Max Collins - Fly Paper

“Very specialized gangster, though.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. All I do is see to it nobody gives Sinatra a bad time.”

She laughed again, and the covers fell down around her waist, and he got a long look at her breasts. They were full, very, too full for her otherwise slender body, but he didn’t mind. The nipples were small, which made the breasts look even bigger. They were coral color, her nipples, and he liked them. He leaned over and nibbled one.

“Hey!” she said. “You’re a horny S.O.B., aren’t you? Don’t be a glutton.”

“Lady,” he said, between nibbles, “I’ll take all the servings I can get. I don’t often eat at restaurants this nice.”

“Quit it,” she giggled, in a tone that said go ahead.

Ahead was where he went, and they had a good time, their second. Nolan believed in going twice whenever possible, because the second time can be done slow and lovingly, without the urgency that makes the first round so good but so frantic. She had an ass as nice as her breasts, not skinny like the rest of her; something soft and fleshy and fun to fill his hands with.

She was doing him a lot of good: his bridges with Sherry were getting burned a bit faster than he had anticipated, and that was a relief. He realized his separation from Sherry had been a little heavy on his mind, and though he hated to admit it, even to himself, he missed the girl, damn it; and he didn’t like going into a heist with that sort of emotional preoccupation working on him.

So sex this afternoon was a real lucky break for him. Made him feel purged. Made him feel great, like a fucking kid.

“Don’t get the wrong idea,” she said, sitting up again, her breasts hanging loose now, sagging just a little, as though tuckered out.

“Wrong idea about you?” he said. “Or about stewardesses?”

She grinned; a good grin, the sort many pretty girls avoid. “Either one. Want a smoke?”

“No. Gave ’em up.”

“How come?”

“Not healthy. Man gets to be my age, he better watch his ass.”

“What do you mean ‘your age’? How old are you, anyway?”

“Forty-eight,” Nolan lied.

“That’s not so old. I’m thirty-five, which is kind of old for a flight attendant.”

At least thirty-five, Nolan thought, saying, “You look like twenty, kid.” He stroked a breast. Kissed her neck.

“Hey, give me a break... enough’s enough. For right now, anyway. So tell me, what is your racket? What are you doing in Detroit?”

“I manage a nightclub, Chicago area,” he said. (Which was semi-true, after all: the Tropical did use entertainment in their bar setup.) He told her that a friend of his, an old army buddy, had a little talent agency up here, and he’d promised to check out some of the guy’s new clients.

“Oh really? You done that already?”

“No. Tonight. Going out to his place tonight and see what he has to offer.”

“Sounds like fun. Care for some company?”

“Naw... it’ll be a drag. This guy’s agency is really small-time, I’m just looking at these acts out of friendship. Or pity. You’d fall asleep, the acts’ll be so bad.”

She made a face. “Well, looks like another rip-snorter of an evening for old coffee-tea-or-me,” she said, apparently feeling brushed off. “Suppose I’ll just catch another movie tonight, and if I’m lucky maybe get molested walking back to the hotel.”

“Don’t give me that,” he said. “I can’t picture you sitting home alone unless you wanted to.”

“I thought you said you didn’t believe what you read in paperbacks? My life isn’t any swinging party. This is the first time I’ve gotten any in weeks.”

“Bullshit.”

“No, really. I been a lousy nun lately. Ever since my marriage broke up, last year.”

“You were married? I thought a stewardess had to be single.”

“Haven’t you heard of Women’s Lib and equal rights and all? The airlines can’t pull much of that crap these days, though God knows they’d like to. And in my case, maybe I’d be better off, at least as far as the old anti-wedlock rule goes. The marriage, it just didn’t work out, with my being a flight attendant and gone days at a time. My husband was balling some secretary at his office, some mousy little twerp with boobs like ping pong balls.”

Nolan shrugged. “Then losing him should be no great loss. He’s obviously an idiot. But there’s plenty of other guys in the world.”

“Yeah, and plenty of other idiots, too. Like there’s this pilot who’s been chasing me, but he’s married, and he’s obnoxious as hell too, so I been ducking him. I have had a fling or two, tiny ones, with some interesting passengers I’ve met on longer flights. But those guys also are married, usually, and I come out of an afternoon like this one feeling like a whore or something. How about you?”

“I never feel like a whore.”

“I mean, are you married? Don’t be a prick.” She said “prick” in a nice way, with affection.

“Not married. Never have been. It’s an institution that holds little appeal to me.”

“After a two-year marriage that was just slightly less successful than the war in Vietnam, I tend to agree with you. Hey, you know something?”

“What?”

“I sort of like you. Your personality is a little on the sour side, but I like it. And your sexual enthusiasm, especially considering you think of yourself as an old man, has me somewhat winded, I’ll admit, but I like that too. Let me make you a proposition. Why don’t you come back tonight and see me, when you’re through hearing those auditions? Then we can resume our conversation... and whatever else you’d care to resume.”

“It could be late.”

“I’ll give you the spare key. Let yourself in and crawl under the covers with me. How does that sound to you?”

Nolan smiled. “That sounds fine.”

They chatted for a while longer, and she mentioned that she had a flight tomorrow, and he mentioned he’d be taking a flight tomorrow himself, and it turned out to be the same one. That was a happy coincidence, and Nolan felt unnaturally pleased that this afternoon’s encounter would be continued tonight and, in a way, on the plane tomorrow. In his younger days, he preferred light involvement with his women, in-and-out situations; but he found, as he grew older, that he liked-something more — not much more, maybe, but something.

He got dressed, and as he went to the door, he turned and said, “Hey! Your name. What the hell is it?”

“Hazel.”

“Like your eyes,” he said.

“Like the fat maid in the funnies,” she said, squinching her nose.

“Well, you’re in the right hotel for that”

“Yeah, I noticed. Comic book fans all over the place, kids in costumes, kids wearing T-shirts with cartoon characters on them. A kid with a T-shirt like that tried to pick me up in the bar, just before you showed, would you believe it?”

“Sure, woodwork’s full of ’em. Listen, I got to get going. I’ll see you tonight”

“Okay. Hey!”

“What?”

“Your name? What’s your name?”

He hesitated for a moment; he better not use the Logan name. He was registered as Ryan, but for some reason he wanted to give her the name he himself felt most comfortable with. So he said, “Nolan,” and to hell with it

“Is that a first name,” she asked, “or a last?”

“Whatever you want,” he said, and went out.

This time he had the elevator to himself, and damn glad of it.

Jon was in the coffee shop, working on a Coke.

Nolan joined him at the counter, said, “How much you blow on funny-books so far?”

The kid grinned. “Four hundred and thirty-five bucks and feeling no pain.”