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.

the raphael

There were the violet stains of red wine on the white linen. I draped it over the curved rosewood arm of the coat rack. I took a look around me, closing the door behind. The room was small but comfortable, walls a decidedly unsubtle pale yellow hue. At one end was the closed door to the bathroom, where the shower ran with a dull roar, past a well-made mustard yellow bed, littered with Italian giallo magazines, facing a rosewood armoire. On the other was a white cornice window, of the Second Empire style; it was opened to the blue evening of the foggy gray city beyond.

The old television in the armoire was playing RKO matinees in start black and white. On the end table near the bedpost, a Chesterfield cigarette laid smoking next to its package in a sallow ivory ashtray. The lean cigarette holder was meershaum chipped and yellowed from use. On the windowsill was a black-and-white dress, patterned in a way that reminded me of Rorschach test inkblots. I smiled and stretched my arms, unbuttoning the linen vest, removing off-white shirt and pants, tossing them to the floor by the window. I put on a pair of brown houndstooth pajamas and searched the liquor cabinet. There was some gin in a tall bottle with a Spanish label. I poured it into old-fashioned glass from the armoire; silver droplets scattered across the table when my hand shook.

I sat down at the brocade chair near the window, smelled petroleum from the cars below, and read “Nostromo” by Joseph Conrad until the shower stopped, letting my mind wander. After a few alcohol-soaked moments passed in the soft amber lamplight. Looking to the side, I noticed the half-eaten remains of a grilled cheese sandwich on white, royal-blue striped china. The door swung open as I faced it, indirectly, one hand on the book in my lap and the other on the armrest of the chair.

When I looked up I saw her leaned up against the frame of the doorway, a lemon bathrobe hanging over her slim shoulders. She wore a black shirt the color of licorice. Her short-cropped auburn hair was still damp and lay in fringe across the shining irises of her eyes. Scarlet speckled her cheeks as she smirked at me. My eyes shifted downwards to the image of a garish yellow revolver embroidered on her black panties. It was aimed at me.

“You took long enough,” she said, as I took a look at her, one-eyed, through the kaleidoscope of the glass, examined the diamond pattern cut into its frosted surface, and shook my head. She was going to make a lecher out of me.

“I’ve been here twenty minutes,” I answered. She laughed, a short, incredulous laugh, and let her head roll across her shoulders as she smiled, brown hair swaying.

“And getting loaded already.”

I gave her a smile both guilty and proud.

“I only drink when I’m nervous.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes,” I continued, and gesturing towards the pleated gray heap under her dress at the window. “And that’s the most buttons I do believe I’ve ever seen on a pair of pants before.”

“Shut up,” she said, half-jokingly, and let the bathrobe fall from her shoulders before sitting Indian-style on the bed. “Do you want to watch a movie?”

“Sure,” I lied, and rose from my seat. I sat down on the oriflamme print of the yellow blanket, and admired the neatly folded linen underneath. I laid down next to her, my hands behind my head against the pillow, and kept my eyes on the television. Gradually they drifted to her, looking at me demurely.

“How was it,” she asked.

“I’m no good at snooker,” I replied. “I think maybe I ought to quit.”

“Well how do you like that.”

Silence. I thought about kissing her, biting her lips.

“Gee, I’m tired,” I finally gave, shakily.

“How long are you staying.” she asked.

“I leave tomorrow morning.”

There was another pause. She twisted over to face me more, putting a hand on the chest of my white shirt.

“If I kiss you I’m going to feel like hell in the morning.”

“That’s okay by me.”