Mark Fishman - No. 22 Pleasure City

Pohl recognized Burnett’s suit and the woman staggering alongside the suit on drunken legs, bumping into the man wearing it, skating out toward an oncoming pedestrian and swinging wide and back into the grasp of Burnett’s hand. Now it was like Pohl had fallen into a hole and it was not completely black in the hole because a light was shining ahead of him and he thought that if he could just reach that light he’d at last find Angela.

He moved forward quietly and carefully. He told himself to keep it that way even though there was so much noise from the traffic and the chatter of people’s conversations and the music that spilled out of a bar, so much noise that nothing could draw attention to him. He gathered his confidence, trying to get in stride again. He followed them, slowly at first, then picking up speed because he was afraid of losing them. They rounded a corner off Jackson, and he was right behind them.

Aoyama’s legs carried him away from the diner where he’d stopped for a cup of coffee and a piece of pie. He moved along the sidewalk, hopped over a low rosebush and turned the corner. What he’d just read in the newspaper about the mayor didn’t make sense to him. How could somebody be so stupid? But nothing made sense to him from the moment he’d entered the house with the woman wearing plum-colored underwear. It was the third day, but not the third day in a row that he’d gone out to bear witness to the excessive behavior of local citizens.

It seemed to him that the whole population of the city had prescribed itself a dose of self-gratification and was busy indulging in a variety of pleasures without any limits. That was all he could make of it because he came to a chain link fence sagging in places with a few of its posts missing that surrounded a backyard of dried-out grass and a messy garden with more weeds than flowers.

Standing on the sidewalk, he leaned forward against the fence with his neck stretched out looking at the rear entrance of a two-story house. The dried-out grass went right up to the first step leading to the ravaged screen door. His eyes went to a table standing on a patch of dry earth surrounded by grass that looked like wispy strands of hair. A fat man came out of the house through the screen door and headed for the table carrying a plate fully loaded with sliced meat. The screen door slammed shut behind him.

The man’s legs were short, he wore loose-fitting cotton trousers and a wide, colorful shirt that stuck out over his big belly. His neck was thick and the thickness of it didn’t let him move his head easily to the left or right, up or down. He was looking straight ahead now at his destination.

There was a lot of concentration on the fat man’s face and it was the concentration of a clumsy man with a lot at risk, a heavy loss waiting for him if he stumbled and dropped the plate. When he got to his destination he put the plate of sliced roast beef on the tabletop, turned and went back into the house through the screen door.

Aoyama heard the clatter of pots and pans, dishes and silverware, then the fat man switched on music and the music swam out of the house into the garden. The fat man came out again, this time with a plate of roast chicken and grilled sausages. His eyes darted from left to right looking for anything that might trip him up. He made it safely to the table. Aoyama crossed his ankles, watching him.

The next time he came out it was with a platter of steamed, mixed vegetables. Latin music played from within the house, following the fat man into the backyard. Aoyama sighed. The atmosphere was calm and soft and amiable.

The fat man went back into the house and a minute later came out with an assortment of sauces and three glass covers for plates and platter. His body moved freely now that the table was successfully laid out with food and the possibility of losing any of it before he could get his knife, fork and spoon into his meal was gone. He headed for the table. His fat jiggled under the wide shirt. He stumbled and almost dropped what he was carrying when he saw Aoyama watching him from the other side of the fence with elbows resting between posts and hands clasped. Aoyama smiled dimly, sort of sadly. Then the smile faded.

The fat man was still on his feet. His mouth spread nervously into a smile. He put the condiments on the table, covered the dishes, and walked slowly, as fast as he could walk, to where Aoyama was standing. When he got to the fence he extended his thick arms, and his thick hands delicately grasped the fence that would have buckled under the weight of him if he’d leaned on it. Aoyama was not going to take a chance with the fat man. He moved cautiously away from the fence. The fat man grinned pleasantly at him.

“It does look good, doesn’t it?” the fat man said.

“Well, yes,” Aoyama said calmly. “It looks good, and it’s a lot of food, too.”

“When you’ve got an appetite like mine the sky’s the limit,” he said with a smile.

He was grinning at Aoyama, but the grin told him not to fool around.

Aoyama couldn’t keep the words from coming out of his mouth. “I can see that,” he said.

The fat man frowned. “No discussion. Just accept it as a fact.”

“Of course,” Aoyama said. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Nobody ever does,” the fat man said, “but they say it anyway.” His fatty arms hung loose at his sides as he gazed at Aoyama, then squinted questioningly at him.

“It hurts when they say it?”

“Not for long.” The fat man winced.

Then he leaned forward and said: “What do you think?”

“Yes, yes, I guess it hurts.”

A dog started barking.

“Well?”

“Now look — ,” he said to the fat man, leaning forward with his hands on the edge of the fence.

The fat man opened his mouth, realized there was nothing to say, and snapped it shut. He was impatient to get to his food while it was hot. Every second or so he glanced at the tabletop covered with plates of chicken and sausages, roast beef and vegetables.

“I’ve got eating to do,” he said at last. “Want to join me?”

Aoyama took a few steps backward and made a running jump over the fence. He landed on his feet. It was hard to focus his eyes, he blinked several times to make the spots go away. He laughed but no sound came out, then saw the fat man pushing two chairs up to the table.

By the time he got to the empty chair the fat man was already sitting down and serving himself from the plate of juicy rare roast beef, spearing a few slices with his fork and setting them gently on his plate. He heaped the plate with vegetables.

Aoyama waited until the fat man was chewing a piece of meat before he said anything.

“How long have you been at it?” he asked, pointing at the plates of food.

“You can tell from the size of me,” the fat man said. “A long time, such a long time that I’ve lost count.”

“Why do you do it?”

“It makes me feel good, what do you think? I love food, and it gives me pleasure to eat like a pig.”

He gracefully cut another bite from a slice of roast beef, gathered some vegetables, and before he put it all in his mouth he said: “And I sleep good after I eat.”

“Well, that’s something,” Aoyama confirmed. “I don’t sleep very well.”

The fat man chewed slowly, savoring the taste.

“But your health. Don’t you suffer from eating all that food?”

“Don’t ask stupid questions.”

“I’m sorry,” Aoyama murmured. “I shouldn’t have put it that way.”

“What?”

“I’m bothering you.”

“Yes, you’re bothering me,” the fat man said. “I don’t like stupid questions and you’re up to your eyes in them. And I don’t like being treated like a child.”