Ad Nauseam (14 page)

“Right.”

The old man nodded again, placing the hot pipe on the counter and pulling open a drawer, rummaging around as he spoke. “You have some tough choices, boy. Every man does sooner or later. But I think I’ve figured out what you need, and if I’m correct, it’s right here.” He held up a piece of paper, his wrinkled face bright with triumph. Laying the paper on the counter, he slid it towards Chad with one shaking hand.

It was some sort of ticket, a couple of inches long and maybe one inch wide, made of heavy card stock. The edges were worn and it was creased in places, the words printed on it faded but still legible. CLUB CARNAL.

“What is it?” He turned it over, seeing the words ADMIT TWO scrawled on the back.

“What does it look like? It’s a ticket to Club Carnal.” The man began to fill his pipe once again.

“What’s Club Carnal? I’ve never even heard of it.”

“Son, there are a great many things you’ve never heard of, and if you live as long as I have, there will
still
be mysteries in the world.”

“So what is it? A strip club, or something?”

“Or something.” The man said, his pipe once again full and trickling bluish smoke that wreathed his head.

Chad was growing annoyed by the old man and his enigmatic speech. “Look, no offense man, I appreciate you letting me come in here and unload my troubles all over you like that, but I’m not going to pay money for an old ticket to a club I’ve never heard of.”

“Who said anything about money? Consider it a gift. From an old man who’s been there.” His eyes sparkled, intense and unsettling.

“What’s there?” Chad looked at the ticket in his hand, feeling uneasy about the exchange.

“A lesson. Maybe a hard one, but one you need to learn.”

“That pussy will ruin my life?” Chad guessed.

“Exactly.” The old man didn’t smile.

“Where is Club Carnal?”

“The address is on the back.”

Chad turned the stub over again and saw an address where before there had only been ADMIT TWO. 122 ½ E. Maple Street, written in spiky handwriting. He was sure it hadn’t been there before.

“What the fuck? Is this some sort of trick?”

“Go there. See what there is to see and have fun. Fuck the girls, but whatever you do . . . ” He paused, his flinty eyes piercing Chad’s for emphasis. “Don’t partake of the flesh. You will want to, but don’t. Learn the lesson, son. Men are more susceptible to their sexual desires. It’s about self-control. Don’t take what is offered without question. No matter how much you want it. All of life has consequences, and beauty is never what it seems. Learn the lesson, Chad.”

He gave Chad another hard look before sliding off his stool and disappearing back behind the curtain.

“Hey! What the hell does that even mean?” Chad called to his back.

If the old man heard Chad from behind the curtain, he gave no indication. Chad made it back onto the street before it even occurred to him that he’d never given the other man his name.

***

Maple Street was in the old section of town, a few blocks away from the strange little shop. Knowing he should just find his car and go home, he turned down the deserted sidewalk to where it intersected Maple instead. He doubted Club Carnal even existed, since he’d never heard anyone mention the place. It wouldn’t hurt to check though.

“You looking for a date?”

The voice startled Chad. Turning, he could make out the figure of a woman standing in the deep shadows of a doorway. When he didn’t reply, she stepped out into the light cast by a street lamp. She was pretty in a tired sort of way, still young enough to have retained her sex appeal despite the lines etched around her eyes and mouth. If she was a junkie, it didn’t show yet. Her figure was full in the right places, her body not yet reduced to the cadaverous stature of someone who has handed the reins of her life over to drugs.

“Actually, I’m looking for a place called Club Carnal.”

“Never heard of it.” She took the ticket from his outstretched hand and angled it towards the light, her brow furrowed as she squinted to read the handwriting on the back. Handing it back to him, she shrugged. “Sorry.”

“Thanks anyway.” Chad smiled and turned to walk away then changed his mind. “You want to come with?”

“Like a date?” She opened her eyes wide with feigned innocence, though the corner of her mouth quirked up in the start of a sarcastic smile.

“Maybe. Just to see what’s there. I mean, really, it’s not like there’s a line of
dates
here on the street.”

She shrugged and stepped up beside him on the walk.

“My name’s Lily. You aren’t some kind of serial killer, are you?”

“Chad.” He accepted her gentle handshake, liking the way her slender hand felt in his own. “And no, I’m not any kind of killer. But I probably wouldn’t tell you the truth if I was, you know”.

Up close, he saw she was younger than he’d guessed. Probably in her early twenties. She was braless under a deeply cut shirt that clung to her full breasts and ended at a skirt so short it could practically pass for a belt. Though he was average height, he figured she would have to crane her neck to look up at him without the stiletto boots she wore.

“So what do you do?” She asked as they walked, her head turned toward him, watching his every move.

Chad’s mind swam, trying to come up with a believable lie, wondering about the wisdom of telling her his occupation. What if it was a set-up? He was filled with visions of some pimp following at a distance, sneaking up to conk him on the head and roll him.

Oh come on!
Chad thought, shaking his head at his own folly.
You are walking down a dark, deserted street in the company of a hooker you just met, looking for a club that probably doesn’t exist on recommendation of some creepy old bastard in a run-down pawn shop that sells douche bags in the middle of the night. And now you want to start thinking about what is or isn’t prudent?

“I’m a lawyer.”

“That’s cool. Maybe I’ll take your card. Might need you some day.” Lily laughed, a husky sound Chad enjoyed.

“Sorry, I only do family law.”

”Good one,” she replied, grinning. “I’ll have to remember that.”

“Can I ask you a question?” Chad said.

“Probably not.” She said with a sigh. “But you will, anyway.”

“Why do you do it?”

“Do what?” She cocked her head to the side.

“You know. What you do for a living.” Chad resisted the urge to kick at the ground like a boy on the schoolyard. Somewhere between that shadowy doorway and their short banter, he’d begun to like Lily.

“What? Being a hooker? It’s okay. I know what I am.” Lily tipped her head back and looked at the stars. “I guess it’s just something I fell into. My Mom died when I was young and I was on my own at fifteen. I could go on and on with my sad story, but the truth is, it pays the bills. And it’s a hell of a lot better than waitressing for quarter tips.”

“I’m sorry that happened to you.” Chad’s apology felt inadequate, and he felt guilty about his comparably privileged life.

“Not your fault. We all have our problems. Hey look. We’re here.”

They stopped in front of a low brick building, the windows covered by boards. It looked to have been closed up for a while, and Chad couldn’t immediately tell what sort of business it had housed when open. Glancing up and down the street, he saw that more businesses were boarded up than not.

“Well, this is 122, but I don’t see a 122 ½. Usually it would be an apartment above the actual business in a place like this, but there’s only one floor. I guess it doesn’t exist.” He was a little pissed at the old man for sending him on a wild goose chase, but at least Lily’s company had been nice.

“Maybe it’s down there?” Lily pointed down a narrow alley south of the building which was barely wide enough to let them enter side by side.

“I suppose it could be. You want to check it out?”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on. If it’s not there, we’ll come right back out. And if it is, I’ll buy you a drink.”

“You’d owe me more than one drink for going down that creepy alley.”

“Okay, I’ll buy you as many drinks as you want.” He held out a hand to her, grinning in the most disarming way he could when she didn’t take it. “It’s okay. I’ll protect you.”

Lily snorted, her eyebrows raised as she made a show of looking him up and down, clearly not reassured by his fancy clothes and lean build.

Chad laughed and shrugged, pulling his hand back.

“We’ll be a team. If someone attacks us, I’ll distract them while you take off one of those high heels and stab them with it.”

“I’ll go down there with you on one condition. If we don’t find anything, you walk me back to my place and pay for a date.”

“That sounds fair. If we don’t find anything, I might just want that date after all.” Chad winked and held his hand out again, and after only a moment of hesitation, Lily took it.

***

The light from the street barely illuminated the narrow alley and they had to proceed slowly to keep from tripping over trash that littered the ground. A heavy stink of urine and garbage made them breathe through their mouths, and Chad had to squeeze Lily’s hand to keep her from fleeing when a rat squeaked at them from atop a pile of refuse. Chad was about to give up and turn around when the thump of heavy bass reached him, more a feeling than a sound. A few yards down, they came upon the door.

Set flush with the brick, the heavy steel door was huge, easily twice the size of an average one, with no discernible knob or handle. Spray painted in black letters across it were two words: CLUB CARNAL. The music came from behind the door.

Looking over his shoulder at Lily, Chad raised his eyebrows in question. She shrugged, squeezing his hand lightly. He raised his other fist and rapped on the door, expecting a hollow gonging noise to reverberate down the alley, but hearing only a soft knock. After several moments he turned to Lily.

“There’s no way anyone will hear us knocking over that music. Maybe there’s another way in.”

The door squealed on unseen hinges as it opened inward, revealing a man in a stained white t-shirt and snug jeans with homemade tattoos covering nearly every inch of exposed skin, including his face and neck. Ignoring Chad and Lily, the guy leaned out and surveyed the alley with narrowed eyes, before allowing them to enter.

Inside it was dark, the only illumination coming from a black light that caused neon graffiti on the walls to glow crude etchings and misspelled words that shocked the eyes in day-glow pinks, greens and yellows. The music was loud and heavy.

Turning toward Chad, the big man said nothing, just held out a scarred hand, eyebrows raised.

“Oh yeah.” Chad said, his voice swallowed up by the beat as he patted first one pocket, then the other with a frantic certainty he had lost the ticket and they would be thrown back out into the alley with the rats and garbage. He jumped when Lily slid her small hand into his front pocket, her fingertips grazing his balls as she retrieved the ticket deep within and laid it in the bouncer’s palm. She winked at Chad as they waited for the man to inspect the stub.

Satisfied with what he saw, the guy opened an interior door and ushered them past the entrance.

Chad’s first impression of Club Carnal was one of sensory overload as he tried to take in all the sights and sounds at once. It was much louder than he would have imagined from the alley. The music vibrated in his chest, and was occasionally punctuated by shrill laughter and screams. The dance floor was full of gyrating bodies in various states of undress. Both women and men danced on raised platforms, their nude bodies glowing with neon paint like that which adorned the walls in the entry. A recessed area contained circular booths where couples and whole groups of people lounged, some engaged in sex acts while others smoked hookahs made of brightly colored glass, the bluish smoke creating a haze that fell upon the room like mist.

Lily pulled on Chad’s arm, her mouth close to his ear so he would hear her shout.

“No way this place is legal.”

He nodded, then smiled when he saw the look of awe that had transformed her face into that of a little girl’s. The strobe lights made her pale skin look bluish, then green, as her mascara ringed eyes scanned the room, wide with wonder.

A pretty young woman holding an empty tray walked up to them, clad only in a loincloth, her nipples dusted with glitter and sporting clamps from which small peacock feathers hung. She grabbed Lily by the hand and led her away as Chad hurried to keep up, taking them to an empty booth that held a translucent pink hookah and a dish of sticky looking tobacco. The waitress disappeared without a word, only to return moments later with her tray full of drinks in carnival colors which she arranged before the two of them.

Fumbling with his wallet, unsure of the price of the drinks he hadn’t ordered, Chad pulled out two twenties, which the woman tucked into the strip of leather holding the loincloth in place. She handed them each one of the mouthpieces attached to the pipe, then leaned over and lit it for them, giving Chad a full view of her bare crotch beneath the cloth.

Lily put the tube in her mouth, breathed deeply, and held the smoke, a dreamy expression taking over her face as she exhaled. Even in the sporadic light from the dance floor, Chad watched as her pupils grew large and glassy.

Must be some good shit,
he thought, his own mouthpiece still in hand as he weighed the wisdom of smoking an unknown drug in an illegal club deep within the city. He already felt strange, probably from breathing the second-hand haze that enveloped the room. In the end he gave in, took a deep drag, and felt euphoria wash over him in waves.

Is it hash? Opium?
The world became soft at the edges, and his whole body thrummed like a tuning fork.

***

Somehow the drinks on the table were half empty, and Lily was on his lap, her mouth tasting of fruit and bitter alcohol as she pressed it sloppily against his own.

The low-cut shirt was rent down the middle, her bare breasts filling his hands. He looked down at them, unsure how they had gotten in this position, and noticed that each nipple was tattooed with a rose. That had to have hurt like hell, he thought, then giggled, pinching first one, then the other, much too hard. Lily moaned and shoved her wet tongue into his ear. Chad took another hit from the hookah.