Songs_of_the_Satyrs (20 page)

During the long journey back to the semi-civilization of the city where the Institute is based, I studied my travelling companion from the corner of my eye, for it is not yet illegal to steal glances. He seemed satisfied by his situation and the topaz orbs of his eyes blinked merrily at the sombre scenery outside. I imagine that bleak valleys and withered farms compare favorably with the nullity of outer space.

There still remained the mystery of how he could speak my language, but I settled this question in my own mind by telling myself that it was an example of magic, pure and simple. It’s a truism that star goats shouldn’t be expected to conform to the conventions of surface animals. And yet at no point did I dare ask him for his name.

***

We stood before Professor Regardus, the space satyr and myself, on that rug that resembled a map of a galaxy; and the smooth walnut-panelled walls glowed warmly in the light of the lamp that pulsed on the rhomboid desk; and I waited to be praised fulsomely.

But the professor took it all in his stride, a stride much longer than any I had beheld before, mental or physical, and he merely waved a hand and said lightly, “Yet another one. Excellent!”

I frowned and spluttered, “He is conclusive proof of the correctness of the Panspermia hypothesis, isn’t he?”

“Oh, I don’t think we require even more proof . . .”

I was shocked and retreated a step.

Regardus gazed at me critically, but there was no unkindness or even disapproval in his expression. He said: “Mr. Livers, do you mean to say that you believed what I told you the last time you stood here in front of me?”

“Why yes, of course. A research project of the utmost importance. An innovative telescope on Mochyn Budr Mountain. Are you about to inform me that those were merely illusions?”

“In a sense, yes, dear Frampton. There is no telescope on that peak nor has there ever been. It’s an incubator, a device for accelerating the growth of the star goats from loose seeds to adults in just a few hours. The way I see it—and I must stress I’m not the only one—is that the humans have made a mess of this world. They have lost a sense of magic and the hope and wonder that accompanies it; so it seems a good idea to encourage as many star goats to settle here as possible.”

“You talk about humanity as if you don’t belong.”

He shrugged. “If I had told you the truth at the beginning, you would have refused the assignment, deeming me mad. You had to experience it for yourself; you had to deliver a star goat in person. There was no other way of winning you over to our side.”

“Are you going to publish my results or not?”

“No. It’s best to keep everything a secret until enough of the star goats are in place to make a real difference.”

I was seized with a strange impulse. I overturned his desk, crouched forward, and lifted him off his chair. “You’re a goat too, aren’t you? You are a satyr from space just like him . . .”

And to my eternal shame, I yanked his trousers down.

“Now I’ll learn the facts!” I cried.

But his legs were human legs, hairy but not hairy enough, and it was clear that his slippers sheathed feet rather than hooves. I fell back and I saw my future career crumble like one of those rotting farmhouses up in the blasted valleys; but the professor calmly rearranged his clothing and righted his desk and then said softly: “That was
my
reaction when I was first told.”

His voice was rich, a unique baritone, and once again I had a feeling he was far away, at the end of a long corridor or inside a tube connecting Earth with the Beyond. And I knew at once that I would dedicate all my talents to the cause, to the secret integration of the star goats, to the next renaissance of my own weak species.

I fell to my knees and rolled my eyes in an improvised gesture of utter submission; but then my vision happened to alight on the portrait of King Harry the New, and I saw clearly and with an expanding inner mirth what I had never noticed before. His horns.

Being a mythical creature in the modern world is a pain in the ass. And when your ass is a goat’s ass, it’s a monster pain.

My name is Darren, and I’m a satyr, bleeding from the stomach and chest on the top-floor balcony of a high-rise apartment complex.

I flatter myself to think you’d like to know how this all came to be. Well, I have to put it in context, so I hope you’re ready to walk a mile in my hooves.

First let’s talk about satyrs.

MYTH: We’re jovial little pipe-playing goat men that dance around drunk, banging forest nymphs.

I ain’t jovial. I play the saxophone. I dance like a three-legged centaur. And I don’t have a nymph fetish.

FACT: We have an epic penchant for alcohol, sex, and music. Call them our Achilles heel.

I binge drink for breakfast. My libido’s as active as Artemis’s bow. And I know a jukebox better than Apollo.

I didn’t cast the fucking mold, all right? There’s some kind of pantheon irony in the fact that “satyr” is a near homonym with “sate,” because our addictions are insatiable. I’d file a complaint, but Dionysus is busy running breweries in Ireland, and Ares is vacationing in the Middle East.

That said, I wake up this morning at the crack of noon, hungover, with a hooker named Sally, naked but for a pair of plastic antlers.

Yeah, she’s a human. We work because she has dissociative disorder, making it hard for her to distinguish fantasy from reality.

But her ass is Zeus’s magnum opus.

I smack her on her finest feature and tell her to get dressed; I’m flying to Hollywood. I’m not, but it’s the only thing that gets her moving.

She dresses into her magistrate uniform and tries to leave my apartment through the refrigerator door. I show her the right exit, kiss her on the cheek, and tell her I’ll see her tonight.

I turn on Tchaikovsky and sip a bottle of Bailey’s on the balcony. The city below is a mosaic of stone, glass, metal, and flesh, dimly lit by smog-filtered beams of Helios’s cosmic orb. Car engines, pigeon wings, and a murmured choir of voices assimilate into a discordant urban symphony called “Friday Afternoon.”

Inside, I polish off a jar of kalamata olives and wash it down with the rest of the Irish cream; the breakfast of chumps.

Then I jerk off to Yo-Yo Ma in the shower, pretending my dick’s a cello bow.

I throw on some baggy jeans, a hoodie, and boots with gel inserts fitted to my hooves. And then I don a fleece cap over my horns and pop my hood up. My human disguise: satyr incognito.

I lock up, leave out, and wait in the hallway for the elevator. Inside, Señora Esperanza is coddling Gordita, one of those glorified hamsters humans call “Chihuahuas.” When I get in, the dog starts huffing and yelping like Darth Vader squeezing a whoopee cushion.

It can smell me, and it knows something’s up. I try to make light of it. “She can smell her own kind,” I say. No one suspects a half goat of a professed canine. I force a laugh.

“Eres un perro?”

Señora Esperanza asks if I’m a dog.

“
Si,
” I answer. “I must be. My mother always told me my father was a dog. And my father always told me my mother was a bitch. So biologically . . .”

“Ay caramba!”
she exclaims.
“Vaya con Dios.”

She crosses the air in front of me and gets off on her floor.

“Woof,” I say, as the elevator door closes.

Downstairs in the lobby, Lenny the security guard is watching porn on a computer monitor. He pulls up solitaire when I walk by and crosses his ankle over his knee to hide his tented Dickies crotch. “I looked up that word on dictionary-dot-com,” he tells me.

“Yeah?” The sound is still going on the minimized sex screen. The panting and moaning don’t mesh well with the stacks of cards displayed on the monitor.

“Yeah.” Lenny coughs and hits mute. “Satyriasis: uncontrollable or excessive sexual desire in a man. Like nymphomania in a woman.”

“You got it,” I say with double meaning.

He looks offended. “That’s what you think I have?”

I hit the volume button on his keypad.

The speakers resume, sounding a screaming orgasm.

Lenny blushes and hits mute. “Well maybe you just think that’s what I’ve got because that’s what you’ve got.” He smiles, proud to be on the offensive.

He’s right, in a manner of sorts, only his condition is my identity. “Don’t make me your scapegoat, Lenny.”

“Scapegoat?” I hear him pulling up dictionary.com as I walk out the door.

I head to the station and squeeze into a tight-packed subway car. Two stops in, my mother calls, long distance, from Greece, only she blocks her number so I can’t tell it’s her.

“Hello?”

“Darren, it’s your mother. I’m going to talk for thirty seconds and you’re going to listen. I’m worried sick about you, up in that big city all alone, never calling to tell me you’re all right.”

It’s been thirty seconds and she’s still going. Meanwhile, my ass is brushing against nine different people in the overcrowded compartment. I’m trying not to draw any attention to myself, but I’ve got this shrill voice squawking through the speaker. People are starting to look at me.

“Mom, now’s not a good time,” I cut in.

But she’s already built up momentum. “Your father’s having a kidney taken out in August. I keep telling him to cut back on his drinking, but he’s all like, ‘I’m a satyr,’ and this, that, and the other.”

More people are paying attention, eavesdropping on my conversation. I tighten my hood and lean in toward the window. “Mom, I have to go.”

“It’s dangerous in the city, you know? People get stabbed and shot all the time. Can you imagine a satyr going into a public hospital for treatment?”

“I have to go, Mom.” I hang up the phone and try to look as normal and uninteresting as possible, but my heart is beating like a horny old man in an erotic movie theater.

I slow my breathing, get off two stops early, and walk. My head aches like I’ve been cleaning my ears with an oil drill. I stop at a local dive for a drink.

Aphrodite’s fairer twin is gracing a silver barstool.

I hear the distant twang of Cupid’s bowstring and take a seat beside her. My vision dallies on her ample bosom, double D’s cresting in the mouth of a V-cut halter top.

Velvety amber tresses flow sumptuously as caramel liqueur over her silken carnality. I want to pour Shiraz down her smooth, sculpted calves and sip the runoff from her toes.

“Macallan twenty-five,” I tell the bartender, still fixed on the belle at the bar.

The aged scotch trails a smooth familiar burn down my throat, pooling in my stomach.

I strut beside the goddess and hit her with my best line. “Hello.” I gaze into her honey-brown eyes as only a satyr can, wild as an animal yet soft as a poet. A waft of sweet, floral perfume sends my hormones on the fritz, an intoxicating blend of lavender and vermouth. “I’m Darren.”

“Marcy,” she sings. I let my touch linger after our handshake and she returns my smile.

“
Merci,
Marcy.” I mean it when I say it.

She laughs. “Thank you for what?”

I pause, staring. “Your captivating allure.”

Demur, she smiles and blushes. “I’m meeting someone here.” She seems sad to confess it.

“I forgive you,” I say without thinking.

She giggles, but stops abruptly and stares uncomfortably high over my head. Behind me there’s a hate-filled, two-eyed descendent of a Cyclops, spewing anger like furnace heat.

To the chest at eye level, I say the first thing that comes to mind: “Fee-fi-fo-fum.” It doesn’t help matters.

The titan lifts me off the ground by my hoodie collar like I’m just another dumbbell. Face-to-face, I can smell the cheeseburger on his breath and envision myself as pulverized goat souvlaki.

Where’s Heracles when you need him?

In a swift and sudden rush of movement, he pulls me in and throws his bodyweight behind a head-butt, smacking his skull against mine.

The room turns into a ringing white flash. When I come to, a second later, I’m standing there, dazed but fine, and he’s sleeping on the floor like a drunken corpse.

The big dummy didn’t know that beneath a couple layers of thin cloth I’ve got horns to shame the Billy Goats Gruff.

Marcy’s got her hands on her cheeks in some kind of shocked arousal. In my bottom periphery I see the rhythm of her breasts in heavy breathing. I step so close that our lips are an inch apart and she can feel my erection on her thigh. “So, where were we?”

She kisses me, lightly on the cheek, unzips my pants, and sticks a napkin in my fly with her number written on it in lipstick. My eyes follow her ass out the door.

I scram when the bartender calls the cops.

Running like a human is difficult with the inverted knees of a goat. It resembles the hobble of a constipated cripple. I slow to a saunter when I’m out of eyeshot.

I duck into a Holiday Inn and slide into the conference room, ten minutes late for the Mythical Creature Support Group meeting that had already begun.

I mouth “sorry” to the mermaid in the wheelchair with the blanket over her “legs,” pointing to her watch.

“I feel like Atlas, burdened by this world of secrets I have to carry every day.” The speaker is a gorgon with sunglasses on, snake-hairs sedated and tied into a bun. “Why do we resist the urge to step out and say
I am?”

The mermaid moderator nods. “I think it’s because we expect rejection. A minotaur goes for a walk in the woods in Orleans, California, gets filmed, and people are screaming
Sasquatch
for years. A hydra goes for a dip in Loch Ness, and all the Scotts are yelping
Monster
.”

“And so we never try, for fear of failure?” the gorgon asks.

“Failure costs,” the mermaid answers. “But someday, someone will try, and it will be better for us all . . . or not.”

As usual, I don’t say anything during the meeting. Words are a sorry substitute for action. And, for now, inaction seems the proper action. I sound like Socrates’ grandfather.