tequi

...continued...

My sudden, though not unexpected change of mind seemed to please the vision in red and she smiled a remarkably pleasing smile at me. Yes, where to now?

She languidly stretched a leg and signaled to the gorilla to bring a drink for her and packet of information for me. I wished I had gotten the drink and she the packet, but the gorilla seemed conscious enough to tell the difference between us. Perhaps if I had worn more red hed have become confused, but his simian intelligence seemed to allow him color-sight. Or perhaps it was pheromones.

The packet, when I had shaken free its contents, understand that this was after my contents had been shaken free of the club, contained but two papers and a photograph. The photograph was of a stately palazzo of repressive demeanor. Its columns and faade seemed to fill me with an overwhelming dread that I suddenly realized might have been an urge to vomit. I had walked to the end of the block by this point and could safely en-alley myself and purge in private.

There is an art to well-mannered vomiting that it is given to few to know and to fewer still to experience. It requires an amazing amount of physical control and not a small amount of mental exercise. When a person is about to expunge stomach-ally, he/she is usually not thinking of the need for neatness and manners. For this reason practice when sober is necessary. One must keep the upper body erect and bend fluidly at the waist. Keeping feet together and planted, the upper body extends, the mouth opens; the oral action is acted. One arm, usually the one holding whatever is needed to be held, is tucked in, under the chest, the other, usually holding a drink is out flung in a direct line from the shoulder. Thusly are shoes and kit untouched by nasty biological substances. The body straightens; the napkin or handkerchief is applied to the lips. Spitting, if necessary, is accomplished out of sight of the ladies.

I utterly failed to accomplish the above-described action. I made a mess of my shoes and the lower extremities of my trousers. I had begun to look rumpled and bedraggled and the evening had not yet passed midnight. My cravat had become a sorry collection of disenfranchised tangles and my suit looked as if several people had slept in it. My formerly well-polished shoes had taken on a beggarly aspect and the polka dots of bile were beginning to add a stench to me that spoke more of bordello and bowery than it did of board and bower. A glance in the nearest shop window and the looks of my fellow patrons of the night showed me my disgrace and I slunk towards home, the rest of the package unexamined.

Entering my abode I noticed an unfortunate amount of noise coming from the stairway that led to my room. I began to be worried that there was some sort of domestic violence occurring between my neighbors. It was uncommon, but there was some sort of Byronic relationship going on next door to me that frequently reminded me of medieval accounts of volcanic activity.

I wandered up the stairs, my exhaustion adding to my appearance of dishevelment. The door to my room was opened. My eyes widened, but I had the good sense not to stop. I walked past my door, towards the stairs to the third floor, with a quick glance inside. There were several gendarmes busy tearing apart my room and coming up with all sorts of interesting gadgets and paraphernalia. My livelihood seemed to be crumbling almost as quickly as my liver. I felt my voice give out a quiet whisper of remorse, but I continued up the stairs to the third floor, walked to the end of the hallway and slumped at a doorway.

Only then did I look at the two papers that had been placed inside the packet alongside the ipecac picture. The first was an address and a phone number, for Emergencies ONLY!! I tried to find the possibility of emergency amusing and ridiculous, but instead I seemed to find it only more galling. The second page was a note indicating the possibility of a police raid upon my place of business if I was not careful. The possibility of outside influences, distractions and attacks upon your person should not be discounted. You are now a little fish in big waters. You are fighting on the side of hedonism, if that gives you any motivation, but you are fighting against forces of authority, so beware authority figures. This will and the possibility of a fortune is not only on my mind, but also on the minds of many people. Your Benefactress I hoped that she had meant benefactress honestly and that the irony of the situation was one that I was aware of, but that she had intended only good things for me. I found it hard to believe.

In any case I couldnt really go snooping in these clothes or with this piquant aroma following me. I probably couldnt find a way through all of this alone either. I felt the need to call someone for assistance, but wasnt sure whom I could turn to. I ran through the short list of fellows and maidens that I have any contact with and aside from a Fourier-ist with shady connections I found myself without any connections to the underworld or such contacts. And as much as Fourier was insane, I doubted that the insanity was of a pertinent form.

Perhaps that requires explanation. Perhaps you think of drug sales as suitably underworld to qualify as, bad ass perhaps you think that, though dandified, I ought to be tough enough to handle this sort of situation, indeed, that I must be the sort of fellow who would hang out with Marv, in Sin City. Unfortunately for all concerned, this is not the case. I am a young man whose main clientele are young men. The young men that I sell to are mostly of a middle class background and have been extensively TV-ed, though not extensively well read nor extensively well worked out. Their bodies conform more to the junky ideal than the Adonis. The people that I, in turn, buy from, while possibly manically evil, are not in the unenviable position of owing me anything. Besides, I somehow thought that this mightnt be the sort of thing that any of the big boys would consider, as inherently in their character as it was in the character of Adam to sin. While they were skilled in sin they were not exactly interested in the gendarmerie or at least not in any way that would make them want to get involved now.

Suddenly a new line of reasoning opened up in the portal of my mind and I realized that the above mentioned fellows would not be at all happy about all of the drugs that I had been supposed to sell ending up in the, if tradition was anything to go by, irate hands of the 5-0. I suspected theyd not like it.

Forestalling that line of thought, I decided to go over to Bents house and see if I could get any clothes or any thing. Besides, I still didnt know how long I had to live before this, nasty virus got to me for good. I hadnt asked any of the right questions, it seemed. I had been in a room, told that I had been injected with a powerful virus and Id failed to ask how powerful or how long I had, or even, now that I thought of it, if it was fatal. For all I knew shed given me a bad case of laryngitis and that was all. I re-packed the packet, signed the front of it with someones name that I made up on the spot. (I can do that because I am inventive and clever) I walked down the hall and back down the steps, past the police perpetrated mess of my apartment, where a couple of officers were deep searching my toilet, which I felt was suitable punishment for them, at any rate. Honestly, the things that have been in my toilet. Down the stairs and out again, onto the street.

Three blocks over and two flights up and a knock on the door brought me into Bents. He looked me up and down and Anthony Blanched me a M-m-my dear b-boy, why on earth do you look so b-b-bedraggled? and waved me to a seat. (Actually he waved me to the covered seat, but I took no offense.) The air was ripe with hashish, as it so usually was in Bents apartment. His latest conquest, he always called them his Boy Mulcasters, was sitting on the sofa looking stoned and pleased. I gratefully slouched in my covered divan and tried to talk sensibly to Bent who was making drinks and rolling awful hash cigarettes for himself and the lounging Boy. He tried to show me his new Carravagio print, but I was dogged in my conquest of the conversation and he finally said.

B-b-but surely the woman was j-joking.

I showed him the packet and the spot on my arm. I showed him the spot on my little pill that had been shaved to judge its worth. He still seemed more amused than helpful.

Theyd n-never trust anyone who l-l-looks like you to do any j-job worth doing. You l-look a frightful m-mess you know?

No one ever practiced a stutter as fanatically as Bent and no one did it with as much intensity and less quiet grace, but he would have his way. I cant tell you how often Id pointed out that anyone who knew who Anthony Blanche was had already gotten the reference and that it was done with, but Bent insisted that if they knew who Anthony Blanche was theyd see him as Anthonys American counter-part and respect his stutter. This line of reasoning usually led to loud arguments and eventually a gross and indecent display of homoerotic knowledge on Bents part. Thus his nickname and thus his proud appropriation of it.

I finally convinced Bent to get me some dark clothes from his personal stash; convinced him that leather was not ideal sneaking places, both of which were great victories. That I had won those two victories made me lose the battle to have him out of the room while I changed, but the virus seemed to have a distinct effect on his amorous feelings and he left halfway through. Or. Perhaps it wasnt the threat of the virus, but the virus had worked some negative magic upon my features? Am I that fragile? Can the ravages of fate touch me in such a painful way? A glance in the mirror belied it, but perhaps I had an aura of flaw that radiated my virally challenged nature. Gods, but I needed an antidote or a cure. If Socrates was right and Beauty is a short-lived reign then this virus work might yet affect the outer face of my... well, of my face.

The clothes I wore, while stylish in black, were neither the glass of fashion nor the mould of form. I would no longer be the observed of all observers, but I might just be inconspicuous. I had a black tight fitting black shirt, with a mock turtleneck, Bent assured me it was the style at the time, though he was lying. A pair of black dungarees and a pair of black running shoes, I looked fit for stratagems and spoils, though my hearts was musically inclined. I was singing a dirge for my lost beauty and my lost health. My hair, no longer cool, was now a mess of brittle twigs sticking out from my head to no purpose. I matted it down in the little en suite bathroom and when I exited the room Bent and Boy laughed at my shockingly bad TV appearance. I gave them a not so subtle look and they subsided into quiet giggles. I gathered my packet and left my clothing with Bent, it was no good to me any longer.

I have since considered, several times and in several different ways, ought I have taken my second pill at that point? Obviously there are both positive and negative aspects to the decision, but the fact of the matter is, I did. I took; swallowing with immense pleasure the only upper that could ever have made me feel any good about the forthcoming caper.

So nigh is grandeur to our dust
So near to God is man
When Duty whispers low, Thou must.
The youth replies, Wheres the E?

Or something like that, Emerson was known to understand that sort of thing, or at least he reads like he did. Within two blocks I was, once again, walking on sunshine. My feet, formerly in russet-ish mantle clad, made no sound, nor were they terribly visible against the inky cloak of night. My stealthy form passed through the shadowed evening like a hot knife through hash. I was The Invisible Man; I am the Invisible, Risible Man. What matter foreboding houses? Have I not the body of a night errant?! Sancho, my sword!

Did I glide majestically down the street, a low and cunning look upon my face? Was I a fox, did I seek an evening of cunning trickery and misdeeds? You bet your ass. I caught the buss over to the east side and stood at the back in a low slouch, with a feline smile of self contentment and a loathing for a populace who had turned its collective back on me. I was their paragon of virtue and vice, I rolled in eternal circles, my black with white eye and my white with black eye staring at a world for the uncharted ages of man.

...To Be Continued, some day...