A. Homes - The End of Alice

“You’re welcome, dear. It was a pleasure having you. I’m sure the boys really enjoyed it.”

The girl nods and moves toward the door. The mother shows her out. “Your eye is going down,” she says. “That’s a good thing. In the morning you’ll forget it ever happened.”

The girl doesn’t speak. She works her teeth back and forth over the lump of flesh, the piece of their boy between her bicuspids.

“You know,” the mother says, stopping her at the door, “you probably don’t do this kind of thing, but if you’re ever inclined, I’m always looking for a baby-sitter. Don’t say anything now, but think on it.”

“Again, thank you,” the girl mumbles, taking great care not to lose the bit between her teeth. “And good-night.”

Prison. A sour old mop and bucket. Bleachy smelling salts of Clorox lift me from my thoughts. The man mops with a mixture so strong that if the job is well done — the way it should be done — when he is finished, we will be thoroughly scrubbed; our floors will be clean, our lungs will be clean, and our thoughts will be clean. I wish him all the luck. The bucket sloshes as he comes toward me. The gray tentacles of his mop dip into my cell. “Wash?” he asks.

“Sure, why not?” I say, lifting my feet from the floor. He makes a quick sweep of the place and is gone. I sit watching the water evaporate] the smell of his stale mop curdling, becoming high and thin like milk that has turned.

“Let me see it again,” Alice says.

I know what she is referring to and instantly blush. “Oh, don’t be a dolt, show me,” Alice says. “I just need to see it.”

Clayton, the pathetic fuck, shuffles into my room, feet scraping the floor as if he’s sanding himself down, the scrape, scraping of his soles like two sheets of sandpaper mounted on wooden blocks, like the noise we used to make in elementary school under the guise of music and drama. He sits on the edge of my bed. Speechless. Whatever he might want to say would mean nothing, all words and deeds are useless. He knows that, but as a shark keeps swimming, a man keeps talking.

The Guiding Light is over. Josh has returned to Springfield for the wedding even though he’s upset that there’s a new man in Harley’s life. As Julie repeats her vows, Bridget arrives and starts reading her the riot act.

All too much. The television is off.

“I’m thinking of piercing my dick,” Clayton finally says. “Putting a nut and bolt through it, so I can fuck you like a truck.”

“Only the finest for you,” I say, tweaking the ivy leaf that hangs off his left titty.

He twists away.

“How about a lip plate; that way when you’re pouting, it won’t be so obvious.”

Fishwife. Nelly. Tired old queen. My surprise at myself, my horror, quiets me.

We stew. There is no point in getting up and running out. There is nowhere to go; his cell, my cell, what difference does it make?

“Do you want your mail?” he asks.

“If you wouldn’t mind.”

As usual there’s plenty for me, none for him. Requests on university letterhead for an interview, an extensive study, a few questions to be answered, research papers, a book.

I respond politely. For someone with a reputation such as mine, it is important to behave oneself, to be mannered and kind. At least on paper.

Dear Monsieur or Madam,

Thank you for your kind letter. I am hardly the fellow you think me to be. I am shy, hesitant to involve myself in studies such as the one you describe, although I am sure it will be insightful and entirely original — a work of great value. But I, being who I am and things being what they are, beg to be excused from this round. However, if you are open to suggestion, I would wholeheartedly recommend several men here, in particular my buddy Clayton, who allegedly — and more than once — fucked men on the Christopher Street pier and then pushed them into the Hudson River where they drowned.

To hear Clayton tell it — and he rarely does tell it — the men he fucked were so taken with the events, so absorbed with the back and forth of the in and out, that when it stopped, when Clayton breathed a sigh of deep relief and shot high into their asses, the men surged forward, flinging themselves into the water. And Clayton, so suddenly drained, so recently depleted and a non-swimmer himself, would go to the edge and simply scream, howl at the water, at the night, offering his arm, his hand, his fist, to the men, who were already dipping under, flailing far from Clayton’s reach.

Again, thank you for your interest and good luck with the project.

All best—

* * *

Mail. There is a letter from her. I do my little Gene Kelly, tapping my toes, counting the pat-patter of my heart, my hands, my feet, the echo of the tapping, the metronome of movement, the keystrokes of her Smith-Corona. She is tapping the keys, tapping to tell, and I am tapping my toes, titillated, ready to receive. I save her for last, hoping Clayton will grow bored with the habits of my correspondence. I answer each as I open it, defending myself against the heavily writ tomes of maniacs and wanna-bes, the romantic rhymes of curious widows, and occasional outbursts from the parents of my old girls — you’d think these would be censored, that the same protection that keeps me from them would keep them from me. “I don’t know what kind of man you are,” they say. But of course you do, that’s why you deign to write. I answer everything, to everyone I have something to say, today more than usual. I write for hours, hoping Clayton will tire and take leave of his own accord, leave and allow me to enjoy my girl, alone, as I must. He plays with a pad and pen, drawing perspective boxes within boxes, heavy black lines. The doodles of a depressed man.

I can wait no longer. I have dealt with the details. All has been answered, sealed, stamped, and rests on the desk awaiting return to its rightful recipients.

Her envelope is thick, heavy, too promising to put off. I tear at it.

Hi. How are you? What’s new? It’s July. I’m sweating. There’s an air alert. The cleaning lady fainted yesterday and I had to drive her back into the city. Chinatown. Took Matt and co. with me. Everything is sticky.

A ride. Her boy and his friends. I’m jealous. She’s buoyant, breezy, too caught up in the events to elaborate, to do more than list the dates and locations, the briefest documentation of her deeds.

Greenwich Village. Eighth Street.

I quote directly, too overwhelmed to paraphrase. My heart speeds. Unbeknownst to me, in these few quiet days, between communications, my feeling for her has grown. My girl. My girl — sweetest thing out on a summer adventure, with this boy, her toy, the practice playmate. So much has changed and she doesn’t know it yet. Mine, all mine — I myself am just catching on. In these letters, and how quickly I have come to look forward to them, cannot live without them, am, in fact, living on them, in them; it is as though I am her, she is me, and we are in this together, doing this twisted tantric tango. If only she were a lezzy, a lady licker, the experience would be more satisfying, more mutually agreeable. The talk of boys, of little men, is fine, but when it comes down to it, when we get to the great and gritty, she’ll have me fucking the boy, essentially fucking myself, which is all too familiar, slightly degrading, and hardly enough fun. Except for special occasions, my incarceration being one, I like pussies not pricks, it’s as simple as that.

Love. It’s only come to me now, in this moment. Love. I am in love. Don’t tell her. Don’t tell anyone. I’m telling you, only you. Never tell them, or rarely. It’s the kind of thing, the exact thing, one doesn’t want them to know. They take advantage. To admit it is to let on that one is weak, vulnerable, ready for the wound.