pariahville - excerpt

His shirt was black and white seersucker, well-pressed. On the white satin lapel of his black blazer, an variegated white carnation had been pinned neatly. He looked like a true southern gentleman; and he bared his bright teeth with slow-burning deviance.
But he was alone, in the center of the room, shuffling ever closer to the boomerang table and the pile of well-worn records that glistened dully under the New Orleans crimson lamplight. He couldn’t sleep. He couldn’t stop. Just moving, two-stepping to the keyboards.
The clean-looking Bang and Olaf was nestled into the armoire on the wall space between the living room and the kitchen where Neal was mixing drinks and laughing, bragging to the guests. Faye was on the balcony, watching traffic in a mint smoke haze. Julia Romanov sifted through the numerous vinyls, before finding an early British pressing of Last Year’s Model, the first letters cut off on the cover.
The beat played. Jack shook his head up and down, lips pursed, he saw the woman in his sights. Odile with her loose linen shirt and her pleated black pants, tight on toned thighs. Odile with her hand-rolled cigarette and her Swedish sunglasses. His blood ran strong. The tunnel vision set in.
Odile with her bare white feet. Odile, sans brassiere. He took a hit from the green flask of Jameson in his right hand. The whiskey made him stupid, the beer made him bitter. He was a hunter. He kissed the St. Christopher that dangled from his neck. He licked his fingers and twisted his brown curls.
He sashayed, somewhat clumsily, catching his steps on Cuban heels. The shag carpet was very thick and very white, and so was the loose shirt that hung over Odile, and her very sharp shoulders, spying him with her arms outstretched like a Sufi dancer.
For to Odile he was not the hunter, but the prey. Her eyes turned to slits, she slipped a narrow tongue from the corner of her mouth and advanced, feet arched, fingers running down the wrinkled face of his seersucker shirt, she gave him a too-knowing smile, showing more gum than pearly tooth…
Their noses touched. The bass throbbed, they moved as one. No one was watching. Jack forgot about Faye. He realized it was the greatest moment of his life and it was painted upon his face like a great sign on the neon strip. His left hand reached for hers, his right ran down the side of her Hellenic body feeling for any imperfection.
The keyboards started again. Julia Romanov had her eyes closed and Odile touched the side of her nose against Jack’s and held his hand tightly and ran her own up his neck and bit his lip. She exhaled and stood on the top of her toes as if she had been struck by lightning and Jack continued to smile. He continued to melt.
He kept at kissing her. He became hungry for it. He thought about taking her by the hips and falling onto the loveseat. He thought about it. They wrestled with eachother. The petals from the carnation lilted towards the carpet. Faye had finished her cigarette.