Welcome to Paradise

by Laurence Shames

"Rents are high. Not everyone appreciates," he whined, "just how hard we work."

  *

  "Batt'ries included,?'' asked Big Al Marracotta.

  The clerk shrugged then took back the latex gizmo, tried to figure out how to unscrew the base. The gadget was not as technologically advanced as the ones in Sex Trek, but it had a raffish design and a certain ingenuity. Katy Sansone rolled her eyes.

  "Yeah, batteries are in there," said the clerk. He sniffled, ran a finger under his nose, then added, "Or you can use the crank."

  "And the hot water goes in here?" said Al.

  "Hot water, margarine, whatever."

  "Would feel good, no?" said Al. He'd taken the thing back and was cranking it in Katy's direction so that it wiggled like a spastic cobra.

  "Al," she said, "isn't it a little early?"

  In fact they'd just had breakfast. The porn store had been open fifteen minutes. The clerk's first cup of coffee still stood on a display case filled with ticklers and extenders and things with leather straps.

  "All of a sudden you're inhibited?" Big Al teased. He flashed that surprising boy-devil grin, the grin that moved his hair and showed the small gap in his teeth. "Like amore's only for the dark of night?"

  "I guess I didn't realize it was amore," she said. "Seemed more like Roto-Rooter. I'm going to the beach."

  "The beach?" he said. "We been through that."

  "Right," said Katy. "You don't like sand and riffraff. So you go to the pool. I'll see you in a couple hours."

  Big Al fidgeted, took a moment to decide if he was mad. He felt a little silly with the pleasure unit in his hand and his girlfriend leaning toward the door. Plus, he didn't like her tone. A little bratty and ungrateful. Then again, some spunk, some spirit—it kept things fresh, a little bit on edge. "Fine," he said at last. "I'll see ya later."

  Half surprised to be sprung, afraid that Al might quickly change his mind, she pivoted on her tall shoes and bolted from the store.

  Breaking out into the clean, hot sunshine of the sidewalk, she inhaled the smells of softening asphalt and sunblock spiced with coconut, and realized all at once that she hadn't had a moment to herself in days. Just to walk at her own pace; to look at what she chose to look at; to breathe.

  She walked fast for half a block, as though pursued, then started to relax. Slowing, using her own eyes, she saw and did small things that exhilarated her beyond all proportion to their actual significance. Twirled a postcard rack; smiled at plump twins in a stroller. Took a color brochure from a young woman hawking snorkel trips; listened hungrily as she rhapsodized about coral and striped fish. Paused at a booth promoting sunset sails, and let herself imagine that someday she would be aboard a sailboat. Why not? If she were on her own? Or had a friend to travel with?

  Or was with a different sort of man?

  There, she'd thought it. For a moment it felt great to think it, but then the feeling backfired, and she felt disloyal, guilty. Undeserving. How shallow could you get? Three minutes out of Big Al's grasp, and already she was fantasizing life without him. After him. Like he'd died. While she was still riding on his ticket, blowing his money, sharing his bed. It was wrong.

  Then again, what was wrong with wanting to be treated right?

  Okay, she thought—she'd made certain choices, choices that she wasn't very proud of. Well, so what? Did that mean she was disqualified forever from a little happiness, a little dignity? Wasn't she allowed at least to wonder if there were still men in the world who weren't married, and weren't outlaws, and weren't maniacs? Men who might see in her something more than a sex toy to be visited by other sex toys?

  She strolled past T-shirt shops and jewelry stores and new construction. She wished she could do life over; then quickly shuddered at how much trouble that would be; then admitted with something like relief that there was nothing to be done except to go from here.

  At an open stand she leaned across a cool chrome counter and ordered up an ice cream cone—vanilla with chocolate jimmies. Her mouth watered as she watched it being made, and she licked it happily as any kid as she headed toward the beach, wondering how long she could dare to stretch these clean, empty hours that were her own.

  12

  Squid Berman, happy and fulfilled, had just awakened from a beautiful and long night's sleep.

  He'd needed it. Two nights ago he'd hardly rested, then he'd done an endless stakeout across the street from Paradise. He'd still been there, skulking in the button- wood hedge, when Big Al and the thick-haired woman wobbled home together from the bar. He was still there some fifteen minutes later, when the woman, furious and suddenly sober, stormed right out again.

  Now he was leaning on a pointy elbow, underneath a tortured sheet, and telling Chop about it.

  "Ya shoulda seen the kisser on 'er!" he was saying. "Freaked or what? A masterstroke! I ruined it for 'im, Chop. I ruined it for 'im good."

  Chop couldn't get that excited about it. Wacko mischief that no longer involved cars. He was thinking about the silver Lexus. Rip out the seats and you had a fine vehicle. He scratched his neck. Something was making him irritable. Probably that it was clearer all the time that Squid was enjoying this gig a whole lot more than he was. Grudgingly he said, "So what next?"

  Squid thought. Thinking made his mouth water; he swallowed and his bony Adam's apple shuttled up and down his neck. Truth was, he didn't know what next, knew only that it had to top what he had done so far. This was the unremitting pressure on the artist, the thing a lunk like Chop would never understand. "Jeez," he said, "lemme savor this one for a while."

  "Isn't time," said Chop.

  Squid frowned. He knew the other man was right. There was never time. The next hurdle was always in your face before your feet had even reconnected with the ground.

  Without getting out of bed, the bandy man bore down, started thinking once again. His eyes bulged, water pooled beneath his tongue, and he dug deeper into the cackling mysteries of making someone miserable.

  *

  Big Al Marracotta strolled back to the Conch House weighed down with two big bags of goodies. He had probes and plungers, harnesses and clips, lingerie and jellies. He had extra batteries and a video shot entirely from underneath a glass coffee table. He was ready for more vacation.

  But back at his hotel, with Katy gone and nothing else to do, he let his mind flit just briefly to his business. In truth it had been days since he'd thought at all about fish and payoffs, ice and trucks, no-show jobs and haulers' kickbacks and soggy cartons full of halibut and crab. Now a sudden nameless qualm made him feel that he should check in, at least, see how things were going.

  He put the goodies by the TV set and sat down on the edge of his giant bed to place a call to Benny Franco, the guy he'd left in charge.

  This was a somewhat complicated procedure. There was a phone in the fish market office, but it was used only for the most mundane chitchat with outsiders. Real business calls were routed through a pay phone bolted to the loading dock across the yard. This meant that an underling would have to take the call, determine if it was worth a bigger man's attention, then trudge through slush and slime to fetch the boss. The boss, in turn, would have to put his topcoat on, his scarf, and tiptoe through the oily puddles.

  Sitting there in Florida, Big Al remembered how freezing cold the receiver usually was against his ear. He dialed.

  In Manhattan a guy picked up the phone, said, "Yeah?"

  "Lemme talk ta Benny."

  The request made the underling suspicious. Everyone who mattered knew that Benny wasn't there no more, had been led away in handcuffs. He said, "Benny ain't here. Who's iss?"

  "Who's iss?!" said Al, and put a little menace in it. "Who's iss?"

  "Lefty."

  "Lefty, you putz. It's Al. Go get Benny."

  Lefty hesitated. He was a cautious guy and not good at explaining things. He knew there was no percentage in carrying bad news. He said simply, "Hey, Al. Hol' on a minute."

  He left the
phone dangling like a hanged cat and trudged through the slush and slime to fetch Nicky.

  "Who is it?" Nicky wanted to know before bothering with the topcoat and the scarf.

  Lefty didn't want to say the name. No percentage setting up a meet between two guys who were never gonna like each other. "I think y'oughta take it" was all he said.

  Nicky slid into his coat and stepped outside. The yard stank of diesel fumes and fish. Gross water seeped into his loafers. He picked up the phone, which was achingly cold against his ear. "Yeah?"

  On his giant Key West bed, Big Al Marracotta yanked in his eyebrows so that his salt-and-pepper helmet crawled. Benny's voice he knew. "You ain't Benny."

  "Did I fucking say I was Benny? All I said was yeah. Who's iss?"

  Big Al puffed up a little, gave his neck a twist. Whoever this guy was, he didn't like his tone. "This is your boss, asshole."

  The words chafed Nicky badly. Boss? Big Al? He said, "I ain't aware I got a boss."

  The insolence, in turn, made Big Al wary; he did not want to admit that he had no idea who he was talking to. He wiggled his butt against the sheets and decided to seek more information. "Where the fuck is Benny?"

  Nicky stomped his feet to keep the blood from freezing and tried to have a little fun. "How's the weather down in Flahda?"

  "Fuckin' gorgeous."

  Nicky thought about Chop and Squid, who were costing him several grand a day to make this guy's life a living hell. "And things are goin' good?"

  "Beautiful," said Al.

  Nicky smiled to think he must be lying through his teeth. Sure he was. Nobody ever admitted that vacation turned out lousy.

  Al had finally put two and two together. "This Nicky?"

  "Bingo."

  "Fuck you doin' there?"

  "Runnin' the place, that's all."

  "Where's Benny?"

  "Prob'ly at his lawyer's," Nicky said. "You picked a loser, Al. Benny got indicted."

  Al sprang off the bed and pirouetted. Wistfully, he looked across the room at his trove of unsampled sex toys. "Shit. I'm comin' home."

  "Don't let it fuck up your vacation, Al."

  "I'll be there tomorra."

  "Al, hey, market's inna best hands it could be in. Best hands ever. Least that's Tony Eggs' opinion."

  Nicky was pleased with that remark, so pleased that for a moment he forgot how cold he was.

  Al said, "Yeah? So why'd he kick you out and make you one more pissant onna street again?"

  Nicky shivered. "Listen, pal—"

  "I'm coming home," said Al. "I'm calling Tony."

  Nicky shuffled his stinging feet. Too late he understood that his ballbusting was utterly misfiring. He should have made nice, been reassuring. Now he would be shortchanged even in his brief, false tenure back on top. His voice took on a wheedling tone that galled him, and he tried to patch things up. "Al, hey, don't get your bowels in an uproar. I'm just kiddin' with ya. Everything's fine. I'm just fillin' in. Temporary, like."

  In Key West, Big Al Marracotta paced to the limits of the phone cord and considered. "I'll check that with Tony, Carlo."

  "Yeah, okay, check," said Nicky, his voice still more conciliatory and chagrined. Bending over just to have a few more days in charge, pretending.

  Al Marracotta hung up in his ear.

  Nothing was more bitter than knowing that you'd lost after thinking that you'd won. Nicky Scotto stared at the phone a couple seconds, like he was blaming it for how things went. He slapped his arms for warmth, wiggled toes inside his squishy shoes, and trudged back through the oily puddles to what used to be his office.

  13

  Nothing stays strange for long. Normal is what's there.

  Al Tuschman sat out by the pool at Paradise and looked around. Bare-breasted lesbians with boxer shorts and hairy armpits. Sleek gay men glistening like basted ducks in Chinatown. The Eurotrash menage a trois with their stacks of fashion magazines, their ceaseless chattering and giggling. So what else was new?

  Al was getting to feel so blithe that he seriously considered getting naked. Told himself it wasn't prudishness that held him back, but concern that his dented and distended scrotum would appear deformed, grotesque. He promised himself he'd strip as soon as the tortured sac resumed its accustomed shape and size.

  In the meantime he tanned. At the very least, he would go home brown and make other people jealous. He lay back on his lounge and offered up his face. Hot sun scratched at his hairline and seared right through his eyelids.

  It was pleasant for a little while. But Al was dark to begin with and tanned easily. No challenge; not a mission. He was soon bored.

  He sat up, then stood. Light-headed, he blinked until the colors returned to flesh and flowers, and decided he would go check out the beach. He put on sandals, fetched a shirt that sort of matched his bathing trunks, and put Fifi on the leash. He got directions from the drowsy and mock-helpful clerk behind the desk and headed out.

  The walk was a great deal longer than he'd been led to believe. Still, it wasn't long enough for him to notice the Jaguar that crawled along amid the traffic of rented convertibles and whining mopeds and clunky bikes, now lolling half a block behind him, now pulling ahead, then discreetly circling back.

  Al's route wound through town streets full of bars and fishing stores, past a misplaced brick enclave of courthouses and county offices, through an apartment complex whose faux-Bahamian motif was the only thing that prevented it from looking just like Jersey. Beyond the complex was a half-abandoned navy base penned in by a rusting chain-link fence, and past the bunkers and scrap heaps of the base was a narrow road that finally got sandy at its edges.

  Along this road, his throat parched, his headache returning, and his heels beginning to blister, Al Tuschman saw someone he vaguely recognized.

  She was moving toward him on silver high-heeled sandals. She was long-legged, slim-hipped, and bosomy, with a rather small-featured face behind big sunglasses, topped by raven hair that salt air and dyes had made a little stiff and spiky.

  Their eyes met, then tried to slide politely apart but stuck, as happens between people who look half familiar. Al finally remembered where and when he'd seen her. Breakfast yesterday. Promenading with a short guy. "Hey, there," he said. "Where's your dog?"

  Katy could not help frowning at the mention of the slobbering and thankless rottweiler. "Oh, hi," she said. "It's not my dog, it's my boyfriend's."

  She regretted the words before she was finished saying them, but there it was, she'd said them. Why did she do that to herself? Fact one: I have a boyfriend. A possessive, maniac boyfriend who takes care of everything and holds me back from anything decent while I play right along.

  Al had to say something, so he said, "Ah. How's the beach?"

  "Nice," she said. "Once you get to it. Water's really green. Wonder why that is?"

  Al wished he knew. He shrugged. The Jag squeezed past them on the narrow pavement, considerately slowing as it headed toward the beach. Its effect was to push them to the margin of the road, moving them closer together.

  The woman crouched to pet the shih tzu. It was a long way down for her but she descended very smoothly, ankles and knees and waist compacting like a closed expansion gate. To the creature she said, "And what's your name?"

  "Fifi," Al told her.

  "Fifi," she repeated, rubbing the shih tzu's knobby head.

  "Mine's Al," he volunteered.

  She kept her face down and gave a quick and mordant chuckle. "So's his." The disembodied pronoun sounded strange, and then again it didn't. It was the way unhappy people referred to their partner when their partner seemed less like a person than a blank but overwhelming fact. Almost as an afterthought, she said, "Mine's Katy."

  She straightened up. She was nice and tall. Her forehead was as high as Al's nose. She leaned forward like she was ready to start walking. Al hoped that she would stay a little bit. "You having fun down here?" he asked her.

  "Pretty nice," she said
. "You?"

  He thought a moment, scratched his ear. Then he said, "Not really."

  This was so wildly and gauchely honest that both of them held their breath a heartbeat, then let out a giggle. No one ever admitted that vacation was going lousy.

  Laughing was a great relief, a godsend, so Al went on. "I'm staying at this weird place. Paradise, it's called."

  "Not exactly modest," Katy said.

  "No. And like, weird stuff has been happening to me from the minute I arrived."

  "They say Key West is like that."

  "No, I mean really weird," Al said.

  "Okay," she gave in. "How weird?"

  "Like someone filled my car with calamari. Then someone put lobsters in my bed."

  Katy's eyes screwed down behind her sunglasses. She figured he was bullshitting but she didn't see the harm. "You must have some wild and crazy friends."

  "I don't have a friend within a thousand miles," Al said. He said it a little louder than he meant to, and the words seemed to hollow out a lonely capsule in the air.

  Katy didn't see it as lonely. She saw it as free and exotic and bold. "You often travel alone?"

  "Depends." Depended on whether he had a girlfriend when he won a selling contest, which usually he didn't, in part because he spent so many evenings on the selling floor.

  "I bet," said Katy, "that's really when you see great stuff, when you get to do exactly what you want."

  Al pursed his lips. "If you can figure what that is."

  "Me," she said, "I'd go out on a sailboat, look at coral, look at fish."

  Al finished his own thought. "And, like, if no one steals your car."

  "Your car got stolen, too?"

  He nodded, shrugged.

  She gave her head a sympathetic though not totally persuaded shake, then began to move away. She didn't really want to move away, but they were strangers, and she had a boyfriend, and what else was there to do? "Well, I hope things go better here on in."

  "Couldn't go worse," said Al. He looked for some wood to knock on. There weren't any trees along the narrow road. He wished he hadn't said it.

  They moved off in opposite directions. After a few steps Al looked back across his shoulder. He'd had a fantasy that the tall woman was looking at him, too.