The Lure (40 page)

“You live close to here?” Zach asked: the standard opening line of a gay pickup on the street.

Noel had led him away from where he lived.

“Uptown. The West Side,” Noel answered.

“Oh, I thought you lived here.” The ingenuous Laguna Beach smile.

“Afraid not. You?”

“No. Me either.”

“Too bad.” A subway might be too deserted, especially if Zach decided he wouldn’t mind going uptown, too. They passed first one underground entrance, then crossed a street, and passed another. Buses went up and down the avenues, but that might be too limiting, especially if the partner showed up. They’d approached Broadway, crossed it, still going west. Fewer and fewer people here. Nothing but warehouses, a few parked trucks. Where the hell could Noel go?

“I’m not doing anything right now,” Zach said. “If you aren’t, that is.”

If it was an act, it was a good one. He’s just trying to get laid for Chrissakes, Noel kept telling himself. Nothing really wrong with that.
You’re getting worse than Eric. Far worse.

“I’m from out of town. Me and my friend,” Zach went on. “I’ll only be here a few days.”

A subtle pressure, Noel knew. They had reached a familiar block, but Noel couldn’t say why until he spotted the curved-arch façade of the Baths. But there was no one on the street he could claim acquaintance with, to drop this guy, pickup or not.

“I am a little occupied this afternoon,” Noel said.

Disappointment was written across Zach’s face. “Later on?” he asked.

“Maybe. I’m not sure.”

“I’d really like to see you later on,” Zach said, all Southern California surfer innocence. “How about it?”

“Well…” They had passed the Baths’ entrance. No one stepped out to help break up the awkwardness.

Zach had a pencil in his hand and was holding out a matchbook cover. “Why don’t you give me your phone number? I’ll call in a few hours.”

“That might be difficult.”

“Why? You have a lover?”

“Something like that.”

“I have an idea,” Zach said. “I’ll give you my number. At the place where I’m staying. If you can get away, just call me.”

They’d stopped walking. Zach turned and went to an inset doorway of what had once been a storefront, now just black-painted glass and metal siding. He held the matchbook up to the wall and began writing,

“Here. Can you make this out?”

Noel approached, reaching for the matchbook, which Zach still held up, read the name and a telephone number. “Seems clear to me,” he said.

“Call anytime,” Zach drawled with a smile.

Noel pocketed the matchbook, realized Zach had put up his hand in the peace and brotherhood shake. What the hell? he thought.

“Didn’t you used to work at the Grip?” Zach asked.

Before Noel could answer or pull his hand out of the sudden strong pressure of Zach’s grip, the man said, “I believe we have a mutual friend. Name of Bill McWhitter.”

Noel didn’t have a chance to react. Zach’s hand tightened to a bone-twisting grasp while his other fist darted out and punched Noel low in the abdomen. Noel was flung into the deepest part of the doorway, slammed against the metal sheet, then punched again in the same place, hard. Before he could register anything but the pain and surprise, someone else had leaped into the doorway, and now there were two pairs of hands holding him, two pairs of fists jabbing at his head, at his body, alternately shoving him against the wall. His feeble attempts at defending himself were useless. Blood ran down one eye, obscuring his vision. The punches came again and again. They began kicking at his legs until the pain was unbearable and he couldn’t stop them from slapping him from wall to wall. His legs began to crumble beneath him, and he was slowly punched down and socked in the chin, in the other eye. His consciousness flashed, flickered, and finally dissolved in a series of colored spots.

Spots that greeted his coming to, he didn’t know how much later, then thought only seconds later, from the hard final jabs of a shoe into his chest, and the grating cement that scraped his face, and the two voices still muttering above him. Until he went out again with more colored lights.

He came to in a warm shower that cascaded over his hair and face, washing the blood out of his eye until he could see with startling detail the grain of the cement of the sidewalk, as well as the bottom parts of three Western-style boots directly in his line of vision. He tried not to groan, tried not to move, tried to figure out whom the boots belonged to, whose voices they were, where the liquid that poured over his face came from, tried not to black out again.

“Someone’s coming!” It was Zach’s voice. “Let’s split.”

“I’m not done pissing,” the other said.

“Let’s go!”

Noel heard the pants zipper. Another kick in the chest bashed him against the door’s edge. This time he spotted out for a long time.

“Give me a hand with this guy, will you?”

Noel flickered into consciousness.

“Where are you taking him?” the other voice asked.

“In there.”

“Into the Tubs?”

“Look at him. He needs help.”

“Call a cop.

“Are you going to help me or not?”

“Sure. Sure.”

Noel felt himself lifted by the armpits. He swayed slightly, then flickered off again. No lights this time, just out.

“…be here in a few minutes. He said not to call the police,” someone new was saying.

“He’s coming to,” the first, helpful voice said. “How are you feeling?”

Dim red lighting. Thin wooden partitions. Three men looking over him, one perched on the edge of the bed dressed only in a towel, the others in streetwear.

“I’m a doctor,” the one in the towel said. He looked like Cal Goldberg: dark, bearded, going bald. “Nothing looks broken. No, better not try to sit up yet.”

Noel tried to talk: mumbled through thick lips instead.

“Better get some water,” the doctor said.

“How about a beer?” one of the others suggested.

Noel tried to sit up now. He’d never had such a headache in his life. Every inch up into sitting position caused waves of nausea, dizziness, the red lights going blink blink blink.

Finally he was up high enough. Someone was helping lift him from behind. The doctor held the beer can to Noel’s mouth. The cool, brackish-tasting liquid trickled down his throat and gagged him at first. But he was able to swallow more. It quenched a thirst he didn’t know he had. Then he was allowed to sink back onto the pillows.

“Can I go now?” one of the men in street clothes asked. He’d been the reluctant one.

“Sure. Both of you can go,” the doctor said. Then, to Noel, “These men brought you in here. You’re in the Baths. You were jumped by some guys.”

“Thanks,” Noel managed to say.

One hurried out. The other asked, “Do you know who did it?”

Noel shook his head: his ears rang for a minute.

“I said, would you recognize them if you saw them again?” the man asked, evidently repeating what Noel had missed in the buzzing.

“Yes.” He’d never forget those bastards’ faces.

“I’ll leave you my name and telephone number. If you ever find them and want to press charges, I’ll stand witness that I chased them off.”

Every contour, detail, and motion within Noel’s vision was getting sharper. That was a good sign. He still felt as though he’d been thrown off a speeding semi onto a concrete embankment. The man was writing down his information, then putting it in one of Noel’s front pockets.

“Thank you,” Noel said. The man looked down at him.

“You used to tend bar in the Grip, didn’t you?”

“What?” Noel couldn’t believe he was asking the same damn question.

“I remember you from there. Pretty as you are, you’re not going to look good in a mirror for a while, sorry!” He squeezed Noel’s hand, then left the room.

The doctor remained, talking soothingly, and making a delicate but thorough examination of Noel’s body, asking what hurt, where, how much, and if he could move his fingers, his toes.

Afterward, the doctor wrote something, and Noel closed his eyes, wishing he could do something to alleviate the throbbing ache behind his eyes, in his chest, below one rib, and especially against one shinbone. When he woke up it was because the doctor was applying ice-cold alcohol pads to his face.

“I know it smarts. You’ll feel better later.”

Noel already felt better. The ache in his head had lessened.

Someone was trying to get in to the room; the locked door was pulled hard from the other side.

“Busy!” the doctor said.

“Cummings in there?” a gruff voice asked.

The doctor got up from Noel’s side, rearranged his towel, and opened the latch. Noel couldn’t see whom he was talking to, they were off to one side. Other men, clad only in towels, passed the half-open door, curiously looking in, until they caught a glance at Noel and quickly moved on. He must look pretty bad. He still hurt all over although his eyesight was normal, and he seemed to be regaining his sense of smell: he suddenly became aware of an odor that was stronger, more pungent than rubbing alcohol. His right arm cramped as he reached up to touch his wet, caking hair. Bastards!

“Someone to see you,” the doctor said, standing in the doorway. “Feel better, huh?” He waved and left.

Noel had thought for sure it was Loomis—he couldn’t have been more wrong.

“It smells like a urinal in here,” Eric said, closing the door and latching it shut.

Noel didn’t move. Eric remained at the foot of the bed, staring down at him, expressionless.

“You come here to gloat, or to finish me off?? Noel asked.

Eric stiffened with anger, but held his tongue.

“Go away!” Noel said, and turned his head to the thin wooden partition, where at least he wouldn’t have to look at Eric.

There was no sound for a while, except Noel’s still heavy, irregular breathing (bastards, tried to punch in my lungs! he said to himself). Then he could make out some noises from beyond the partition: the creaking of a cot under the rhythmic weight of two bodies. It almost made him laugh. He’d made it into the Baths all right. “And I didn’t even have to pay to get in,” he murmured to himself.

“What?”

“I thought you’d gone.”

“This isn’t a hospital, Noel. You can’t stay here.”

“I’m staying and getting my twelve hours’ worth.”

“You’re raving. I have the car downstairs.”

“No, thanks.”

“Be reasonable,” Eric said in another tone of voice, softer, calmer. “Either you get up and come with me, or you’ll be dragged out by the management.”

“What for? So McWhitter can finish off what his pals fumbled?”

“McWhitter? What does he have to do with this?”

“That’s who did it.”

“He was with me all day.”

Noel insisted: “They said they were from McWhitter.”

“I thought they were just some street punks?”

“They followed me out of the drugstore near my apartment. One got lost. The other tried to pick me up. I couldn’t shake him. Then, boom!”

Eric’s annoyed condescension became intense interest. He even sat down on the cot. “Were they Spanish?”

“Spanish? No.”

“One tried to pick you up. And then they both jumped you?”

“That’s right.”

“Yeah, that’s his style, all right,” Eric said, as if to himself. “Making it look like street kids, too. That’s the way he always did it before.”

“Did what? Who?”

“Vega. Your friend Vega. Or whoever he’s working for. You see, Noel, I’m supposed to believe all this crap and take you back with open arms.”

Noel couldn’t make heads or tails out of what Eric was saying. He was still having difficulty grappling with any reason why Buddy Vega or his friends would attack him.

“You see,” Eric was saying, “by doing this to you, I’m supposed to believe you aren’t working for them. Oh, very smart. He’s a mean mother, your boss. Doesn’t fool around. But you know what? I don’t believe it. Not for a second.”

What Eric was saying was so unthinkable that Noel couldn’t finish the chain of reasoning for a while. Then he did, and felt cold all over, nauseated again. He reached for the half-empty can of beer.

“They said they were from McWhitter,” he repeated.

“What were they going to say? That they were from me? Would you have believed that!”

Noel thought no, yes, maybe. “Sure I would,” he said.

“That’s because you’re so fucked up you don’t know who your real friends are. I could do all this to you myself if I wanted to. I wouldn’t hire punks to do it.”

That seemed right to Noel. But it was confusing. His head was hurting again. He moaned.

“Let’s go one step further,” Eric said. “Let’s say I do take you back. Not that I believe it for a minute, mind you. You following me?”