On Archimedes Street (12 page)

“Oh,” Dutch Abbott said suavely, “wait. Am I cheating you here? I think I owe you five dollars. Lessee—I gave you eighty, and….”

“No, no. It the udder way ’roun’. Stupid me.” Lotte handed over the five dollars.

“Well,” Dutch said, “let’s give Mother Cabrini’s shrine those five dollars.” And then he slipped, not five, but twenty-five dollars into the jar.

Lotte fell instantly in love. What a beautiful boy! And his brother was nearly as beautiful. Were they fraternal twins? Undoubtedly. Except for the coloring, they were dead ringers for each other. Yes, the blond one was a little shorter, but still a giant. However, the blond Abbott clearly didn’t have the sense God gave a chicken. The dark one obviously avoided the sun; his skin was buttermilk and roses. The blond one was tanned to a golden burnish. Foolish boy! Did he have any idea of what melanoma can do? She definitely preferred the dark one.

The door jingled its jingle. Lotte looked up with a scowl that immediately dissolved into a smile. The Abbott brothers. “Crabmeat again tonight,” said Dutch, “and some of your Creole tomatoes, if you have any left. And Italian parsley, you have any of that? And two lemons. And either chives or shallots, whichever you have.”

“The tomatis is fresh from Frenchman’s Bend,” said Lotte, breathless. “Jes’ a little erl an’ vinegah an’ you got the bes’ tomatisallet on oith.” She noticed that each boy had the Bible in their identical mesh book bags. And not only one Bible. Two Bibles each. Also a big book with a skeleton on the cover.

As Dutch and Flip left with the groceries, Dutch slipped a twenty into the Mother Cabrini jar.

The neighborhood was looking up, thought Lotte. But the generosity of this boy had started making her uneasy. Was it wrong, what she was doing? She dispatched this thought instantly, sending it to its grave to lie beside the suspicion that maybe Raymond had played around with other women. And then she fondly pictured the two boys at Bible study after their dinner.

Chapter 16

D
UTCH
HAD
imposed two conditions before agreeing to be exiled to the hinterlands of the West Bank. The first was a dry, shady place to keep his robin’s-egg-blue 1963 Triumph TR4 with the surrey top. That condition was premet by Rita’s sunless carport, enclosed on three sides, at the end of the oyster-shell drive by the side of her shotgun double. It easily accommodated the BMX bikes as well. The second was a bathtub big enough to accommodate him. Dutch didn’t shower. That condition had been met by Councilman Achille Abbott, who, to Rita’s delight, had sent his contractor, Celestin, over to redo the bath in her rental shotgun, at no cost to Rita and in a mere five days, before the boys moved in. Flip could hear Dutch wallowing and thrashing in the tub now, like some sleek, muscled dolphin.

Flip had been floored by the many grooming products Dutch seemed to require for his ablutions. Flip had only toothpaste, soap, shaving cream, and shampoo. If he had no shampoo he soaped his hair instead. Dutch had row upon row of
product
. Flip had been especially struck by a bottle of something called
Bodacious Feet
. But he now knew Dutch lavished attention on his feet, lovingly cleaning his toenails every time he bathed and giving himself a pedicure every week. “It’s the mark of a gentleman. You go around smelling like an overused Odor Away insole. Who knows—you might meet somebody who wants to suck your toes.” He’d waggled his eyebrows at Flip. Flip had shot him the bird, but even so he now paid more attention to his feet when he showered.

While Dutch had schmoozed Lotte LaNasa—God, that woman gave him the creeps!—Flip had picked up a leek and a two small red potatoes. Dutch had ridiculed his efforts at cooking, but Flip didn’t feel right letting Dutch pick up all the groceries and do all the cooking. So tonight he’d decided to make leek-and-potato soup. Dutch had mentioned liking it, and it seemed simple enough. Dutch had told him all it took was water, leeks, and potatoes. They could have it before the crab. Dutch was inordinately fond of crab, and, yes, it was delicious, but God, the expense! Well, Dutch was made out of money, it was evident. But Flip wanted to keep up his end, even if it was only a leek and two potatoes.

Flip had peeled and chopped the potatoes and sliced up the leek. They had boiled down nicely, he now saw, in a gallon of water. He looked around for that rotator thingie, the immersion stick or whatever, to blend the soup. Or maybe he should put it in the blender? No. Too much liquid. He located the gadget and whirred the soup, then looked at the dishwatery liquid with doubt in his eyes. It tasted of nothing. Also seemed a lot thinner than Flip had anticipated. Salt. Yes, salt. Lots of it. Flip was surprised by how much salt it took to make his soup taste of anything.
Well, it will have to do
, he finally decided.

Dutch entered the kitchen in his cutoff sweatpants and got to work on his crab salad. “Thought I’d make a mayonnaise from scratch this time,” he told Flip. “The crab looks too primo for the bottled stuff.”

Dutch cracked an egg into his gigantic manicured paw and let the white seep through his fingers into the sink. Whisking the yolk with lemon juice and dry mustard, he asked Flip to hand him the Pleignard olive oil.

“Egg and oil?” asked Flip in disbelief.

“Sure. What do you think mayonnaise is, anyway?”

“Well, I don’t know. I always thought, well—it was milk-based, I guess, or cream, maybe? Something white, anyway. Mayonnaise isn’t yellow, for Chrissake.”

“Milk?” It was Dutch’s turn to be incredulous. “You’re not serious. Maybe it’s jit-based instead,” he mocked. “Picture all the guys wanking into the bottles as they travel down the conveyor belt at the mayonnaise factory.”

“Is everybody in this fucking town born with the cooking gene activated or something? Okay. Shoot me. I’m sorry.” Flip found himself fuming more often than not. Dutch brought out this defensive side of him.

But when Dutch asked him to sample the finished product, which had capers, chives, parsley, and grated lemon peel, Flip had to admit it was delicious beyond his expectations. He began to feel increasingly anxious about his contribution to the meal, but he decided to risk it anyway.

“I made some soup,” he offered meekly. As he ladled it into two bowls, he realized there would be leftover soup for days.

Dutch was already seated at the kitchen table, where they always ate. The crab salad sat in an inviting mound. Flip placed the two bowls on the table, trying not to look sheepish.

Dutch looked at the offering dubiously. “Looks like bong water,” he deadpanned. He spooned through the watery liquid with suspicion, and finally brought a spoonful to his mouth. Flip noticed Dutch ate his soup oddly, spooning from the front of the bowl to the back, wiping the bottom of the spoon on the far edge of the bowl, and tipping the liquid from the side of the spoon into his mouth. Was that the “right” way to eat soup? Did his feet really stink? Sometimes Dutch drove him crazy. Never had he questioned himself like this before.

Dutch swallowed and put down the spoon. He glared at Flip. “What the hell? It
is
bong water, isn’t it?”

At first, Flip adopted an indignant posture. But as he spooned the soup himself, his composure began to crack and finally he couldn’t help laughing. Bong water. Criminey. The man had a way with words.

Dutch joined in, rising and grasping Flip under the armpits, and hauling him into the air. Flip staggered and lurched, his laugh swallowed in a gulp. Dutch smelled of that lemon-scented, hand-milled French soap. And more so, just of Dutch. He writhed and wriggled in an effort to get his feet back on the floor. He could feel himself start to swell and harden.

“Flabbott”—Dutch had taken to calling himself “Dabbott” and Flip “Flabbott,” and as usual Flip got the short end of the stick—“you’re better than an
I Love Lucy
episode.”

A
FTER
DINNER
Flip slouched on the sofa, watching a DVD of Hitchcock’s
The Trouble with Harry
and unconsciously hugging one of the throw pillows to his chest. Dutch sprawled on the other end, thumbing through the Bible, feet on the center cushion and knees bent above. Flip brought his nose to the pillow and breathed. Realizing he was breathing in Dutch’s scent, he threw it down in turmoil. As soon as it was gone, he missed it. He glanced over irritably at Dutch. He remembered how easily Dutch had hoisted his six-three, 180-pound frame into the air and dandled him like a baby. Flip couldn’t remember the last time he’d been held like that.

“Why do you bother?” he asked Dutch testily. “We all know what Immaculata’s final will be. ‘Compare the style of the
Song of Solomon
to any of Jesus’s parables, and elaborate on what the two styles suggest about the audience and the respective messages.’ All you have to say is that—”

“Yeah, yeah. But… the Bible! You know, we Catholics don’t read the Bible much. Just catechisms and shit. Wow! What dirty fuckers they were! I can’t believe what I’m reading.”

Flip knew all about catechisms but little about the Bible. “Dirty? You’re losing it, Dabbott.”

“Oh yeah? Well how about Asshola and Assholina?”

“There is no one in the Bible named Asshola,” said Flip with derision.

“Okay, okay. Maybe not Asshola. But Aholah and Aholiba sure are. And they sure liked donkey dick.”

“What?”
The Trouble with Harry
was getting interesting.

“It’s right here in Ezekiel 23:19–21.” Dutch flipped to a sticky note in the Bible. “Yet she multiplied her whoredoms, in calling to remembrance the days of her youth, wherein she had played the harlot in the land of Egypt. For she doted upon her paramours, whose flesh is as the flesh of asses, and whose issue is like the issue of horses.”

“Flesh? Issue? What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about pecker and spooge, stupid. Or at least the Bible is.”

“Ridic.”

“Well maybe the New Revised Standard Version”—Dutch shuddered as he reached for it—“will convince you—‘and lusted after her paramours there, whose members were like those of donkeys, and whose emission was like that of stallions.’”

“Holy shit!” Flip figured he could watch
The Trouble with Harry
anytime.

“Holy dick is more like it,” said Dutch. “And how about this: We’ve got King David flashing his family jewels while dancing in 2 Samuel, dung-eating and piss-drinking in 2 Kings—”

“You lie!”

Dutch arched a brow and paged to another sticky. “‘But Rabshakeh said unto them, “Hath my master sent me to thy master, and to thee, to speak these words? Hath he not sent me to the men which sit on the wall, that they may eat their own dung, and drink their own piss with you?”’ 2 friggin’ Kings 18:27, I swear on the Bible,” said Dutch.

Flip just stared at him.

“And what about Cain’s wife? Lessee… there was Adam, Eve, Cain, Abel, Seth. I don’t recall a sister, do you?” Dutch let the implication sink in. “
Oedipus
was yesterday’s news at its premiere.” Dutch lolled on the couch, leafing through the Bible lazily.

“Just because she isn’t named doesn’t mean—”

 “And then, there’s hemorrhoids….”

“Get out of town! The Bible does
not
mention hemorrhoids!”

“Twice in Samuel and once in Deuteronomy.” Dutch flipped to yet another sticky. “My fave is in Samuel: ‘And it was so, that, after they had carried it about, the hand of the Lord was against the city with a very great destruction: and he smote the men of the city, both small and great, and they had emerods in their secret parts.’” Dutch grinned a satisfied grin. “How about you, Flabbott? What have you got in your secret parts?” He lunged at Flip’s behind and gave it a stinging grope.

“Jackass!” snarled Flip, fighting him off.

Dutch reclined and plopped his huge feet in Flip’s lap. Flip threw them off in a mock show of disgust. He noticed again how well shaped Dutch’s feet were. Dutch promptly plopped them in Flip’s lap again and seemed to be reading his mind. “How beautiful are my feet without shoes, Flippie. The joints of my thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning workman.”

Flip looked at the length of Dutch’s cock, clearly noticeable under the cutoff sweats, and felt his own cock stirring. This couldn’t be happening. “That’s not what it says!” Flip knew this verse from Solomon well, because it was on Sister Immaculata’s final.

“Yeah, well.” Dutch sighed heavily. “And some of these Biblical dudes sure liked plundering the booties of other dudes.” Dutch worked his feet into Flip’s lap, and Flip was sure he would notice his boner. “This one Ham dude even did his own father while he was asleep!” Dutch grimaced in disgust.

Flip was silent and unreadable, but his boner spoke volumes.

With speculation in his eyes, Dutch directed his gaze at Flip’s lap. “We’ll end this tour with a Biblical breaking of wind,” he finally said.

“Farts?” Flip felt his erection subside. Thank God.
Had
Dutch felt it below his feet?

“Yeah. Good old Isaiah. I
love
Isaiah, especially 16:11.” Dutch paged to another sticky. “Wherefore my bowels shall sound like an harp for Moab, and mine inward parts for Kirharesh.” At this, Dutch grasped one knee with two hands, brought it to his chest, and made a “Thwwaap” sound with his lips.

“Gross! Fucker!”

“Haw! Haw! Haw!”

Flip looked at Dutch, suddenly serious. “Look, Dutch. There’s something I want to tell you. You’ve got to promise not to tell anyone else.”

He looked interested. “Okay.”

Flip stammered. “I’m…. Shit! Look. I don’t know how to say this.”

“Just say it, Flabbott. I ain’t gonna faint.”

Flip steeled himself. “I’m—I’m a virgin,” he said.

It was Dutch’s turn to be unreadable.

“Shit, something’s happening, and I just think I’ve got to get laid, Dutch. Dutch, help me out here. You’ve lived here all your life. You must know—”

“Somewhere where you can get laid?”

“Yeah. I think I’m cracking up. Sprouting wood at just anything. I’m in a bad way.” If Dutch had noticed his erection, Flip hoped this would explain it away.