Evan Hunter - Candyland

He has never called any of these magazine phone-sex numbers, but there's always a first time, and tonight seems as good a time as any, given the lack of amateur talent available. He fans through the magazine to the 800 and 900 numbers at the back of the book. There is no question here about what is being sold. He is glad he's not blind because the photographs are explicit and in full color, good-looking men or women or both exposing themselves or each other in poses designed to encourage and entice, the more the merrier, Ben thinks. The last several digits of the telephone numbers spell out words like DICK and CUMM and PUSS and PINK and SEXY and PETT and LICK and WETT and HEAD and WILD and LEGS and COCK and STUD and SUCK and BUTT and DEEP and FUCK and other subtle variations on the theme. The headlines range from the maudlin: LONELY? CALL ME NOW! to the boastful: SIMPLY THE BEST LIP SERVICE to the quasi-medical: MASTURBATE? ORGASM IN 30 SECONDS! to the confessional: I ADORE GIVING HEAD to the imperious: CUM FILL BOTH MY HOLES or SPREAD MY LEGS WIDE or GIVE IT TO ME! (does Grace have a phone-sex line?) to the merely didactic: ASS FUCKING or SWEET ACHING SNATCH or DILDO FUCKING or TEENAGE TARTS or HOT COCKS HERE or QUICKIE BLOWJOBS or HORNY LOCAL HARLOTS.

Ben chooses a service that shows a color photograph of two scowling young girls sitting spread-legged with shaved pussies. The headline over the photo reads FILTHY YOUNG COCKSUCKERS and the 900 number ends in the word SUCK. He dials a 9, which he supposes will get him out of the hotel, and then a 1 and the 900 number ending in SUCK, visualizing his call going out into the wild blue yonder to where a middle-aged farmer's wife will be sitting in a XXX-rated flour sack on the front porch of a ramshackle house, shucking sweet peas while she talks dirty to him. Instead, he gets a very proper male voice on a recorded message that informs him he cannot dial 900 numbers from the room, so much for that.

He wonders if he should try Heather again, beg her pardon for having committed the unpardonable sin of not having called her from California the moment he knew he'd be in New York, ask her if he could just talk to Lois Ford for a minute, maybe she might understand the possibilities of — no, the hell with it. There are girls galore here at the back of the book, all of them with 800 numbers to call, all of them patently more receptive than Heather or her pal. In a wild swing away from his first choice, he settles on a service with a headline reading SEX SLAVES! DAY AND NIGHT! and listing an 800 number ending in the word LASH. He dials a 9 again, gets a dial tone, dials a 1 and then 800 and then the first three digits and the word LASH and lo and behold he gets a human female voice, albeit not a live one.

"You have reached the Sex Slave line," the voice intones, "where young girls ache to satisfy your every need. You may charge this call to any major credit card or direct-bill it to your telephone number. Please stay on the line for our next available…"

Wait a minute, he thinks, and hangs up.

Does that mean I can direct-bill it to the hotel's number? Because I certainly don't want an item called SEX SLAVES INTERNATIONAL to appear on any of my credit cards, and I don't want an 800 number ending with the word LASH to appear on my next telephone…

Well, wait a minute.

L-A-S-H translates as 5-2-7-4. If that appears on the phone bill, no one's going to raise an eyebrow. But there'll also be a date alongside the number, won't there? And Grace might wonder why he called an 800 number on the night he was in New York, not that he gives a damn what she wonders. Still, she's already grilled him about a non-existent bottle of fifty-dollar wine, whatever he said it had cost. What'll she do if she gets her hands on an 800 number charged to the home phone? In fact, will these Sex Slave people even be willing to charge it to a number he isn't calling from, without first checking with that number? It all sounds suddenly too risky. He picks up the receiver, and dials "0" for Operator, intending to ask whether he can bill charges from an 800 number to the hotel here, and then realizes that this is like telling her he'll be dialing out for phone sex. He puts the receiver back on the cradle.

Nothing's ever simple, he thinks.

He sits in the comfortable chair under the glow of the floor lamp, and opens New York magazine in his lap. He has used this magazine before. There are no booby traps awaiting him here. He would have preferred not leaving the room again tonight, but it's still early…

A glance at his watch tells him it's eleven forty-five.

… and he'd rather venture into the rain than go to bed with this cramped and somehow ugly feeling still inside him. He skips past the ads listed under the heading MASSAGE/THERAPUMC. All too often, these are legitimate practitioners catering to jocks with pulled muscles or strained tendons, although some of the ads sound highly suspect.

Like:

Heavenly Hands. Private. In/Out. Complete Bodywork.

Or:

Magic Touch. Personal and Private. Sensual Therapy.

But why waste time and why take chances offending someone who may indeed be a licensed therapist? Instead, he flips past BOATS AND YACHTS and NEW YORK KIDS (do pedophiles skim the ads under this heading in vain?) and SUMMER ENTERTAINING and INTERIORS AND EXTERIORS and comes to the heading MARKETPLACE, which is an apt description for what he hopes to find listed there. Skipping the sub headings for APPLIANCES and ASTROLOGY and CLEANING SERVICE and LIMOUSINE SERVICE and PETS he comes to a heading in bolder, larger, blue type: ROLE PLAY.

SUTTON PLACE BLACK BEAUTY

WILD AND UNINHIBITED TENDER

BUT NOT MISTRESS

VERONIKA DECADENT

CHARM WITH

A SLAVIC TOUCH.

He has often been tempted to visit a dominatrix, but he has never followed through on the impulse. And yet, he finds exciting and seductive all these ads that promise Creole Role Play or LADY HELEN — BEHAVIORTHERAPY or STRICT SISTERS or ASIAN FANTASY BONDS — but all of these possible delights are listed under the "Role Play" heading and he does not wish to submit himself to anyone who wants him to crawl on his belly and lick her shoes or her asshole, not tonight, not after having narrowly scored with Karen. He turns the page somewhat reluctantly, flips back again for a final glance, his eye scanning the listings until it lights on:

SENSUOUS MISTRESS AND MAIDENS

TRAINING FOR DISCERNING MEN

Attracted, but afraid to call, fearful the phone will be answered by a fierce woman who will belittle him or demean him, insist that he control himself or pay attention, he almost breathes a sigh of relief as he turns the page again and comes to the next heading, again in larger blue type: MASSAGE.

Here, now, is the true marketplace. Here is New York magazine's own little open air meat market, beef on the rack, juicy cuts of tender loin or porterhouse, how would you like your cunt, sir — your cut, excuse me — medium, well done, or rare? He is tempted to open Penthouse, allow his eyes to sample pages of pink lips and rosy nipples, permit his glance to alternate between the open crotches there and the open invitations here. But he resists the bait, so close at hand, stays with the printed ads instead, at least a hundred of them on the page, it seems, so many treats and so little time, his plane leaves at eight in the morning. Idly, he wonders what such an ad costs. He wonders, too, if the people busily running around New York padlocking sex shops in decent neighborhoods know that in equally decent neighborhoods all over the city there are hookers galore who advertise their wares in New York magazine, do they know this? Do they realize that there are lonely men like me who look through these ads in the hope.

Well, I'm not lonely.

I have a wife in Los Angeles. A daughter in Princeton, New Jersey.