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Lyman was really getting daring. “If we do it fast, nobody will see us.”

I couldn't fucking believe Lyman would take this risk. Especially since Watson's asshole probably stretched at least an inch an hour since his arrest.

“You first,” I said.

He handed me the camera.

Rainbow tossed the goddamn cat to me like it was a rag doll. I caught it off balance and almost dropped the pen over the side into the ocean. I cradled the squirming, furry cat in my right hand and handed her the pen with my left hand.

“Hurry,” the girl hissed.

Lyman faced the corner of the two walls with the ocean to his left and his back to the pathway. His hand shook as he unzipped the fly to his khakis. He pulled out his limp dick.

“Jesus,” the girl said looking at it. “Another John Holmes.” She gripped the end with her left hand, stretching it out. “What's your name again?”

“Lyman. L-Y-M-A-N.”

She snickered. “If it was Alexander you'd be out of luck.”

Slowly she printed the letters in a fancy, swirled design that was barely legible. When the girl got done I dumped the squiggly cat into her left hand. She smiled and posed, her right hand holding Lyman's outstretched dick with its visible printing like it was the trophy for winning the Kentucky Derby. I snapped the shutter and a big flash went off in this tiny, dark corridor.

The camera purred and buzzed and whirred for a few seconds before the grayish print started sliding out.

“Let me see it,” Lyman said, grabbing the bottom edge from my hand.

The three of us stood there staring at the photo as the colors slowly developed. It seemed like less than a couple of minutes before a damn good picture showed this screwball girl printing Lyman's name on his dick.

Lyman was turning the picture around trying to get a better look in the poor light. “I'll take your picture now,” he said, snickering like a little closet-pervert.

I handed him the camera and we changed positions with the girl staying where she was.

“I'm getting cold,” Rainbow said, shivering. “Hurry up.”

I was shivering too and had trouble grabbing the zipper tab; especially since I kept looking over my shoulder expecting Dirty Harriet to be standing there dangling an open set of handcuffs all ready for my wrists. Then I remembered Vysell and Batman. Where the hell were they?

“Come on already,” this sweet little thing snapped.

I finally got the zipper down and reached into my jockey shorts and pulled out my dick.

“Shit,” she snickered. “It's too shriveled up.”

Lyman started laughing.

“Yank it out further,” she growled. “I'm freezing. I'm not staying here much longer.”

I pulled on the thing but it stayed shriveled, barely measuring an inch.

Rainbow started laughing. “I'm leaving.”

“Please,” I pleaded. “I just got four letters. K-U-R-T. Write them small.”

She looked down at my dick before her eyes met mine. “If your name is Al there's not enough room to write it.”

Lyman started laughing again and this bitch joined him. I stuck my dick back in my pants, zipped up the zipper and looked around at the water. The waves were getting real choppy. Then I spotted a clock on top of a huge building across the street from the pier. It was nearly 9:20; only forty minutes to go!

Both these bastards were still laughing, suddenly getting real chummy as they stood next to each other facing the railing, looking out at the water.

I crept forward a few steps until I was directly behind Lyman. Then, suddenly, I reached into his back pocket and grabbed the Polaroid picture! In one sweeping motion, I flung it like a Frisbee over the side, smiling as it waffled around in the air before finally floating down and getting buried under a crashing wave.

“Hey!” Lyman screamed. “What're you doing?”

I didn't answer.

Seconds later some Mexican busboy wearing a white apron walked around the corner towards us drinking a can of Coors. He looked at us.

“You OK?” he said to the girl.

She nodded. “Yeah.” Then she looked at Lyman. “I'm leaving.” She turned to me and blew me a kiss. “Bye.”

“Bye,” I answered sweetly, mimicking her.

“Fuck you and your little dick,” she sneered before she turned around and walked away.

I grabbed the camera away from Lyman.

“At least I still got the writing on my dick,” Lyman said cheerfully.

“But no proof.”

“You saw her do it.”

“Do what?”

“Fuck you too, little dick,” he snapped. “I'll get her to do it again.”

“But I got the camera, asshole.”

“Then I'll get another pledge to photograph it.”

“Go ahead.”

He turned around and rushed after the girl, disappearing from sight.

Great. So now what?

I hurried back to the stream of people walking up and down the pier and joined them, looking around, wondering where the hell Batman and Vysell were. Meanwhile I kept trying to dream up something to get the autograph. I was more desperate than ever. I called each guy again leaving a message that the girl signed Lyman's dick and then left the area. And to keep looking around for a girl and to stay in touch.

I stopped one girl and asked her but she told me to eat shit. The second one said her father was a cop and she was going to tell him about me as soon as he got out of the bathroom. I changed directions fast and disappeared into the mass of people swarming around in the other direction.

I looked up at the revolving Ferris wheel, with its beautiful
geometric design that brightly lit the sky. Then the rumble of the roller coaster raced by with carloads of screaming, laughing idiots inside.

I kept walking, looking at the suckers play carnival games: throwing ping pong balls in goldfish bowls having tiny openings, trying to knock over steel milk bottles with light baseballs, trying to throw a baseball at some dolls that were heavily weighted. I don't know why, but the people looked like they were having fun even when they lost.

There was booth after booth after booth. Fortune tellers, foods of every kind, booths selling T-shirts, trinkets and souvenirs. I scanned them all until I spotted the sign: GUSSIE'S TATTOOS.

I hurried across the width of the pier and entered the yellow booth. A black and white, digital, Felix-the-Cat clock, with eyeballs and tail that moved back and forth, said 9:35. A gray-haired woman in her mid-50s, with a yellow and white name tag that said GUSSIE, was seated behind a tiny table next to the hanging tattoo mechanism that held the needle at the end of it. Although her arms were her best advertisement, designs of all shapes, colors, and styles lined the walls.

“Your artwork is really beautiful. Where'd you learn how to do it?”

Her light smile quickly faded. “The joint. Did almost three years in Corona for forgery.”

I nodded. “You do penis tattoos?”

“Sure. What do you want on it?”

“My name. K-U-R-T in black letters.”

She shrugged. “Easy. Go in the back, pull your pants down and turn on the porn video. Call me when you're ready.”

I raised my right palm. “But I got a problem.”

She smiled. “You don't seem the bashful type.”

I sat down on the tan folding chair opposite her and told her what needed to be done.

“You're a crazy motherfucker,” she said in a scratchy voice when I finished. “If you were here twenty-two years ago we wouldn't have this problem. But now, even if I did it,” she said,
“and I will for a hundred bucks, I couldn't pass for thirty. So it would be useless.”

“You know any girl around here would do it? I'll give you a hundred bucks for a finder's fee. Same for the girl.”

She seemed lost in thought. Finally she shook her head. “Sorry. Don't think so.”

I stood up. “Well, thanks anyway.”

“Wait a minute,” she said, obviously not wanting to lose the C-note. “Is all that you need is just is a picture of a girl between eighteen and thirty writing the four letters on you?”

“Yeah.”

She smiled with tobacco-stained teeth. “Does the girl have to pose naked when she writes it?”

“Hell no. Fully clothed is fine.”

She clapped her hands together, smiling broadly. “Got somebody for you. Let's see your money first.”

I handed her my American Express Card.

She shook her head. “Sorry. I don't want to run this money through the books.”

“Is there an ATM machine around here?”

She nodded. “Next door. In front of the corn dog stand.”

I looked at Felix again; twenty minutes to go.

“Where is this person now?”

“Sells tickets at the merry-go-round. Not far away.”

“Fine. Get her now and I'll be back with the money in a minute. Remember, unless it's done and I'm back at the end of the pier in about eighteen minutes, the deal's off.”

I jammed the speed-dial button on the phone again, asking Vysell and Batman the same question: “Find anybody yet?”

Both guys said no.

“Me neither,” I lied, before hanging up.

Without them and their partners, the thirteen pledges left would turn into nine. That would almost guarantee that I'd make the fraternity assuming all my other problems got solved which was probably impossible.

I don't believe in coincidences but even the fraternity's name gave me the creeps sometimes: SIGMA OMICRON LAMBDA.
S.O.L. SHIT-OUT-OF-LUCK. That was me, all right. Shit-out-of-luck. These initials should replace my real ones.

Fuck it. By this time I was almost mentally ready for the Marines anyway. Then, for the first time in my life—and I don't know why—I resisted the temptation to fuck over somebody even though it would help me. I phoned each guy back.

“Got somebody! Get over to Gussie's Tattoo place fast! Yellow building next to the Ferris Wheel! It's now or never!”

_____

Five minutes later, Gussie walked in with this skinny brunette girl in her 20s, with thick make-up, wearing tight jeans and a black leather jacket, walking unsteadily in pastel-flowered high heels.

“The money,” Gussie said, holding her liver-spotted, right hand out.

I handed her five twenties and the girl five more twenties.

“You don't have much time,” Gussie told me. “Get in the back behind the curtain and turn on the VCR and get ready. Jody and I'll be right there.”

Before she finished the sentence, Vysell and Batman rushed inside, both out of breath.

I pointed to Jody. “She'll do it.”

“Wait a minute,” Batman said, staring at Jody. “She's old enough. But is she a girl?”

“Want to pull the string on my bloody Tampax?” Jodie asked, real lady-like.

“Uh, no I believe you.”

“They want it too?” Gussie asked.

“Yeah,” each guy blurted out.

“For another hundred each,” the tattoo lady demanded.

Both guys looked crestfallen.

“A hundred?” Batman said. “I only got six bucks.”

“I got eleven,” Vysell mumbled.

I handed Vysell one of my three Visa cards. “Get three hundred and hurry. There's an ATM machine next door in front of the corn dog stand.” I walked over to him, cupped my hands over his right ear and gave him my PIN number. “Hurry!”

Vysell sprinted outside, Batman waited in the front, and I followed the two women into the back room that looked like a makeshift bedroom. After a few minutes of watching some bachelor party video where the lucky groom fucked all six bridesmaids, my dick was still only spongy.

I handed the felt-tip pen to the girl and gave Gussie the camera.

“Please hurry. All you got to do is print four letters: K-U-R-T.”

The girl giggled. “Can't do it. No room to write it. Once had a boil on my ass bigger than your cock.”

Quickly, I zipped up my fly.

“Batman!” I yelled. “Come in here!”

He hurried inside just as Vysell arrived and joined us.

“Give the girl two hundred,” I directed Vysell.

“I get ten percent,” Gussie piped up. “I'm her agent.”

Vysell nodded and handed Jody one-eighty, Gussie a twenty, and me the other hundred.

I looked at Jody. “Do these guys first.”

Both guys looked uncomfortable but neither one of them said anything.

“Watch the video, boys,” the old lady directed. “It works every time.”

And it did. In thirty seconds Batman's dick said J-I-M and I snapped the photo of him and Jody. About a minute later she printed T-O-M on Vysell's dick and I snapped their picture too. Both shots came out great.

“Now you,” Batman said, probably trying to give me a little encouragement.

I thought every sexy thought I ever had and almost nothing happened.

“What time is it?” I asked anxiously.

“Nearly 9:50,” Vysell answered.

“Look you guys,” I said to both of them. “Get the hell out of here and make it to the truck in time without me.”

“What about you?” Batman asked.

“I don't know. I'll do something. I'll come up with some excuse for being late. Don't worry.”

“Like what?”

Frantically, I thought for a few seconds. “Maybe I'll call in a bomb threat for the pier. Cops will close it down. Good reason to be late. Or maybe I should fake a heart attack and somebody will call the paramedics. When they get here I'll be recovering. Tell them it was only dehydration. Then I'll have them drive me back to the house so the actives could see I was righteously late.” The more I thought about the paramedic plan, the better I liked it. Fake bomb threats now weren't exactly appreciated if I got caught.

Both guys looked solemn.

“Get going!” I insisted.

I clenched my right fist and held it in front of them. They made fists too and each of us lightly tapped the other's fist at the same time like a three-way fist high-five.