We are tired. We sleep.
We wake up in early afternoon. The heat is stifling. Today
we are going to take the special acid we have been saving, N
and me and poor R. I am excited. N says first she has to meet
the guy from last night. She promised him. She just wants
forty-five minutes alone with him. He comes in the dead heat
of the afternoon. In the glaring heat of the sun he is still cold,
glistening, mean. He wears a suit. He wears a tie. He has on a
clean shirt, buttoned up to the top. His shoes are polished. His
face is set, he doesn’t try to smile, he has no expression, he
doesn’t sweat. Standing up he is towering, dangerous, cold. N
is happy to see him, reserved, courteous. I am bewildered and
afraid. I just want to fuck him, she says quietly to me. We
have dropped the acid. He is dangerous, I say. What are you
49
going to do when you start tripping? He will be gone by then,
she says. One fuck, then he will go. I wait outside like she tells
me to. They go into our storefront. I expect to hear screams. I
hear nothing. I strain to hear but I hear nothing. Forty-five
minutes later they come out. Nothing has changed with him.
Suit. Tie. Clean shirt, buttoned up. Polished shoes. No expression. Still not sweating. N is glassy-eyed, creamy, content.
I got what I wanted, she said. Whad ya do in there, I ask,
casual but really scared, worse now since I see no sign of human
emotion or exertion in him. Just fucked, she says. He is not a
man who fucks. I can see that. He may kill but he doesn’t
fuck. Either the needle or he tied her up. I am pretty sure. She
is wearing a blouse with long sleeves, not her usual T-shirt. I
don’t see her naked for the next few days. Even as the street
begins to slide and whirl, I know that there are bruises on her
arm from one thing or another. I don’t exactly know the word
sadist but that is what I think he is anyway. I strain for the
word without finding it but I know what I mean. I am scared.
She is satisfied. I never see him again. I think he kills people.
Most of the violent men we see are sloppy, one way or another.
Their violence sort of oozes out. This man is a perfect diamond
cutting through glass.
*
There are the layers, the dumb, slobbering junkies, oozing pus
and grief, dealing a little, stealing, falling down on top of whatever doesn’t move fast enough; there are bastards a little colder, still oozing, and the pimps, who drool. There is a ladder of
street slobber, so that the violence gushes out like tears or
drips like a leaky faucet, but it is a mistake, not cold, ruthless
art: as much accident as intention, not coldly calculated and
perfectly executed. Then there is this other level. No fear. No
ooze. No slobber. No exhibitionism. No boast. Nothing except
serious intention, perfectly conceived and coldly executed, an
interior of ice and a perfect economy of motion.
*
What has he done to her? The acid begins to grip and she will
not say anyway. Poor R had left when she heard N was inside
with a man. N is politely, resolutely silent. She will not budge.
We are worlds apart and the subject is closed. Then we are
awash in acid and beyond all human argument. We begin to
50
roam the magnificent city streets and to play like children in
their decaying monumental splendor. We range over these
grand cement plains like wild animals, we dance up mountains
fleet of foot, we rush down rivers dancing on the silver light of
the rapids: each sight and sign of squalor is dazzling and
unique: there is no language for this and sadist is a word even
when you can’t quite find it: and each and every human form
shimmers in light and motion: the cold, cold man is more than
gone or forgotten: there is no place in the universe for him: he
is behind us now and time is a river, rushing on. The cement is
a luminous rainbow of garish silver and blinding white coming
out of the gravel, rising up like a phoenix from it: gold mixes
into the stone from the heat and the scarlet from the blood is
brilliant and intensely beautiful.
The air is spectacular, daylight, light that dances, a million
shining fragments of light like tiny speckled stones: you could
reach out and touch them except instead you walk between
them, skirting their shiny surfaces, never feeling their glossy
round edges. You reach out your arm to touch a piece of light
and your arm stretches into the distance, it has the curves of a
gracious hill and subtle valley and your fingers slide gracefully
past each other, one then another then another, and they are
gracefully curved, like a valley between two hills, a slight curve,
slack but aesthetic and delicate. And the tips of your fingers
touch the light and dance, dance.
The red from the traffic light spreads out through the air, it
is circle on circle of diffusing red light, it is like a red light in
the sky and with the sun behind it, it becomes fierce and hot.
The streets are endless arcades filled with gentle refuges. There
are stores where they greet you warmly, hippie boys all hairy
and with wet eyes, and give you tea and have you sit and offer
you smoke: and you laugh and laugh: or are deadly solemn:
and there is sitar music and you get lost on each note and drift
until the hot tea is in your hand: and you come back, treated
like a holy traveler, an honored guest, by the warm hairy
strangers. You look at the colored beads and the huge drawings
of tantric intertwinings on the walls: and you are home here
on earth, taken care of, given refuge: until you move on, the
acid pushing you, the pulse somewhere calling you.
51
Outside it is dark now, and you roam through the streets
until dawn when you watch the light come up. There are people
you touch, their faces, their tongues, you slip behind cars or
into doorways or spread out on suddenly available floors,
mattresses that seem to just be there waiting for the simple
traveler with legs that spread all wet. You smoke and smiling
people hand you pills and you swallow them because nothing
can hurt you now: and you stop cars with your acid smile: and
communicate with your acid brain: and you watch something
you could never look at before, a huge roach, a dead rat, and
you are awed by its monstrous beauty.
Your sweat simply melts you and you take off your clothes
somewhere with someone and you come and come and come:
and laugh: and fuck: and smoke: and drink: and run, run, run:
and smile: and the music is everywhere, in the traffic, in the
rumbling of the heavy trucks, in the sirens, in the screeching
wheels of police cars, in nasty motorcycles and in the sucking
sounds of the dirty men who whisper cunt when you walk by.
And you talk, intensely. The universe. Reality. Light. Truth.
Time. Dawn comes and you are hungry. You are coming down.
You smoke. You sit on a stoop, tired and content. A man
walks by. You
ask him for breakfast. He takes you to one of
the all-night restaurants run for the likes of you on the Lower
East Side. The rabble are eating, all tired, all fucked out, all
drugged out. It is beautiful, serene. You get orange juice and
blintzes and sour cream and eggs and toast and coffee. The
man waits. Hey mister, you say laughing, wanna buy us
breakfast? He nods. Now you sit and eat and he watches. Now
you are full. Now he pays the bill. Now you say, hey, mister,
wanna fuck? You are still zinging on the acid a little but mostly
it is over: back to business: of course mister wants to fuck.
*
N and I sit on the stoop in front of poor R ’s apartment. The
light is just beginning. The dark is lit up from inside. The acid
is beginning to soften, to lose its grip. We are still wavy, still
floating, still charged, still porous, bodies floating in light and
air: but personality is beginning to creep back in: we know
who we are and where we are: we know that dawn is on its
way: we know that we are hungry and have to eat: we know
the acid is going: we know the night is over and the trip is over
52
and pedestrian day is nearly here: we sit watching the dark
becoming lighter and lighter: we sit watching a dead rat at the
curb: it is indisputably a rat, not God: poor R is sleeping inside,
she won’t let us in, she won’t make us breakfast, we are excommunicated, we are happy, we are turned loose to look for breakfast elsewhere: we sit there, buddies, and chat in the dark:
we walk around: we touch fingers and briefly hold hands.
*
N and I sit on a stoop in St M ark’s Place. Hey mister. We are
hungry. The acid is wearing off. The smoke has given us
ravenous appetites. We are tired. Hey mister. Some misters
pass. This one mister takes us to breakfast. He is silent,
watchful, not easy to disarm. Mister turns out to be not such
an easy fuck. N fucks him and falls asleep. Mister doesn’t
sleep. Mister probably hasn’t slept in months. Mister is nuts. I
get Mister for hours. N sleeps like a log.
*
Mister is white, lean, wiry, crew-cut, muscled, tense, wired to
go off. A coil ready to spring. Full of inexplicable rushes of
violence. He fucks like he hates it. It never gets him anywhere.
He concentrates, he fucks. You can’t feel much except his concentration. He is doing some martial art of the thighs, over and over, trying to make it perfect, get it right: it doesn’t touch
him: then the violence pours through him, impersonal, and he
is in a frenzy of fuck: then, more tense but calmer, he concentrates, he fucks. Eventually I sleep. I don’t know how or why.
When I wake up it is nearly night again. He is taking us to
the beach. The heat here in the storefront is scalding; treacherous, wet steam. Our skin is raw and burning. Our clothes are wet. Our eyes are almost swollen shut. It is hard to breathe.
Heat hurts our lungs. Mister has a car. He is giving us dinner.
We are going with him to the beach.
He drives like a maniac, but we only feel the breeze. The car
barely touches the road. It swerves. We leave the city behind.
The air gets less hot. We see the city lights trailing behind us
as we swerve and curve in the airborne car. We cool down
enough to be afraid.
The car stops, and there is a beach and an ocean. It is endlessly deserted. There are no cars. There are no people. There is a full moon and it is nearly light on the beach. The water
53
shines. It advances up against the beach. The waves are small
and delicate. The ocean is tame but it goes on forever. It goes
out as far as we can see, way past the moon. We are on the
beach. Mister wants some sex. N whispers to me that she can’t
fuck, she is bleeding again. All summer she has had this mysterious bleeding. I tease her that she wants to get out of fucking this creep. But still: she is bleeding, not menstruation, hemorrhaging: she can’t be fucked. She and I make love for him on the beach. It is not enough. He is wired, tense, has spasms of
violence, shows us his knife. N holds me down from behind,
both arms. He turns away one minute, a modest gesture unzipping his fly. She grins ear to ear. I try to get loose watching her grin. She is strong and I can’t. She holds me down. He
pulls down his pants. He fucks me. I get dressed. N and I sit
and watch the ocean. N and I sit and watch the moon. He
goes off by himself. A cop comes along. What are you doing
here? Watching the ocean officer. It’s dangerous here at night
girls. Thanks officer. We walk up to the car. The cop moves
on. Mister jumps up from behind the car, plays with his knife.
Mister takes us for lobster, he is silent and watchful, he doesn’t
eat, then Mister drives us home.
*
We get out of the car. The beach is there. The ocean is there.
The moon is full. We see the ocean with the moon hanging
over it. Mister is wired. Mister tells us he has a gun in the car
under the front seat. Mister tells us he hates his wife. Mister
tells us he is going to kill the bitch. Mister tells us his wife has
tried to get away from him. Mister tells us his wife was walking
down a street and he beat the bitch to pieces and pulled a
knife on her. How could his wife do that, we say, not knowing
what she did. We go on to the beach.
*
The beach is a little scummy, empty cans and empty bottles,
paper, trash. The sand is a little dirty. N and I undress each
other. We kiss. We make love standing up. He wants us in the
sand. We make love in the sand. She dresses. He shows a knife.
She holds me down. I am flat on my back naked on the beach.
She is behind me. I look up into her face. She grins. It is her
comradely grin. But I try to get loose and can’t. She is strong.
She is holding me down. It is our charade, but I can’t get
54
loose. He fucks me. He disappears. I brush the sand off but I
am all gritty. I get dressed fast. N and I sit and watch the
ocean. N and I sit and watch the moon. The cop comes. He
tells us girls could get hurt alone on the beach at night. We are
panicked that Mister left without us. The car is still there. We
walk to it. We get in covered with sand. I can taste sand in my
mouth. Mister buys us lobster. He sits and watches, all tight
and coiled. He drops us at the storefront. Inside we drink iced
tea and sleep entirely embracing each other. We sleep and kiss
like it’s one thing, wound round each other like the gnarled
branches of an ancient tree. She has stopped bleeding. The
sand rubs and rubs, hurting a little, we are drenched in sweat,
we sleep and fuck at the same time, not letting go.
*
Have you ever seen the moon, full, rising behind the head of a
man fucking you on a dirty beach? Have you ever heard the
ocean, lying flat on your back, your arms behind you, held
down, have you heard the sound of the ocean behind him, have
you looked up to see her broad grinning face? Have you ever
felt the sand, dirty and a little wet, all over, and kissed her
thighs and the sand? Have you ever kissed a bleeding woman
&nb
sp; everywhere and tasted dirty sand and then watched moonlight
fall on a knife and been naked in the sand while he fucked
you, the full moon behind him, the sound of the ocean behind
him, and your wrists weighed down by lead, her knees on top
of your arms as she caressed your breasts while he fucked like
doing push-ups, but the full moon is very beautiful and the
sound of the ocean is very fine?
*
And then, alone, have you needed each other so bad that you
slept and fucked at the same time, the whole time you were
sleeping, what others call night, so close, so entangled, melted
together, wrapped around each other, sand biting your skin
rubbing in the sweat: and been at peace, happy, with time
stopped right there?
*
The narrow mattress on the painted floor is drenched through
with sweat, and the sand pricks like sharp, tiny bites, hurting,
and the room is dark and airless, and we are wound together,
sleeping as we fuck: a somnambulant intercourse: wet and hot,
55
barely on the verge of consciousness and not yet dream: the
heat turning it into delirium: for all the hours of a human
night.
*
We wash. N goes to use poor R ’s shower. She has broken the
letter of the law but will not tell. The promise was made when
N loved her. Now she doesn’t. The shower is redundant in the
wet heat but it will get rid of the sand. I stand in our kitchen,
it is dark even though sunlight blankets the earth outside the
iron bars covering the kitchen windows: I look first through
the grating over the doors and windows into the backyard to
see if the neighborhood boys are there: they stare in, bang on
the windows, bang on the doors: we try not to undress in front of
them. I fill a big pot full of water. It comes out of the tap
sweaty. I dip an old washcloth in and out of the pot and rub it
disconsolately all over. Then I do the same again, using soap,
but not too much, because you can never quite get it off. Then
I do it again with clean water. Then I am ready.
N comes back clean. She has not told, I can tell. We both
broke our promise to poor R. The beach was within the law;
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