“Joe Willie, I gotta go. I gotta …”
He reached for the crutch beside him and slowly pushed himself to his feet, half smiling through the effort. It gave him the look of a crazy man. As he hitch-stepped along the side of the bed, the toe of the crutch slipped on the carpet. He lurched sideways and fell awkwardly against the side of the mattress. The crutch fell to the floor and he landed on one hip on the side of the bed. When he caught himself he looked up into the mirror again, and Darlene saw the face of an invalid: embarrassed, pitiful and scared.
“Sorry,” he said quietly. “Don’t exactly have the wheels yet.”
“God.”
“It’s all right. Give me a second here.” He reached for the crutch.
“No. Joe Willie, I gotta go. I gotta get back. I gotta …” Darlene fumbled for her keys.
“Hey, hey. Relax. It’s me, darlin’.”
He stood again awkwardly and turned to face her, leaning harder on the crutch this time. Darlene fought to control the muscles in her face. She wanted to cry, she wanted to scream. But more than anything she wanted out of that doorway and out of the house. She found herself staring at the empty sleeve despite herself, as though she could still see the wizened stick of an arm it contained. Joe Willie followed her line of sight and looked down at the arm dangling off the shoulder. When he raised his eyes to look at her again she could see the rage in him.
“Joe Willie, I …”
“Go,” he said. “Just go.”
She felt a tremor in her legs and she reached one hand up to her cheek. It shook. He stared at her. She couldn’t meet his gaze and her eyes darted back and forth across the room until finally she pursed her lips, rubbed them with two fingers and a thumb, turned and walked quickly down the hallway. When she stepped out onto the veranda again she leaned hard against the wall, closing her eyes and heaving a deep, silent breath. She breathed out in a long, slow exhale. When she opened her eyes she saw Johanna watching her from the round pen where she was training a colt. The two women looked at each other across that space and it was like there was no space at all between them. Darlene felt herself leave long before she climbed into the cab of the truck and drove quickly down the driveway, disappearing in a long plume of dust toward town.
Johanna looked toward Joe Willie’s window before turning to the colt again.
“No more Ken and Barbie world, I guess,” she said to the colt and chucked at it to get it moving around the pen.
Eric moved slowly that morning. The hangover was severe and he’d called the office and let his girl know he’d be working at home. The girl was paid good money to say whatever he told her to say and because she was a good girl she’d do as she was told. Besides, the top-of-the-desk benefits he paid her after hours kept her tight-lipped. He smiled. Took a long time to find a girl who would go the extra distance for him and it had been worth the search.
The few extra hours at home allowed him time for the hair of the dog, and he’d had a couple to get the blood moving again. He’d been to the Gentlemen’s Club. Claire had been away somewhere and he hated to miss a night’s action, so he’d headed off for a massage and a high-priced piece of ass from a willing body, and he’d drunk a few too many of the complimentary beverages. He hated that. Sure, it was a good thing to be able to hump like crazy, move the bitch around wherever you wanted, get excited as hell, look down at her, watch himself give it to her good, but there was no release, the alcohol meant there was no delivery of the goods, no dumping into her or all over her like he enjoyed, and that pissed him off more than anything. Three hundred bucks for a hard-on and a hangover. That’s pretty much what it had boiled down to.
Along with Claire’s uppity attitude lately and having to bring her into line, things hadn’t been going according to the script, and Eric Bennett believed in the script. He needed it. He worked hard to perfect it and find a woman to play the part he’d written. Claire had been that for the most part. But she’d told him no. Imagine. Uppity nigger. For all the good he was bringing to her world, the house, the car, the money, the opportunity to have a man like him, she would say no to his right. His right. Hitting her wasn’t about punishment or even anger, really. It was about rightness. The rightness of his power and the rightness of his due. She’d see that when she got back from wherever it was she’d got to. God, she was a tight little thing. He loved fucking her. Fine black ass and it was all his. Bought and paid for. Earned. He thought about the compact lines of her and he felt himself get hard beneath the robe. When she got back he’d give it to her all romantically, slow the way women liked it, deliberately. He’d make her come and then fuck her dizzy like he’d wanted to the night before. Jesus. He was thinking about taking care of himself in the shower but the doorbell rang.
“Fuck sakes.” He drained his glass and moved to the door.
The badge at the keyhole sobered him immediately. “What the hell?” he asked when the door was opened and he saw Claire standing with the cop alongside another neatly dressed woman.
“Detective Golec, Mr. Bennett. This is Lisa Keenan from Family Services and Miss Hartley you know.”
“Is the kid okay? Did something happen?”
“We can get to that. Right now we need to talk to you about charges.”
“What charges?”
“Like assault, Eric,” Claire said, staring right at him.
“And rape,” Lisa Keenan said.
“Rape? There was no rape. And there was no assault. We had a disagreement, that’s all.”
Golec pushed him into the house with the flat of his hand against the chest. Bennett stumbled backwards and righted himself against the foyer wall. Golec moved quickly and grabbed him roughly by the lapels of the robe. “Does that face look like it had a disagreement, Bennett? Does it?”
“You can’t do this,” Bennett said. “You can’t come into my home and rough me up. It’s my home.”
“I can do whatever I want, pal. Beginning with maybe reading you your rights and hauling your sorry woman-beating ass downtown. Would you like that?” Golec asked, pulling harder on the robe.
“I didn’t do anything,” Bennett complained.
“I’ll ask you again,” Golec said. “Does that face look like it had a disagreement?”
“No,” Bennett said.
“No. No, it doesn’t. What it looks like and what it will look like in the photographs the judge and jury see, is a face that got the shit knocked out of it by some asshole. Sorry about the language, ladies.”
“That’s okay, Marcel,” Lisa Keenan said. “Mr. Bennett, I think it will be better for everyone if we just sit and talk this out.”
“Yes,” Bennett muttered. “Yes. Certainly.”
Golec let go of his grip and the four of them made their way to the dining room and sat around the table.
“What’s this about, then?” Bennett asked.
Golec looked at him solemnly. “It’s about a little word called no,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“He means that when a woman says no, it means no,” Lisa Keenan said. “It means that if you continue a course of sexual action after she says no, it’s rape. Claire said no to you, didn’t she?”
“Well, yes, but not really,” Bennett said.
Golec stared at him hard across the table.
“She was upset,” Eric said.
“Why was she upset?” Keenan asked.
“You know. The usual stuff.”
“Like having your dick shoved into me as soon as you got in the door without even a hello?” Claire asked. “Like being thrown on the sofa like a rag doll, talked dirty to and fucked like some whore? Like being forced to give you head because I didn’t want you in me? That usual stuff, Eric? Is that the usual stuff you’re talking about?”
“Hey, you never complained before. I thought you liked it a little rough.”
Golec slammed his palm down on the table. “I can arrange a place where you can experience it a little rough, Bennett. Woul
d you like that? Huh?”
“Let me spell this out for you, Mr. Bennett,” Lisa Keenan said, “just so we don’t have to waste anyone’s time here. Spousal rape is a big issue. It wasn’t long ago that it wasn’t even on the books, but it’s become so prevalent that we’re charging men all the time now. You can’t demand sex anymore. You can’t come home and take a woman’s body without her consent. It’s rape. Plain and simple. The assault is self-evident, of course. Taken together, it’s a very serious situation you’ve put yourself into. If we go to court, you will go to jail. Definitely. The press will have their way with this story, and I think you know what harm that will do to your business reputation. Then there’s the NAACP, the women’s groups, the community association, that sort of thing. You’re looking at a long period of hell in your personal and business life, and that’s after the court decision.”
“You said if,” Bennett said.
“That’s right. What we’re prepared to do is offer you a course of action that will preclude any of the eventualities I mentioned.”
“Explain,” Bennett said.
For the next few minutes she outlined the arrangement while Bennett sat quietly in his chair, one leg crossed over the other, and stared out the patio doors. When she finished he looked levelly at Claire. She held the look. Finally, Bennett smirked, nodded, rose and moved wordlessly into the small office he kept off the kitchen. He returned with a cheque and the car registration. He tossed them onto the table.
“How do I know she won’t be back next month? How do I know I don’t keep on getting screwed?” he asked.
Claire stood and looked across the table at him. “Because I’m not like you,” she said.
“How’s that?” he asked with a smirk.
“I don’t take hostages.”
“You ate up this life.”
“This life ate me up, Eric.”
“So your buyout is ten grand and a used car?”
“It’s enough.”
“Yeah, well, don’t be ringing my doorbell when it comes up short.”
“That will never happen.”
“Right. Just get the hell out.”
“Just as soon as she grabs some things,” Golec said.
“Sure. But make it fast.”
“It could never be fast enough,” Claire said.
He tried to raise it. He looked at it in the mirror, then looked up. Joe Willie stared intently into his eyes and strained for control of his body, his arm. His girl had fled. Took one look at him and bolted. The same girl who’d welcomed him so warmly into her world, into her body when he’d been whole. Whole. No woman wanted a gimp. No woman wanted a cripple, half a man, a loser. He felt the anger rub against the inside of his ribs and he wanted that burn. Wanted to taste it in the blood when he bit down on the inside of his cheeks, his tongue, his lip. He wanted the salt of blood. He steeled himself, gathered all the resources and power of his will like he had in the chute all those years, forcing strength upward from the centre of himself, focussing it on the narrow bend of withered elbow. He moved it. Minutely. But it took all the concentration he had. The arm flopped down against his thigh and lay there, loose and rubbery. He arched his back and bent his head back as far as he could, feeling his spine compact and the muscles in his abdomen stretch, breathing quick, shallow breaths before lowering his head level to the mirror and staring at himself. He grimaced. Every ounce of energy was focussed on his left side, and he felt the strain in his back as he managed to pull the arm back from the elbow and the wrist slid along his thigh before lifting a fraction along his rib cage. It fell back to his thigh. With his eyes closed still, Joe Willie breathed, his right hand reaching over absently to cover the wrist of the left protectively. He arched his back again and felt the hot sear of anger in the tendons of his neck and the middle of his back. He clenched his teeth, scowled at the ceiling and tried to raise the arm again. Then he saw the bear.
There was a meadow: an alpine meadow with the sun shining on it and the blue push of mountains all around it. He knew where it was. He’d ridden there often when he needed to ride and think. The trail up to it wound back and forth along the face of Iron Mountain, and a horse and rider needed to be very careful and very good in order to make the journey. It was treacherous because of Iron Mountain’s fast climb to the sky. It took a very deliberate horse and a determined rider to get there, but the payoff was the most spectacular view he’d ever seen. That panorama had never failed to settle him, and the meadow was one of those private pleasures he never shared with anyone. That was where the bear was. It sat on its haunches at the edge of the meadow at the lip of the west-facing precipice.
When it saw him the bear climbed to all fours and shambled closer, head swaying on its great neck, eyes focussed intently on him behind the tremendous snout and jaws. He watched it. The bear eased closer. Eventually it stopped swaying its head and instead lowered it, pushed it forward and down so the eyes of it were all he could see. The eyes stared at him intently, and he could see flecks of yellow in the dark hazel of them, the pupils set there as deep and mysterious as the mouths of caves, accentuated by the deep furrow of the brow. It walked steadily toward him, neither threatening nor frightened, and the eyes stayed on him, studying him, watching him, reading him almost. Primal. That’s the word that came to him. Ancient, primitive, untamed, strong, the eyes looked at him as the bear got closer and closer, the meadow receding, the mountains compacting, the sky closing off, until all that existed in the universe were the eyes of the great beast staring directly at him, closer and closer and closer. Joe Willie snapped his head down and found himself staring into his own eyes in the mirror. He shook his head to clear it. The image of the bear stayed with him, and when he looked into the mirror again the eyes drew him instantly. He stared into them, hard, insistently, looking for that primitive, feral edge he’d seen in the bear’s eyes. Then he moved the arm again.
The Cadillac felt good. She’d never sunk herself into luxury before, and the street rolled beneath the wheels as smoothly as anything Claire had ever felt. There was no tremble in the steering wheel and no rattle and clunk like the ancient wagons and sedans she’d had in her time. This car was fine. In the rearview mirror she fussed with her hair and grinned at herself for her foolishness. It didn’t take much for a girl to get the vanity back. Here she was all black and blue, hiding behind oversized sunglasses and still primping and preening as soon as she got the chance. All because of a fine car. All because of the ten thousand dollars headed for her bank account.
Ah well, she thought, she’d earned it. Call it survival benefits. Call it danger pay. Call it the high cost of loving. She liked that play on words. Except that love was never really a part of it. Not like she understood the word to mean. She hadn’t really loved any of them. All of them, in their own particular ways, were skewed, lives out of kilter, so that loving them wasn’t anything she could say absolutely that she’d done. No. She’d experienced them. She’d survived them. And it was curious to her, driving along that street, how she’d always managed to find another one. Despite the hunger she carried for a settled, predictable life with a reliable, loving man, she’d always wandered into the arms of the needy, the profane, the kinky, the emotionally unavailable, detached, controlling and now violent kind of man. All beautiful in their way. All fine physical examples of manhood. All cash rich, employed and driven. But beneath the skin and bone where the real man lived, the heart was always missing. Maybe that was it. Maybe she’d always been attracted to the vacuum, like a part of her was pulled relentlessly toward the empty emotional chamber like those poor sailors following the pull of the siren’s voice in that myth. Her love life had always been a shipwreck. Boy, was that the truth.
But this car could take her beyond all that. This car and the money could move her into a whole new world. Celibate. She shook her head at the word. It sounded like a mental disorder, something they locked you away for, something socially unacceptable, whispered behind your back when you passe
d. Don’t talk to her—she’s celibate. Oh, poor Claire, she’s just been diagnosed as celibate. Jesus. That kind of thinking really would drive you crazy.
“What are you thinking?” Lisa Keenan asked.
“Oh,” Claire said, pulling herself back to reality, “I was just thinking about being celibate.”
“Are things that bad?” Lisa asked.
“Frankly, yes.”
“It’s an extreme choice.”
“It’s been a kind of extreme life.”
“I suppose,” Lisa said. “I understand that Eric was likely the latest in a long line and that maybe your choices haven’t always been the best when it comes to men, but you’re talking about shutting your womanhood off.”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” Claire said.
“Why?”
“In a word, Aiden. He’s been through enough. Enough men, enough men’s bullshit, enough instability, and I won’t put him through that again. He’s in jail and won’t speak to me or see me. I only hope he reads my letters. My son needs me now. Me. The whole package. Not one that comes with a man included.”
“I’d say that’s a good call. But I’d also say that you can’t displace yourself. You have to stay open to the possibility.”
“What possibility?”
“The possibility of a good man appearing out of nowhere.”
Claire laughed. “Lisa, I had a construction contractor with money falling out his ears. Big house he’d built himself, nice shiny life, great body, knew how to use it.”
“Gay?”
“Bingo. Then there was the landscaper. A virtual artist with every bush but the one that counted.”
“Gay?”
“No. Just never wanted sex. He only wanted a woman for show. It turned out that he could always take things in hand, if you get my drift.”
“Porn?”
“Always. After that there was the cross-dresser, the alcoholic, then the drug addict, the womanizer and finally, Eric the batterer. So keeping myself open to the possibility of a good man appearing out of nowhere is a stretch right now.”
Dream Wheels Page 13