Nude Men (16 page)

Finally, I answer, “She’s just hot, that’s all.”

“But why does she want so badly to be petted? She’s completely

frantic.”

I reply the first thing that pops into my mind: “She likes to be petted when she’s hot, because it aerates her fur.”

“What do you mean, ‘aerates’?”

“You know, it ventilates it.”

“I wouldn’t mind getting my fur aerated,” mutters Sara.

I pretend I didn’t hear, and we leave it at that. We drink the tea and talk about the weather. She’s the one who brings up the weather, and I’m glad; I could not have thought of a more wonderful subject to discuss with her. Deliciously impersonal. Perhaps if we get sufficiently into it, we can talk about the weather until Charlotte gets back in a few hours, and I will have survived this visit. After a while, though, the conversation is becoming one-sided. I’m the one talking about clouds, various clouds, and how I wish I knew the names of all the different types of clouds. And I tell her about rain, and the fact that one should not drink rain, because even though one might think that it’s the purest water in the world, actually it’s not, especially in the cities, because it picks up the pollution from the air as it falls from the clouds. And I tell her about snow, that I used to eat snow, and that one should probably not eat snow either, especially in the cities, for the same reason that one should not drink rain. And I tell her, “Could you please pour me a tall glass of warm summer rain.” And I laugh. Sara is starting to look at me strangely. I don’t know how I know this, since she is wearing the mask, but I do know it. Perhaps through the particular quality of her silence. A silence with her breath restrained, her breath just hanging there in the middle of her lungs, not going out very much and not going in very much.

I don’t dare ask her why she’s wearing that mask. If I’m lucky maybe she’ll forget she’s wearing it. Or at least, maybe she’ll forget
why
she’s wearing it, which is what matters.

Finally, she says, “Did you have a good week?”

“Yes. Yes, I did,” I lie, and nod. “And you?” I see the danger of that question as soon as I have uttered it, and I wish I had kept my mouth shut, because she either did or did not have a good week, both of which possibilities are probably my fault for reasons I don’t want to hear or know.

“I had an interesting week,” she says, “other than waiting nervously for your phone call. I had to write a story for school. The teacher gave me an A-plus on it, but then she called in my mother for a private conference because she thought the story showed that I might have problems at home. She’s a stupid teacher.”

I suddenly get very scared and wonder if her story is about a little girl who goes to Disney World and has an affair with a grown man.

“What was in your story that made your teacher think you might have problems at home?” I ask.

“Beats me.”

“Who
beats you?”

“No. Beats me, as in: I have no clue.”

“Oh. Well, what was your story about?”

“Thank you for asking. The title was, quote: The Unauthorized Biography of the Late Humpty Dumpty. The True Story Behind His Great Fall. His Secret Addiction, His Hidden Obsession, His Torturous Temptation, His Dilemma: To Hatch or Not to Hatch? That is the Question. End of quote. Do you like the title?”

“Yes, but why did your teacher think you had problems at home? What was your story about?”

“Thank you for asking again. Once upon a time Humpty Dumpty had a temptation, a great desire. He wanted to be sat on by a hen. After all, it was normal, for he was an egg, and being sat on by a downy bird butt is an egg’s natural destiny and desire. There was a big beautiful hen near where he lived. She was always sitting, and never on any eggs, and therefore she had plenty of vacant space under her for him. Humpty wanted ever so badly to go slide himself under her soft sitting bird butt, but he knew it was dangerous, it was a risk, for if he indulged in the pleasure of being sat on, he would soon hatch and would no longer be an egg, and he liked being an egg, and he wasn’t sure he’d like being a chick. Do you like it so far?”

“Yes; go on,” I tell her.

“Okay.” Sara puts down her tea, walks over to me, takes my teacup from my hands, puts it on the table, and sits on my lap.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Telling you the rest of my story. So Humpty went to ask the advice of his brother, Lumpy Dumpty, who told him to have willpower, to resist the temptation of getting sat on, or he would hatch. ‘To hatch,’ said his brother, Lumpy, ‘is undesirable. It’s the unknown, it’s probably immoral, and it’s tremendously harmful psychologically
and
physically, if not downright fatal. It breaks you, it scars you for life, and that’s if you’re lucky enough to get glued back together again by the king’s horses and men, but if you’re not, then just forget it; you’re in pieces. Getting sat on is sinful. Above all it’s indecent. It shows the lack of any basic eggly decency.’ Do you like it so far?”

“Yes,” I reply, though I’m wondering if she’s not indirectly trying to insult me through her story, since I am now being sat on by her.

“Humpty Dumpty knew that his brother Lumpy was probably right. However, one day he circled the hen many times, trying to imagine her downy bird butt feathers covering his hard bald shell, and he got chills of pleasure thinking of it. The hen frisked her downy bird butt in his direction and made soft bird sounds. Finally, he could resist the temptation no longer.”

Sara slides her hand into my shirt and caresses my skin softly and says, “Humpty slowly slid himself under the hen, feeling each feather, one by one, move over every millimeter of his hard bald shell as though he were submerging himself in a warm, delightful bath. The bird smell was intoxicating, and he knew it was dangerous, knew that once eggs are drugged by the bird smell, they have no more will or desire to escape before they hatch. But Humpty was not drugged yet. It takes a while. Every few minutes he would turn himself over, to have every side of his body exposed to her warm feathers, much the way one might turn over a piece of food in the frying pan so that it will be cooked on both sides. That’s what was happening to him, he realized: he was cooking. The longer he was sat on, the more the monster within him would grow, and soon it would come out.”

Sara slides her hand out of my shirt and slowly starts unbuttoning my shirt buttons as she goes on: “Humpty gathered all his willpower, slid himself out from under the divine hen, and walked over to his meditation wall. He sat on the wall for days, and thought, and tried to make a decision. ‘To hatch or not to hatch? That is the question,’ he told himself. ‘To be sat on or not to be sat on? That is the other question.’ He did not think he could go through life without being sat on. Life simply would not be worth living. It felt so natural, so right, how could it be evil or immoral or harmful? After all, we all have a need. Some of us need to be sat on, and some of us need to get our fur aerated. Anyway, Humpty felt his soul shriveling under the strain of trying to resist something his body needed. He was becoming grim and bitter. Permanent wrinkles of unhappiness appeared on his hard bald shell of a face.” Sara caresses my face. “But he still sat on his wall, thinking. Finally, he started rolling on his side, back and forth, with indecision and restlessness, and he had his great fall off his meditation wall. And all the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put him back together again. Do you like it?”

“Yes, it was a very good story.”

“It’s not over. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty back together again. So they carried his pieces to the castle and...”

At that point Sara unbuttons my pants, slides her hand inside my underwear, and begins to stroke me, and I instantly stop hearing the rest of her story, as though I have become deaf or she started talking in another language. But her story is fascinating anyway, so I tell her, “Stop that. I can’t concentrate.”

“Stop what?”

“That.”

“What I’m doing or what I’m saying?”

I can’t answer her, because I’m not sure. I’m confused. That question requires quite a bit of thought and concentration, but I can’t think clearly enough, no matter how hard I try, so I say, “You know which.”

“No, I have no idea.”

I make a superhuman effort to focus my mind, and I finally think of the proper, correct answer. “What you’re doing.”

“I can’t, or
I
won’t be able to concentrate on my story.”

“Well, tell me a bit more. Tell me what happens.”

She continues stroking me and tells me more of her story, not one word of which I hear, even though it’s fascinating. So I tell her, “Speed up the pacing. Get to the point more quickly. You’re too slow. It’s boring. I can’t concentrate.”

She strokes faster.

I still can’t hear what she’s saying. “Blah blah blah blah,” I tell her. “Hurry! Get to the point.”

She strokes faster and continues her story.

“Louder! I can’t hear you!” I say.

She talks louder and strokes harder. Suddenly, something feels strange.

“I can’t concentrate! I can’t hear you!” I cry out, panicked. “I haven’t heard a single word you’ve said in the past five minutes, do you realize that?”

“I’m not offended,” she says.

“You talk too loud and too fast, and you don’t articulate well enough, and you skip vital information. It’s unclear, it’s too intense.” I look at her, and I am startled. “My God, you’re
nude!
When did you get so undressed?”

“When Humpty Dumpty was getting reconstructive surgery to remove his scars.”

“I don’t remember that part. I couldn’t concentrate on your damn story, which is a shame cause it was so good. I wish I had heard it.”

“Let’s do one thing at a time, then,” she says, and slides her hands inside my underwear again.

I take them out. “No, let us
not
do one thing at a time. Let us not do anything at all except get you dressed. Get dressed.”

“Never.”

“Never?”

“Ne-ver.” She lowers my pants and my underwear, and I feel terribly awkward, being exposed like this. Sara’s nudity never seems as naked as my nudity, for some reason.

“That’s it. It’s over,” I tell her. “You’re finished. We’re finished. I’m calling your mother right now. This minute. I’ll tell her everything that happened, and I’m bringing you back home.” I pick up the phone, but Sara slams my hand down. “Stop it, Jeremy! You
know
you want me. And you
know
the only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, and sick with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful.”

“Where do you
hear
these wisdoms? From your mother?”

“No, Lady Henrietta did not say that. It was Lord Henry in
The Picture of Dorian Gray.
And I’ve put that quote at the beginning of my Humpty Dumpty biography. It’s the message of the story.”

“No wonder your teacher thinks you’re having problems at home.”

“Well fuck you. Doesn’t that quote have any effect on you? Don’t you see the truth in it?”

“Yes, it does have an effect on me. It snaps me back to reality with the word ‘unlawful.’ The word ‘monstrous’ causes a nice special effect in me as well. Would you like to see what it is?”

“What?”

I pick up the phone and say, “To call your mother.”

Sara grabs my cheeks, squishes them angrily in her palms, and desperately shouts in my face, “But you’re
misinterpreting Oscar Wilde!
“

“Let go,” I say, articulating with difficulty through my squished cheeks.

She lets go, huffs, raises her arms, and slowly starts turning around, swinging her hips and undulating her body. As she turns, she snaps her fingers and rolls her wrists and stamps her feet like a Spanish dancer. Her beautiful breasts jiggle like Jell-O.

Calling Henrietta is not such a good idea, after all, especially while Sara is trying to distract me. So I take out some blank paper and a pen.

“What are you doing, Jeremy?” asks Sara.

“I am writing a letter of confession, which I will mad to your mother as I escort you back home.”

I write down “Dear” on the paper, and then wonder if I should write “Henrietta,”

“Lady Henrietta,” or “Lady,” or “Ms. Lady Henrietta,” or what. Sara grabs the pen from my hand and draws the face of Mickey Mouse on my letter.

She hands back the pen and says, “Now you can write the letter around it, and I’m sure Mom will appreciate the drawing. Letter reading is more fun when there’s an illustration that explains the text.”

I tear up the letter and start again on a new sheet. I write, “Dear Henrietta,” and a comma. Sara tries to grab the pen from me again, but this time I am quicker than she is, and I hold the pen out of her reach. She lunges for my letter, but I beat her to it and press the letter and my pen against my chest and remain stiff and motionless in my chair.