If there's one goddamn thing that I can not possibly stand, it's a ball breaker. Don't get me wrong, I'm not like against women or nothing like that, but I can't fucking stand it when a woman seems to have nothing better to do than just wait around until you get home so she can break your balls. People think I'm abusive sometimes, and I disagree; I think I'm just taking care of myself. If I went around letting whatever women who wanted to dump shit all over me I'd be a pissant, one of those guys at work who never comes with the rest of us on Fridays to the bar. We all hate that pathetic little jerkoff, and that's just the word for him, 'cause we all know he just goes home and jerks off while he's imagining that he'd made a different choice, I'm sure of it, he knows that somewhere in his life he made the wrong decision and now instead of being a real man like the rest of us he's got to sit at home and lock the bathroom door so his wife or his girl doesn't come in and catch him and he jerks off. I bet one day he'll forget to lock the door and she WILL catch him, and boy will that be the end of him. She'll make fun of him and belittle him for the rest of his scrawny days. Now I'm sorry, but that's just not for me. I'm a smarter guy than that. Most important thing in life is to look out for number one, that's an old saying and it's a true one.
I came home after my regular nine-to-five and a few drinks to take off that afterwork boredom I get sometimes, and it was like when I opened the door it was the gunshot at the beginning of the race and she'd just been poised there right behind the door waiting to sprint. I couldn't even understand what she was saying right away. She just screamed and screamed and touched her face a lot and threw the paper all over the room. Eventually I think I heard a few words here and there and I could piece together that she was talking about me staying out after work too much. And right there I knew she didn't have any right to be upset, I knew she was just trying to bully me into her little beartrap so she could have me, and own my vitality for herself. She hadn't ever had a real job in her life, from what she told me; always getting her parents to pay for her shit, or her man, and inbetween when money was tight she worked as a secretary for a time here and there. Horseshit. She didn't have the vaguest goddamned idea what coming straight home from work was like, what a drain it was on a man. So I told her to shut the fuck up and then she started smacking my chest and my shoulders. Don't get me wrong, it's not like that hurt or anything, but I was just too damned tired and pissed off to tolerate some shit like that. So I grabbed her by the shoulders and threw her over the table onto the couch. I didn't hurt her or anything.
Then I just took my jacket from the top of the television and walked right back out. I'd gotten maybe ten feet into the place the whole time I'd been there. I didn't want to drive 'cause I know that's dangerous when you're as bloody-eyed mad as I was. So I walked to the busy street one block away and then followed it downtown for a while. There was a parking garage where we'd had a few talks, all sensitive and touching and all, and suddenly I started hoping she'd followed me so she could apologize and tell me she loved me and knew how hard I worked to put food in her gut and a roof over her head. I figured if she HAD done that she'd probably look for me there in the garage, so I walked in. I didn't want to look like I was waiting for her or anything, so I found a spot with a light above me and leaned up against the wall facing away from where she'd be coming from.
I leaned up against that wall for probably about ten minutes. I started humming songs to myself, something to keep me from being too bored just standing there in the parking garage. Then it just hit me really hard: I was acting like such a phony little bitch it made me sick to my stomach. I couldn't believe she'd made me act like such a pathetic little drama queen, going to our little spot in hopes we'd make up or some shit. Fuck that. I didn't want to make up, I wanted a fucking apology. I couldn't stand it, when she made me act like a phony. I whacked myself to the side of the head for good measure and walked the hell right out of there.
I went back to a bar that was about seven blocks downtown from the garage. Along the way there was this whore that tried to get me. "Hey, sugah, you lookin' tense, baby. Howsabout we get a room and relieve you of ya troubles, baby?" I looked at her. She was a tall chick, I thought, and she's got real nice slim hips. She looked at me really kindly, it seemed. She looked like the kind of babe that would put a moist rag on my forehead when I was feeling sick, or make me her mom's chicken soup or something like that. I just basically got a good feeling, so I said okay.
We walked right around the corner to a motel, or I guess the right word would be hotel since it had more than one floor, but I'm not really sure anyway, and then we walked inside and up the stairs. I thought to myself that maybe this was an apartment building, actually. It seemed decent enough; there was only an occassional smell of sour beer or vomit. In most places downtown you'd find the whole building to be loaded with stink, the atmosphere of a hospice or the really far-gone end of a hospital. You could just breath in in most places and get a remarkable certainty that the deaths of the people around were actually tangible pieces of the air, that the smell was as precise as hearing a man's last breath or watching his eyes roll back; there was a sharp, and almost lively, smell of armpit stink and vomit, and with that you were almost reassured because that meant the guy in there was still kicking. Then you'd get a more sedated stink coming from other rooms, a lethargic smell of rotten hair and shit meandering under the doorcrack in little tentacles you could almost see. And when it was really bad and you were in the poorest neighborhoods there was a definite and reliable air of death; I'd lived around it for years, moving from one room to another with my pillow and a bag of tapes and books. I had a guy die in the room next to mine once, and so I knew the stink of it just as well as a person who's face or voice you recognize. The same sourness was there as in the more vital rooms but it wasn't growing or dancing anymore. Instead of teasing you, pissing you off and wafting around in and out of windows, it just lay there on your shoulders. And it kept itself hidden for a while, small and easy to pass off as a rotting plant or an old piece of fruit. And then it spilt open and just spread with no aim all around. It rankled even the walls and the paint, muddied up the windows. There was very little of this smell in this building, but enough suggestion to remind me. I was less comfortable than I had been out on the street but I reminded myself that it could be worse.
We got to her room after about seven flights of stairs, which probably explained her legs, which were VERY long and superbly toned. Her ass was nice too, and she kept rolling it from one side to the other when she climbed the stairs, probably teasing me (or maybe trying to give me an early hard-on so it wouldn't last too long when we got there). She was a damn sexy bitch. Something about her seemed really strong, a security in her figure that wasn't there in any other woman I'd ever seen. It wasn't just her height, because it wasn't as if I'd never seen a tall woman before... she just seemed very well excercised and at the same time that she was a whore she kept this proud mysteriousness to her expression, something she knew I didn't know. She was glazed, almost, like sometimes in old motion pictures when they'd throw a whole lot of light on a dame to make her skin seem softer or whatever the hell it was. Maybe more like a piece of clay that'd been glazed and run through the kiln, so it was all shiny and hard looking. That was like what I was seeing in this hooker, for whatever reason.
I asked her what her name was and she said Georgia. I thought that sounded sweet, like a pretty little girl on a farm in the south somewhere. I told her my name was Stanley, which suprised me 'cause I never tell people that's my name; instead I always say it's Stan so they won't think I'm some pencil-neck or something. But I got to feeling with Georgia like she was a real sweet woman and I guess I thought it would be nice to tell her my name was Stanley. I didn't wanna be just some guy who gave her fifty bucks and then climbed right on top of her and tried to act all tough and studly. I mean, I know I'm pretty good with all that, it's not like I had any concerns whatsoever about showing her a good ride. But I didn't want her to give me the whole runaround she gave all the other chumps who didn't see what a sweet girl she really was, I didn't want her to kiss my ass, is what I'm saying. I coulda just gone into a bar or something and picked up any drunk-ass skank if I wanted to do that, and it only woulda cost me the price of a couple drinks. I wanted her to feel like I was a good guy. She smiled a little and giggled, which made me feel good. She seemed to be pretty open to me smiling at her and everything, and I felt like she wanted to smile at me too.
But the thing was that then she got totally different. She asked me what I wanted to do, and when I said I was having a good time just doing this she told me to cut the crap. I'm on my period so you can't have any pussy, but I'll give you some good head, she said. Fifty clams. I thought it was funny when she said clams because it reminded me of old movies again. But it kinda bothered me that she got so down-to-buisness about it. She started to take off her clothing. Now like I said, she was a beautiful woman. Graceful, it seemed, but strong. She was full of life and brightness. But as she unbuttoned her shirt she started to get uglier. My respect for her got darker and darker, like a flashlight that's losing the juice in its batteries. She started seeming cheap and worn. Her shirt came off and crumpled on the floor. Her bra had cumstains on it, and some other stains. When she unsnapped it and dropped it on the floor near her shirt, her cleavage disappeared, the shine on her breasts gone. They just hung there like sad little faces, frowning. They looked worn. Little purple and blue veins wrapped around the bulb of each breast and crudely masked scars sneered at me from under the nipple. I couldn't look at her face anymore, and I suddenly felt very sad and nautious.
I started to stand up as if to go and stared exclusively at the door. She ran to me and grabbed the chest of my shirt in her tiny fists. She started pleading with me, don't go, I was lying about my period, you can have my pussy if you want. I asked her why on God's green Earth she would lie about something like that, and she said she'd just not been in the mood. Then I said do you have to keep talking about your pussy like that? I don't like when you say that word, and she apologized and said she'd call it whatever I wanted. She kinda missed the point, but I didn't want to argue about it. It just made me a little uneasy that she called it that, and talked about it like it wasn't even her, a part of her at all, but more like a posession and something distanced from her. I thought she should feel like her genitals were part of her and her body, but I also didn't want to try to make her feel bad about herself. She mewled at me and pushed with her thin fingers until I conceded and sat back down in the chair. I still didn't feel like being there, but I didn't want to make her cry. Now she took her skirt off and I could see her pubic hair beneath her underpants, which were very stringy, frizzy fabric that looked like she'd found them on the street somewhere.
Then she took off her underpants, which really hurt me when I saw what was underneath. Her privates looked miserable. The lips were saggy and long, and hung out, looking sick. Some parts of the skin were wrinkled and gray, like they'd been burned or worn down. I couldn't look anymore, but if I left now it would really hurt her feelings and make her feel ugly, so I asked her to turn around. Maybe she would think I liked her ass. When she turned around, though, she bent over the bed and spread her ass cheeks apart as if to lay herself open for me. Her asshole was even more sickening that her crotch. It was crusted and also gray. It looked like a war wound that had become infected. She had taken it in the ass so many times it had been torn loose and discolored. I thought of all the guys that had treated her like just any old hooker and told her to suck their dicks and said dirty things to her while she did, saying stupid things like suck it and you like that, dontcha bitch? And then I thought how she probably pretended everything they said was true, that she did like that and she did want it, when really she was probably sick from even having seen all these purple, gnarled cocks, veins running all up and down the sides, guys who weren't circumsized, ugly guys who couldn't score with anyone else. The whole thing upset me, but I felt a stronger need to humor her than to purge my own disgust by leaving. So I rubbed her ass with my hand and told her she was beautiful. She smiled over her shoulder and said so do you wanna get to it, Butch? She was trying to turn me on but ended up making me swallow a couple times in nautious protest.
I took my pants and my underwear off with the same movement, hooking the waists of both with my thumbs. I had no erection whatsoever, but I tried to think of something to get me off so she wouldn't take it personally. I tried thinking of all the movie stars I thought were hot, and nothing happened so I thought of all the girls I'd wanted to fuck in high school, and again, nothing. I was just standing there with my pants down rubbing her ass and her thighs and breathing heavy to make her think I was hot for her, but after a while she stopped buying it. What the hell is that matter with you, she said, why don't you fuck me? I told her I just didn't have it in me, and she screamed and hit my chest with those tiny fists and grabbed her clothes. She ran out the doorway, looking much shorter than she had when I first saw her. I was confused for a second and then thought maybe it was the high heels that had made her look so tall.
I didn't feel better at all. I didn't even feel like drinking any beer. I was just sad and when I tried to think of something else to get my mind off it I just thought of how the bitch had yelled at me back home, like I could call it home, and that made me just angry. I didn't know what time it was, but maybe she was asleep. I walked home, hoping I wouldn't see her when I came in.
My keys seemed to be really loud in the lock. The door stuck and cracked loudly when I pushed it open with my shoulder. I tiptoed quickly to the bedroom to see if she was in there. She was lying on the bed in her clothes, breathing loudly. I hadn't woken her, thank God. I tiptoed back to the kitchen and opened the fridge. There was one full beer and one open, half empty beer inside. I took them both out and turned on the small reading lamp near the television. I sat down in the chair and leaned over to the small radio on the TV tray I had set up there. I clicked it on and finished the opened beer, then opened the other one. I realized I didn't need the light anymore and turned it off. I sat there for some time in the dark, finishing that stupid beer, listening to John Lee Hooker sing for me, it serves me right to suffer, it serves me right to be alone, and I dropped the bottle to the floor where it spilled over and I fell asleep.
Back.