Dessert!
Without waiting for distraction or cover, I raced from the table to the kitchen. I should have been in position already. Now I was in trouble. Ruth brought in the first load of dishes and stayed while Elizabeth retrieved the rest. I climbed to the underside of the counter, to within several feet of the canister shelf, but I could get no farther. Ruth was only placing dishes in water; she would wash them later. Her back wouldn't be turned long enough for me to make my move.
She raised the shopping bag to the counter, put the pastry box beside it, and placed the serving platter beside that, all as I had anticipated. I smelled the lardy sweetness of the pastries as she arranged them, and heard her lips smack after she licked her fingers. Oh, to have her place me into the arrangement! I cursed myself. If the platter left the counter without the prepared garnish, all my work could easily come to nothing.
The crackle of wax paper. The pastries were all on display. Maybe I could salvage a little icing before I took the bad news home.
The doorbell rang. Could it be Rufus already? I didn't care. As soon as Ruth went to the door, I raced over the counter, up the wall, and to the top of the sugar canister.
"Yo, what's goin' on?"
I pushed the pit off the handle. It slid down the shoulder of the canister, glanced off the shelf, and landed in the platter.
"You're so early," Ruth said.
"No, right on time," said Rufus. "I'm a businessman."
The pit stuck in the thick glaze on the edge of the top pastry. This was no good; during her final inspection Ruth would pluck it off.
"You're right," she said. "I forgot, we got held up. . . we were delayed. Come in. We're about to have some dessert."
As soon as I heard the awkward syncopation of her heavy steps and his taps, I leaped. I landed on the pastry beside the pit, and my legs sank to the first joint. The glaze was like flypaper. This was too cruel.
Ruth's pumps were quickly scuffing back. I flattened against the pastry. I was lucky—this time she chose to take the coffee pot. I had about thirty seconds before she would come back for me. With the superhormonal strength generated only by pure fear—the strength that lets old ladies lift cars off trapped sons—I managed to get one leg free, pry the pit up on the edge, and kick it between the pastries. With a soft ping it found the platter. Pulling myself onto a walnut, I eased out my legs, almost losing the back left to the glaze. Then, despite my exhaustion, I sprang farther than any Blattella germanica has in 350 million years, from the middle of the platter to the countertop—a feat I never announced in the baseboard, knowing I would not be believed. Not even the glaze caked to my legs could slow me now. I raced across the counter and made it behind the toaster just as Ruth returned.
This time she took the coffee cups. My heart was pounding; I wished I had known. By the time she brought the platter into the living room, I was sitting with the others, who had moved to the coffee table.
"So, Rufus, old man, how've you been?" asked Oliver.
"I been good, Oliver boy."
Elizabeth said, "We haven't seen you in ages."
"Not in a coon's age," said Oliver.
"I've been busy, mindin' the store."
Oliver was tapping his foot again. "Rufus, you'll be glad to hear that Ira rectified a serious breach of constitutional justice today."
"A refund from the tax man? He musta owe you what, five, ten green easy."
"No, no, it was a Negro. Someone neglected to read him his rights after he ran twenty people down with his car."
Ira's head swung back and forth as he made a futile effort to intervene.
Rufus's voice fell to a whisper. "Sound like the Miranda Gang. Buncha bad-ass nigger love to be read to, like little kids. Forget, Pom! you nothin' but dust."
"Wow!" said Elizabeth. "They must be a well-educated gang." Oliver dropped his head.
"You dumb enough to get caught, not hearin' your right don't buy you nothin'," said Rufus. "Only on TV."
Oliver looked at Ira. "That's it! The TV defense. It's every bit as good as the San Francisco Twinkie defense. Rufus, do you eat Twinkies?"
Rufus stuck out a tongue like a lizard's. "I like to lick out the white part."
Ira quickly passed him the tray. "Why don't you try a pastry?"
"That's the longest tongue I've ever seen," said Ruth. "Can you touch your nose?"
Rufus said, "I can touch your nose."
"What are you doing?" Oliver said to his wife, whose little tongue was straining over her own upper lip.
"See what you started?" Ira snapped at Oliver.
"I can do it," Ruth said to Ira, as she painted the bottom of her promontory. "Can you?"
With an expression of contempt, Ira picked up the winning pastry and opened his mouth. The watermelon pit, stuck lightly to the bottom, fell to the platter with a thwack. The conversation halted.
No one spoke for several seconds. Finally the host said, "Where did that come from?"
Elizabeth was watching her husband. "The pastry was fruity tonight."
I signaled to Crest, in the doorway, who passed word to Bismarck in the kitchen. It was time to dispatch the contingent up the wall.
I had gone through all the effort of placing the pit to spur Oliver's racism, which would humiliate his host and infuriate his wife, thereby consolidating their alliance. Oliver took his cue. "Ira, you devil, you've been filching from the Legal Aid coffers."
"Shut up," said Ira, then to Elizabeth, "Did he put that there?"
"I'm not saying you're not entitled to your pits. But are you declaring them to the IRS?" Oliver chortled. "Rufus, you're a businessman. Would you accept this as legal tender?"
Ira looked defeated, Oliver mirthful. Elizabeth's apprehensive eyes darted from face to face; Ruth was not quite as concerned. Rufus tapped his outstretched fingertips against one another. The pit sat in the middle of the white platter, a black hole with profound cultural gravity over the orbiting humans. I had done it—pushed them together and left them with nothing dignified to say. I was stripping their civilization, abandoning them to their naked humanity.
Finally Rufus broke the silence. "Let's do business. I ain't got all night."
Ira leaped up. "In the kitchen."
I sent a second signal to Crest, and Bismarck relayed it up to the fuse box. Holding the rubber cement girdle, a squad of citizens pushed the copper wires from the vacuum cleaner into bare points on a connection in the main line. Pop! The apartment went black.
"What the hell was that?" said Ira.
Oliver laughed. "The Miranda gang. They want their story."
"The lights are on across the street," said Ruth. "It's just our old wiring. Don't worry."
Rufus’s shins cracked against the edge of the table, and he fell back into his chair, cursing and massaging. Ira felt his way along the wall to the light switch and yanked it up and down.
"That's not it," said Ruth. "The hall and kitchen went out too."
"It must be the fuse box," said Ira.
"And they say Jews aren't handy," said Oliver.
Oliver's wife said, "Why don't you help him?"
"I'm not the kind of guest who gets in people's way." Ira worked toward the kitchen like a mole; he had walked the route thousands of times, but without sight, Homo's only adequate sense, he was lost. I easily kept up with him. "Nice work," I called to Bismarck.
Ira fumbled for the utility drawer. Feeling the resistance we created, he gave the handle a brutal yank. The shattering glass rang out; the flashlight was eviscerated.
He picked it up and tried the switch. "Damn it, Ruth. Shut the flashlight off when you put it away." He threw it back in the drawer.
"What?" She smacked the table with her legs and sat. Ira felt his way back down the hallway wall. "Turn the thing off. The flashlight. Never mind. Oliver, you must have taken one from work."
Oliver patted his pockets. "I seem to have left it at home."
"Shit, I ain't got time for this." Rufus rose and
stumbled over Elizabeth's foot but still kept going.
Ira said, "Wait, Rufus, I'll get the lights back on."
"But it's so cozy like this," said Oliver.
"Next week." Rufus left.
This was the critical moment, and Elizabeth rose to it perfectly. "Come on, Ira. We have a flashlight."
WHEN WE GOT to her apartment, she turned on the kitchen light. Two squads from our colony were in place; we had negotiated with the natives for operating time.
"There's one in here, I'm pretty sure," she said.
Ira said, "I'm really sorry about this. What a mess. Sometimes I don't know what she's thinking."
"You're lucky. I always know what he's thinking." She dug into her utility drawer, a mess like Ira's. Her perfume filled the tight, poorly ventilated space, and soon his pate began to turn pink.
He watched for a moment, then plunged his hands in beside hers. When their shoulders brushed he flinched. Lusty, impulsive Ira. She said, "Oh, yuck!" and pulled out a khaki L- shaped flashlight, which looked like war surplus. The batteries had eaten through the base, and the switch was corroded. She dropped it back in and closed the drawer.
Clausewitz gestured impatiently from a socket box at the end of the counter. I signaled him to wait. This was the culmination of months of work. We could not risk it by striking a measure too soon. The animals in my humans, like gas in bread, needed time to rise.
But what was I thinking? Animals in these players? My male lead's big Jewish brain was most adept at holding down his little Jewish penis.
I gave the signal.
Clausewitz and the others pushed the second pair of copper wires into the socket, and the kitchen lights blew.
"This time it must be a blackout," Ira said.
"I don't know, Ira. The clock radio is still on in the living room, see?"
Side by side in the doorway they stood, watching the illuminated squared-off digits mark the passing minutes. Alone in the dark beside the pretty blonde, oblivious to everything, I imagined, except for her hand on his shoulder, and the perfume tantalizing his nostrils, what else did Ira need? And Elizabeth, alone in the dark with a man built more like a human than a huge slime mold, who had shown her consistent sensitivity and generosity over the years. What were they thinking? Was plain, stout Ruth, the appointed cause of more and more of Ira's woes, suffering beside the sleek, redolent blonde? Was fat, crass, offensive Oliver suffering beside the gallant, scrawny defender of the downtrodden? After I had pushed them together and polluted their domestic lives, were they finally ready to relinquish themselves to the natural course?
"Where's the light?" The question struck me like a mallet.
But beautiful Elizabeth said, "Wait, Ira, I want to let my eyes adjust for a minute."
She's offering herself, you shmuck. Look at her, Ira, a blonde! You've never had one. Kiss her! Then you can make up for your deficiencies with expensive gifts.
"Take my arm," he said. "Now, where's the switch?"
Go ahead, turn it on. May the sweat from your cowardly hands get you electrocuted.
Ira and Elizabeth stumbled into the hall, kicking each other like karate warriors, then apologizing like librarians. If Oliver and Ruth weren't so contemptuous of each other, they would have long coupled by now next door.
"Turn right," Elizabeth said.
But by propensity Ira turned left, and her spike heel drilled into his instep. He yelped and tore his foot back. She screamed as she fell, and clutched the back of his jacket, which split up the middle with a quiet zip. Tangled and off-balance, he toppled over on her.
Never had I flattered myself that I could fell and stack these two so quickly. I was giving up hope that it would happen at all. My mind danced with visions of Elizabeth's tight skirt pushed up, quickly, desperately, her panties peeled down, no, torn off, zippers racing, and mad rutting to words of eternal fealty. Even if Ira and Elizabeth later tried to dismiss the event as blackout madness, their groins would be sure that things were never again as they were. As the primitive Arab knows, magical rays flow from the hair of women; Elizabeth's gleaming mane would levitate Ira's stash from the cabinet. And then, for us, a quick midnight relocation into the back of the cabinet, followed by endless generations of peace and prosperity, served up by Ira and the next woman of his choice. I wished the whole colony, even my detractors, were here to see the birth of a new age.
The lingering silence began to unsettle me; a few whimpers would have been reassuring.
"I can't believe it!" Ira said passionately. A premature ejaculation? Impotence? These things happen. Keep the tip in the soup, man. Try to relax. Breathe deeply; inhale the perfume. Still furled? Stick your face into her pooze. That'll buy you some time.
Elizabeth surprised me even more by asking, "What is it?"
"I think I tore my pants. Oh, God, I can feel it. A brand new suit."
She reached up and switched on the light. Ira was sitting, legs bent, fingering an arrow-shaped tear over his knee. Both of them were still fully clothed, buttoned, and zipped.
"Brand new, Pierre Cardin. Cost me three hundred bucks wholesale. Damn!"
The woman, Ira, the woman!
"It doesn't look bad," said Elizabeth. "A tailor could mend it."
"No," he whined. "It's never the same."
I did all the work—all I asked was a token of cooperation. Sure, I'm just a little bug, and I couldn't really understand the reproductive principles of higher life forms—cowardice, impotence, and marriage. But didn't they hate themselves for being like this? No, they didn't. And that was the most mysterious thing about the perpetuation of this species.
Elizabeth listened compassionately as Ira went on about the venality of tailors. I had turned to leave when he caught himself, took her hand, and said, "Thanks for listening. I know I carry on sometimes."
But that's as far as I would get with them. Elizabeth was about to reply when Oliver opened the door. "Just as I suspected. Pulling my wife in here so you could show off your kneecap."
I DRAGGED to the outside hallway and sat on the ceiling. How could I face my colony now? What excuse could I offer, what plan, what future?
The fluorescent fixture, with its mocking buzz and blinding light, was like Ira: dumb, unnatural, unrelenting. Maybe it was time to admit that I was obsolete and that he represented the new order. I was tired of fighting. I decided to join him.
I squeezed into his liquor cabinet and found in the very back the inevitable bottle of Manischewitz. Two long purple scabs ran from the cap down to the stained label. Belly up to the bar, boys, this one's on me.
My saliva turned a segment of one of the clots into a frothy cocktail. At first I felt dizzy and a little nauseated. But then I settled into a gentle, expansive state that was not all unpleasant. I should have been more suspicious of anything humans pursue with the ardor that they do alcohol.
Suddenly a vision of Oliver appeared beside me. He looked contrite. Have I been too harsh on you, big fellow? Maybe I've made too much of our differences. After all, we are neighbors, and we live for the same things—good food, good pussy, and deep sleep. No reason to fight over that.
Wait. You can't bamboozle me. You're a fat slob, a selfish, foul-mannered boor, and the others tolerate you because they're too decent to tell you what they think of you. But what the hell, Ollie, your wife is dim and has no tits, so maybe it's not your fault. Underneath it all you're probably just a frightened 250-pound puppy, albeit with the heart of a jackal. Never mind, Ollie, you're OK with me.
And Liz, you oversanitized little fox, you golden-haired twit. If you had half a brain in your adorable head you'd dump the oaf. He drains you like an enormous, flat-footed leech. I gave you a shot at Ira. He respects you—or pretends to. But what the hell, I can't listen to him, so why should you? I forgive you, Liz. You're sweet and harmless and I like smelling your perfume and hiding under your high heels. You're all right with me.
Ruth, you're tougher to excuse, you porker, because you're sma
rt and you have class. What are you doing with this sanctimonious whiner? It can't just be your jello-thighs or aspic-ass, can it? Follow the dictates of your superior mind. Don't shrink from cellulite; it's inescapable, all around you, like spores. Am I wrong? Is this the presumption of an animal blessed with pheromones? Maybe you're right, Ira is the best humanity will offer you. In that case it is a nice apartment you've chosen. Damned cozy before you let that alien into the kitchen. I still don't know why you want him, but you must have a good reason. You're OK with me, Ruthie baby.
As for you, Ira, you skin-headed, limp-dicked little pansy. Can I ever forgive you for destroying my home? Or for your nasal voice, which injects putrid humanisms into every crack you've left me? But I'll give it to you, Ira, you're a scrapper. You were willing to sacrifice to stop me. I could hear those glands screech to a halt. I toppled the blonde onto you, didn't I, those pointy little tits and that bony mound jutting into your soft, undeserving body. And what do you do? Lower your head and take a whiff, cop a feel, or just cram her one, like any normal male? Hell, a slug would have scored enough slime to brag about. No, you let her lie there, dreaming to be had by even a circumcised dick, but feeling unsure, then unwanted, then humiliated. Her blonde pubic hair glistened with dew while you whined about your hideous suit. It's not as if I didn't know you'd suppress your hard-on by concentrating on the Republican convention or calamari. Being a gentleman, you'd spare her that embarrassment. Still, Ira, giving up shikse snatch just to get at me? But never mind. You've got a good woman, so why don't you go buy her something nice? Women love gifts; money is the pheromone of Homo sapiens. Complacency could lose her, Ira, and you're a cheap, cowardly jerk, but, I don't know, you're still all right with me...
I awoke later that night on my back on the bottom of the cabinet. The bottles towered over me like bad futuristic skyscrapers. I was very cold. When I moved, I could feel the beginning of a hangover in every ganglion, a carillon of pain. But at least my mind had cleared.
Scarves, watermelon pits, fuse boxes? What was all this bullshit? Too complicated. Too human. Scars of my youth in the bookcase. The problem was simple: I wanted the money out, which meant I wanted Ira and Elizabeth together, which, I realized, couldn't happen in this pathetic monogamous household until Ruth was gone. Who was the better woman? Who would prevail? I decided to find out right now.
The Roaches Have No King Page 13