Days of utter dread, p.19
Days of Utter Dread, page 19
‘No. But I imagined that I saw him.’
‘It counts for the same thing.’
‘Who is he? What is he?’
‘I can’t really explain.’
‘Is he a ghost? Is that it?’ She didn’t even know how she could bring herself to think such a thing, let alone suggest it out loud, on a bright summer day.
Jamie Starck shook his head. ‘I don’t think that I believe in ghosts. But perhaps I believe in the overwhelming power of human desires – particularly sexual desires. Think about it – sometimes we can almost bring ourselves to orgasm, can’t we, just by thinking sexual thoughts. Lo Duc Tho is one of our desires, and that’s what gives him such a grip on our imagination.’
Jessica said, ‘You’ve seen him too, haven’t you? I mean, after you took his picture? Did he come to your bed?’
Jamie Starck said nothing. Jessica hesitated for a moment, and then she said, ‘He’s very alluring. I’m not sure what to do.’
‘No, it isn’t easy, I’ll admit. It’s that mixture of absolute innocence and absolute corruption. Let me tell you… I walked into mademoiselle’s salon one afternoon when she and her friends were gathered for tea. Lo Duc Tho was sitting on the chaise longue, wearing a girl’s velvet hat, his cheeks rouged, his eyes made up with eyeshadow, his lips painted with lipstick. His legs were wide apart and he was erect. An elegant woman in a Balenciaga suit was sitting beside him, a truly classic French beauty of a certain age, and she was slowly pushing her long pearl necklace into his anus, pearl by pearl, right up to the clasp, and then slowly pulling it out again, over and over, until he climaxed all over her skirt. She laughed with delight.’
‘Is he dead, do you think?’ asked Jessica.
‘I don’t know. Probably. Even if he isn’t, I wouldn’t even know where to start looking for him.’
*
That night Michael had to take three of his clients to Le Cirque, so Jessica spent the evening alone, washing her hair and giving herself a pedicure. At 11:00 pm, Michael called to say that he was going to be very late, so not to wait up for her. She went to bed with the television switched on but the sound turned right down and tried to read, but she was too tired to make much sense of Coleridge.
‘And all should cry, Beware! Beware! His flashing eyes, his floating hair! Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread, For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise!’
Without realising it, she fell asleep, and the book dropped out of her hand and onto the comforter. And it was only a few minutes afterward that a young long-fingered hand gently lifted the book away, and stroked her forehead and her hair, and kissed her cheek.
She opened her eyes. Lo Duc Tho had climbed onto the bed next to her, on all fours. His glossy black hair was hanging loose, so that he looked like a wild young animal. He was staring at her intently, his lips slightly parted, but he didn’t speak. She could see between his thighs that his penis was already stiff, and that his testicles were as tight as two walnuts.
‘What do you want?’ she asked him, and her voice seemed unnecessarily loud. The light from the television gleamed on his naked back. ‘Are you alive? Or dead? Or am I going mad?’
He kissed her again, and then he drew down the comforter. She was wearing a pink sleep-T, and he reached down with both hands and softly squeezed her breasts through the warm brushed cotton. She no longer felt frightened. She could see now that Lo Duc Tho was everything that Jamie Starck had described. He was everything that she had secretly desired, and never dared to tell anybody, come to life.
She sat up in bed, crossed her arms and took off her T-shirt. She stroked Lo Duc Tho’s cheeks and upper lip, and pushed the tips of her fingers into his mouth, so that he could kiss them and lick them and nip them with his perfect white teeth. Strongly but gently she pushed him onto his back, and then she sat astride him, as he had sat astride her. With both hands, she moved his penis up and down, quite forcefully, so that on her downward stroke his foreskin was stretched right back.
‘Are you never going to talk to me?’ she said. Lo Duc Tho gave her his abstract smile, but still didn’t speak.
‘I suppose that’s the nature of fantasies,’ she told him. ‘They don’t argue with you and they don’t involve you in idle conversation.’
She leaned forward so that her nipples touched his chest, and she swung her breasts from side to side. ‘I think we’re going to have to decorate you a little,’ she said. ‘How about some silver rings through your nipples, and some tattoos? You’d look gorgeous with a few flowery tattoos.’
She kissed him and ran her fingers deep into his clean shining hair. His skin was absolutely flawless, except for a tiny, star-shaped scar on his right shoulder. ‘Touch me,’ she said, sitting up again; and he slid one hand beneath her thigh and stroked her clitoris with the tip of his middle finger, so lightly that it was almost like being licked. She was so aroused that his stroking made a wet clicking noise like somebody softly smacking their lips.
She raised her hips, and took hold of his penis in her hand, and positioned it between her thighs. Then she sank down on it, all the way down, until she could feel his scrotum squashed against the cheeks of her bottom, and she let out a long quavering moan of absolute pleasure. If this was nothing but a fantasy – if this was nothing but her own desire – it was a fantasy of unbelievable intensity, and she didn’t care if she was going mad or not.
‘Lo – Duc – Tho—’ she breathed, again and again. ‘Lo – Duc – Tho—’
He felt so long and hard and slippery that he seemed to penetrate deeper into her body than any man who had ever made love to her before. She could almost believe that the head of his penis would nudge her heart.
‘You’re driving me out of my mind,’ she gasped. ‘You’re killing me.’ They were both glistening with sweat and yet Lo Duc Tho still didn’t appear to be exerting himself, or involved in what he was doing to her in any way. She rode up and down on his penis even more forcefully, smack, smack, smack against his thighs, and she caught him closing his eyes for a moment, as if at last he was beginning to feel something like the same pleasure that she was.
Exhausted, she lifted herself off him and rolled onto her back. Lo Duc Tho rose up next to her, as if he was going to climb on top of her, but she threaded her fingers into his hair and said, ‘You’re my fantasy, remember? I want you to lick me.’ This time, she wanted an orgasm, too. This time she urgently needed one.
In silent obedience, Lo Duc Tho crawled down the bed and lay between her thighs. She watched him enthralled as his narrow tongue flickered on her clitoris, and he watched her back, never taking his eyes off her once. The feeling he gave her was so strong that she felt as if they were on a raft, on the ocean, at night, being washed out on an overwhelming swell.
Jessica had an orgasm that made her deaf and blind. It went on and on, until she couldn’t tolerate any more back-breaking spasms, and she reached down to push Lo Duc Tho away from her.
Except that Lo Duc Tho wasn’t there any more. She was lying alone on the twisted sheets, with the silent television still flickering, and her book of Coleridge lying on the floor where she must have dropped it.
She couldn’t move. She knew that she should have got up, but she couldn’t. She lay staring at the ceiling and breathing like a marathon runner. She thought: What’s happening to me? I’ve never had sex like that before, ever. But maybe I haven’t had it even now.
She was still lying there when the bedroom door and Michael came in, tugging off his stripy silk necktie. ‘Hey, there! You still awake? Jesus – I thought those guys were going to go on drinking all night.’
He came over to the bed and sat down beside her. ‘You look hot. Are you okay?’
‘I’m fine, I’m okay.’
He reached out and touched her forehead. ‘Jesus, you’re burning up. I’m not kidding you – you look like you’re going down with the flu. You should keep yourself warm, not lie here undressed like this.’
She couldn’t think what to say. She couldn’t stop trembling and she was still short of breath.
‘I’ll call Dr Biedermeyer first thing. And there’s no way you’re going into work tomorrow.’
*
He came back with two glasses of milk. ‘How are you feeling now? I should have known something was wrong when you had that accident with the pasta sauce.’
She was sitting up straight in bed in a black silk kimono, with her hair in a towel turban. ‘That was no accident, Michael.’
‘I don’t get you. You didn’t make all that mess on purpose?’
‘Michael, there’s something I have to tell you.’
He took off his robe and climbed into bed next to her. ‘You’re very stressed out, honey. I know that. That’s why I’m going to call Dr Biedermeyer. He can give you something to keep you together until this Moist-Your-Eyes account’s all wrapped up. You know, maybe Prozac.’
‘I don’t need Dr Biedermeyer, Michael, and I don’t need Prozac. I’ve been seeing somebody.’
Michael had just taken a mouthful of milk but now he slowly put his hand to his throat as if she had told him that she had poisoned it. ‘You’ve been seeing somebody? Who?’
‘It’s not what it sounds like. I haven’t been having an affair. I’ve been seeing somebody, like a hallucination. Here in the house.’
‘What?’ he said, with a disbelieving laugh that was almost a bark. ‘I don’t understand you. A hallucination? Like, a mirage?’
‘More like a ghost. Except that he doesn’t walk through walls or anything like that. I can feel him. I can actually smell him.’
‘A ghost? For Christ’s sake, Jessica. I thought you were the most pragmatic woman I ever met.’
She was tempted for a second to tell him the truth, but then she decided that he wouldn’t be able to take it. Apart from being very straitlaced about sex, he was also fiercely possessive. Even the thought of a ghost making love to her would upset him.
He took hold of her hands. ‘Listen, sweetheart… I still think this is definitely a stress thing. You know and I know that ghosts don’t exist. What you’re seeing, what you’re feeling, it’s all in your head. You remember Chet Lewis, who used to work with Langton & Clarke? He got so overworked that he started believing that black dogs were chasing him down the street.’
‘Please, Michael. I don’t want to see Dr Biedermeyer and I don’t want Prozac. This is nothing to do with stress. I guess the best way to describe it is that it’s some kind of epiphany.’
Michael looked completely baffled. ‘An epiphany? Like a revelation? The burning bush, something like that? Jesus, you do need a doctor.’
‘There’s only one way I can explain it to you, and that’s to show you. Meet me tomorrow lunchtime on 49th and Lex.’
‘This is crazy, Jessica. This doesn’t make any sense at all.’
She leaned forward and kissed him on the lips. ‘Michael, I love you. When you see this for yourself, I promise you, you’ll understand.’
‘I don’t know… I’m supposed to be meeting Ron Shulman at twelve.’
‘Meet me at eleven-thirty then. Please.’
He puffed out his cheeks. ‘Okay, if you insist. But I still think you need some help with this. Really.’
*
It was raining again when she met him outside the gallery. He stepped out of a cab, paid the driver, and came over with his coat collar turned up. Then he saw the poster outside announcing Queer Nation and even before he said ‘hello,’ he said ‘Here? This is where you had your epiphany? I can’t go in here.’
‘Please, Michael, you must.’
He looked around uneasily. ‘For Christ’s sake. Supposing somebody sees me.’
‘It’s a legitimate photography exhibition, Michael, and you’re a professional photographer.’
‘I don’t think so, sweetheart. This kind of thing really isn’t my scene.’
‘I need you to understand, Michael. Please.’ She grasped his hand and led him through the door into the softly carpeted interior. Jamie Starck wasn’t there today, but his young assistant was. He came over with a wonderfully hip-swaying, hands-flapping walk and said, ‘Hel-lo!’
‘Hi,’ said Michael, in the gruffest of voices, and held on to Jessica’s hand as tightly as he could.
‘Come for another peek?’ the young assistant said. ‘You’re in luck; we close tomorrow. Next week it’s the Reuben French, the Grey Period. Very dour, Reuben French.’
Jessica said, ‘My partner and I just want to take a quick – you know—’
‘Professional interest,’ put in Michael. ‘I’m photographic director for J.D. Philips.’
‘Oh, I am impressed,’ the young assistant told him. ‘Do feel free, won’t you? And if you need anything…’ and here he gave Michael a long, lingering look ‘…you won’t shy away from asking me, will you?’
‘Yes,’ Michael told him. ‘I mean, no, we don’t need anything.’
As they walked into the gallery, Jessica said, ‘You’re not coming down with a cold, are you?’
‘No, why?’
‘You were talking like thurss,’ she said, mimicking his gruffness.
‘I always talk like that.’
‘You mean you always talk like that when you think another man’s taken a fancy to you.’
They reached the photograph of the Arab boy bending over in the desert. Michael stopped and said, ‘Oh my God.’
‘Abid,’ Jessica explained. ‘That means slave.’
Michael didn’t say anything but slowly shook his head.
‘Anyhow,’ said Jessica, ‘that wasn’t what I brought you here to see.’
She led him around the corner and there was the photograph of Lo Duc Tho. Michael looked at it for a moment and then turned his back on it.
‘This?’ he said, pointing his finger over his shoulder. ‘This faggot is your epiphany?’
‘You don’t see it?’
‘I see a dirty picture, that’s all.’
Jessica approached the photograph and stared into Lo Duc Tho’s unfocused eyes. ‘He was a plaything,’ she said. ‘He would allow women to do anything they wanted.’
Michael turned back. ‘I can’t see what you’re trying to show me.’
‘He was naked all day, so that women could touch him and kiss him and pet him. Don’t you understand? He was completely open, completely unthreatening, completely compliant. Men expect that in women, but sometimes women need that in men.’
‘I’m sorry, Jessica, I really don’t get it.’
‘Look at him, Michael. Look at his face. Look at his eyes.’
Michael looked at him, and then he shook his head. ‘You’ve lost me, sweetheart. You’ve completely and utterly lost me.’
*
Michael took her to the Park Bistro on Park Avenue that evening, where she toyed with sautéed skate wing in vinegar sauce while he had a messy saddle of rabbit, and kept tearing off large lumps of bread and stuffing them into his mouth.
‘They have the best bread here. They fly the flour in from France.’
‘I’m sorry about today,’ she said. ‘I guess you’re right. I’ve been trying to take on too much.’
‘Don’t even think about it,’ he told her, with his cheeks full like Chip ’n’ Dale. ‘You ought to try some of this rabbit – it’s out of this world.’
*
That night she thought about Lo Duc Tho, but she was too tired to want him to visit her. All the same, she wondered what it would be like if she tattooed him all over – his back, his buttocks, his thighs, his face. She would cover him in large blue chrysanthemums, like the chrysanthemums on her silk scarf from Galeries Lafayette. She would decorate his nipples with gold rings, and his belly button with a gold stud. Then she would have a large, gold ring pierced through his foreskin, so that she could lead him all the way around the apartment by a long silk cord.
In his sleep, Michael grunted, ‘Won’t.’
*
The following evening she had to stay late at the office to finish off the last of the Moist-Your-Eyes layouts. She didn’t finish until way past one o’clock in the morning, and she was hyped up with too much coffee. She caught a cab home, and the seats were sticky and smelled of sick.
The apartment was in darkness when she let herself in, apart from the silent-movie flickering of the television under the bedroom door. She went into the kitchen and poured herself a large glass of Evian water. She could see herself reflected in the window, and she thought that she looked almost like a skull. White face, high cheekbones, dark rings under her eyes. She finished the water and rinsed the glass under the faucet.
She opened the bedroom door and at first she couldn’t understand what she was looking at. Michael was crouched on the bed on all fours, and he didn’t see her at first because his face was turned away from her. It was only when he slowly turned around and lifted up his head that she realised that he wasn’t alone. There was a slight, mottled figure crouched beneath him.
In the stroboscopic light from the television, she saw that it was Lo Duc Tho, his long black hair hanging loose on the pillow, his thin elbows propping him up. He was decorated all over in chrysanthemum tattoos, and she saw the sparkle of nipple rings. Michael was hunched over him in the way that a stallion covers a mare.
‘Michael?’ Jessica whispered.
Michael sat up, withdrawing himself, his penis gleaming, one hand laid protectively flat on Lo Duc Tho’s slender back. He said nothing at all, but simply stared at her, caught in the act, waiting for her to say something.
Jessica approached the bed. ‘Michael?’
Lo Duc Tho turned his head towards her and smiled at her slyly, his face half-covered by his hair, like a girl.
‘I fell asleep,’ said Michael, in a parched voice. ‘I felt somebody touching me and I thought it was you.’
‘I never knew you – well, I never imagined you ever wanted men.’
‘I didn’t. I mean I don’t.’ Michael’s penis was sinking. Lo Duc Tho reached around and took hold of it, and started lasciviously to rub it. All the time he kept on smiling at Jessica in that secretive, superior way, as if he knew that she wouldn’t do anything to stop him.
