The Price of Candy (24 page)

We got underway again on I-95. Here it was a
fresh new day. The last day. This was it. We’d be in Florida later
and I wasn’t any closer to intimacy with Betty Jo, let alone
converting her into my mistress.

She leaned back, crossed her legs, and looked
out the side window at the Georgia scenery zipping by. I thought I
had time to sneak a look at her without her yelling. I’d never paid
any attention to a woman’s knees before and now I stared in strange
fascination. How smooth and creamy they looked. Flawless knees.
Dimpled and soft as if they were brand new, never used.

“Freddy, do you mind? The highway’s out in
front. Try to glance at it now and then.”

“I’m sorry. I’ve never seen myself like this.
I don’t understand myself. And I certainly don’t understand you. I
think we both should loosen up and enjoy the situation. You don’t
have to be constantly on guard as you are. You’re treating me as
though I’m just another man who doesn’t appreciate you for what you
really are.”

“Freddy, you assume I want to screw you
because I strip to make a living. Only a man in a man’s world could
come up with this stuff. You’re not my type, get it? I could hand
you a bronze plaque that reads ‘Freddy. It ain’t gonna happen.’ And
you’d still be convinced that somehow a party will soon start.”

She had accurately sensed my frustration.
Perhaps I’d misunderstood the situation entirely. Perhaps I’d been
too subtle. “I don’t mean to insult you, but what if I just flat
out paid you?”

“Hookers get paid. Female friends and
housewives do it for free.”

She might have thought I took her for someone
cheap. “I’m talking about real money. Much more than you think I’m
offering. You’d have money in the bank and a lot of money in your
pocket when you walked in on your mother. You don’t want to show up
as broke as she is. You could fly back to Baltimore first
class.”

“Hold on, let me get out my calculator.”

“You’re making fun of me. What if I offered
you something really big, a luxury apartment, expensive clothes, a
glamorous lifestyle?”

“You left out the sun and moon. How far do
you go before you realize you’re making an ass out of yourself? I
know what I want, Freddy, and that isn’t it. Look, I admit I
tricked you into giving me a ride. You appeared harmless and I
loved this big safe car. I was stranded and it was up to me to take
care of myself. I needed to keep myself safe. So the first thing I
did before I ever approached you yesterday morning was to write
down your license plate number. I have it tucked away in my purse
in case something bad happens. You men don’t have to think about
such things, but the world out there can get very nasty very
quickly. No one is getting over on this girl ever again.

“All I want from you is the ride. I didn’t
ask for food or drinks from you. And that was very nice of you,
Freddy. Did I play you a little? Sure. I was keeping the ride
going. Now I’m getting the ride without doing anything. So why
should I do anything.”

“You could be nice.”

“Look, Freddy,” she said softly, “Don’t you
understand you’re asking me to trade sex for a ride to Florida? How
dare you? I don’t do things like that. Second, once we do the deed,
then the ride might be over. Ask any teenage girl. The chance of a
man like you kicking me out of his car while he’s still horny is
zilch, nada, and zero.”

“I’m not going to put you out or leave you
stranded whether I’m sexually satisfied or not, Candy.”

“Don’t call me Candy.”

“If you’re so pure in thought and deed, you
mind telling me how you paid for that motel room last night?”

“What, your imagination suddenly stop
working?”

“You got that old man off, didn’t you?”

“We were just sympathetic spirits. We
understood each other. We each had something the other wanted. So,
we made a deal. He was at my door this morning—told me I could stay
a month free.”

“No doubt ready to sign over the motel to
you.”

“I’m joking, Freddy. Do you really think I’d
do Pops a little favor for the price of a motel room? I told you I
don’t do that stuff. If I had diddled him, he’d be on a respirator
right now thanking God for his last good time and saying he now was
ready to go. The truth is we were talking about Florida. He told me
he used to drive down and see his girlfriend in Apalachicola, but
the last time she unexpectedly told him she was getting married.
Poor guy. He said I reminded him of her. My guess was every woman
he sees reminds him of her. That’s all. Told me he had one room
rate for the tourists, but he gave me the lower rate for locals.
You know what else he said? Anyone as pretty as me should float
through life free anyway, like a national resource, so everyone
could look at me. Wasn’t that nice? Oh God, to be able to float
through life.”

“But that’s exactly what you are doing. I’m
not suggesting your life is easy, and you don’t have to pay your
way. But you float along in social situations by making promises
with your sexuality.”

“If you’ve been promised anything, you did it
to yourself.”

“That’s not true. And I’m not talking about
just me. I’m talking about every man. You make promises with your
body language and the way you carry on. You don’t just flirt. You
put on your stripper personality and act sexually bold. Are you
saying I’ve misinterpreted all that?”

“Freddy, what do you expect me to do? You
haven’t had one single non-sexual thought in your head since I got
in this car. Now how is that supposed to make me feel? Treat me
like an object and I’ll react like an object.”

“You’re the one who made yourself up like an
object to get this ride. You’re the one who conveniently told me
you dance around naked for a living. You’re the one who put those
sexual thoughts in my head. And if I hadn’t reacted, you’d move, or
twist, or touch your legs or something until I got the message. You
tease so much you don’t even realize you’re doing it. You’ve the
power to turn a perfectly normal man into a delusional idiot. You
love it and you use it. Now you’re saying I’m wrong for
misinterpreting all your sexual manipulations.”

“Okay, you’re right. I used sex to get the
ride. I do fall back on that when I need to. I’m sorry.”

“You believe the best way to hurt every man
is to make then lust after you, excite them, and leave them
frustrated to the point of abject agony. Which is what you’d do to
George if you could do it over. Remember what you told me about
stripping? The idea was to make every man in the room think you’re
dumb enough to actually have sex with him. Maybe, subconsciously,
you’re still trying to hurt George. Your goal is to make men
suffer.”

“That’s ridiculous. I like men. I don’t want
to hurt them.”

“Why did you tell me you were a
stripper?”

“What? You asked me what I did.”

“When you’re out in the real world, what
happens when you tell a man you’re a stripper? We both know. The
man looks at you in a different way. He immediately starts to judge
your character even your morals. And his judgment isn’t likely to
be charitable.”

“Strippers being immoral is a cliché.”

“Yes, and so commonplace why on earth would
you tell a stranger that you strip unless you were seeking such a
predictable reaction?”

“I’m not ashamed of being a stripper.”

“That’s not the point. You purposely told me
you stripped knowing exactly how I’d react. From then on, it was
easy and you got me going knowing I’d crave you and subsequently be
disappointed and hurt. You hurt me on purpose because I’m a
man.”

I was thinking it all through as I spoke. I
thought the rape made more of a mess of her psyche than she
realized. Suffer Freddy. Suffer all you men out there who’d like to
have her. Suffer because of George. That’s why it was now a part of
her being. She couldn’t turn it off if any man was watching.

“It’s no mystery to me why you were attracted
to stripping. You’ve been doing a sex dance in front of men ever
since that rape. Just so you could get them excited and then let
them stew in their own lust. All the while thinking ‘Go to hell,
George. Go to hell all of you.’”

“Wow, Freddy where’d all that come from?” She
sat still for a minute then shrugged. “Anyway, it’s all a bunch of
silly shit and not what’s going on with me.”

“I’m sorry, maybe I went too far. But if you
women put all your sexual power together you could rule the
world.”

She said, “Frankly I don’t see what all the
fuss is about. You see one naked body, you’ve seen them all.”

I looked over sharply. Her expression was
extremely stern for a moment and then she burst out laughing. I
thought she was laughing at me, and for an instant I was angry.
That’s when I saw this warm almost motherly smile on her face for a
moment before she started laughing again. Then I caught the joke.
And I started laughing as well. She hadn’t said it to pity me. She
wasn’t laughing at me. She was laughing at the ubiquitous power of
sex. Whether it’s a naked woman or a naked man, we’re all in this
ridiculous sexual attraction game together. The outrageous effect
of sex enslaves us all. Its chaotic passion lies within us and
we’re subject to its rule. We live at its mercy.

We sat there riding side by side for a
beautiful moment. Two helpless humans laughing together at the
absurdity of sex, and how it makes us act.

I realized I’d been acting foolish and
ungentlemanly. I don’t know what she realized at that point, but
she appeared softer, even slightly vulnerable. Perhaps she’d
experienced some insight into her own behavior. We’d made a small
connection. At least we had laughed together honestly for the first
time.

At that moment, what I wanted was to clear
the air of sex and for us to act like adults friends who happened
to be traveling companions. “Look, Betty Jo, This is entirely my
fault. But things don’t have to stay this way. We got off on the
wrong foot. Let’s start over.”

“Let’s keep it on the wrong foot.”

At that moment I gave up. She was
unattainable. She was smarter and more complicated than I ever
expected. She had my number. She had me. She’d make the rules from
then on and I’d let her. I’m not proud to say it, but I’d have done
anything for her. I’d grovel at those zebra-striped shoes. Now I
didn’t want to get to Florida because then she’d be gone.

For the next hour, I was afraid to look over
at her. I didn’t want her scolding me. I noticed she seemed to be
interested in how the scenery conspicuously changed as we proceeded
farther south. So I took a chance. Her shoes were off and I could
look down cautiously and see her bare feet and toes. I kept my eyes
mostly on the highway. I don’t think Candy was aware I could look
down and see her bare feet.

We crossed into Florida late that afternoon.
This was the home stretch. Betty Jo started watching for a suitable
place to get gas and coffee. She was excited. “Freddy, I hope this
is the last damn stop before Fort Lauderdale.” Apparently, no
question remained about how far I would take her. Although we had
never discussed the subject, I was to drive hours out of my way and
deliver her precisely to her mother’s doorstep. That was all right
with me; I’d be near her that much longer.

She spotted a crowded truck stop near
Jacksonville and told me to exit and pull in there. You notice
she’s calling the shots. “You gas up. I’ll be back in a
minute.”

She got out and did that walk of hers across
to the main building with her head up in the air, those hips in
motion, and those long legs going up as far as the eye could see.
All accentuated by the tall heels she wore. How nice for everyone.
Two cars honked. Without moving her head, she raised a hand to
acknowledge their approval, but kept walking straight ahead.

Watching her, in that moment, I recognized
something about her that I had missed. Now I understood her walk,
the way she carried herself. Now I understood her demeanor whether
walking across a motel parking lot or into a store. She didn’t
stand up tall to show off her figure; she stood tall with pride.
She had a true sense of self that had nothing to do with being a
stripper. What had she said?
They may have my body but they
don’t have me
.

She walked to the building entrance and
stopped. Something had her attention. Instead of going in, she
turned around and walked on down between the line of parked cars.
She walked up to a green Ford Taurus parked there. She looked at
the license plate. She tried the car doors. Then she looked back at
me, waved excitedly, and pointed to the car.

Just then, a middle-aged blond woman wearing
white jeans and a leather jacket rushed up to Betty Jo. She shook
her fist in the woman’s face. The woman pushed Betty Jo hard back
against the car. Instead of just pushing back, Betty Jo wound up
like a discus thrower and swung her shoulder handbag hard without
holding back. She caught the woman up alongside her head. The
woman’s feet literally left the ground. She screamed. Her knees
crumpled and she fell backwards. I thought, oh god, if there’s a
heavy gun in that handbag the woman will lose all her teeth if not
her head. I rushed over and got there in time to partially support
the woman and keep her head from hitting the curb. I lowered her to
the sidewalk. She was dazed. She sat holding her head and crying,
and then started vomiting at the same time.

I shouted, “What in hell are you doing, Betty
Jo? You nearly killed this poor woman!”

“Freddy, go inside find a cop and tell him
who you are.”

“Tell him who I am?”

“For chrissake, you’ve got a big black car
with a U.S. Congress license plate attachment. You think I’m
stupid. This is the bitch who stole my suitcase and new coat and
stranded me back where I met you. Go in there and start throwing
your goddamn weight around. You want to show off in front of me,
now’s your chance. Phone the governor. Phone the President. Get the
fucking FBI over here. I want her arrested, jailed, and
executed.”