What Matters Most is How Well You Walk Through the Fire (12 page)

they come visit and

sit across from me and talk

and their voices are very loud

and they laugh too much

and soon I have a headache

as they tell me about their men

how they had to throw this one out

and how the other one tried to

kill himself when they left him,

and they talk on

smiling

laughing

nodding

and most of them are a little bit

heavy and a little bit

blonde

and after they leave

I think about the men who needed them:

those are the kind of men who would consider

turning on the gas if they lost their jobs

as stock boys at

Sears-Roebuck.

those are men who need women like they once

needed their mothers.

those are men who need loud laughing

wenches of little

spiritual or physical

attraction.

and the women feast on those men

like candy

like peanuts

like sunflower seeds

and throw away the wrappers and shells

as they tell others of their womanly

conquests

while holding a warm can of Coors in one hand

and a Marlboro in the other.

Sally was a sloppy

leaver. she was good with farewell

notes,

she wrote them in a large

indignant hand.

Sally was always indignant, she was

good at that.

and she always took most of her

clothes,

but I'd

sit and look about—

and there'd be a pink slipper

under the bed.

I'd

get down under the bed

to get that pink slipper to

throw it in the trash

and next to the pink slipper

I'd find a pair of stained

panties.

and there were hairpins everywhere:

in the ashtray, on the dresser, in the

bathroom, and her magazines were also

everywhere with their exotic headlines:

MAN KIDNAPS GIRL, THEN

THROWS HER BODY FROM
    400 FOOT CLIFF.

9 YEAR OLD BOY RAPES

4 WOMEN IN GREYHOUND    DEPOT RESTROOM.

Sally was a sloppy leaver.

in the top drawer next to the Kleenex

I'd find all the notes I'd written her,

neatly bound with rubber

bands.

and she was sloppy with her

photos:

I'd find one of both of us

crouched on the hood of our

'58 Plymouth—

Sally showing a lot of leg

and grinning like a Kansas City moll,

and me

showing the bottoms of my shoes

with the holes

in them.

and, there were photos of dogs,

all of them ours,

and, photos of children,

most of them

hers.

she'd leave and an

hour later

the phone would ring

and it would be

Sally

and in the background

music from a juke

box, some song I

hated, and while she talked

I'd hear men's

voices too.

“Sally, Sally,” I'd say,

“come on back,

baby!”

“no,” she'd say, “there are other men in the

world besides you. but

I could have loved you forever, Chinaski.”

“get fucked,” I'd say and hang

up.

I'd pour a drink

and while looking for a scissors in the bathroom

to trim the hair around my ears

I'd find a brassiere in one of the drawers

and hold it up to the light.

I'd drink my drink

then begin to trim the hair around my ears

deciding that I was quite a handsome man

but that I'd need to lift weights

go on a diet

get a tan,

and so forth.

after a while

the phone would ring again

and I'd lift the receiver

hang up

lift the receiver again

and let it

dangle

by the cord.

I'd trim my ear hairs, my nose hairs, my

eyebrows,

then lie down

and go to

sleep.

I'd be awakened by a sound I had never

heard before—

it felt and sounded like the warning of an

atomic attack.

I'd get up and look for the sound.

it would come from the telephone

still off the hook.

I'd

pick up the

phone.

“sir, this is the desk clerk, your phone is

off the hook.”

“all right. sorry. I'll

hang up.”

“don't hang up, sir. your wife is in the

elevator.”

“my wife?”

“she says she's Mrs. Chinaski.”

“all right, it's

possible.”

“sir, can you get her out of the

elevator?

her language is abusive

and she says she won't budge

until you come and

help her…and, sir…”

“yes?”

“…we didn't want to call the

police…”

“yes?”

“she's laying on the floor in the

elevator, sir, and, and…she has…

urinated on

herself…”

“o.k.,” I'd say and

hang up.

I'd walk out in my shorts

cigar in mouth

and press the elevator

button.

it would come up slowly:

one, two, three, four…

the doors would open

and there would be

Sally.

I'd

pick her up and

carry her out of

there.

I'd get her to the apartment

throw her on the bed

and pull off her wet

panties, skirt and stockings.

then I'd put a drink on the coffee table

nearby

sit down on the couch

and

wait.

suddenly she'd sit straight up and

look around the

room.

she'd ask

“Hank?”

“over here,” I'd

wave my hand.

“oh, thank god…”

then she'd see the drink and

gulp it

down. I'd get up,

refill it, put cigarettes, an ashtray and

matches

nearby.

then she'd sit up again:

“who took my panties

off?”

“me.”

“me?”

“Chinaski.”

“Chinaski, you can't

fuck me.”

“you pissed

yourself.”

“who?”

“you…”

she'd sit straight

up then:

“Chinaski, you dance like a

queer, you dance like a

woman!”

“I'll kick your god-damned

ass!” I'd say.

then she'd put her head back on the

pillow: “I love you, Chinaski, I really

do…”

she'd start snoring then.

after a while

I'd get into bed with

her. I wouldn't want to touch her

at first. she needed a bath.

I'd get one leg up against hers;

it didn't seem too

bad. I'd try the

other.

I'd remember all the good days and the

good nights

slip one arm under her neck,

then I'd put the other around her

belly

gently.

her hair would fall back

and climb into my face.

I'd feel her inhale, then

exhale. we'd sleep like that

most of the night and into the

next afternoon. then I'd be the first to get up and

go to the bathroom

and then she'd get up and

have her turn.

I am sad

like

a

dead angel

I am sad

like

porksalt

I am mad

like

a

dead angel

a woman has

told me

when things get bad

she'll come and

bring me

lovely living

angels.

I phoned her

an hour ago

holding a

sharp knife

in my

left hand.

the phone service

said

they'd

leave the

message.

she was 32 years younger

than I was

with a body fit for the

gods.

it was 2:30 a.m.

we'd lived together for

8 months

and she shook me,

“Hank?”

“yeah?”

“I have to have some

deep fried

chicken gizzards!”

“what? again?”

“I've got to have them
now!
”

“all right.”

we got up and dressed.

outside it was beginning to

rain.

we drove to the Hollywood

Ranch Market.

she ordered her

deep fried

chicken gizzards

and I ordered an ear of corn

and a roast beef

sandwich.

it was beginning to rain harder

and as we waited

a man without legs

rolled up on a little platform

he had an unforgettable face

with black eyes and

a large nose.

he grabbed my woman around

the calf of one of her

legs

with a hand the size of a

table radio:

“
hey, Cleo, baby! how ya

doin'?
”

“
Beef-o!
” she replied,

“
you son-of-a-bitch, how ya

doing?
”

“
great, baby, great! got a

light?
”

Beef-o had a king-size Marlboro in his

mouth.

she bent over and lit him

up as one of her breasts almost

slipped out of

her blouse.

“
you're looking great, baby
,

great! who's the guy? that your

old man? hey, man, how ya doin'?
”

I bent over to shake and

my hand vanished into his.

after some more small talk

Beef-o rolled off into the

rain and she said,

“can you wait a minute?

I want to run down and see

Billy John. Billy John's just got one

arm but he's the neatest guy

you ever met! be right back!”

I paid for the orders

and stood there in the rain

holding the

bags for 10 or 15 minutes.

then Cleo came back,

“Billy John's not there, I

don't know what happened

to Billy John…”

back in bed we sat upright

eating. I finished my corn

and my sandwich. she put her

gizzards down.

“they just don't taste right,

they just don't taste like they

used to taste.”

she stretched out.

then her young lips parted

red red red with lipstick.

bits of chicken gizzard still

clung to the corners

of her mouth.

she began to

snore.

I sat and listened to the rain

then I switched out the

light.

I knew then that

I had to get out of east Hollywood!

they didn't even bother to

fix the streets

anymore.

the Free Verse Poets whispered

that Julia only gave it to the

Rhyming Poets, or at least

she was always seen only with

them.

the Free Verse Poets put it into my head

to go on over there and score

one for Us.

early on that 4th of July evening

I had Julia up against the refrigerator

trapped

when this 19-year-old boy

walked into the kitchen and asked,

“hey, mom, what's going on?”

we were introduced and went into

the other room. I poured the boy

a half glass of Jack Daniels

and watched his delicate lips

pucker as he took little sips.

that would teach him not to

get in the way of his mother's

erotic life.

then there was a knock on the

door and in came Monzo the

poet and his wife

Denise. Denise hated me with

a hatred

much more powerful than

Monzo's poems.

I figured the only way to

accomplish my mission

was to drink them all senseless:

the son, Monzo, his wife and

Julia. then

I'd ravish Julia.

I had brought along enough

beer and whiskey

to accomplish this.

we drank and then the fireworks

came on at the Los Angeles

Coliseum

and by standing at the window

we could watch the show.

everybody seemed delighted.

“terribly dull shit,” I said.

“Chinaski,” Monzo's wife said,

“you are so negative!”

I placed my hand on Julia's ass

as we watched, I pinched her ass,

fondled the crack.

the boy was in the bathroom

vomiting.

then somebody said, “oh,

my god!”

some of the fireworks had fallen

into the tall palm trees

in the street outside

and they were burning,

one setting fire to another.

“now,” I said, “there is something

that is
really
beautiful!”

“oh, Chinaski,” Monzo's wife said,

“you are such an obnoxious

son-of-a-bitch!”

the fire engines came and soon spoiled

it for me. we sat down and drank some

more.

they talked. they used terms

like lower-class, middle-class, upper-

middle-class, upper-upper-class. they talked

about personal communication. they talked about the

environment and Dylan Thomas. they

discussed communes and organic gardens.

they spoke of Yoga. they talked about unstructured

schools and about growing grass

indoors with ultraviolet light. they talked

about Tim Leary, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin,

about the war in Vietnam and how they liked

certain cartoonists like Robert Crumb.

they talked about love-ins, they

talked about smoke-ins. they talked about

how everybody was fucking the American

Indian. and they drank very little while I

drank a great deal. I soon realized that

they had decided to stick it out with Julia to

keep her from being ravished.

I finally gave up

got back to my car

and drove to my place on

DeLongpre Avenue

where I uncapped a beer

lucked upon some Wagner

on the radio

and then my landlady in the back

came out and we went

over to her place

where we drank two quarts of Eastside beer

one after the other

while her old man

in a white torn undershirt

his head resting on the table

slept peacefully.

she talked about

Catholicism

(she went to mass every Sunday)

and the horrors of

hemorrhoids and gallstones

(and operations for same)

and in between we sang songs

from the 30's,

Bing Crosby songs and the like,

and when I left there at

5 a.m.

it was unclearly the 5th of July

and I had forgotten all about

my failure to ravish

Julia.