The Girl who Couldn't Come (3 page)

and then the werewolf

In the park, we drink the wine right from the bottle and stretch out on our backs on the pine needles.

“You got any kids?” she says.

“No.”

“I’m never having kids,” she says. My fingers are cold, but when I touch her, she smiles again. I slide my hands across her stomach, so smooth and warm. I think about life growing inside, under my hand, and we stay like that.

She sits up and she pulls her sweater off. It pulls her undershirt up with it, showing me the very bottoms of her breasts. I reach out and take the shirt in my hands and I hold it down as she pulls her sweater the rest of the way off.

“Thanks,” she says. Underneath she’s wearing a strapless shirt that just sits on her small breasts. I am still holding the bottom of the shirt and she looks down at my hands. I haven’t let go and I don’t want to. All I can think about is how I know she’s not wearing a bra underneath. Her skin is smooth and pale and the shirt clings to her. It is so perfect and thin.

“I don’t want any kids either,” I say. I feel stupid for saying it. She’s looking at me like I’ve got my lines all out of order. I might.

I still haven’t let go. I grip the sides of her shirt tighter and I pull slowly downward. The elastic top catches on her nipples. I can see the soft pink skin right above them. I tug and the shirt falls down around her stomach. She has such small nipples. I touch them with the tips of my fingers and thumb.

“Kids ruin everything,” she says. We do have the dialogue all wrong. I should be saying something about these breasts.

She turns me around, and takes hold of the front of my blouse. She gets hold of each side and then tears it open, buttons popping everywhere, the breeze suddenly on my own  breasts. She pulls my pants down, just to my knees, just enough so her hand can reach between my thighs, and then she shoves me forward.

“I ought to slap that lawyer,” she says. “Right in that smug face.” I am on all fours, with my face in the pine needles, and she is pushing one finger into me, slowly. She pulls it all the way out. I can feel the finger’s nearness. My body knows it’s there, but it isn’t touching. Then she pushes it in again, a little further than before. Something underground is rumbling. I can hear cars honking on the street nearby. “He said that the judge would like me better if I were a mother. I’d have a better chance.”

“You should kill him instead,” I say. “You could be a murderess.” I love that word. Murderess.

“He’s not worth it,” she says.

But it would be worth it. Of course it would. I used to read about murderesses, hidden in the back of the library. The big book of murderesses. I read that book again and again. That was the first time I fell in love. Page 67. She killed her whole family in the middle of the day one Sunday afternoon. In her picture, she scowled.

My murderess.

This girl is no murderess, but she scowls. She has another finger at the mouth of my cunt now. Two fingers. She has a wet fingertip against my asshole and then everything is hot. She is breathing on me and I press my face harder against the pine needles.

I think of my own lawyer, of the condescending frown he must have given the judge when I didn’t show. Her finger is inside my ass now. She breathes on me again. Oh, please touch me. No. Don’t touch me yet. My lawyer frowns at the judge, and the judge frowns at my lawyer. The prosecutor frowns at everybody. The big church windows burst inward and my murderess is standing above the courtroom screaming. Guns are firing everywhere. She has her tongue on me now. It is too soon. It is perfect. She’s licking all the way from my clit to my asshole. She licks so slowly and so firmly. Back and forth. She spends her time with each.

The courtroom is on fire, everyone is standing on their chairs. There is music playing and the air smells like pine needles. I have pine needles in my mouth, I am moaning and biting the ground, driving my teeth and tongue into the dirt while she fingers and tongues me.

My mouth is full of dirt. There’s a sound in the brush, and I look over, expecting a man out walking his dog in the park, hiding in the bushes and watching the free show. But it isn’t a man. It’s an animal. It’s so big.

She doesn’t see, her tongue still working between my legs. The creature goes straight for her, and there is a sound like crisp lettuce being broken. Then I am on my back, trying to get out of the way, blood on the backs of my thighs, her finger still inside me.

patricia

I have a list of six names scrawled on a grocery pad, and in block letters up top it says: “Geniuses to have sex with.” Underneath, I’ve added: “(in order of sexiness)” but that’s hard to do. I hemmed and hawed and in the end I just listed them randomly, boy girl boy girl boy boy. 

Genius number one was “Richard Feynman (1918-1988)” and his name’s already crossed out. I took a red pen and drew a little frowny face, too. Asshole. 

Genius number two is “Patricia Highsmith (1921-1995)” She’s standing behind the counter over there, twenty one years old, gaunt and fierce. There are pimples along one side of her forehead, but when she turns everything is fine again. Her skin on this side is smooth and perfect, like in the photographs I’ve got up on my walls. 

With Feynman, we made love after he’d already won the Nobel Prize. That kind of success does something to a person in bed. It was awful. But Pat hasn’t even begun her first novel yet, and I have a chance at the real her. The real Patricia Highsmith, blemished, violent, brilliant. I want something from her, but I don’t know what it is. I guess that means sex. 

She’s straightening the dolls on the shelf behind the counter. What do you say to someone you’ve stalked through time? Do you come here often? Can I buy you a drink? 

She’ll just say, “Thank you, no, I’m a lesbian. You shouldn’t be here. This makes no sense. I’m long dead.”  

The note was a better idea, I think. It’s taped to her jacket sleeve, a small green envelope with “Pat” written on the front. Inside there’s nothing. What do you say? I wanted to just write “1995” on a slip of paper. I wanted to write a passage from The Talented Mr. Ripley. I wanted to write, “I’m not so ugly. What does it matter? It’s just one night. Take me home.” I’m sleeping in a park nearby. I’ve got no money here.  

She’s talking with a customer, smiling, and I’m thinking I should walk over and ask, “Haven’t you ever wondered about the construction of a moral universe within the novel?” I’m thinking I could put my hand on her neck all easy, and say, “I’m at least as well-endowed as any woman. Give it a chance.”

I thought being this close would let me see into her head a little better. It’s worse, really. The zits have sort of driven home that she’s a real person, more complex than the little snatches of interviews could possibly show. Before, I could believe I knew her, that I could see the passions that drove her characters, the fears that twisted the plots of her novels, but now I can see that’s bullshit. It’s written all over that side of her forehead.

There’s a picture on the wall in my kitchen of Pat standing in a doorway, shadowed and naked, her skin perfect. My friends never want to have dinner over, it’s always, “Let’s eat out,” or “Come over for pizza,” and it’s because I stare. What an amazing picture. I should have tried to find out what day that was taken. I should have shown up then.

The customer is still talking. He’s ugly, balding, and I swear to god if he touches her elbow once more I am going over there. She’s smiling even though I know that inside she’s hating him, wishing he would go away, imagining some death for him, some completely justifiable murder. Does he show up in a novel? I try to remember. 

Her hair looks nice. Maybe I should wait a few days to approach her, until the pimples have cleared up. It will distract me in bed. The customer looks over, meets my eyes. One of his ears is higher than the other, just a bit.

“Excuse me,” he says, loud enough for everyone in the department to hear. “Is there something I can help you with?” Now I can see that he’s got a name tag on, too. How long have I been standing here watching? Has it been twenty minutes? An hour? Both of them are looking at me, expectantly. “Are you waiting to be served?” he says, and I nod, looking at her. 

She walks so strangely. I’ve never seen her move, her back up, her eyes on mine. Shit. Shit. Her name tag says, “Patricia,” and I want to reach out and wet my fingers in her eyes. It doesn’t feel right. She’s looking through me. I turn and start walking away. In my head I beg her not to say anything. I don’t want to hear her voice yet.

On the bench outside I think, will I end up in her journals? If we go to bed, will she write me down in cruel honest description? In fifty years, will I be mentioned in a biography? Will I be a brief detour on the road trip they paint of her psychosexual development as an artist, or a fork in the road? Will she come? Will she want me to want her to come, or will she want me to play indifference? Will she want me to come?

I find her later in the bar, drunk with her arm around a nervous looking girl from the university. The top button on her blouse is undone. I sit a few feet from them and I watch as the girl pulls free, as she looks around for her friends and takes off, drink in hand. Pat watches her walk away, bored. 

I take a deep breath. I stand.

In bed she tells a dirty joke. She forgets my name. She touches me and laughs about my ridiculousness. I tell her, “I’ve always loved your novels,” and she laughs harder. In the end she comes, and doesn’t care if I do or not. I ask, if she wants me to come and she points off to the bathroom and says it’s none of her business what I do out of her bed. She says to clean up afterwards. 

I want to lay down and cuddle, but she’s having none of it. She’s pouring herself a drink and looking at me differently. I have no idea what she’s thinking. I say, “The individual has manifold shadows, all of which resemble him, and from time to time have equal claim to be the man himself,” and she just sits there drinking. Have I got my dates wrong? Maybe she doesn’t start reading Kierkegaard until ‘48 or ‘49. I start thinking that I should go, but this isn’t right. I haven’t come and I want to, I think it’s important to come. 

“Haven’t you got somewhere to be?” she says, sounding annoyed. I want to say something perfect, something that cuts to the root of who she is, but also makes her want to make love with me again. I’m stammering in the doorway, foolish in my underwear.

“I... I like your cat,” I tell her, and we’re both dead quiet for almost a minute.

And then she smiles.

checkmate

It’s only the second floor. With the right shoes, it wouldn’t hurt to fall from that height. Cassie crawls out the window and along the ledge to the computer room. It isn’t a very wide ledge, so she moves slowly. And when she gets close, she moves even slower. 

She can see Carl’s shoulders inside and she slows down because she doesn’t want him to hear her. Carl moved his computer near the window a week ago, to hide whatever he was doing. Cassie figures porn. 

She’s got nothing against him watching porn and hiding it. She likes the idea. Everybody should have their secrets. She also likes the idea of sneaking out the window and watching him. She’s going to masturbate on this ledge, watching Carl like a peeping tom. 

But, inside, Carl isn’t watching porn. He’s playing online chess. Instead of nude bodies twisted under harsh lighting, the screen is a grid of black and white pieces and a square of text where he’s chatting with his opponent. 

Cassie’s come all this way, though, and she can still pretend. She half-closes her eyes, so that the details fade out. She pictures pornography on the screen. She slides her hand down into the front of her pajamas, pushing under the elastic waistband of her panties. One of her legs sticks out over the edge.  

In her head it’s lesbian porn, the kind directed by men so that the girls are stuffed full of big fat dildos and they keep yelling things like, “I’m sorry I got an F, Daddy,” even though there are no men in sight. So, when Carl reaches forward to type again and she sees his cock, it takes a moment for Cassie to realize that she hasn’t imagined it. 

He types something quickly and then puts his hand down onto his lap again. The angle is shit, but she catches another glimpse of his penis sticking up. His pants are open at the fly, but not pulled down. He has his fist wrapped around the shaft. There’s no porn on the monitor, just the chat box. Cassie presses closer to the window, so she can read what’s on the screen. His opponent is named “Checkmate_girl16” and Carl’s online name is DOMINATOR. 

Checkmate_girl16: They’re pink. I borrowed them from my friend. Mine were ripped. 

DOMINATOR: you rip them? you fall?

Checkmate_girl16: I don’t remember. I get too drunk on beer. I can’t keep track of what happened. Someone else ripped them.

Checkmate_girl16: That was a stupid move. I should have moved my bishop. Can I take that back? 

DOMINATOR: maybe your boyfriend rip them? he rip them off and fuck you hard. 

Carl’s talking to a sixteen year old girl. Pervert! Cassie has a stupid grin on her face. DOMINATOR? She had no idea at all that he was into this. Was this what he thought about when they fucked? She moves her fingertips slowly underneath her, the back of her wrist presses into the ledge as she watches Carl and starts to grind against her own hand. 

She imagines Carl in one of those leather masks with a zipper on the mouth. Those are terrifying and silly at the same time. Imagining the mask on Carl startles her, though. She lets out a little gasp and pushes her fingers harder into herself. She slides them inside, then pulls them out, pressing them, wet, against her asshole before sliding them back into her cunt. 

She watches as Carl leans forward to type again. It’s a long message, and Cassie imagines what he’s typing, the filthy things he’s promising to do to Checkmate_girl16. One of her fingers stays in her ass, now, almost to the first knuckle, pulling against the side, while her thumb strokes and touches the spot just above where her vagina opens for her other fingers. Her whole hand is moving. When Carl sits back from the keyboard, there is a new message on the screen. Cassie strains her neck to see. She wants to see the words, “Brutal,” and, “Rough,” and, “Fuck.”

Checkmate_girl16: My boyfriend would be too shy to do that, I think. He’s only seventeen. I don’t remember who did it to me. Sometimes when I am drinking I end up in the country bar downtown, where they don’t ID me. I let men buy me drinks and take me in the bathroom. I love to feel them inside me. 

Carl isn’t DOMINATOR at all. Cassie’s hand starts moving again beneath her and, as she watches, another message appears on the screen, this one from Carl’s opponent. 

DOMINATOR: You are slut! Do you love to have cock in you? WHAT DO YOU DO FOR ME? 

Carl leans forward to respond. 

Checkmate_girl16: I don’t know. What would you do to ME if I was too drunk? Would you share me? 

She wants to reach out her hand and tap on the window, right then, but she crawls backward to their bedroom window instead. Is this what he does while she’s at work? 

The next day, Cassie buys a bottle of wine on the way home from work. She stops at a small store with a display wall covered in dildos. She picks one, veined with thick ridges. Modeled after a real cock, but not too large. The clerk helps her pick out a harness, explains how it fits. 

At home, Carl cooks dinner, and they eat and drink in silence. He has a second glass, and without asking Cassie pours him a third. After dinner, she leans down close and she puts her hand on his leg. 

“I want to fuck you,” she says. She kisses him roughly and pulls him into the bedroom, leaving the dishes on the table. Cassie pulls a pair of handcuffs out from under the pillow, and handcuffs Carl to the foot of the bed. She ties a blindfold around his eyes. 

She kisses the very back of his neck, and then pushes his face into the blankets. Then she pulls out the new dildo from under the bed. She warms it up in her hands while Carl sits there, waiting, hard.

“Okay, he’s ready,” Cassie yells, like she’s yelling to someone in the hall. She gets up quietly and pulls the door open fast. Carl looks over at the door, still blindfolded, confused. Cassie sneaks back to where she was sitting beside the bed, and continues to talk as though someone is there. “You can be rough if you want,” Cassie says. “Just wear a condom.” She pulls his pants down and begins to finger lube into his ass. She slaps him, and then again. 

“Cassie?” Carl says, quietly. She doesn’t answer. She slides her finger into him a little deeper, and he lets out a low moan. She has the dildo in her harness now and she rolls a condom down over the length. When she grabs his hips, she grabs them hard, so he doesn’t recognize her touch. She puts the tip of her cock against his ass. Carl bites his lip as a stranger presses against him from behind. 

She goes slowly and they still have to stop a few times for more lube. Cassie is still playing the part, slapping him hard, pretending to be a man, using Carl like a common whore. He writhes underneath her, and he yanks at the handcuffs and when they are done he says, really quietly, “Oh, Cassie, this was nice.”