Nicholson Baker - House of Holes

“Just hold it for one second, will you, please?” he said. “I’m quite desperate.”

“Oh, okay,” she said. She held his cock in her orange sponge mittens. In a flash he grabbed a sprayer and sprayed her shirt.

“You!” she said. She looked down. The dark buttons of her nipples were visible through the white fabric.

“Watch what your nipples do to me,” he said, and he tightened his cock muscles so that his scythe squirmed and nodded like some strange plant.

“Whooo!” said Shandee.

“Take off the mittens and hold it, please, please!”

“I’m going to get in trouble, but okay.” She pulled off her sponge mittens and held her hands under the soapy water till they were slippery. Then she took hold of Ruzty’s cock, which was as hard as a summer squash. She splayed her fingers and moved them over his balls and then over his stomach. She could see his thigh muscles tighten. His cock was straining, and she had to stroke it. She took it in her hand and felt its thickness and its sense of certainty. It was like the Arch of St. Louis. It had one thing to say to the world: “I am a stiff swervie.” She slid her hand up to the tip — it was like sliding over a steering wheel — and slid it down again, enjoying the sheen of the soapy water on his cockknob.

“This is a big, beautiful dick you’ve got, Ruzty,” she whispered.

“Thank you,” he said. “You’re nice to say it.”

She began moving her hand slowly, then faster. “Ooh boy, I want this dick inside me,” she said, “I want to be fucked by this dick, I can’t help it, it’s so perfect. It’s literally THE perfect dick for me.”

She gave it a number of good quick pulls and then she noticed that Ruzty was quivering and trembling. Suddenly he said “Ohhhhhhrrrrr” in his beautiful accent, and several white glops spouted from the end.

Immediately there was a buzzer and a ringing. “Uh-oh,” said Shandee. She blew Ruzty a kiss.

“Bye-bye,” said Ruzty.

An assistant named Krock appeared and led Shandee away.

“Why in heaven’s name did you wank him off?” Krock asked.

“I didn’t mean to. He begged me, and I obliged him.”

“Did you take off your sponge gloves?”

Shandee nodded. “We had a rapport. I’m sorry.”

Krock reassured her. “I think it’ll be okay. Lila will give you your reassignment tomorrow.”

“Is there any chance that I’ll be able to see him again?”

“You never know,” said Krock. He gave her a sly look. “I’ll put in a good word for you.”

“Thanks.” Shandee shook her head wistfully. “I really wanted that cock of his so bad. God, I still do. I can’t stop thinking about it. I had to hold it. I’d give that cock everything.”

“I wish people said that about my cock,” said Krock, as they reached the lobby of Shandee’s hotel.

“I’m sure it’s nice,” said Shandee.

“Do you want to see it?”

“Um—” Shandee checked the wall clock. “No, thanks. Dave’s arm is going to be needing his meal.”

Rhumpa was her name, and, yes, she paid a visit to the House of Holes. The people she was staying with in New Haven were wealthy and under-read. Although they were middle-aged, their minds were very young and she couldn’t take them seriously. She saw a pepper grinder in the middle of the table, and while they talked about the price of tires she unscrewed the little knob on the top, and when it came off she lifted the wooden part off the central spindly thing and looked inside, where she could see in the shadows of peppercorns. She thought, The peppercorns are waiting to be ground up. They’re still round, like little dry planets, but not for long.

Rhumpa held the machine to her nose and smelled the distant sharpness of the pepper, which made her smile. And then the pepper grinder got bigger and she jumped down into it and fell through tumbling peppercorns, and she smelled a hundred dinner parties of the past.

Then she was herself again, but standing on the porch outside the House of Holes. She rang the buzzer. A man with a bag on his back answered. He introduced himself; his name was Daggett. He took her into a small room with a round wooden table and, referring to a clipboard, began asking her questions. He asked her to describe her ideal man.

“I like men who are intelligent and witty,” Rhumpa said. “Also kind to animals and interested in other people and able to hold a conversation of a reasonable length.”

Daggett frowned and looked at his clipboard. “It says here that you favor a man with a heavy, dark dick. It quotes you as saying, ‘Some nice things are just not possible with a small, pale dick.’ ”

“Where did you get that piece of information?” Rhumpa asked, outraged.

“During reassembly they do a spectrum analysis,” Daggett said. “They screen for diseases, of course, and comb through for lurid thoughts. What’s your ideal sexual encounter?”

“Oh, touching, kissing, caressing,” Rhumpa said, at a loss.

“It says here that you would favor having three Italian airplane pilots in uniform shoot their comeloads onto your belly while you cup your clitoris with a wooden spoon.”

“They don’t necessarily have to be Italian,” Rhumpa said. “And they can be race-car drivers if that’s easier.”

“Because of your interest in pilots, we thought you might be a good person to fly one of our pornsucker ships.”

Rhumpa asked what a pornsucker ship was, and he explained. “It’s an airplane that flies around sucking up bad porn from cities.”

“Why?”

“Because bad porn is bad porn — it’s depressing and drowns out good porn. We store it, letting objectionable content settle out. The less porn there is overall, the more likely people are to come to the House of Holes.”

“How sordid,” Rhumpa said. “I don’t want to spend time doing that.”

“Oh? It says here that you’d definitely like to steer an airplane with your crotch.”

“I do believe you’ve got the wrong clipboard,” Rhumpa said.

“I don’t think so,” Daggett said, a trifle testily.

Rhumpa asked him if she was a prisoner or a guest.

“Do you want to be here?”

“I’m not sure,” said Rhumpa.

“If you do, then you’re a guest,” said Daggett.

He looked at his notes again, and then at her. He seemed a little hesitant.

Rhumpa asked him, “Are you a guest, too?”

“Yes, but I’m on an intensive work-study program because I accumulated a great deal of debt and they assigned me to do intake.”

“I see,” Rhumpa said.

He changed his tone. “You’re very pretty,” he said, leaning forward. “You have a lovely spicy smell. Excuse me.” He sneezed.

“What else does it say on your clipboard?”

“It says you’d like to dance in a solo porn video and hold your pussy folds open with your hands, and then you’d like to watch nine men watching your video and getting completely out of control.”

“Hm, is that so?”

He tapped his finger on the page. “I’m just going by what it says.”

“Well — I do like the idea of men being out of control at the sight of me.”

“Ah.”

“But I don’t want anybody to watch me making the video.”

“Of course. You can do it in your hotel room. I’ll take you there now.”

They rose, and Daggett led her to an elevator and down several hallways and then they came to a catwalk. “Don’t be worried,” Daggett said. “We’re going through a visual privation area. You’ll probably hear some shouting. The men are Deprivos. They haven’t been able to see nude breasts in any form for three full weeks. This is the last day of their treatment, and they’re in pretty sorry shape.”