him why don’t we go back to my apartment?

  And what did he say?

  Kathy says he said sure.

  I say that’s what I said. So what’s up, Cyn?

  Cynthia says you want another beer there?

  Sure.

  Cynthia says plenty in the fridge, go help yourself.

  I get up to go to the fridge and I say to Kathy do you want one? and she says no and Cynthia says she looks like she’s had enough and I ask Cynthia if she wants one and she says sure so I get two beers, one for me, one for her, and sit back down with them.

  I say I feel funny.

  Do they know what I mean?

  I ask what’s on TV.

  They both say:

  The news.

  Cynthia says the goddamn economy; the fucking economy.

  Kathy says I thought you had to work until nine or ten.

  Cynthia says I was at work. She says I heard you; the both of you; I could hear you in your room, Kathy; you cannot mistake those sounds; I knew.

  I ask did you know it was me?

  Cynthia says not until you came out buck nekkid; otherwise you were just an anonymous male sound.

  I say you remembered me: my name&face.

  Of course.

  Kathy says why wouldn’t she recall you? It’s not like I have ten zillion men waltzing through here; it’s not like it’s been a generation since your last visit.

  Cynthia leans over to the TV to change the channel, saying there must be something else on one of these stations other than news – a sitcom, cartoons, a sad love story.

  I say it’s almost like when you go back home. You have memories of a place, a home – of furniture and the way things are situated; the way things smell. An – an overall feeling and/or sensation. You walk in and you know the surroundings, perhaps intimately, and yet you still feel like a stranger; like you do not belong; like you’re just passing through; not a traveler, but reduced to common tourist; for a moment, you actually become one of the fixtures.

  Cynthia says I could hear you both and you both sounded – happy.

  I say I feel at peace and I don’t know why; I seldom feel at peace.

  Cynthia says I tried picturing what was going on in your room. I had these images. I tried to imagine the positions you were in.