Women - Charles Bukowski [201]
“I need food, shelter and clothing. Buy me another drink.”
Babette nodded to the barkeep and I had a new drink.
We pressed our legs together.
“I’m a rat,” I told her, “I’m constipated and I can’t get it up.”
“I don’t know about your bowels. But you’re a rat and you can get it up.”
“What’s your phone number?”
Babette reached into her purse for a pen.
Then Cecelia and Valerie walked in.
“Oh,” said Valerie, “there are those bastards. I told you. The nearest bar!”
Babette slid off her stool. She was out the door. I could see her through the blinds on the window. She was walking away, on the boardwalk, and she had a body. It was willow slim. It swayed in the wind and was gone.
82
Cecelia sat and watched us drink. I could see that I repulsed her. I ate meat. I had no god. I liked to fuck. Nature didn’t interest me. I never voted. I liked wars. Outer space bored me. Baseball bored me. History bored me. Zoos bored me.
“Hank,” she said, “I’m going outside for a while.”
“What’s out there?”
“I like to watch the people swim in the pool. I like to see them enjoying themselves.”
Cecelia got up and walked outside.
Valerie laughed. Bobby laughed.
“All right, so I’m not going to get into her panties.”
“Do you want to?” asked Bobby.
“It’s not so much my sex drive that’s offended, it’s my ego.”
“And don’t forget your age,” said Bobby.
“There’s nothing worse than an old chauv pig,” I said.
We drank in silence.
An hour or so later Cecelia returned.
“Hank, I want to go.”
“Where?”
“To the airport. I want to fly to San Francisco. I have all my luggage with me.”
“It’s all right with me. But Valerie and Bobby brought us down in their car. Maybe they don’t want to leave yet.”
“We’ll drive her to L.A.,” said Bobby.
We paid our bill, got into the car, Bobby at the wheel, Valerie next to him and Cecelia and me in the back seat. Cecelia leaned away from me, pressed herself against the door, as far away from me as she could get.
Bobby turned on the tape deck. The music hit the back seat like a wave. Bob Dylan.
Valerie passed back a joint. I took a hit then tried to hand it to Cecelia. She cringed away from me. I reached and fondled one of her knees, squeezed it. She pushed my hand away.
“Hey, how you guys doing back there?” Bobby asked.
“It’s love,” I replied.
We drove for an hour.
“Here’s the airport,” said Bobby.
“You’ve got two hours,” I told Cecelia. “We can go back to my place and wait.”
“That’s all right,” said Cecelia. “I want to go now.”
“But what will you do for two hours at the airport?” I asked.
“Oh,” said Cecelia, “I just love airports!”
We stopped in front of the terminal. I jumped out, unloaded her baggage. As we stood together Cecelia reached up and kissed me on the cheek. I let her walk in alone.
83
I had agreed to give a reading up north. It was the afternoon before the reading and I was sitting in an apartment at the Holiday Inn drinking beer with Joe Washington, the promoter, and the local poet, Dudley Barry, and his boyfriend, Paul. Dudley had come out of the closet and announced he was a homo. He was nervous, fat and ambitious. He paced up and down.
“You gonna give a good reading?”
“I don’t know.”
“You draw the crowds. Jesus, how do you do it? They line up around the block.”
“They like blood-lettings.”
Dudley grabbed Paul by the cheeks of the ass. “I’m gonna ream you out, baby! Then you can ream me!”
Joe Washington stood by the window. “Hey, look, here comes William Burroughs across the way. He’s got the apartment right next to yours. He’s reading tomorrow night.”
I walked to the window. It was Burroughs all right. I turned away and opened a new beer. We were on the second floor. Burroughs walked up the stairway, passed my window, opened his door and went in.
“Do you want to go meet him?” Joe asked.
“No.”
“I’m going to see him for a minute.”
“All right.”
Dudley and Paul were playing grab-ass. Dudley was laughing and Paul was giggling and blushing.
“Why don’t you guys work out in private?”
“Isn’t he cute?” asked Dudley. “I just love young