The Royal Family

by William T. Vollmann

  Lily’s dead, said Tyler. But what’s the difference? You can’t even remember her goddamned name.

  And he went out. They’d impounded his car. He must have parked incorrectly or something. He had a headache. He inhaled the smoke of burning trash cans and of his dead and burning Queen.

  | 519 |

  He called the district attorney’s office where after several wearisome recorded pushbutton choices he finally had the option of speaking to a real live operator, which meant that he was treated to a fifteen-second blast of classical music, followed by the voice of a firm but pleasant woman saying: That extension does not answer. Please try again later. Goodbye! —He tried again later, three times. Then he tried the criminal investigation number. Nobody there had ever heard of any Africa Johnston.

  | 520 |

  The Cambodian girl who provisionally resembled Irene, the one whose mons he’d rubbed through the polyester, sent him a letter which ran:

  TO: HENRY ! ! !

  I got you letter on 02-23-97, that is very nice of you letter, and I am very thank you to hear all those words from your heart.

  I hope I see you again as a good friend and I feel so sorry that I can’t give you any love more than a good friend.

  Thank you

  SOEUN

  He kept that letter for a long time. Then he tore it into strips which issued from his opening fingers into separate trash cans, because he was afraid of being unfaithful to the Queen or Irene . . .

  Later that day he was on Kearney Street and saw John and his colleagues all in a football huddle, deciding where to go for drinks. As he passed them, they stared at him with the bright round goldish eyes of pigeons.

  We’ve got fifteen PEMEX engineers working on the project, he heard John say.

  Tyler’s face turned crimson. He waved to John without looking and hurried off, walking and walking until he’d come all the way down to Sixteenth across from the Roxie Theater, practically in the doorway of Ti Couz which was too loud or too busy for John except on weekends when John liked to feel free. Tyler watched cloud-cream glowing down on the slate-blue sky of twilight, lamps already shining in a row halfway up the height of each street-block’s dwelling-crystal. Now the clouds were going yellow. People rushed to dinner, cars peered troll-eyed ahead, and buses, almost friendly in shape, rolled up and down before him. A huge group of tourists received birth from a Dodge van and gathered in front of Ti Couz, reading the menu aloud.

  The next morning John telephoned him.

  Yeah, he said.

  How’s business? John said.

  Fine.

  Don’t bullshit me.

  You’re wrong. You’re trying to force the issue, John, and everybody’s always saying I’m forcing the issue but—

  How are you doing, Hank?

  All right, he said, his heart aching, remembering not Irene at all, strangely enough, but the Queen standing before the mirror with her arms raised, affixing the pink plastic curling set that Beatrice had gotten her, her armpits full of darkness.

  Bullshit, said John.

  How about you, John? How’s Celia? How’s business?

  Listen, Hank, his brother said. What do you need to get your life together?

  Oh, hell, said Tyler. I, uh—

  I’m not asking this for you, John continued in a shriller voice. I don’t give a damn about you. But I promised Mom before she died. I’m doing it for Mom.

  All right, great. You’ve done your duty to Mom. Now let her bones and my bones and Irene’s bones rest in peace, said Tyler, slamming down the receiver savagely.

  | 521 |

  My slaves know what to do when they’re in there, don’t they? drawled Domino.

  The reaching arms in the cage, the stroking Queen, the strange squeals and squeaking in parallel with the black dildo that stank, still gave off an insect hive impression. A woman muttered: Well, it stinks because you haven’t . . . —Yes, she was talking about the Queen’s long black shiny dildo in that cage filled with women playing with each other. Beatrice with quick and fearful side-smiles told the Queen she loved her.

  Snapping her whip in the air, Domino chuckled, I’m not just going to break the sound barrier, I’m going to break the skin barrier.

  A shaved head began gliding up the Queen’s thighs.

  Let me just pet you, Domino purred. You’re such a gentle little thing. You’re so . . .

  That hurts, the girl said.

  Speak when spoken to, Domino chuckled, slapping her across the face.

  Walking slowly around her little cherubs, her little girls (who included a whore as wide as Australia), her little toys—how nicely they played for her! —she admired rosy arms and legs in the cage, tongues and laughs, swollen labia. They’d all forgotten the old Queen, she was sure. (But I am starting to feel better about myself, she mumbled. I don’t think about myself as much as I used to.) And, indeed, it would be surpassingly easy for us to forget the old Domino as well—which is to say, the young Domino, the runaway. Go back fifteen years and see her barefoot and dirty. The pale unsmiling face kept blinking, lost, the blonde hair tarnished, as she sat there in the American Embassy in Mexico City, cradling a dirty blanket about her. The tall boy in the white shirt, grimacing, took a pen out of his pocket. —First you tell me one name, then another, he said. Is there anyone else?

  Please let me think, she whispered. Please. Leave me alone and let me think.

  Oh, so there is another father? said the clerk.

  Mr., uh, Northway. Please. This time it’s for real. He’s my real father. His name’s Mr. Northway and I know he lives on Northway Lane . . .

  Oh, so now you want me to call Mr. Northway on Northway Lane. No, I won’t call him. I’ve had it. It’s too much.

  Yeah, I’m Northway, Tyler would have said, butting his way into the conversation. I’ll take custody of my daughter right now. Come on, honey, I’m taking you home.

  Hey, who the fuck are you? slurred the girl in semiconscious alarm.

  You can call me Dad, Tyler would have said, grabbing her hand and pulling her out before she shredded his cover story any further.

  They got in the elevator and she said: You gonna hurt me?

  No, Domino, Tyler sighed. No, probably not.

  They went out. The guard gave them back their passports, and they passed through the tall steel gate.

  You wanna french me? said the girl vaguely.

  Sure, said Tyler, popping an antacid. I know French. Ne pencher pas au dehors means don’t pinch the whores.

  But none of that happened; nobody came along to rescue Domino until the old Queen did and by then it was already too late.

  And so, kneeling outside the door and mewing like mice, they welcomed their long-thighed new Queen coming out from the closet to whip their tattooed flesh with black movements and gritting teeth while their friends kept singing and giggling and kissing each other, laughing in the cage, Queen Domino now leaning on the cage, black-clothed with her black eyes peeling blue-black jewels away from their souls, positioning shining leather girls in each other’s arms, terrifying them with her stranger’s teeth, wide open lips, applying jewel-like bruises down their tattooed backs, hugging them, shaking breasts, playing, rubbing the triple-pink lips, pinching and licking buttocks, devouring alike the wise and the lovely heads, the shadowed eyes, Strawberry’s heels clicking on the floor, Bernadette’s fat heart-shaped buttocks (she could have been any old varicose slut with sneakers and a slave’s upturned eyes). A whore knelt, cage-shadows on her flesh, praying to the Queen’s apples . . .

  I reach into that little place right inside of me, Domino said to them. I feel everything. I am everything. I’m your Queen.

  She slowly sank her fingernails into Strawberry’s nipple until the woman screamed. She drank the cool feel of Bernadette’s navel.

  We’re playing with each other, she whispered, because we’re reaching inside . . .

  Terrified, Chocolate cleared her throat.

  I’ve alw
ays been a showgirl, Domino murmured to them all. Every time you walk onstage, every time you do a lap, every time you rise some man, that’s about bravery. Then he has to cough the fuck up—not necessary money, but something. And so do you. If I can sit here and spread my legs for money and not know any of these people, can you take off your bras? Can you let me stick my dildoes up you? Can you suck me? I guess that would depend on what you wanted, wouldn’t it? But I’m telling what what I want—oh, you sluts, you cunts, you fucking whores!

  And she was happy, coasting the long curves of back and pussy, until Bernadette started lifting her hands and going a-a-a-a-a-a-a-aaaaaah—

  Oh, she’s going into one of her convulsions, said Domino, bored. Forget it! The ritual’s ruined.

  Domino’s reign was supposed to go on forever. But one night when she was walking across the freeway in her dazzling silver hotpants, a car swerved toward her. With a started cry, Domino raised her hand to her mouth, then began to back away just as the car struck her. That was months later, long after she’d been established and other amusing things had happened. (She was real cranky, Chocolate later recalled. I was, like, I didn’t wanna be on the other side from that bitch.)

  | 522 |

  On the anniversary of Irene’s death the false Irene was out selling pussy on Eighteenth and Capp when a gentleman picked her up, a nice old gentleman she knew named Brady, who paid well for a quick no-nonsense suck. She’d just been beaten up by two tall black men, and told him so. He grinned a little and said: Why don’t you girls stick together more and protect each other?

  We used to do it like that, she said, but the girls have changed. They’re usin’ too much. You just can’t trust another girl no more.

  | 523 |

  As for Beatrice, she finally went back to Mexico where she wore pink cotton dresses and walked slowly in the heat, swaying from side to side.

  | 524 |

  Here in America we aren’t willing to treat each other as human beings anymore, Smooth was saying, standing in the air-conditioned darkness with a cigarette flame shooting like escaping treasure from his lips.

  Tell me about it, said Tyler.

  And you know what? When I cross this burning earth—hey, asshole, are you listening to me? I said: When I cross this burning earth . . .

  You’re drunk, Dan. Don’t call me an asshole.

  You’re the one who’s going to cross the earth. Your Mark is shining tonight.

  I’m not going anywhere, Tyler muttered.

  You’re going to get you an education, boy. Remember what the Queen said?

  The Wonderbar was louder and noisier now that Loreena had gotten fired. In the corner beside Tyler, a drunk resembled a Brady’s Boy snoozing at headquarters, chin on hand, in an armchair by the wall of recycling cartons.

  So what if I’m drunk? Are your ears getting envious, Henry? Don’t interrupt me. I needed to tell you how irritatingly commonplace it’s now become to hear such stupidi-ties as: Speaking as a woman, I find this piece of pornography offensive.

  You don’t like women much, do you, Dan?

  You know I like twats! And that sister-in-law of yours, I—

  Go to hell, Dan.

  I never felt that women understood me. When I was in my twenties I used to . . . I. . .

  What would the Queen have done? Tyler asked himself. And then he knew. He put his hand on Smooth’s shoulder. He said: I’m listening.

  He’d already kept Smooth company for two hours in the Mother Lode, whose tinsel purple and green resembled seaweed. Even though it was Friday, the disco ball had remained still. They’d sat among the easy transvestites and the hard transvestites drinking their beers, made-up men’s made-up faces expressionless beneath the powder as their bloody-red lips made O’s and they crossed their big thighs in their shimmery miniskirts. There was one genetic female in the place, an uneasy soul who seemed to be realizing only gradually that she was the sole representative of her gender. Meanwhile, Smooth’s utterances grew charged with enthusiastic and increasingly incoherent bitterness. Tyler was torn between boredom and pity.

  They’re funding the attack, said Smooth, shaking off his hand. I’m sure Brady’s in on it. So it’s very very duplicitous what they’re doing. Do you even care? Justin cares. Our Queen would have cared, but she’s in the same place as your sister-in-law.

  Tyler bit his lip.

  Your fucking sister-in-law. That dead rotten fucking sister-in-law bitch. That cunt. That whore. That she. What does she have to speak as a woman for?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, said Tyler, scratching his face.

  She’s saying: If you disagree with me, you’re disagreeing with half the human race. And I’d wager that she knows half the human race no better than I do. It’s a cowardly and dishonest attempt at intimidation, is what it is. And I find it very sad that such words pit one group against another when right now we all need to help each other because we’re all under attack, and if you don’t agree, you can just go eat your dead sister-in-law’s twat . . .

  Are you okay, Dan?

  What the fuck do you mean, am I okay? I’m under investigation and this jerk asks me if I—if I. . .

  Let me drive you home, Dan.

  Aren’t we being schoolboyish? And you expect me to go on feeding you with my divine wisdom—my, I’d never have thought it! And those FBI turds . . . There’s nothing that’s okay the way it is.

  All right, Dan. Here we go. Door’s wide open.

  And the Queen—

  Lean on me for a minute there.

  And you and your envious ears—

  Lean back so I can put your seat belt on, Dan.

  The Queen, Henry.

  Yeah, the Queen.

  Do you read the Scriptures?

  You must have asked me that a hundred times.

  I think she made it easier to make changes, to like experiment, try and be somebody better. And now I . . . Although I can’t believe it, either. I’m on your side, Henry, but she’s truly gone. I love you, Henry. I want myrrh and aloes to wrap up inside her shroud. I want to lay her in a new tomb and wait for her to rise. I want to believe in fucking miracles. Isn’t that rich? As if that asshole up in the clouds would ever give anybody with the mark of Cain a break!

  You’re wrong there, Dan. He put the mark of Cain on us to save us, and you know it. He said: If anyone slays Cain, vengeance shall fall upon him sevenfold.

  I don’t give a shit. I need miracles, Smooth wept.

  I know, said Tyler, seeing with his soul’s eye the Queen’s soul leaping tall and slender and stiff into a smoky yellow sky.

  And I know what that brother of yours would say. He’d say, Let’s keep the Queen out of this. But that won’t do any good, Henry, because you’re going to have to live without Irene and without the Queen for the rest of your whole goddamned life. You’re going to have to live with yourself, Henry, you poor sad bastard. I feel so sorry for you, I just pity your stinking guts . . .

  All right, Dan. Here we go. Now, when we get to your house, I’m going to need your key so I can let you in. Do you know where your housekeys are?

  They’re in Irene’s twat, Henry. They’re jammed up your victim’s cunt. She died because she hated you. You wouldn’t leave her alone and she was so desperate to get away from you that she—

  Tyler switched on the radio.

  | 525 |

  On August ninth, which was Irene’s birthday, two black girls approached the counter giggling and whispering, and the righthand one, who was very pretty and dark and full-breasted, said to the man: Excuse me, but are you helping anybody?

  Nope, the man said. The sign beside him said: ALL SALES FINAL.

  Where the long glass counter started was at the partition that said LOAN DEPT., behind which, attended by a dozen safes, a nighthawk of an old woman sat watching the world with jaundiced eyes.

  Beneath that stretch of counter, harmonicas large and small slept on blue felt, some of them cheap, made in China, and a few grand Hohners as sil
ver as the barrel of a Colt Python, cold mirror-silver chased with floral swirls as folkishly stylish as the designs on the immense silver belt buckles sometimes seen in Mexico.

  Can you play them harmonicas? asked the girl shyly.

  The man folded his arms. —Nope, he said.

  How come this little one’s only twenty dollars and this big one’s a hundred and seventy-three dollars?

  Well, the man replied, that’s like asking the difference between a Cadillac Fleetwood and a Cadillac Whatchamacallit.

  Oh, said the girl.

  She looked at the harmonicas for a while, then said: Why’s this big one a hundred and seventy-three dollars and this little one’s two hundred dollars?

  I can’t rightly say, the man answered.

  The wall behind the counter was hung with banjos and guitars, some black-lacquered. After those, just behind the man, rifles and shotguns leaned barrel up in a long row like prison bars. Within the region of glass case which touched the man’s belly were the pistols and revolvers, beautiful, black, silver and grim.

  Can I hold one of those? pleaded the girl laughingly.

  Nope, said the man.

  I have I.D.

  Let’s see it, then.

  I’m nineteen.

  Then you’re not old enough.

  Please?

  Nope.

  I’m not going to buy it, I promise. I just want to look.

  If you can’t buy it, what’s the use of looking? the man said, pleased with his own logic.

  I just want to know what it feels like to hold a gun, the girl whispered with lowered eyes.

  Her friend screeched mirthfully: Don’t you let her, mister!

  Nope, said the man calmly.

  The two girls fled. When they were safely outside the store, the pleader turned around and outstretched her tongue.

  Can I see that Browning there? said Dan Smooth. What is it, a Buck Mark?

  Nope. That’s a Browning Challenger III.