Charles Bukowski: Women

Oh, look at that one! If that were only Tanya!

Or her. My god! All that haunch. Dressed in yellow, smiling.

Or that one… in my kitchen washing the dishes.

Or that one… screaming at me, one breast fallen loose.

There had been some real women on that plane.

I felt somebody tap me on the back. I turned and behind me was this very small child. She looked about 18, thin long neck, a bit round-shouldered, long nose, but breasts, yes, and legs and a behind, yes.

"It's me," she said.

I kissed her on the cheek. "Got any baggage?"

"Yes."

"Let's go to the bar. I hate waiting for baggage."

"All right."

"You're so small…"

"Ninety pounds."

"Jesus…" I'd slice her in half. It would be like a child rape.

We went into the bar and took a booth. The waitress asked for Tanya's I.D. She had it ready.

"You look 18," the waitress said.

"I know," Tanya answered in her high Betty Boop voice. "I'll have a whiskey sour."

"Give me a cognac," I told the waitress.

Two booths over the high-yellow was still sitting with her dress pulled up around her ass. Her panties were pink. She kept staring at me. The waitress arrived with the drinks. We sipped them. I saw the high-yellow get up. She wobbled toward our booth. She put both hands flat on our table and leaned over. Her breath stank of booze. She looked at me.

"So this is your mother, huh, you mother-fucker!"

"Mother couldn't make it."

Elsie looked at Tanya. "What do you charge, darling?"

"Fuck off," said Tanya.

"You give good head?"

"Keep it up. I'll turn you from yellow to black and blue."

"How ya gonna do it? With a bean bag?"

Then Elsie walked off shaking her ass at us. She barely made it back to her booth and then she extended those glorious legs again. Why couldn't I have both of them? King Mongut had 9,000 wives. Think of it: 365 days a year divided into 9,000. No arguments. No menstrual periods. No psychic overload. Just feast and feast and feast. It must have been very hard for King Mongut to die, or very easy. There could not have been an in-between.

"Who's that?" Tanya asked.

"That is Elsie."

"You know her?"

"She tried to pick me up. She wants $50 for a blow job."

"She pisses me… I've known a lot of groids but…"

"What's a groid?"

"A groid is a black."

"Oh."

"You never heard that?"

"Never."

"Well, I've known a lot of groids."

"O.K."

"She's got great legs, though. She almost gets me hot."

"Tanya, legs are only a part of it."

"Which part?"

"The biggest."

"Let's go get the luggage…"

As we left Elsie hollered, "Goodbye, mother!"

I didn't know which of us she was speaking to.

Back at my place we sat on the couch drinking.

"Are you unhappy that I came?" Tanya asked.

"I'm not unhappy with you…"

"You had a girl friend. You wrote me about her. Are you still together?"

"I don't know."

"You want me to leave?"

"I don't think so."

"Listen, I think you're a great writer. You're one of the few writers I can read."

"Yeah? Who are the other bastards?"

"I can't think of their names right now."

I leaned over and kissed her. Her mouth was open and wet. She gave up easily. She was a number. Ninety pounds. It was like an elephant and a churchmouse.

Tanya got up with her drink, hiked up her skirt, and straddled my legs, facing me. She wasn't wearing pants. She began rubbing her cunt against my hard-on. We grabbed and kissed and she kept rubbing. It was very effective. Wriggle, little snake child!

Then Tanya unzipped my pants. She took my cock and pushed it into her cunt. She began riding. She could do it, all 90 pounds of her. I could hardly think. I made small half-hearted movements, meeting her now and then. At times we kissed. It was gross: I was being raped by a child. She moved it around. She had me cornered, trapped. It was mad. Flesh alone, without love. We were filling the air with the stink of pure sex. My child, my child. How can your small body do all these things? Who invented woman? For what ultimate purpose? Take this shaft! And we were perfect strangers! It was like fucking your own shit.

She worked at it like a monkey on a string. Tanya was a faithful reader of all my works. She bore down. That child knew something. She could sense my anguish. She worked away furiously, playing with her clit with one finger, her head thrown back. We were caught up together in the oldest and most exciting game of all. We came together and it lasted and lasted until I thought my heart would stop. She fell against me, tiny and frail. I touched her hair. She was sweating. Then she pulled herself off me and went to the bathroom.

Child rape, finalized. They taught children well nowadays. Rapist raped. A final justice. Was she a "liberated" woman? No, she was simply red hot.

Tanya came out. We had another drink. Damn it, she began to laugh and chat, almost as if nothing had happened. Yes, that was it. It had simply been some exercise for her, like jogging or swimming.

Tanya said, "I think I'm going to have to move out of where I live. Rex is giving me a hard time."

"Oh."

"I mean, we don't have sex, we never have, yet he's so jealous. Remember the night you phoned me?"

"No."

"Well, after I hung up he ripped the phone out of the wall."

'"He may be in love with you. Better be good to him."

"Are you good to the people who love you?"

"No, I'm not."

"Why?"

"I'm infantile; I can't handle it."

We drank for the remainder of the night then went to bed shortly before dawn. I hadn't split that 90 pounds in half. She could handle me and much much more.

When I awakened a few hours later, Tanya was not in the bed. It was only 9 am. I found her sitting on the couch drinking out of a pint of whiskey.

"Jesus, you start early."

"I always wake up at 6 am and I get up."

"I always get up at noon. We're going to have a problem."

Tanya hit the whiskey and I went back to bed. Rising at 6 am was insanity. Her nerves must be shot. No wonder she didn't weigh anything.

She walked in. "I'm going for a walk."

"O.K."

I went back to sleep.

When I next awakened Tanya was on top of me. My cock was hard and buried into her cunt. She was riding me again. She threw back her head, arched her body back. She was doing all the work. She gave little gasps of delight and the gasps kept getting closer and closer. I also began making sounds. They got louder. I could feel myself approaching. I was right there. Then it happened. It was a good long hard climax. Then Tanya climbed off. I was still hard. Tanya put her head down there and while looking into my eyes she began to tongue the sperm off the head of my cock. She was some scullery maid.

She got up and went to the bathroom. I could hear the bath water running. It was only 10:15 am. I went back to sleep.

I took Tanya to Santa Anita. The current sensation was a 16 year old jockey still riding with his 5 pound bug advantage. He was from the east and was riding at Santa Anita for the first time. The track was offering a prize of $10,000 to the person who could pick the winner of the feature race, but his or her entry had to be plucked out of all the other entries. One person was drawn for each horse and it went from there.

We drove in about the 4th race and the suckers had the place filled to capacity. All the seats were gone and there was no parking left. Track personnel directed us into a nearby shopping center. They had busses to shuttle us in. They would let us walk back after the last race.

"This is madness. I feel like going back," I told Tanya.

She took a pull from her pint. "Fuck it," she said, "we're here."