Nicholson Baker - House of Holes

“Fantastic.” Lila untied the rope end from her breast. “Now can you stand up for me? And Zilka, I’ll ask you to wrap the tinkly bells around Henriette’s pretty waist. We’re going to attack this on all fronts.” Zilka arranged the bells. Lila sat in her chair, flicking the end of the cord that led to Henriette’s legs against her crotch.

“Thanks for doing all this,” said Henriette.

“We’re going to get you back in the saddle, missy,” said Lila. “Now, Krock, do we have a reasonably handsome and friendly arrival who could accompany our lovely friend Henriette up to the observation tower? The really high one that looks out on the White Lake? I think she needs a rejuvenating ride on the Pussyboard.”

“I think we can find someone,” said Krock. Henriette thanked Zilka and Lila for their help, and Krock took her through narrow passageways on a shortcut to the hotel. She heard someone practicing the drums, and she saw a man sitting on a bench eating a hot dog. As she walked, her waist belt jingled, and the jingling made people smile. Occasionally, as they passed an entryway or courtyard, she heard a sudden whoop of laughter or a stifled orgasmic cry. A large round building lit with many small lightbulbs loomed on the left. “The Merry-Go-Round,” said Krock. “That’s where the beautiful ladyboys hang out, swinging their cocks around and hoping for a brass ring.”

They went down more streets, into another hotel lobby, and up an elevator, and they knocked at a double door. A man answered in his socks and boxers — it was Ned, the golfer. “Ned, this is Henriette. Would you be willing to take her up to one of the ultrahigh multicolored rock crags?”

“Sure, absolutely,” said Ned. “I’ve just been sitting in here — uh, well — give me one second to get my pants on. Sorry about this.” He pulled on his jeans and buttoned up a shirt and stuffed his wallet in his back pocket and shoved his feet into his shoes. “Will I need bug spray or sunblock?”

Krock shook his head. “Neither.”

Ned grabbed a pair of sunglasses from the side table, and he put on his hat. “Ready, steady, go!” he said.

They rode the elevator to the top floor of the hotel, where there was a sign that said “Observation Crags” and “Pussyboard,” with pointing-finger arrows. “Here’s as far up as I’m allowed to rise,” said Krock. “You two will go up on one of the lifts to reach an observation plateau on one of the chemical crags.” He pointed to a little yellow door. “I’ll be down here reading if you need me. You have an hour. Any questions?”

“May I ask — what’s the Pussyboard?” asked Henriette, pointing.

Krock gestured off in the mist. “That’s when your pussy becomes a surfboard. You glide down in that direction along a cable, in a spread-pussy harness, and you land in a lake of white rejuvenating oil. You skim along gently on your pussylips over the lake, making soft spreading ripples.”

“Oh,” said Henriette.

“It feels very wonderful, so I’m told, and it heals numbness. An aquatic animal lives in the lake, but he’s kind of a late riser.”

“The Cock Ness Monster,” said Ned. “I read about him in the guidebook.”

“Yes. And there’s a restaurant where people stand on the balcony to watch the pussyboarders come zooming downward to the lake one by one. Men, mostly Deprivos, line up afterward, if that’s what you want. It’s totally up to you. Some women feel so fresh from the lake that they want sex immediately.”

“Got it,” said Henriette.

She looked at Ned and Ned looked at her, and they shrugged — what the hell? Then a small cable-car gondola arrived, swaying and circling around on a metal track. The cables made gentle zinging sounds of tautness, and the door whished open. They got in, waving good-bye to Krock. The gondola rocked a little as the doors closed, and it began silently ascending toward a very high craggy tower.

Ned and Henriette smiled embarrassedly at each other. “This is fun, I think,” said Ned.

“It’s quiet,” said Henriette.

“Very quiet,” said Ned.

“Oh, look at the little herd of mountain zebra! So elegant.”

Ned looked, but he couldn’t see them. They rose up up up, till the trees thinned out and stopped, and the mountains changed color and became turquoise and orange and red, and then they turned past a tall tower where there was a sudden dinging and an urgent pull of acceleration, and then they went higher still, through an impossibility of mist, and then finally out again into very bright deep-blue daylight. As they slowed, Henriette yawned to adjust her ears. The gondola’s door opened, and they disembarked on the flat smooth top of a crag.

There were two chairs and a table with a linen tablecloth, and each chair had a shiny chrome double-scoped observation telescope in front of it. It was sunny and, fortunately, not too windy. The strange swooshing silence was even deeper here.

“We’re really up high,” said Ned.

The table was laid with some fruit, some grapes, some crackers, and a bottle of House red and two glasses. Henriette looked out, chewing a grape, letting her eyes adjust. They seemed to be about a mile up on an irregular, brittle, wind-eroded obelisk with a flat top and a low railing. There were about fifty other pillars, or spears, needling up from the clouds around them — each looking like the chemical mountains that grow in toy aquariums. The closest mountain was about five hundred yards away. Henriette spied a couple sitting on it. They, too, seemed to have a table with some delicacies set out. She waved. They waved back.

“Have you got a quarter?” Henriette asked.

“I think so,” said Ned, looking through his pockets.

They fed some coins into the slots of their sightseeing scopes. Henriette frowned, looking through the chrome-hooded viewer. At first she had a little trouble getting the hang of it because the image hopped around, but then she learned to move slowly, and she found she could see into the haze very far away. There was a red Mustang convertible on one tower, with a sunbathing woman on top of it wearing a red bikini bottom and no top. On top of one green crag a naked man had painted a billboard with large letters that said, “Show Me.”

“There’s a couple in this direction,” said Ned. “Looks like they’re doing stuff.”

Henriette swiveled her binoculars around. “Yeah?”

“Yeah, the man’s got his johnny-stick out, I think. Yeah, the woman’s jerking it. Wow, fast. Now she’s blowing him. He’s having fun.”

“Where? Dang, can’t find it,” said Henriette.

“Way over there. I’d say he’s going to pop the oyster pretty soon.”

Finally she found the right angle. The man was holding himself up off the chair with his hands, and the woman knelt between his splayed legs. It was difficult to see at this distance, with the colors gone all blue and pale, but she thought she saw the woman’s lips relax and a gush of sperm flow back down over her fingers.

Ned made a little noise. “What did you think?” he asked.

“Very nice,” she said.

“Did you like to see her sucking on his bone?” Ned rubbed her shoulder in a friendly way.

“Uh, sure. Have you got another quarter? Let’s find out what else is up here at the roof of the world.”

They scanned the horizon.

“Another couple!” said Ned excitedly. “Oh, boy. He’s doing her real nice. Mmmm-yeah, her boobs are jumping around. Jesus mama.” He shifted the direction of his scope. “And there’s a AR-24 Pornsucker ship!” He pointed excitedly. “See it? Out on a mission, sucking that pornstarch. You can tell it’s an AR-24 Recon/Pornsucker because of the red tips on its wings. That’s the giveaway. You can always tell.”