Stephen Dixon: Love and Will: Twenty Stories

The woman’s being treated by paramedics. She gives a description of her attacker and details of what happened. “Honestly, try not to talk,” one of the paramedics says. “Yes, you probably shouldn’t,” a policeman says. She says “No, I want you to know what happened. If I go over it enough times, you’ll get everything. I came into the building. We’re still on my building?” “Yes, of course,” the policeman says. “I meant, he didn’t drag me over the parapet to the next building?” “If he did, he brought you back or you got back here on your own.” “No, what am I talking of?” she says. “I came into the building. I’ll proceed chronologically, no digressions. I came into the building.” “I really don’t want her talking,” the paramedic says. “You heard him, Miss. Don’t talk.” “I came into the building. He was waiting for me in the service elevator. That elevator ought to be locked at night, not left open. People can hide there. I’m digressing, but so what? The lobby door should have a better lock. Anyone, with a little force, can push the door open when it’s locked. The building should have better lights. Look at the lights when you leave in the lobby and hallways. Thirty watts, maybe. One to a hallway if you’re lucky. There’s a city law. My roommate’s checked. She’s studying to be a lawyer. Where is she?” “If you mean Miss Kantor,” the policeman says, “she’s not home. We’ve been inside your apartment. To look for your attacker. I hope you don’t mind.” “There’s a city law saying the wattage should be higher, Phoebe said. Minimum of two lights too. In case one goes out. He had a long knife. Said he’d kill me unless. Well, he nearly did. Maybe he will have. No he won’t. I should say that. No he won’t.” “You shouldn’t say anything,” the paramedic says. “This officer and I say don’t.” “But I wouldn’t have sex with him. Why would I? It would have been worse than anything. He was filthy. A beast. A jungle. I thought I could escape on the roof. I should have tried to break away sooner. In the lobby. That way I would have had a chance. But I was so scared. I couldn’t think. I got my wits about me going up the elevator. His knife seemed shined. Maybe he shines it with polish. He was sick enough. Maybe I should have let him do it. Screw me, he said. Maybe it would have been worth it, filth and all. When you can’t do anything.” “Now that’s enough. Absolutely no more talk.” “This has all been very valuable, Corinne,” the policeman says, “but this man is right. Save your strength. I insist. For your own sake.” “All right.”

He’s in a bar about ten blocks away having a beer and scotch. He got about twenty dollars from her bag. He’s standing a man he just met to a drink. He says “Oh boy, did I have a good one tonight. Met a chickie on Broadway. She hadn’t been laid for months. She just looked at me and said ‘I’ll give you a twenty if you lay me in a basement I know of — it’s the only place we can go. If you don’t want to, just say so and I won’t say another word about it.’ No bullshit. Under a bus shelter. We were both waiting for the number four and she turns to me and says this. ‘My husband’s home,’ she says. ‘He never lays me. He likes men only now. You don’t like men,’ she says, ‘do you? I hope not.’ That’s what she said. I told her I like women only. All parts of them, not just the ones that count. And I can do it all night. This is what I tell her. ‘Or at least I used to. Now only half the night which is fine for most ladies, okay?’ So we went to this basement. I was so hot by now I could have done it to her right on the street. She gave me the twenty. It was cozy down there. Even had a mattress and nice little table lamp on the floor. She took me into an alleyway and made me shut my eyes the last minute of walking so I wouldn’t ever find the place alone. Even turned me all the way around a few times so I’d be all mixed up in my directions. I bet she did it with lots of guys down there. But twenty. For laying her. She was great. Clean. Wet. Smelled good. A Mother Earth, no Miss Twiggy. Big hips. Big tits. Big everything. I felt I was swimming in her. I would’ve paid her if I had a twenty and she asked. If I’d known how good she was, is what I meant, for I don’t pay anyone for sex. Things are free now, free now, you don’t have to pay. Women walking around without panties and bras, kids doing it before your eyes in cars — man, it’s all over the place. But to get paid for it? Hey, I’ll take it! But that was it. Twice. That was all she could take, and to lay it on the line to you, me too. She was too much. She nearly killed me. Then we got dressed and left together and she made me shut my eyes again till we got into the street. She never gave me her name or phone number or address, but I bet she lives in that same building but higher up. You think she had a husband?” Other man raises his shoulders. “I don’t. I think that’s just her line so you don’t think of going to her apartment right after to rob her. You know, some guys could just get her address from her bag while they’re even balling her. ‘If we meet, we meet,’ she said when I said what about us doing this again sometime? ‘You were the best,’ was the last thing she said to me. Even if I wasn’t, what do I care? All I know is she gave me a great time and made me twenty bills heavier.”

The other man says “That’s a fantastic story — unbeatable — I only wish it was me,” and thinks if ever a guy was full of it, this one’s it. He downs his drink, says “Got enough for a refill? — I’m a little low.” “I think I can make it.” “Thanks. I’m going to hit the pisser. Tell Rich for me to put a soda in back of mine this time,” and goes to the men’s room.

Her parents’ phone rings. He looks at the clock. “Who can be calling so late? Probably a wrong number. You answer it, please, or just let it ring. I can’t even move off the bed.” Which one of her children? she thinks, going to the phone. It can’t be anything but bad. It’s rung too many times.

Her sister’s sitting in a movie theater in Seattle. The phone’s ringing in her apartment. Another sister’s working in the sun on an archaeological dig in Egypt. This work is harder than she ever thought it would be, she thinks, and no fun. She wishes she was back home. Face it: she’s homesick. She never would have believed it but she is. Her brother’s sleeping in his college fraternity house. The person calling the house gets a recorded message that the phone’s been temporarily disconnected.

The tenant leaves the building very early, says good morning to the policeman guarding the front door, asks how the girl is. “I haven’t heard.” “Do you know if they caught the man who did it yet?” “I don’t think so.” She goes to church, kneels, prays for the girl’s life and that the man is caught and that the whole city becomes more peaceful again, at least as peaceful as it was about twenty years ago, but if only one prayer’s answered then that the girl lives. She sits, covers her eyes with her hands, just let things come into her. It’s quiet in here, she thinks. For now, this is the only place.

The man who took her home the night before gets up around nine, has coffee, goes out for the Times and a quart of milk and two bagels, dumps half the newspaper sections into a trash can, reads the front page of the news section as he walks home, reads the sports and book sections while having a toasted bagel and coffee at home, looks at his watch, 9:42, still much too early, slips in a tape cassette, does warm-up exercises, goes out for a six-mile or one-hour run, whichever comes first, comes back, did good time — must have been all the alcohol last night that gave him so much sugar — showers, shaves, checks the time, 11:38, no, not yet; twelve, on Sunday, is really the earliest he can call someone he just met. If she worked as hard as she said she did this week — studying, painting, her waitress job every other weekday afternoon and all-day Saturday — she’ll need a good ten-hour sleep. Once she gets up she’ll probably need an hour just to get started. One. Call her at one.