Chapters Eleven to Fifteen

Chapter Eleven

"Tell'em about your call," Freddy says, "The one you did with Tom Hutchins."

And everyone around the table looked at me. I looked at Fred, stunned that he was asking me to speak.

"Go, on," he said. "You were the stud. Tell it."

"Okay, I guess," I knew I was blushing, but I saw people looking at me now with interest, plus the girl, whose name I learned was Carrie, was sitting there with her girl friends, and I saw the way she was looking at me like she really was interested, or curious at least to hear me."

"Not much to tell," I said. "Me and Tom, my partner were driving down Collins Street in 453 after leaving Saint Fran. I saw something that didn't look right, so I said, "Hold it a minute. Shit," I said, “There's smoke coming out of the window. The building's on fire.” Tom called it in on the radio and I got out and started shouting at people to get out of the building. The front door was open so I ran in went up and down the halls banging on doors, shouting "Get out, get out, the buildings on fire.” I went upstairs, and that's where it was smoky. I'd been in the building before, so I knew how the hall hooked to the right once you got on the second floor. I was just shouting and banging, and people were yelling back, but once they heard what I was saying, they all came out, and went out and got in the front yard. I helped one lady with her kids, and when we got outside the fire was just pulling up, and I looked up and I could see flames flying off the roof."

"Flying," Fred said, "the place was completely engulfed. I was there by then and I saw him come out of the holding that little girl. You're one crazy fucking dude, I'll tell you to go charging up the second floor of a building smoking like that. He saved that family's life, not to mention everybody else in the building, a bunch of fucking drugged out, liquored up lazy ass welfare families, but still he saved their lives. I won't be surprised if he gets a medal, for it. You done well there. And I take full credit for bringing you into the trade. Raise our glasses. Tim, my brother, you're the man tonight!"

They raised their glasses and toasted me, and said kind things, and I didn't tell anyone of them that immediately after I had hidden in the back of the ambulance and cried because I had been scared, running through that building with the smoke suddenly so thick, I could hardly see my feet, and it got so fucking hot in there, and hearing the woman cry, and banging into her, and feeling the girl, and lifting her up into my arms, and being so thankful to see the stairs again, and making it back out alive, watching the mother crying as she took the girl from me and held her. I knew I never would have done it if I had known what it would have been like. I had only done it because I hadn’t know better. My heroism was, in fact, a fraud.

A little while later, when the news came on, it was the lead story. "Firefighters rescue city dwellers as building burns. Four Hartford families were lucky to be alive tonight as emergency personnel's quick response helped evacuate the building..." And a TV news crew happened to be driving by as well, and they filmed me coming out with the girl in my arms, looking dazed.

A cheer went up and they saluted me again.

Later, Carrie came over and introduced herself to me, asking if she could sit down next to me. "My name's Carrie," she said.

"I know, I've seen you around. I'm Tim."

"I know you said. What you did was great."

"I just happened to be driving by. I didn't know it was going to go up so fast, I don't know if I'd have gone in there."

"They're lucky you did."

"It worked out, I guess."

We talked some small talk. She said she worked as a secretary in a real estate firm in Windsor Locks. She was a year older than me, and said she had just broken up from her boyfriend, and wasn't seeing anyone, just hanging out with her girlfriends.

"Would you like to go out sometime?" I impressed with my ability to keep cool, while my heart was racing.

"A date?"

"Well, yeah," I said.

"Sure." And she gave me her number.

When she left with her friends, she turned back and waved. I waved back.

"You are the man," Fred said, having watched it all.

"She likes to put out, too," Mindy say.

"You are in luck," Fred said.


That night I slept with her number pressed against my heart.

Chapter Twelve

The next Friday -- the day of our date -- I came in early and worked a transfer car for eight hours so I could get off by three in the afternoon.

"What's the big occasion?" Ned Martinson said when I handed him the keys and radio for 462. "It’s not like you to get off early."

"Check please?" I said, holding out my hand.

He sat at his desk, and flipped through the stack of payroll checks. "Rumor has it that you actually have a date."

I wasn't commenting. "Da me, por favor," I said, when I saw him pull my check out.

"Let me give you some advice," he said. "Women will do you in in the end. Enjoy it while it lasts."

I snatched the check from his hand. "I intend too," I said.

"Good luck, just be sure you're on time tomorrow."

I took the check straight to the bank, and instead of depositing any of it, I asked for it all in cash. The teller counted out seven hundred dollars, fifty seven cents.

My first stop was the Tuxedo Store off Sisson Avenue, where I had already measured and fitted for a black tuxedo, cummerbund, bow tie and cufflinks. At first they had tried to sell me the certain latest style they were pushing, but I said I wanted to look just like Dean Martin, and it cost me more, but I wanted to do it up right. The old Italian guy at the store got a kick out of that. "Say hi to Sammy and Frank," he called after I'd paid out the eighty nine bucks, and took the wrapped tuxedo off the hanger, and the box of shoes under my arm. "Don't forget to bring it back before your turn into a pumpkin." I just smiled and nodded. I heard him say to his wife, "That boy a gotta class,"

I went to the florist and paid $45 for the white orchid corsage I had them specially make at the florist's suggestion. "This is a classy girl," I told her, "I want something beautiful, but not overbearing, something that she'll tell her friends about and her mother, and they'll think wow, what a thoughtful, sweet guy."

"I have just the thing," the florist said. "A white orchid."

I had never been to a prom. I know that had disappointed my mother, so I called and told her I had a date, and could she help me get ready, make certain I had everything in order. She had the Polaroid out again. "When are you going to introduce me to her?" she asked. "She could come over for dinner on Sunday."

"Not yet, Mom, I don't want to scare her away."

"Are you embarrassed about me?"

"No, no, It’s just this is our first date. Eventually, sure, but I don't want to rush anything."

"I'll do that meatloaf, and make a chocolate pie, and if she doesn't like dogs, we'll just lock them up in the backyard. You look so handsome, I know I say that all the time, but you are and I'm so proud of you."

"He looks like a freak," my sister said.

"He does not."

"Watch it," I said, "I'll freak your butt all the way up to your room."

"I'm scared."

"You know I wouldn't hurt you, unless you really pissed me off."

She laughed. "You do look okay, just strange seeing you in a suit. Where are you taking her McDonald's?"

"Carbones," I said.

"Carbones," My mother said, "I've always wanted to go there. The food and the service. That's classy."

"I figure go first class or don't go at all."

I looked at the clock. It was seven. On cue, I heard a knock on the door, and it was an older gentleman in a tuxedo as well. My limo.

"I've got to run, mom."

"Are you forgetting something?"

"Your slot money. I'm still going to give you that on Sunday."

"No, no, a kiss for your mom."

But of course, and I gave her a quick twirl like she was a dancing girl, and kissed her on the cheek. "Wish me luck."

"What kind of luck, do you mean?"

"Don't worry, I will be a gentleman."

She's going to think your rich, you have to have protection."

"Please."

"I just worry. I know what young women are like, I was one."

On the limo ride over to Carrie's house, I thought maybe I should have covered that angle. I laid out everything I might need, and I never even thought about condoms. No, I wasn't expecting that anyway, not on the first date. I didn't want her to get the wrong idea about my intentions anyway. That would come in time, when she was ready.

The limo was great. I had wanted a stretch, but then I thought that would be ostentatious not to mention, more per hour, as it was the three hour rental was going to cost nearly $300 bucks with the tip thrown in.

I directed the driver to the address she had given me, a condominium complex in Bloomfield, where she rented a room in her friend's condo.

I had told her to dress up, but I think she was overwhelmed at my tuxedo. She stood there with her mouth open, "My god, look at you."

I smiled and pinned the corsage on her red dress. "Nothing but the best for you," I said. "I'm taking you out."

She looked pretty good herself. She wore a strapless dress that showed a fair amount of cleavage, and her perfume enriched my nostrils that had too rarely smelled such scent in the circumstances of a date.

The limo driver, held the door for us, and Carrie was incredulous at it all. I had a bottle of champagne on ice in the back, and we drank it on the ride, with the sky roof open, though with all the city lights you couldn't see any stars.

"What do you know someone who works for the limo company?" she asked.

"Don't you worry, about the arrangements, I just want you to have a good time, a toast to a beautiful woman and to the evening. Here's to being young and alive."

And we clinked glasses and drank, and with each growing moment, I saw her begin to look at me in a way no woman had ever looked at me before, like I was a man with real class.

At Carbone’s they gave us a booth near the kitchen, and I ordered steak Diane for us, which they prepared enflambe at tableside. And as we ate and drank our wine, she opened up to me about her life. She told me that night she had been engaged to a police officer, who had broken it off a month before the wedding.

"His mistake," I said.

She cried some, but said it was good to be back dating.

"I'm surprised you didn't have a line of gentlemen callers at your door."

She nearly spit her wine out. "There's always guys who will fuck you," she said, "but guys who want a relationship is a different story."

"It’s a shame," I said. "They'd be crazy not to see you for more than that."

"It just hasn't been my luck."

I raised my glass and clinked with her as I said, "Well, here’s to your luck changing."

For desert we had another flamish dish, bananas jubilee. The preparer set the flame so high for a moment, I thought it would hit the sprinkler and douse all of us, but we made it. I spooned some of the desert and Carrie ate it from my spoon. I paid the bill by laying two one hundred dollar bills on the waiter's bill holder without even checking to see the price. I had in fact earlier, added up what it would cost so I knew with tip, the two hundred would take care of it.

"What do you own a diamond mine?"

"No, I just believe in enjoying life, some things are worth spending money on more than others."

She sat close to me on the limo ride home, and rested her head on my shoulders. I walked her to the door, and I was set to just kiss her good night, when she looked back at the limo driver, and said, "Are you going to send him home?"

"Huh?"

She reached for the back of my head and moved my head toward her, and I felt her tongue in my mouth. She kissed me hard and long, and then said, “Send him home. I'm just going to use the bathroom a moment.”

I walked back out to the curb, my hand shaking as I gave the driver the last of my money, three hundred and fifty bucks. He winked at me, and cracked his first smile of the evening. Instead of a handshake he offered me his closed fist to bump. “You the man,” he said, before peeling off.

When I came back in the house and walked through the door she had left open for me, I stood in the living room, hands in my pockets. I tell you I was nervous. My legs were shaking. I could hear her in the bathroom. I started to sweat.

She came out in a nightgown, and nodded for me to follow her. We went down the hall to her bedroom, where there was a queen-size bed with a jungle colored bedspread, a mirror on the ceiling and posters on the wall of male underwear models. “You don’t have any pot, do you?” She asked, as she reached for my bow tie.

“No, no I don’t,” I said. “Not on me.”

“That’s all right. I just enjoy it sometimes, but I’m feeling all right as it is.”

“Me, too.”

She untied my bow tie, unbuttoned my shirt, then pulled the tie on her bathrobe, and took my hands and brought them up to the breasts that were now revealed to me. My heavens, I thought. I knew then for sure I was going to get some.

What can I say? She was a wildcat, and I more than held my own. I may not have been the smoothest lover, but I knew then that as an old man I would look back on this night, and know that my dick didn’t let me down in my moment of need. We went for hours. There is little in the world as nice as finding yourself suddenly with a woman, who presses her pelvis against you, smothers your face in her breast, and when she kisses you, nearly suffocates you with the passion and force of her desire for you. Oh I was crazy for it all.

I left at three in the morning, and walked the two miles to my apartment. It was quiet; a half moon illuminated the night sky. While I knew that like everyone born, I would one day die on a day not of my choosing, I felt that I had much to live for. It didn't matter that I didn't have a penny left in my wallet. I had the scent of a woman on my skin.

Chapter Thirteen

The first time I stole was a month later. I can tell you I did not walk into that dormitory expecting to embark on a spree of crime. We were called for an overdose. A campus security guard led us into a dorm room where a student sat sobbing with his head in his hands.

“He told me he took a handful of pills and drank a shit load of beers,” his roommate said. “He said he wanted to die.”

“Why did you call?” the student said angrily to his roommate, his speech slightly slurred. The student had long hair and wore a tee-shirt that said “Fuck War.” “I just want to be left alone.”

There were posters of rock bands on the wall. U2 and Dave Mathews. I looked at the expensive stereo equipment. Someone was loaded.

“What did you take?” Tom asked.

“I didn’t take anything,” the student said. “I just drank.”

“His prescription bottles are in his bureau,” the roommate said. “He’s on antidepressants. This isn’t the first time he’s tried to kill himself.”

“Go check them out,” Tom said to me.

As the roommate led me into the bedroom, and showed me where the prescriptions were, I heard Tom ask, “Why do you want to off yourself?”

“None of your business. I wish you’d all leave me alone.”

The roommate answered, “His girlfriend broke up with him.”

“Fuck her,” Tom said. “You want to get her back, go fuck someone else, don’t take pills, she’ll think you’re a weenie.”

Tom had his own method.

As I was sorting through the meds, which were in the first dresser drawer – the dresser itself was littered with empty bottles of Corona, I saw several small film canisters in the tray and I opened one. I knew right away it was weed. It was filled to the brim. I glanced over my shoulder, saw I was alone -- the roommate had returned to the main room -- and just like that, I recapped the canister and slid it in my pocket even before my heart started to pound. It was that fast.

What went through my mind? I was thinking about Carrie, and how pleased she would be if I brought her this little gift. She’d lamented how much she liked a smoke, but that she’d been out since she’d broken up with her old boyfriend – the cop.

“How’s it coming in there?’ Tom looked in the bedroom. “What are you finding?”

“Valium, Prozac, Wellbutrin. There’s just a couple valium missing. No empties.”

“Well, one way or another, you’re going to the hospital. You bought yourself a ticket by saying you want to die, bought yourself a charcoal shake.”

I was by now feeling pangs of conscience, and would have returned the vial to its proper place, but two police officers appeared, and Tom was giving them a quick rundown, including showing him the prescription bottles, and saying, “It doesn’t look like he took much, but we’ve got to take him in. Get his sneakers and a jacket, and let get going.”

The roommate was in the room now gathering what Tom had requested, and I was called back in the main room to set the stretcher up.

The roommate rode in the front with me as I drove to the hospital. He kept looking back at Tom and his roommate. Tom was lecturing the guy on how to handle women.
“The way to keep your woman is brute fucking force. I’m not talking about smacking her around, I’m talking about TCB -- taking care of business. Every time – every time you are in the sack with her, you give her everything you got and more. That’s all that matters. You must conqueror her. All this sensitive crap might work at first, but once a woman has had a true man – a champion sire, she is yours at the ring of a bell. You can not call her for a year, then give her a little ringaling and suggest a little get together and she is there. That should be lesson number one in college. Study history. The arms race. The side with the best weapons wins. No surrender. The Gattling gun. Blitzkrieg. The Allied army on D-Day. The H bomb. Desert Storm. Overwhelming power. It’s the American Way. TCB. Taking Care of Business. You might want to look into it. ”

I was glad Tom’s show was keeping the roommate from suddenly remembering that they kept their stash right where my thieving little hands had been.

“Is he always like this?” the roommate asked me.

I nodded.

“I know he’s your partner,” the guy said, “But what a fucking asshole.”

I just shrugged. Who was I judge? Tom may have been a little burned out and full of himself at the same time, but he was entertaining, and at least he wasn’t a fucking thief. And I had to hand it to him—from the way his pager was always ringing -- he seemed to have the ladies at his beck and call.

***

“Why are you so jittery?” Tom asked once we cleared the hospital.

“I’m not jittery.”

“Yes, you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Don’t tell me that you’re the type to try to off yourself if a girl pulls one on you?”

“No.”

“We’ll see.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“How a man acts in adversity is the mark of character. Soon as your squeeze puts the hurt on you we’ll see how you act. You’ll turn into a blubbering fool. You’ve got to be a man and go out and bang someone else before twenty four hours are up.”
“She’s not going to put a hurt on me.”

“She’s not, huh?”

“Nope, not going to happen.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m a fucking conqueror,” I said. “TCB.”

That cracked him up. “You’re all right. I’ve taught you well. Still…we’ll see.”

***

That night I stood on Carrie’s doorstep, and was thrilled again to be pulled in through the door, and given a deep kiss, and to feel her hand groping for me.
I lightly pushed her away. “I have a surprise for you?’ I said.

“Where is it?”

“In my pocket.”

“I see.”

“It’s not what you think it is.”

“Really, is it better?”

“Well, maybe not better, but you’ll like it.”

I took the film canister out of my front pocket and handed it to her. “Open it up.”

She opened it and raised it to her nose and sniffed.

“Oh, all right! You’re the man,” she said.

“That’s what they tell me.”

“Com’on, let’s fire it up.”

We went into her room, and she took a bong out of her closet. “Where’d you get it?”
“I have my sources.”

“Is it good shit? I could use some good shit.”

“Fair to middling,” I said.

“Let’s hope its better than that, but hey, at least it is what it is.”

She filled the bong with water, put some of the crumpled dope in the holder, put end of the bong around her mouth, her thumb on the hole in back , used her lighter to lit the leaves, then took a deep long inhale that caused the water to bubble as the smoke passed through it, then clouded up the tube. At last she released her thumb and the smoke shot up into her mouth and lungs, she sat back, smiling, holding her breath as her eyes grew large, and then slanted. I was silent as she held it in, held it in, until I sear it looked like it was starting to come out of her eyes, then she started to let it out slow. It streamed out of her nostrils like a bull snorting on a cold morning.

“Good?” I asked.

“Fan-fuckingtastic,” she said. “Let me set you up.” And she handed me the bong.
Now it had been awhile since I had smoked. I’d given it up when I’d decided to be an EMT. I was used to just smoking out of shitty little pipes or poorly rolled joints. I don’t know if it was the bong or my abstinence making me sensitive, but I was floating on the ceiling.

Sex—Sex while high. Oh my goodness. I was in a slow motion movie, a 3-D surround a feel slow motion full length picture. I was in heaven.

When at least our movie reached its climax, and the credits began to roll, instead of nudging into my side and pulling my arm and leg over her laying at my side before falling quickly asleep with her soft gentle snoring, she was back up with the bong, lighting up another mega-hit.

“Good dope, you’ll have to get some more.”

“Anything for you.”

I felt peaceful like I was a benevolent ruler, and everything in that room was my creation. We passed the bong back and forth.

“They ought to make this legal,” Carrie said. “The President and all the world leaders smoked this, we’d have no wars.”

“Maybe they do smoke it and think they can do anything,” I said.

“You have a point. Any rate, I'm glad to have a new connection."

“I’m glad to make the connection.”

“Look at you, you horny devil. I’ve got a connection for that.”

And we were back at it.

And I was thinking I fucking rule. TCB.


Chapter Fourteen

The weed went over so well, I knew I had to come up with an encore performance. The meager supply I’d stolen had lasted barely a week. The pressure was on for more. Carrie did not appreciate it if she was out and I came over empty-handed. “What you don’t want me anymore? I thought you said you had connections?”

“I do,” I’d say. “I’ve just been busy.”

“Thinking about getting some for you, but not for me. You’re a typical man. Well, did you bring me something to eat? Chinese? Not Chinese again?”


***

I turned to Fred, and for a month he kept me in supply, selling me skinny joints for $5 each.

“Can you get me a larger amount?” I asked Fred at the bar.

“Dude, why don’t you show some initiative and get some of your own? The city is your garden.”

“Huh?”

“Just fucking steal it. Don’t tell me you haven’t been on calls where it’s just laying there for the taking. All the ODs we go to, its not like they always hide their stash before they hit up.”

“I don’t want heroin.”

“Where’s there’s heroin there’s dope, just like where there’s alcohol, there’s dope. The President’s right -- it’s the gateway drug.”

“But I smoke and I’d never do heroin.”

“You’re still a young man. I wouldn’t be surprised to see you, standing on the corner, strung out, your life belonging to the needle. I think you’ve got that kind of addictive personality. I mean look at you with you girl. She’s got you by the balls. Someday heroin’s going to get you the same way. Mark my words.”

“I don’t want heroin, just a little dope for the little lady.”

“You need a lot of dope for your not so little lady.”

“Well, can you get me some?”

“You should be getting some for yourself. It’s all over the place. You got to learn to pat down your patients. That’s where all my dope comes from. Why buy what you can get free?”

“Stealing?” I said.

“It’s not stealing, its asset forfeiture. Finder’s keepers. Possession of the law is 9/10s. It’s a well documented legal principle. If the shit wasn’t illegal in the first place, you’d win in court, and because the shit is illegal, they can’t take you to court. It’s just like why we’re going to war in the desert. We’re not going there to save the towel heads, we’re going for the oil and the plunder. It’s there for the taking. It’s the American Way. Christopher Columbus did it. The old guy Roosevelt in the wheelchair did it. Bush is doing it. No reason we can’t. It’s an American tradition going back to the days of Genghis Khan.”
“I don’t know about stealing.”

“It’s getting you laid isn’t it?”

“Huh?”

“Don’t tell me Carrie doesn’t like the weed. How do you like her big bong?”
“How did you know about that?”

He looked at me like he often did – like I was an idiot. “She and Melinda are pals. We were over there a year ago, she got out that bad boy and we passed it around.”

“So can you get me some?”

He reached in his pocket and just like that handed me a couple joints. “These are only because you’re my friend, but I want to see you out there getting your own. Give a man a fish and you’ve feed him for a day, teach him to fish and you’ve fed him forever. Besides, you’re soon to be on your own. I’m going to be leaving for more lucrative pastures.”

“What are you talking about?"

He pointed to the TV where the newscaster was speculating about when the country was going to invade Iraq. “I’m thinking about enlisting.”

“Enlisting.”

“Yeah, my brother’s in the service. Since 9/11, a man in a uniform is a pussy magnet. You think medics are pussy magnets? Army Ranger, it’s a whole other exponential power there.”

“But they’d be shooting at you.”

“Comes with the territory. Besides there’s treasure there—treasure for the taking.”

“Oil?”

“Gold – that’s what my brothers says. This is not going to be desert fighting, we’re going into Baghdad. We’re going to be occupiers. We’re going to be rich, and I intend to take my game to a bigger scale.”

I didn’t know what to say. I thought he was crazy. I knew one thing, I wasn’t one to put myself in harm’s way any more than I could help. Besides Carrie was almost more woman than I could handle I hardly need anyone else.”

“Gold and pussy,” Fred said, “makes the world go round. Now cough up the $10 you owe me.”

Chapter Fifteen

We were called for an unconscious male at 45 Barber Street. A woman led us to the apartment at the end of a dark hallway.

"He out cold,” she said.

We found a black male in his early twenties supine on the bed. He was still warm and had a pulse. I handed Tom the blood pressure cuff, but he reached into the house bag and took out the yellow med kit instead.

It was then I noticed a wicker basket by the foot of the bed. It contained what looked like about thirty plastic baggies filled with crushed dark green leaves and twigs. I looked at it closer. In another house, I might have thought it was green potpourri, but it was clear to me – it was weed. The woman was out of the room, making noise in the kitchen. My partner strapped a tourniquet around the man’s bicep. I remembered Carrie had said she liked to smoke, but had lost her connection when her ex had split. I plucked an ounce bag from the pile and stashed it in the side leg pocket of my work pants.

“Stand back!” Tom warned, suddenly.

The man sat bolt upright, spewing vomit. I tried to jump out of the way, but the projectile splash caught my pant legs and boots.

“Good morning, sunshine,” Tom said. He still held the syringe in his hand.

The man was looking all around trying to figure out what happened to him. “Fuck,” he said. “You didn’t give me that narcan shit. Motherfucker, why?”

“Your friend said something about being late for your 10:30 appointment.”

“What?”

“I may have misunderstood. Now that you’re up, can we take you to the hospital?”

“Fuck no.”

He spewed again.

“Suit yourself then.”

***

I gave the whole bag to Carrie that night. I didn’t tell her where I got the dope, although I did tell her about the call. “He yacked all over me. He looked like Daffy Duck in one of those Bugs Bunny cartoons where he’s just gotten knocked on the head and he’s looks all around going ‘Which way did he go? Which way did he go?”

She knocked my hand away from her breast. “I can’t believe that the man playing with my breasts is talking about drug addicts, yacking and Daffy Duck in the same sentence.”

“You really have beautiful breasts,” I said. “I don’t know what I did to deserve such a beautiful girlfriend.”

“Well, I’ll give some credit for keeping me in supply here, although I admit you’ve been stringing me out some lately. I was thinking about finding a new supplier.”
“Supplier of what?” I asked.

She laughed. “ You’ve bought yourself some time today. This ought to last a good month.”

“I should hope.”

“I do thank you for it.”

"I've got a few ideas how you can thank me."

"I'm sure you do, but before I thank you, you've got to pay rent yourself. I want you to visit Mrs. Landlord," and she pointed between her legs.

And I got down on my knees, and waddled over and assumed the position. I didn't mind, even when she squeezed my head so hard, I was worried, my brain fluid would end up splattered on the ceiling and walls like an exploded pumpkin. She really really liked it, and I'd bring her around, not just one time, but two and three, until she was so sensitive she could no longer and even bear the touch of my tongue. But give her a minute then, and she would grab me and want me inside, and the romp would begin all over again.

"You're the best lover I've ever had," I'd tell her when we lay exhausted across the couch or the bed if we ever made it there.

"Probably the only one you've had." But then she'd see the hurt in my face and say, "ah, you're not to so bad for your age. You've got a nice tongue. That's a start."

It was a start, but where it was going to end, at that time I did not know.

***

Chapter Fifteen 1/2

Carrie had her moods. And the dope I bought or the beer I'd bring over didn't really help. Me, I'm a happy drunk, a silly pothead. We'd watch Saturday Night Live and Will Ferrell would come on and tell a joke or do something funny, and I'd start laughing and my laughing would turn into a coughing fit, and it would get so snots were coming out of my nose, and I'd be struggling to keep from pissing myself the laughter would be so much. I laughed so hard sometimes my chest wall would hurt. Carrie would look at me like I was from another planet.

"I'm going to call animal 911 if you don't control yourself better," she'd say, as she refilled the pipe. "Just don't pee on the carpet.

"I'm sorry," I'd say, "Will Ferrell kills me. Did you see Austin Powers when he was the Number 2's assistant, and they dropped him in the pit but he wasn't dead?"
"No."

"That was a funny movie. We should rent that."

"Speaking of rent."

She looked at me and gave me a little nod for me to come to her like I was her trained lap dog. I thought for a moment, just a few months before, if you asked me if I had any problem at all being naked on a Saturday night, smoking dope, drinking Bud Lights and having as my company, not some hot chick's picture in a magazine, but a real live, breathing, not unattractive woman who was also naked, and who's breast completely occupied and fascinated me, and that she would be sitting there on the couch, spreading her legs and inviting me over for a taste, well, I would have had no complaint at all, and thinking that right now, I thought, so she likes to throw barbs at me, it isn't all that bad. At least I’m not having to duck bullets to get it.

"Just make certain, you wipe the snot off your nose before you start in on me," she said, then laid back and looked up at the ceiling.
I don’t know what it was – her tone probably, but in a second – as quick as I had pocketed the dope – I was standing and putting my clothes on.

"What are you doing?" she said.

"I'm tired of your fucking cracks. I'm nice to you, you ought to be nice to me."

"Nice to you. We're in my fucking apartment watching my fucking TV, and you’re playing with fucking breasts. Tell me who's being nice to whom. You don't even have an apartment."

"If you're going to be in one of your moods, I don't want to be near you."

"Good, go leave then. I don't want you here anyway. You're a fucking loser."

I just held up my hand. I know my neck and face were turning red. I was angry. I felt rising up in me for the first time the trait that must have come from my father -- the desire to hit a woman. I did not relent to it, though I was sickened that I felt it there. I dressed quickly, and left in my huff without saying goodbye, or even saying I would call.

"Don't fucking come back, creep!" she called.

Halfway home I started feeling bad, and thought about turning around. I couldn’t believe what had happened – it had been so sudden. I imagined her laying there on the couch alone, sobbing and asking herself what she had done, driving away a man who loved her. And it was true I did, for all the shit she gave me, I did love her, I couldn't help it. I saw the good in her, and knew that she just hid it well. But I did not want to go back, because I did after all have some pride.

I went to Uncle Frank's instead. I even paid ten bucks for a lap dance. The girl put her hand behind my had, and slowly brought my head forward until my lips were just inches from her swollen nipple at the end of her large breasts, and while her breasts were much more attractive in the normal sense than Carrie's, I couldn't escape the fact that I wished I was back there with Carrie, and that I could lean my head forward that last inch and open my mouth and lick and kiss and suck Carrie's nipple, while hearing her sweet moaning, instead of being unable to go any further with the bored but attractive dancer, with Motley Crew playing on the juke box, and a three hundred pound bouncer standing nearby, ready to pound my head against the wall, then throw me out the door if I so much as gave a soft whisper kiss to Juliet’s nipple.

I shook my head and began to cry, and Juliet looked at me strangely, then shrugged, and moved on to the next customer.

I was a wreck.

By three am I was too drunk to drive home. I couldn't even stand. I was on my knees barfing in the parking lot, and I guess even for awhile passed out against the wheel.

I was lucky when they called the ambulance, Fred and Mary were the ones who responded. "I should have taken you to Hartford," Fred told me the next day when he stopped by to see how I was doing. "Imagine waking up in the tube station with a posey on, strapped to a recliner sitting next to Papa Lopez, and Jimmy Schmidt and with having to listen to Al Bork babble on with everyone in the company stopping by to see you there."

"I appreciate your taking me home," I said. "I hope you didn't get in trouble for it,"

"No, anything for a pal. Though you keep it up, you may be seeing me for an intervention.”

“An intervention?”

“Yeah, I think your brain’s getting scrambled. That girl’s got you wrapped around your finger her, or more likely got your head in a vice grip – and that isn't good for your brains."

I looked at him, wondering how he knew.

"She's got a bit of a reputation. Take my advice, get out while you can. If you want I can call dispatch and we'll take you down to Cedar Crest for a couple weeks, they've got a secret unit for pussy detox there."

I would have taken him up on it, but like the addict I was, I was already planning how to get my next fix, how to patch things up, so I could be back there in her warm arms, hearing her moans, knowing I was the source of her happiness. I needed it bad.

Three days later I knocked on her door wearing my Dean Martin tuxedo, holding a dozen roses, and a box of Whitman's chocolates. "I've been a fool," I said. "I'm a sorry for the way I acted."

The roses got trampled into the carpet, the chocolates squished, and I got cum stains on the tuxedo pants that I had to pay ten dollars extra for.

But there I was again, desperately moving my head from side to side to keep some pressure of it, and have to breathe, as I burrowed in, imagining I was a miner, burrowing toward her heat, toward her heart. Who would have thought a human had such need?

Chapters Sixteen to Twenty