HCC 115 - Borderline (7 page)

“The games are across the border?”

“That’s right. In Juarez. There’s probably a Mexican law against gambling but it’s
never enforced. They barely enforce the laws against murder in Mexico. They don’t
have time to worry about a quiet poker game.” He stopped, thought for a moment. “There
are some crooked games,” he went on, “where suckers get taken with marked cards, stuff
like that. Those games get broken up now and then because it can hurt the tourist
trade. But I’m not interested in crooked games. They’re no kick.”

Meg said, “I like you.”

“Good.”

“You’re good for me.” she went on. “You know what I want, Marty? I want to let go,
I mean of everything, just let go and let the world spin out on its string all over
the place. I want excitement. I want to do everything and see everything.”

“You’re in the right place.”

“El Paso, you mean?”

“I mean Juarez.”

“It’s exciting?”

“Whatever you want, it’s here. Sex, drugs, gambling, liquor, everything. It’s all
here.”

“Do you take advantage of it?”

“Not much. I’m not a tourist. I just live here.”

“We could take advantage of it together,” she said. “We could go wild, Marty. We could
let the whole world spin its string out for us. Would you like that?”

“I might.”

“Is Juarez still open? Could we do anything tonight?”

“It’s open until dawn.”

“Can we go?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Not tonight?”

“Not tonight, Meg. I want you again. And then I want to go to sleep.”

She didn’t say anything. He rolled over onto his side, slowly, and she turned to face
him. His hand reached for her, touched her shoulders, moved very slowly to her breast.
She had thought she was through for the night but the minute he touched her breast
she realized she had been mistaken. His hands sent her reeling again.

“Marty—”

“Shut up,” he said. “Don’t talk.”

His hand was busy with her breast. He fondled it, patted it. He took a nipple between
two fingers and began to caress the taut flesh until she wanted to shriek. His other
hand was on her thigh now, moving higher.

She could not remain still. Her own hands reached for him, found him. She touched
him and his eyes blazed with need for her. His hand moved from her thigh, higher,
and found her. His fingers played with her, teasing her, and she grew warm for him.
She was trembling inside.

She rolled over, onto her back, and he moved above her. He had his hands on her breasts
now and he worked them. She thought she was going to be torn apart, to die. She gripped
him pulling him closer.

He touched her. Then, fiercely, he drove into her, and she surrounded him. His body
drove at her, again and again and again, and the excitement was here, the passion
was here—

At the moment of fulfillment—towering, shrieking, frighteningly powerful fulfillment—her
nails clawed his back and buttocks and his teeth bit into her shoulder. She screamed,
once. The sound that tore from her lips was not remotely human.

Then he was saying, “Now go to sleep. Tomorrow we’ll find some excitement, if you
want.”

She would have answered him but she was too empty to move, to speak, even to think.
She closed her eyes and slept.

* * *

Ringo was around forty-five, with a pot belly and bandy legs. He had long glossy black
hair that he combed carefully over a bald spot on the top of his head. He looked from
Cassie to Lily, then back to Cassie, then at Lily once more. His eyes travelled over
her body. He looked at her breasts and at her hips.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“She’s good-looking,” Cassie said. “Man, you know that much, don’t you?”

“Maybe.”

He took a cigar from his pocket, unwrapped it, bit off the end, spat, and lit the
cigar. To Lily he said, “Peel. I want to see what you look like without clothes on.”

She didn’t argue. She took off the blouse and the khakis. She was wearing no bra,
because the Texan in Dallas had ruined the only one she owned. She wasn’t wearing
underwear, either. Her panties had been dirty, and she hadn’t had a chance to rinse
them out.

“The boobs are real and you’re blonde all over,” he said. “That’s a help, anyway.
Nice boobs.”

He was not looking at her the way men usually did. His eyes were cool and impersonal.
He was a businessman studying a commodity, trying to decide whether it was worth buying,
whether he could make a decent profit on it. “Get dressed,” he said at length, and
she put her clothes back on.

“Well?” Cassie looked at Ringo. “She hired, man?”

“I don’t know.” He chewed the cigar. “You hustle any, kid?”

“I been laid, if that’s what you mean.”

“So have I,” Ringo said. “But I’d make a lousy whore. You do any hustling?”

“A little.”

“I don’t mean giving it away. I mean for money?”

“A little.”

“You can’t play prude here.” Ringo said. “Some broads want to hustle but won’t turn
anything but straight tricks. That’s fine if you’re in the States, maybe. These Mex
broads’ll do anything in the world. You draw the line, you can’t work here.”

“I don’t draw the line.”

“Some guy’ll want you to talk to ’em in French. You know how to speak French?”

She remembered the second act with the man in the Dallas hotel room. She told Ringo
that she could speak French.

“And Greek?”

“And Greek.”

“Well, that’s something. Still, I don’t know. This isn’t just a cathouse operation
I got here. This is like a club, you understand. We have floorshows. We get an expensive
clientele, serve the best food and the best liquor and give ’em entertainment you
can’t find on Broadway. They can find whores for five bucks and get good ones, but
this is a package deal and that’s what brings them around. The show is full now. I
don’t see where you’d fit.”

For a moment no one said anything. Lily waited for something to happen. Now, strangely,
it seemed important for her to get the job. She wanted it badly.

“Ringo,” Cassie said, “I got an idea.”

“I’m listening.”

“Lily an’ I could do an act. A gay act.”

“We’ve had that and it’s nothing new.”

“You’ve had it with Mex chicks. Think about it with us. A redhead and a blonde on
the stage. Picture it, Ringo. It’s twice as hot for a tourist to see a redhead and
a blonde up there, both Americans. Twice as hot.”

Ringo looked thoughtful. “It might go.”

“It’ll go, Ringo. You know it’ll go.”

Ringo chewed the cigar. “You start tomorrow,” he told Lily. “You get here ten in the
evening, do your number with Cassie here, then put out for whoever wants a piece of
you. You get ten for the special and two bucks every time you turn a trick. Okay?”

She looked at Cassie, who was nodding her head. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll see you.”

Outside she said, “I don’t know, Cassie. This is a lesbo number he’s talking about.
Right?”

“Right.”

“Well, I don’t know.”

The redhead looked at her. “You never made it with a chick?”

“No.”

“It’s a groove,” Cassie said. “It’s better that way. Something different.”

“Are you a dyke?”

“I work both ways, Lily. You shocked?”

“I don’t shock easy.”

“I didn’t think so. Listen, I work four or five hours a night doing it with men, balling
with ’em. It’s like a drag after a while. You need a change of pace now and then.
You know Didi, she was at the bar there?”

“I remember her.”

“I was making it with Didi for a while. Then she decided to straighten out. She flipped
over Paul and she’s shacking with him now, spending all her time at his pad.”

“And I’m supposed to take her place? Is that the general idea, Cassie?”

Cassie shrugged, “You can try it on and find out if it fits or not. That’s all.”

Lily thought about it. Hell, she decided, everybody had an angle. Cassie was tickled
magenta to put her up for a good-pay job, but Cassie wanted a payoff for her part
in the game. She smiled to herself, thinking how neatly the redhead had set it up.
Even if she didn’t want to go along with it, even if she stayed away from Cassie except
for working hours, she still would make love to the girl once a night. On stage.

And who knew—it could even be fun. Balling was balling, and it shouldn’t make a hell
of a difference whether you were balling with a man or a woman. The equipment was
different, maybe, but that was about it. If it was a kick to make it with Cassie,
she’d enjoy herself. If it was a drag, she would tolerate it.

“I suppose I could try,” she said.

“Solid.”

“But aren’t you working tonight?”

“I’m taking a night off.” They were walking along a poorly lighted street, walking
in the middle of the street because there was no sidewalk. Cassie let her arm go around
Lily. Lily didn’t flinch.

“A night off,” Cassie said. “For the rehearsal.”

“The rehearsal?”

“That’s the bit. We have to make it for an audience tomorrow night. So we spend tonight
getting our lines straight. You never balled a chick before, Lily. Lots of things
I’ve got to teach you, like.”

“Yeah, I dig.”

“I do too.”

“The first lesson then.”

“Oh, maybe the second and the third ones too. I’m offering a special tonight.”

“A special price or a special lesson?”

“Both,” Cassie smiled.

“All right.”

“I knew you were the night school type.”

“You got a pad?”

“A few blocks. We’re on our way right now.”

“What kind of a pad?”

“A room in a dumpy hotel. They don’t ask questions there. It’s practically a whorehouse
itself. A batch of Mex girls sit in the bar downstairs and guys pick ’em up and take
’em to their rooms.”

“Yeah. I’m hip to that scene.”

“Sometimes you can go down there and pick up a trick yourself.”

“After work?”

“Yeah. Bring in a little extra bread that way. You can’t depend on it but you can
take your pick—and you don’t have to share the bread with anyone.”

Lily nodded in understanding.

“Last week I picked up a crazy trick. Taught me something new. I tried it at Ringo’s
and it went over big. The customers were so happy that Ringo gave me a bonus.”

Lily didn’t reply.

“Maybe we could try it tonight, eh, Lily baby?”

Lily shrugged her shoulders.

“I’ve always wondered whether two chicks could do that together,” Cassie said.

Her arm tightened about Lily’s shoulder.

At the corner they turned, and Lily could see lights up ahead. Cassie’s hand dropped
from shoulder to breast.

“You got about the nicest boobs I ever saw.” Cassie was whispering hoarsely. “I was
hot as hell when you peeled for Ringo. I wanted to jump you then and there.”

Now Cassie’s fingers were pinching a nipple. Lily smiled to herself. It didn’t make
any difference, she thought. The hand could have been Cassie’s or a man’s—it made
no difference at all.

It’s what the hand was doing to her, that was important, she thought. And
what
it was doing to her. The fingers on her nipple, the warmth of the rest of the hand
between her breasts, spreading the soft flesh.

Cassie ran her hand back and forth between the two mounds of flesh and the softness
molded itself, around her hand.

Then her fingers slipped down and under and gently lifted.

“Nice, nice, nice,” Cassie repeated. “You’re so nice there. Wait till we get to my
pad and I’ll really show you some scenes with those boobs of yours.”

Her hand was darting in and out and around now.

“Just wait,” Cassie was saying now, her lips close to Lily’s ear. “Just wait. I’m
going to show you everything, Lily. Everything there is to know. Baby, you’ll dig
it. I know you will.”

“Maybe.”

“And you’re blonde all the way, aren’t you? Hell, don’t answer, baby. Like I saw it
myself.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I’m a redhead all the way. You like?”

“Sure, Cassie.”

Cassie stopped, turned Lily around. “Come on,” she said. “I’m like so crazy for it
I can’t stand it. Give me a kiss, Lily.”

“Here in the street?”

“Nobody’s looking.”

“Well, sure.”

Lily reached out her arms, let the redheaded girl come close. Their mouths came together
and Lily found out what it was like to kiss a girl. It was different. Cassie’s mouth
was softer than any man’s mouth had been, and Cassie’s body was different in her arms.
When Cassie’s little pink tongue stole between Lily’s lips, Lily was surprised to
find herself responding to the embrace.

“You feel it, don’t you?”

“I feel it.”

“Well, you’ll feel it even more back at my pad,” Cassie whispered into her ear. “You’ll
feel it there and someplace else. You’ll feel it, and that feeling will mount and
grow and spread inside you. You’ll feel all those feelings meet and join. You’ll feel
it lift you up into space and speed through you until you crash through the heat barrier.”

“I feel it now,” Lily whispered.

“And you like it, right?”

“So far I like it.”

“Oh, Lily. Oh, baby. There’s a lot more, Lily, and you’ll like it, baby, you’ll love
it. You’ll scream and you’ll beg for more, you’ll just love it. That’s where it’s
at, baby.”

And they hurried to the hotel.

Weaver finished the horror comic and hurled it across the room. It was the third time
he had read that particular comic book and on this final reading it had not held his
interest at all. He took a long shuddering breath and pressed his face down into his
pillow.

He could not sleep. It was late, past three in the morning, and he had been trying
to fall asleep since well before midnight. He would close his eyes and lie in darkness,
listening only to the monotonous whine of the overhead fan, and he would wait for
sleep to come to him. This it refused to do. Time after time he got up, switched on
the light, crawled back into his clothes. Sometimes he would re-read one of the horror
comics. Other times he would scuttle down the hall to the bathroom to void his bladder.
Finally he would try again to sleep, and would fail again.