The Lucky Star

by William T. Vollmann

  I, I don’t know.

  What’s the use of asking you anything? But here you are, nosing into my business again.

  I’m sorry, and I sure do appreciate it. You know how Hillary Clinton keeps saying, it takes a village to raise a child? Well, it’s taking all of you to raise Judy, and I—

  You’re too much, said Catalina.

  I’m just saying hello. Okay? Just wanted to say hi. Um, hi! Am I being inappropriate? I don’t want anything. Are you bored with me yet?

  Yes, said Catalina.

  I’m sorry.

  Oh, God, I give up. Come in. Sit down. I’ve got a late shift at the grocery market pretty soon, but whatever. And I’m already tired, and you annoy me, and how is learning who I am going to help you figure out who you are?

  I don’t know, said Judy miserably.

  Fine. I was already attracted to women when I was little. I remember one time when we lived in some apartments and that hallway where, that outside hallway, the alley, and I found a porn magazine and it had women, and I had weird feelings, and nice feelings, and those women, they were looking like my teacher. She was a very pretty white woman.

  And did she . . . ?

  Be quiet. I used to play family with a lot of the girls that were my neighbors. I always liked boys that were more like feminine looking and I did have boyfriends. But I didn’t know that that could be like my life until I started realizing that I had real crush feelings for a woman when I was eighteen. I was afraid because I knew that my mom was not gonna be okay with it. She makes the rules; she’s the boss. My mom, she caught us one time in my room, and my mom she said that she was gonna tell my dad, but she had never brought up my dad as a power figure and she said: what do you think your dad will say? At first I told her that I would stop seeing this girl, that I would fix it. I had had boyfriends before. In the room that we were in there was a door to the back yard, so that girl just ran out. And after I was done talking to mom I went looking for her, and she was in the neighborhood, and I had her stop, and she was so sad. My mom told me that it was her fault, because she had wanted a boy. I stopped for about a week. And then I was playing soccer at the time and my coach told me he had a gay aunt and she was dying of cancer because she couldn’t accept who she really was, and I thought that was so scary, so that same night, I hooked up with my girlfriend, and she was so happy. But my girlfriend’s family had her do conversion therapy. Then her mom brought me a picture of her son and said, isn’t he attractive, don’t you wanna be with him? Very traumatizing, being pushed into being a normie. It lasted four or five weeks. Then our relationship was open and people just had to deal with it. Within just three or four months it was out in the air. Her mom and dad called me, and they said that if I didn’t stop calling her they were going to call my mom, and they said if I wanted to be with her I would have to get surgery; so I had to show my mom the e-mails that were harassing. And my mom told them that I was nineteen and Tenicia was nineteen, so we would both do what we were gonna do. My dad told me to keep it private and not post anything on Babble or those other sites. I said nothing, but I was so hurt. I felt mad but I didn’t tell him. My brother, my sister, they were super cool with it immediately. The rest of my family, they never told me anything. My grandpa, my grandma, nobody. But back in Mexico, I had a cousin that was also coming out, and my mom had my sister, what’s wrong, so they could both vent about their lesbian daughters. But maybe you’re not a woman, Judy. You might be something else.

  21

  What was she, then? For that matter, what was Neva?

  Victoria could not bear to take her hands off the lesbian’s body; even touching her all the time with one hand was not enough; while the straight man stayed home, unable to stop dwelling on the many lovely things that the lesbian had done to him while he lay so ecstatically open and helpless, driven beyond mindlessness by pleasure’s bloody assaults; and Shantelle kept happily choking her in little pulses (the victim, purple-faced and wheezing, smiled up at her) . . .—after which she demanded that Neva keep rubbing her cunt all night, up and down, up and down, which Neva did, until she finally whispered that she was getting tired.—Then fire Judy and Francine and all them other bitches, replied Shantelle. It’s your fuckin’ problem for being a slut.—So the lesbian resumed rubbing, all the while wondering whether she had shut off the front left burner of the gas stove.—Oh, you motherfuckin’ slut, groaned Shantelle, ho bitch; you’re nobody’s bitch but mine. Neva, Neva sweetheart, ain’t you my precious little bitch?—Neva nodded gamely.—Vermilion neon and vermilion traffic lights from Taylor and O’Farrell kept sweetly staining their faces and hands. In the morning that couple flew downstairs and up the street like newlyweds, drinking coffee and eating pastry at the Fat Girl Bakery. But the transwoman, ever more inflamed at being no more loved than us others, longed to sink her teeth into her dear Neva’s white throat; because just as Nancy Kerrigan once said about her Olympic rival Kristi Yamaguchi, competing never gets in the way of our friendship.—Shantelle, of course, seeing how the lesbian smiled at Judy, felt a sharp pain in the center of her breastbone.

  Up came my lucky number. Ascending the carpeted stairs, I found the lairs of other residents no more distracting than the relief carvings on the lintels of false doors. Although she usually preferred not to sit on top of me (but upon request, of course, she would and did) because it went in too deep and hurt her ovaries, this time without my even asking her (not I but my penis required it) she immediately leaped on top of me, roaring with apparent pleasure as she slid down my hard, hard erection, doing this thing for which she had been born; and with her shoulders thrown back and her beautiful breasts bouncing, the nipples hard and fat as berries, she rode me like the wind (I forget where to, maybe the lost city of Ai Khoum), climaxing like nobody’s business, laughing and growling with her hair swaying back and forth as I reached up to squeeze her breasts, and then (following Shantelle’s example) gently squeezed her throat with both hands. She had toys; just for me she was wearing the black leather collar of consensual victimhood. The next time my wish was for her to beat me black and blue, which she sweetly did, sitting on my back; then she turned me over and began slapping my face into ever warmer happiness, my head rocking back and forth on the pillow, kept in motion by her palms, while she who comforted the lonely smiled down at me until I found myself lost in some adorable place of having given her everything, upon which I was sacrificed, used and slapped deeper and deeper down into my grave where I longed and deserved to be—killed lovingly and intimately by the lesbian! Finally her wrists were tired. As soon as she stopped, that cold forlorn feeling settled on me, and my burning face, craving endorphins, caving into loneliness, almost seemed to be dissolving away. Massaging her wrists with some of Francine’s yellow serum, she lay down on top of me for awhile. Then she checked the messages on her cell phone—what a good soldier! Here I might as well quote from a three-page editorial letter from this publisher remarking that to be honest, I do wonder whether some readers will simply tire of, for example, all the climaxing in the book. Of all the descriptions of sex acts . . . Does that end up having a bit of a deadening/boring effect? Well, I do suspect that Neva was getting somewhat deadened—but Al was on his way over, followed by the straight man; and no matter how much we drank from Neva, repletion would have been as impossible as ceasing to run our fingers over the gentle tapering of that fluted golden cup which we found close by the remains of Queen Puabi, when we dug up the city of Ur. She was buried in the company of nine hundred angels, each of whom had wings of lapis and a tail of gold. When we scraped away the hardpacked dirt, they opened their jeweled eyes and flew away; but she who had exceeded them could not reenter her bones. Across her skull lay solid gold ribbons, leaves and flowers, and a row of lapis-centered golden disks to shade her complexion from the devouring sun of Ur. Turning away from her, we quarreled over her golden cup.

  Rehearsals and Performances

 
I must add that I washed my neck and the top of my bosom with calf leather soaked in water and sheep’s foot lotion, and it was from this type of care that my skin remained sweet and white.

  THE ABBÉ DE CHOISY (who dressed as a woman), date unknown

  It is beauty which gives birth to love, and beauty is ordinarily the share of women.

  THE ABBÉ DE CHOISY

  I see only a beautiful woman and why forbid myself to love her?

  THE ABBÉ DE CHOISY

  In fact the mothers would not mistrust me in a thousand years, and I believe—God forgive me—that they would have put me to bed with their daughters without any scruple.

  THE ABBÉ DE CHOISY

  1

  Trying to tell out to myself whatever it was I knew of her, the lesbian who was teaching me how to love, I went looking for Natalie again and behind those two garbage bins where she should have been I saw Judy kneeling before a man’s crotch; her profile could have been an acolyte’s carved out on a votive frieze. She rose and spat while the man turned away to zip up his pants. I stepped aside. When Judy came out she said: God, do I need a drink.

  Of course you do, I said, so we went to the Y Bar, where Victoria sat showing off her brand new look.

  Hi, said Judy, wide-eyed like a starstruck fan.

  Hi, said Victoria.

  Gimme a triple, said Judy. You know why? Because it’s payday.

  What do you mean? You want three times as much bourbon in your ginger ale?

  No, I want . . . Gimme a triple shot of Old Crow straight up.

  Just like your old man, said Francine. How’s he doing?

  I don’t know.

  Nine dollars.

  Victoria, is that olive oil on your face?

  It most certainly isn’t.

  Well, my face is not as high-quality as yours anyhow. Do you think olive oil would be right for me? Because I can’t—

  Oh, no, Judy, shea butter is a must have, said Victoria. Or would you rather completely give up on your skin? You see, your complexion needs help.

  Observing her reinvigorated earnestness, I deduced that through teaching, persuasion, desperation or other inducements the transwoman had been led into another effort at reincarnating her namesake. She promised me that she had now lost a total of twenty-two pounds, and for all I know she was even telling the truth. Trying to assist, I repeated Natalie’s motivational mantra: If you don’t stand for something, you fall for everything.

  What the fuck’s that about? demanded Shantelle.

  It means, good for Judy, because she’s trying to—

  I don’t care.

  Well, keep your not caring to yourself, said Francine, snappishly I thought. Shantelle, imagining that she was about to do something awful which glowed right out of her head so that everyone could see it and was therefore excitedly watching her, fired off her best evil smile, but by then we had more to entertain us, because Xenia had just marched in, wearing her trademark red, and Judy immediately commenced pumping her: Please, big sister, can you tell when people like your act?

  Actually, no.

  Your usual? asked Francine.

  I guess so.

  Three dollars.

  Keep the change. Now, Judy, what did Shantelle just say?

  That she doesn’t care.

  Do you care?

  No.

  About anything?

  No, I swear.

  What if somebody started beating you to death?

  I—

  Come on, Frank! Just say it!

  I wouldn’t care.

  All right then. If you keep saying it, someday you’ll mean it, and then nobody can hurt you. Now what did you want? Oh, yeah: If I was really good . . . When you’re really good at performing, you’re really confident, and then you’ll draw a bigger crowd, and that includes assholes. Girls are mean, especially in wedding showers. Bachelorettes, they are always drunker than the men, and they feel very entitled just because they have vaginas. So. There are two kinds of girls who come to my shows. There are hardcore lesbians, and there are girls who come to hate. When the boyfriends start getting excited, the girlfriends get unhappy, and they take it out on me. And when that happens, what do I say?

  I . . . I don’t care.

  Gold star for Judy. How much weight have you lost?

  Twenty-eight pounds.

  Bullshit.

  I don’t care!

  Good for you. Are you practicing your routine?

  Sure, I—

  Don’t lie to me.

  But I am.

  We’ll see next Thursday. You’d better not fuck up.

  2

  We all knew that among the greatest pleasures of Judy’s life was the anticipatory fantasy of feminine success, which she would have defined as lustful attention. For her no distinction existed between worship and objectification. Perhaps that was also true for the first Judy Garland. It certainly applied to everyone I knew, possibly excluding Neva. To the heroes, heroines, accomplishers, etcetera goes the joy of doing. But to the rest of the human race, who can hardly aspire to anything better than sitting at the Y Bar, dreaming is all there is. And thank the Goddess that is so! For where would all those doers be, without, say, Victoria and me to applaud once the doers were already down to the pasties, their mouths wriggling into femmie-femmie smiles, their buttocks all a-wriggle-jiggle while the mistress of ceremonies expounded upon a group of lovely ladies that came in today to break all kinds of records?

  3

  One of the best parts of my own life continued to be anticipating my turn with the lesbian: forty minutes to go, then twenty, and at five I would be at the top of those carpeted stairs, waiting for Francine, Ed or Shantelle to come floating out on a wave of diminishing happiness. Once Neva opened the door for me and I started kissing her, even if I could taste Francine or Ed or Shantelle in her mouth I didn’t care, because everything became pure. What still astonished me was the sudden luxuriance of time. Between foreplay, afterplay and orgasm no longer existed any difference. I could stroke her upper arm or lick her lips for half an hour straight, never tiring or growing urgent to do some other thing, which reminded her of her mother’s fiddlings in her underpants, and the way her mother would play perfectly tenderly with Karen’s vulva so long as she was not crossed; she could have been any considerate lover, even me; but the instant that the child began to back away, the fingers would pinch, the long nails would dig, poke and stab, worrying at the girl’s labia, scratching her clitoris, bruising her and sometimes making her bleed. My penis might be stiff and throbbing for that entire while, and maybe Neva would touch it or suck it but that felt neither better nor worse than rubbing her arm! Everything was perfect. If I penetrated her I never knew when I would climax, and when I did, the unceasing flickering of our tongues pleased me no less than before. Could this have been how it was for her? I remember licking and sucking her pussy; she would utter long soft moans, and sometimes begin to move, but never as if she were approaching release. When I later asked her how she had felt, she would always assure me that she had been climaxing steadily for the entire while. My conclusion is that she, the one whom we desperately magnified, was either always climaxing, day and night, alone or in company, like an efflorescing spring—or else that she lied for all of our sakes. (I, who sometimes write as if I know what others felt and did, love to make up stories.)

  4

  Next Thursday was only four days away. Having now lost twenty-three pounds, the transwoman bought a box of gratitude chocolates for her idol. Now she was wondering whether she could control herself enough not to eat them. Of course the lesbian would graciously unwrap it in her presence, thank her, select the smallest bonbon, praise it, then pass the box to her, at which point she could get away with eating up to four without seeming gluttonous—and it would be so generous to wait until th
en! Not that Neva would mind if she did open the box right now, just to verify that no chocolate was missing . . .

  What’s in your purse? said the retired policeman.

  Oh, some . . . some chocolates.

  For me? he laughed.

  She flushed.

  Well?

  That’s right—

  You’re the most hilarious liar ever, he informed her. You would’ve gone straight to the electric chair . . . ! Now listen, Frank. You cheat on me left and right. Just for a change, step out on your crappy little Karen Strand. Come on, bitch! Open ’em up!

  So she did. After all, just now her darling lesbian was walled in by Shantelle’s legs.

  That’s my girl. Come snuggle up beside me. One for me and two for you; one for me and three for you . . .

  Chuckling, they stuffed their faces until they had gobbled up all three dozen. It was the most fun they’d had in ages.

  Then he turned on the crime channel and fell asleep in her arms. She lay licking her lips. That chocolate had had the perfect texture: somewhere between grainy and pasty; the taste had been sweet and floury, like a Japanese chestnut candy, or Neva’s pussy, or . . . If only there were more!

  Truth to tell, nowadays, and why this was she could not say, holding the lesbian in her arms gave her less pleasure than sadness, although this sadness was more precious to her than anything else.

  That was when she began considering, as she later told me, that if she truly loved Neva she ought to kill herself on the landing of the carpeted stairs where all of us passed to and fro in accomplishing our trysts; she had not the courage to slit her throat, nor the knowledge to unlock the retired policeman’s gun safe, so it would have to be pills—any opioids, really, or even cheap and nauseating barbiturates, so long as fentanyl could help her along; and for that her go-to bitch would be Shantelle. But could she actually go through with this, or would she chicken out? Better to lock herself into Neva’s affections. And that is why I kept observing the transwoman whispering and winking, digging her fingers into the lesbian’s arm, desperately trying to look cute.