The Love Machine (60 page)

“It’s everything. It is also the only place on the block that serves breakfast.” Sergio was staring at the good-looking boy across the way.

Robin patted him on the shoulder. “Okay. Sergy, go join the boys.”

“I will stay with you. Perhaps Brazillia will not come. I do not want you to be alone.”

“Listen, chum, I don’t need a caretaker. And don’t worry, she’ll show.”

“Robin, I don’t like it. You know what kind of a girl Brazillia is, don’t you?”

“Beat it, or the muscle man across the room will lose interest. He probably thinks I’m your date by now.”

“But, Robin—”

“Do I have to toss you out?”

At that moment the door opened and she entered. She looked around the room hesitantly. Robin stood up and waved. She walked directly to his table. “Beat it, chum,” he said under his breath.

Sergio shrugged and joined the table across the room. Brazillia sat down beside him. The woman who ran the place brought her a cognac.

“I speak English,” she said in a low throaty voice.

“You don’t have to talk, baby.”

He glanced up in time to see Sergio leave with the handsome man. Sergio waved and Robin formed a victory sign with his fingers. The girl sat and silently drank her cognac. Robin ordered her another. He reached out and held her hand. She returned the
pressure. A blond, effeminate young man entered the room and walked over to their table. He spoke a few words in French to Brazillia. She nodded and the man sat down. “This is Vernon. He does not speak English. He is waiting for a friend and does not like to stand at the bar alone.”

Robin signaled for a drink for Vernon. To his surprise the fat woman brought him a glass of milk. “Vernon does not drink,” Brazillia explained.

Just than a tall rugged man entered. Vernon gulped down the milk, and dashed to meet him. “Poor Vernon,” Brazillia said. “He does not know what he wants to be.”

“It’s pretty obvious,” Robin said.

Brazillia sighed. “During the day he tries to live like a man. At night he is a woman. It is sad.” Then she turned to Robin. “Are you here for wild thrills?”

“I like any kind of thrills.”

“If you expect something wild and crazy with me, go away.” She sounded weary. “You are handsome. I would very much like to go to bed with you. But I would like a night of love, of beautiful sex—no sickness. You understand?”

“That’s fine with me.”

“It will be like that?” She was almost pleading.

“You call the shots, baby.”

“Excuse me a moment.” She walked to the bar and whispered something to Vernon. He nodded with a faint smile. Then she returned. “Let us go.”

As he paid the check he wondered what her deal with Vernon was all about. But then, many girls had fags as confidants and close friends. Amanda even said a model friend of hers lived with a fag. And look at him with Sergio.

A cab was parked outside but she tossed her head in dismissal. “I live near here.”

She led him through dark cobbled streets until they came to a large building. They went through a wooden door into a courtyard. Suddenly there was a look of Paris about the place. The geraniums in the window boxes, a stray cat prowling around, middle-class domesticity. They walked up to the second floor. She leaned down and picked up a loaf of bread and put the key
in the door. “I always have bread delivered, in case I have had too much cognac. If I eat bread, I don’t wake with a hangover.”

The apartment was small, but totally feminine. Sparkling clean and almost virginal with the white ruffled bedspread and the dolls on the bed. There was a picture of Brazillia on the dressing table. And on the mantel above the fireplace was a picture of one of the girls in the show—the one named Véronique.

“She’s too good to open the show,” Robin commented. “She could make it in New York.” Then he reached out and caught her around the waist. “And you’re too damn good a dancer to strip. You’re really good.”

Brazillia shrugged. “It gives me extra money and makes me a headline act. Ah, but what is the difference? None of us will go anywhere no matter how badly we want to. Once you live and work on the Reeperbahn, it is too late. But I was in America once. I played Las Vegas.”

“You did?” Robin was surprised.

“Yes, not doing what I am doing now. I was part of a chorus. There were six of us. We did a straight dance, to support an old has-been American singer. He could barely get out the notes and we came on behind him to drown him out. That was ten years ago. I was eighteen and I had hoped to study the ballet seriously. But when the act was finished, all I had left was a return ticket home. So I came back.”

“Where is home?”

“It was Milano. I stayed there for a time.” She poured him a cognac. “Then I realized that trying to wait on tables and live the bourgeois life that was expected of me was as dishonest as—” Again she strugged. “Come, are you like all the others—must the life story be part of the evening?”

“No. You don’t have to tell me a damn thing, Brazillia. But you are young and attractive. Don’t give up all your dreams.”

She pushed him on the couch and sat on his lap. “Tonight I am having a dream come true.” She ran her fingers along his profile and her tongue flicked his ear. “To have a handsome man like you want to make love to me.”

“Eager to make love to you,” he said. He kissed her gently, she clung to him… . Then she pulled him to his feet and led him to the bedroom.

The moment they were in bed she became the aggressor. Suddenly she seemed to be everywhere. Her tongue was like butterfly wings across his eyelids, her firm young breasts were against his chest, her long dark hair fell on his face. She made love to him and he lay back powerless to do more than accept her love. When it was over he lay limp with pleasure and exhaustion. In the dim light he reached out and stroked her head. “Brazillia, I’ll never forget tonight. It’s the only time in my life that a girl made love to me.

“I enjoyed it, Robin.”

“Now it’s my turn.”

“You don’t have to …”

“You crazy little idiot. I want to.” He stroked her face and her body and when he entered her he moved rhythmically and held back. He wanted to please her. He moved deeper and faster. She was clinging to him, but he sensed she wasn’t ready. He continued the steady rhythm for what seemed an eternity. A pulse was beating against his temple, he was using every bit of strength to hold back. And still he felt she wasn’t ready. This had never happened to him before. And he had never held back this long without pleasing a woman. He gritted his teeth and kept moving. He
had
to please her! Then he felt the unbearable yet wonderful weakness flood through his groin as he reached his climax. He fell off her exhausted, with the knowledge that he had not satisfied her. She reached out and touched his cheek. Then she snuggled against him and kissed his brow, his nose, his neck, “Robin, you are a marvelous lover.”

“Don’t pretend, baby.” He got up and went to the bathroom. It was frilly, like the rest of the apartment, and complete with bidet. He showered and returned in his shorts. She held a lighted cigarette out to him and patted the bed. He stared at her lovely body. The breasts stood upright under the sheer nightgown she had put on. She smiled. “Come, have a cigarette.”

His smile was weary. “Brazillia, in my country they think I’m pretty good in the kip. But I’m not up to another session.” He took the cigarette and began to dress.

She jumped out of bed and threw her arms around him. “Please, stay with me all night. I want to sleep in your arms. Tomorrow morning I will make you breakfast. And if the day is nice,
we can take a walk. I will show you St. Pauli in the daylight, and then perhaps in the late afternoon we can make love again. Oh, Robin, it was so wonderful—please stay.”

He began knotting his tie.

“Didn’t you like me?” she asked.

“I liked you plenty, baby.” Then he turned to her and reached in his pocket. “How much?”

She turned and sat on the bed. He walked over and touched her shoulder. His voice was gentle. “Come on, Brazillia, how much? You name it.”

She lowered her head. “There is no charge.”

He sat beside her and lifted her face. Tears were spilling down her face. “Honey, what’s wrong?”

“You don’t like me,” she sobbed.

“I—?” He was bewildered. “Look, I’m not about to give you my fraternity pin, if that’s what you mean. But I liked you plenty. I’m only sorry I didn’t rate with you.”

In a flash her arms were around his neck. “This was the most wonderful night of my life. Robin, you are completely straight.”

“Straight?”

“When I saw you with the boy, I thought, well, you were the butch kind. But you are a man and it is wonderful.”

“Sergio is a friend—a good friend. Nothing more.”

She nodded. “I realize. And he took you slumming.”

“Stop putting yourself down. He showed me the night life of Hamburg. Period.”

“How did you feel, doing it with me?” she asked.

“It was great. I’m just sorry nothing happened at your end.”

She looked at him and smiled. “Robin: it’s all here with me.” She touched her breast. “Holding you and loving you is my thrill.”

He touched her hair softly. “You mean you never come?”

“I can’t anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Some things that are taken off cannot be replaced.” His stare was blank. Suddenly she looked frightened. “Robin, you didn’t know! Oh my God—” she jumped off the bed and ran into the other room. He followed her. She huddled against the wall and stared at him. She was genuinely frightened.

“Brazillia.” He came to her. She backed away as if she expected him to strike her. “Brazillia, what is the matter?”

“Please, Robin—go.” She dashed across the room and handed him his topcoat. He threw it on the couch and grabbed her. He was shaking with fear.

“Now tell me what this is all about. No one is going to hurt you.”

Her dark eyes searched his face. She was trembling. “I thought you knew what kind of a place Maison Bleue was.”

“No, I don’t,” but the first terrible suspicions were beginning to gnaw at him.

“Vernon—he is the one who opened the show, the one you admired. When he wears a wig he calls himself Véronique. He is my roommate.”

He dropped her arm. “And you. What is
your
real name?”

“My name was Anthony Brannari—before I had the operation.”

“You’re a—”

She backed away from him. “I’m a girl now, I am a girl!” she screamed.

“But you had balls once,” he said slowly.

She nodded and the tears streamed down her face. “I am a girl now. Don’t hit me, don’t be angry! Oh God, if you knew how I suffered to become a girl. Do you know what it is to
be
a girl and be trapped in a man’s body? To
feel
like a girl,
think
like a girl,
love
like a girl? I was always a woman inside.”

“But the breasts?”

“Silicone. And I took hormones. Look, feel my face—I never shave. And my arms and legs are smooth. I am a girl now.”

He sank on the couch. A transvestite. He had banged a goddam transvestite. No wonder the poor bastard couldn’t come. He looked at the cowering creature. “Come here, Brazillia. I’m not going to hit you. You’re right—you are a girl.”

She ran to the couch and started to snuggle against him. He unpried her arms gently. “Only now that I know what you
were
, let’s have a man-to-man talk.”

She moved to a respectful distance on the sofa. “All those broads in the show—they’re men?” When she nodded, he said, “Did they all have the operation?”

“Except Vernon. He still holds out. He feels he won’t be able to use his passport and get back to Paris if he has it. Although he wants to go—it is so sad for him. He is in love with Rick, the man he was meeting tonight. Vernon swallowed iodine three months ago over him. That is why he cannot drink. Rick is—how you say?—a switch hitter. Sometimes he goes for a real girl, sometimes he goes for a butch guy. Poor Vernon is neither.”

“In Vegas, did you fool them too?”

“Oh no. Then I was a male dancer.”

Robin stood up and reached into his pocket. He didn’t have too many marks. But he had over a hundred dollars in American money. “Here, Brazillia—buy yourself a new dress.”

“I don’t want it.”

He tossed the money on the couch and left the apartment. He heard her sob as he closed the door. His own throat tightened. He was not sorry for what had happened to him. He was sorry for the poor lost creature inside. He ran down the rickety steps. The first signs of dawn were beginning to streak through the sky. The night people of the Reeperbahn were going to bed. Couples walked arm in arm. Sailors with striptease girls, men with men, men with girls who suddenly looked suspiciously masculine to him. These people—all their dreams and hopes had turned to sawdust. The world was not made for losers. Brazillia was a loser.