Killing Johnny Fry (22 page)

“Cynthia,” I said. “You couldn‘t possibly know me well enough to set me up on a date."

“This is no date,” she said. “It‘s nothing like that. This meeting you have with Brenda could very well be a turning point in your life. It could open you up to understand just how important your receptivity to the world can be."

I wanted to be angry but I couldn‘t hold on to the feeling. The concern in Cynthia‘s voice was real, and that was all that mattered to me.

“I hope you‘re right,” I said. “Because I‘ve been beginning to think that I won‘t survive this trauma of Jo‘s."

“Have you told her?"

“No."

“Has she gone back to her lover?"

“I think she intends to. They‘re going down to Baltimore to attend the service for the uncle that molested her."

“How does that make you feel?"

“Like shit."

“What are you going to do?” she asked.

“Some things I cannot share with you, Cynthia. I hope you understand that."

“Absolutely. But you need to know that you can tell me anything. Anything. I will always be in your corner."

That was an emotional time for me. The tears came up and out. I didn‘t know which way to turn, and so I said, “I gotta go,” hung up the phone, and hurried out into the night. I walked down 42nd Street toward Broadway looking into storefronts and wondering about love. I thought about my mother in the Connecticut retirement community. I called her once every two weeks to talk for three minutes or less. I asked her how things were going and if she needed anything. Things were always fine and she had enough.

“I love you,” I would say after saying good-bye.

She‘d hesitate and then murmur, “Uh, oh yes. Bye."

But Cynthia, whom I had never met, was willing to try to make some commitment to me. She was looking for my number on her line.

It was no wonder that Jo thought me at best common. I couldn‘t even respond when I saw her with her lover. He was fucking her ass like it was his and his alone. She was nodding and calling him Daddy. And what did I do?

I felt for the pistol in my pocket. At that instant, a raindrop splashed against my cheek. I had a Brookstone umbrella in my briefcase. By the time I had it out, it was raining hard—a downpour.

My feet were getting wet, but that was okay. The rain fell straight down, and the design of the umbrella made it quite wide when open, despite its compact size.

At Sixth Avenue I found myself standing next to a young black man, no more than twenty. He wore black slacks and a loose T-shirt and was getting soaked by the rain.

“Which way you goin‘?” he asked me rather sheepishly.

“West."

“Can I . . . ?"

I gestured with my briefcase, and he huddled under the comparative shelter of my umbrella.

We walked side by side, close but not touching, together by circumstance, not speaking a word. Around us people ran and stood in doorways. One extremely fat man carried an umbrella so tiny that was of little more use to him than a hat would have been.

After a few blocks, the young man said, “I‘m goin‘ to Billy‘s Burgers, past Tenth. You goin‘ that far?"

“Sure."

It felt odd walking with someone I didn‘t know, sheltering him. It made me think of those glass-eyed wolves at the Museum of Natural History. Some things are done from instinct—precious in the so-called civilized world . . .

When we got to the door of the fast-food restaurant, the young man asked, “Where you goin‘?"

He had a lazy eye and
one
silver tooth.

“Just out walking,” I said. “Killing time."

“You wan‘ somethin‘?” he asked me.

“Like what?"

“A blow job?"

“Uh . . . No . . . No thank you."

“It wouldn‘t cost nuthin‘. You live around here?"

“Sorry . . . no."

“M‘kay. Thanks for walkin‘ me."

He turned and went into the restaurant, where other young men greeted him and kissed his cheek and lips.

The rain started coming down even harder.

On the walk back toward Grand Central, I thought about the last time I‘d driven up to visit my mother. She was having a nice time. The only thing my siblings and I agreed on was ‘making sure that our mother had a comfortable place to retire. We all chipped in for the monthly payments and her government income covered the rest. There were bingo games and nightly movies in the small auditorium. She had a white boyfriend who still played tennis and ate dinner with her every weeknight.

“Would you think of marrying him?” I asked my mom during one of our three-minute talks.

“Oh no, Eric,” she said. She often called me by my brother‘s name. I wondered if she even remembered that she had two sons.

“Oh no,” she repeated. “I never even married your daddy."

“What?"

“I never married him. I‘m a free woman. He can‘t own me. Nobody can own me.” She was very animated, angry even.

“So you never wanted to be married?"

“No sir. Not me."

“Yes, sir?” the young Hispanic hostess asked.

“My name is Cordell,” I said. “Hers is Brenda. We were to have dinner at ten."

The handsome young brown woman looked down at her computer screen and smiled.

“Your guest is already at the table, Mr. Cordell. Just walk past the bar and turn to your right."

At the entrance to the dining room, a chubby white girl in a flouncy blue dress smiled at me.

“Right this way,” she said holding the menus to cover her ample cleavage.

The restaurant was divided into sections. The first one was smaller but with large tables and a banquette for eight or nine couples. The next room, where our table was, was open, looking out onto the main floor of the station and up at the roof, which was dark turquoise and had the creatures of constellations painted on it, with small yellow lights to indicate the position of the stars.

The waitress was bringing me to a table that was perched at the outer wall, giving the best view of the floor. I was so happy about the placement that I didn‘t pay close attention to the profile of my blind date.

She was black, that is to say, Negro; her coloring was caramel, and her dark hair was straightened. She wore a red dress and seemed to have a nice figure.

The waitress brought me to the table and set down the menu. It was only then that I got a clear view of Brenda‘s face.

“Have a nice dinner,” the waitress was saying.

“Uh . . . huh . . . “ I said, gawping at the woman who called herself Brenda.

“Maybe you should sit down, Cordell,” my date suggested.

I realized that the hostess was holding the chair for me. I tried to show some decorum sitting, but I went down too fast and stopped the chair before she could push it fully under me.

“That‘s okay,” I said. “I‘ll get it."

The buxom hostess moved away, and I gazed into Brenda‘s radiant face.

“I can‘t believe this,” I said.

“You know me?"

“I, I, I . . . “ I said. Then I took a breath. “You‘re a dream, not a person—not a living, breathing, smiling, eating person."

Her smile was certain and sharp.

“Am I your fantasy?"

“Was Mel an actor or someone who didn‘t know what he was in for?” I asked.

“You could tell that?"

The surprise on her face sent a wave of glee down into my intestines. I had to use all of my strength not to giggle and jitter in my chair.

“How did Cynthia know?” I asked. “How did she know to send you to me? And why would you,
you,
agree to meet with me?"

Sisypha‘s smile was intelligent. Her eyes defied my humility.

“I‘m a woman and you‘re a man,” she said. “Nothing‘s gonna change that. Cynthia used to be a sex worker a long time ago. We were friends in West Hollywood. She‘s always had my number."

“And she just called you and you came to New York?"

“That was serendipity . . ."

Just her use of the word elated me. My right foot was tapping out her name in Morse code: my first foreign language. I used to sit at the dinner table tapping out
fuck you daddy asshole
while my father lorded over dinner.

“ . . . I had to be .in New York for the games,” Sisypha was explaining. “Cynthia knew I‘d be here, and she called and said that there was someone who was on the edge of something wonderful or something bad. She said that you had seen my film,
The Myth,
and that it intrigued you."

“You made him submit to you,” I said.

“Is that what you want?"

I brought my hand to my face and then put it down again. I looked for a waiter, but there wasn‘t one around.

“What, what are the games?” I asked, hoping that my heart didn‘t leap out of my throat.

Sisypha (I would always know her by that name or some derivative thereof) sat back and smiled, showing her teeth.

“The Sex Games,” she said. “They‘re held in New York every three years. There are twelve major events and twice that many entertaining performances. They also have mixers very late at night, after the competitions are over."

“I‘ve never heard of them,” I said, and her smile broadened.

“No. You wouldn‘t have. They bend a few rules and so they‘re kept quiet. Tickets are a thousand dollars each and the events are held in special warehouses in Brooklyn and the Bronx."

“And you, you like to go to, um, the events?"

“I‘m a judge,” she said. “I score a few competitions every season."

“I was walking down the street just now,” I said. “And it was raining, and this young man asked me if he could walk with me because, because I had an umbrella."

Her face was hard in places but the underlying beauty was undeniable. I wanted to keep her attention on me, on my words.

“And?” she asked.

“When we got to where he was going, he offered me a free blow job.” I whispered the last words.

“Did you take it?"

“No. No I, I wasn‘t interested."

“Oh. I see. So why are you telling me this?"

“My whole life up to last week was as plain as a brown paper bag,” I said. “I had missionary sex with my girlfriend, with some slight variations here and there. I had never been approached by a woman sexually, much less a man. And I never met women like you at all."

“And what am I like?” she said with a hint of danger in her tone.

“You‘re a person who lives in the world. You make your own decisions and live by them. You take your feelings and make them real. You are everything I want to be, but I never knew it before."

“You want to be a woman?"

“No. I want to be free."

A spark of something beyond humor and indignation showed in Sisypha‘s eyes. She regarded me closely and clasped her hands before her.

I noticed that she wore no jewelry.

“Aren‘t we all free in America?” she asked.

“Freedom is a state of mind,” I said, wondering where I had heard it before, “not a state of being. We are all slaves to gravity and mortality and the vicissitudes of nature. Our genes govern us much more than we‘d like to think. Our bodies cannot know absolute freedom, but our minds can, can at least try."

“That‘s very wordy, Cordell,” Sisypha said, and then she looked up behind me.

“Anything to drink?” the waiter, dressed in black and white, asked.

There were nicks on his newly shaven face. He stood close enough to me that I could smell the cedar fumes in the fabric of his jacket.

“Just water,” Sisypha replied. “And I‘ll have the Caesar salad with chicken."

“Pork chops for me,” I said, “with green beans and that stacked-up bread you have."

“Very good,” he said without writing anything down.

I waited for him to leave before starting up our talk again.

“Too wordy, huh?” I said.

“Freedom is also an exercise,” she said. “You have to practice it to master it."

I breathed in and for a moment forgot how to exhale.

I wanted to tell her about how I intended to kill Johnny Fry, but I held back.

“Would you like to come with me to the games tonight?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said knowing nothing about what I was agreeing to. “I‘d love it."

This seemed to make Sisypha happy. Maybe she thought it was a submission. Maybe it was.

After the salad she ordered the cheesecake.

“You should have some coffee,” she said. “The games are pretty late. They don‘t start till after midnight."

I ordered a triple espresso and flan. They were both delicious.

Over the meal Sisypha talked about ordinary, even dull topics. She was from Milwaukee originally and had three years of college, where she studied accounting. She owned almost every image of herself in existence and therefore made a good living over the Internet.

“My audience is small but dedicated,” she told me at one moment. “They like the serious bent in my work. I always try to make some kind of point somewhere, either about love or loss or how impossible our desires are really."

“You mean because we want one thing and also the opposite of that same thing?"

She smiled and said, “Cynthia didn‘t tell me that you would be good for me too."

“When do we leave for the game?"

“Games,” she said. “I don‘t know. In a while. I guess we could take a walk after dinner."

“If it isn‘t raining.” The sex star smiled, and I knew it wouldn‘t be raining.

“What was Cynthia talking about?” Sisypha asked me.

We were walking down Sixth Avenue nearing 40th Street. Cars were rushing up the avenue, but there were no pedestrians other than us two. The bleak street had a hard-edged beauty to it—a quality of waiting that resonated with my emotions.

“I found my girlfriend with this guy,” I said. “This white guy named Johnny Fry."

“And you were jealous?” she asked. Her tone was nonchalant.

I looked at her sleek figure, thinking that any boyfriend she had could see her with dozens of men. He would know that when she left for work in the morning she was going to have sex with any number of powerful, well-endowed lovers.

No. Not lovers. Something other than mere love.

“He was fucking her, and she was looking at him like he was some kind of god . . . Then he turned her around and fucked her back there. It destroyed me,” I said.