Sheldon Lord - 69 Barrow Street

Why?

He flipped his cigarette into the phony fireplace and pulled another from the pack, placing it between his lips. He scratched a wooden match on the underside of the end-table and lit the cigarette, flipping the match into the fireplace. He drew deeply on the cigarette and held the smoke in his lungs for several seconds, expelling it finally in a long, thin stream that wandered slowly to the ceiling.

Hell, he knew why. He knew why he stayed with Stella, why he did what she told him and took the abuse she hurled at him constantly. Why he was able to stand it all, to stand the things that a normal man shouldn’t be able to stand. Things like letting other men make love to her and forcing him to watch from the closet. As if he wasn’t man enough for her!

She even took women as lovers and made him watch the two of them perform.

And he took it, all of it, the insults and the torture and all the rest. And he knew why.

Because he loved her.

He loved her and he hated her. He hated her for what she was but he couldn’t help loving her for what she was at the same time. He needed her as he had never needed any woman before. All the things that he hated about her only made her more exciting, more desirable, more thrilling than any other woman he had ever met. And so he was tied to her by invisible threads, tied up so securely that he could never get away.

He dragged on the cigarette. It tasted terrible, and he wondered if it was the cigarette that tasted lousy or that he was smoking too much, or just the generally bad taste in his mouth that came when he spent too much time thinking about himself and Stella, about the sick, twisted life he was living and the sick, horrible, beautiful, wonderful, damnable woman he loved and hated and surrendered to: Stella.

Impulsively he hurled the cigarette into the fireplace and watched the sparks dance up into the air a few feet. Then he pulled himself up from the chair and stalked to the window, scanning the area outside.

Barrow Street.

Ralph Lambert hated Barrow Street. He hated the men and women walking quietly by, the kids playing stoop-ball a few houses away, the old Italian peddling ice cream on a stick from a wagon down the block, he hated everything about Barrow Street.

And he knew what it was that he really hated.

He hated Ralph Lambert.

Susan Rivers was afraid.

She had been afraid ever since early that morning, when she had passed the beautiful woman on the way to her new apartment. The beautiful woman was very blonde and very tall and very well built and very lovely, and Susan Rivers was very much afraid of her.

She had just moved into the apartment that morning. Before that she lived on Gay Street — which she thought was particularly appropriate — but then Gloria had decided to fall in love with another girl and she had to find a place for herself. So she had found this place on Barrow Street.

She located the apartment through an ad in the Village Voice , a neighborhood newspaper which combined excellent columns and reviews with news on everything going on in the area. The ad had said, simply:

BARROW ST., lg. liv. rm., kitch.,

bath, $85, apply supt., 69 Barrow.

which meant, simply enough, that she had to apply to the superintendent at 69 Barrow Street for an $85-a-month apartment with a large living room, a kitchen, and a bath. That was Thursday, and she applied to the super that afternoon, signed the lease, packed her belongings and brought them from Gloria’s apartment the next morning.

And met the beautiful woman on the steps.

Not because she met a woman, or even because the woman was beautiful. Susan was a lesbian, but that didn’t mean that she wanted to hop into the hay with every good-looking gal she bumped into. Hardly. She had her own desires, and although her desires were classed as abnormal, they were not overwhelming compulsions which she couldn’t overcome. She was a lesbian simply because she found women more attractive than men.

Well, it was more complex than that, she admitted. There was the fact that men scared her silly, that the mere thought of letting a man enter her and touch her inside had her shivering. And a psychiatrist could probably delve into her mind and figure out even more complex reasons for the way she was, but to hell with all psychiatrists. She was what she was, and she was damned if she was going to start worrying about it now.

But the woman worried her, worried her very much. For one thing, she couldn’t remember being so strongly attracted to anyone before. More important, she could tell that the attraction was not all on her part.

They had met on the steps. Susan was carrying a suitcase and the woman stepped aside to let her pass. As she did so she could feel the woman’s hot, insistent eyes burning into her slender body. She felt the woman’s warm breath near her cheek.

And she knew that the woman wanted her.

It would he so easy, so easy to go off on another hot sex bout. Easy — and very nice. But God, after the thing with Gloria ended on the rocks she had been so damned determined to sleep alone for a while, to just relax and spend some time by herself until she got a clearer idea of who the hell she was and where the hell she was going. She had been so damned determined, and now look at her. Just another dyke with hot pants who couldn’t look at another girl’s breasts without wanting to kiss them, who couldn’t pass close to another female body without itching to cover it with her own.

God!

Que sera sera. That was how that song went, and it made its own kind of sense. Whatever will be will be, whatever would happen would happen, and she would just let things happen to her. It would work out; everything always worked out.

But Christ how she wanted to see that woman again!

She heaved a sigh and sat down on the edge of her bed. It was a single bed, and that at least was a good sign. If she got in the mood for any horizontal acrobatics she could go someplace else instead of making love in her own apartment. In her own place she could be alone by herself.

She stood up and decided to take a nap for an hour or two. She undressed slowly, baring a body that was slim and tan and boyishly beautiful. Her breasts were small but perfect, and she was by no means flat-chested. Her dark brown hair was cut short and her legs tapered from full, rounded thighs to trim ankles.

It was a nice body. She wondered how the blonde woman would like it.

When she was completely nude and ready for bed she threw back the covers and stretched out on the clean white sheet. She rested her head on the pillow and let her eyes close.

In her mind she pictured the blonde woman. Thinking about her, she let her own hands caress her body. She cupped her breasts, feeling the softness and firmness of them and imagining in her mind that it was the other woman’s breasts she was holding and that the woman was embracing her. Then she moved her hands down to the lean, flat stomach and stroked gently, rhythmically.

Everything was so quiet, so peaceful and so gentle. She relaxed completely and continued to stroke herself, her hands lingering on the inside of her thighs where the skin was so extraordinarily soft and tender. She remembered the way Gloria had loved to touch and kiss her there, and in her mind she saw the blonde woman doing the same.

Then her hands moved to the spot where no man had ever been and she stroked herself gently, languorously, feeling warm sensations of love course through her young body. Deliciously obscene pictures flooded her mind as she handled herself until she drifted off into a deep, heady, luxurious sleep.

It was almost 5:30 in the afternoon when Stella James mounted the steps at 69 Barrow Street and fitted her key in the lock. Anticipation coursed through her as she walked to the door of the apartment she shared with Ralph.