Women - Charles Bukowski [212]
“Larry’s practicing self-hypnosis.”
“He told me.”
“You don’t know how much better I’m sleeping, you don’t know how much better I’m relating,” Larry said.
“Do you think everybody should try it?” asked Debra.
“Well, that would be difficult to say. But I do know that it works for me.”
“I’m throwing a Halloween party, Henry. Everybody’s coming. Why don’t you join us? What do you think he could come as, Larry?”
They both looked at me.
“Well, I don’t know,” said Larry. “Really, I don’t know. Maybe?…oh, no…I don’t think so….”
The doorbell bing-bonged and Debra went to open it. It was another homosexual without his shirt on. He had on a wolf’s mask with a big rubber tongue hanging out of the mouth. He seemed testy and depressed.
“Vincent, this is Henry. Henry, this is Vincent….”
Vincent ignored me. He just stood there with his rubber tongue. “I had a horrible day at work. I can’t stand it there anymore. I think I’ll quit.”
“But Vincent, what would you do?” Debra asked him.
“I don’t know. But I can do a lot of things. I don’t have to eat their shit!”
“You’re coming to the party, aren’t you Vincent?”
“Of course, I’ve been preparing for days.”
“Have you memorized your lines for the play?”
“Yes, but this time I think we should do the play before we do the games. Last time, before we got to the play we were all so smashed we didn’t do the play justice.”
“All right, Vincent, we’ll do it that way.”
With that, Vincent and his tongue turned and walked out the door.
Larry stood up. “Well, I must be going too. Nice meeting you,” he said to me.
“All right, Larry.”
We shook hands and Larry walked through the kitchen and out the back door to his place.
“Larry’s been a great help to me, he’s a good neighbor. I’m glad you were nice to him.”
“He was all right. Hell, he was here before I was.”
“We don’t have sex.”
“Neither do we.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I’ll go get us something to drink.”
“Henry, I have plenty of everything. I knew you were coming.”
Debra refilled our glasses. I looked at her. She was young, but she looked as if she was straight out of the 1930’s. She wore a black skirt that came down halfway between her knee and ankle, black shoes with high heels, a white high-necked blouse, a necklace, earrings, bracelets, the lipstick mouth, plenty of rouge, perfume. She was well-built with nice breasts and buttocks and she swung them as she walked. She kept lighting cigarettes, there were lipstick-smeared butts everywhere. I felt sure I was back in my boyhood. She even didn’t wear pantyhose and now and then she tugged at her long stockings, showing just enough leg, just enough knee. She was the kind of girl that our fathers loved.
She told me about her business. It had something to do with court transcripts and lawyers. It drove her crazy but she was making a good living.
“Sometimes I get very snappish with my help, but then I get over it and they forgive me. You just don’t know what those goddamned lawyers are like! They want everything immediately, and they don’t think about the time it takes to do it.”
“Lawyers and doctors are the most overpaid, spoiled members of our society. Next in line is your corner garage mechanic. Then you might throw in your dentist.”
Debra crossed her legs and her skirt hiked up.
“You have very nice legs, Debra. And you know how to dress. You remind me of the girls in my mother’s day. That’s when women were women.”
“You’ve got a great line, Henry.”
“You know what I mean. It’s especially true of L. A. Once not long ago I left town and when I returned, do you know how I knew I was back?”
“Well, no….”
“It was the first woman I passed on the street. She had on a skirt so short you saw the crotch of her panties. And through the front of the panties—pardon me—you could see her cunt hairs. I knew I was back in L.A.”
“Where were you? On Main Street?”
“Main Street, hell. It was Beverly and Fairfax.”
“Do you like the wine?”
“Yes, and I