Karolina Waclawiak - How to Get into the Twin Palms

The fires made the air ten degrees hotter. The Citibank thermometer said it was really 109 degrees. There was a faint buzzing in the air, quieter than the rumbling buses. But there I could hear it and walk toward it, toward low hanging branches, and I saw the flicks through the night. They were flying in a tornado formation. They kept me in the eye as I walked up Fairfax; past the people already lined up for a chance to get on The Price is Right. Some wore shirts that matched. Some already had The Price is Right t-shirts. They were veterans. They sat on lawn chairs, smarter than those who had simply set down jackets to sit on. One man had foam fingers and multi-colored plush hats and wild eyeglasses — owlish and round.

I couldn’t concentrate on that right now. I was being surrounded by bees. Hornets or yellow-jackets. I couldn’t tell. The swarm was moving too quickly. The dirt from the empty lot was being kicked up around me. I picked up speed, a clipped walk. A bee flicked into my cheek and I started to run. I tried to outpace the bees. They continued to flick against my face. One, two, three, then four flicks at once. No stings. Just kamikaze bees careening toward my face, attacking my arms. Then I felt one. A bee crawling around my bra, inside the cup. I wrestled my hand into my shirt. Down, through the v-neck opening as I pushed it aside with my palm. I stuck my hand into the cup and worked my hand down, looking for the bee. I stopped running, stooped down, jiggled my bra with both hands and tried to untangle the bee. It stung me.

“Fuck.”

The bees continued their tornado down the street, back under their tree as I held the dead bee in my hand. Their comrade. His face was flat, black and yellow. I cupped him in my hands and sat down on the sidewalk. I stared down inside the cup of my bra. I had a pink bump growing on the underside of my breast. Next to stretch marks I had never noticed before. It hurt.

The wings of the bee shimmered in the orange streetlight. Not shimmered, really. Gleamed. It was dead and my breast was swelling and now I had discovered stretch marks. I threw the bee in the gutter, got up, and started walking back to the apartment.

I walked up the stairs to my door, stared at my balcony, and saw Lev sitting there.

I knew my hair was in disarray. I had ripped my hands through it in a bee fit, when I felt little wings beating against my scalp.

I wasn’t ready for Lev.

“You look like shit.” He smiled at me. It was his come on.

I smiled at him demurely, “Thank you.”

I walked into the apartment and shut the door. I heard him knock. I opened it. I didn’t care. He pushed me against the wall and he pulled my shirt up. He had the intoxicating smell, onions and cologne, and I wanted to press my face into the crevice of his armpit but I didn’t.

He kissed me hard and I let him and he tugged at my hair and I let him. He kissed my breast. The swollen one. I cringed. It hurt. He bit it. I screamed. He didn’t stop. When I pushed him away he fell against the couch.

“What’s the matter, Anka? You don’t like me?”

I smiled at him. I felt woozy, as if I had caught his intoxication. “I like you fine.”

I smiled at him weakly. My shirt on the floor. The V stretched at the seams. My bra on the floor.

“Why don’t you come sit on the couch, on my lap?” He sat down and patted his lap.

I stared down at my swelling breast and thought about his offer. I walked over slowly. He was already undoing his belt, then the button, then the zipper. Untucking his shirt. Pulling the ends out from his waistband. Unbuttoning each button hurriedly and pulling it away from his undershirt. The armpits were stained yellow. He didn’t notice but I couldn’t help but stare. He pawed at me. Pulled at me. Made my choice for me.

“Stop acting, Anka.”

He pulled me on top of him and he pulled at my hair, let the rest of the tendrils loose.

I pulled my head back, in motion with his tug.

He liked that.

I could tell.

He leaned in close to my breasts. Kissed at them. He saw the swelling. Touched it.

“What happened, devochka ?”

“Bee sting.”

He kissed it gently. Let go of my hair. Tried to be tender. It was nice and I liked it and I knew I shouldn’t be letting him do what he was doing. He didn’t deserve me but it felt nice and I wasn’t going to make him stop. He pulled me into my room and took my clothes off and for once I was able to drown out the sound of the birds outside.

When we finished he rolled over and wouldn’t look at me. I stared at his back. It was fleshy and white and reminded me of the underside of a whale. He had faint stretch marks above his ass and his ass was hairy. He wasn’t turning around and I had to focus on something. There were a few pimples as well. I began to wonder if I had pimples on my ass too. I could hear him snoring lightly and felt that our fucking didn’t warrant a nap. It wasn’t hours. Or even half an hour. It was more like 20 minutes. The kind of sex where you hurriedly put your underwear back on… made sure you were posing so that the dimples on the side of your thigh were not visible and your breasts looked high and perky, not flat like pancakes. But he wasn’t behaving like that. He wasn’t tugging on his underwear. He wasn’t looking at me. He was asleep in my bed and I wondered how long he would stay there. I didn’t have the right to touch his back or get in close to him or coax him into letting me into his arms. We were strangers. I wanted a Misty Ultra Light bad, or maybe just a 120. I was scared to get up and wake him. I figured he was immovable and he was taking up so much of the mattress that I wouldn’t be able to get any sleep anyway. I started to get up. Inch by inch I moved my legs away from him. He didn’t move, he didn’t heave, he didn’t even notice.

I got up quickly and ran from the guttural growls and from his smell. I went onto the balcony and hunted around for stray cigarettes. One I had dropped, somewhere. I found a half. It was mostly submerged in soot-colored water. I weighed my options. There were really only two. Yes or No. I hunched down and picked it up. I pulled off the wet part, left a little nub and struck a match. It would have to do. It fizzled when I tried to light it. I pulled a little more off; the tobacco flaked and stuck to my wet fingers. The flakes transferred onto the stem of the Slim as I tugged at it and re-lit it. Inhaled deeply.

One and a half drags was all that Misty Ultra Thin could give me. I had fucked him. Now what? I wanted to get into the Twin Palms. I wanted to be more than just his Fairfax girl. I wanted to be his main girl. The only girl. Men like him didn’t have just one. I had to stand out from all the others. I had to make myself more tantalizing. I wanted his soft white underbelly over me nightly. Groaning and sweating and cursing me while he thrusted. He never used the word suka for me so I figured I was okay. He didn’t know that I knew what it meant. He didn’t know anything about me.

I came back into the room and he was letting out whimpers now. I decided to rouse him. I touched his back, it was warm and clammy. He didn’t move. I walked around and stared at his front. His belly obscured most of his penis. There was only some on display. He looked like a small child, overwrought and over-nourished. His hands were covered in those rings. Black marked and chubby. I touched one of them. They were rough. Like a worker’s hand. I was surprised. I thought he would have soft child’s hands. Why hadn’t I noticed when he was running his hands over me? Because he wasn’t. He was tugging and pawing. He had moved his hands quickly, efficiently. When I touched his hand he made a sound. Murmured something in Russian that I didn’t understand. So I touched it again and he opened his eyes and said, “What is it?”